Chinese Fake Magic Cards

EDIT: Lately I've seen more of these Chinese fakes around and their owners actually bought those cards thinking they were real so that is why I decided to move this post to the top of this blog now. Originally published on 3/2/2014

Some time ago 'Chinese' fake Magic cards flooded the world. Many articles were written about it and many seemed to say that this will affect the market etc. Today I had the chance to see the fakes in real life and after seeing them I have to say that these fakes are not done well and that it's not the end of Magic just yet even though some fakes look pretty convincing notably revised dual lands, Jace, the Mind Scultor and Spellskite for example. The fact that revised dual lands actually look pretty convincing is not a good news though so beware of those when buying them. When a card is NM it can be a fake. Fake cards are in very good condition and they show wear in a completely different way than genuine cards.

If you look at a card and something doesn't feel right it is possible that it is a fake. If you are used to seeing and handling cards for years you'll be able to spot fake cards even if you won't be able to say why. Our brain simply remembers how a card should look like (or anything else).

Since I think that majority of fakes can be seen immediately in most cases one just needs his or her eyes. If that is not enough a light test or looking at the card through a loupe (or scanning the card at 1200dpi) are the safest methods (at the end of the post).

The back of the card is usually the first thing you should check. Except being completely off-color, the quality of the print is way worse than the front of the card that can actually look almost perfect (both color-wise and sharpness-wise).

Fake cards' graphics/text is usually blurry, the colors look bleached or are simply off (too much red in like 90% of the time). You can also notice that the card border is usually bigger than on the fake card and is usually in NM condition.

The fake card's surface is pretty smooth and glossy (this can be 'fixed' though by scratching the card on the table for a while). This can be seen at first glance as well if the card is not sleeved (and there is enough light). On the other hand cards from Event Decks, Clash Packs and the ones gotten from Prerelease packs are also glossy in similar fashion. Due to this gloss the fake cards reflect way more light than genuine cards.

The paper of the fake cards is a bit different. It is a bit thinner and lighter (by 0.04g but some real Magic cards are lighter as well, especially some beta cards are way thinner). The job on the paper is actually better than on the print template, but still it feels different. There are fake cards printed on three different kinds of paper - blue core paper, black core paper and white paper. The black and blue core paper fake cards have way better quality of the print and pass the bend test and some seem to pass the light test as well (even most cards don't pass enough light, those that do the light is of different color - it's not that blue, but if you don't have enough experience with this you might not see the difference). This also means that if you tear in half a blue core fake card it will have a blue layer within like genuine cards (black core fake will show black layer inside).

If you encounter blue core or black core paper fakes the regular tests - bend test and water test - won't do much good since these fakes will just pass the test (unless you really try hard damaging the fake card which when damaged will show the difference, but if done with care the fakes will pass these tests). For example if you dip a tooth pick in water and scratch a real card it won't make the colors go off. The color on a fake card will (but don't do that...). Q-tip dipped in water or a drop of water won't do anything to either of the cards.

Also there are cards that have different font used (Candelabra of Tawnos, Tarmogoyf MM) or different spacing and leading (Flooded Strand) which should give away the cards at first glance. You can also see on some cards that the text is not aligned with the text box. Certain cards even contain typos or wrong text. So they obviously use some kind of a template for this but I really don't understand how they can get something wrong (since there are perfectly correct templates online that are ready for high quality print with correct colors for a professional printer to use). I created some of the card templates to see how difficult it is to do (I wasn't trying to redesign the back of the card). I used the real cards for reference and I achieved a way better results, so hope that those people producing these counterfeits won't reach that kind of quality as well.

The Crypt on the left is the real one. You can see too much red in the one on the right, expansion symbol done wrong, graphics blurry etc...

Note that some fake cards even don't have some of the graphics. For example red dots missing on the back of the card, black borders on dual lands missing (Tundra) etc. or they even have something that should not be present on the card (see beta Volcanic Island's white dots). Fakes from older batches have the mana symbols wrong (Force of Will). If a card has an expansion symbol it is something that gives it away right away. The symbols are not done well and have usually way thicker white or black border (best can be seen on Mana Crypt or Wasteland). If the symbol has some kind of gradient on it (Alliances, Urza Saga etc) it is usually completely different.

For me the safest way is to check the mana symbols if a card has any. If you look at the Ancestral Recalls you will notice the difference. You can observe that the black elements on the real card have sharp edges (click to enlarge) and mana symbol on the fake card looks slightly different as well. Expansion symbols look even more different if the card has any. This can be seen by the naked eye.

Real Ancestral Recall

Fake Ancestral Recall

Loupe/Scanner
If you want to be 100% sure that the card is genuine all you need is a loupe (which is easily portable) or a scanner. If you scan a card at 1200dpi you will be able to see certain print patterns and will be easily able to see solid black elements that have sharp edges on a genuine card. The blacks on a genuine card are printed after the rest of the card which makes them stand out. You can see it in the example below.

Real Mox Sapphire

Fake Mox Sapphire

On a fake card you'll see one surface having the same texture (colored dots) everywhere (black areas + the rest). If you look at a black or white border on a fake card you'll find those colored specs there unlike on genuine card where you either won't see any or you'll see some kind of white specs/scratches. Old artifact counterfeits do not usually show the motley gemstone background.

Light test
If you have a strong light with you (a cell phone light can be used if you don't have better LED light with you) you can also check if the card is real or fake. The light comes through a real card easily and you can see what is on the other side (in my case blue dot). That is not the case with fake cards where the light does not pass through much or at all if the light is not that strong as in the case below (iphone used)

The best way to see if a card is fake is to use a black light but that is something most people don't have because they don't need it and can't take it with them to a GP let's say. Under black light Magic cards are fluorescent. The color with what they are illuminated is different though. Fake cards are simply dark. This method is good for batch processing^_^.