Pokémon TCG: Sword and Shield—Brilliant Stars

Different editions of Base boosters (shadowless?)...

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Planteon

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I've been trawling ebay for cheap boosters (for draft) and have recently bought two boxes of Base set boosters from two sources. When I recieved the second box I realised that it looked slightly different from the other one...

Both boxes have the same "cut out" on the lid so it folds nicely for display when you open it, both boxes have the same ISDN# and Bar code and are stated to be made in the US.
Distingushing features are:
BoxA
"Wizards" logo on shrink-wrap
Contact addresses for non-US distributors on bottom of box
Smaller scale of pictures on outside
Box B
No logo on shrink wrap
No non-US addresses
Large scale pictures, especially Charizard side of box

I haven't opened any of the boxes (as I said I want to use them for drafts), but my question is:
Have I been had and bought one real box and one counter-feit or could I have been so lucky that one of the boxes (the one without the non-US addresses) contain the "shadowless" edition? (In that case I'll open that box and ebay here I come ;) )
 
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Planteon said:
Box B
No logo on shrink wrap
No non-US addresses
Large scale pictures, especially Charizard side of box
Click to expand...


A Shadowless Box's Charizard is the picture from the card.

A Shadowed Box's Charizard is the picture on the booster wrapper.
 
TrEkIeV said:
A Shadowless Box's Charizard is the picture from the card.

A Shadowed Box's Charizard is the picture on the booster wrapper.
Click to expand...

Hmmm, as I don't have the box with me now, I'm not certain, but I think you're right and that the pictures of Charizards were different, not olny in size, while the Blastoise was just larger on the "potentially shadowless" box... :D
 
The one is probly fake. Where was the saler from. If they were in Honkong then it's likely, because they do a lot of stuff like that there. And I'm not trying to be raices.
 
Do they have the years on the boxes?

You know like :

Wizards of the Coast
Nintendo
(year)

All that stuff? Maybe you can tell if it's a Shadowless box in the
same way you can identify single Shadowless cards (?)
 
Ugh, The first runs of base were SHADOWLESS, As far as i remember, i think the Shadowless Boosters do look differ.. I'm sure both are real, not fake.
 
Hmm... boosters and boxes printed for some English speaking countries outside of North America had some changes. See if you can find the Nintendo of America logo on the box. European boxes had the Worldwide Nintendo logo.
-Phil
 
More info:
The Charizards do differ, the one on Box B (Potentially shadowless) is a blow-up of the one on the card, while the other looks like the one on boosters.
The wording of the text on the boxes are identical as far as I can see (apart from the bottom where "Box A" has the additional information on non-US addresses). This includes the copyright years. The actual size and position of the text differs.
Nintendo Logos are the same.
Box B came from Seattle - both reducing the chances that it is fake and incresing the chances of it being shadowless... Seller did not have any more boxes for sale as far as I can remember.

So...

Should I open the "potentially shadowless" box, or would I get a better deal if I tried to trade it unopened? (I'm more keen on playing the game than collecting different versions of the same cards)
 
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Hard to say.
It's hard to trade it as "shadowless" unless you can guarantee that when the buyer opens it, it will be shadowless.
 
Besides the Shadowless set, there are two other different Base unlimited sets. The only difference is the copyright information on the bottom of the cards. The cards in the first set have a copyright of 1999 on the bottom and later sets say 1999-2000. These dates are printed under the flaps on the back of sealed boosters also. I assume the dates will be on the sealed boxes as well. As for the cards themselves, all of the holos say 1999 - only rares, uncommons and commons will have 1999-2000 printed on them. If your box says 1999-2000 on it, they're not shadowless. Shadowless cards, packs and boxes say 1999.
 
PokePop said:
Hard to say.
It's hard to trade it as "shadowless" unless you can guarantee that when the buyer opens it, it will be shadowless.
Click to expand...

Point taken! I'll have to open at least one booster to be sure as no-one seems to be able to tell me if the box contains shadowless cards or not... and I guess that selling shadowless boosters could "bless" more colectors with shadowless cards (that is, if A-The cards are shadowless and B-I go head and sell the cards)
 
PokePop said:
Planteon:
IM me with what you would want for the box.
Click to expand...

Hmm, I'm still wondering if I should sell or not so give me some time to think it over.

As you (and others) seem a bit reluctant to say that "yes it is shadowless", then I on one hand would feel bad if I resold something that wasn't was it was supposed to be and on the other hand I might be kicking myself if I found out that I did have the "the real stuff" and sold at a too low price... I think I'll open the box next weekend and have a peek in a booster - If it is shadowless and I decide to sell, then I'll come back to you (after trying to figure out a resonable value for shadowless boosters).

Shop closed for now (unless anyone has "the" detalis of how to identify a shadowless box, so far I'm getting too much conflicting information).
 
I'm not exactly sure how to identify a Shadowless box, but you don't have to open a pack to find out. Shadowless (and 1st edition Base) packs say "11 Tradable Game Cards". Regular unlimited base packs say "11 ADDITIONAL GAME CARDS" (yes, all capitalized). Hope that helps.
 
dooskoop said:
I'm not exactly sure how to identify a Shadowless box, but you don't have to open a pack to find out. Shadowless (and 1st edition Base) packs say "11 Tradable Game Cards". Regular unlimited base packs say "11 ADDITIONAL GAME CARDS" (yes, all capitalized). Hope that helps.
Click to expand...

Well, I couldn't contain myself and opened the box last night - Indeed, the boosters said "11 Tradable Game Cards" and not "11 ADDITIONAL GAME CARDS" so I guess that it looks like I have 36 booster packs of shadowless cards. The dating on the boosters is not different from my other box - both say 1999. However, the last sentence on the "upper half" of the back of the boosters saying "Each player must have a 60-card deck of Pokémon cards to play" is missing from the shadowless boosters...

I'll probably open a booster later on to confirm that I have shadowless cards.
...and then give the cards to my 2-year old so she can bend them and smear them with jam ;)
 
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At the risk of sounding rather stupid... what is a shadowless card?
o.0
I feel I've missed out on something here...
 
It's an elaborate scheme that as a result has a different price tag for two rather identical cards that only have different copyright year printed at the bottom. There is also an explanation on that the illustrations have/have not shadows and colors may differ (Charizard has greenish, not redish or brownish wings, etc.), but I myself couldn't see the difference. This is of course a sarcastic explanation. I hope that someone will give a serious answer to your question.
 
When WotC first printed cards, the first edition printing and first unlimited printing did not have a "shadow" around the picture box. A shadow can be seen along the right hand and bottom border of the picture. Using eBay, HERE is a picture of a Shadowless Ninetales. HERE is a shadowed Ninetales.
 
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