Hot (for me) Pack

Well, if I call it a hot pack, you know there must be some Toronto in that thar pack of 1990-91 Upper Deck hockey cards... 

Maybe not in the first half though. Graves and Broten are fine pulls but...

What was one of the hardest slapshots of his time, Al Iafrate in his Toronto blueness, and another Dany boy to boot make for a couple nice additions.

I haven't talked about the hologram differences on this set, which can be a pain for those "micro variation" collectors. There are multiple different holograms on the back which provides lots of variations for those that collect them. I worry about them for cataloging cards for trade and because I care for my Jays.

If it wasn't for those reasons and my need to be exact with details, I would ignore the small differences with my collection.

Good Choice

 Another pack and another good pick...

Always loved the Collectors' Choice subset with the great artwork. Best of the first bunch....

May not be the calibre of Brett Hull, Mike Richter or Keith Primeau though - that is a solid trio.

Brett took a lot to become arguably the best player in his family - give him credit for the big shoes he had to fill, and doing a great job getting there.

I never saw him quite on the top tier as a Gretzky or Lemieux, but maybe that's just me.

Should We Continue?

 I mean, we had the first team all-stars in the pack yesterday, why not the second team today?

Mike Modano and Brian Leetch would be great additions to an all-star team.

Vernon and Murphy would add two more for the all-star team for sure. Don't always get this kind of star power in a single pack, so need to enjoy them when they happen!

Star Power

As the Jays continue to make the end of the season interesting - I am trying not to jinx it by talking about it too much, just saying, I am following closely and hope that they are able to win the division....which was almost a lock 10 days ago. I digress though....let's look at cards.... 

Unlike yesterday, wow, we have an All-Star team in the pack today.

Doesn't get much bigger than the great one with Wayne Gretzky. A Leaf in the mix doesn't hurt either.

Doug Gilmour and Trevor Linden would easily make that All-Star team as well. Even if this is pre-Leaf timing for Douggie.

Then end with an Yzerman / Hull hologram, and we just named a bunch off first team all-star players in the single pack.

Praries Represent

 Another pack of 1990-91 Upper Deck hockey cards and we get some solid Canadian team representation.

Dave and Doug representing the old Winninpeg Jets as well as, if you want to stretch out to B.C., you have Paul there too.

We keep up the Canadian connection with three more Canadian teams carded in the second half as well.

Maybe not the star power in this pack, but can't all be amazing packs. Still, not too shabby.

A Big One

 When we talk about this set, there are a couple of cards that are of "value". One of them would be just down below.

No, not Lou, although getting back to back packs with Leaf cards is a great start.

Jaromir Jagr. What can you say about the workhorse? He was a strong second on the Pens to Super Mario. Jagr was amazing for a long stretch - something Super Mario wasn't even able to do. Was one of my favourites growing up and watching as a kid and the fact he played for such a long time was just amazing. Not sure there will be another career that stays so productive for so long.

Quebec

When I think of the Nordiques and the move to Colorado, there are two players I think of - Sakic and Forsberg.

We get the nice Sakic card starting off this pack. Adding in Lou for the Leaf content, and that's a good pack.

Well, since we mention trams of tears gone by, the Hartford Whalers would definitely fit the bill!

What team of yesteryear do you miss seeing in the league - or any other league for that matter?

Before taking off for today, I do have a completely separate share - we finally got together for birthday wishes with my side of the family (my birthday, both kids and my wife are all within a month basically), so I got a couple sports/cards related presents which I can share...

A bunch of Timmies packs from my mom - happily not a surprise and always fun to rip.

A nice signed puck from my brother. Behind Toronto, Pittsburgh is my team, and Paul's a great player so a very nice surprise to get this. I won't be starting a signed puck collection or anything, but very cool.

1990-91 Upper Deck Hockey

Today, we get to start through another few packs (10-12) from local collector Scott who passed them along.

1990-91 Upper Deck hockey was a solid set and early offering from Upper Deck's forray into hockey. The look and feel was in line with their baseball offering with a slight difference on design.

I am just missing a few cards from the set to finish it, so probably not going to luck out here but you never know.

Always like the design, though I'd say 1991-92 is slightly better.

No Leafs in the first pack, but we do end with...

an insert! These top line technologically advanced holograms don't scan well, but they were very unique at the time. Hard to tell which one you get with the scan but in hand can at least tell it's Yzerman and Hull. Would be nice if they numbered them, even on the sticker backing, but no such luck. Still, new one for me so a good first pack considering I wasn't going to find any of the missing cards I needed. Now to try and find odds on the insert...

Ending The Fantasy

Last pack from the MTG bundle today, and though we have had a couple solid hits, nothing specific for my keeping which is a bit disappointing, and value wise, not equite there. As they say, you'd be better spending the money on singles instead of busting packs, but busting packs is so fun!

You're Not Alone - well it would be nice if this pack sent me something other than reassurance.

Well, at least the token is a keeper, and we did get two rares in the pack, though neither is outstanding.

Well, unfortunately the break is where I expected since there isn't a ton in the packs that would be for me to keep, but still a very fun break if nothing else.

Maybe Crashing

 Well, with two packs of Final Fantasy Magic cards left to open, we are going to either crash out and get not much else of anything, or end with a bang - so let's see which today has in store.

Well, I guess the airship crash card is hinting at not a great ending.

That Chocobo is so dang cute! Is it worth anything more than 1,000 oohs and aahs, no, but those have value too you know! Shiva is alright and so is the Brunhildr, but no artifact helpers at all today unfortunately.

Repeats and Land Keeper

 THree packs left to try and get a nice keeper hit for myself like a rare or mythic artifact. Will today be the day? We shall see...

Well, might not be a big dollar card, but a land that produces colourless mana fits the bill and is a keeper. 200 gil a night for an inn, sounds about right for a stay somewhere in most Final Fantasy games to be sure, as it the quote for what they are likely to say.

You might recognize some of the cards as dupes from the last couple packs - par for the course when half the pack is commons and half the set is, if that.

Not all extended art cards look good, but I really like the Torgal. It happens to be the foil, and looks really nice. As I've said before, before artifacts, I played green, and it would have been a nice card to stick in one of my decks.

As for Vaan, he's the last main FF character I remember playing as XII was the last game I worked through and beat. Yeah, been a while.

More Memories

 First card out of the next pack, and all I can think is that Magic really did it some favours...

I don't ever remember Ice Flans being of any real challenge, but a 5/4 creature is really overstepping their value I think. I would have pegged them as 2/2 creatures maybe, but that might just be me.

I do love the Choc/Mog picture - wish it was a full art picture instead. Something more like the Search for the Frozen Esper full art treatment.

The fist adds another artifact pick up, still looking for a first rare or mythic pick up from these packs though...

Random Encounters is a great name and card - very appropriate and something that just first both worlds well. Doesn't hurt to have the Ocho on the card in the background - very Final Fantasy-esque creature.

More Art

We keep working through play boosters from the bundle and come across the second art card - see the end if that's your thing, but otherwise, the cards first! 

The Dwarven Castle Guard is a great resemblance of a not so important, but memorable character from the series.

I didn't mention before, but the Magic cards like Thunder Magic above, and Ice Magic below, are a great work to tie in the different levels of spells and their impact increasing with level - very nice way to tie it in.

Nice, another foil artifact pick up, and a Bahamut art card - a bit too colourful for my liking, but an interesting look at least. I wasn't a big fan of the saga cards, or summon cards here, just too much mechanic for my taste, but at least I can understand the appeal for the different impacts over a few turns.

Another decent enough pack - four more to go, I think.

Double The Chocobo

 It's like a game within a game, how many Chocobo's are there in a pack of Final Fantasy MTG cards? Well today, we get an easy double in that regard.

Last pack and this one, we started to see some of the coom cards appear for a second time, such as Warrior's Sword here, but take a notice of the Chocobo Kick above...and then check out below...

Happen to hit the same card in the foil slot, a neat coincidence.

Also get the first borderless card with Bartz - not an expensive one, but very cool looking. Another artifact keeper with a second copy of the Relentless, though surprising, the Cerberus isn't a very expensive rare....still a neat card though.

THese packs have been pretty consistent thus far and solid for what I'd been expecting.

A Blitz

 Another pack of Final Fantasy MTG pack today and we start with some nostalgia...

If you played Final Fantasy X or X-2, you should absolutely know Blitzball. Final Fantasy was good for having side games, my preference was the card game in VIII, but Blitzball was an interesting one as well. Honestly, the game could be a bit infuriating at times, but at least it was different.

I pick up a third World Map card here, all good still on that front.

Cactaur is another iconic character from Final Fantasy games, nice to see him here.

The Treasure token counts as an artifact card so another double pack for me - yay! The Lightning mythic card is a solid hit here too worth a few dollars, so as long as that holds, I should be able to at least trade it in for something neat.

Two In One

Well, this pack of Final Fantasy Magic cards gives me two more artifacts for my collection... 

We get another Chocobo appearance with the Call the Mountain Chocobo card, and another World Map to go with the single I picked up. I can make some chuckling remarks about the Commune with Beavers card, but I will try to refrain.

The Odin rare is a solid one, while the foil spot providing a second artifact card for the collection, is amazing.

We also get the first art card from a pack, this one showing Zidane. Apparently there are 53 different art cards, and those alone I can see being a nice collectible for Final Fantasy fans. I do wonder how many non-Magic FF fans are picking up some of the cards out of interest in FF.

The Bird

 Today we start opening packs from the Magic The Gathering Final Fantasy bundle box I shares the other day. Going in, there are a handful of strong artifact cards, and some in various different versions, so hitting one or two of those would be amazing, and for my collecting, is what I would be looking for here. The other "win" would be any solid trade value for hits - not going to value that in the big picture of success for the box, but it would be a nice side bonus.

Now, the big cards in this set are the Chocobo cards, but those are really only in the Collector boosters - and I am not opening the one I bought (bought it for $85 CDN - you can see how that has held up by checking the prices for such packs now, just a couple months later. I do get a bird in this pack at least...

One artifact in the pack, Iron Giant, I did pick up one as a single, so still good getting a second to work on rounding out the play set of four.

The Black Mages and Gardener cards are great throwbacks to even the original game - the black mage and Ocho ddefinite resembled in those cards - love it.

The Sandworm is great too - but isn't the bird token the cutest thing you have seen since squirrel tokens? I mean, it's bang on great artwork of a young Chocobo.

May not have been a great pack for dollar value or artifact cards, but for nostalgia - totally there!

No Sweat Trade With Caouette

I have done a number of trades with fellow TCDB member and Canadian, JFCaouette, and this one sent me some baseball helpers. 

A few Jays of course, including a couple of the variations from 2020 Topps Opening Day with the very Canadian borders that are a cool little touch, definitely very nice.

The bulk were helpers for my 2021 Topps set build which of course meant getting a bunch of rookie cards since that was the bulk of what had been pulled and missing from the lot I bought.

The bunch does get me to about 90% done the big 660 card set, so very cool and awesome on that front. I do wonder if I have some of those remaining cards hidden in the cards I still have backlogged to search through, share, and log into my collection, but if I get them through trade first - that works for me just fine!

All The Singles

Yesterday, I shared the contents of the MTG Final Fantasy bundle I bought, and today it's the singles from the set and the Commander release of the Final Fantasy set - not too many cards, but a start that, hopefully, the packs from the bundle, help to grow.

I am a fan of Final Fantasy, but my "core" was the original on the Nintendo (still have, and actually was the first video game I had my son play and complete after playing a bit of Mario and Zelda) through about VI. I don't know why exactly, but past that, it was VIII, X and XII - don't know why it was every other release, but I know the more recent ones are because time is not something I have had in any manner that would allow me to put tens of hours into a video game the same way.

So when I think of the series, it's more so images like Lion Heart below and the Adventurer's Airship above that resonate with me for the series. I do appreciate and like the theme for the other set representations, but those cards of course hit different.

World Map - dang right that's an important thing in Final Fantasy. I remember with the first game, how cool it was that you could actually look at "the whole world" and where you were on the maps. It seemed like such a massive and expansive game, and was at the time, but I wonder if we were to compare it to say, Breath of the Wild, what the game play size really was.

Probably one of the best cross overs with Magic in the Universes Beyond series, glad that it was done, and a cool cross between nostalgic things I enjoy.

MTG & Final Fantasy

 Before we get to the cards - 24 years ago today, the world changed in many ways with the September 11 attacks on the twin towers and rest of the events of that day. There have been other atrocities and terrible things that the world has gone through since then, but it still sits as a stark reminder of what we should all work hard not to have in this world. I may not be an American, but the events of that day effected everyone worldwide, and I hope the importance of learning from those events doesn't fade with time.

You are here for cards, and cards there shall be. There was a LOT of excitement this past June for the release of Magic the Gathering's cross with Final Fantasy. It was the biggest success in the history of Magic apparently, and I will say, I bought into the hype. I picked up a loose booster and collector pack...

Which I won't open and keep in my pack collection. I did also pick up a bundle box which was $110 CDN...

After everything came out, I don't really get why the price was so much since the individual packs ended up going for about $9 each, and you definitely don't get $30 of value generally on the rest of the offerings. The papers included, if you are interested, including tokens and such are...

The die is pretty nice as well, I will say that, but it's only a couple dollars of value at most.

The deck storage box is nice enough too...

You also of course have the packs themselves....

Those are the packs, and I am going to open them all over the next week or so, but I am going to count ALL of the contents, including the lands and promos, so let's also tack in the land cards here since they won't be anything but pretty!

These are the non-foil lands, and they do of course look really nice. I'm just happy there is a waste as those are about the only basic land I keep given my restriction to "non-colour" card collecting with my artifacts. Too bad the lands will never probably be worth anything more than a dollar or two, though for lands, that's still really good. Back in the early days, lands were just a requirement to play and many places kept bulk basic lands to add/remove from your decks when playing at the stores, not with the different arts, special releases, the lands have some value.

The foil card lands are the same, but foil - so won't bother with those, but the surprise before getting to the packs, are the two foil cards included, which can be a wide range, so let's see what we get there...

Well, the Terra card definitely has some value being a mythic, extended art, foil card. See having to see where prices settle to after the release, it was as high as $100 or so on initial release of the product back in June. I may not be into cards for the value, but with the Magic cards here, I will keep an eye out for being able to get trade value to put into Magic cards I want.

Not a bad start for the bundle, but we have 9 boosters to open over the next little bit, but before I start that, I did pick up some singles from the set to share, and may have a trade or two to share as well.