I think it’s unnecessary. As we already see, lacking a 1st Edition print doesn’t do anything nowadays to effect collecting since we have the sub-standards of Rare, Super Rare, Holo Rare, Ultra Rare, Prerelease etc. Add on people who want Graded Cards and we already have several other Tiers of rarity. 1st Edition does nothing, and if anything, I’m sure lacking it ensures a larger collector base overall - those concerned about their wallet and those who do not.
I can’t but think that 1st edition coming back would just be another gimic. It would really be dependent on the print run. Something interesting could be that you can only pull 1st edition cards from pre release kits. At least we’d have an idea of print runs
I’m under the impression the 1999-2000 unlimited print run was smaller than the 1st Edition print run, ignoring theme deck cards. A few people believe the Shadowless print run to be smaller than 1st Edition also. 1st Edition still commands a premium because of the stamp.
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tpci does not care about the secondary market or collectors. theyre main goal as a company is selling product to 10 yr olds to play the game with. rainbow rares are there to bling out decks and keep up the chase for players. personally i think theyve got it really well balanced in terms of chase right now. its really hsrd to pull a charizard still but your not gonna go broke making a deck to play with.
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It’s a debated topic, though I personally feel that they may be rarer, more so due to the fact not a lot of people know of their existence. But what we do know for a fact - at least from second-had accounts - is that just because you have a 1999-2000 (aka Base 200 according to @styluspt ) box doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ll get 1999-2000 holos, similar with the booster packs or theme decks. Here are some accounts on that very subject of whether 1999-2000 is rarer than Shadowless or 1st Edition:
@cman : “Assuming that the print runs had the same quantity of packs made, yes. I actually think that fewer 1999-2000 packs were made since they were targeting a smaller market (Europe).”
@mikejofthecoast : “To your question as if it is rarer then the rest, in my two years of collecting I have come across more 1st edition and shadowless cards in collections ive bought then UK 1999-2000 print run cards.
Ive gotten holo rares, rares, uncommons, commons, and energys in 1st edition through base unlimited print runs. But I’ve never gotten a holo rare in UK 1999-2000 print run. I’ve never checked for UK 1990-2000 energies though.
So from my personal collecting experience, the UK 1999-2000 print run has been rarer then the others.”
@pichufan : "I’m very curious as to how spread throughout the UK this release was. Base Set came out in the UK when I was at school and myself and my friends remained heavily interested in the TCG from Base Set up until Neo Genesis. Base Set was by far the most popular of the sets when I was growing up and I’m fairly certain every single kid at my school had their own Base Set cards.
I’ve had a look this evening through my childhood collection and not a single one of over 500 cards I still own, including the theme deck holos, have the 1999-2000 copyright date. Every single one is 1999. At school I must have made well over a thousand trades with people of all different ages from all different backgrounds, yet not a single one of my cards I stil own has this copyright date. This to me implies that either London and its surrounding areas (where I grew up) did not see this release widely distributed, or simply that these cards weren’t released in England at all.
I’d find it very odd to have somehow missed obtaining any of these cards, especially as my parents supported by TCG addiction from 1999 right up to when I lost interest in 2002 or so. I feel that it’s possibly quite the misconception to assume that this was the UK release as that doesn’t appear to be the case at all."
Mtg is doing collector boxes with a much higher price point and I don’t like it. It creates an inflated demand for this product versus the regular product, which is tanking. If they stick to the original formula of a limited 1st edition release, followed by the unlimited release all at the same price point, it’ll help. The stamp part they can figure out. I don’t think it’s economical to do different designs. It’s too difficult to balance. We already have a billion variants. That’s the last thing we want…
So your suggestion would be for 1st edition cards to be placed within the unlimited boxes (thus, no need for the 1st edition boxes?) That’s rather intriguing, as that would sort of emulate the whole Charlie and the Chocolate Factory model, to an extent.
I see a problem with the return of 1st Edition boxes. While it would be cool, I think some distributors would just hoard the 1st edition boxes to later sell at a premium while instead selling the unlimited variant immediately. The fact that we can look back at WOTC 1st edition and see the higher price it commands now, makes it hard for me to believe that companies would distribute new 1st edition product in an organic “earliest orders are fulfilled with 1st edition product” kind of way.
Also, what someone mentioned earlier about master set collections having so many cards already with the sets being enormous.
That’s what I was thinking about the distributors hoarding possible 1st edition boxes. That’s actually a fairy brilliant point 