New Sets:

Excellence – 2 Waves (40 base, 5 sigs, 5 undertaker, 1 superstar insert per wave)

Topps Picks

Triumph Wave 1

Women’s Division Finishers and Signature Moves (17 cards + Award)

Boom Comics Wave 5

Heritage 2017 Wave 2

Survivor Series 2017 (Base, signatures, NXT poster, Teams, Posters, NOW)

Boom Survivor Series What If

Jeff Hardy Artwork (9 cards + Award)

Boom Comics Wave 6

Infinite Wave 3

Thanksgiving Bundle Cards

Starrcade (Base, Signatures)

Black Friday Bundle Cards

Steel Base (48 cards)

Signature/Kiss Cards

Cyber Monday Bundle Cards

Apps Tuesday Bundle Cards

Live Signatures

Stephanie McMahon/Triple H

VIP Signatures

Kairi Sane

Inserts

Kurt Angle Special Signature (500cc)

Base Variants

Purple Kurt Angle, Becky Lynch, Bayley

Gold Rush – Iron Sheik, Chris Jericho, Brock Lesnar

Marathons

PPV Logos #15 – Backlash, Award #3 – Royal Rumble 96. Overall Award TBD (Set Compete)

Taglines #6 – 9, Award #3, Overall Award – John Cena, Bray Wyatt, Neville, Ted DiBiase, Kurt Angle (Award #3), Ric Flair (Overall Award) (Set Complete)

Headlines #3 – 7 – Kairi Sane, Rusev, John Cena, Elias, Pete Dunne

Fuel #3 – 6, Award #1 – Mark Henry, Corey Graves, Cesaro, Shinsuke Nakamura, Jake “The Snake” Roberts (Award #1)

NXT Series 2 #1 – 5, Award #1, Montez Ford, Sonya Deville, Tino Sabatelli, Liv Morgan, Adam Cole (Award #1), Alexander Wolfe

New Insert Set Checklists

Topps Picks

Naomi Shinsuke Nakamura Seth Rollins Finn Balor

Award – Asuka (1052cc)

Triumph Wave 1 (5000cc)

Bobby Roode Aiden English Bob Backlund Drew Gulak Jimmy Uso Tyler Breeze Samir Singh Sin Cara

Award – Trish Stratus (2344)

Boom Wave 5 “WWE #3”

Seth Rollins Edge Bayley Ric Flair Royal Rumble Dude Love Action Figure Raw Women’s’ Championship Title Belt

Boom Survivor Series “What If” (500cc)

What if Bret Screwed Shawn? Brock/Goldberg

Boom Wave 6 “WWE #11”

Roman Reigns Ricky the Dragon Steamboat Ted DiBiase Royal Rumble

Signature/Kiss Cards (250cc)

Becky Lynch Liv Morgan

Infinite Wave 3 (2 variations)

Dash Wilder Nikki Cross Triple H Becky Lynch Zach Ryder Jack Gallagher Mandy Rose Velveteen Dream

Award – Undertaker

Thanksgiving Bundle Set

Roman Reigns (650 Diamonds) Bayley (2200 Diamonds) Jeff Hardy (4400 Diamonds) Alexa Bliss (11000 Diamonds) Seth Rollins (22000 Diamonds)

Award – Ultimate Warrior Signature

Black Friday Bundle Set

The Miz Drew McIntyre Trish Stratus Dean Ambrose Charlotte Flair

Award – Sasha Banks Signature (36)

Cyber Monday Bundle Set

Naomi Asuka Bobby Roode Braun Strowman Brock Lesnar

Award – AJ Styles Signature (22)

Static

Naomi Rhyno Andre the Giant Dana Brooke Shawn Michaels Andrade “Cien” Almas TJP

Award – Samoa Joe

Apps Tuesday Bundle Set

Adam Colea Ric Flair Becky Lynch Lita Macho Man Randy Savage

Award – Shawn Michaels Signature (22cc)

The major releases of the month were clearly “Excellence” and Survivor Series. Excellence, as aforementioned, is a “digital exclusive”, it even says so on the back of the cards. Each wave had a base set of 20, signature set of 5, an Undertaker tribute set of 5, and a single poster type release (Finn Balor in Wave 1, Bobby Roode in Wave 2). There were FIVE variations of the base set, with the most common black and green being available for coins, and orange, purple (500cc) and gold (100cc) being behind the paywall. Signatures were available in three variations, black at 1250, green at 750 and purple at 150. Some Wave 1 signatures did not sell out prior to the entire wave’s deadline, so they were inserted into Wave 2 packs, and in fact as of this writing purple sigs are still available. Wave 1’s sigs offered nothing new, while Wave 2 held first single sigs of Ruby Riot(t), Ember Moon and the “legend” Junk Yard Dog. Single purple sigs topped out at $25, but can be had for much less, while Greens never made it higher than $8 apiece.



Survivor Series is the second set for this annual major show, and just like last year, it was huge. Over 80 base cards split between the NXT and Main rosters, were issued in four variants, black and blue being available in coin packs, with red and purple (500cc) behind the paywall. The same four colors were used for the signature sets with black uncapped, blue at 1250, red at 750 and purple at 250. The signature set of five cards included two dual sigs from the main roster (Alexa/Charlotte and The Miz/Baron Corbin) and three from NXT (Andrade ‘Cien’ Almas single, Undisputed Era & Sanity Triples). The award was a dual sig of Brock Lesnar and AJ Styles. The purple dual of the two women champions almost made it to $25, while the NXT triples and the male purples didn’t go much higher than $15. Reds topped out at $10, but were on average much lower.

The two hottest cards of the month weren’t even in a major release, they were the first ever “Kiss” cards in the game. Single cards of Becky Lynch and Liv Morgan were issued a couple weeks ago and sold out their 250cc print run in minutes. Lots of both cards have gone as high as $45, with Becky alone selling for $20 to $35 while Liv goes for $20 to $25.

Gold Rush always send the player base into a whirlwind of activity, until those 50 cards have actually traded hands a couple of times and then they settle down into obscurity and become “grails” for player collectors. Brock topped out at $15 and is currently available for $12. Chris Jericho also topped out at $15 and is available for $12 right now, but has sold for slightly less in the past. The legendary tweeter The Iron Sheik maxed at $10 and was as cheap as $5.

Over 40 of the standard base set was released as a “steel” variant on Black Friday with a 250cc limit. They sold out in minutes as usual. Singles for superstars like Alexa and Finn went for as much as $8 apiece, despite there no award being offered.

The Topps cash grab went berserk over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend with bundle cards being offered for different diamond bundles each day for Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Cyber Monday and Apps Tuesday. Each six card set had a signature award card, and none of them ended up more than 36cc total. Cards for the $50 and $100 bundles are in extremely short supply.

Heritage returned for a second wave of more of the same, the most exciting part of which was the first sigs of Tomasso Ciampa and Johnny Gargano, who used to make up the DIY Tag Team in NXT.

Boom Comics accounted for two and a half sets this month, including their first all-paywall set, the two card Survivor Series “What If?” set which is still available for 900 diamonds for 1 or 1500 diamonds for both cards. Boom cards continue to be popular with traders who overvalue them upon release, they don’t realize that almost immediately upon release full sets are available for under $3.

The December VIP Signature care was actually worth chasing this month, as it was the first sig of NXT newcomer and the winner of the Mae Young Classic Kairi Sane. Of course, it sold out in a few minutes unlike previous months’ chase cards. Singles are selling for between $7 and $10.



Smackdown Live Top Stars Top Cards

So I meant to write this up over a month ago, but as I really didn’t want to write about Jinder Mahal and Natalya, I decided to wait, and of course we were all rewarded with new champions right before Survivor Series. This frankly saved the show in my humble opinion. Despite losing to Brock, AJ really showed that he is the top guy over on Smackdown.

A.J. Styles Top 10 Slam Cards as of December 5, 2017

Card CC HI Lo 2017 Off the Panels NYCC Variant 50 65 20 2017 Cyber Monday Award Signature 22 60 50 2017 Undisputed Triple Sig w/Dean Ambrose & John Cena 250 41 20 2017 Live Signature Green 250 30 10 2016 Undisputed Silver Signature 50 30 25 2016 Survivor Series Gold Signature 50 22 15 2017 Royal Rumble Black Dual Award w/John Cena 30 20 15 2017 Battleground Gold Award 59 18 13 2016 NOW No Mercy 291 16 5 2016 Summerslam Orange Dual Signature w/John Cena 50 17 12

So far Topps has given AJ as the award for completing a set a massive 31 times, many of them being PPV award due to his sheer amount of time as WWE Champion. He has 5 different award cards under 100cc, four of them being sigs. He has 13 sub 100cc PPV cards. Also he personally inscripted 10 1/1 Live Signature cards. I haven’t done a full analysis, but I wouldn’t be surprised if AJ still holds the record for most sigs in the game and most individual cards in the game.

Clearly AJ is popular with fans and in game. Fully 7 of the top 10 are 59cc or less, and only 3 cards have him featured with another performer. Dollar amount wise he’s amongst the top men in the game in terms of value, but his cards don’t really make fans salivate with a “must own” type mentality. He’s certainly no “Demon King”.

Charlotte Flair Top 10 Slam Cards as of December 5, 2017

Card CC HI Lo 2017 NOW Roadblock Relic 25 135 125 2017 Undisputed Triple Sig w/Becky Lynch & Sasha Banks 250 80 20 2016 Live Signature Relic 50 60 50 2016 Summerslam Orange Award Dual Signature w/Sasha Banks 55 40 30 2017 Black Friday Bundle 43 30 20 2017 Survivor Series Purple Dual Signature w/Alexa Bliss 250 24 10 2016 Live Signature Purple 250 19 14 2017 Excellence Purple Signature 250 19 14 2017 Hell In a Cell Gold Award Signature 141 19 14 2016 NOW Team Raw 153 19 14

So you thought that AJ Styles had a lot of awards? Charlotte has more with 33 different award cards. Of course she had her very own dedicated set and was champion for a longer period of time than AJ. She also got her very own Live signature set early on, and it was the first one to have a relic added to the mix. Speaking of relics, the Queen’s top card is her 25cc Roadblock NOW Relic which broke the $100 mark more than once already. If you look at who owns copies of that card it’s a veritable who’s who of the whales in the game.