GenCon Tournament Module • Collecting Appraisal • The Acaeum

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GenCon Tournament Module
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Ralf Toth
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 1:21 am

Any opinions on the final price of burntwire's tournament module?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... RK:MEWA:IT

The price is 1/2 Tsojconth. Considering the amounts te R1-3 pre-pubs would sell for, this one looks like a steal to me.

- "When the going gets weird, the Weird turn pro."

Hunter S. Thompson (July 18, 1937 - Feb 20, 2005)

mbassoc2003
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 3:09 am

I would have gone in higher, but I'm watching the pennies at the momet.

This week I've been mostly eating . . . The white ones with the little red flecks in them.

killjoy32
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 4:02 am

Ralf Toth wrote:Any opinions on the final price of burntwire's tournament module?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... RK:MEWA:IT

The price is 1/2 Tsojconth. Considering the amounts te R1-3 pre-pubs would sell for, this one looks like a steal to me.

i was gonna bid $450 but i fell asleep and forgot to put my bid on :cry:

oh well never mind. prb best i didnt bid anyway

Are we nearly there yet?

bclarkie
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 7:42 am

I suspect lack of name recognition was to blame. Most people are all to familiar with the most of the "rares" by now, but in a situation where you have such a unique item, I would imagine that unless you are a serious collector, then most folks would not have even really know what they were looking at.

"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." -Neitzche

harami2000
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 8:10 am

Ralf Toth wrote:Any opinions on the final price of burntwire's tournament module?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... RK:MEWA:IT

The price is 1/2 Tsojconth. Considering the amounts te R1-3 pre-pubs would sell for, this one looks like a steal to me.

The main draw is that you get "three for the price of one".
The price of that "one", however, certainly didn't seem like a "steal", here.

R1-3 are a good few years earlier and are very well hyped-up modules in their own right.

Can't see any serial numbering, etc., on these 1985 tourneys, either.
Unsure how much interest there would have been if the seller had an unknown reputation. Far too easy to forge...

Give me half a Tsojconth (closer 60%) any day; if not a hole-punched one.

killjoy32 wrote:i was gonna bid $450 but i fell asleep and forgot to put my bid on
oh well never mind. prb best i didnt bid anyway

Seems to be a running theme, here...

Did you have a good excuse, this time? *chuckles* sry! :oops:

a2jeff
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 8:27 am

Yeah, I was surprised these didn't go higher and expected some mega-snipes, but that's ok by me :lol:

As to rarity, I wonder if anyone has other tournament mods and knows how many copies were printed? I'll have to ask Devon about this.

I have to believe the numbers are extremely low, surviving copies perhaps in the single digits?!

mbassoc2003
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 8:32 am

a2jeff wrote:As to rarity, I wonder if anyone has other tournament mods and knows how many copies were printed? I'll have to ask Devon about this.

Speek to our resident Greyhawk Guru. I believe he has a few.

This week I've been mostly eating . . . The white ones with the little red flecks in them.

killjoy32
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 8:43 am

harami2000 wrote:
killjoy32 wrote:i was gonna bid $450 but i fell asleep and forgot to put my bid on
oh well never mind. prb best i didnt bid anyway

Seems to be a running theme, here...
Did you have a good excuse, this time? *chuckles* sry!

well i had been down in london for 3 days - went to see a band called "killing joke" play two 25th anniversary concerts, which were utterly fantastic - was pretty much on the go for most of that time, so got back sat night totally shattered. as for them sniping programs, i fork out enough in charges n stuff, so they can shove it for more money off me

in the end, if i forget, i aint that bothered......there is more to life than remembering to bid on stuff

Are we nearly there yet?

johnhuck
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 8:56 am

killjoy32 wrote:went to see a band called "killing joke" play two 25th anniversary concerts, which were utterly fantastic

25th anniversary?

I've just realised it's 20 years since I last saw them. Now that does make me feel old

killjoy32
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 9:11 am

johnhuck wrote:
killjoy32 wrote:went to see a band called "killing joke" play two 25th anniversary concerts, which were utterly fantastic

25th anniversary?

I've just realised it's 20 years since I last saw them. Now that does make me feel old

john yeah

tell you mate, they were absolutely amazing. played tons of their old stuff and the set list was a good 2hrs long too. they filmed the 2nd night, as its going to be made into a 25th anniv DVD, so keep your eyes peeled. they're also doing a world tour starting later in the year, so go check em out!

my daughter said to me yesterday "hey dad you're 37 this year - god thats really old!" - you can just hate em sometimes :?

Are we nearly there yet?

grodog
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 11:44 am

Tourney print run sizes are really hit or miss---it depends in a large part on whether the tourneys were run at multiple cons, as well as whether they were RPGA events (which tended to draw more players), and if RPGA whether they were the AD&D Open or not. I'm sure that's why the pre-pub copies of R1-4 exist at all--because they were run at so many cons vs. say, Treasures of the Dragon Queen, and yes, I'm still looking for a copy

I don't know of many c. pre-1987 surviving tourneys outside of the hands of ex-TSR/-RPGA folks, because the database of the adventures was apparently deleted by a disgruntled ex-employee before she/he left. (That's a rumor I've heard from a few sources, so I tend to lend it some credence).

I'm sure Paul, Shawn/Devon, and others could chime in with the details about the tourneys in their collections (and I'd certainly love to hear the details about them, btw! I've got a large update that'll be going onto my tourneys page in the next week or two---this does incorporate info from the brothers burnt who provided me with a list of all of the tourneys that they had picked up over the years)

Allan Grohe ([email protected])
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mdr003
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 5:28 pm

Killing Joke - one of the guys in my old gaming group was a big fan and whenever we were at his house, he'd have them on the stereo (this was back in the early to mid-eighties).

Just on the GenCon stuff - I won one of Burnie's auctions for some TSR memos from 1983, which were primarily GenCon instructions and Dave Sutherland's particular assignments. I received an email this morning from a guy called Randy Porter, which said:

Hi my name is Randy Porter an I was one of the bidders on the Gen Con material you won. I am the official Gen Con Historian and was wondering if you could make copies of those documents and mail them to me. Here is my website to show you I am not blowing smoke. http://mypage.iu.edu/~wrporter Look foward to hearing from you Randy

He looks legit, but I was wondering what people thought - should I make copies and send them off, or not?

Regards

Mike

mbassoc2003
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 5:34 pm

mdr003 wrote:He looks legit, but I was wondering what people thought - should I make copies and send them off, or not?

I'd say that would be entirely your call. Remenber though, at the moment you have an item that is unique. There isn't another one. If you copy it and post it off to someone it is no longer unique. And you have no way of controlling how many copies are made of the 'wild' copy. Are you willing to take a possible drop in value of your win?

This week I've been mostly eating . . . The white ones with the little red flecks in them.

grodog
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 5:35 pm

Randy's a good guy, Mike, and has helped me to compile info about the various tourneys I've got on my site, as well as with general GenCon research.

To Ian's point, if you scribble/stamp COPY on the copy, then that should help to keep it from being confused with your original....

Allan Grohe ([email protected])
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harami2000
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 5:47 pm

grodog wrote:To Ian's point, if you scribble/stamp COPY on the copy, then that should help to keep it from being confused with your original....

*nods*. Sounds cool here, Mike. Item has no inherent or particular mass-market/resale value and is research-only in that context.

Or whether he just needs the "data" therein, which would ensure the originals are kept "secured" in their current form, if those could be scanned/OCR'd.

mdr003
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 6:23 pm

Thanks guys - I'll do as you suggest and write COPY or some such in large letters on the photocopies. Basically all I was looking for was confirmation that Randy was an OK guy, and if he's helped out acaeum members in the past then thats good enough for me.

Regards

Mike

cgould42
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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 8:45 pm

Ralf Toth wrote:Any opinions on the final price of burntwire's tournament module?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... RK:MEWA:IT

The price is 1/2 Tsojconth. Considering the amounts te R1-3 pre-pubs would sell for, this one looks like a steal to me.

I think the price on this one was about right. I feel one of the main factors which pushes up the value of the Tsojconth. & R1-3 pre-pubs is that they are so strongly connected to a more widely distributed module.

Most tournament modules remain simply tournament modules. Those that are turned into a mass-market product will have a much stronger interest from the collectors market as a whole. I consider myself a completest when it comes to collecting. I won't feel my collection is truly complete until I have all the items such as Tsojconth and the pre-pubs. I would not consider most tournament modules as part of that elusive goal of acquiring 100%. Don't get me wrong, I would love to have a copy

but willingness to pay the high price for it is just not there.

Cheers,
Curt

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Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 10:10 pm

CGOULD42 wrote:
Ralf Toth wrote:Any opinions on the final price of burntwire's tournament module?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... RK:MEWA:IT

The price is 1/2 Tsojconth. Considering the amounts te R1-3 pre-pubs would sell for, this one looks like a steal to me.

I think the price on this one was about right. I feel one of the main factors which pushes up the value of the Tsojconth. & R1-3 pre-pubs is that they are so strongly connected to a more widely distributed module.

Most tournament modules remain simply tournament modules. Those that are turned into a mass-market product will have a much stronger interest from the collectors market as a whole. I consider myself a completest when it comes to collecting. I won't feel my collection is truly complete until I have all the items such as Tsojconth and the pre-pubs. I would not consider most tournament modules as part of that elusive goal of acquiring 100%. Don't get me wrong, I would love to have a copy but willingness to pay the high price for it is just not there.

Cheers,
Curt

I agree with part of Curt's commentary. Every tournament has modules, many of them typically. Some survive, some don't. Some are good, some are not. The ones that are typically worth the most are those that have the closest links to the origins of TSR and the founders of the game.

I personally don't think that this particular one was worth what it sold for (no offense to those that bid on the item), mainly based on the condition, the authors, and the fact that it has no ties to subsequent publications (that I'm aware of). It is simply an earlier tournament module. I've been collecting them for years.

Granted a lot of them never survived since they were usually very basic in presentation. They are also easily copied. I would be concerned about that potentially becoming an issue when they go for this kind of price. A signature/autograph at least gives the item some authenticity. Not that I doubt this items authenticity since it was in the collection of the brother's Burnt.

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