I got the email from BBTS as well. Unfortunately I only have Whiplash pre-ordered, as I didn't want another War Machine, and Mandarin and Ultimate IM pre-orders were sold out. I'll just have to wait for my other stuff (G.I. Joe Pursuit of Cobra wave 5, MU wave 13) to hit my pile of loot to save on shipping.

I pre-ordered comic series Wave 4 today from BBTS. We'll see if it isn't cancelled.

As I want 3 out of 4 of that wave, I should probably do the same thing.

Not sure which ones you want Shellhead but Whiplash and Modern War Machine are in stock for $11.99 and Ultimate Iron Man is available for pre-order. I almost did this but want to take a shot at getting Mandarin.

Mandarian is the only one I need as well, please keep posting here is he shows up, that way i have a better chance of getting him.

andrain is my top pick, but I want all four, although if given the choice of just mandarain or the other 3 I would say mandarian. He is one of my top ten villians in Marvel Universe.

I want all of them but I only want them if I can pick them up at retail. I absolutely hate buying any figures online, that feels far too artificial and sterile to me, that's not collecting, it's whipping out your credit card and letting others do the work.

If I can't find them at retail, I'll never have them and that's fine with me too.

I can understand that, but I have never been about "the hunt" but about what I can add to my collection (that being what I like of course). I have no issues with those who like the hunt, I just get so sick of it after a few years (and been at this for a very, very long time). I don't like buying things online but at the same time I probably wouldn't have half of what I wanted in my collection if I never did. To me it's the lesser of two evils, but I can get people thinking the other way as well (and lord knows I have passed on enough online in the hopes of finding it later, sometimes I do, sometimes I don't and have to find it second hand somewhere).

I'm all about the hunt, otherwise it's just a credit card exercise. I can find anything I want online, I can certainly afford anything I want, what's the point in collecting if all you're going to do is whip out the credit card and have anything you want, any time you want, without any effort on your part?

It's rare that I'll ever order online. Granted, I just ordered a couple of figures about a week ago, only because I found something my wife has been looking for that's more than a decade old and I got free shipping if I ordered enough to make it worthwhile. I threw on a couple of older figures there was no way in hell I'd ever find at retail and dropped about $150 total and made an online retailer happy. But that's a real rarity for me.

Again that works if you are about the hunt, but not everyone is about the hunt. Not everyone collects for the same reasons.

I collect because I like the figures, not because I enjoy fruitlessly searching in vain.

Never said they were, I said what *I* do. If you do it for a different reason, more power to you. I never said or implied that I was doing it "right" or that anyone else was doing it "wrong".

I used to be all about the hunt... until I realized that it wasn't a fair game. It wasn't "search X times per week and you're guaranteed to see figure Y within 6 weeks" because distribution just isn't always there. If every line were Star Wars, where it seems that 90% of the figures follow the "search X find Y" rule, then I'd be all about the hunt.

Instead, I've found that if I really want figure Y, I'd better get while the getting's good whenever I can.

Of course all of the above only applies to me. YMMV!

Star Wars isn't like that either, at least around here. No matter where it is, TRU, Walmart, Target, etc., they haven't stocked the shelves in months. I've gotten what I've found, there are still lots of holes in my collection, but I can't find them anywhere. Sure, I could get online and order most of it straight from Hasbro, but where's the fun in that?



Sure, if you see it, get it, assuming you think it's worth the asking price. There are plenty of figures that I'd like to have, but I look at what they're asking and pass every time. No piece of plastic is worth those prices, I'd much rather do without. Wanting and justifying the purchase are two different things. However, that's the kind of thing I've struggled with over the years with my wife, who will see something she wants, talk herself out of getting it, then never be able to find it again and kick herself. After a few dozen times of that, you'd think she'd learn, but she still does it all the time. I keep buying her things that she says "oh no, I'll get it later..." No, you'll get it now.

Well, it's more fun for me to have the figure rather than not have the figure, but that's neither here nor there, as we're clearly discussing two different perspectives. I will say that it would be BEST to find the figure at retail, get the thrill of "I GOT HIM!" and pay $8 than to pay $15 online and lose the "thrill" of discovery.

It's too bad your area isn't good for Star Wars. Still, Hasbro's distribution with that line keeps online prices down somewhat with most figures, as well.

I completely agree with everything you've said here. After three years of actual collecting of entire lines (Star Wars has always been "grab this one here, that one there" for me) like DCIH and MU, I've finally just learned to trust my gut. There is not a single figure out right now anywhere that is absolutely calling to me. Therefore, I go to Target/TRU once a week around here, and what I see is what I see. When Scarlet Spider is out, however, he'll be a must-grab for me, and I'll take the first one I see anywhere where I can get him for $18 or less, postage included. I used to try to find reasons to justify that kind of thing for myself, but now it's just... "I need it" or "I don't need it."

If "I need it," I definitely "get it now" as you put it. I've learned that lesson.