Tag Archives: Collecting

Gravity Feed Box – Pirates of the Caribbean 24 pack box

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Gravity Feed Box – Pirates of the Caribbean 24 pack box

Recently I managed to acquire my first gravity feed box of Wizkids Pirates product – a 24 pack booster box of Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean set. It features the image-changing effect of the Flying Dutchman on the front, showing the ship at various stages of construction.

Gravity Feed Box - Pirates of the Caribbean 24 pack box

The PotC characters featured on the pack art for the set are on the sides:

Gravity Feed Box - Pirates of the Caribbean 24 pack box

I realize it’s not the most special item, but still a pretty cool and unique part of the game’s packaging history.  The kind of thing you have just to have the unique box.  I generally like regular booster boxes more than the gravity feed box style, but it’s a solid concept.  The Pirates of the Caribbean set is also a pretty decent one, with various impressive game pieces and incredible characters in it.  If you’d like, you can help out the website by buying some packs through the eBay affiliate link.

The back: Gravity Feed Box - Pirates of the Caribbean 24 pack box

This is the quick unboxing video I did:

I got it for about $200 from Poland. I partly bought it since these gravity feed box items seem quite rare.  The only other set I’ve seen them from is Fire and Steel, and I’ve only seen a couple of those.  One F&S gravity feed box sold on eBay in 2023.  Here are the pictures from it (not my pictures!):

The supercollector karakas529 also has one of the boxes:

Gravity Feed Box - Pirates of the Caribbean 24 pack box

Here is the Buy/Sell/Trade facebook group where I found the box for sale. (Please make sure to answer the membership questions and agree to the group rules if you request to join the group!)

Have you come across any gravity feed boxes of Pirates packs at any point in your life?  I’m curious to know if they made them for any other sets!

Pirate Posters – Unique Collector’s Items

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Pirate Posters

A little-known aspect of collecting Pirates CSG “things” are the pirate posters that Wizkids made during the production days of the 2000s. I happened across a Barbary Coast poster on eBay back in 2015 and bought it for probably $20 or $30.  I had no idea how rare it might be. The most prominent collector of the pirate posters that I’ve seen is DoubleAAsauce/PirateCaptainAndrew.  He’s got most of the poster variants known to exist, and told me that my Barbary Coast poster was the only one from that set he had ever seen or known about.  I traded it to him for posters from Spanish Main and Crimson Coast, since I couldn’t pass up the 2-for-1 deal and I like those sets more than BC (still a good set though).

Here they are framed in all their glory!

Pirate Posters - Pirates of the Spanish Main and Pirates of the Crimson Coast posters from Wizkids Pirates CSG

Framing and Background

The posters are 17×22, so I bought frames according to that.  The framing process was pretty simple and easy, and now I can have them on display all the time instead of hidden away in a binder or rolled into a cardboard tube.

I must credit Andrew for bringing my interest in these posters up a few notches.  Before his posts about them in the Discord server, I didn’t give them much credit.  However, now I see them as gorgeous and historical display pieces that bring my passion for the game to life on the walls of my room.  Excited to hopefully acquire more someday, though they seem to be quite rare.

Here is the Pirates of the Barbary Coast poster:

Pirates of the Barbary Coast poster

Each poster has four identical quadrants on the back.  Here they are in set release order (SM, CC, BC):

Pirate posters - back of Spanish Main

Pirate posters - back of Crimson Coast

Pirate posters - back of Barbary Coast

I hope you enjoyed this overview of the pirate posters I’ve had in my collection.  I’d love to know which is your favorite!  Leave a comment below with your thoughts!  😀

Pirates CSG Podcast #55: DHolub1!

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Pirates CSG Podcast #55: DHolub1!

You can listen to the audio via Anchor!

Questions of the Day:
(Ben) What would it take for you to come to Tampa next January for Gasparilla Pirate Festival and Pirates CSG events the day before and/or after?
(DHolub1) What is your passion? What would it take for you to help bring more interest to Pirates CSG and help the game come back?

Audio version: https://anchor.fm/a7xfanben/

You can also listen on Archive.org.

Thanks for listening!  Feel free to answer the Questions of the Day below!

 

Take the podcast survey! https://goo.gl/forms/CsnwVmi3qhtqik323

Feel free to rate and review the podcast on iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/pirates-csg-podcast/id1258016060

Pirates packs on eBay: https://ebay.us/S14uSE

Sign the Petition!  https://www.ipetitions.com/petition/bring-back-pirates-of-the-cursed-seas

Join the Forum at Pirates with Ben!  https://pirateswithben.com/forums/forum/pirates-csg/

 

The following should eventually be updated so they will be available when they get the podcast.

iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/pirates-csg-podcast/id1258016060

Amazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/257e819a-bf7a-45d7-8523-bcda49d12139/pirates-csg-podcast

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/44vu9VrDaF1QABOSH8IRan

Blubrry: https://www.blubrry.com/piratescsgpodcast/

Stitcher: https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/a7xfanben/pirates-csg-podcast?refid=stpr

TuneIn: https://tunein.com/podcasts/Sports–Recreation-Podcasts/Pirates-CSG-Podcast-p1025637/

Overcast: https://overcast.fm/itunes1258016060/pirates-csg-podcast

Pocket Casts: http://pca.st/Svji

UNBOXING THE MOTHERLODE | Massive Pirates CSG Collection Haul

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UNBOXING THE MOTHERLODE

Documenting my hoarding habits from purchases made in the time period of November 2020 through September 2021.  Most of it is contained within this youtube playlist, with 18 separate videos showing the stuff I got!

Before it was all unveiled.  The 11 boxes totaled 138 pounds!!

Phase 1 Comics and Games order:

Phase 1 Comics and Games order

The same order at the bottom right.  8 Ocean’s Edge Special Edition boxes from the UK at left, Troll and Toad order at upper right.

Packs of SM, RV, and OE along with some Plunder Packs:

Pirates CSG Packs

Super awesome to get a set of Revolution from Holofernes himself. (one of the most legendary and complete supercollectors ever, and the main editor behind the Wikipedia page for the game as far as I know)

Holofernes Revolution complete set binder

Finished the boxes with one from Matt L.  Quite excited to finally get most of the CC LE’s, MI SR’s, the Independence and HMS Mirage.

This weekend it took quite a while to get everything sorted and organized.  My way of organizing ships is by faction (based on a combination of history, preference, and size), then mast count (biggest to smallest), then ship type (ex: 5 masted square rigged before giant squids), then set (chronological), then collector’s number.  In this way, English 5 masters from SM would be the first ships in my collection, followed by those from CC and so on until the 4 masters start with SM again.

Here are some in progress sorting pics.  The big stack at lower left is 133 Unique Treasures.  Left of that are a bunch of Ocean’s Edge megacard ships, with punched deckplates above those.  In the middle section are each faction’s ship and crew piles, with the huge stacks at the back being the second stacks of unpunched ships for each of the Big 5 factions.

Sorting English ships by mast count:

Absolutely ridiculous towering stacks of unpunched ships and crew:

styrene cards

This is after I got the Big 5 into a 5000 count storage box.  The box can hold over 1000 ships, as it is not full here with 970 unpunched ships in it.  For now I thought it would be fitting to store the UT’s in the treasure chest tin.  🙂

Pirates CSG storage

I’ve always wanted to have a massive card box full of Pirates stuff after seeing artisturn’s collection, and here it is!  Almost 1000 ships!  O_O

970 Pirates CSG ships in 5000 count storage box

And now it is time!  The full grand pictures!

 

THE MOTHERLODE

The Motherlode (Pirates CSG)

Unboxing the Motherlode The Motherlode (Pirates CSG)

The Numbers

Unboxing the Motherlode final stats

So there you have it.  870 packs, 3109 ships including over 1100 not even in packs, 509 crew, 133 UT’s, and a dream come true.

I think this concludes UNBOXING THE MOTHERLODE.  XD   I am officially a Hoarder!!

Trading Pirates CSG – A Great Way to Expand Your Collection!

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Trading Pirates CSG – A Great Way to Expand Your Collection!

Trading Pirates CSG

I acquired these pretty ships via trade!

One of my favorite ways to expand my collection is by trading Pirates CSG with other community members.  Often when you open fresh packs, you eventually end up with some duplicates (dupes) of various ships, crew, and other game pieces.  Unless you want to sell them or give them away, trading is a great option that can net you some brand new Pirates CSG plunder in return!  How great is that!

Many Options Available

As of this post in late 2019, there are plenty of options available for trading Pirates CSG.  I just released a Buy/Sell/Trade version of the Master Spreadsheet.  It includes all of the game pieces and is ready for you to use.  Just hit File>Download to make a copy for tracking your personal collection!  Once you have your copy, you can edit it however you wish so the data appears the way you want it.  In my opinion, an even better option can be to have your own shared Google Sheet (just like the one above) that you provide a link to.  That way, people can simply click a link to get your full updated collection ready for trading, rather than having to download a .xlsx file/etc that needs constant re-uploading to be up to date.

What about finding people to actually trade with?  I recommend the Buy/Sell/Trade Facebook Group and The non-eBay Sales & Trades thread.  There you will be able to find many of the current community’s active traders.

There are other options as well!  BoardGameGeek has a trading section for each game.  The Pirates section at Pojo has a sub forum for trading.

My Personal Trading Experience

The main reason I recommend trading so highly is because I have been very successful with it.  Trading Pirates CSG has allowed me to grow my collection on a budget.  It allows you to connect with various other “pirates” in the community of fans.  When I first joined the Pirates CSG community in June 2011, I joined the (at the time) “Big Three” of Miniature Trading, Pojo, and BoardGameGeek.  Most of my trades were through MT, though I did one at Pojo as well.

Just to give you an idea of the scope of potential trading operations, here is my record of trading at MT.  122 total trades, 73 references from fellow traders, and many dozens of ships and crew acquired, nearly all from duplicate stuff I had that other people wanted.  Incredible!

I hope that you can have a great experience with trading Pirates CSG.  Feel free to leave a comment below with your own experiences – if people share some great trading stories, it might get other people to post their haves and wants as well, furthering the community driven game that we love!