Sunday, November 4, 2007
rarer than Rare?
One thing I'd noticed in collecting the first two sets of Heroclix under the new set construction - Avengers and Justice League - is that it can be a pain in the ass to collect the cardboard items that are the 6th element in a booster. With Mutations and Monsters that's about to go up a notch.
This isn't at all a doomsaying post, but just something I think it's important for people to anticipate as they look towards collecting the new set starting in less than three weeks.
We all know that under the new set structure the Super Rares have become chase pieces. Certainly not at the rarified level of the at least questionable (I'm trying to be charitable here and not turn the thread down a side-path) move they did with Supernova and Origin, but most people who weren't either very lucky or had LEs to trade have found it difficult to collect a complete set of SRs. No news there. At that level we're still watching for the list to be filled in so we can see which ones are likely to be hot and which are less likely to be seen as solid trade material.
Also, I'm sure I'm not the only one who's noticed that collecting a complete set of cardboard elements from Avengers and Justice League didn't tend to prove easy, all the less so if one wanted to gather multiples of any of them. The new booster design dropped their occurrence noticeably now that there's only 1 per every 5 clix instead of 1 per 4.
In both Justice League and Avengers we had 18 of what I'll refer to as 6th element items (something beyond the 5 clix in a booster, which for those first two sets were only cardboard), and as noted above I'd never had as much difficulty getting a complete set of cardboard, including some multiples of interesting Feats, in any set before the structure change. Once I heard about the Events Dials being in the same slot I'd hoped they would trim other card elements so that we at least would only be dealing with the same level of difficulty.
Not so, it appears.
With Mutations and Monsters, it seems, the mathematics of the set are going to make accumulating multiples, especially more than two, of any of the 6th element bits (not that one would have much use for more than one of the Event Dials or even BFCs, but objects, Feats and perhaps a few of the bystanders may become sought after as multiples) more difficult than any earlier set.
I'm estimating roughly 23-25 of these elements in M&M, so even if meticulously distributed through a case (and we know they've done this before when they set their minds to it) that still wouldn't be a complete set of 6th element pieces in a case. Chances are, it won't be that even-handed. As with the Super Rares these elements won't have a parity of value, so the poor shmuck whose luck brings him a plethora of bystanders and maybe BFCs and a deficit of the other items is likely to find it difficult to trade those extras directly for Feats, Objects and perhaps even Event Dials.
I'm figuring 7 bystanders, 3 BFCs, 2 Special Objects, 6 Event Dials and 6 Feats, the last based on partially pulled information found on a Spanish Heroclix site - so that's 24 pieces occurring in that extra spot beyond the 5 clix in a booster. Since there are only 16 Rares and they, too, are 1 per booster, the individual 6th element pieces are now solidly, technically rarer than Rare. (We won't discuss the three LE Feats that will be out there, because whether they're there to be won or handed out as participation pieces they're not going to be in boosters, so they're not part of this discussion.)
So, for now, I'm just mentioning that collectors/players should keep in mind that what's of value in the set may be changing in a way that may seem odd. Most of the Commons, Uncommons and Rares under the new set structure have dropped in trade value. I'm expecting Cuckoos and perhaps Korg, who could be viewed as a generic in some circles despite the specific name, will hold more trade value, but most of the rest will be fairly easily found and soon will be lightly esteemed by the average clix buyer. The 6th element bits, though, I'm suspecting more of those will be sought after. During the summer and early fall events I increasingly saw people causally giving away commons, uncommons and even rares, considering them so worthless and not useful in the least for trading for the pieces they really wanted (the SRs) that they didn't even try lining up a trade. Some where that way with the cardboard, too. I'm... just advising that you may want to revise your estimate of what trading value these extra bits beyond the clix may end up having before you go tossing things away because you have an outdated illusion that they will be very easy to come by.
One thing I'd noticed in collecting the first two sets of Heroclix under the new set construction - Avengers and Justice League - is that it can be a pain in the ass to collect the cardboard items that are the 6th element in a booster. With Mutations and Monsters that's about to go up a notch.
This isn't at all a doomsaying post, but just something I think it's important for people to anticipate as they look towards collecting the new set starting in less than three weeks.
We all know that under the new set structure the Super Rares have become chase pieces. Certainly not at the rarified level of the at least questionable (I'm trying to be charitable here and not turn the thread down a side-path) move they did with Supernova and Origin, but most people who weren't either very lucky or had LEs to trade have found it difficult to collect a complete set of SRs. No news there. At that level we're still watching for the list to be filled in so we can see which ones are likely to be hot and which are less likely to be seen as solid trade material.
Also, I'm sure I'm not the only one who's noticed that collecting a complete set of cardboard elements from Avengers and Justice League didn't tend to prove easy, all the less so if one wanted to gather multiples of any of them. The new booster design dropped their occurrence noticeably now that there's only 1 per every 5 clix instead of 1 per 4.
In both Justice League and Avengers we had 18 of what I'll refer to as 6th element items (something beyond the 5 clix in a booster, which for those first two sets were only cardboard), and as noted above I'd never had as much difficulty getting a complete set of cardboard, including some multiples of interesting Feats, in any set before the structure change. Once I heard about the Events Dials being in the same slot I'd hoped they would trim other card elements so that we at least would only be dealing with the same level of difficulty.
Not so, it appears.
With Mutations and Monsters, it seems, the mathematics of the set are going to make accumulating multiples, especially more than two, of any of the 6th element bits (not that one would have much use for more than one of the Event Dials or even BFCs, but objects, Feats and perhaps a few of the bystanders may become sought after as multiples) more difficult than any earlier set.
I'm estimating roughly 23-25 of these elements in M&M, so even if meticulously distributed through a case (and we know they've done this before when they set their minds to it) that still wouldn't be a complete set of 6th element pieces in a case. Chances are, it won't be that even-handed. As with the Super Rares these elements won't have a parity of value, so the poor shmuck whose luck brings him a plethora of bystanders and maybe BFCs and a deficit of the other items is likely to find it difficult to trade those extras directly for Feats, Objects and perhaps even Event Dials.
I'm figuring 7 bystanders, 3 BFCs, 2 Special Objects, 6 Event Dials and 6 Feats, the last based on partially pulled information found on a Spanish Heroclix site - so that's 24 pieces occurring in that extra spot beyond the 5 clix in a booster. Since there are only 16 Rares and they, too, are 1 per booster, the individual 6th element pieces are now solidly, technically rarer than Rare. (We won't discuss the three LE Feats that will be out there, because whether they're there to be won or handed out as participation pieces they're not going to be in boosters, so they're not part of this discussion.)
So, for now, I'm just mentioning that collectors/players should keep in mind that what's of value in the set may be changing in a way that may seem odd. Most of the Commons, Uncommons and Rares under the new set structure have dropped in trade value. I'm expecting Cuckoos and perhaps Korg, who could be viewed as a generic in some circles despite the specific name, will hold more trade value, but most of the rest will be fairly easily found and soon will be lightly esteemed by the average clix buyer. The 6th element bits, though, I'm suspecting more of those will be sought after. During the summer and early fall events I increasingly saw people causally giving away commons, uncommons and even rares, considering them so worthless and not useful in the least for trading for the pieces they really wanted (the SRs) that they didn't even try lining up a trade. Some where that way with the cardboard, too. I'm... just advising that you may want to revise your estimate of what trading value these extra bits beyond the clix may end up having before you go tossing things away because you have an outdated illusion that they will be very easy to come by.
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