The Battle of the Box

Jackalope here with another cost/value analysis. This time of an older set. A lot of players and collectors feel that there is less value when you buy an older box and open it. This is for various reasons, but the most commonly held belief is that the longer a set is out, the more of it gets broken (opened) and the more single cards there are in the market. I’m going to do a single box breakdown for you here. This is just one random box that I opened and is not typical of all boxes, but it gives you a good idea what you should expect if you bought a box of YuGiOh 5D's Starstrike Blast.



[caption id="attachment_819" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="So serene, just sitting there…"][/caption] 

[caption id="attachment_820" align="alignnone" width="293" caption="NOM NOM NOM!"][/caption]

Okay, let’s look at what makes up a box:
24 Packs, 9 cards in each pack. Each pack will contain at least 1 Rare card and may contain a foil card.

Our box broke down like this:
1 Secret Rare
1 Ultimate Rare
2 Ultra Rare Cards
5 Super Rare Cards
24 Rare Cards
183 Common Cards

The price of the Starstrike Blast Booster Box as of this writing is $84.99. So the cards we got out of this box should exceed the base price of 85 bucks for this to be worthwhile. Furthermore they should do so by a decent margin as you want to make it “worth your while” - that is the time it takes to open the box, sort the cards and sell/trade the cards to get money or cards you desire.

So let’s see what we got and what it is worth!



[caption id="attachment_821" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="Nice and organized!"][/caption]

1 Secret Rare:
Dragunity Knight - Gae Dearg = $36.99

1 Ultimate Rare :
Supreme Arcanite Magician = $7.99

2 Ultra Rare Cards :
Shooting Star Dragon = $9.99
Glow-Up Bulb = $44.99

5 Super Rare Cards:
Anarchist Monk Ranshin = $.99
Karakuri Klock = $4.99
Royal Knight of the Ice Barrier = $1.99
D2 Shield = $1.99
Archfiend Empress = $2.50

24 Rare Cards:
Formula Synchron = $24.99
Gravekeeper's Recruiter = $9.99
22 “Junk” Rares* = $5.50

183 Common Cards:
183 Assorted Common Cards** = $5.50

Grand Total = 158.84!

[caption id="attachment_822" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="Drat! Foiled again!"][/caption]

Okay so clearly that’s a worthwhile box break! We got lucky in getting that Glow-Up Bulb as that was a big money card, but really the value from this box came from the 2 Rare cards, Formula Synchron and Gravekeeper's Recruiter! Those 2 were 35 bucks, which is insane value. That’s what makes  Starstrike Blast such a great buy right now. You should almost always get one of every rare out of a box so you’re automatically lowering the “price” of the box from $85 to $50! So you’re looking at trying to make more than 50 bucks from the box “break” which is pretty easy to do.

So there you go; I hope this opened up some of you to trying out some older boxes for value and making some money while adding to your collection.

Exit, stage right!

*Junk Rares refers to Rare cards that you would have to sell in bulk, or lots, they are generally of very limited use, for the above example I valued them at $.25 each.

**Assorted Commons refers to Common cards that you would have to sell in bulk, for the above example I valued them at $.03 each.