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I have received an unexpected set of 5 extra uncuts of Lorenzo's pre-edition "Deck Nr 17" deck, printed on an even thicker Arjowiggins 330gsm heavy French Casino bond paper, which is the same paper Lotrek used to print the Venexiana Gold decks.

While I understand that these aren't something everybody would want, I do figure that - being as there are only five of them total available, maybe a couple of people would be interested in picking them up?

I am still in the process of shipping out the very last few of those initial 33 shipments of the "CL Promo Decks" that were presold on The Deck Refinery because I had an eventful weekend and didn't get everything done I had planned. The first 21 went out Monday and Tuesday, and the rest will go out tomorrow. I've been having to fight the USPS.gov site to get shipping labels printed: you would think that's one thing that would be pretty reliable, but when I first went to do these on Sunday around noon I found that the site would not print any labels at all, and that persisted through the end of the day (well, at least until about 11PM when I went to bed). Monday morning it was still flaky, but I printed about a dozen of them and got those into the mail before they closed at 1PM and then went back home and tried to print more: not happening. As of Tuesday it seems to be reliable again, not really certain why or what the problem was, and right now it won't let me print "Small Flat Rate" Priority International shipping labels without a sincere fight, but I did get 1/2 dozen more done last night and Donna is packing those today for us and I should have the balance done tonight for shipment along with those (there were only four more I didn't get to before I hit the bed last night).

Terribly sorry this wasn't done on the very day I first stated they would be mailed, which was Monday, but - I fought the good fight, and believe me, when USPS.com refuses to print postage, there is no way to argue nor reason with it.

Back where I started: five uncut sheets - Lorenzo Gaggiotti's 3rd deck preview edition printed for the CardLauncher opening. If I get an overwhelming response, I suppose there's nothing fair except making it an auction, I don't know. They charge you $25 per sheet to do them, which frankly doesn't make sense, but they do. I guess it's because the decks themselves are printed a card at a time and this requires them to print that single oversized sheet - which is unusual in itself: it's an 11 wide x 5 tall card arrangement that I suppose is specific to the MPC printers. Unfortunately I don't have a picture of them here with me, but I'll post one when I get home. It's a very resilient uncut since it has not been pre-punched like most USPCC or other uncut sheets are even before they are 'stripped' and punched out.

Auction you say? I would bid on them, but only to a limited amount. Assume shipping would be $10-$15 for US? Not sure what starting bid would be, but that's getting close to my limit for this uncut right there since I already have limited wall space for more.

Just throw them up on ebay or something and plug them here. See what happens.

ecNate wrote:Auction you say? I would bid on them, but only to a limited amount. Assume shipping would be $10-$15 for US? Not sure what starting bid would be, but that's getting close to my limit for this uncut right there since I already have limited wall space for more.

Just throw them up on ebay or something and plug them here. See what happens.

You know, I guess that's the only truly fair thing to do, frankly. That way whatever they sell for just goes back into the account it came out of, which is the same CL checking account that paid for those promotional decks back about a month ago, now.

I would love to purchase one, Mike. Let me know...

I'm interested for sure. Would prefer a lottery over auction though.

Maddest Hammer wrote:I would love to purchase one, Mike. Let me know...

chach wrote:I'm interested for sure. Would prefer a lottery over auction though.

Oh, I'd love to be able to just hand the darned things out, and you know if I could I would. The only fair thing is to auction the darned things - except for what I forgot to mention is that there ARE two more that are going into the UC prize pool, and one will be in the list of items available for the UC 2014 Deck of the Year contest coming up in January. That one will be free - for somebody that's good at guessing the real opinion of most of the users here as far as those 18 categories - or more. We did 18 last year, I'm thinking we might do a couple more this time because I have one hell of a prize pool! Last year it was about $3500 worth of prizes at retail that people gave me to give to the users here. This time I started putting things away almost six months ago, and I think it's going to be very close to $5000 worth this year!

If we have 20 categories, that means that the +average+ prize will be worth $250 for all 20 of the winners. That's worth doing. If one thing I learned last year in the UC2013 DotY contest: nowhere near as many people as I thought would enter did, and I'm still not certain why. I guess maybe part of it was that UC was in a major state of flux at the time. Another thing I think contributed to the lackluster participation was that - I think - a lot of the "long-timers" here refrained from participating so the people that did vote/enter could win the prizes. While that's an admirable thing for them to do, I hope they will participate so their vote counts and if that's how they feel mark their ballots "not eligible for prizes" thereby disqualifying themselves. Makes sense to me - and that way we should have twice as many votes to count, making it less of a guessing game and more of a science of truly knowing how the community as a whole feels about the decks of twenty-thirteen. We'll see - I can only guess at participation, but I truly hope to see at least double the votes in the contest this year. Kai worked very hard putting the contest together, and due to the system crash in the middle of the contest we had to do it twice, and that's bound to have influenced some people not to bother the second time as well. Can I make people vote? Nope, I sure can't. Can I entice them to? Oh, you bet I can: I have several one-of-a-kind items like these uncut sheets that pretty much nobody is going to have, and those are worth giving a few guesses - IF you want to win them. Even then I can't make people want them, but I can certainly try.

We're going to be in the middle of producing the UC2015 Annual Deck by Lorenzo Gaggiotti. Can I make people buy it? Nope, I cannot. Can I try to make it the best thing since sliced bed, you bet I can - and will.

The great thing is that since Lorenzo is doing it, I don't even have to try hard: it will already be one of the greatest things since sliced bread, we already know that!

mike i think chach was asking to to put out a set price, and hold a lottery/random drawing to see who is drawn to buy the sheets. I cant wait to plan the upcoming deck of the year again

volantangel wrote:mike i think chach was asking to to put out a set price, and hold a lottery/random drawing to see who is drawn to buy the sheets. I cant wait to plan the upcoming deck of the year again

yep that's what I was getting at. Set a price. Everyone that is down to buy state so. Make a list of their names and assign them a number. Use a random number generator to pick the folks that get first shot at buying them. If they choose to pass (which why would they of they said they'd buy it) pull another number from the hat so to say.

That way it doesn't just go to the person or persons that have the deepest pockets. Plus in auction, what's to stop one person from buying them all? And it removes the chance from the core group that would appreciate them the most.

Maybe auction 1 or 2 off to raise money and do lottery for chance to purchase the others?

More than a month later, I have yet to even think about it - yet. Maybe lotto / random draw a pair for UC members only, and worry about the rest later. There will be 2 of these other than the 2 for the prize pool and pre-sold ones, so how about $50 + shipping? I have no idea what shipping is overseas, but I won't even try without tracking, so expect it would be about $23.50 regardless of destination for Priority International Mail (with tracking), and $11.50 (as I recall) for domestic / US / 5 digit ZIP code land.

To be fair, send me a PM with a request to add your name to the list of randomly picked two or however many are interested and on October 15th I will pick a pair of lucky destinations for the two. Remember - it's a different layout, 330gsm Arjowiggins (French) casino grade black core bond paper stock in 11 wide by 5 tall layout. Best quality for uncuts I have ever seen since they are never intended to be handled, just glorified and adored.

That gives people about two weeks to find and raise their hand, and delivery by the middle of the month state-side and hopefully end of month if overseas.

Two of about 9 ever made available, and never to be reproduced or otherwise reprinted.

Time to get back to what we used to do here - find and share great and unusual items - these two alone being at "cost plus". Just raise your hand for now (PM me) and on the 15th I will let random.org pick two, PayPal and it's out the door and on yours in a couple of days.

I'll attach a decent pix so you know what you are raising your hand for...

The two picked by random.org are "chach" and "cbkimble". Seeing as how I'll see cbk (again) tomorrow morning, I'll save him postage and hand-deliver his to the 52+Joker convention and he can put it in the passenger seat for the drive back to Alabama.

Chach - $50+$11.50 for Priority Mail 4" tube in a 6" x 6" x 24" box and you're golden. PayPal to "cardlauncher@gmail.com" and I'll get 'er done the day after you ante up (or Monday if paid by late Sunday).

Mike Ratledge wrote:The two picked by random.org are "chach" and "cbkimble". Seeing as how I'll see cbk (again) tomorrow morning, I'll save him postage and hand-deliver his to the 52+Joker convention and he can put it in the passenger seat for the drive back to Alabama.

Chach - $50+$11.50 for Priority Mail 4" tube in a 6" x 6" x 24" box and you're golden. PayPal to "cardlauncher@gmail.com" and I'll get 'er done the day after you ante up (or Monday if paid by late Sunday).

Sweet! Thanks, on my way to PayPal now.

Definitely going on the wall as soon as I get some frames. this is definitely one of the highlights of my collection.