Buyers Market Now? • Collecting General

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Buyers Market Now?
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Badmike
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Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 4:47 pm

A post in the collecting appraisal section got me thinking: What system is way undervalued right now for collecting purposes? Duke spoke that Metagaming prices were some of the lowest right now that he'd ever seen. Any other systems that are great to collect right now?

I'll throw one in: Shadowrun. Although never valued that much, there were a few individual items (Universal Brotherhood, Bug City, Tir Na Nog) that went for over $50.....now you could probably buy an entire Shadowrun set for dirt cheap. I don't think there is a single Shadowrun item you couldn't get for under $30. Whether or not value will ever go up in the system is debatable, but I bet that at some point it will be republished again.

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Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 6:27 pm

I think Judges Guild has been undervalued for a while.

Not the Wilderness or City State publications, but what we think of as "commons." There are some items that excited only yawns a year or so ago that are gone from Ebay now. When is the last time you saw a listing for Ravenscrag or The Maltese Clue? What about The Treasure Vaults of Lindoran or Verbosh?

Not even Castle Book I or Castbook II come up that much any more.

Other than that...I actually don't want to say... :wink:

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jasonw1239
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Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 6:49 pm

I think you are correct on the JG observation.
I am not seeing nearly as many things like Tarantis that used to come up on a regular basis.

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Kingofpain89
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Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 8:09 pm

From what I have noticed the classic Traveller, MegaTraveller, and New Era items seem to be undervalued for the most part right now. It also looks like sellers are still using prices from a couple of years ago and very little is being sold using BINs. And some of the high-dollar items have dropped in price significantly this year. Just a few examples:

** expired/removed eBay auction **

** expired/removed eBay auction **

** expired/removed eBay auction **

** expired/removed eBay auction **

The Starship Operator's Manual and the more uncommon Paranoia Press items (Beyond, Vanguard Reaches) would usually hit between $30 - $40 even when they werent in perfect condition. 101 Robots was easily a $100 item. And Azhanti High Lightning was usually a good performer and would fetch upwards of $80 or $90.

Some of the D20 and GURPS Traveller items are still selling well but for the most part it looks like a lot of it has lost steam. Its good to know that a few items still see some action:

** expired/removed eBay auction **

** expired/removed eBay auction **

A lot of the digests and fanzines continue to sell well too.

** expired/removed eBay auction **

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JasonZavoda
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Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 8:09 pm

Badmike wrote:A post in the collecting appraisal section got me thinking: What system is way undervalued right now for collecting purposes? Duke spoke that Metagaming prices were some of the lowest right now that he'd ever seen. Any other systems that are great to collect right now?

I'll throw one in: Shadowrun. Although never valued that much, there were a few individual items (Universal Brotherhood, Bug City, Tir Na Nog) that went for over $50.....now you could probably buy an entire Shadowrun set for dirt cheap. I don't think there is a single Shadowrun item you couldn't get for under $30. Whether or not value will ever go up in the system is debatable, but I bet that at some point it will be republished again.

Mike B.

I think Metagaming RPGs (which have a much different sales history than their microgames) are great series to collect but Melee, Wizard, death test, etc... haven't been going cheap by any means.

I do agree about Shadowrun, though I think you need to seperate the more sought after from the run of the mill.

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Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 10:28 pm

Well I can really only comment on what I watch, and that's Judges Guild. I don't think its undervalued at the moment, rather not being sold as readily.

I actually think 3.x maybe the items to look out for as undervalued, especially modules, if Pathfinder RPG really takes off. Have no bases on that, just an opinion.

Oh and maybe Thieves Guild :wink:

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mbassoc2003
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Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 4:08 am

On the flip side of the coin, we have seen the highest ever prices paid for D&D fanzines, almost across the board, and very high prices for UK non-TSR like Tortured Souls! and the CDM Series. This doesn't seem to have rubbed off onto the UK magazines, but with the current economy, and the pound still fairly strong, it is a little unexpected.

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SoulCatcher78
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Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 8:29 am

This week looks like it'll be a good test of the theory. A bunch of Judges Guild stuff just got listed on Ebay from Kristy's Kollectibles so we'll get an idea of how many folks are in a buying mood.

ashmire13
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Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 8:55 am

I know from what I have been watching in the UK, there isn't a huge market it seems, although the recent big items went well.
(see JG forum)

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TheHistorian
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Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 10:06 am

From a slightly different viewpoint on the topic title... yes, I think overall it is a buyer's market right now. A lot of collections are coming available (some good, some not even close) and some oddball items are coming up as well. And I think prices are down overall because of this (not for big ticket rares of course, those are generally immune in any collectibles field). I feel that I've been seeing a lot interesting items and having a lot of chances to not have to overpay to buy the more common items. Maybe the market has always been like this (my return to D&D collecting is pretty recent), but it SEEMS plentiful.

FormCritic
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Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 6:47 pm

TheHistorian wrote:From a slightly different viewpoint on the topic title... yes, I think overall it is a buyer's market right now. A lot of collections are coming available (some good, some not even close) and some oddball items are coming up as well. And I think prices are down overall because of this (not for big ticket rares of course, those are generally immune in any collectibles field). I feel that I've been seeing a lot interesting items and having a lot of chances to not have to overpay to buy the more common items. Maybe the market has always been like this (my return to D&D collecting is pretty recent), but it SEEMS plentiful.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... NA:US:1123

So, in the midst of a Buyer's Market we have this auction....for an item that was around $20 when I started bidding in 2004.

I believe that part of the rush over this one was that these are coming up less and less often.

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faro
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Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 6:58 pm

FormCritic wrote:
** expired/removed eBay auction **

So, in the midst of a Buyer's Market we have this auction....for an item that was around $20 when I started bidding in 2004.

I believe that part of the rush over this one was that these are coming up less and less often.

Nice price...

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TheHistorian
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Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 11:05 pm

FormCritic wrote:So, in the midst of a Buyer's Market we have this auction....for an item that was around $20 when I started bidding in 2004.

Nothing is 100%.

I'm just saying that I feel like I've seen (and won) many tougher items recently, for less than conventional wisdom says they should go for.

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Posted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 1:33 am

faro wrote:Nice price...

Should have looked harder. Thought this was just for First Fantasy Campaign.

$45 for each publication is still pretty good for the seller.

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bbarsh
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Posted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 7:42 am

I think I posted the lack of Judges Guild items on ebay about a month ago. I thought it was a problem with my search results.

It is really hard to determine what is going on with prices right now. The only thing I can say is that there is very little consistency anymore. Prices seem to swing wildly - even on the most common things. I know that has always been the case to some degree - hence our silliest price thread. Modules have always been a consistent seller. Now they go unsold for $5 with cheap shipping. Again, not all the time, but the frequency of low prices for general TSR modules is definately up. Of course this could be due to postal fees go up every few months...

But on the other side, I have noticed that general 1e HCs have actually increased, in general, over the past year.

And I could've bought these damn modules off the 1$ rack!!!

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red_bus
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Posted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 4:05 pm

bbarsh wrote:It is really hard to determine what is going on with prices right now. The only thing I can say is that there is very little consistency anymore. ...

I would absolutely second that for Chulhu and also MERP, although some of the 2nd ed MERP stuff has been high for a while.

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Kingofpain89
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Posted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 5:51 pm

This Traveller lot went super cheap.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... 0360300115

Damn I wish I hadnt just dropped a crap load of money into car repairs.

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JohnGaunt
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Posted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 6:02 pm

Kingofpain89 wrote:This Traveller lot went super cheap.

** expired/removed eBay auction **

Damn I wish I hadnt just dropped a crap load of money into car repairs.

Should have told the rest of us so we could have bid it up to a reasonable price!

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