People like Unlistedleaf are gateway drugs
Scott’s Patreon is methadone
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Pokemon is pretty stable.
Start small, work your way up. Consolidate as you go.
As for your original question, I wouldn’t say Pokemon is growing rapidly. It’s grown considerably since 2016 but it’s slowing.
There’s a lot of active participants who have learnt more since 2016 and are engaged in the more shrewd investing that is possible in Pokemon rather than fresh blood finding pokemon.
Pokemon’s growth as a franchise exercises a trickle down effect to collecting Pokemon cards. tpci doesn’t foster a strong collecting environment, particularly in the west. 5 new sets a year, nothing could be considered an investment or is particularly rare, niche or interesting. It’s similar to MtG where the majority of people are only interested in cards from a certain era.
At least with MtG, you can go on eBay and buy let’s say 3 boosters of Lorywyn and crack them able and still have cards that are playable in a legal format. You can have the excitement of opening packs, the excitement of pulling Thoughtseize and just being able to play your cards in 5 different formats.
Pokémon doesn’t have this. If you crack a pack from let’s say the DPPt era, you’re cracking it to send holofoils to PSA and get PSA10’s. There is nothing playable, nothing rare, nothing sought-after, nothing but maybe 1 chase card ‘block’ which usually all go straight to PSA. Because, a big chunk of collecting Pokemon is posting your high value, high graded slaps on social media.
There is value in some old school playables such as Rockets Admin, Call energy and Holon Transceiver, There is a fair amount of old format players, I personally play 10, 12 and RSPK.
There are plenty of players that play fan made formats casually. I own a (in played (light to heavy) condition) Rainmaker deck myself. But unlike Magic it’s not a supported format. The existing Expanded format is only there, in my opinion, to don’t make players feel ‘cheated’ when they’ve spend $400 on a Charizard-Reshiram like deck which key cards go out of rotation and it no longer is Standard Legal. Pokemon would really benefit from a strong third format, that allows only cards from XY and up (like a more narrow Expanded) or… a real vintage format, which won’t really work due to supply/demand and just a whole ton of broken trainer cards (also… I doubt Pokemon would want to see WotC-era cards being played in tournaments).
It’s good that fans are making their own formats, and that they’re played. Don’t get me wrong. But a reason why Magic survived for so long, and is currently growing (even while Brawl so far is a failure, like other formats they tried and adding Pioneer) is because you can pick one of so many formats in which there are official, legal, tournaments with price money etc. and play the game. And I sometimes feel, majority forget that the Pokemon TCG is a game that should be played. Not cardboard to be placed in plastic holders because value or rarity.
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I certainly would agree. The only vintage format I can see happening is RS on, with a large banlist. But this probably won’t happen as Expanded is not even well tended to at the moment (at least in Europe). I think generally the reason Pokemon does well is that it is much more than just a card game when comparing it the Magic. Looking the queues for the London Pokemon Center has been insane and even if 0.5% of these people filter over annually to the TCG it will fine. The lack of vintage support from Nintendo does make me a little sad nevertheless.
I think it’s realistic to understand that nobody will ever see all the cards they want to collect. Rare cards are getting rarer, and demand may or may not be rising. Either way, it feels like missing the opportunity to buy them now, even though your favorite card might be far out of your price range. I think, for now, focus on what you can get. You could make yourself miserable thinking about every card you might not get, so be excited about the ones you can get.
edit: typo
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If you’re into collecting some Japanese, I have a lot of bulk NM cards you can have and other stuff that’s just sitting around
I don’t think I’ll be saying anything that hasn’t been said in this thread already, but try to take small steps towards your bigger goals. Research, analyze and keep tabs on those big cards you want to obtain. And also appreciate what you’ve already acquired and realize that you’re not going to own everything you want within 5 years. And that’s okay.
There’s no limit to what you can earn and set aside in your life. And judging from the information in this thread I’d say time is on your side as well.
Just take a deep breath and dream big, but don’t let the big ticket items on your Want List blind you from the overall experience of collecting something you love.
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