What box should I get?

[atressler]

Hello everyone,

I managed to not buy random packs and blaster boxes at Target and Walmart this month in hopes to save money to buy a good box of cards online. I have a rough idea of what box I want to buy, but I want to see what everyone else picks too.

I'm new collecting hockey cards as of right now and would like to expand my collection and try to get some good valuable cards. The only cards I have is 11-12 Victory (I wanted to start with something cheap and make sure it really was something I wanted to get into) and some UD Series 1 cards.

Lets get to what I like, and what I want in a box of cards:

Packs Packs Pack: I don't need to have 20 packs to open, but I don't want to buy a box that has a single pack either. I'm still new to collecting, so buying The Cup to me isn't worth it yet... and I enjoy opening packs of cards. :) The lowest I would like to go is around 8 packs.

Amount of cards per pack: After reading above, you might find it hard to believe that I prefer -low card counts- in each pack. Read on and I will explain.

Few base card packs:I bought a blaster box of Artifacts along with about 4 more packs and didn't receive a single insert. Very very VEEERRRYY disappointing, and made me quite angry. I want to feel like I'm getting my money's worth. I watched quite a few YouTube videos on box breaks and too many times I saw videos of boxes with HALF the packs as base.... I understand why, but it's not what I like.

Card Design: I can go on and on about this but I'll keep it short...
Base: I'm a big fan of 11-12 UDS1 base photos. Those are by far my favorite type of card design; I like seeing action shots. The 11-12 Victory base cards are quite plain and are really boring to look at. 11-12 Artifacts feel like they are a good quality cardboard, and I do like that too.
Inserts: 11-12 UDS1 has decent looking inserts. My favorite of theirs is their young guns and how they "outline" the players to make them stand out a little more. I don't know why, but their GU Jersey cards are not very interesting to me. It seems like they didn't know what do to so they just went with whatever design. 11-12 Victory's MVP design is nice and I do like their all black border rookie MVPs. I did get an 10-11 SP Authentic Future watch Auto, and that design I did like for Autos. I don't want it to be too crowded of a picture and no one notice the autograph.

Collection: I am a set collector, and I do like having a range of base cards to collect. Although they are commons, I do wish there were some that were still a bit harder to pull. So packs that contain fewer cards are more desirable to me. I want to start collecting Autos and GU, so a box that contains a decent amount per box would be preferred. It's not the ONLY thing I want to collect, I mainly would like to start up a collection of them so I can use them as trade bait when I decide on a single player to collect.

Thanks for reading, and I would really appreciate your input on a box for me.

[gardzy99]

NEVER, EVER waste your money buying Upper Deck Blaster boxes. Panini is much more value for the dollars spent. They don't chince you on inserts and hits as much as Upper Deck does. Certified Blasters are a good purchase if you must buy blaster boxes.

If you are a set collector looking to do a challenging set with GU'd and autos involved......Limitted would be a choice. All the base is numbered.

I find Artifacts a great set to do IF you buy the hobby boxes.....they contain a variety of hits, parallels, and RC's. The base set is always very well designed and the Stars/Legends subsets are challenging sets to complete because they are only a couple of hits per box and numbered /999.

That's my two cents.

Recently I find myself flashing back to the 80's and doing sets I once had. I just completed 87/88 OPC and am now doing 88/89 OPC.......nostalgic, no inserts, no parallels....just a straight 264 card set.

Cheers.

[jonpop]

Black Diamond or Parkhurst.

[pur3strpker0]

I would actually avoid Crown and Certified. I know many have had big hits but there seems to be more that dont like it.

[Slapshot4]

UD Parkhurst Champions I got my box for $60 dollars so I didnt break my bank. Im a kid. It had many packs and has minis inserts and all that just not jerseys. I was lucky enough two get 3 autos but I got 2 in my box, and bought some packs. And just as my luck I pulled a base auto parellel of Mr. Hockey Godie Howe.
http://s1224.photobucket.com/albums/...t=IMAG0021.jpg

[atressler]

NEVER, EVER waste your money buying Upper Deck Blaster boxes. Panini is much more value for the dollars spent. They don't chince you on inserts and hits as much as Upper Deck does. Certified Blasters are a good purchase if you must buy blaster boxes.

I wasn't aware of how terrible UD made the blaster boxes until the end of Jan when I had bought about 6 of them. I wish there was a warning so I didn't drop so much money on blasters when I could have bought the hobby boxes.

If you are a set collector looking to do a challenging set with GU'd and autos involved......Limitted would be a choice. All the base is numbered.

I thought about it, but I just can't bring myself to spend THAT much money on only 7 cards.

I find Artifacts a great set to do IF you buy the hobby boxes.....they contain a variety of hits, parallels, and RC's. The base set is always very well designed and the Stars/Legends subsets are challenging sets to complete because they are only a couple of hits per box and numbered /999.

I'll have to take Artifacts back into consideration. It's unfortunate that their price sky rocketed this past week though. Wish I would have bought a box sooner now.

Recently I find myself flashing back to the 80's and doing sets I once had. I just completed 87/88 OPC and am now doing 88/89 OPC.......nostalgic, no inserts, no parallels....just a straight 264 card set.

Cheers.

Lol, I dug into my parents attic (that's where they stored my cards after I moved out) and found all my cards I had collected. 94-95 Pinnacle are really nice looking cards. One of my favorite sets I'm trying to complete now. Only need a about 17 cards for it, but they are impossible to find... even on ebay.

Black Diamond or Parkhurst.

Are you an Upper Deck fan???? Hate the others?...

I would actually avoid Crown and Certified. I know many have had big hits but there seems to be more that dont like it.

Thanks, I’ll be sure to take that into consideration. What box would you recommend?

[atressler]

UD Parkhurst Champions I got my box for $60 dollars so I didnt break my bank. Im a kid. It had many packs and has minis inserts and all that just not jerseys. I was lucky enough two get 3 autos but I got 2 in my box, and bought some packs. And just as my luck I pulled a base auto parellel of Mr. Hockey Godie Howe.
http://s1224.photobucket.com/albums/...t=IMAG0021.jpg

Wow!! Nice pull!! I'm actually really interested in collecting Jerseys, and I wasn't aware that there aren't any in that set. Thanks for the heads up, and the suggestion.

[pur3strpker0]

If you like the UD ser1 set, the ser2 is supposedly releasing in a few weeks.

[theboxbreaker96]

Id stay wasy from panini if you are looking for value in your cards.

Since you are starting out id go with UD S1 or Parkhurst Champs