Combating Scalpers (by making the set worse) READ BEFORE COMMENTING

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I was looking at prismatic evolutions and journey together when it kinda hit me. We don’t need to overprint sets or do special stuff to limit scalpers.

We just need to make the sets worse.

Now I know I know what you guys are saying. “if the sets worse why would we buy it” “togepi do your homework” “blah blah blah” LISTEN.

Making the set “worse” USUALLY MEANS eliminating full arts, reducing chase cards, or just kinda make the set less desirable because of less desireable pokemon. You can see that Journey together has some fantastic arts, and Lillie should be a surefire hit right? But it isnt. Why? Because there simply isn’t enough appeal as a set like Prismatic Evolutions, with pokemon even 40 year old scalpers recongize.

We can also make the set “worse” by upping the pull rate, not to the point where it’s worthless, but enough to make sure that eventually your gonna get some good cards.
You don’t actually have to overprint the set as in overprint sealed products, you litterally just have to boost prints for the hits (but not so much as to discourage collecting) and the price goes down. The best part?

We’ve already seen real world examples with this.

Crown zenith is still MAJORLY cheap compared to other sets because of it’s natural appeal to collectors. It has beautiful arts while keeping the pull rates high so that casual collectors feel satisfied.

Japanese is also a great example, with hits being in every box and a garaunteed rare card, although you’ll have to buy boxes with it.

There’s still sets like Paldea evolved, Paldean Fates, the list goes on…

The Scalpers Market depends on scarcity, Popularity, and margins. Eliminate the Scarcity and the price naturally goes down. Even if the set was popular, Margins could be thin enough to reduce scalpers while true people with distributors still get to make a profit.

Sorry if I explained this horribly, I just thought of this due to comparision of multiple S&V sets and the everlasting feeling of boredom.

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Love the idea of going against the popularity of cards and I would love for the people who aren’t here to stay just disappear but the biggest problem I’m seeing with this is if we stop having big hits then a big hit will appear and sure there might be a window where one isn’t at the beginning but it would go up eventually a set would appear that everyone likes because all of a sudden everyone like flamigo or something and that new set vibrant colors has a good artwork of it

It would be interesting if they stopped printing ultra rares and made it like base set where there are just holos would make everything more simple esspesially with all the good artworks now like one of my favorite swsh era card artworks astral radiance ponyta

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it’s an interesting way of dealing with the problem, but I think unfortunately the problem is more with hobbies and recreational commerce in general at the moment. It almost doesn’t matter what Pokemon does when there is a massive fervor, the same as it not mattering when sneakers are in a big fervor, or the next gaming console, or graphics card, or whatever the current major product is. People have realized that they would rather make money through arbitrage than working some horrible job and so many many more people are doing that. This is greatly exacerbated by the ease of access and use people have with bots nowadays as well

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Ive said it a few times, but if TPCI made cards from any new set print to demand until the next set drops, but charged a premium this whole fiasco would go away. Printing ANY card would make it so players and collectors could get any card they want, it drives down FOMO making it non existent, keeps cards “rare” since no one will know the population of cards bought, lets stores stock more product for kids and people getting into the hobby, destroys scalping, and makes pokemon more money. I know with cards being on sheets is difficult to print singles to demand, but it could be done. I dont really see a huge negative to this idea either.

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Thats the beauty of this: A big hit appearing still isn’t affecting the other sets, only the set it’s in. It’ll also be able to to be pulled “easy” (easier than usual, but again, not too much)

Also you can still print that set for a long time as added defense.

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If we’re talking about supply now, it’ll most likely take a bit to work (some chance of not at all), but keep in mind Journey together has quite a drop compared to prismatic now.

I think if this was implemented earlier, it would’ve changed everything and probably prevented this bubble, but now? It might take a while. Again, Journey together might be a coincidence, as we haven’t gotten to release yet.

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Never cook again

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Bro you didn’t even read it :sob: :sob:

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Did they change the title because of this? lol

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Yes.

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You observe that many unpopular sets already exist, and that the demand is low. If your goal is to avoid scalping, why not just focus on those sets. We’ve got 30 years worth of unpopular sets, why do we need more?

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Im all for making changes to how sets are designed and even released to some extent. Not so much this idea, just in general

I also didnt read the post before commenting

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I’m assuming your talking about that paragraph I did, those were examples of how people THINK I mean when I say worse sets, when below is what I actually mean

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Make all the hits promos and release a promo pack, orderable at cardshops. Problem solved

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main sets die then

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No disrespect, but thats a horrible idea,

It makes the cards like mcdonalds packs: Worthless (except glorious rayquaza)

Also every set now becomes emerging powers.

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Isn’t this the point?

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I actually like the balance of hype sets and boring sets. It allows me to focus on what I really want and ignore what I really dont. The issues we see now are due to excessive demand and not enough supply. Thats not really the norm, albeit it happens semi regularly with special sets. Still, focus on supply (and maybe boost pull rates) and then nearly all the complaining stops

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No, it was to combat scalpers, not make the set worthless. Didn’t we just talk about how everyone should hate emerging powers?

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I think supply and pull rates is actually the best way to go, only reason why I didn’t use it is because of supply chain issues and accomodating or cough tariffs cough