Pokemon Center Says More “Destined Rivals” Product Coming!

gymleaderorion said:
I mentioned this in another post a bit back. What is a reprint if it means scalpers are still going to raid the site with purchasing bots? Couldn't have said it any better when talking about the Covid/Logan P era. This is something completely different.

What shocks me the most is the amount of these new "fans" coming into the hobby because they see the $ amount on these products sky rocket and think "hey i can make $ on this as well" We never saw this drastic of a change in any era (SW/SH was messy, but not this messy). The fact that S/V era sets are going more or challenging SW/SH era box prices is insane to me when everybody and their mother thought the S/V era was "the end of Pokemon". Now its only about S/V for good or worse (rn for the worse).

We also see these things being scalped for far more than sets that have already gone out of print. If these buyers/investors were smart, dropping $2500 on a case of JP Glory of Team Rocket makes absolutely 0 sense when that $2500 could get you products that are truly out of stock from back in SW/SH, S&M, or XY even. Just a zoomed out perspective in that regard.

They have to print the crap out of this era or else its going to be the fanbases worst nightmare.
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I have to wonder how long this can keep up for. Like, that one guy who had 15,000 packs of JTG. Ignoring the problem of them even getting that many packs in the first place, how many people will actually want to buy JTG once Destined Rivals is out?

gigachad said:
yeah given the effectiveness of bots in line, then the huge number of bots we see might just be a few scalpers who have managed to successfully procure supply at scale, rather than tons of independent scalpers each claiming a small chunk of the supply that they’re then competing with on price with the other scalpers

ever since I saw that TCGPlayer infinite article about how it’s possible one person is controlling the supply of the Tera Greninja ex SIR from Twilight Masquerade, I always have to wonder if it’s a small group of people who have figured out to control supply
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You can really tell that there's some group of people who would choose certain cards from certain sets and manipulate the market to make them super valuable. It's been thrown into disarray now that literally every card is overvalued atm, but stuff like the IR (not even SIR!!) magikarp being worth 250 dollars seems like good proof that something has been going on. More recently, you have the IR Drowzee which shot up to nearly 100 bucks about a month ago. Let's be real, nobody even likes Drowzee.

If you ask me, the best (and funniest) solution is to just start reprinting IRs as promos. The magikarp is a regular IR. It's not that rare, and if you put some emblem or different set code on it, it's technically a different card. Knowing that any individual card is no longer safe from being reprinted will immediately hit the investor market hard, and the gambling addicts who buy from scalpers will end up discouraged. If you're using cards as an investment piece instead of a game piece, you shouldn't really be here in the first place.
 
chris.n7 said:
We go through this exact same thing every couple of years.
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I'm sorry, but I can't entirely agree with you here. I've been around since 2014, and this has only become a recent issue. Hidden Fates was the first set that was actually hard to come across. Then in 2020 with the COVID boom, things got crazy, and now with the Pocket boom we're beyond even that. This isn't "normal" compared to what a boom or a bust in the TCG market was when I was hardcore into collecting (See: Pokemon Go's release). The culture has completely shifted, and Pokemon's not quite figured out how to adapt to it. I'd like for them to. I'd like the market to correct itself. I'd like to be able to actually access products. But we're in a very abnormal time right now, and unfortunately I don't see things changing anytime soon.

Grim Thoughts said:
Please don’t leave now. The best times of the hobby was after the COVID boom, which I presume is when you left last time. The period after that was a wonderful time to be in the hobby, which you missed out on alongside all the other people that left. 2023 was my favorite year ever as a player and collector. You’re only exposing yourself to the worst periods and never the best periods with unfortunate timing combined with deciding not to wait it out. It will go back down, as the last boom did, albeit with a higher demand floor than before (but also a higher supply floor).
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I took a hiatus and sold the majority of my old collection in 2023. I got back into things after getting a new job and being able to afford a little bit more on my hobbies, I began to piece things together. I'm not fully quitting again after deciding I'd come back to things, but it's just very discouraging the situation we're all in right now, both due to internal and external factors around this. Frankly, I just miss the good old days before any of this, but I do appreciate the optimism regardless.
 
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So out of curiosity why isnt there a system that prevents the same credit card use. I have seen it on other websites where if card info is found on multiple accounts they put them on hold. I know some people will just use multiple cards, but wouldnt it at least help against the millions of bots?
 
Scoop said:
I hate to be apocalyptic, but these days truly feel like it's the death knell for the TCG as a hobby normal people can enjoy. I do hope TPCi is actually aware of how bad things are, but at the rate things are going I don't have much faith. I dunno. Even if they do print more, who's to say that the losers who scalp and bot and buy out all the stock won't get those too?

I can't see an end to this in sight. And it's sad- I got back into the TCG last year. I decided that, yes, I would drop a lot of money to enjoy this hobby again. But because I'm a normal human with a full-time job- And bills, too, it's becoming harder and harder to get the opportunity to access anything.

I'd like to be more optimistic, I really would, but this is making the Logan Paul/COVID nightmare look like a walk in the park. I've said it before, and I'll say it again, but I really do wish I could gatekeep these people out of the hobby. That's where we're at now.
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Please dont call it a logan Paul era, giving that turtle killing jack ass any attention, especially an era only feeds his ego. Just call it the covid era.
 
To be honest, at this point in time, I'm about ready to just take a break from trying to do ANYTHING in regards to the TCG. I've been having a nightmare trying to buy anything current since Surging Sparks dropped, and up until Prismatic Evolutions dropped, I didn't have to resort to making phone calls to shops on the days new products came in on the very, VERY slim chance of being able to pick something up. After spending half an hour on Thursday in a fruitless attempt to get a PE Premium box, and an HOUR today trying to get anything Destined Rivals-related, only for the website to just crap out completely on me and not load a single damn thing, I've more or less reached my limit with this, and it's heartbreaking. The shop near me hasn't had any Sparks singles in for quite some time, and I've been actively trying to hunt down a Milotic to no avail.

I'm going to make an attempt to get a box of Journey Together on Friday, but after that, I don't know when I'll make another attempt to get anything, unless I'm in the right place at the right time.
 
I just wanna tell you all again, we will get through this. We have gone through this before and we will go through us again. Call me overly optimistic but we will prevail. If we only focus on the negative aspects, we never see the goodness of this hobby. God speed yall
 
MarlinRimes said:
I just wanna tell you all again, we will get through this. We have gone through this before and we will go through us again. Call me overly optimistic but we will prevail. If we only focus on the negative aspects, we never see the goodness of this hobby. God speed yall
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I appreciate your optimism. But fact is unless pokemon absolutely floods targets and walmarts, and others of this manner, with product we are at the mercy of LGS/scalpers who have banded together in this fight. They are buying out targets and such as well, and they also have the bots. Until people stop giving them money this will continue. The way it's going is it will stop once it becomes too expensive for almost everyone to buy. Then they will lower prices, the whole time waving their "support your local game shop" banner. It sucks that all this horrid behavior is coming from someone you want to trust. It's like the ice cream man ripping you off. All because some many people joined the love of collecting and playing. Remember everybody, they have enough to make everyone happy, they just know you will pay more to get it
 
Honestly they should just stop printing gen 1 shit, if they gave love to other gens, like gen 9, 8, 7, then none of this would happen. We've had 3/4 gen 1 or popular Pokémon sets, being surging sparks (the Pikachu) prismatic in all the eeveelutions, and now destined rivals, absolutely ruining the hobby for everyone, and journey together for a lesser extent, but at least the singles are a reasonable price for that set (they're already less than most of prismatic). When they were giving Pokémon like iron crown and walking wake beautiful illustrations none of these scalpers even gave any notice to it. They keep making poor decisions in always focusing on the best of the best, and put no countermeasures to stop stuff like this happening. There's 1025 Pokémon now, why do we have to see the same 20 get chases every few sets. Make it more koraidon and miraidon, lunala, yveltal zygarde etc, cause at least then only dedicated fans and ones who enjoy the actual game will buy it. Sorry for the long ass rant but the hobby would be better without prismatic, 151, misty and team rocket
 
Journey Together has almost no Gen 1 Pokemon in the spotlight and the booster boxes are still marked up to the highest value they've been in 26 years of the game. 151 was also very easy to obtain for nearly a year after it was released. Out of Prismatic's 17 cards worth $100+ on TCGPlayer, only five are from Gen 1 (the four Eeveelution SIRs and the gold Pikachu), and seven of them are Gen 9 Pokemon. I don't think Gen 1 is the reason.
 
Frost said:
Journey Together has almost no Gen 1 Pokemon in the spotlight and the booster boxes are still marked up to the highest value they've been in 26 years of the game. 151 was also very easy to obtain for nearly a year after it was released. I don't think Gen 1 is the reason.
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All the singles in journey together are already half the price of everything in prismatic and the Pikachu from surging sparks, this set sold out in meer seconds due to it being a team rocket set, I'm sure it wouldn't have been the same if it was an Ethan, Cynthia Arven set. 151 is causing literally brawls to break out Infront of stores, prismatic and surging sparks caused everything to go to double MSRP, if everything stayed like it was from paradox to stellar crown and giving Pokémon like terapagos, the paradox mons, hydreigon, Latias milotic, gardevoir and literally everything that isn't in 151 and prismatic everything would still be fine, and then instead of all this eeveelution, team rocket and Pikachu stuff instead some old favourites like kyogre groudon, lucario, garchomp, rayquaza and then newer Pokémon like lunala and ZA stuff then everything would still be in stock and everyone could get it at a reasonable price.
 
1st time had it in my cart, couldn't enter card number.
2nd time could enter card number but buyout didn't go through (visa window didn't close after multiple checkmarks).
3rd time, was in "waiting line", did nothing for 30 minutes when it suddenly banned me.

no vpn, no bot, no script.

Absolute joke.
 
CalebVersus said:
Hype comes and goes. As brutal as things are right now, it won’t be all doom and gloom forever. Pokémon has hit another all-time popularity spike and is just going to need more time for things to pan out. Today’s queue system was a good (but flawed) step in the right direction.

If you think this is too much of a waste of time and a stresser, that’s perfectly fine and reasonable. Just put down your devices and cop some singles at your local card shop.
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Yeah I can't wait for the shit show that'll come next year for the 30th anniversary. If we think this is bad now, wait till next year
 
The UK Pokemon Center is still popping & spoinging away, glitches galore, followed by Maintenance pages, back to the Timed Queue which has finished anyway & then Security blocking access. The whole site is a mess at the moment!
 
Hey Pokemon can you also unblock me, I literally just browse on your site and I've bought like 1 etb from you. The fact your broken site still lets in thousands of bots still but permanently bans real people without warning and without reason (also after waiting an hour in a q too mind you) is disgraceful.
 
The state of the market is a combination of many factors. Most people who were here before this latest boom are still here (players, collectors, investors, manipulators, etc). The people who are exhausted, sick or have given up hope are few (the people posting are a minuscule amount of the hobby, market, or whatever it is classified as now as it isn't just a hobby anymore).

You have people/whales slide over from TCG Pocket.

Pikachu slapped on the face of a set and an Eeveelution set sure doesn't hurt demand. Once Prismatic became a hot topic it was unattainable (relatively speaking compared to prior Surging) - even then Prismatic was exponentially more available to preorder (especially the PC ETB) compared to JTG and DRI when the set was officially announced. Prismatic PC ETB was available to preorder for many many hours on November 1st - a special set without booster boxes sat there for hours where you originally could order multiple sealed cases, then down to only 1 sealed case and then to only 2 ETBs. You could easily walk away with dozens of ETBs to one address without crashing the site or queues.

I don't see it mentioned often but people also don't give enough credit to what the new Horizon show has done for the SV era of cards. Yes, Horizon has been out in Japan for some time but you can see the international release impacting sales and price too. The series is a standalone great show and it might not get talked about in various online areas dominated by the people that were already here but that series is breathing new life into the anime. The new series is a great anime on its own and provides much more depth compared to many repetitive Ash series.

You also have other external factors, like cashing on other assets at their highs, instability in the market and administrations, world politics in general, etc. Leaving a COVID era where people's attitudes have also adjusted to enjoying what is in front of them and worrying less about too far into the future when you never know what can shut things down completely and turn things upside down.

All these factors plus so many more that have led to more people in the space and the TPCI reading that we were heading into a down market and slowed the printers for a few sets starting from Paradox onwards certainly accelerated the problem. Naturally, where there is easy money to be made, they will come. That adds more gasoline to the fire. It just continues to compound until finally the bubble will burst when too many people either stop buying and the overleveraged need to bail and fire sale.

It took many factors to see this spike. It'll take a lot of factors combined to create a huge burst that is inevitable. Any historical data from past market conditions will repeat itself. These prices won't be supported forever and usually the higher the rise the harder the fall.
 
Lowkey, is there a way to publicly ridicule scalpers and those who buy massive amounts of product. There should be a sign or comment that tells ppl that a certain store is scalping or mock ppl who do it online. I believe if we can make them feel as uncomfortable to be in this space, then they will not want to do this or at least have a misrible time doing it
 
Personally I avoid Pokemon Center because they like to mark me as a bot when I'm just purchasing some plushes that nobody ever wants lol. I do feel sorry for those who wanted the exclusive ETBs though, those are just botted out of existence. I myself haven't bought a Pokemon Center ETB since Astral Radiance.

Without sounding like I'm just complaining, I wanted to stand by something I've mentioned before for the sake of clarity. The symptoms of a lot of these problems are sourced back to TPC themselves. They seem to barely take one solution at a time (if even that) and then they think it'll last for the long term (but it rarely does.)

If it's true TPC is printing more cards than ever then people will just keep arguing it's not a printing issue. Then what is? A combination of many factors but the bigger factor IMHO is by keeping pull rates so low when the sets are so large. You're not meant to ever meet that demand at that rate. TPC creates a domino effect of symptoms or otherwise outright enables it. Low pull rates means it's easier to sell $15 pack rips for longer periods of time, easier to convince hoarders they'll see a quicker return, easier to convince workers to sell stock behind the store/under the table (card vendors, store employees, etc), easier to keep prices higher on ebay, easier to convince local card stores to match ebay prices, easier to convince scalpers to use bots or travel and empty entire stores, easier for investors to also see a bigger/quicker return. The harder it is to pull anything, the more incentive people have to keep this up. Why should they stop?

If TPC does nothing to stop the actual chain reaction from happening? It'll just keep happening.
 
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