Anyone putting togther "impossible" sets?

[cardbooker]

My impossible set was X-Men 2 the Movie. Hobby hits were easy to find, but the retail exclusive foil and clear insert cards were incredibly difficult to track down. It took me over 2 years to finish back then. It’s probably more difficult to complete now since the set is 20+ years old and retail is pretty much dried up.

[Archangel1775]

Originally Posted by BobCollects

I didn't think the 1967 Leaf Star Trek cards were that hard to find. Are you only looking for pristine cards and that's why it's taking forever?

I think there are two mindsets in this thread. One being building the best regular raw set and another being building the best graded set. Nothing wrong with either. So yes, putting together a tough raw set is fantastic but so is putting together one of the highest rated graded sets on the registry.

[finfangfan]

I don’t know if I’d say I’m actually attempting it but it would be cool to reunite all 32 plates (8 - 4 plate rainbows) in the Marvel Anime KAIJU set. I did manage to get one of each and rainbow the Devil Dinosaur at least.. so I’m basically done as far as what is likely accomplishable.

Originally Posted by finfangfan

Was just able to complete the entire eight card printing plate set from the Marvel Anime Kaiju subset. Very tough set to put together. Much thanks for the multiple traders on ePack who were able to help!

Devil Dinosaur 2020 Marvel Anime Kaiju, K-1



Krakoa 2020 Marvel Anime Kaiju, K-2



Orrgo 2020 Marvel Anime Kaiju, K-3



Mangog 2020 Marvel Anime Kaiju, K-4



Fin Fang Foom 2020 Marvel Anime Kaiju, K-5



Monstrom 2020 Marvel Anime Kaiju, K-6



Man-Thing 2020 Marvel Anime Kaiju, K-7



Xemnu 2020 Marvel Anime Kaiju, K-8

[finfangfan]

And here’s the Devil Dino rainbow…

Devil Dinosaur 2020 Marvel Anime Kaiju, K-1

[DynaEtch]

Wow those inserts look awesome as plates, very cool set.

Rare to see a true plate rainbow- and no I dont count those pre-made plate booklets UD does in its metal sets, as that's kinda cheating.

[Raymond23]

Star Wars 40th Anniversary “Master Set”. I got a lot, but I’m not even remotely close to a complete set. I’m obviously going to ignore all of the 1/1 parallels and printing plates (but trying to get full rainbows with 1/1 and plates for every card type). Here’s where I am at last count (and all of the stuff I’m missing - hint: I don’t have deep pockets for the big signers).

Base: 200/200
Green base parallel: 100/100
Blue base parallel: 100/100
Purple base parallel (/99): 100/100
Gold base parallel (/40): 100/100
Rainbow card 79 (red 1/1, black plate, magenta plate)
Rainbow card 97 (red 1/1, black plate)

Classic Stickers (/100): 17/17 - no parallels/plates produces
Film Cels: 50/50 - no parallels, no plates produced

Death Star Medallion Cards: 11/11 (no plates produced)
Rainbow Jabba (all parallels including red 1/1)

Millennium Falcon Medallion Cards: 12/12
Rainbow Jabba (all parallels including red 1/1)

Star Wars Patch Cards: 20/20 (no plated produced)

Promo Cards (/200): 4/4
Promo Cards (unnumbered “volunteer edition”-estimated 30 card print run): 4/4
Digital SWCT promo: 1/1

Star Wars Vintage Buybacks:
Blue: 37/66
Red: 61/66
Yellow: 66/66 (yay!)
Green: 51/66
Orange: 44/66
Modern Buyback “hits”: no checklist, no idea what was produced. 12 different types found (missing Jedi Legacy Film Cel buyback)

Autographs: 47/51 (most common tier obtained for each signer: 40/40 unnumbered base autographs, 4/4 purple autographs (/40), 3/7 gold autographs (/10)…missing Hamill, Fisher, Ford, Bauerfeld)
Rainbow Conley: all parallels including Red 1/1, Black/Magenta/Yellow printing plates

Sketches: 96/96 artists, 270 sketches, 125+ subjects (characters, droids, aliens, sets, props) from ANH.

Bonus: 13 base cards used in Star Wars Signature Series

Things I am missing (besides 1/1)
-all parallel medallions, patches, autographs.
-71/330 buybacks
-Rainbow patch cards
-Plates to complete my partial rainbows
-Autograph Medallion cards
-All Multi Auto Cards
-Jedi Legacy Film Cel buyback

[chilly55]

Now that is an impossible set. I applaud you for going after such an undertaking. But what you've done so far is jaw dropping. Really hope you can complete one day, especially the buy backs. That in itself would be a cool set to have!

[Archangel1775]

Wow, nice Star Wars collection. I'm putting the 2023 Game of Thrones Red set /50 together and just picked up my first Dragonglass /15 and Printing Plate. The latter I swore I wasnt going to buy but now there is no turning back. I think I may do one of each sketch artist for 30 total but want to make sure they are reasonably affordable before I commit to that. In the meantime I'll just do the accessible stuff.

[BobCollects]

Holy cow that's a lot of Star Wars cards. 270 sketch cards is larger than a lot of mini master sets and its only a fraction of your collection.

I've considered trying to put together a master set of Women of Star Trek Art and Images but the thought of trying to get the Starfleet's Finest Painted Portrait Metal Cards (/50) and the Women of Star Trek 20th Anniversary Archive Collection Expansion Set (/99) is too daunting. Not to mention the base parallel sets (/99 and /50) and the Artist's Rendition Triple Art Cards parallel set (/50). And the autographs I don't have yet after opening three cases.

[Raymond23]

Thanks for the kind words. The buybacks will never be complete. I’ve just added 3 cards…first addition in over a year. But I’ll chip away.

Obviously, this is just a sample of my set, but I will post the whole sketch collection (minus the commissions in process) since I just love how it all looks together. So much creativity and imagination in that first film and such a staggeringly broad artistic styles to pay homage to my favorite film. Indulge me as I show it off and give props to the 96 artists that contributed to that set…
































Since I love and collect the entire Original Trilogy, but 40th only featured characters/scenes from A New Hope, I felt something was missing. So I made a small side collection for memorable characters from ESB/ROTJ trying to get art from artists that weren’t in 40th (was not always successful, as some of these guys are not featured on a lot of art cards…)

[Arazi4442]

It probably would be, literally impossible, since every card in the set is a 1/1 and there’s always going to be some left in unopened product but I would really like to collect some of the big names in the Goodwin Art of the Ages set. I think there are like 300 cards in the set (again, all 1/1s). Would be really neat to get just a couple Da Vivci’s, Monet’s, Van Gogh’s, etc.

[DoombotA76]

Dupe.

[DoombotA76]

Originally Posted by DynaEtch

Another near impossible set, the 92 masterpieces Dynamic Forces Jusko autos. Back in the 90s, DF issued 5,000 sealed sets of 1992MM that have one card on top that is auto'd by Jusko, in distinctive gold ink, and handnumbered to 5,000 (only the top card is auto'd, and it’s different from set to set).





I am not chasing this auto set, and just have this Cyclops. 5,000 may sound like a lot, but if there are equal amounts of each character auto'd, thats 5000/100 or only 50 out there per character. That may seem like a lot still, but it's not considering these were from back in the 90s and many lost in the sea of time...dispersed out there or buried in collections, sometimes without people even knowing about them, just another card in their base sets.

I cannot confirm if each of the 100 cards indeed were auto’d (or even just 99, excluding the checklist), but with the varying ones I have seen on the market, all characters being auto’d is a good guess.

Technically these are after-market auto cards (not issued by Skybox), but in a sense they are 'official aftermarkets' considering it's Dynamic Forces and a specific release they did with these sealed sets.

Nice Cyclops. I've got a Sauron that I bought with the set in the 90s. Unknowing about the auto at the time as it was just sold in a 100-card holder with no Dynamic Forces label.

[DynaEtch]

Originally Posted by DoombotA76

Nice Cyclops. I've got a Sauron that I bought with the set in the 90s. Unknowing about the auto at the time as it was just sold in a 100-card holder with no Dynamic Forces label.

Yea this is definitely a thing- finding these in any ol regular 92MM sets in snap cases. I've found a couple over the years in old collections I bought, the auto card just mixed in with the set. There is at least one collector out there (more ambitious than me!) who I think is going for the whole 99 card set. They will usually fetch decent prices on ebay, even just the single auto card not sealed in the DF set. I dont think I've seen Sauron before, at least in recent memory.

[DynaEtch]

An interesting question: which set is harder?

-Dynamic Forces '92MM Jusko gold ink auto set
-2016MM '92MM Buyback Jusko gold ink auto set

Both are obviously major challenges. I think both should be 99 cards. The 2016 buybacks are /15, while the DF's should be about /50 based on division. So the DF has a little more than triple...but they are also from 30ish years ago, and many more of them lost in the sea or buried unknowingly in sets over the years, compared to 2016MM buyback autos which were carefully preserved as hits, or on epack, and likely still all around. I dunno...could be a toss up.

[DoombotA76]

Originally Posted by DynaEtch

An interesting question: which set is harder?

-Dynamic Forces '92MM Jusko gold ink auto set
-2016MM '92MM Buyback Jusko gold ink auto set

Both are obviously major challenges. I think both should be 99 cards. The 2016 buybacks are /15, while the DF's should be about /50 based on division. So the DF has a little more than triple...but they are also from 30ish years ago, and many more of them lost in the sea or buried unknowingly in sets over the years, compared to 2016MM buyback autos which were carefully preserved as hits, or on epack, and likely still all around. I dunno...could be a toss up.

The 2016 buyback autos will be harder to complete a set of since they are simply more valuable per card. My two cents.

[dijit31]

I have a near complete "Lost" television series autographed cards with most variations and many duplicates. Only missing francois chau disney expo d23 promo. I've never even seen one for sale

[chilly55]

Originally Posted by dijit31

I have a near complete "Lost" television series autographed cards with most variations and many duplicates. Only missing francois chau disney expo d23 promo. I've never even seen one for sale

Same, I also need that one for my collection. Starting to work on the relics/props and almost halfway done. Glad to see I'm not the only one who has never seen the Disney card.

[promoking]

Originally Posted by BipolarBear

Yeah, if the watches were ever broadly released, I feel like we'd see a lot more of them out in the wild, both opened (because X-Men was huge back in 1992) or sealed (because this was the height of the collector/speculator era). The fact that they are nearly non-existent leads me to believe that they were never released. In the days before the internet, the idea of one or a few collectors cornering the entire market just seems impossible.

So...what hapened, then? Clearly, at least a few were manufactured, maybe given to limited retails as promotions or prototypes or something. And enough cards were printed that several people have put together partial collections. I suspect the product was scrapped at the very last minute for some reason (contract dispute or legal issues, a defect in production, etc.). We'll probably never know the full story, but it's given us this odd and obscure piece to a legendary set that only the diehards are even aware of.

I was already heavily collecting cards that came in action figures etc. when these were purportedly released, and I never saw any of the Marvel watches or the individual cards for sale in the 1990s despite scouring Ebay since 1996.
I think your conclusions are spot on!