Anyone know if the Lookouts set is gone forever, or just temporarily out of stock?

ChimneyImp

Hey pin pals,

I notice the Lookouts set is out of stock in the Penny Arcade store, but it's still displayed there. I thought this was an evergreen set like the core, and haven't a clue if it's been out of stock for five minutes or five months. Anyone know how long it's been gone, and if it's ever coming back, or should I start looking trades?

TheAggroCraig

It sold out about when the Christmas set launched in December 2014, because I got one of the last ones and then people were noting it was gone shortly after .

It might be gone forever? Some sets have gone away and came back, though it's possible they're holding some stock to "de-fodder" their status.

fishfishmonkeyhat

TheAggroCraig wrote: »

"de-fodder"

The two best words in the English language!

ChimneyImp

Thanks Craig. Looks like I'll have to get out some other way. Gotta have that sweet logo.

Hijump

I am in the same boat as you Chimney still needing 5/6 of the set

dmosinee

It'll be a long time till they're actually hard to get though -- at East a ton of them were still being plunked down for staff trades. We had a few sets worth still in our trade/fodder pile and since we were going to use them for staff trades anyway, I let anyone who asked do any 1-for-1 on them.

Senno

I've traded away all of mine and I guess they're getting ready to put them in to the new blind bags. Because people are trading them plenty.

Lazorz

Senno wrote: »

I've traded away all of mine and I guess they're getting ready to put them in to the new blind bags. Because people are trading them plenty.

After the Lookouts sold out, the staff trade tables primarily became show core sets and Twisp & Catsby. I noticed considerably less Lookouts at the trading event at East this year, for example. I'm guessing that a lot of the upcoming Double Secret boxes will be packed with East 2015 logos and T&C moons.

Senno

Thats sad. There were plenty being traded at PAX Aus. When I traded one to Mike he was disappointed, especially when I got the 15 years LE pin for it. They were being sold there too, so I bought a few as they were 6 pins for the price of 4, making them excellent for staff trades. So I figured there were plenty to go around, and I used up all mine. Guess we got the last of the bunch.

Keroan

I miss the lookout set; it was slightly cheaper for a greater amount of pins and fantastic for PAX trading. My thought is that if the lookout set wasn't returning, they would remove it from their website listing? the fact that it's still there makes me think it won't be gone forever.

I kinda love the idea of "value packs" of pins - basically tradables in bulk (I'm going to need at least 26 pins this year to trade for staff set 2 and 3 which... requires a bulk purchase). Not that Lookouts was junk, but it provided good value for trading fodder.

It would be interesting to have a basics value set that changed every year so that you wouldn't run into there being 500 lookout kids sitting on the staff tables. It could also function as a fun introductory set for new pin users, to set them up for trades.

Senno

Keroan wrote: »

It would be interesting to have a basics value set that changed every year so that you wouldn't run into there being 500 lookout kids sitting on the staff tables. It could also function as a fun introductory set for new pin users, to set them up for trades.

I couldn't agree more. The vast majority of staff trades were for the lookouts sets. And so I quickly used mine as fodder, especially considering they offered more bang for your buck. Get a new 6 pack every year would help break that up.

adambarg

I'd like to see them make 2 new Lookouts pins and then split them up into 2 sets of 4 at the standard price point. I like a bargain as much as the next guy, but after seeing what happened to blind boxes and staff tables, it's just not worth it.

Also curious whether the original 6 pin set re-released at $45 would be unworkable.

PedroAsani

adambarg wrote: »

I'd like to see them make 2 new Lookouts pins and then split them up into 2 sets of 4 at the standard price point. I like a bargain as much as the next guy, but after seeing what happened to blind boxes and staff tables, it's just not worth it.

Also curious whether the original 6 pin set re-released at $45 would be unworkable.

I think a whole new 6 Set would be better. Having a "fodder" Set really helps for those Staff trades, and when the fodder Set is discontinued it becomes tradebait for new people.

Keroan

What we need is a 6 pack Daughters and Thornwatch set

Beker

PedroAsani wrote: »

I think a whole new 6 Set would be better. Having a "fodder" Set really helps for those Staff trades, and when the fodder Set is discontinued it becomes tradebait for new people.

"Helps" for staff trades by making those trades pretty boring for us you mean? Personally I much prefer when there is no obvious trade fodder PAX after PAX like that and I get a wider variety of pins in trade.

dmosinee

Yeah, without the lookouts set -- staff trade fodder is going to be a lot of whichever set is sold at that show (cheapest, since there's no tax and shipping). That gets more of the show sets sold and circulated.

pakopako

Beker wrote: »

"Helps" for staff trades by making those trades pretty boring for us you mean? Personally I much prefer when there is no obvious trade fodder PAX after PAX like that and I get a wider variety of pins in trade.

Any more staff on Pinnypals.com? :P

PedroAsani

Beker wrote: »

PedroAsani wrote: »

I think a whole new 6 Set would be better. Having a "fodder" Set really helps for those Staff trades, and when the fodder Set is discontinued it becomes tradebait for new people.

"Helps" for staff trades by making those trades pretty boring for us you mean? Personally I much prefer when there is no obvious trade fodder PAX after PAX like that and I get a wider variety of pins in trade.

I just meant from a financial perspective. If Blind Boxes are the cheapest way to get fodder, you will see plenty of different stuff. That's why I'm ok with a Blind Box Set at some point (pre-requisites being high print run and no year variants) because having stuff like that helps ease the wallet-pains.

Lazorz

Beker wrote: »

PedroAsani wrote: »

I think a whole new 6 Set would be better. Having a "fodder" Set really helps for those Staff trades, and when the fodder Set is discontinued it becomes tradebait for new people.

"Helps" for staff trades by making those trades pretty boring for us you mean? Personally I much prefer when there is no obvious trade fodder PAX after PAX like that and I get a wider variety of pins in trade.

I agree, it's super cool when you're getting a wide variety of pins traded back. At East this year I saw a couple Aus pins pop up at the staff trade event, as well as Rock Band 4 pins, and so on. I know some of those are staff provided, but it's awesome when other traders try to "trickle down" the pin wealth by throwing some rares on the table.

However, as long as the core sets continue to sit at $30 and almost all of the third party exhibitors choose to price their individual pins at $15, you're going to get 97% core set and lookouts at the event. As someone who doesn't have a ridiculous amount of expendable wealth, I'm going to go for the cheap trade every time since I don't have the luxury of making it rain on the tables. Maybe if exhibitors lowered their pricing to $10 (or even lower... thank you so much, Prime 2013 Behemoth), then you'll actually start to see a wide variety. If situations like South this year happen continue to happen (what was it, only one exhibitor had demo-obtainable pins and everything else was $15 or higher?), then, you know. Logo pin paradise.

Beker

I have no problem with getting PAX set items back in trade, that changes every PAX, and usually there is another set people can buy as well making it 8 possible trade items. Plus then we get different pins coming in every PAX that we can use to seed our trade tables and put in the bucket for future blind boxes. But, i'm not a decision maker on this stuff, so no idea on what the actual future may hold.

Keroan

Very true. You would want more people buying the pax sets to get more of them in circulation. But the popularity of the lookouts as "tradeable" is undeniable (data from blind boxes). Since it's the number one set coming out of the store, I would think that having something like it but different every year would be in traders and PA's best interest.

adambarg

All that spreadsheet shows is that when given the opportunity, people will min/max their staff trades. I'm sure if PA had anticipated this, then Lookouts would have been handled differently.

TheAggroCraig

This hobby can be expensive as hell, so if people can save a few bucks collecting anything they'll go for it. The $5 for 2 more pins in the lookout set was so damn appealing, and was the next best thing to pin farming at some booths.

I think I bought... 5 or 6 lookouts sets in total ever, which included 1 for me and 1 for Qumaden, so only 3 or 4 sets made their way back which wasn't too crazy as some others paying out the ass for a double digit amount of sets. And for the record, I was sick of buying lookout sets, but it did make getting the staff sets more affordable.

I do like seeing people looking for them now though, not that they're rare by any means, but they deserve love because it's a nice looking set.

misskass

In Aus in particular it's a real struggle to get any international pins. With our appalling currency conversion rate as compared to the US, and the fact that shipping to here - both from companies (my ND logo pins were heinously expensive) and from individuals (through no fault of their own, this isn't a blame game) - is atrociously high, it's difficult to be a collector of all the PA pins I'm interested in, ignoring the fact that I can't possibly afford to collect everything any more. So seeing a lack of variety at trade tables is disappointing, because it's one of the few places we can get pins without spending $30 AU on a single pin from overseas.

Of course, variety in the staff trades is nice, but from a monetary standpoint it's a no brainer that people will want to maximise their return by trading away a <$10 pin from a set they don't want, as compared to a $15+ vendor pin (though we don't really get these at PAX Aus at the moment anyway). Conversely, I really did enjoy when, at Aus 2013, I traded a staffer for one of the early Prime pins that they brought from the US as their own fodder from that con, which I then made a cool trade with later on.

It's clear that I'm not quite sure what I support. Having a collection of low price pins to make staff trades with is good, because staff have to take any pin they're given (though that makes their trade experience less exciting). But, those pins are then filtered back into the community (though blind boxes etc.) as semi-worthless until they're retired and new collectors have the chance to get hold of them.

I think I'm just bitter that everything is so expensive.

Solelron

I think the key is that the Pinny arcade is still new, so having variety in the 'low cost' pins is difficult. I think its good that PA is keeping the prices MOSTLY within a range (long standing pin trading groups new pins can range from 6-40.00, but they also produce hundreds of new pins every year).
I don't think lookouts need to continue to be THE 'fodder' pin, however, having pins at a slightly lower pp balanced out with pins that are more expensive and limited tends to be the common trends among pin trading programs.