The Question of the Day is a way to facilitate community discussion to help members ponder the unanswered questions of the world that are somehow relating to the hobby. Questionsj are many times open ended and up to interpretation. Feel free to post your thoughts in as much or as little detail as you’d like.
Helpful Considerations may or may not help some people focus their answer, these are blurred to not bother those who have their own ideas.
Today’s Question: QotD: What is your limit to species collecting?
Helpful Considerations: Cameos? Do stamps featuring your species count? Or even more out there, what if the card has the name of the species (e.g. Kamex Mega Battle or decks named after the mon)? This is a suggested question.
I go all out.
For sylveon i included the whole half deck cause of the logo on the bottom.
I also include the korean genesect with sylveon on the stamp.
For kabutops i have included all cards that mentione kabuto and kabutops by name (strange cave, underground cave, fossil excavation kit etc)
My one limitation is i dont include cards with the mysterious fossil in the evolution box as i am not keen to collect every omanyte and aerodactyl pre gen 4….
right now i’m interested in everything, even the smallest cameos, but limited to english releases. i think i will probably expand to japanese once i’ve completed english, but i don’t know if i’ll go much past that as i don’t think my binder will have space
Disclaimer, I don’t think I’m a real species collector… but one of collecting goals is just trying to collect all unique artworks for my favorites, but cameos definitely count for me. I’m undecided on stamps and would say just having the name in the deck etc. shouldn’t count.
I don’t think evolution boxes count though, but I wonder what other people think.
every torchic other than the cards that are more than 2k usd at the time of buying (currently missing 6 such torchic cameos). I’m lucky to have bought gold stars before this current market.
other than that, all cameos and official cards in all languages (with non-tcg including topps, channel nice, trading figure game), including ex codes and holo variations.
I’m mostly done with torchic, missing only 5 cards at the time of writing this. Cameos, I’m a bit further out, but I’d say I’m over 95% there (there are 115 different switch cameos for scale…)
Some people meme that I need to get every combusken ever since there is a torchic on every combusken card…I’m actually slowly doing that by just picking up what I can easily find when convenient other than what I would consider the “unfindable” combusken which I have put significant effort into finding (of which there is only one super hard one left for me to find).
As for the torchic decks, I’ll get them eventually but it’s not a huge focus for me. I have the complete Korean starter deck and most of the cards from the Japanese ones in both editions. The Japanese quarter decks I don’t have any cards of other than the torchic line cards.
Everything outside of the TCG. I have great respect for people like @joponnes collecting the most obscure merchandise out there, because it contains Grimer in one corner, but for me personally that would be a bit too much, especially as merch outside the TCG is rarely well documented.
species collectors are WHY we have any documentation on the most random stuff. They are the heroes we don’t deserve. And it is why I can’t possibly try to go that far. I’m not strong enough
I start getting more of the same species when I find it benefitted from multiple good cards and I stop when I got all these good illustrations. Sometimes I could push a little further to finish the set because it is contained, but I don’t do it because I can’t cross the border to collecting cards I don’t appreciate the artwork.
So not a real species collector I think, although I will have a lot of cards from the same pokemon and consider it a set ( ex : ampharos, altaria, milotic )
I use to think I have limits with Zigzagoon merchandise but I realised recently I like to collect anything with that stupid pokemon on there Although if it’s something like a generic poster with every gen 3 pokemon on I won’t bother
For my main collection I prioritize 1 of every unique printing (where there is something different other than just language) and 1 of each unique sealed product. I will collect as many languages as I can, but anything beyond the 1st unique item I consider extra. Many species collectors pursue a “global” set or achieve 100% completion- which is an incredible and impressive goal! But for me is not what sparks my joy
Cameos also don’t really do it for me, since I collect a species out of love and enjoyment, and why would I enjoy my favorite being a background character?? They should always be front and center! JK, cameos are happily collected, but not considered to be part of the main collection goal and is itself a small sub-collection.
Condition is important to me, because for my precious, why would I want anything less than the best? Grades are nice, but NM+ is the goal and the collection is all bindered anyways, so any graded card not yet collected in NM or better is cracked and added to the pages.
Non-tcg cards and accessories are also not mandatory for my collection being “completed”, but I do try to get at least 1 of each that I come across. A few of the weird vending cards and funky accessories are some of my favorite collection items that I own
Bootleg cards and non-official stuff is sporadically collected purely for fun and memes, as sometimes I cannot resist the absurdity of the nonsense people come up with in an effort to make a quick buck.
The final part of my species collection is custom artwork, either commissioned, gifted, or found in the wild. It’s neat to see each artist’s spin on the character, and often it comes with a nice story or memory behind it. While by far the smallest part of the collection by quantity, they certainly mean the most per copy.
I guess im in the minority in not liking cameos in my species collection. If collecting togetic cards, a togetic cameo doesnt feel like a togetic card and feels out of place. And multiple cards (different languages, 1st ed vs unlimited etc) also dilute my species binder. I just want 1 version of each artwork of the pokemon. I’d rather look at 9 artworks of a pokemon on a page than 4 different versions of 2 artworks.
Had the feeling someone would bring those up, haha. Still such an odd thing to have in my collection, but hey, it’s a cameo nonetheless, and it’s cool to have every Pokémon ‘Look Upon The Stars’ item featuring a Seviper eventually.
For Seviper, the only limit I’ve set for myself is that I don’t include items featuring the entire gen 3 (or gens 1-3) as a whole. Everything else that features a Seviper, no matter how small, I collect. All languages and variations, including cameos, for the TCG. All non-TCG items (also in all languages/variations, if applicable), whether it’s a non-TCG card, sticker, pog, plushy, figure, or even something as weird as underwear.
For Pikachu, I do have a bit more limits on the other hand. Roughly ten years ago, I started out collecting all regular-sized TCG Pikachu cards in all languages without cameos (since cameos include the Pokémon Illustrator and Trophy cards). About 1-2 years later, since there weren’t too many, I decided to also included all Jumbo cards (and also all Jumbo cards with cameos, since they were cool, and there also were only a handful). Due to financial limitations and stress of trying to keep up with the hundreds of releases each year (the opposite of what you’d want in a hobby), I stopped collecting all languages and only continued with all English releases since the 25th Pokémon Day (Feb. 27th, 2021), with the exception of the Base Set reprints and one of each non-English artwork.
For Pikachu, I will never bother with cameos (I do have a bunch for fun, but don’t chase them); nor non-TCG stuff. Also because Pikachu isn’t even in my top 25 favorite Pokémon, unlike Seviper at no. 1, tbf.
Although if it’s something like a generic poster with every gen 3 pokemon on I won’t bother
Still such an odd thing to have in my collection, but hey, it’s a cameo nonetheless, and it’s cool to have every Pokémon ‘Look Upon The Stars’ item featuring a Seviper eventually.
Everything else that features a Seviper, no matter how small, I collect. All languages and variations, including cameos, for the TCG. All non-TCG items (also in all languages/variations, if applicable), whether it’s a non-TCG card, sticker, pog, plushy, figure, or even something as weird as underwear. 