Finally after several months away of buying & collecting. I’m now able to look at engaging in both again.
Prices as we all know have skyrocketed & I am a bit thrown back about some of the prices of cards I wanted to add to my collection. However I want to start collecting again with something that has great meaning and personal taste.
So my initial thought was to create a binder that represents the history of the tcg from base Set to modern day. Cards that really stand out as part of the history of the hobby with some random personal favourite cards of mine.
For example I have:
Base Holos
Jungle Holos
Fossil Holos
Banned Cards
Shinings (albeit it only x1 or 2)
Team Rocket for the into of dark pokemon
Neo Destiny for the into of light pokemon
Gold Stars (again only x1 or 2)
Crystal Pokemon
Legendary collection for the first set to include reverse holos
First e-series cards
Ex Ruby & Sapphire as the first set released after the WOTC takeover
Lv X & Primes
The first full arts from B&W
First full art trainer cards
The gold Reshiram & Zekrom with the Silver Dialga
First full arts from XY of the big 3
Pikachu 090 XY-P First Battle Festa Card
Shaymin Ex
Secret Rare Gold Aritia cards (the first alternate arts)
Intro of Rainbow Rares
20th & 25th anniversary stamped cards
Shiny full arts from Hidden Fates/Ultra Shiny GX
First Tag team alts & tag team rainbows & trainers
Character Rares
First Rainbow Trainers
Charizard V SWSH Promo (as the most graded card of all time)
The first shiny alt arts from Shiny Treasure ex
Aside from English & Japanese/Chinese exclusives not mentioned is there anything else I maybe missing here? Be it historic in the 29 years of the hobby from a playability aspect (such as Shaymin & Iono) or iconic like the shiny sub set from hidden fates that created massive interest like nothing before it.
Appreciate any input and help on things I may be missing
If you want two birds with one stone you could add Neo Genesis Cleffa. Both one of the most playable cards of all time and introduces the baby mechanic
I do have the holo Pichu from the set in the spreadsheet (personal addition to the binder) but definitely will add the cleffa too now and thank you very much for that snippet of info
I think the best thing to represent the history of the hobby would be the creatures corp deck given out to specific employee’s regarding 1 card every year to commemorate pokemon. Although the deck would be too expensive to complete, having 1 card would likely be worth getting.
Sounds like a cool idea. The only thing I can think of after reading through your list is perhaps some iconic Promo cards. Obviously there is too many to even count as this point but WOTC era promos (including Southern Islands) would be a good start. Trophy cards may be cool too as they captivate the tcg side of things. Good luck with and don’t forget to post your progress!
I didnt include the full list by any means but I do have Ancient Mew, the Pikachu promo from the OG Pokemon movie so far. Also will be adding in two cards from Souther Islands as it was the first English sub set.
For trophy cards (peasant form) I have already the champions festival XY176 as that also is the first card technically to feature all 3 gen 1 starters & Pikachu, the Pikachu 090/Xy-P as the first battle festa card and an Acerola 1st place league promo. Unless the above dont really count, I’d love some recommendations of course.
That’s a very solid list you’ve built so far. Outside of your list, I’d say that there’s some pretty great cards in the SWSH and S&V era at this point. The regular art rares are still affordable depending on the exact one, and the secret art rares are quite amazing of course, but very expensive in some cases.
If you like Gen 1, I’d highly suggest collecting the 151 set in both English & Japanese from S&V, I think it’s going to be a ‘classic’ set in the long-term and has a ton of great cards. Even just the regular set cards have some fantastic art.
Don’t worry there is a few from SWSH & SV in there . Such as the first vmax rainbows, the first eeveelutions alternate arts, a few trainers and of course the 25th anniversary cards.
Unless something is a first of its kind, I would be inclined to omit versions of it from later eras as then its merely picking art/personal preference over history.
Art rares are technically a variant of character rares which go back as far as Dream league when they were first introduced (and I have pikachu & mimikyu added). The newer versions must have some sort of significance/history to them such as the ARs of 151 with Bulbasaur, Squirtle & Charmander (technically the first full arts of the gen 1 starters) is the road I am going down. Also Pinsir from Crimson Haze would fall into this category as well. Where as I love the AR of Zeraora from Stellar Miracle but its not historic by any means nor the first illustration rare.
I have some pretty odd inclusions also as I have been digging through the likes of Bulbapedia such as the first secret rare item card (featured in Dark Rush) , first gold item card (in Freeze Bolt) , full art gold item/energy cards (first started in Collection Sun & Moon).
Also going back a bit reverse holos from L1 as this set was the first Japanese set to do reverse holos and CP6 as it was the last set in Japanese to have the separation between 1st edition & Unlimited.
Yea I’m not a huge fan of 151 in terms of long term outlook (however if any of the post covid sets have a chance to succeed this set has one of the best chances). And like you mentioned the SIR’s have dropped significantly along side master balls so I definitely want to take advantage of that and get a good chunk of the most important ones to me. Just waiting to see how far prices will drop before I strike lol.
I love the Dark Raicu idea (one of my favorite cards). The general idea for first time for cards is spot on. I’d love to expand on that idea and get every single first secret rare for each Pokemon (especially the original 151). For example Charmander from EX Dragon.
A ‘History of the English Pokémon TCG binder’ is actually one of the primary collection goals I’ve been working on since I started to take collecting more seriously about 6 years ago. Hopefully I can give some good advice and suggestions
I think the most important thing for you to understand before you begin this project is how expensive it is. “Prices as we all know have skyrocketed & I am a bit thrown back about some of the prices of cards” - This part of your intro post makes me think you’re starting this project at least a little bit out of price frustration, but you need to know you’re going to get a lot of that here too. When I first started this project I could fill a lot of slots with a $5 or $10 card, nowadays it costs $50+ to fill a slot and from the kind of cards you listed, it looks like you would be looking at that average price to fill a slot too.
My binder has 480 slots… 480x50=24,000…
This next point is entirely up to you of course, but linked to the above, for a binder of this scale, I don’t really care about the back of a card at all, and I’m happy to save the money that a HP card back can provide.
Set an end point for your collection, mine is the first 25 years of the TCG up to Celebrations. If you don’t, your collection will always feel kind of unfinished and you’ll constantly be having to reshuffle and try and squeeze new stuff in.
Plan out the binder in a spreadsheet before you start buying.
Consider how the cards will look together on the page, not just as individual cards.
You considering the playability of cards in how historic they are suggests you may have played? If so, include some trophies from your time playing even if they’re very small - I have some of my League Challenge winner cards and Internationals participant cards in mine.
Don’t feel like you have to dedicate even amounts of space to the binder, just go for what you like. I’m going for every single Gen 1 holo, but only 8 cards make the cut from the entire B&W era.
Know when it is stupid to have certain cards in a binder. I recently pulled my complete pack fresh set of Tag Team alt cards out the binder to grade and will have to come up with a new plan for those pages.
I’ve put a couple of photos from my work-in-progress binder below, feel free to ask any questions
Wow I just looked this up and it’s over 80,000 graded. Is 2nd place even remotely as close? Lol that’s enough graded submissions to sell out Fenway Park twice + the Boston Garden once
Thanks so much for your detailed reply and input! Really well thought out
The part about how the skyrocketed prices annoys me, is more so towards my price memory and frustration of cards I have previously owned and bought for significantly cheaper and now need to rebuy at much higher prices is all But I get we are in different times and that PSA 9 silver dialga I got before covid for $60-70 will never be replicable again
I am intrigued about your approach to the condition of the card. Again this is probably down the price memory but prices of LP-Good cards today would have got me close to EX-NM copies is putting up a mental wall to me saving thousands in the long run I’ll attach a picture of an umbreon prime I’m looking to snap up but the old mentality I would never buy a card in that condition even as a binder copy. That’s probably a bad example too since Umbreon Prime really isn’t historically significant but hopefully it gets the point across.
I have the spreadsheet already done and it (so far) totals 340 ish cards from base to present day. Based on what I already have and purchases made since I made the post I’m about 34% completed to date. In regards modern times the only new things I could see myself adding would be some cards from the 30th anniversary as nothing in modern days hasn’t already been done or would probably not have much of an impact in the history of the TCG.
Unfortunately I’ve only played Pokemon pocket so that aspect was only to include things like the Cleffa (as mentioned by Rambo), Shaymin EX etc throughout the years.
Aside from base/jungle/fossil holos, everything else I’ll take what art or personal favorite Pokemon appeals most to me such as for Neo Destiny (historic for the introduction of Light Pokemon) I’m only putting in light Arcanine & Togetic because I just always have loved those two arts. Then Shining Celebi as it was also the last set to feature shining Pokemon until they were re introduced in Shining Legends. Which I also have cherry picked 3 from that set as it’s the first mechanic to be re introduced in the TCG.
Once pages start to fill up though I will be posting pics of the pages and the historical reasons behind each card within the page. However would love to see your progress too as it comes along and thanks again for the detailed reply/suggestions
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. Such as the first vmax rainbows, the first eeveelutions alternate arts, a few trainers and of course the 25th anniversary cards.
But I get we are in different times and that PSA 9 silver dialga I got before covid for $60-70 will never be replicable again 
