>>96455683
>alt arts, showcase, etc
All versions of a card are equally playable so I usually go with what's cheapest.
The only exception is for flavor reasons or the extended art or whatever. Even then I really only go for it if the price is less than $10 extra.
I will always go for the extended art of a pet card like Lethal Scheme because I get the bonus cat and it removes the cluttered reminder text for convoke and connive.
I should say if Im ordering proxies or playing digital I go nuts and get whatever matches the flavor of the deck the best.
>foils
I almost universally avoid foils because I think mtg's foils are ass. WOTC desperately needs to go talk to any other card game about it. Have you ever seen the crazy shit japanese card games can pull off? Our textured foils look like ass compared to the stuff I've seen from yugioh or pokemon.