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.
I stopped collecting around 2009/2010 because I didn’t know anyone else who was interested and I felt like the hobby would slowly drift into obscurity. Now I feel like even if I live to 125 I’ll be able to find someone to chat about cardboard with. It’s a good feeling to have a hobby you know you’ll be able to enjoy for a long time to come.
Early on I sweared to myself I would never ever collect any cards illustrated by 5ban Graphics. I used to have very strong feelings against Ryo Ueda’s style. That pokemon cards should be about artists using hand drawing and craft to bring life into our little creatures.
But recently I’ve started to collect XY/BW full arts SR and ex era holo border cards…and so had to come to terms and appreciate the existence in my collection of computer generated illustrations…I even think some ex era cards might be the best looking cards ever made…
The hobby is about the people and not about the cards themselves. I have realized that I feel more contended by the friends I have made rather than the cards I have collected. For me, this was by far the best “side effect” of getting into this hobby.
I used to be so strategic about everything. Now I’ve realized that you should really focus on the cards you truly want over cards that you would like to have that may be rarer/show up less but you dont like as much as others.
Man your posts today are my exact thoughts! I realized around 2017 or so that sharing your collection has a cost. Not to discourage anyone, as it might partly be my unique position as an unintended influencer, but being private can protect your enjoyment. Similarly to how using less social media is better for your mental health.
learning who to trust and why to trust people took many years and more than a couple dollars to figure out. Seems like something that just comes with time
· There is no one grading company that is consistently better than the others, and you should absolutely switch who you grade with if you’re unhappy with the output of your current company of choice.
· You can’t catch em’ all irl, save that for the video games.
· Secrecy & privacy is key, you only make more issues for yourself down the line if you’re always highlighting what you’re currently amassing.
Funny you’d say that, since when I started ten years ago, I didn’t cared about condition at all, and these days, I still don’t care too much about condition except for centering.
If a card is too off-centered, I deem it a minor misprint and will also get a non-OC one for my collection.
(I also try to do the same with very minor ink dots and holo bleeds, but unfortunately a lot of cards aren’t even available without holo bleed..)
I really disliked a lot of ultra modern. Over the last couple years I’ve grown to like it a lot more. There are a bunch of old and new illustrators crushing it in the current era.
I remember being around for the BW era release in 2011 and I thought the hobby was dead for sure. I hated the new BW style of holos, and the art just felt SO uninspiring compared to the cool stuff in the late stage WOTC and ex era (just my personal opinion). I thought Pokemon was just going in a terrible direction and if they kept going in this uninspired direction, the hobby would die. Today, they just keep putting out amazing art set after set. I truly think if they keep putting out these amazing alt arts, art rares, SIRs, etc, the hobby can’t help but grow.
