Resepctfully speaking.

Why seperate most of the items from the Siver Box Set and sell them in a haphazard fashion like you are? It looks like from all of your auction listings, that you do have a complete silver anniversary box set, but for some reason you have decided to sell the items seperately and are combining various items from the set with other totally unrelated items in other listings. That is most confusing to me....

I can almost understand the reasoning for some folks selling an L3 seperately, as for some reason it garners ridiculous bids on E-Bay. Sometimes even higher than a complete sealed box set does.

But your auctions do not seem to fall in that category. It seems to be just jumbled up. So, I have a question. Why?

First I should point out that I am the bane of every Acaeum poster's existence - I am a gamer, not a collector.  8O

<ducks... >

I bought this set a couple years ago with the intention of playing the modules. It was cheaper for me to buy this set with a lot of the modules I wanted (I was getting back into D&D after a long RPG hiatus) than if I had tried to buy modules individually.

Had there been opened boxed sets, I would have preferred to buy those, but I wasn't seeing any at that time (or at least very many). The auction I finally won for one of these was a sealed set (for $40 + S&H).

So I opened the set and (carefully) read through all the books. Since I wasn't interested in L3 (I was looking for modules I knew as a kid), I put it aside thinking I might sell it while I kept the others.

To speed this up, I'm no longer playing D&D (a long story) and am now selling all my D&D possessions. For the sake of ease, I broke my stuff up into a few large lots. I tried selling them for fixed prices on Dragonsfoot. The only lot I sold was my boxed sets of Basic/Expert D&D. That was when grodog tempted me to sell the L3 by itself on Ebay for big bucks.

In one of my lots on DF, I had offered the complete silver anniversary boxed (including L3) for $60 (which included the cost of Priority S&H). Chasing after the image of fame and fortune that grodog had implanted into my head, (and since my stuff wasn't selling) I then decided to sell L3 on Ebay (along with the rest of my stuff).

Why didn't I sell the L3 with the complete boxed set? At the rates that module is selling on Ebay, I just couldn't turn down the money (I had no compelling reason not to). But what about the rest of the boxed set?

True, I could have sold the boxed set minus L3 as one auction, but I didn't think that auction would do well (since the big draw to the boxed set is L3). It wouldn't appeal to collectors since the set had been opened and wouldn't be complete. I could have sold each book/module separately on Ebay, but I doubt that I would be able to sell many of them. Even if I had, they would have sold for very little since they are not "originals." Plus, that would mean having to make a bazillion of small shipments through the mail.

That is why I broke up my collection into the following lots: Basic D&D, AD&D, and miscellaneous 2nd & 3rd D&D stuff. I took the Basic D&D books from the silver anniversary set (Holmes, B2) in the Basic D&D lot. I took the AD&D books (G1-3, S2, I6) and put them with my AD&D lot. Everything else (the art print, history book, page insert, box) and put it with the L3 auction.

So if you wanted the complete set, you'd only have to win 3 auctions. That is only one more than if I had done what Aneoth suggested (which would make for 2 auctions). Besides, right now the Basic lot is going for around $20, the AD&D lot at $.01 (with no bids), and the L3 lot at $.01 with one bid - you could get the complete boxed set with a lot of other D&D junk for a steal.  :D

Oh boy, I am going to laugh if grodog wins my L3 for a penny (that'll be my luck  :lol: ). Make more sense now?

bclarkie wrote:With that, you can sell the L3 seperately and it would probably maximize you profits. Just my .02

Not true, at least in my experience.

Look at it this way: the L3 is a given. It commands ridiculous prices, so why not sell it seperately, right? I think we can all agree on this one.

But what are you left with then? A Silver Anniversary set missing its most attractive item. What's the lure for the potential buyer? Personally, I'm going to pass if a seller says to me, "Hey, I'd love to sell you this expensive boxed set, except you're not going to get the best item." That's not much different than saying, "Hey, I'd love to sell you these New York Yankees baseball cards, but I'm going to keep the Derek Jeter rookie card for myself." Screw that.

There's another problem, too. The buyer looking to replace his worn copies of the G series, for example, doesn't necessarily care about Ravenloft (or vice-versa). Nor does he care about the added expense of buying a big lot — not to mention the higher shipping for a boxed set — when all he's after is those G modules.

Once the decision to sell the L3 has been made, breaking up the Silver set makes perfect sense. I've broken up five sets myself, beginning with one of the two sets I bought at the 1999 (?) GenCon convention. I usually sell the L3 alone (of course), group the G series together, sell Ravenloft alone, try to get a few dollars for the History of TSR booklet, then either take my chances with the remainder or add them to bigger lots. Thanks mostly to L3 and some good prices on the G series, I've shown a healthy profit every time.

Of course, as with all eBay activities, YMMV. There's no way to control the very important variables of timing and luck, not to mention seller reputation and the ability to put together an attractive listing. All I can relate is my disagreement with some of the above posts and my personal experience: five Silver sets broken up, five nice profits shown. I'm not claiming it's gospel, but I thought I'd throw it out there ...

Xaxaxe wrote:

bclarkie wrote:With that, you can sell the L3 seperately and it would probably maximize you profits. Just my .02

Not true, at least in my experience.

Look at it this way: the L3 is a given. It commands ridiculous prices, so why not sell it seperately, right? I think we can all agree on this one.

But what are you left with then? A Silver Anniversary set missing its most attractive item. What's the lure for the potential buyer? Personally, I'm going to pass if a seller says to me, "Hey, I'd love to sell you this expensive boxed set, except you're not going to get the best item." That's not much different than saying, "Hey, I'd love to sell you these New York Yankees baseball cards, but I'm going to keep the Derek Jeter rookie card for myself." Screw that.

There's another problem, too. The buyer looking to replace his worn copies of the G series, for example, doesn't necessarily care about Ravenloft (or vice-versa). Nor does he care about the added expense of buying a big lot — not to mention the higher shipping for a boxed set — when all he's after is those G modules.

Once the decision to sell the L3 has been made, breaking up the Silver set makes perfect sense. I've broken up five sets myself, beginning with one of the two sets I bought at the 1999 (?) GenCon convention. I usually sell the L3 alone (of course), group the G series together, sell Ravenloft alone, try to get a few dollars for the History of TSR booklet, then either take my chances with the remainder or add them to bigger lots. Thanks mostly to L3 and some good prices on the G series, I've shown a healthy profit every time.

Of course, as with all eBay activities, YMMV. There's no way to control the very important variables of timing and luck, not to mention seller reputation and the ability to put together an attractive listing. All I can relate is my disagreement with some of the above posts and my personal experience: five Silver sets broken up, five nice profits shown. I'm not claiming it's gospel, but I thought I'd throw it out there ...

I actually just looked at it from a different perspective.  I looked at as a person trying to win the "full set".  L3 is obviously the most attractive part of the set, so that someone trying to get the "set" had to win 2 different auctions.  With that he would be competing against 3 different types of bidders: 1) bidders looking for the full set; 2) bidders looking for parts of the set but not L3; 3) bidders looking expressly for L3.  In retrospect, I agree it would probably be better to group them in the manner as you stated.  Personally, if I was breaking the set up and selling it, I would most likely just list each module individually and let people fight it out for each module individually.  :D

Ralf Toth wrote:

Xaxaxe wrote:I've broken up five sets myself, beginning with one of the two sets I bought at the 1999 (?) GenCon convention.

I like it! That way our complete / shrinkwrapped Silver Boxes become rarer and thus more valuable.

I agree totally  :!:  :!:

bclarkie wrote:Personally, if I was breaking the set up and selling it, I would most likely just list each module individually and let people fight it out for each module individually.

This can absolutely work; I've just found it to be a little less effective. The problem is the S2, B2, and Basic rulebook — none of these are exactly that rare. What you're trying to sell, in effect, is their condition (which, hopefully, is still mint). With the right planets in the right alignment, though, I don't see why this couldn't also bring in some profit.

Really, once the decision to break up a Silver set is made, the final figures are always going to revolve around L3. As an example, I sold my latest L3 for something like $48; a week earlier, Darkseraphim managed to get something like $95 for one. Believe me, I wouldn't have minded if those figures had been reversed ...