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Valiant first appearances (quick version for beginners) Now with pictures!
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^ Make sure it has the coupon!

 

You will see more sub 9.0 copies hitting the census as people dig these out of long boxes after 15+ years. The Valiant line was hard hit by the crash, and many expensive books were mistreated over the last 10+ years and thought to be worthless by many.

 

9.8's are the best to collect and will hold the most value, but don't count out the market on lower grades. Especially with the story of Valiant and their resurrection from the $1.00 bins. Not specifically Harbinger #1, but many key issues. Solar 10 1st print is so hard to find as a clean raw copy in the wild.

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All of this is to say...how many copies of Unity 0 Red do you own? And how many Magnus 5s?

 

While I do have what most consider to be a hoard of books... I have only bought one or two copies of my favorite Valiant books per year since I joined Ebay.

 

But I joined in 1997, so it sounds like a lot when you do the math and see that I have 30+ Unity #0 Red.

 

Most were not already graded, so my slabbed counts are lower, and many of my slabbed books are 9.6 and under,

so the actual number of CGC 9.8 key issues for Valiant that I own are pretty low.

 

For example, I only have two copies of CGC 9.8 Harbinger #1.

 

Since the amazing increase in Valiant key issue prices in the past 3 weeks, I've sold... nothing. :grin:

 

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Or...the number of 9.8s on the census will double, through a combination of new submissions and pressing, now that the book is worth nearly 3x what it was 3 weeks ago and a whole new generation of collectors who haven't even thought about Valiant in 20 years now decide to submit the books they haven't looked at since 1995.

.

 

The census will not double on this book any time soon.

 

It has taken 7 years to get from 12 to 135. Harbinger #1 selling for $2500 was a watershed. Everyone and their grandmother slabbed whatever copies they could find.

 

In that same time period, starting in Jan of 2008, Batman Adventures went from 1 9.8 to 280 9.8s.

 

New Mutants #98 went from 128 to 1597 9.8s.

 

There will be no "census doubling", just like with ASM #301 (which, since the discussion last August has added NINE 9.8s to the census, despite selling for $1000 several times.)

 

Some people may believe that there are endless copies of every single 1980-up book out there in raw 9.8, just waiting for attention to be paid to it so it will go in that slab. That isn't the case.

 

Will there be a few here, a few there? Sure. But will there be a large jump in the census? Of course not. The book hasn't sold for less than $300 in 9.8 since 2002; it is a easy money.

 

So where was the flood...?

 

You're looking at it. 135 copies. That's the flood.

 

The book had a relatively low print run, a good chunk were manufactured with spine splits and bindery tears, and another good chunk had the coupons cut out.

 

If...and granted, this is a colossal if...but if Harbinger were to ever gain any sort of mainstream, widespread buzz....the book will have no problem being a $2,000 book again.

 

And this time, there will be no flood to mitigate prices....

 

 

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Or...the number of 9.8s on the census will double, through a combination of new submissions and pressing, now that the book is worth nearly 3x what it was 3 weeks ago and a whole new generation of collectors who haven't even thought about Valiant in 20 years now decide to submit the books they haven't looked at since 1995.

.

 

The census will not double on this book any time soon.

 

It has taken 7 years to get from 12 to 135. Harbinger #1 selling for $2500 was a watershed. Everyone and their grandmother slabbed whatever copies they could find.

 

In that same time period, starting in Jan of 2008, Batman Adventures went from 1 9.8 to 280 9.8s.

 

New Mutants #98 went from 128 to 1597 9.8s.

 

There will be no "census doubling", just like with ASM #301 (which, since the discussion last August has added NINE 9.8s to the census, despite selling for $1000 several times.)

 

Some people may believe that there are endless copies of every single 1980-up book out there in raw 9.8, just waiting for attention to be paid to it so it will go in that slab. That isn't the case.

 

Will there be a few here, a few there? Sure. But will there be a large jump in the census? Of course not. The book hasn't sold for less than $300 in 9.8 since 2002; it is a easy money.

 

So where was the flood...?

 

You're looking at it. 135 copies. That's the flood.

 

The book had a relatively low print run, a good chunk were manufactured with spine splits and bindery tears, and another good chunk had the coupons cut out.

 

If...and granted, this is a colossal if...but if Harbinger were to ever gain any sort of mainstream, widespread buzz....the book will have no problem being a $2,000 book again.

 

And this time, there will be no flood to mitigate prices....

 

 

Great post.

 

Is there somewhere you can check past Census numbers, or did just keep a record of various books? Just curious, as I would love to compare issues for fun.

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Or...the number of 9.8s on the census will double, through a combination of new submissions and pressing, now that the book is worth nearly 3x what it was 3 weeks ago and a whole new generation of collectors who haven't even thought about Valiant in 20 years now decide to submit the books they haven't looked at since 1995.

.

 

The census will not double on this book any time soon.

 

It has taken 7 years to get from 12 to 135. Harbinger #1 selling for $2500 was a watershed. Everyone and their grandmother slabbed whatever copies they could find.

 

In that same time period, starting in Jan of 2008, Batman Adventures went from 1 9.8 to 280 9.8s.

 

New Mutants #98 went from 128 to 1597 9.8s.

 

There will be no "census doubling", just like with ASM #301 (which, since the discussion last August has added NINE 9.8s to the census, despite selling for $1000 several times.)

 

Some people may believe that there are endless copies of every single 1980-up book out there in raw 9.8, just waiting for attention to be paid to it so it will go in that slab. That isn't the case.

 

Will there be a few here, a few there? Sure. But will there be a large jump in the census? Of course not. The book hasn't sold for less than $300 in 9.8 since 2002; it is a easy money.

 

So where was the flood...?

 

You're looking at it. 135 copies. That's the flood.

 

The book had a relatively low print run, a good chunk were manufactured with spine splits and bindery tears, and another good chunk had the coupons cut out.

 

If...and granted, this is a colossal if...but if Harbinger were to ever gain any sort of mainstream, widespread buzz....the book will have no problem being a $2,000 book again.

 

And this time, there will be no flood to mitigate prices....

 

 

Great post.

 

Is there somewhere you can check past Census numbers, or did just keep a record of various books? Just curious, as I would love to compare issues for fun.

Yup. Use CGC Data (cgcdata.com). They have a feature that allows you to compare various census dates.

 

K.

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Or...the number of 9.8s on the census will double, through a combination of new submissions and pressing, now that the book is worth nearly 3x what it was 3 weeks ago and a whole new generation of collectors who haven't even thought about Valiant in 20 years now decide to submit the books they haven't looked at since 1995.

.

 

The census will not double on this book any time soon.

 

It has taken 7 years to get from 12 to 135. Harbinger #1 selling for $2500 was a watershed. Everyone and their grandmother slabbed whatever copies they could find.

 

In that same time period, starting in Jan of 2008, Batman Adventures went from 1 9.8 to 280 9.8s.

 

New Mutants #98 went from 128 to 1597 9.8s.

 

There will be no "census doubling", just like with ASM #301 (which, since the discussion last August has added NINE 9.8s to the census, despite selling for $1000 several times.)

 

Some people may believe that there are endless copies of every single 1980-up book out there in raw 9.8, just waiting for attention to be paid to it so it will go in that slab. That isn't the case.

 

Will there be a few here, a few there? Sure. But will there be a large jump in the census? Of course not. The book hasn't sold for less than $300 in 9.8 since 2002; it is a easy money.

 

So where was the flood...?

 

You're looking at it. 135 copies. That's the flood.

 

The book had a relatively low print run, a good chunk were manufactured with spine splits and bindery tears, and another good chunk had the coupons cut out.

 

If...and granted, this is a colossal if...but if Harbinger were to ever gain any sort of mainstream, widespread buzz....the book will have no problem being a $2,000 book again.

 

And this time, there will be no flood to mitigate prices....

 

 

Rebuttal:

 

Iron Man 55.

 

Like Harbinger 1, it's been worth money for the last 25 years. Haven't looked it up, but I'd wager that it too hasn't "sold for less $300" in 9.8 since 2002.

 

I'd also argue that it languished in quarter bins for a good 12 years from 1973-1989 before the Infinity Gauntlet made it a super key in 1991.

 

Census shows there are now 48 copies in 9.8, precisely double the 24 copies in 9.8 that showed up on the census on Apr. 9, 2012, immediately prior to the release of The Avengers movie and the revelation that Thanos would be hitting the screen in a big way.

 

So the 9.8 census for the book has doubled in almost 3 years to the day following the movie announcement.

 

Further, only 3.3% of all Iron Man 55s submitted hit 9.8, vs. 18.3% of all Harbinger 1s submitted.

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"I'd also argue that it languished in quarter bins for a good 12 years from 1973-1989 before the Infinity Gauntlet made it a super key in 1991."

 

I didn't collect during this time period (started in 1989), but I would have thought this would have been far from a quarter bin issue.

 

I would have guessed a Starlin written and drawn comic dealing with the cosmic side of Marvel would have been a desired book.

 

Interesting.

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Yup. Use CGC Data (cgcdata.com). They have a feature that allows you to compare various census dates.

 

K.

Very cool!

Thank you.

When you use the search function to get the single census data for a book (or a list of books), click on the book name in the results and it will give you the full census history of the book in a new window.

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Granted. I'll retract that. Might never have been $.25 bin fodder.

 

But arguably, neither was Harbinger 1. I've pulled Magnus 1 and Magnus 12 from $1 bins post-1994, but never seen a Harbinger 1 for less than $5.

 

In each case, the survivability of high grade copies should be much higher than say...Astonishing Tales 25 in 9.8, which had very few collectors taking care of it prior to 1990.

 

And yet, Stalin cosmic story and all, only 1 in 30 of Iron Man 55s submitted have hit 9.8, vs. 1 in 6 Harbinger 1s. Sure...that's not a fair & direct comparison because folks aren't rushing to sub 6.0 or 7.0 copies of Harbinger 1 the way they might IM 55.

 

But it remains a very tough book to find in 9.8 -- with GPA recording it hasn't sold publicly for less than $1,500 in the last decade.

 

And the 9.8 population has still doubled in the three years since the movie announcement.

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Further, only 3.3% of all Iron Man 55s submitted hit 9.8, vs. 18.3% of all Harbinger 1s submitted.

 

One thing to consider is, it never made financial sense to submit Harbinger #1 for grading unless it was a 9.6 or a 9.8. So it would make sense that there is a greater percentage of 9.8's. It has made financial sense to submit IM#55 in lower grades for some time now so we see a lower percentage of 9.8's for the issue.

 

 

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But it remains a very tough book to find in 9.8 -- with GPA recording it hasn't sold publicly for less than $1,500 in the last decade.

 

And the 9.8 population has still doubled in the three years since the movie announcement.

 

This is an interesting point.

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Granted. I'll retract that. Might never have been $.25 bin fodder.

 

But arguably, neither was Harbinger 1. I've pulled Magnus 1 and Magnus 12 from $1 bins post-1994, but never seen a Harbinger 1 for less than $5.

 

In each case, the survivability of high grade copies should be much higher than say...Astonishing Tales 25 in 9.8, which had very few collectors taking care of it prior to 1990.

 

And yet, Stalin cosmic story and all, only 1 in 30 of Iron Man 55s submitted have hit 9.8, vs. 1 in 6 Harbinger 1s. Sure...that's not a fair & direct comparison because folks aren't rushing to sub 6.0 or 7.0 copies of Harbinger 1 the way they might IM 55.

 

But it remains a very tough book to find in 9.8 -- with GPA recording it hasn't sold publicly for less than $1,500 in the last decade.

 

And the 9.8 population has still doubled in the three years since the movie announcement.

 

Right, that was the "first major impact" to the Iron Man #55 census numbers... and they doubled in three years.

 

The "first major impact" to the Harbinger #1 census numbers was in 2008... and they went from 12 to 24 in one year.

 

The "second major impact" to the Harbinger #1 census numbers was in 2012, when Valiant announced Harbinger relaunching... and the CGC 9.8 census went from 80 to 135 over the course of 3 years.

 

The question is whether the "third major impact" to the Harbinger #1 census numbers in 2015 (due to the investment announcement) will result in ANOTHER 135 copies being graded CGC 9.8... and how quickly it will happen.

 

Comparing the "first major" from Iron Man #55 (double in 3 years) to the "first major" from Harbinger #1 (doubled in 1 year) is valid.

 

Comparing the "first major" from Iron Man #55 to the "third major" from Harbinger #1, seven years later, which is about to happen... probably isn't as valid.

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Nah -- because then you're back at the "what % of AF 15s are still raw" conversation going on over in the Silver Age thread. With a small minority believing there's no way anyone would keep an AF 15 raw, so 90%+ of the copies must be already slabbed.

 

Aside from the explosion in census #s in 9.8 Harbinger 1s since 2008, the % of slabbed copies hitting 9.8 rose as well.

 

It used to be considered "rare in 9.8" because of a bindery production flaw -- back when less than 6% of submitted copies hit 9.8. Now that % hit rate has tripled. That matters. A lot.

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Nah -- because then you're back at the "what % of AF 15s are still raw" conversation going on over in the Silver Age thread. With a small minority believing there's no way anyone would keep an AF 15 raw, so 90%+ of the copies must be already slabbed.

 

Aside from the explosion in census #s in 9.8 Harbinger 1s since 2008, the % of slabbed copies hitting 9.8 rose as well.

 

It used to be considered "rare in 9.8" because of a bindery production flaw -- back when less than 6% of submitted copies hit 9.8. Now that % hit rate has tripled. That matters. A lot.

It takes several examples in the data, but I believe that I can prove that CGC got VERY relaxed in what they gave CGC 9.8 during the 2009 timeframe.

 

Across pretty much every major modern book, across all publishers, there is a sharp increase in the % receiving CGC 9.8 around 2009.

 

Sure... it could be prescreening, and it could be pressing, but I believe it was literally a relaxation of the standard.

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It takes several examples in the data, but I believe that I can prove that CGC got VERY relaxed in what they gave CGC 9.8 during the 2009 timeframe.

 

Across pretty much every major modern book, across all publishers, there is a sharp increase in the % receiving CGC 9.8 around 2009.

 

Sure... it could be prescreening, and it could be pressing, but I believe it was literally a relaxation of the standard.

 

Started a topic about it in the Copper section: http://boards.collectors-society.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=8498672

 

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What are some of these common defects on H 1 to look out for -- apart from the usual things to look for on any book to sub?

 

We don't usually look for spine splits on modern books, but the cover stock on H1 was bad enough that they are common. Top, bottom, center, at each staple, you name it I've seen it.

 

Pressing can "cause" this defect as well. Meaning it can split an otherwise intact spine because the paper is so bad.

 

Page/coupon browning is other one. Again, bad paper, it can get toasty.

 

Staple placement... and bad staples. There are 2 and 3 staple versions of the book. Many have the staples shifted to the front and are not closed properly, so the staple seems longer than it should. It can detract from appearance.

 

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