Over the past week, I watched a debate emerge on X about whether or not sets rotating out of Standard means they are now out of print.
It all started with this post, where a creator named @PokeHEX5555 stated that, with Standard rotation coming in the Spring of this year, the sets that were rotating out were officially no longer being printed.
Several prominent creators disagreed, including Serebii Joe and PTCG Radio, responded and insisted that Standard rotation does not mean anything with respect to set printing:
Serebii Joe and PTCG Radio are both correct.
But they're also missing the point.
It's true that Standard rotation is nothing more than a rule for competitive play: it's an annual update to the list of cards players are allowed to use in the 'Standard' competitive format, with the oldest cards 'rotating out' and no longer being legal for competitive play.
This rule has no direct impact on printing decisions.
And yet, many experienced collectors and investors continue to use Standard rotation as a proxy for when cards might go out of print.
Because, even if the rule has no direct bearing on printing decisions, it does indicate a shift in the probability a set will be reprinted, and this shift has served as a useful directional indicator.
This is what @PokeHEX5555 was suggesting with their post.
When deciding what to print, The Pokémon Company needs to balance a number of different factors. Although their decision-making criteria is not public, a couple factors have emerged over the years that inform our understanding:
New sets (supply the market with the latest set releases),
Competitive accessibility (demand from players + need for availability), and
Collectible demand (characters, nostalgia, chase cards, cultural significance)
The moment a set rotates out of Standard, the need for competitive accessibility instantly adjusts to zero. With that reason for printing the set eliminated, the collectible demand needs to be enormous to justify reprinting the rotated set over any of the newer, Standard legal sets.
Standard rotation removes one of the strongest structural reasons to reprint a set. And, in the end, this shift commonly represents the end of reprints.
This is why being aware of Standard rotation is a helpful, directional guide about the future availability of a set.
Now, all the parties we've discussed who are involved in this current debate understand this. Instead, the debate here is really about the semantics: it is incorrect to say that Standard rotation has any definitive impact on reprints. Saying so, and with so much confidence, does quality as misinformation.
But, with the right context (which I've tried to share here), I still think this information is valuable.
Serebii Joe provided some examples of sets that were reprinted after rotation, specifically:
Shining Legends,
Roaring Skies, and
Evolutions.
These 3 sets all became available, in differing quantities, long after their sets rotated. However: I’m not aware of any proof that they were reprinted. Instead, it appears that previously printed supply became available.
In the case of Evolutions, this was because that set was printed in enormous amounts relative to the market demand, and it took The Pokémon Company years to sell it all by slowly including Evolutions packs in all kinds of collection box products.
Roaring Skies, meanwhile, was reprinted heavily due to competitive accessibility: the Shaymin EX card from that set became essential to nearly all competitive decks, and the set was reprinted heavily to make sure players had access to it.
If Roaring Skies packs continued to be available in products after rotation, it was likely also excess supply being distributed and not reprints.
Lastly, I’m aware of a small restock of Shining Legends ETBs in 2020, but not an actual reprint.
But, regardless of whether these represent reprints, it’s important to note that, since they rotated out of Standard, all of these sets have eventually seen their values increase significantly as the Pokémon hobby has continued to grow while these sets have become rarer and rarer.
And, when Standard rotation hits, its only a matter of time for these new sets too.
As usual,
Thanks so much for reading the TCG Buyers Club newsletter. My name’s Grey, I buy cardboard, and I’m on a mission to make collecting and investing in Pokémon simple.
Cheers 🍻