Pokémon TCG: Sword and Shield—Brilliant Stars

Question about base sets

Just to add my two cents which can be taken however one wants to..

I own a lot of 1st edition base set cards, all of those with the supposed "Thick" stamp look the exact same. No differences other than sometimes some had darker (more) ink than others. They are very consistently sized always, through the holos and non-holos.

My "Thin" holos.....whole different ball game. It isn't one thin stamp, it's many different stamps when looking at my cards, almost like a spectrum of thinness. Some have a very thin 1, others have an almost thick 1, many are various sizes in between. It gets to the point where it becomes very hard to distinguish between a thick and thin stamp. Many are too close to call.

Personally, I think the original thick stamps are all consistent, which makes me believe that there must have been a time partway through stamping (after all the non-holos were done, and many of the holos) where all of the sudden quality control changed. I don't know if they changed to a different stamp or got lazy or what, but my cards are all over the place after that.

Basically "Thin" doesn't exist to me. There's "Thick" ones for sure, then a crapshoot of other inconsistent holo cards.
 
One thing I forgot to mention in my previous comment is that Pokemon along with just about every hobby is supply and demand. If there is a demand for something, in this case someone who desires collecting "thick" and "thin"cards, then there is nothing wrong with it. Hobbies are not necessity, so if someone is willing to pay, they are willing to pay.

However, if the distinction was made without merit to primarily generate more revenue, then I feel more like this.
 
Well...the old saying "you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink" could apply here.
It is a different font(ask any graphic artist) but I guess it's better if some of you don't get it cause maybe it adds to the mystery.
DJG...are you a betting man? Ill put 1000.00 up to your 100.00 and we'll get an expert we agree on to inspect the two examples. I'm giving you (or anyone else) 10 to 1 odds;)

---------- Post added 11/27/2012 at 12:20 AM ----------

Something else...look on the PSA set registry and you'll find a customer of mine with 5 complete PSA 10 1st ed base sets. Four are thin sets and one is a thick set. He bought all but just a couple of the cards from me. It's an awesome collection and I've been trying for 3 years to get PSA to designate them for him with no luck yet because nothing's published on them. They concede the difference but consider it too minor:(
 
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Can someone post comparison pictures? I'm having a hard time visualizing what is meant by the difference between the two.
 
This is just out of curiosity...but to me it looks like 2 different stamps; not different pressure. Both stamps have very crisp edges around the "1"'s. If less pressure was applied, wouldn't the "1" look a little more smooth or fuzzy? Again, just a curiosity. I don't know much of anything how cards are printed... lol
 
garyis2000 said:
Well...the old saying "you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink" could apply here.
It is a different font(ask any graphic artist) but I guess it's better if some of you don't get it cause maybe it adds to the mystery.
DJG...are you a betting man? Ill put 1000.00 up to your 100.00 and we'll get an expert we agree on to inspect the two examples. I'm giving you (or anyone else) 10 to 1 odds;)

---------- Post added 11/27/2012 at 12:20 AM ----------

Something else...look on the PSA set registry and you'll find a customer of mine with 5 complete PSA 10 1st ed base sets. Four are thin sets and one is a thick set. He bought all but just a couple of the cards from me. It's an awesome collection and I've been trying for 3 years to get PSA to designate them for him with no luck yet because nothing's published on them. They concede the difference but consider it too minor:(
Click to expand...

I'll bet $10 to the 100:1 odds. If you wish to go back to the 10:1 odds I'd be fine w/ that too. Now who's the expert?
 
Ill give you a hint guys
on the whole stamping stuff
Look way back to 2009
if you dont understand then ill just sit back and count how many years it takes for you to figure it all out
 
smpratte said:
So who is saying all of this? I read this 3 times and do not know if this is WOTC or the 3rd party company being quoted. I still do not see the connection between a run of sets made by WOTC and the stamp being different from the 3rd party.

While there is a noticeable difference in the stamp, it could of been a number of reasons for why it is that way. In my opinion, it is how it was applied. Some of the 1st ed base cards have a stamp which is more gray than black. This is probably due to the ink being low when stamped, aka lower quality control. If you look at the 1st edition stamps after the base cards they are all consistently black and applied with the same pressure.

I do not see any proof to make claims that they intentionally made them thick and then changed to thin. To me it just looks like quality control came through on the later runs.
Click to expand...

Alright I went ahead and asked about the 3rd company Stamping and this is what I got:

"The printer (determined by me) would get 2 negatives for the black plate. The printer would burn 2 plates for black. One had the black type on it and the 1st edition stamp, and the other black plate had just the black type, minus the 1st edition stamp. After the correct number of sheets were run after make ready allowances, the plate was removed and destroyed and the 2nd black plate was put on the press."


Going off of this and if everything that was said earlier is true, when they "broke the rules" and had an additional run of 1st edition they would have had to use another plate with the 1st edition stamp since the other would have been destroyed. This difference in plates could account for the difference in the stamp that we see. This is just my idea though, I will continue to work out information when I can.
 
So the cards weren´t sent off to be stamped, instead the stamp was printed on the cards directly with the black
printing plate?
 
Like I said before, this is a hobby, not a necessity and if someone wants to pay for the difference between thick and thin, then that is no problem. However, I am more concerned than normal because the people insisting that it is a real thing were the ones who originally made the distinction years ago on ebay.

Regardless, I went ahead and purchased a hand stamp of the 1st edition stamp. I literally made one stamp where I applied pressure and one where I applied a bit less. Here are the results:

http://i728.photobucket.com/albums/ww282/smpratte/Sale/both013.jpg?t=1354214440
 
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smpratte said:
No, they were definitely sent off to a third party to be stamped.

Like I said before, this is a hobby, not a necessity and if someone wants to pay for the difference between thick and thin, then that is no problem. However, I am more concerned than normal because the people insisting that it is a real thing were the ones who originally made the distinction years ago on ebay.

Regardless, I went ahead and purchased a hand stamp of the 1st edition stamp. I literally made one stamp where I applied pressure and one where I applied a bit less. Here are the results:

http://i728.photobucket.com/albums/ww282/smpratte/Sale/both013.jpg?t=1354214440
Click to expand...

Where was is stated that they were sent off for the stamp? I have not been around long enough to know when this was all said so I have only heard about this through this Forum. I am asking the same question again to make sure, but it seems fairly clear to me that WOTC is saying otherwise.

Unless.. "printer" is the 3rd party company being referred to instead of a literal machine printer, and it was not only the 1st edition stamp but the stamp and the text that was printed by this 3rd party.

The stamp is quite cool!

I do not really see either of those looking like 1st edition stamps I have seen on Base cards though... maybe the Team Rocket series where many smeared. Those seem less detailed and fuzzy like someone else mentioned earlier
 
It was discussed awhile back when we had a tenticruel card that had a 1st edition stamp misplaced. I contacted someone who has worked for WOTC/Nintendo to see if the card was authentic. And that is when they explained to me the stamping process. The cards were printed and then sent off to be stamped.

And of course the stamp is going to be fuzzy, it is a hand stamp, not a machine stamp with permanent ink. With literally two tries, it looks like a thick and thin stamp, but it is just one stamp doing both.
 
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It scares me that hand stamps exist :|. Take a dirtbag seller, a hand stamp, some shadowless cards, and grainy listing pictures and you have the makings for a huge scam.
 
cbd1235 said:
It scares me that hand stamps exist :|. Take a dirtbag seller, a hand stamp, some shadowless cards, and grainy listing pictures and you have the makings for a huge scam.
Click to expand...

Like the one we saw on ebay recently. :nonono: I don't know how someone could live with themselves knowing they made a stamp to scam someone in pokemon. If there was a photo of decent quality it would be obvious to see the difference.
 
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