Oh interesting, I didn’t know he stole them. Hmm… wonder how he got away with it
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Wasn’t meaning to single you out, just that it’s the feeling you get across the site through many topics. I was just bringing attention to it.
That’s so weird. Why would he do that? To control the market? I guess it had the opposite effect?
It’s thousands of copies he presumably stole from a factory and he was just trying to off load them.
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I don’t necessarily think something being less rare makes it less collectible! All set cards are mass-produced, doesn’t change the fact that they’re nice cards. I collect tons of cards that aren’t particularly rare or scarce
All set cards are mass-produced – and that’s precisely what makes condition rarity for them so important. Look at other mass-produced items that people collect, and look at the impact that condition has on value. This isn’t a Pokemon-specific phenomenon; it’s common across all collecting categories that I’m aware of. Just because you don’t care about it doesn’t make it not important.
Simply put: when too high a proportion of a mass-produced item is kept in mint condition, it never becomes collectible. TPCi printed tens of thousands of copies of each gold star – none of them are rare, in absolute terms. Yet only the gold star dogs are abundant in mint condition. And it is solely because thousands of copies circumvented the normal process of attrition that cards are subject to. And that is what makes them not collectible.
If none of this matters to you, then that’s great! All that means is that you and I approach collecting in different ways, and there’s nothing wrong with that. What I’m expressing here is my opinion, and my opinion alone – it’s not meant to be a prescriptive account of collecting. Everyone is free to collect whatever they want to collect.
That’s horrible. Just had for the hobby. How recent was this?
Understood; I just think it’s a bit of a mischaracterization to say that people on this site are “negative” about modern. People might feel negatively about the collectability of modern, but that has nothing to do with the cards themselves. I’ve never seen someone argue that alt arts aren’t gorgeous cards. Everyone thinks they look fantastic. Many people just don’t view them as good collectibles – and this is not the same as “hating” on them.
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Years and years ago. If I recall correctly, the guy ended up selling them to some shop or site that slowly sold them off. Im pretty sure most if not all of these have been spread out into the market. The unseen forces gold stars used to be significantly cheaper than others but they eventually rebounded imo.
Pretty sure most collectors don’t even realize these are significantly more common than the other gold stars which keeps them from being too cheap imo. I mean they’re still the cheapest but theyre close to price to the power keeper ones at least.
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Hmm, im not saying condition rarity isnt important or doesnt serve a purpose, nor am i saying i dont care about it. Im saying extreme rarity isnt the only factor that determines the collectability of an item. “Too high a proportion” is still relative; ive seen people with bricks of mint promo cards that are still collectible. Even with the gold star dogs, its not like 1000 or 2000 is an astronomical volume of cards. Everyone is entitled to collect what they want, but youre saying a card isnt collectible and i just dont rly agree with ur view of what makes something collectible
@bk2021 yea, modern can be a touchy subject for some lol i feel like people view alt arts as good collectibles but idk, depends on what makes smth a good collectible to you. I personally think modern has great collectibility… japanese modern, anyway 
I think even this is overdoing it. I’d argue collectability is entirely subjective.
We probably agree here though. To rephrase what you’re saying slightly, I would say people here are generally seeking value. If I have $10,000 to spend, what is the best way to spend it? Typically, going for the newest, most popular thing is not the answer because the level of both competition and irrational buyers are highest.
Bringing it back on topic, I’d say you get great value out of gold stars. ~$1K can get you a nice PSA 9 copy of many of them. They have stood the test of time and are much more price stable. Comparably, buying a Lugia alt art or whatever the current hot card is carries much more risk. For example, I just checked Aerodactyl V alt art - auctioned for $250 a month ago and sells for $120 today. Last PSA 10 auctioned for $463 despite having 75% of the population being PSA 10 (aka easy grade)
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2000 copies isn’t an astronomical number of cards, I agree. But 2000 mint copies of a card released 17 years ago is an astronomical number because the vast majority of cards from that era weren’t kept in mint condition.
I feel like the amount of mint cards of the gold star dogs is only proportional to the amount released by that guy. Looking at pop reports between the dogs and power keepers, they are all proportionally pretty equivalent. So yea there are more psa 10 gs dogs, but only because there are just more gs dogs in general.
In terms of PSA 9:10 ratio? True. But that’s not the important metric – compare the PSA 8:9 ratio, because basically all of the cards from the gold star dog hoard were 9/10 quality. This will show you how much the pops are inflated:
Flareon gold star: .67 : 1
vs
Entei gold star: .26 : 1
Basically, mint copies comprise a disproportionally high amount of the total gold star dog population. The hoard didn’t significantly affect the number of PSA 8 copies, but it hugely affected the number of PSA 9/10 copies.
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Yea I suppose. It’s interesting seeing very similar prices for power keepers vs unseen forces gs nm condition. The psa 9/10s of the power keepers vs unseen forces seems to reflect the difference in ‘rarity’ but the raw unseen forces are pushed up to similar prices of raw power keepers.
I feel like if your cheapest non unseen forces gold star is lets say 300 near mint and you as an average buyer go “ok gold stars 300 minimum in near mint” and then see entei gold star for 150 nm, you think “what a steal, 150 for a nm gold star” and this forces unseen forces gold stars closer to the other cheapest gold star.
I think over time unseen forces will continue to straddle just behind whatever the other cheapest gold stars are (likely power keepers or crystal guardians) while a gap between unseen forces psa 8/9/10s and psa 8/9/10s of the other gold stars increases more and more.
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I’d say that something also needs to be accessible to be collectible.
There’s a balance there. If it’s only for high end collectors - like what okjluv is discussing about with the recent skyrocketing of JP alt arts and waifu cards - then attrition will be high as it’s no longer achievable. You can’t motivate people if they feel like everything is out of reach.
At least in English, for the most part, prices drop over time - with some major exceptions recently, that will hopefully remain exceptions. If this keeps up in Japan, whether it’s price manipulation by stores or not, then you need to buy in a short window of time before you are priced out.
@zorloth isn’t 2,000 still a small number? Surely there are more than 2,000 people interested in that era and having the dogs is better than having none of them - since the graded count is so low anyways.
It’s the relative numbers that matter. 2000 isn’t a small number of mint copies when compared to the mint pops of the other gold stars. To put it into perspective:
PSA 9+10 pops:
Mudkip = 253
Torchic = 201
Treecko = 262
Latias = 161
Latios = 201
Rayquaza = 243
Groudon = 250
Kyogre = 258
Metagross = 259
etc.
When gold stars from other sets each have a PSA 9+10 pop of <300, it cannot be overstated how significant 2000 extra mint copies of each of the gold star dogs is. Back in 2005, people didn’t preserve cards like they do now. A mint copy of a gold star from TRR or Deoxys or Delta Species etc is a special thing. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said about a gold star Raikou, Entei, or Suicune.
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assuming this is eng ver then the jap one should has even less POP than these right? cus some of them are just too hard to grind
i wonder if this guy ever regrets how he acted with this. Man could have been set for life if he just kept his mouth shut instead of feeling the need to flex them
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I don’t think he was wanting to hold on to these long term. Just wanted to offload and make his 100k or whatever. Especially given the legality acquiring them and the risk of possible legal trouble.