I'm posting this in compliance with Discourse rules.
We just completed negotiations and are trading as follows:

I'm sending:
3 Bicycle Clot
3 red/blue pairs of Bicycle Big Gun
total 9 decks

and I'm receiving:
2 Tally Ho Maeda decks, one each red/standard blue (not light blue)
2 Carlton Aviator in red
2 red/blue pairs of Steamboat
total 8 decks

I'm pleased with this trade.  It does mean I no longer have any Bicycle Clot for trade, but to me it's worth it.

Siote is shipping later today via EMS from the Philippines, I'll be shipping from New York via Priority Mail either today or tomorrow, probably today.

Hello.  My name is Don [HI, DON.], and I'm a cardaholic...  It's been about five minutes since I opened a fresh deck of cards...

I'm from the greater New York area, have lived here most of my life with the exception of '89/'90, which I spent in Broward County, Florida, either in Coconut Creek or Pompano Beach.

I've always enjoyed playing cards, since childhood.  Loved watching magic on TV and seeing it in person when I could (which wasn't often).  I played around with a few Svengali decks and stripper decks when I was younger, but I didn't get solidly interested in magic until around mid-2010, when I was searching the web for custom playing cards for the family poker night and found Ellusionist.  I hemmed and hawed, finally placed an order in December which I received on Christmas Eve.  I've been hooked ever since.

Got married at 25, got divorced in a messy manner 15 years later, and now, four-plus years later, I'm engaged and very happy.  My fiancee, Anya, is a Ukrainian women who emigrated to the US nearly 20 years ago and has an attractive Russian accent but understands my English very well.  It helps that I enunciate clearly most of the time and don't rush my speech - she has trouble understanding people with thick accents who talk fast.  Interestingly enough, my mother was also from another country - she's Quebecoise and moved to the States in the middle of high school.

Anya and I were born on opposite sides of the Earth but only 30 days apart from each other (I'm the older one).  She has two sons from a prior marriage, one of whom lives on his own and is graduating from the School of Visual Arts in the spring, the other of whom wants to be an FBI agent but is still struggling with the 7th grade.  He's smart, but wisecracks a lot, acts very spoiled and lacks focus and time management skills.  I'm working with him on those.

I practice aikido, a Japanese martial art, and my dojo is with the Takemusu Aikido Association, following the teachings of Saito-shihan (may he rest in peace) and his son, Saito-sensei.  I was hoping to be taking my black belt test this spring, but I've been out of the dojo for over a month now, largely due to a pain in my hip that my orthopedist is diagnosing.  It's probably just osteoarthritis, but I need to make sure it's nothing serious before going back.  So perhaps I'll be testing in the fall instead - we shall see...  For now, I'm ikkyu - 1st grade, the highest rank before obtaining a black belt.  In dojos that use colored belts, it would be a brown belt with a black stripe.  My dojo doesn't - you're white belt or black, that's it.

My wedding will be in south Florida, hopefully on September 1st.  I always visit Florida in the late spring and summer, it just seems to work out that way for me.  It's not as crowded that time of year, but there's a lot of sun-starved European tourists that drop in despite the heat.  We're planning on two receptions: a small one in Florida with some of my friend's family (his dad will be officiating over the ceremony), and a second one a week later for our New York family and friends.  Anya's never been to south Florida, so she's a bit excited about the idea.  I'm still trying to convince her to stay at my buddy's apartment rather than renting a hotel room - summer or winter, good hotels aren't cheap in Florida and bad ones aren't worth the trade-offs.  I'm thinking of trying to book one of those little family run motor lodges, the tiny operations with ten rooms or less - never tried that and I can't imagine it costing more than the Sheraton Fort Lauderdale, my past default hotel.  Trivia: it used to be called the Sheraton Yankee Clipper, and the Wreck Bar with the window behind the bar that's also the side of the outside pool was the location for the bar scene in "Analyze This!" between Billy Crystal and Robert DeNiro.  It's fun watching bikini exhibitionists swim past while enjoying beverages and bar snacks... 

What else about me...  I enjoy science fiction and anime, but it's been a while since I kept up with either.  I enjoy reading, but these days most of my reading is magic manuals.  I dabble in video games, but I'm not exactly the greatest - generally stink at a new game, get up to being about average or slightly better, but don't usually devote more time than that to it.  Big movie buff, and a tech geek, but one who doesn't find it necessary to always have the latest and greatest gadget if the one I have is doing the job well enough.  My favorite color is black, I am often wearing something black, my favorite food is freshly-made Tokyo-style ramen with real ingredients and fresh noodles rather than powder stock and a freeze-dried brick.  I aspire some day to have a company of my own, probably a retail magic shop, because I'm tired of having a schedule that's almost completely opposite from that of my partner.

Any questions?

We all know by now about the creative deal that USPC worked out with T11 last year.  So far, the results as seen from the consumer perspective are:

* USPC has a nicer looking website.
* T11's Guardians came out in an excellent USPC version.
* T11's Steam Punk deck, well - not so much.  The USPC version was a big downgrade from something that was already lacking to start with.

Since these two companies are already working hand in hand, what do you think would happen if USPC were to simply buy out T11, making the whole staff there USPC employees in the Creative/Design department?

Would this be a good kick in the pants for the company, making the creative team more inventive in their in-house deck designs?  Would T11 simply get absorbed and forgotten in the gears of the USPC printing presses?  What about the magic side of T11 - do you think USPC would take this opportunity to really start exploring magic and adding it to the company business, or would they cast it aside in favor of just designing decks (or as some people see it, designing pretty boxes to hold cards in)?

Cast a vote and give an opinion - don't be shy about the details.

EDIT: I've expanded the poll to include the purchase of any of the major players in the card/cardistry/magic market.  Imagine them buying out Ellusionist, or Dan and Dave, or perhaps The Blue Crown...  How would that change things?  I reset the poll for people to re-vote on the expanded possibilities.

I just got a few decks of this brand in a trade with Lalita/Phantom, and I'm telling you - the quality is impressive to me.  I read around a bit on the net, and poker players love these cards, the plastic versions in particular - they're pretty frequently seen in casinos throughout Macau and Australia.

I would compare them to Bee or Tally Ho in terms of production quality.  They're stiffer and a little thicker than Bees and use variants of the standard courts that actually look kind of cute - the eyes just seem more expressive to me, silly as that might sound.  They're traditionally cut, as well, and faro rather nicely.  The back pattern is simple - reminiscent of Bee Stingers, but with a hard white border instead of a fade, and a line pattern forming diamond shapes, alternating as the back color plain and the back color with a diagonal pattern of small white stripes.

Fresh out of the box, they're flat as a board.  They're curling a little now, but that's largely due to being used on the cold-stone desk I sit at while at work - they cause practically any deck to curl a little, but they flatten out when removed from the cold and played on, say, a wood table.

The colors aren't "casino colors", but they're not as brash and bright as most general-use decks - they're slightly faded, a lot like a plastic deck.  The texture reminds me of Air Cushion, but the dimpling of the paper is much, much tighter, with more dimples, and the paper has a gentle shine to it when held in the light.  They slip over each other very well - it's not Magic Finish quality, but it's an improvement over standard Air Cushion.

I have no idea how they'll hold up over time, but frankly, I'm pretty impressed by these.  I'll try getting some photos taken when I get home in a couple of hours and let you folks get a peek at them.

In theory, they're available in the States as well - the manufacturer, Angel Cards out of Osaka, maintains an office in Henderson, NV.  But what I read on the poker websites about these cards is that the company is far more interested in casino sales than general retail, plus they're extremely slow about replying to email inquiries.  But if you can find them, try them.

EDIT: nearly forgot - my one gripe about them is that the edges aren't a single, uniform color of gray.  They appear mottled, as if the base paper under the laminate wasn't a pure shade of gray, giving the edges a dirty appearance straight out of the box.  But it's a minor issue, I feel.  I'd still recommend getting a pack or two for your arsenal.  Available in blue and red, at the very least.

You: have two white Centurions


I: want your WCs, have some rare trade fodder - BG1E, Gold Arcane, Red Artifice, LTD, and a lot of Black Crowns.  I even have Fulton's and white Arrcos, if you need some!  And did I mention I have a LOT of Americanas coming when they're printed?


What do you want?  Let's negotiate...tell me what you're seeking.


This is for trade only.  For the right person, I will trade overseas, but my list of right people is short.


PS: keep an eye out, I'll be posting some magic tricks for sale hopefully tomorrow, and some misc. decks.

I was picked!  I won Pick-A-Card #3!  They're sending me a deck!  I didn't pick the card, but only four people did - I was one of the eight who won the post-pick raffle.


Sweet!

Say, Alex - could we trouble you to list the known ranks in the Discourse?  I can't remember them all and I think it'd be cool to see a list of the ones achieved so far and how many posts you need to make to achieve them.


PS: I'm just a handful of posts behind you now!  Fourth place will soon be mine!  Mwa-ha-ha-ha-ha!   

I recently had this private exchange with John and would rather not have to do it again, so I thought I'd toss it up here and see if it sticks.  Enjoy!

Hey don, I was wondering if you could send me a picture where it says performance coating on the series 1800 decks. Also if you have performance coating arcanes could you send me those pictures?

Thanks!
-John

It doesn't, not yet.  The first-ever Performance Coating deck, the Gold Arcanes, doesn't (and never will) say "Performance Coating" on it.


Read this, it will explain - bear in mind the information is now out of date and MORE decks are being sold with PerfCoat on them, some of which don't specify this fact, while some (new-issue red Masters being an example) do.


http://blog.ellusionist.com/air-cushion-or-something-better/

Actually it says it on the bottom of the box, above the fine print, as seen here on the white ghost, and the shadow masters: http://postimage.org/gallery/5w1u8ug/

But back to the original question, could you send me a picture of where it says performance coating on the box.

*Side note* I just realized the 1800 might not have it, because they don't have fine print on the bottom like other E decks. But i am positive the arcanes do.

They DON'T.  Not yet, at least not as far as I know.  The first batch with PerfCoat certainly didn't say as much.

Here's the deal.  Time line!

* E dropped UV500 paper due to massively higher stock costs.  About the same time, USPC Legal said all Bicycle deck coats are called Air Cushion, regardless of their actual composition.  So "UV500 Air-Flow" becomes "Air Cushion", using a heavier-than-normal stock that's similar to but isn't UV500, doesn't glow under UV light.

* E experiments with a new USPC finish with the working name "Performance Coating".  The Gold Arcane is the first to have it.  Slowly, other decks start to get printed with the coating, but still have the "Air Cushion" markings on the box.  (My PerfCoat red 1800 Series deck is dated 2010, has the small print, but no mention of PerfCoat.  The difference is immediately noticeable in the performance of the deck in comparison with older 1800s I own.)  The Gold Arcanes - the whole print run, every deck - has PerfCoat, but not a single deck says so anywhere; it's not even a Bicycle deck, but the coating was still sort of in the "beta test" stage.

* Beta test ends.  USPC starts calling the new coat "Magic Finish" while E retains the classier-sounding "Performance Coating".  USPC Legal allows the name for this finish on new Bike decks - first one to use it and hit market is the Bicycle Brimstone by Russ Kercheval/CCCC.  E still has decks left from the beta testing stage that had the Air Cushion name on them but were given Performance Coating, continues to sell them, publishes a blog post on the topic which I linked to you.

* THE PRESENT DAY.  As older stocks of both UV500 Air-Flow, interim Air Cushion and beta-test PerfCoat/AC-labeled decks run out, E starts getting the Performance Coating name for the finish on the box and using the finish for the new print runs.  The Gold Arcane deck will never be reprinted, though they're all PerfCoat.  The Black Tiger White Pip deck is discontinued; all remaining stocks are the original UV500 Air-Flow and no Air Cushion or PerfCoat versions will ever exist.  As you've started noticing, some decks already have PerfCoat labeling on them.  While red Masters have it big and bold, right where it would normally read Air Cushion on the side, some are more subtle, like the Shadow Masters and White Ghost.  Those "subtle" decks may also be re-designed for yet another future print run - only E knows for sure.

Does ALL of this answer your question?

Try here:

http://dealingdeuces.com/playing-cards/tally-ho-split-spades-red.html

I recalled someone was looking for SS Tallys but I can't remember who and can't find the topic.

First, look at this:

http://www.naplestownhall.org/pages/David_Blaine.html

Then, look at this:

http://www.naplestownhall.org/pages/ticket_information.html

Not cheap, is it?  Now look at THIS:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Naples-Town-Hall-Distinguished-Speaker-David-Blaine-/170748767764?pt=US_Tickets_all_in_one&hash=item27c16b6e14

If you're a David Blaine fanatic, this is a rare opportunity...

Ron Saylor deck - anybody heard of this guy before?

http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?hl=en&ie=UTF8&prev=_t&rurl=translate.google.com&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http://52cartes.wordpress.com/2011/12/11/ron-saylor-deck-infos/&usg=ALkJrhhHokzlMR0OUl1EmC3EgH00QywOsg

Looks a lot like the Pentad deck in that its most unique feature is the deck back, period.  They even share the same silver peek-a-boo box!  But where the Pentad had interesting back art, this one's little more than an advertisement for the magician in question.

This is a big pass for me.

FYI: for those of you only collecting USPC products, Gemaco is now a subsidiary of USPC as of a couple of years ago.  I think they're still operating out of their own facilities, though, much like Fournier does.

Go look for the 52cartes post on this deck - the cards look totally amazing and there's a video showing about 80% of what the deck will look like.  Good transformation decks are hard to find, and this one looks great.
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For those who have not yet seen the work of José Emmanuel , here's a compilation video and some pictures.   You can see all of its ongoing work on Tumblr .
  All maps were produced using techniques of "paper cutting".
  Hopefully see this game next year printed with kickstarter.