Thats very fair as well! If youre only buying a few cards here n there, then it probably doesnt make as much sense to pay for a membership and go through the effort of grading. If you collect a lot of graded modern tho, I think it can definitely be worth it and you can save money!
@darkapples its card rush!
Definitely, 9 times outta 10 for modern graded with me is I buy the card raw and wait for my next sub. More cost effective that way.
Along with what I said above, I could also see people who are 10 or bust paying that premium as opposed to grading themselves to just for the piece of mind of having the grade they want.
Maybe i messed up, were you talking about psa count?
Yeah, but I’m not sure what you meant.
What did you mean by in the short term there is no shortage but at the same time 5k is low?
And then, the second statement as well.
Obviously a card with say 10-50 PSA 10s would be low now and in the future but what is high if the amount of people in the hobby continues to increase? That 10 would become ultra low or whatever but then it does require people to continually be interested in those cards.
Those Munch and etc promos I think have over 1,000 copies as PSA 10 compared to a Sugimori holo from the beginning, but already I think the younger generations or rather new generations of collectors don’t care about substandard art which they have no nostalgic ties.
Substandard art? 
That one hurt. 
Well we all can agree that a psa count of less than 100 will always be low pop no matter what.
Now to the Munch part, those are “low pop” in modern standards, an extremely popular art/promo, with just barely over 1k (the Mimikyu) that released on 2018.
And sure nostalgia is the first hook for you but eventually the longer you stay within the hobby, the more likely you’ll get deeper into other cards.
You are totally betting that demand will always be high and forever increasing, which is fine but that’s why i mentioned how many years are you planning to be in the hobby, so for the past 2 years modern has been extremely hot but how can we know those will be always hot?
It boils down to you betting on ever growing demand, if im speculating, id feel safer speculating on numbers (including some sort of price history) of at least 5+ years.
Absolute molten lava, surface of the sun hot take that you would call the Munch promos substandard art
I have to log off for a bit, I’m getting my jimmies rustled here
I think @bk2021 was suggesting that the early WoTC-era cards have substandard art and that the Munch promos are exceptional.
I meant Sugimori not Munch lol.
@Dyl I have nostalgia for the WOTC sets, but those that don’t. I cannot see how they could be comparable. Something like Arita Charizard, Venusaur, Clefable etc I can see people appreciating, but Mewtwo, Raichu, Snorlax etc.
And without the holofoil it becomes even worse, and at least those sets have nostalgia. Seeing Sugimori art in Sun and Moon looks so bad.
We can’t know of course, but as much as art is subjective, when you take out nostalgia, a full art illustration will more often than not look better than one in a small frame, or one with stock art.
Although it is much safer to bet on those cards with price history, at the same time, I feel like most collectors don’t eventually want to chase trophy cards etc. It’s bad CGI, it looks bad etc. I’m not saying that current modern cards prices will surpass the old cards or really rare cards, I think they are a different collector altogether.
Collectorbases mature, appreciation of the TCG history increases, the older the TCG gets the more historic WOTC becomes, demand goes up. Nostalgia plays a significant role in collecting but it’s not everything. You can take pretty much every other class of collectables as an example of this.
I hate to generalize, but all of the young folk that I’ve met at card shows could care less about the art. They just want STONKS and popular items to show off to their friends. The popular items are influenced by hype and exposure on social media, not necessarily art.
A great example of this is how cheap the Aerodactyl Alt Art is compared to the Umbreon VMAX Alt Art. The younger crowd just wants the Umbreon because it says Umbreon. The Aerodactyl Alt Art is much better in terms of artistic composition and story.
You may be right, I don’t live in the US so it’s not as ubiquitous but even though there are many STONKers today, some % would translate to real fans/collectors down the line.
As I’ve mentioned before, I came back in mid/late 2021 and the first cards I wanted to collect were the Sun & Moon tag team alts. My experience ends at e-Series, packs even before that during Neo Revelation, and even then, when I first bought cards to finish my set in 2012, I only went for missing holos/cards in Base, Jungle and Fossil.
Now looking back at all the eras I missed, would I collect cards from Team Aqua Vs Team Magma? No, they almost all look horrid. Compare that to Team Rocket Returns. Obviously the holos were more common than ex cards, but once again, EX era holos, at least non-Sugimori ones can look pretty great compared to the bad ex CGI.
I think I’ve lost my point, but it was supposed to be the art also matters, not just the rarity.
I think the best thing about Pokemon is that there is something for everyone. Some are drawn to the art, the rarity, the playability, and certainly the sTonKaBILitY.
I agree with you that the art style is influential. For example, I don’t collect prime cards because I think that they are ugly/gimmicky. Another great example is the recent downturn of full art rainbow rares. They used to be prized (looking at you Charizard and Pikachu VMAX), but now have been thrown to the wayside in lieu of Alt Arts.
It’s not a young person thing. In economics, increasing prices generally reduces demand. However in this case, higher prices generate demand because it makes the card seem more desirable. This can be due to the fact that it:
I’m not sure if Pokemon cards quality, but we’re describing a Veblen good here unless I’m mistaken.
Very nooby question, but how do you find the Grade A condition cards? All I can find are A- or lower…
Cards with ‘stateless’ condition are supposedly mint