R2-B1 & TC-14

[chris solo]

Whats a good price for R2-B1 carded in good condition?

Is it really as rare as the prices you see listed on ebay, or is there a quiet conspiracy between comic stores to stockpile a bunch in the back and keep the price jacked?

Does anybody have one for sale?

[chris solo]

Sorry. I just found an extremely similar thread down a bit:

URL Text

Still, anybody have a spare?

[chris solo]

What was the reasoning behind the R2-B1 being so rare? Before I got into collecting I swear I had seen it in Quebec.

I got a great deal from a friend that had 2 boxes of assorted Ep.I figs. That started me into collecting. Of course it didn't have the expensive rare figs in it. I'd like to finish off my Ep. I collection, but I don't want to spend $50 Can. at my local comic shop for it.

Do you guys think the price will go down a bit in the future or increase. I have found alot of ROTJ figs on c6.5-7.5 card for less.

[Morgbug]

The basic reason these guys cost this much is that production was slowed down.  They came at the tail end of the Ep I line with retailers sitting on piles and piles of Anakin's, battle droids, Ric Olie's etc.  No demand, production goes down.

I would be surprised if you saw them in PQ though, they were only released on US cards.  Perhaps at a collectors shop?

I think the price is pretty stable and will remain so.  Just one of those items that there are less of.

[chris solo]

Another thing that got me into collecting was finding 4 EP.I figures at dollaramma in Montreal. You mentioned Ric Ole. There was also Emperor Palpatine, Padme, and the Cancellor. That was a great deal. You can figure out the fabrication/mark up costs after finds like these.

I don't know who take care of marketing, but those figures sucked. No kid/collector would really want them near the amount that was fabricated. They should have focussed more on the R2-B1, TC-14 and other astromechs or podracers. I'm not into marketing, but those would have deffinately sold better.

[Nathan]

I really wanted both of these but I didn't find either at retail and have never seen TC-14 in person. I did see R2-B1 at a local convention once, but it was thirty or forty bucks and I'm not made of money.

I hope they repack both someday; if not, it's a bummer but I'll live.

[Darth Slothus]

THese droids- the tc14 and r2b1 were easy to find. I saw them once at a KMART grand opening in Texas then again in Idaho at another Kmart. When I discovered them in Idaho( in a town of 14,000 people) the case must have been crushed because the cards were all openers-they were seriously curved and dented in bubbles) 
The real trick is....IF you really WANT the figure bad enough-you actually have to have dementia and go to the stores DAILY! when they open or are stocking! If not well, then.....I'm sorry my friend- then your left crying at this website about why you didn't get one.

[Nathan]

Well, at the time I was 14 or 15, without the transportation ability to check five stores a day.

to JediDefender, by the way.

[JesseVader08]

After 5 years, I finally got a hold of these guys last month.   

[DoctorPadawan]

After 5 years, I finally got a hold of these guys last month.

Good to hear, Jesse.  Even though they're not the best figures in the Episode I lineup, they are unique characters and as such, I'd have a major headache if I didn't have them in my collection.  That's what insanity can do to you.

As for something mentioned earlier in the thread, one of my hobbies in keeping mental notes on the contents of particular waves, and how difficult they were to locate.  TC-14 and R2-B1 were part of the final assortment of Collection 3, which was a very small assortment unto itself.  In fact, TC-14 and R2-B1 were the only figures in their "wave" and were only the fourth wave of Episode I Collection 3 figures overall.

Wave One (which shipped en masse and sat) was the May 3, 1999 wave, which included Boss Nass, Valorum, Gasgano, Ki-Adi Mundi, and Mace.

Wave Two (which shipped slightly less en masse, but with even more of Wave One shipped again, making that worse) included Tarpals, Ody, and OOM-9.

Wave Three (which shipped sparingly) only included one figure: Adi Gallia and (again) more reships of waves one and two, making that problem even worse.

Then they get around to Wave Four.  Not only was it the last wave of Collection 3, they shipped even more figures from the first two waves mixed in with 2 each of the new figures.  Stores were choking on C3 so much by that point that if they got any of this wave at all, it was only a case or two at most.

So, the droids were pretty much the victim of the Hasbro case cycle: Overproduce and overship the first wave, continue to devote the majority of the case space to these figures and only include 1 or 2 new figures a wave, create a glut, and then blame retail for overordering and the consumer's inability to find action figures. 

[bobafett14]

Both were non-existant in my parts, I lucked out and happend to stumble upon one of each at an out of the way "We're Entertainment" store back in the day...didn;t know they even had figs, they were on a low corner peg, darned near didn't see them.

Never saw them again, and still don;t see many at the toy shows.

[Jesse James]

THese droids- the tc14 and r2b1 were easy to find. I saw them once at a KMART grand opening in Texas then again in Idaho at another Kmart. When I discovered them in Idaho( in a town of 14,000 people) the case must have been crushed because the cards were all openers-they were seriously curved and dented in bubbles) 
The real trick is....IF you really WANT the figure bad enough-you actually have to have dementia and go to the stores DAILY! when they open or are stocking! If not well, then.....I'm sorry my friend- then your left crying at this website about why you didn't get one.

That's cool you were able to find them easy enough Darth Slothus...  But the fact is that they tended to not ship in very high numbers, so for the majority they were indeed tough finds.  Some people, regardless of how hard they looked or not, didn't see these items.  Myself included and that was when I did hit a variety of stores daily (sometimes twice daily) on my commute.

I got mine from friends instead who did have good luck...  These simply weren't easy finds for most though.  Not to mention they suffered a lot of regional variety.  Like Bobafett14 mentioned, they weren't terribly common in Pittsburgh stores at all, yet once the clearance dumps happened I heard some areas found them a bit more abundantly.

Currently on Ebay I see R2-B1's anywhere from $12 to $18+ carded so I'd say he's at least still something a lot of people are in search of.

"Rare" is an overused term in the modern hobby generally, that is for sure!  However it's also a matter of perspective...  I'd say R2-B1 and TC-14 come probably as close to the term "rare" as most any modern figure has though...  Short of something oddball like the Toy Fair Vader or some such. 

[JediMAC]

THese droids- the tc14 and r2b1 were easy to find.

Not quite sure I'd say they were "easy" Jon.    I sure as hell never saw them, and don't know anybody else who ever did either.  Judging by their prices on ebay over the past 4 years or so, I'd say they were definitely amongst the toughest figures to find from Ep. 1.

Got 'em for cheap on the trading boards though, fortunately.

[Darth Slothus]

Ok, Ok howz about this...They "weren't difficult to find?" Geography-wise look where I was collecting. Honestly- I had no collecting friends-other than my 11 years younger brother- and really didn't need any since everything"fell in my lap"( there was no competition)--I had to learn about getting collector help when I moved back to this state 3 years ago. I swear collecting star wars in the US is about thirds...One third east coast-(NY,NJ other crammed pop. states) another third southwest including so. Cal..and lastly the last third which comprises the the other 90% of US. geography. Look I had know idea how "whatever-hard to get" these were until months later when the LEES and Tomarts showed price increases. At least I completed my other collections since 95 before I moved( except FF weequay!). I will concede if I lived here.. then I probably would not have got those droids

[TheBlackDog]

I have to admit, I got "lucky" on these. I was at TRU when they were unloading cases and grabbed three of each. I thought a friend would want a set, he turned them down and I never got back to returning them. The other two were for me, one to open, one to card. Eventually I opened two sets, and left 1 carded. I now have 2 R2B1 loose, 2 TC-14's loose, and 2 Padme Ascensions and 2 Sio Bibble's (all loose). I traded my carded ones about 2 years ago for a bunch of stuff I needed.   My son has one of the loose sets on his shelves for his special collecting figures. He played with them when younger, and still will, but his are still on his shelf for the most part.

After that, I never saw these again. They were very rare in my book and very hard to find.