Hey guys! I’m new to the forum.
For some background, I’m relatively “newish” (maybe intermediate) to collecting but not to the franchise. I was (and still am) an avid fan of the core and side games, tv show, and movies since 2000-2001 (age 5); however, I didn’t start collecting the TCG until late 2017 when I was inspired by smpratte, maxmoefoe, and leonhart.
With the current market conditions, I’m having trouble determining whether prices for certain cards (mostly vintage and out of print) are temporarily inflated or not.
Currently, I’ve been looking into expanding my current collection of English gold stars, Masaki promos, Pokemon Center Pikachu promos, Play promos,Battle Road & Battle Festa promos, and other Japanese exclusives (such as Theater VS Alto Mare’s Latios; already have Latias). Unfortunately, many cards in these categories have sharply increased in price.
Is it possible to distinguish between “hype” and “fair value” or is such a distinction impossible to make? For instance, Mario and Luigi Pikachus have increased drastically but are only 5-years-old. I recognize that the collaboration between two iconic franchises, the cards being Japanese exclusives, and the cards being out of print adds value. However, do you think that the current prices are temporarily inflated or permanent.
It’s much easier to make this determination with modern TCG sets. New alt arts/Charizards will be $300+ on release and decline over months (or days) to more reasonable prices. With vintage, I feel it is more challenging to isolate “hype” from smpratte’s “older,rarer, minter, better”.
Maybe my perspective is incorrect and “hype”, in certain cases, is an important component in determining a card’s “fair value”. Thoughts?
Thank you in advance!