…if the resellers didn’t buy it there would be stock available from the source. If there’s not enough stock from the source, every item sitting in a reseller’s inventory is an item not in the hands of someone who appreciates it for more than its monetary value.
1 Like
Haha! Seriously though not caring about the money is what allowed me to be first to market for those life changing deals. I’d be just as happy if prices stayed the same.
2 Likes
i would say that is more scalping that reselling. if someone goes and clears out target of all the modern product just hold off on buying until they are forced to liquidate all of that stuff is race to the bottom anyway.
On topic post. A+ 
I’m going to beat this tin horse a little bit more.
“Zero” is a hyperbole. Things would never go to absolute 0 barring apocalyptic events. But if things got as cheap as my lands collection (pennies) I would love the chance to hold 'em!
This. We’re not talking about antiseptics or toilet paper…
Cards loses appeal when their population increases past a certain level.
2 Likes
Desire for set cohesion is moot without sufficient chase cards of popular Pokémon
e.g.
- Emerging Powers (gen 5-only set)
- Dragon Majesty (Dragon set, but no Rayquaza and Charizard is only a holo)
- Shiny Treasure ex (159 shiny Pokémon set, but only 4 AR & 3 SAR Pokémon for a high class set)
3 Likes
I like. But IS this unpopular? I sense a need for a poll…
…Though, Emerging Powers didn’t have a set identity. It’s idendity was so bad, I barely remembered that it was THAT set… 
Here’s a hot take
I dont like Pikachu. I think it’s the Mary Poppins of the pokemon world. It’s actually one of my least favorite pokemon
I understand they need a cutesy child friendly mascot, but the power level in the anime is wild
I also didnt like that they wouldnt let pika evolve. I much prefer raichu. Thats a pokemon I can actually jive with being powerful and it’s still small and cute, but is way cooler imo
Pokémon’s entire gimmick is evolution. They should have let Raichu evolve in season one and let him be the mascot
Or
Accept that it’s a weak Pokémon and quit constantly putting him up against (and going toe to toe with) legendaries and ubers
whenever i pull a big Pikachu card, I sell it immediately unless im collecting the set. Not a fan
3 Likes
I think I prefer this as a stronger unpopular opinion.
I always believed the entire gimmick of Pokemon in terms of themes and messaging is Friendship and companionship. In the anime specifically loyalty, hard work and persistence which brings you great results in the end.
Cheers!
11 Likes
Set cards with trophy card prices
I understand they were short printed and rare within their sets and that the artstyle was absolute DaVinci. I also grew up with Goldstars so I am nostalgic for them as well.
At the same time I see better value in a 1/5000 limited promo and most of those are currently $100-300, whereas your average shining, crystal, Goldstar set card goes for $500-5000.
Ex: I could buy two get campaign Rayquazas for the price of one gold star charizard.
7 Likes
Do you think there are more than 5000 Charizard 
today in near-mint or mint condition?
2 Likes
I am not considering conditional rarity, but I would assume that the amount of goldstars that were damaged was proportionate to the amount of triple get lottery promos that were damaged given that they were both released pre-pokemon boom. The difference is one is a mass-produced set card and the other had a known, limited print run. Please share if I am wrong to assume so.
Were any goldstars used competitively? A factor like that would result in disproportionate wear.
Charizard total PSA pop is 2,991. A significant number are probably regrades or crossgrades. Mew from the same set is pop 1,779
For the Rayquaza, I’m assuming your talking about the shiny one 075/L-P. Total pop is 328 (156 being PSA 10, vs 99 for Charizard )
The dynamics are that the Rayquaza is harder to find (most copies are probably still floating around silently in Japan), in generally better condition and easier to grade. The total number produced isn’t too useful of a metric, more useful is what’s actually available out there. A crude estimate from the pop tells us Charizard is ~6-10x more available than Rayquaza 075 (though the Rayquaza 075 is actually far more available in PSA 10 than Charizard )
It is not this simple, but if we believe that Charizard is 12-20x more popular than Rayquaza 075 (which is pretty reasonable imo) then the 2x difference in price starts to make sense.
Ultimately, the average collector outside of japan would probably not recognize Rayquaza 075 but would know what Charizard is. Paradoxically, some cards are too rare for their own good and end up suffering simply because most people to even know what they are.
9 Likes
I’m no expert but quite a few gold stars were at least usable, with several being highly playable. Latias , Mew and Jolteon were all used within World Championship winning decks. In fact E4 member @dylan was the winner who caused the Mew to be reprinted in the World Champ decks!
Rayquaza was also playable as a powerful counter towards decks which tried to use lots of Pokemon-ex.
Here’s a really good write-up of the history of competitive Pokemon TCG by another former world champion. I haven’t read all of it, but it has a detailed section on the ex-era which I found super interesting! 
8 Likes
No wonder Dylan knows so much
1 Like
If you think gold stars are overpriced for the reasons you mentioned, i want to know what your opinion is on a $500+ psa 10 pop 20.000 alt art👀
4 Likes
Not to put this thread too far off topic, but a little rundown on exactly how playable each GS was in its playable era:
Mainstream playable: Latias, Mew
These are probably the only two GS cards that were playable enough to significantly impact their pop. Latias was a pretty staple attacker in LBS throughout 2006, but never saw much play after. Mew was good at a few points in its playable life, especially as a counter to DP Infernape at US Nationals in 2007. Mew was fringe playable in 2008, Rainbow Wave was particularly good in Empoleon mirrors. It carried my top 8 match at worlds that year. I’d guess that a few hundred copies of each got played during this time.
Fringe playable: Ray, Latios, Jolteon (in that order)
While Jolteon showed up in two WC decks, Jolteon was never mainstream in these decks beforehand, especially in 2008 Gardevoir. Latios was important in a deck called MSNBC in 2007, it used Meganium ex to power a toolbox of attackers, but it’s no Blastoise and was never very popular. Ray was solid in decks that use Dragonite delta and Electrode ex. Accessibility was a problem with Ray 18 years ago too. Not many people ran it, it was seen as optional.
Vaporeon saw super niche play in Flygon ex decks to fix some math in the mirror match. The rest are basically unplayable. That’s about it.
NOW if you want to get into Japanese, Alakazam is probably #1. LBS style decks were playable for much longer, and Alakazam ended up being a great attacker when you could Skill Copy a Lugia ex without exposing a two-prize attacker to danger.
20 Likes
Limited promos hold no nostalgia to 99.9% of the Pokemon market. It’s far easier to argue they’re overvalued since their biggest thing is scarcity
6 Likes