See I'm right there...  If we always got Han Carbonite level figures, I'm in.  I may buy two of him even because I want to custom a block as well, but I worry we're still going to get those repaint droids, crummy Yodas, and that 3PO (again, forgot about him) mixed in with repacks of figures people clamored for...... at the last price point. 

That hurts then.  The financial impact goes from "oh it's just $2/per fig, no biggie", to "Plus you have to eat this ****** figure or three to get a set of what you want, or case to split". 

Plus cases are tough to split in the current form...  2x of each I'm all about, but 1x of some, repacks from previous waves, etc....  Case packs are always against the collector it seems, with that rare 2x each gem that trickles out.

I see where you're hopeful Jeff, and I want to be optimistic about it too, but there's part of me just isn't banking on it.  If quality is up across the board I'm not only happy as a clam, I'm a bit amazed.  I'm just more the pessimist at the moment maybe.  And I do attribute that somewhat to the trends (all downward) in overall quality in the brand that have let me down, like the AT-DP, Yoda, and so on.

I'm in the camp where if it's new (and not too animated looking), I figure I either want it for what it is, or I want it to try and attempt a custom articulation job on it.  I've found some interesting avenues of late for adding articulation with relatively minimal effort, skill, and having it function without issues like paint flaking and joints falling apart...  If I can do that, and get some very basic stuff out of a figure (knees and elbows, wrists as well), then I'm pretty content with the figure for what it is.

Like you though, articulation keeps me from ALL the other figures.  I may get Hoth Luke for the head though.  A goggle-less hoth hat is interesting to me.  Weird thought I know.

Feeling like a General Lee is a must.

I think I'm looking at it at a slightly different perspective from you Jeff, in that I'm looking at it from a "by the case" standard sort of thing.

I want Mosep, I want the Carbo Han...  Jawas, eh, I have literally dozens I'm content with and I guess that's where I'm at this point where I want greatness without the fluff Hasbro always squeezes in.  That is to say, I don't want repaints, repacks, and the other horse**** that gets put into case assortments under the guise of "it takes X to help pay for Y".  Which I always accept, but a $2 price hike on top of it makes me beg the question of just how much fluff they NEED to put in there then.

That said, if a case comes out and it's a solid grouping, or 2x of each, or whatnot...  I'm open to cases too.  I'm just questioning how easily it can be done getting 1x of what I want for retail...  I've written stores like WM or Target out because they feel to me as though they've written the line off for the most part.  TRU you can find stuff, but it's never a guarantee.  I hate hunting for stuff. 

Amazon I think is a viable option.  Sets, perhaps may work, depending on how Hasbro decides to boner things up with repacks.

I'm far from saying I dislike what we get...  I'm just saying the further and further they push retail lines, the less and less I like it all.  Case assortments have to be a lot more collector friendly for me, I guess.

That and I hope things maintain at 20 figures or so a year...  Less even.  I like the lower numbers.  I never understand people wanting 60 figures in a year anymore.

But like you said Jeff, a Jawa 2-Pack is a 2-pack in general, and that's a step in the right direction at least even if it's not something I'm giddy about.  If it were in a set I had to buy and I wanted the rest, I'm in on that.  But what if it were just a Jawa?  Or what if it were that Yoda, or R5 droid (And I LOVE droid repaints)?  Things start getting funky at that point.

I still like Star Wars toys, if they're things I really want...  Han Carbonite and Mosep could turn my mind around 100% if I had either one in my hand at this moment.  It also feels like a lifetime ago that we saw them.  Maybe it's just the long lull since the last time I saw that that I've not bought anything new at all.  Hardly anything old either it seems. 

Last year didn't help me either.  I got some figures I love like that Dagobah Luke, and I'm in the minority.  And like you Darby, I'd probably been content to get Torryn Farr and the Snowie Commander for even the inflated price (though not multiples of either, like I ultimately did, short of a steep discount).  I really loved Ree Yees and Doallyn's doppelganger and definitely would've paid $13 for each of them as well.  Good stuff is there, but something is just off for me right now, I guess.

I guess it's not so much the price hike's actual financial impact, especially if figure counts on the year stay similar.  I think it's more just how it makes me perhaps a little more critical of the toy itself?  Such as Yoda, who I could pass through my nitpicking because the backpack, the gear, and all that made it cool and fun to me.  But $2 more and I'm looking at it and thinking Yoda's more an accessory that should've been packed with Luke (I'm kidding...  sorta.  ).

Anyway, like I said, I'm still buying...  I'm out on extras short of sales though, and if cases are not collector-friendly, not sure what I'll do outside of Amazon, which makes me kind of antsy because they don't always get their pre-orders up quickly with Star Wars stuff.  Sometimes they do, but sometimes they're way behind it seems.

It'll really suck when they re-release stuff like the INC or Fleet Trooper, but at more money, and when I wanted many more of both if I could get them.  Same with the Echo Base Rebel, or Legacy Hoth Rebels, should either see their way back to retail.  I want more...  but at $13 a pop for things made years ago, army building is just not justifiable.

I hope buying online will be relatively easy for the year I guess.

Ugh I hear you on that...  My gf bought a truck before Christmas, which when you get something old (99) with over 100k on it you know it'll have problems, but I've nicknamed this thing Murphy...  and I do my own work, and with a steep parts discount (better than garage discounts), so I can totally feel your pain there.

At the moment it's apart in the garage while I try figuring out why the alternator is intermittently kicking the battery light on/off.  Electrical probs are always a real joy to track down. 

Murphy strikes again. 

The figure looks like production paint so I'm assuming it's a production figure overseas.  Guessing Jayson just ran into a language barrier issue perhaps.  It happens.  Bossk is back on my radar.  Without the jaw joint, I was pretty ready to just pass.  Seems Hasbro didn't cut a corner here afterall.   I'm pretty happy since I wanted only that figure, and the thought of any cost cutting measure was immediately annoying.

I'm not so sure...  Porting old games seems relatively easy, but each I'm not counting on it.