I had anticipated that the Studio Series version of the Sweeps would be difficult to find, as most fans and collectors would (I imagine) have been buying up multiples in order to assemble a grand and glorious Sweep army.

Instead, I find that the exact opposite is true—the Sweep harvest seems to have been ripe and plentiful, and there are handfuls of them at nearly every Walmart I visit these days.

Are people just not armybuilding any longer? To me, these would be like gold every time I saw one on the shelf... had I not already bought a substantial number of Studio Series Scourge toys to serve as my personal Sweeps.

Or are people really turned off by the same-but-different color scheme? I thought the name on the box would trump the aesthetics for most folks. Color me surprised.

Zob (I mean, it's not like we get armybuilder characters for Transformers every day...)

On Sunday, February 20, 2022 at 6:40:56 AM UTC-6, Zobovor wrote:
> I had anticipated that the Studio Series version of the Sweeps would be difficult to find, as most fans and collectors would (I imagine) have been buying up multiples in order to assemble a grand and glorious Sweep army.
>
> Instead, I find that the exact opposite is true—the Sweep harvest seems to have been ripe and plentiful, and there are handfuls of them at nearly every Walmart I visit these days.
>
> Are people just not armybuilding any longer? To me, these would be like gold every time I saw one on the shelf... had I not already bought a substantial number of Studio Series Scourge toys to serve as my personal Sweeps.
>
> Or are people really turned off by the same-but-different color scheme? I thought the name on the box would trump the aesthetics for most folks. Color me surprised.
>
>
> Zob (I mean, it's not like we get armybuilder characters for Transformers every day...)

I did notice the Target store by my work and the one by my other work each got at least 3 cases of Sweep/Wreck-Gar. Was considering getting one.

On Sunday, February 20, 2022 at 4:40:56 AM UTC-8, Zobovor wrote:

> Instead, I find that the exact opposite is true—the Sweep harvest seems to have been ripe and plentiful, and there are handfuls of them at nearly
> every Walmart I visit these days.

I figured it was part of that problem you mentioned where Christmas stock still hadn't gotten pushed out by mid January. Wherever a WalMart is drowning in Sweeps around here I see full pegs of MotU and Gi Joe so I figure it's related.

> Are people just not armybuilding any longer? To me, these would be like gold every time I saw one on the shelf... had I not already bought a substantial number of Studio Series Scourge toys to serve as my personal Sweeps.

I think the average toybro stalking the aisles is too much of a generalist to go balls deep into Transformer Voyager price point army building. This is a $40 figure that's smaller than the Beast Wars reissue Megatron. 40 bucks is a lot nowadays. I buy two of them and I'm already in 80 dollars, and it's the same robot. I can't really justify it when I look at two identical voyagers plus Scourge who is just barely different and think-is this 120 dollars worth of plastic robot fun? Or plastic fun at all? That much money goes a long way on other lines. 40 bucks is two 6 inch Joes more or less. I understand I'm a lot more of a casual fan compared to the rest of you here but Joe Blo toy collector probably thinks a lot more like me.

> Or are people really turned off by the same-but-different color scheme? I thought the name on the box would trump the aesthetics for most folks. Color me surprised.

Over the years if you've been into this long enough you've gotten multiple Scourges through the various lines from Generations to Titanium to Titans Return. So we already have a bit of a Sweep army and with variety in the designs. I don't really need two that look the same anymore. I just don't know if there are enough people who've seen the movie or season three and are rabid enough to move a 40 dollar troop builder. Even seekers have completely different decos and character. What makes me worry is Wal-Marts around here almost chocked on Grimlock and he's an A-lister. Well hell, I'm not worried-a clearance would be great. No trailer Mr. Optimus Prime himself went for clearance around here and he's way more famous than a Sweep.

> Zob (I mean, it's not like we get armybuilder characters for Transformers every day...)

Well you know what they say about one man's Titan Scorponok...

Actually there's been at least some troop building overt the last few lines.. We've gotten the seekers which are the same in spirit as you end up buying the same mold over and over, the Reflectors from Siege, multiple Gnaws, and the drone guys from the Netflix show (I think). What makes this different is that the Sweeps're actually out in abundance and available for once unlike the Netflix exclusives and other one wave shortpacked wonders. So here's the real test of troop building popularity where there's enough to go around instead of every other time where its tough to do because of scarcity as a result of low supply.

I also wanted to mention I saw this auction the other day for loose set of Kingdom Galvatron, Cyclonus, and Studio Scourge with two Sweeps and I think it presented well as a collection of movie baddies:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/175140870318

Two Sweeps would satisfy my display desires. Good for whoever won the lot at $122.50. There were about 7 or 8 legit bidders involved and it took 25 bids to get there. That tells me a lot about the demand for these toys and how much people are really willing to pay.

My Target was also loaded with Sweeps.
I also find it a steep price point to buy multiples. Perhaps if there's
a sale.

Just want to clarify the Studio Series voyagers are $31.47 currently at Wal-Mart and $36.99 at Fred Meyer up here in Washington state. With the 10% sales tax that pushes them up to the range of $34.57-$40.68 depending on where you buy them. That's the range I am dealing with over here.

On Sunday, February 20, 2022 at 6:37:03 PM UTC-7, evil.king.m...@gmail.com wrote:

> Just want to clarify the Studio Series voyagers are $31.47 currently at Wal-Mart and $36.99 at Fred Meyer up here in Washington state. With the 10% sales tax that pushes them up to the range of $34.57-$40.68 depending on where you buy them.

I totally fall for Walmart's "trick pricing"; i.e., when I see $31.47, my brain goes "about thirty dollars." But of course there's tax and such, like you said.

I guess maybe the serious fans who were going to buy ten Sweeps or whatever, they probably already pre-ordered online or something. Walmart is still going to cater predominantly to casual buyers, I suppose.

Zob (stuffed ten boxes full with G1 toys today)

On Sunday, February 20, 2022 at 11:36:42 AM UTC-7, evil.king.m...@gmail.com wrote:

> I think the average toybro stalking the aisles is too much of a generalist to go balls deep into Transformer Voyager price point army building.

Maybe that's it. I think I've become acclimated to the steady increase in pricing. $30 doesn't feel like a lot to me right now, but if you had told me in 1999 that you were going to buy ten Optimal Optimus toys, I'd have called you insane.

(Beast Machines should have been a great opportunity for armybuilding, but none of the toys were good enough. The Tankor toy was awful, and the actual, official Tank Drone was pathetically tiny. The Aerodrone was just the bad Jetstorm toy in different colors. The Cycle Drone was actually a good toy, but I don't think I ever saw it in stores. I'm pretty sure I had to get ViceGripX to send me one.)

> Over the years if you've been into this long enough you've gotten multiple Scourges through the various lines from Generations to Titanium to Titans Return. So we already have a bit of a Sweep army and with variety in the designs.

I can't imagine putting one of each of those Scourge toys in a display together. That would be gaudy!

I feel like the Studio Series Scourge/Sweep is the culmination of many years' worth of waiting. I mean, we got the Generations Scourge in 2010 with his fake non-Targetmaster gun, and I know people were buying multiples of those. I had the opportunity, but not the desire. As a Deluxe, he was only ten bucks, but he was also wing-shaped and completely wrong.

Then the Titans Return version came along, which was better in a lot of ways (only a couple of erroneous fins that I could sort of squint and pretend weren't there). I bought several because, at the time, we didn't know what was coming down the pike, and it arguably could have been the best Scourge we ever got. (And then Titans Return went on clearance, and I ended up buying several more.)

To me, though, the Studio Series version is the pinnacle of Scourge collecting. It doesn't get better than this. (Well, maybe it will when and if we get a Masterpiece edition, but it will cost like $200 and I'll only be buying one of those.) It's the right scale, the right colors, and the design is spot-on. Better than G1. This was the time to stock up. Like the Sharkticons and the Quintesson Judge, I needed a handful of these.

I've sort of been looking ahead and building an imaginary bookshelf full of neo-G1 toys in my mind, and it would require Scourge and several Sweeps to flank Galvatron and Cyclonus. I imagine that shelf is going to become a reality, finally, after I move into the new house. The only problem is that all the stuff I do display ends up covered in dust, and I don't know how to avoid that. At least the stuff that I store in boxes always looks new when I pull it back out. Maybe I need to put everything under glass and just build a toy museum.

Zob (did I really want a moustacheless Man-At-Arms badly enough to order the Eternian Palace Guard? Apparently the answer was "yes")

Zobovor <zmfts@aol.com> wrote:
> I had anticipated that the Studio Series version of the Sweeps would be
> difficult to find, as most fans and collectors would (I imagine) have
> been buying up multiples in order to assemble a grand and glorious Sweep army.
>
> Instead, I find that the exact opposite is true—the Sweep harvest seems
> to have been ripe and plentiful, and there are handfuls of them at nearly
> every Walmart I visit these days.
>
> Are people just not armybuilding any longer? To me, these would be like
> gold every time I saw one on the shelf... had I not already bought a
> substantial number of Studio Series Scourge toys to serve as my personal Sweeps.
>
> Or are people really turned off by the same-but-different color scheme?
> I thought the name on the box would trump the aesthetics for most folks.
> Color me surprised.

I bought one Sweep, and the more I look at him the more I dislike him. The
bright blue and the subdued light grayish blue have very different hues,
and just clash. Had they made the light colored bits a brighter pale blue,
it would look better — but then the hand wouldn’t match Scourge if you
wanted to do a hand transplant.

I think three Scourges are fine.