Are the ones from Gencon, actually printed, as opposed to Print on Demand?

I am not uderstanding why they are selling for HUGE amounts on ebay unless their quality is going to be supeiror to the POD ones available later?

I wondering if it was a quality issue as opposed to impatience?

danman71 said:

If you are a fan and want it now as opposed to waiting for the POD to be released, then why wait?

As for the number of copies available on Ebay, they had tons to give out to those who signed up to play at GenCon - each player got one. My wife and I played and each got a copy - we then gave our extra copy to a friend ours who is a giant LOTR fan but could not go to GenCon. To each his own I suppose.

Very cool scenario BTW. Very hard, but very cool.

So unless you are in a hurry, there is no reason to buy the overpriced ones on ebay? The POD copies will be of comprable quality and are not inferior to the Gencon ones?

Those handed out at GenCon were definitely of lesser quality than the Core Set and first two expansions. Note, the quality is less, but certainly not "bad". I think it is safe to assume they were Print on Demand products. Our game group returned home with 3 copies, one of which we're keeping to play and the other two we've already sold on eBay. We grossed $152 between the two auctions. And while we're extremely happy, we're also shocked by the results. Prices have already started to drop, as more folks push their cards onto eBay in an attempt to join the "gold rush".

The only thing these cards may have going for them, over the soon to be released POD product, are the two "bookend" cards which contain the Gen Con 2011 logo (and don't affect play at all). I would assume the new POD products will contain something different, but I could certainly be wrong.

More than anything I think the crazy prices M@Og is getting on ebay is a reflection of human impatience with a dash of collectors fever added in.

We have been told the set will be available via POD, I'm guessing it's not going to be anymore than $30 US, why be impatient and pay over double what it's really going to be worth?

Having only just receieved Gollum, I'm happy to wait.

Klaen said:

my guess is a lot of people might not know that it'll be POD -- otherwise, why pay over $100?!

As long as they are printed for legibility, I don't mind if the POD are of lesser quality. If I can sleeve them, no one will likely know the difference.

Dain Ironfoot said:

For all the panic that Massing induced in my group at GenCon, my kids and I cleared it today on our first run. Final score 86 for three players.

"What was so hard about that, dad?"