General Forum

I don't even like the IDEA of random breaks! That is a complete crapshoot and not worth my money or time. If I'm not going to get anything I want from it, I'll buy my own box. If I could buy my own team for a decent price, I'd consider it. This is only when it comes to NFL and MLB though. I would never do a NASCAR group break. That's just ridiculous to me. Unless they are going to refund your money when they pull nothing of your driver, I wouldn't even consider it. Plus, per driver prices are outrageous for some drivers. 

The only group breaks I've ever done were with my uncle. Not really a group though, just a pair. He'd tell me how much he wants to spend. I'd match that and order us whatever I could find that looked like the best deal for the money. When the boxes arrived (always at least 2 hobby boxes of something), I'd hold them until he came to the house. Then we'd open them together. The way the packs were stacked in the boxes determined how we'd separate the packs. If there were 4 stacks, we'd flip a coin to see who gets to pick a corner first. Then the other one picks a corner and also gets the last corner. Then we'd open the packs and keep what we get. Sometimes we would trade cards with each other. If the box only had 2 stacks of packs, we'd blend them with every other pack going into the other stack. For example: If the box was 2 stacks of 5 packs, the left stack is packs 1, 3, 5 from there and packs 2,4 from the right stack. Then we flip a coin to see who gets to pick their stack. If it was just one stack of packs, we'd alternate opening packs.

I have done a few case breaks of NASCAR, but not the way this thread is talking about breaks. I get in with several other people to request boxes from one person who can get them for wholesale prices. He then buys the case(s) and ships individual boxes to whoever ordered them. Everything I get in my box is mine and then I can also trade with others who bought boxes. Plus, the guy who orders them is a collector and I can trade with him. Even after the shipping cost, I still get boxes for cheaper than I would through a store (online or not) AND his shipping cost is cheaper b/c it's based on the actual purchase instead of a catch-all price. It's very hard to beat a case break like that, especially since I still get to enjoy opening the packs myself.

I think there is a place for them. They are nice for team collectors. Sometimes ypou can find a break where they randomn packs and you get a random pack.It can help ease the cost a bit if you just collect a team or if you would like to get a packor two of a more expensive product. Understand that this is coming from a guy who doesn't have a card shop within 100 miles of his house.

Sorry for digging up this thread but I was wondering if there's a good way of calculating if the odds are worth a spot's price? I'm bad at math but I thought I'd test myself a little as to see if I made a rationally sound decision or not.

So I've signed up for a 2018/19 Topps Chrome Champions League soccer case break on Ebay. My favourite team costs $18.40 including free international shipping. It'll be my first break and I though it was a good deal. Is it really?

This is what I figured: one pack = 4 cards, one box has 18 packs, one case has 12 boxes which makes 864 cards to be distributed. There are 20 teams in the set. 5 teams have 6 base cards, 15 have 5 base cards including my team. So the base checklist is 105 cards. For each base card pulled I have a 5,25% chance it is a card of my team. But of course not all of them are base.

The SP's make my head dazzle. I'm not sure how to calculate these correctly. There are 216 packs and the odds of a refractor (the most common insert) are 1:3. So at least 72 cards are inserts on average. Since the other ones are much rarer I'll assume there are 80 to 90 inserts/parallels in total in this case. If I subtract 90 from the total cards, that leaves 774 base cards / 105 = around 7 complete sets of base cards in a perfectly even distributed case. Which I'll assume hardly ever happening in reality.

So I'm likely to complete a base set I guess, maybe even several. Let's say I get two complete base sets. I'd keep one set of 5 cards valued at $1 each, which I could've bought at $3.40 shipping (to keep it simple). So to get these cards guaranteed I could've spent $8.40 instead of going for this break. So I'll need to make up $10 in cost. I could sell my second base set for $5 and will need to get lucky for the remaining $5 to break even (= one or two decent SP's or one extra complete base set to sell).

The gambling part of me still likes this decision but the rational part says NO!

Agree with madding.  I build multiple Topps Phillies teamsets and a Topps base set every year.  I don’t do it often, but my last one netted me a Harper SP, 3 more inserts and parallels and a couple teamsets.  And it was fun to watch!  I’ll prolly do the U&H break if he has one!

I was driving through Pittsburgh last week and told the wife that there was a company in the area that I had bought cards from a number of times and I wouldn't mind visiting there shop. (SteelCityCollectibles) When we were leaving they had an ad for a break and my wife asked me what a break is. After I told her she told me she would kick my a#### if I ever did one of them.

I dont think it's that bad, for what he paid. Paying X dollars in a large enough break that you're guaranteed several cards, but having a shot at something real good, is what the hobby is built on. I see no difference between that and just buying a few packs. But the cards he gets will all be the team he likes.

Question related to breaks that maybe somebody can answer...I'm relatively new to it and have been exploring it as something fun to do.

I see a lot of breaks refer to "paper base" cards (in the context of usually not shipping). What are "paper base" cards? Is it just the regular base cards or is there more to it that that? I'm assuming the idea to not ship these is because it of the cost of the weight associated with generally lower value cards. Thanks for the insight.

I have no problem with them.  Been in several.  Will be in several more

I dont know the term "paper base".  I wouldn't bid on a team if I didn't get ALL the cards though.  But that's not the popular opinion, most likely.

I agree completely David. I wouldn't purchase a team if I'm not getting ALL of the cards pulled. That's the point of buying into the break, getting team cards no matter what they are.

I'm guessing that "paper base" means cards that aren't base SP's and/or AU/MEM cards.