Kraken's Eeveelutions Binder Update

[ragingkraken]

Final card update of the year. I’ll split it into 2 posts. An Eevee update, and a Skarmory one.
A lot of these cards just took forever to ship. Almost a month for a lot of it. Kept me waiting for a bit, but at the end of the day it’s all here.I’ll start with some general stuff I got. Again, in my infinite knowledge, I ordered the wrong cards, thinking I didn’t have the Lost Thunder Espeon or the Furious Fists Sylveon. Guess I have a copy now in case something happens.

Now on to some Eevees that I’m excited about. Got some e series cards because why not. Good looking card format and good artwork. One of them is even unlimited so it’s a win. Also tried to get the 3 remaining codes I needed for the Sandstorm Eevees, but I still can’t find the JPX code. I found one on Mercari, but after a week of purchasing it, the seller never even shipped, so I cancelled that order. Since then, I’ve only found 1 JPX code online, but they wanted the expensive shipping from England, and I’m not that desperate for the card. Hopefully eventually it’ll pop up.

And now some Espeons. Got an unlimited Reviving Legends Espeon. Apparently these take a while to show up, so thanks to @eeveeteam for telling me about those listings for both the Revivng Legends cards in this update. The Espeon even has a really cool holo pattern, so I’m real happy.

Onto some Umbreons. Another RevivingLegends, and a World Championship card that was incredibly cheap and has a small crease that isn’t really visible. I’ll probably end up replacing that one some time, but not a priority given how much those cards cost when they’re not exactly wanted. Oh yeah, another VMAX alt art down. Funny to see just how much the price has come down.

Now some Sylveon. Decided to get the tag team one. I really like the tag team cards, especially the art for the Sylveon ones. Figured I’d work on it bit by bit.

Now on to the cameo cards. The last of the Evolving Skies cameos that I needed. And then the Shaymin and Pokemon Communications card. I swear I’m going to have to bring out a microscope for the Pokemon Communications. The Mimikyu cameo is easier to see than this one. Honestly, I don’t see the Eevee on this card, but it seems to be accepted so I can’t speak out against it. I’ll just have to believe I guess.

[ragingkraken]

Part 2. I’m pretty sure this is the first Skarmory update in a while. These cards take me down to just 10 English cards left to go. Should be fun. It’s also at the point where I should probably go ahead and get a binder for this collection. Then it’ll be time to find someone who can source me the hard to find ones. I got lucky I was on an Indonesian sellers good list, and he’s going to source all the Indonesian ones for me. Because apparently Skarmory gets included in a bunch of decks where no one really sells the commons from. Gonna have to find a willing Chinese/Taiwanese and Thai seller eventually for that. Should be an adventure.

And the Ho-ohs. I love this cameo. Literally a corner of a Skarmory wing. I love it because for some reason Pokemon decided to include Skarmory in the same artwork as Ho-oh and Lugia. Just makes it an even better Pokemon now. Now I have to get the Neo version of this Ho-oh. Just happens to be not as cheap as the Lost Thunder reprint.

[joponnes]

Was nice to see so many cards added! Have you considered keeping the main binder for only english and japanese cards so you didn’t have to move everything if you get something out of those languages and then have a separate binder for everything else?

[ragingkraken]

@joponnes

Was nice to see so many cards added! Have you considered keeping the main binder for only english and japanese cards so you didn’t have to move everything if you get something out of those languages and then have a separate binder for everything else?

So that was my original plan for the binders. But in the end I decided that being able to look at the cards side by side, especially when it comes to the holos in the WOTC era and the modern Gym Promos where English is holo and Japanese is non holo. I decided being able to compare the cards and see the difference was worth the pain of moving everything around.

[ragingkraken]

So December ended up being an expensive month for me. Found some of my goal cards that are pretty much at the top of my list. So I couldn’t say no to them. So I guess it’s time to start the new year strong. Before a little drought because my wallet is still crying lol.

First up, the big stuff that had me excited for most of December while it just sat in customs throughout the holidays. Guess Christmas came late for me this year. 1st edition Neo Umbreon and the holo Skyridge. The Aquapolis came as part of the lot but the one I already have is in better condition, so maybe this will be a display one? Not sure. But the other two ended up costing less than what I could currently find for sale individually so I couldn’t ignore it. The holy trio of top vintage Umbreon. I’ve never left work so fast to get home to pick something up from the post office. So happy that for once my drive home was only just over an hour today and not the almost 2 hours that it normally is. I still can’t believe that the listing wasn’t a complete scam (unless I’m just way to into this and overlooking a fake or something). This was the purchase that capped off my year on a real high note. And then came the even bigger purchase that will likely be the capstone of my collection. Something that will probably only ever be topped by a Japanese gold star Umbreon/Espeon (which would need the market to crash completely to happen). But that hasn’t come in yet, so I’m still impatiently waiting.

Now on to some other cards that I bought back in December. The last of my card purchases until February considering how expensive December ended up being.
A reverse holo Sandstorm Eevee and HG/SS Darkness Energy. Love this era of reverse holos. Just a simple shine on the card, especially with the e-reader format. And the darkness energy is real nice. Although I do need to find out how many variations of the Japanese version exist, since there are 3 English versions. Really nice artworks.

Speaking of Sandstorm, I managed to find the last of the Eevee Sandstorm codes that I needed. After searching, I managed to find one. A little expensive for what it is, but I wanted it to finish up the codes and given how I couldn’t find any other ones, I went for it. The Flareon is real nice. Has some weird print line/mark on the top left corner, but it doesn’t bother me considering the rest of the card is extremely clean. Then comes one of the better Jolteon artworks imo, and TCGPlayer fixing their mistake of sending me multiple reverse holo Eevees, instead of the normal holo one I ordered.

And the last of the Eevees for this update. The new Indonesian Inaco Eevee promo. Cool artwork, unique stamp, and can’t go wrong with a foreign language.

Now, on to the Skarmorys. Super happy that I had bought off this Indonesian seller before, because they were willing to go out of their way to track down all the Indonesian Skarmorys for me, including the Starter Decks and Gramedia ones, which apparently can be a real pain in the butt to track down. Wasn’t too hard to convince them. I was on their good side, and I am going back to them to finish up getting some of the Indonesian Gym Promo Eeveelutions. Not a lot of variety, but each one in the picture does have a different set number in the bottom left corner. And just like that, all the Indonesian Skarmorys out of the way in one simple purchase. Now I just need to find a seller who’s willing to track down the Thai and Chinese ones for me since they also have the Starter Decks that no one seems to sell those common cards.

[heywolf]

@ragingkraken

Drapion isn’t a mistake. It has an Espeon in the artwork, although it’s probably the weirdest looking Espeon ever featured.

Haha I think the Sabrina’s Espeon card is the weirdest.

[ragingkraken]

@heywolf

@ragingkraken

Drapion isn’t a mistake. It has an Espeon in the artwork, although it’s probably the weirdest looking Espeon ever featured.

Haha I think the Sabrina’s Espeon card is the weirdest.

That’s a tough one. It’s definitely weird, but the redeeming feature is that it’s shiny. The Drapion one is just weird.

[ragingkraken]

Right. I’m going to apologize for the wall of text, but for me, this is the peak of my collection. Everything else can be an afterthought. This is the reason I went overbudget and won’t buy more cards until February at the earliest. I could go on to never complete my goal and it would be alright because of this one card. This is the card I’ve been most excited for. Basically my holy grail of cards because it’s rarest planned purchase of my collection. I still can’t believe I found it. This is the best Christmas gift I’ve ever given myself. Unless some Pokemon Rumble Eevee appears for a reasonable price, or the market crashes to the point that the Japanese Gold Star Espeon and Umbreon become attainable instead of a dream of a dream, then this is it. My most prized card, my holy grail. I’ve always sucked at taking photos (just look through the thread, especially the early parts) and always thought “eh, I have the physical cards, the photos are just to document it,” but this time I’ve spent probably 30 minutes just looking at the card in disbelief and 20 minutes trying my best to take good photos of it (I’m going to have to change the definition of good in the dictionary). It’s definitely my favorite of the art design cards from this year, even if it didn’t have an Umbreon. But before I saw this in person, it was just that. A really good artwork on a rare card that happened to have Umbreon. Now, it’s my absolute favorite card. My whole opinion changed just on seeing it in person. I’m still not sure if I leave it in the little case it came in, or throw it in the binder. Maybe I’ll throw it in for photos and otherwise keep it in the case zipper up on top of the first page of the binder. This thing is literally out of the pack that the Pokemon company sent to the winning artist. The listing photos didn’t even make it seem this clean. I’ve never had this feeling of “how do I handle this card” before. It’s surreal.
I’ll probably clean up this post tomorrow when I calm down and work manages to bring me back to normal levels of excitement. Anyway, Illusion’s Zorua by Miho Sugano.

[goldstarlugia]

Wow @ragingkraken that is such an amazing grail! Big congrats. I usually keep up with every Japanese exclusive card that I can, but I have honestly never even seen that card. It is super magical! I love pooch, sneasel and weavile, and murkrow in this card. All of them have such big personalities haha

[heywolf]

@ragingkraken, Wow! That’s insane, no need to apologize for the wall of text, I would be freaking out too

[ragingkraken]

@goldstarlugia

Wow @ragingkraken that is such an amazing grail! Big congrats. I usually keep up with every Japanese exclusive card that I can, but I have honestly never even seen that card. It is super magical! I love pooch, sneasel and weavile, and murkrow in this card. All of them have such big personalities haha

Thank you! Yeah this was a card that took me forever to find out about. I can’t even remember how I found out about it. But it’s part of the 2010 Art Design contest, and of the 6 contest winners this is the best one in my opinion.

[eeveeteam]

@ragingkraken, congratulations on the art contest promo. Any idea on release date on that one? It’s the only one in my master spreadsheet where I don’t have a release date.

[ragingkraken]

@eeveeteam

@ragingkraken , congratulations on the art contest promo. Any idea on release date on that one? It’s the only one in my master spreadsheet where I don’t have a release date.

Thank you! As for release date, the only info I could find was that the winners were announced July 27, 2010. So I’m guessing that the cards must’ve been distributecd some time around that time. I think the only way to really find out would be for someone who knows Japanese to search Japanese sites.

[ragingkraken]

Right. I’ve had my time to calm down after the Illusion’s Zorua. Picked up some more cards. Most of them are new, and some of them are from way back in December (USPS decided about 2 months later to deliver a soggy box to my mailbox with their patented “we care” note…).

Starting with the alt arts. I love them. And I need to save up to get the Japanese VMAX ones some day. Managed to snag the boxes online from Target because I still have yet to see any packs in person at any stores by me. Flareon V is easily my favorite, and Jolteon V is my least favorite, but that’s like saying chocolate shakes are your least favorite shake. Still great, but there’s better options.

Up next, the last of the Gym Promos I needed to round out the Gym Promo set. Cool cards. All of the Gym promos look great, with Umbreon and Espeon being my favorites.

Now, the VMAX Climax cards. First off the normal cards. Basically just reprints, which I do get annoyed at the fact that Japan does this so much, but oh well. At least it gave us some cool reverse holos. Love the pattern in person, but man is it hard to capture it in a photo. Only way is at an extreme angle that doesn’t do it justice.

Up next the character rares. Thank you Pokemon for bringing these back. The Sun and Moon ones look amazing, and I love that they did it again. Hopefully the English ones stay as cheap as the Japanese ones are. Also, I finally realized how big the Eeveelutions are. I always thought they were tiny for some reason.

Now, the V/VMAX cards from the set. Still need the Umbreon V and Sylveon VMAX from the set, but I’ve got that worked out already with a seller. So those will come in eventually. Gotta say, the Umbreon VMAX character rare just looks off to me. But still cool. The new Sylveon VMAX reminds me of the Gardevoir & Sylveon GX alt art, which is nice.

Speaking of Gardevoir & Sylveon GX alt art, I picked it up. It was one of those artworks that I really wanted, so I decided to pull the trigger on it. Picked up some other cards that were pretty cheap too.

[ragingkraken]

Time to unload all my February additions. Some solid pick ups.
Starting off with my goal of completing the WoTC era, a Japanese Blaine’s Quiz #1. Thought it would be a little harder to find since it was part of a theme deck, but surprisingly, there were a lot of them. Another cameo out of the way.

On the other end of the spectrum, the recent releases. The VSTARs. Artwork isn’t anything special, but I’m really digging the VSTAR border. Looks pretty good in silver. And I pulled the Espeon V from one of the boxes, so that’s a win.

A whole bunch of Japanese cards too. Thanks for @eeveeteam for the cards. Knocks out a large amount of JP cards. My binder is going to look so much more full now. After I reorganize it again since there’s no Dark Rush unlimited… Oh well.

And finally, I saw a good deal on the Chinese 25th Anniversary Umbreon Box. Went for it, and it was definitely worth it. Really wish we got something like that here, although I guess it would probably impossible to find one for MSRP given how I still can’t get my hands on a UPC without markups.

[ragingkraken]

Time for the March update. More cards trickling in.

Got some more Japanese cards in. Nothing super flashy, but really nice cards in general. Another one of the unlimited Eevee Research deck cards out of the way.

Up next, Dawn Stadium. Loved the artwork when I used to play the TCG with my brother. I’m pretty sure I stopped collecting/playing around the time this card came out.

Like always, I saw some foreign cards for cheap and went for them. Which means I now have to shuffle almost all of my cards in the binders… Oh well, always nice to have those non E e-series cards. And Thai font is always cool.

Nothing special. Just the final cards I was missing from VMAX Climax

Managed to find a store online that had all the Brilliant Stars Eeveelution blister packs. Good, because I sill can’t find any physical product. Even managed to pull my chase cards from the blisters. I’ll call it a win.

[eeveeteam]

@ragingkraken

Managed to find a store online that had all the Brilliant Stars Eeveelution blister packs. Good, because I sill can’t find any physical product. Even managed to pull my chase cards from the blisters. I’ll call it a win.

Those blisters paid for themselves and then some!

[ragingkraken]

@eeveeteam

@ragingkraken

Managed to find a store online that had all the Brilliant Stars Eeveelution blister packs. Good, because I sill can’t find any physical product. Even managed to pull my chase cards from the blisters. I’ll call it a win.

Those blisters paid for themselves and then some!

That’s true. Nice when my wallet doesn’t take a huge dent on a set.

[ragingkraken]

After my good luck puling the VMAX alts in Brilliant Stars, I figured I’d just buy the rest and save myself the time and money. Also figured I’d get one of the big VMAX alts since they seem to keep climbing in price. Love the Espeon VMAX. It’s like a peaceful Attack on Titan. And the sparkle really does some work on this artwork. It’s weird having a page and a bit of the binder without empty spaces. I should get around to completing Evolving Skies/Eevee Heroes so I have multiple complete pages. That’s gonna be painful. 1 alt art at a time I guess.

Been a good month for Espeon too. Some nice picks. I also finally have an Espeon ex. Stupid English versions are so expensive…

And finally, a little progress on the Skarmory collection, a Ho oh. Couldn’t really get the light to not land right on Skarmory’s wing, but whatever. I’ve got some more foreign Skarmory’s on the way. I do need to find a middle man for Chinese cards though. Seems to be the hardest language to get… Need to get a binder for them now that it’s starting to grow. Getting kinda difficult to keep them organized.

[ragingkraken]

Time for a little Indonesian update. I only really go for Indonesian cards that are unique/rare (Indomaret and KFC promos, Poke Gym cards, etc…). Was finally able to make a big dent in that sense. Really happy that I finally got my hands on a lot of these, considering how hard some of the gym cards seem to be to get at a reasonable price.
I’ll start with the GX Gym promos. Most of the ones I find on Ebay are like $40+ plus shipping, if there even is a listing. Luckily my go to person in Indonesia was able to track most of them down. I already have the Eevee, so all that leaves is Glaceon, which is apparently is the hardest one to find. Not sure why, but I’m still waiting to see if one pops up for some reasonable price. Had no ideas the cards were that hard to find, until it took the person weeks to get all of these together.

Up next, some Indonesian Umbreon cards. The gold star is a nice one. Since the original is such a sought after card, I figured I might as well get as many of them in different languages as I could. Debating whether or not to get that card in all the languages. Just to make up for the fact that I will probably never get the original Japanese version, and the English version will probably be the card I get years down the line. The V card was a nice touch that got thrown in by the seller and I can’t say no to that artwork.

And finally, the VMAX alts. Apparently they are prizes for winning LCS tounaments, which apparently makes them rare since the scene isn’t huge over there and the tournaments aren’t really happening. Cool to have these rareish cards without having the pay those Japanese prizes (other cards that I probably won’t get for a loooong time).