Nice topic @joer! It was nice reading the stories behind the avatars.
My avatar was done by @cullers. I thought it would be cool to have all three of them together, partly since completing the 1997 pikas was one of my bigger achievements.
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My Avatar is just a picture of my 1st edition fossil booster box. It was my first big purchase getting back into the hobby so it’s meaningful to me!
After reading this thread I’m considering coming up with something new for my Avatar! Something permanent! I just don’t know what yet.
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My avatar is from the first episode of the anime, when Ash sees Ho-Oh. This scene always resonated with me as a kid; even as a adult, I still get goosebumps every time I watch it.
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When I got back into collecting I started with the evo zard. At one point they were selling for as low as $3. I bought all the ones I could find at that price. Would also go into stores and look for gem mint caliber ones and buy all those.
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Thank you @smpratte. My avatar actually dates back to when I was a writer for now defunct super smash brothers site “allisbrawl.com”. Loved my little black and white sketch, but having talented students to lend a hand is great.
The art in some of these avatars is truly amazing and it’s super fascinating how there are so many stories to go with others. I love the mix of emotions versus creativity. Some are favorite cards, some memories and some are just feelings put to paper. Even the ones for simple fun are great! Bravo ladies and gentlemen!
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For a second I thought I had original thread topic idea but lo and behold it already exists 
Mine is pretty simple. I was watching South Park when I created my account and I needed a username. I picked one of my favorite characters for my username and used a picture of said character for my avatar.
I’m hoping others share their avatar origin story. I see many that I assume are a reference to something I’m unfamiliar with 
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My profile pic is from a Canadian freelance artist named MinueCharm or Ashley Sloan. Super talented. Dropping their links below if you would like to support them.
Here is the original post from October 2016!
Tumblr: https://minue-art.tumblr.com
IG: https://www.instagram.com/ditsy.ashley/
Twitter: https://x.com/minuecharm
LinkTree: @Minuecharm | Linktree
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@Dyl that’s awesome! I had no your Dragonite was a commissioned piece. Their art is great! Very talented.
@c0ll3ct0r I’m glad you responded because your avatar was one I had in mind. Unfortunately I’m not familiar with this fella. Care to elaborate?
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John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, the author who invented the character in my avatar, the Witch-king of Angmar. The smoking is a happy coincidence, the eyes are for flavor.
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Oh, it wasn’t commissioned by me… I stole it from the internet. 
That’s why I try to advertise the artist when anyone brings it up!
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My avatar is simply the sketch Arita made for me in 2017. I love Dark Flareon and I hate that there isn’t a holographic version of him.
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Ashley Sloan burned a copy of Good News For People Who Love Bad News by Modest Mouse on her MacBook Pro for me in our high school leadership class
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Mine is a little drawing that I made myself, trying to replicate the Sugimori style used in the og anime: then I photoshopped it on a cosmo holo background.
It didn’t turn out that good honestly, but I still decided to use it.
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Mine is an open portal into the heart of the current Hahbee to which I’ve also adjoined a complementing profile header picture.
Gholdengo is a Pokemon made of currency, travels around on a golden surfboard, and is the only character that can learn the move “Make it Rain”, while prancing about like a dreadlock-laden Chad. It is also the 1,000th Pokemon, with its design reminiscent of an unofficial and almost passive-aggressive acknowledgement by TPC of its facilitation of one of the most lucrative iNvEsTMENt vEhiCleS of modern times. It is an amalgamation of the fictional IP with its real-world economic aftereffects. In other words, $tonks are now canon.
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Pin this one because nobody ever knows
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Mine is a Yugioh card called Green Baboon, Defender of the Forest.
When I was in middle school I frequented various sites for Japanese Yugioh releases and tournament results. Several decks intrigued me that weren’t available in North America due to Konami’s strange release schedule. If you didn’t know, certain cards were in Japan for many years before they made their way to the US.
One of the decks I saw was an aggressive deck fearing beast type monsters and Skill Drain that turned off abilities (think of Garbotoxin or Cessation Crystal in Pokemon). Forest Guardian Green Baboon (its Japanese name at the time) was a gigantic 2600 attack beater that had no real effect while in play, but could recur itself from the graveyard whenever a beast you control was destroyed (it could also summon itself from the hand too). For whatever reason this is the Japanese deck that stood out to me the most as a 13 year old.
Fast forward a couple years or so and Baboon finally got a release in the U.S., but it was immediately limited to 1 copy per deck instead of the 3 per deck like I saw when I was younger. I didn’t care. Was so stoked to finally have it in hand. I tested a lot with my team and came up with a Baboon deck that worked pretty well. Myself and another team member took the same deck to a Nashville regional and both made top 8.
Not too long afterwards, an official Konami ruling change went into effect that stated Baboon’s effect couldn’t be used during the damage step. This was really unfortunate since his effect to revive himself from the graveyard or put into play from your hand could no longer trigger from a beast type monster being destroyed in battle. It’s hard to explain the significance of this unless you’re deep into Yugioh, but it more or less killed Baboon’s playability on the spot.
RIP monke
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My pfp is made by Anavae_ru on instagram, a super great guy and i wanted a piece made by him, at a time it felt like a perfect profile photo to have here, still does 
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