eBay Board Wargame Collector’s Digest Volume 1, Number 2
Welcome to the second issue! The response we received to the first issue was incredible… it was sent out to over 110 people, no fewer than 25 wrote letters of encouragement and offers of support! We’ve also added 23 new subscribers, and only lost one!
Special thanks goes out to Gerald Delker who has volunteered to keep track of SPI game prices closing on eBay for us – thanks!
In addition to our email distribution list, John Kranz of ConSimWorld is offering the newsletter for download from his web site in Adobe Acrobat format, and Alan Poulter is posting issues and archives in his www.grognard.com site.
With this issue, I’m changing the document format from
Microsoft Word, to HTML. Several
members wrote in that they use no-Windows based platforms and had some
formatting problems with the Word 95 document, and the HTML format will also me
to post the issue on the web quickly and easily!
As always, letters, comments, suggestions, and submissions
are welcome!
Many thanks, and enjoy!
Peter T. Szymonik
EBay = Xorg
344+ eBay Rating
Game Price Tracking:
Every issue we’re going to track closing eBay auction
prices for “mint” and “punched but excellent” wargames. Over time people can use this as a guide to
gauge what they can expect to get for a particular game title before posting
it, as well as to watch trends in game pricing.
There are other wargame price guides out there, Mike Boone
in particular has an excellent one.
However, my experience with these price guides is that they often
contain dated information.
Additionally, since they track auction prices from conventions and sales
prices from the newsgroups, they really aren’t a great guide for auction prices
on eBay, which is what we all really care about!
Since our last issue, John Kranz of ConSimWorld has
created an eGroups area tied to his great www.consimworld.com
web site. The eGroups link has a great
database function, and we’ve moved our eBay price tracking to this web based
format. The advantage is that it’s a
lot easier for us to keep track of prices this way, and we have a running
record!
Listed below are the most expensive games sold on eBay
since our last issue:
Campaign
for North Africa |
SPI
|
BK
|
MT
|
355.00
|
9/19/2000
|
War in
the Pacific |
SPI
|
FT
|
EX
|
251.00
|
8/24/2000
|
War in
the Pacific |
SPI
|
ZP
|
MT
|
250.01
|
9/14/2000
|
War in
the Pacific |
SPI
|
FT
|
EX
|
242.50
|
8/29/2000
|
Module
One |
SPI
|
FT
|
MT
|
212.50
|
9/18/2000
|
War in
the Pacific |
SPI
|
FT
|
EX |
211.00 |
8/27/2000 |
John Carter of Mars |
SPI |
BK |
MT |
206.04 |
9/20/2000 |
War in Europe |
SPI |
FT |
MT |
202.50 |
8/20/2000 |
DAK |
The Gamers |
BK |
MT |
202.50 |
9/16/2000 |
First to Fight |
GRD |
BK |
MT |
177.50 |
9/14/2000 |
Middle Earth Trilogy |
SPI |
FT |
MT |
172.50 |
8/28/2000 |
Empires of the Middle Ages |
SPI |
BK |
MT |
167.50 |
8/29/2000 |
Highway to the Reich, 2nd Edition |
SPI |
FT |
MT |
167.50 |
8/28/2000 |
War Between the States |
SPI |
FT |
EX |
162.51 |
9/16/2000 |
Highway to the Reich, 2nd Edition |
SPI |
FT |
MT |
162.50 |
8/28/2000 |
War in Europe |
Decision Games |
BK |
EX |
162.50 |
9/11/2000 |
Empires of the Middle Ages |
SPI |
BK |
MT |
158.50 |
9/17/2000 |
The Longest Day |
AH |
BK |
MT |
153.50 |
9/17/2000 |
Campaign for North Africa |
SPI |
BK |
EX |
153.50 |
9/20/2000 |
Campaign for North Africa |
SPI |
BK |
EX |
152.49 |
9/18/2000 |
Module One |
SPI |
FT |
MT |
151.50 |
8/28/2000 |
The Longest Day |
AH |
BK |
MT |
151.00 |
9/17/2000 |
Scorched Earth |
GDW |
BK |
MT |
129.52 |
9/16/2000 |
The Conquerors |
SPI |
FT |
MT |
117.51 |
9/19/2000 |
Empires of the Middle Ages |
SPI |
BK |
VG |
107.60 |
9/17/2000 |
Guide: MT –
Described as Unpunched and Mint
EX
- Described as Punched but Excellent
FT
– Flat Tray Packaging
BK
– Bookcase style packaging
ZP
– Ziplock packaging
( ) – No listing – game only has one package
style
The new eBay Price Tracking database can be found on
eGroups here:
http://www.egroups.com/database/consimworld?method=reportRows&tbl=4&sortBy=5&sortDir=up
You may need to create a free eGroups accounts to view
this database. Just follow the steps to
create and eGroups account (free!) and find the consimworld area. Click on Databases, and you’ll find our eBay
Pirce Tracking database!
It’s become clear to me that about 15-20% of the people I
trade with on eBay don’t know that the Board Wargame hobby is actually alive,
doing fairly well, and churning out new titles by some outstanding
companies. I’ll spend some time over
the new few issues highlighting these companies.
DECISION
GAMES: www.decisiongames.com
Decision
Games is headed by Dr. Christopher Cummins, and the company is the direct
descendant of the old SPI and England’s World Wide Wargames.
After TSR opted to get out of the
board wargame business in the early 1990s, Doc Cummins bought the rights to
many of the old SPI classics from
them, as well as all of the former
S&T magazine games.
Decision Games has continued
publication of STRATEGY & TACTICS, the military magazine with a game
inside, on a regular basis – the latest issue is
Nr. 202, Taipei 2000, and is
available now. If you were a former
S&T subscriber in the 1970-1980s, be prepared to experience much improved
magazine published on high-quality
paper, with better magazine and game graphics!
Additionally, Decision Games also
publishes MOVES and FIRE & MOVEMENT magazines, and the old 3W WARGAMER
magazine has been folded into
these two publications. No games in these, but extensive game
analysis articles, scenarios, options, and more.
Decision Games is a prolific
publisher of boxed wargames. They have
republished many of the great old SPI game titles, and even expanded
some Quad game series with new
games. Additionally, they offer a whole
slew of new and highly playable wargames.
Finally, Decision Games is working
hard to update and republish many of the most popular old SPI monster wargames. Their new and expanded War in
Europe is available now, a new
version of Wacht am Rhein is in the works, and they are also working on board
and computer versions of Empires of
the Middle Ages. These reprints take a tremendous amount of
effort, and Decision Games is working to republish one new monster game a year.
THE GAMERS: www.tgamers.com
Dean Essig and the gang have been
in business since 1988, and they have produced some of the greatest wargames published
during the past ten
years. They are very active on the Wargame convention circuit, and are
known for the extreme attention to customer service and gamer feedback.
The Gamers has probably the most
robust wargame store web site around today.
Not only do they sell their own line of award-winning wargames,
but also games by other publishers
as diverse as: GMT Games, Decision
Games, UGG, West End, Clash of Arms, Avalanche Press, Mayfair, and GRD.
In addition to games, they also
sell military books, and game parts (now you know where I buy all those
replacement counter trays I include with
some of the games I’ve been
auctioning!)
The Gamers also publishes
OPERATIONS magazine, a quarterly journal devoted to coverage of their
wargames. OPERATIONS subscribers also
enjoy
discounts on purchases made from
The Gamer’s web site!
GMT GAMES: www.gmtgames.com
GMT Games is head by Gene
Billingsley, perhaps the hardest working man in the hobby today. GMT can also be found at just about every
wargaming
Convention, and like Decision
Games and The Gamers, these guys have helped carry the hobby through the
1990s. Look at the list of GMT’s game
Designers, and you’ll find many of
the masters from the old SPI days – including Mark Herman, Rich Berg, and Van
von Borries.
Ask any wargamer about GMT, and
the number one word that comes into mind is feedback. These guys love it, and they feed off of it. They post
“living rules” on their site so
gamers always have access to the very latest rules revisions and edits, and
encourage people to send in game ideas
and modification suggestions. All of GMT game’s are graphic masterpieces
and highly playable.
GMT also has a great way to ensure
that they only publish games people really want to see designed and
played. Their “Project 500” posts
future
game design ideas in detail. Once 500 orders are placed for a game, it’s
marked for production and published, with the first 500 copies going to the
first 500 people who invested in
the game’s concept. Discounts are also
available for pre-publication games.
eBay & PayPal
Looks like the online payment system wars are beginning to
heat up!
PayPal has recently been taking some heat for “reminding”
its members to upgrade to a Business or Premier account if they use the service
for “business purposes.” The problem is
that PayPal has not clearly defined what a “business purpose” is, and they have
seemed to imply that people who use eBay on a regular basis are in fact “business
users.” The difference is the basic
PayPal account members don’t pay to use the service, while Business or Premier
account holders pay a nominal 1.9% transaction fee in exchange for a several
enhanced services (including the ability to download transaction logs files in
Excel format.) We’ll watch to see how
this develops.
eBay seems to have finally noticed that PayPal has been
eating its lunch, and that BillPoint isn’t a very popular method of
payment. Beginning October 1st,
BillPoint will offer the following new pricing and features:
|
eBay Online Payments |
PayPal
Business/Premier Account* |
Credit Card |
|
|
Transaction
Fee (for a $15 sale) |
0.00% + $0.35** |
1.90%
+ $0.25 |
Transaction
Fee (for sales greater than $15) |
2.50% + $0.35 |
1.90%
+ $0.25 |
Deposit
Fee |
0.50% |
0.60% |
Electronic Check |
|
|
Transaction
Fee |
FREE! |
1.90% |
Deposit
Fee |
FREE! |
0.60% |
Net Rate*** |
|
|
Transaction
Fee |
1.55% + $0.35 |
1.90%
+ $0.15 |
Deposit
Fee |
0.33% |
0.60% |
Note that eBay is making a comparison to PayPal’s highest
level Business/Premier account, and that eBay will still be more expensive for
transactions over $15, but this bears watching. Additionally, few people use Electronic Checks when using PayPal
– its far more convenient to simply have funds transferred between PayPal
accounts than to wait for an electronic check hit my checking account, IMHO.
PayPal has been making moves in the international payment
arena:
- INTERNATIONAL PAYMENTS -- a way to receive
payments from anyone
in the world. International payments to Premier and Business
Accounts will be treated the same as domestic transactions --
that means no extra fees for you.
I
know a lot of people on our mailing list have been waiting for this to finally
happen!
International Transactions:
The following letter comes to us
from one of our international correspondents, Bruce Probst of Melbourne
Australia. Bruce has some great points
regarding the current state of international electronic payments. This has become an important issue for me
personally, as in the past few weeks I’ve sold games to eBayers as far away as
Australia, Japan, Finland, Italy, and South Africa!
Just some additional points for "e-Bay for
newbies":
For non-U.S. gamers like myself, the BillPoint
facility, whatever other faults it may have, is a godsend. Non-U.S. customers cannot (at this time) use
PayPal
at all (they say they're working on it, but who
knows). Another bonus with BillPoint is
that if you use VISA, you get $1 off each purchase. That can add up
if you buy a lot!
The next best thing to BillPoint/PayPal is
BidPay. This allows you to buy U.S.
money orders with a credit card and have the M.O. sent directly to the seller.
There's
a fee (something like 5% of the value of the M.O., minimum $5.00) but that's a
*lot* less than purchasing a M.O. in US$ at a local bank (and considerably less time and hassle, as well). They will post to addresses in Canada, as
well. The only major limitation is that
there must be an online auction for Bidpay to check against (doesn't have to be
e-Bay, can also be Yahoo, Amazon, etc.) -- you can't use it to pay for stuff
you might buy on rec.games.board.marketplace, for instance. Why they have this limitation I have no
idea. Maybe they get some kickback from
the auction sites they support?
Finally, note that some online shops (not private
sellers) will of course let you send them your credit card details via e-mail.
Contrary to this ease of use is the considerable
difficulty involved in dealing with non-US/Canada sellers. There are no on-line facilities (that I'm
aware of -- I'd love to be proven wrong) equivalent to PayPal etc. for sending
payments in non-U.S. currencies, which makes buying stuff from the U.K or other
places in
Europe a real pain, and additionally expensive to
boot (it costs me about A$15 for each foreign currency cheque I have to buy --
maybe it's better in other
countries, but I expect all have a similar policy).
Any way, just some thoughts, hope you find them
useful.
Bruce Probst
Thanks
Bruce!
eBay
Guidelines – A Clarification…
This submission comes
to us from Steve Bucey. Steve raised an
excellent point regarding one of the sections of my Game Guidelines. Steve expressed
concern that since he trades infrequently
on eBay, he may be considered a risky trader according to my guidelines:
"Second, how frequent and current are those
ratings? Is the seller auctioning off
games on a constant basis (a very good sign) or has it been months
since they last had something to offer (potential red
flag.)"
Hello Peter,
I just read through your journal, and I decided I
would send you a few words of comment.
I guess that the first thing that I noticed is that it appears that
the journal really is intended to have a very limited
audience. Whether you intended this or
not, it seems that only a very small group of wargame buyers
and sellers on e-bay would be interested in
this. The above comment I found under
"Ebay's Feedback System" is one such item that leads me to this
conclusion.
I guess maybe the above item actually prompted my
response more than anything else because I fall squarely into that category. I'm an occasional e-bay
user, both buyer and seller. Once every few months I gather up a handful
of games I've decided I'll never play (or never play again) and sell them. In fact,
I was just thinking of doing that this coming weekend. But with comments like the above being
made, I'm now wondering if it will be worth my bother, as I
would begin to wonder if people who would read your
journal would avoid me because my last auctions were several months ago and I
have less than 50
positive ratings.
So, if I ignore your rating system am I going to lose
potential buyers? Am I going to lose
potential buyers who read your journal and decide I'm not
to be trusted?
I wonder.
Steven Bucey
==========
Thanks for your letter
Steve!
The newsletter is most definitely geared to a small audience,
namely those folks active in the Wargames area of eBay. Right now the mailing lists stands at some
115 wargamers, and I’ve been adding about five new people each week.
Personally, I don't think you'll have problems at all. Experienced eBayers know to weigh the whole
body of evidence before bidding on a game, and as long as you have a positive
rating with few or no negatives, you'll be fine regardless of the frequency of
your postings (in fact, I may have bid on some of your games myself!)
If anyone asks (and most will if you have a game they really
want), just offer them some good references from previous buyers.
This being said, new members tend to be very leery of eBay, and
my guidelines just note one of the generally recognized eBay "potential
red flags."
There have been cases where people (often stores believe it or
not), dump a lot of product on eBay, get a quick 20-30 positives, and then
disappear and screw the next 20 people out of their money, only to re-appear a
few months later with a new handle.
I see your viewpoint, and if you'd like to edit this into a
"Letter to the Editor", I'd be happy to include it in the next
newsletter!
Thanks
Peter
How to List Non-Mainstream Game Titles?
This letter comes from an eBayer I have bought far too many
games from! J
What is the best way to post obscure but rare and highly
collectible game titles? Posting these games
involves a higher degree of risk. They
are probably have very high collector values, but unless you get the attention
of a critical mass of bidders and collectors, they may sell far below their
worth. Setting a reserve price helps,
but reserve prices also tend to scare away bidders, which is not the desired
goal! Is there a solution?
Peter-
An item I'd like to see addressed in a future issue
of the newsletter is how to best list and sell obscure (non-AH, GDW, SPI)
wargames. I originally used the ..."not Avalon Hill, GDW , SPI tagline in
my titles and descriptions, but got a warning message from eBay about "Key
Word spamming", which they consider this to be.
I did email them back, saying most wargamers would
have no other way of locating these obscure titles in a "normal"
search. They never replied. Then I began sending listing messages to
regular buyers of my auctions. Some,
like yourself, objected to this practice, so I've discontinued it for the most
part.
BUT, I recently sold a mint PWG To the Wolf's Lair
for $32, and expected to get substantially more. I think part of the reason is that PWG or People’s War Games
aren't regularly searched by most eBay game buyers. Like I stated, I'd like to see topic discussed in a future
issue. One thing I do all the time when
I'm buying is to search using "unpunched" or "punched" as
my search word, searching titles and descriptions... rather than searching for
game titles.
In this way I found a copy of GDW Tsushima, which I'd
never have found otherwise, because the guy had misspelled Tsushima in his
title, and didn't include "GDW" in his title. This is another issue that merits
discussion… trying to establish a "standard" for listing titles and
descriptions.
In my example, I think most of us would list that
game as GDW Tsushima, or something similar.
His listing, however, read "Tsuhima wargame", fortunately he
did use the word unpunched in his description.
A standard way of listing especially titles would be very helpful...
Thanks! Rob
"Brunell"
================
Rob raises an excellent point! I start all my game headers with an
abbreviated company name: SPI, AH, GDW,
GRD, COA, with the assumption that most gamers and collectors know what these
stand for. This has worked great for
the most part, but like Rob, I’ve also posted very obscure but highly
collectible game titles that people have ignored or passed over because of poor
search term usage on my part, or just a general unfamiliarity with the game
being offered.
Some regular eBayers I know do check eBay on a daily
basis, scrolling through all of the new postings each day (and slogging through
all of the Warhammer stuff!) But many
eBayers just log on every few days and search for “SPI”.
Anyone else have any more tips on to solve this
problem?
Hey Peter!
Great job on the first issue!
Nice to see my name in THAT list of ebayers and onliners - I guess I'm
doing something right!
You told me the first time we did business on eBay
about PayPal - and how right you are! Great
service and it's free. I try to
recommend this to everybody
whom I meet who has never used it. A couple of them have, and now they love it
as well.
I read about the packaging and learned something
new-putting packing peanuts/newspaper INSIDE of the game! Never thought to do that! What about
games
still in shrink? I sent somebody a copy
of GRD's War of Resistance a while ago and inside the box everything was
shifting from side to side (BUT it was sealed and I didn't want to open it
up!). Next time, I'll ask the person if they want me to open it up to secure the merchandise
inside.
Something I might mention is dealing with
Canadians. J
I seem to have a knack for buying things from them
and one of them told me to use only an International Money Order with them
because the Canadian Banks DON'T treat a regular money order as cash (like most
American banks do). Canadian banks, he
said, will hold checks and regular money order for up to two weeks!! He did say though, that international money
orders are as good as cash, even in Canada.
Might be worth mentioning to everybody who buys from up North to be
polite and spend the extra $3.00 to get an international money order when
buying from our Canadian friends (I know I would hate to have to wait two weeks
for my money to clear - NOT to forget that the buyer is waiting for the game!)
Also, stores receive a BUNCH of packing peanuts and
the like and usually throw them away.
If the people knew this, they might be able to arrange to pick up
These discarded peanuts and use them in their
shipping. This would save them from
being used once and then thrown away.
Every little bit helps the
environment.
I run a small store here in the boonies of NM, and I
get a huge amount of the peanuts! I
save them as long as possible to use them.
Same with boxes for
the stores too - and 90% are completely
reusable. While I do like getting
Priority Mail boxes from USPS, they are still new (even though I think that
they're
actually recycled) and if we can reuse anything -
THAT's GREAT! I'm not an
"environmentalist" at all, but even I see the sheer amount of
"one use" items
and shudder.
Speaking along the lines of the above - I would like
to know who is a store and who is a person/group of people when dealing with
people on eBay. Stores
seem to usually list the new stuff and not the old
(at least the ones I've dealt with so far.)
Todd Davis in New Mexico
======================
Thanks Todd!
Your point on shipping mint and shrinkwrapped games like War of
the Resistance can be an important issue for several reasons...
Clearly a collector would want to
receive a new shrinkwrapped game in as close to pristine condition as
possible. If the counters shake loose
of the tree during the shipping due to loose packaging, some “more critical”
collectors might be upset. Best to ask
if in doubt on this one.
A related issue regards out-of-print and older shrinkwrapped games. I don’t trust shrinkwrapped games for two reasons. This first is that SPI was notorious for missing parts. It was not all uncommon to buy a new SPI game, remove the shrink, and find two copies of one map, charts missing, and the wrong countersheets included with a game.
Even worse, during the 1980s, there were some unscrupulous people out in the wargame convention circuit and in the newsgroups who were repackaging collectible SPI games with copied or used components, reshrinkwrapping them, and them offering them as “new” or “mint condition” games. This is quite rare these days since its fairly easy to tell the difference between 20+ year old yellowed shrink and new, but its still a concern.
For these reasons, I always asks sellers to remove the shrink and to verify the contents before bidding on a shrinkwrapped OOP game title.
Excellent points on the recycling of peanuts and boxes. Priority Mail boxes are made of recycled materials, and I use spent Priority Mail boxes as my recyclable containers. My recycling man loves them, since he can dump the cans and bottles out of them, and toss the boxes in with the newsprint!
Personally, peanuts have always annoyed me. They’re messy, cling to everything, and most can’t be recycled. Some companies have started making these out of corn starch, which is great – except that my cats seems to think they taste good J Recently I’ve noticed that more companies are shipping product with large plastic air bags. Great on the weight savings, but the use of plastic is again an issue. The bottom line is that the more we all trade our packing materials along with our game trades, the better!
Peter
Countersheet Database!
This letter and suggestion comes to us from Tom Ciampa. Tom suggested we expand our newsletter to include
a database of countersheets from collectible games.
How about setting up an archive of countersheet fascimilies on a
server somewhere? I shouldn't
think there would be a flap over copyright or anything IF they were strictly
put on in black and white and reduced to odd, random sizes before uploading....
or scanned at an odd percentage. If
they were put up in color there would be some clever types that would know how
to size and print them out and pirate them to make their own copies of the
countersheets which they could conceivably sell as spare parts on eBay..... I
hope it can work out though as it would be a valuable service for people with
used games and a way to know what is missing.
Tom Ciampa
=========
Thanks for the letter and idea
Tom!
A lot of collectors and people on
ConSimWorld think this is a great idea – but the real issue is one of
copyrights. The copyrights to many of
the old wargames we’re trading on eBay and collecting are in fact still in
force and owned by various people and companies. It would unfortunately be a violation of copyright law to
publicly post these countersheet scans with the express approval of the
copyright holders. For starters, I know
that the rights to many of the old SPI boxed games, and all of the S&T issue
games, are owned by Doc Cummins of Decision Games. I believe Rich Berg retained or purchased the rights to his GBACW
series games from TSR, and he holds those.
Avalon Hill game copyright are now held by Hasbro.
To create such a database, we’d need
someone to volunteer to ask these people for permission to post their counters
on line. A great idea, but we need to
do this legally!
Thanks
Peter
Communication – It Works!!
One of the most difficult
decisions an eBay collector needs to make is how to react when a deal goes
bad. Recently, I witnessed an example
of how good communication can help solve even the most difficult
situations… [The names and eBay handles
of the actual people involved will be kept confidential for obvious reasons…]
Recently a number of gamers
complained on ConSimWorld that a particular eBay trader had taken their money
and disappeared. He stopped replying to
emails, and never sent their games.
While this is a very rare occurrence in the wargaming area, what really
caught my attention is the name of the person who allegedly wronged all these
ConSimWorld members. He was a trader I
had successfully bought a number of games from before, and he had a respectable
70+ eBay rating with no negatives (at least prior to this event!)
Curiosity got the best of me, so I
contacted this problematic trader and asked him what was going on. Sure enough, he thanked me for my email and
concern. He said that he was going
through some personal difficulties which preventing him from completing his
eBay deals (i.e. he didn’t have access to his home computer or wargame
collection.) He assured me that once
his situation was resolved, he would do his best to fix things with the wronged
bidders.
Sure enough, one of the bidders
that whose check this fellow had cashed and not delivered on informed me that
he did finally get the seller on the phone, and was promptly sent a refund!
A happy ending to a difficult
situation. We should always remember
that people have “real lives”, and that sometimes when things go wrong, they’ve
gone wrong for a reason outside of the seller’s or buyer’s control. Give it time and communicate before
panicking or going negative!
Thoughts for Future Articles!:
If you’re interested in writing
for this newsletter, here are some topic ideas up for consideration for future
issues. If you’d like to wrote the
piece, please contact us! We’re looking
for a page or two of text, more if you’re so inclined!
SNIPERS! – GOOD, BAD, or UGLY?
All week, you’ve been the high bidder
on a rare wargame you’ve been searching for for years. You check your bid in the final hours of the
auction, and all seems well…. then in the final two minutes, along comes a
“sniper” who outbids you in the closing moments of the auction and wins the
game by a dollar! Do you get angry and
start to scream? Accept this as part of
the eBay auction experience, and do some sniping yourself? Baby all of your auctions to the final
second to make sure this doesn’t happen again?
What are your thoughts on this?
PUNCHED GAMES AND COUNTING
COUNTERS – DOES IT REALLY MATTER?
Based
on some fiery discussions that have occurred on ConSimWorld and the newsgroups
of late, there are strong feelings on both sides of this issue.
Some
collectors believe that punched games should always have their counters counted
for completeness, and that every counter – even the blank
ones, must be there in order for a
game to called “excellent.” Others
believe this is a waste of time and that punched games should be considered used
games. A missing counter or two
shouldn’t impact the game’s overall value or condition rating as long as every
counter needed to play the game is there.
What are your thoughts? Do you
assume every punched game you buy has every counter that came with the game –
including blank counters? Or do you buy
punched games strictly to play them, and assume punched games probably are
missing a counter or two, and only buy mint games for collecting purposes?
TREASURE TROVES – REAL LIFE
WARGAME COLLECTING FINDS!
A wargame collector walks into a
run down old toy store in a small town in upstate New York and finds a pile of
mint condition SPI wargames in the corner marked at $5.00 each. An old wargamer returns home after many
years away at college. Digging into
their closet or basement they find a collection of old wargames they forgot
about that are worth hundreds, if not thousands of dollars. At an estate sale, among the piles of old
furniture and paintings, the auctioneer offers up a collection of old board
games – turns out most of these are highly collectible Avalon Hill game titles
from the 1960s. Truth or urban
legend? What are your own stories? Have you experienced anything like this – or
do you know someone who knows someone who has?
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