The View from the Hard-Bottomed Seat
For those of you who do not attend Origins solely for the auctions, the title above refers to the fact that auctions seem to be universally held in auditoriums that have hard bottomed seats. This year, the room was even worse in that the seats had these cute little half tables that usually go on grade school chairs. For anyone who is even slightly over the "normal" size, this was cruel and unusual punishment... and for some reason a lot of collectors fit this large size profile.
How the auction runs
Leaving aside the purely physical irritations, these auctions were like most other Origins auctions. The auctioneers accepted games from sellers in lots and labelled those lots by letter in blocks of ten. This allowed them to only offer the first ten for each seller before they offered the next ten, etc. The individual items were labelled with small yellow removable stickers. Theoretically, the auction crew can enter the information about the games from these yellow tags into the computer as the games are sold, and thereby speed up the closing.
At the end of the auction
In practice, the system broke down at this Origins almost immediately. This was the result of the auction team being entirely new to the process, and their system was not as well developed or honed by experience. in addition, they suffered from the usual problem at Origins: quantity. In the registration process Friday, they accepted more items than could have been auctioned on all the time scheduled for Friday and Saturday, with items left over for Sunday. This had also occurred with devastating effect in 1983 in Detroit.
To the credit of the auction group, although they seemed overwhelmed at times, the auction didn't go near y as badly this time as in Detroit. Registration of new items was reduced on Saturday and Sunday, and by judiciously extending the auction hours on Saturday, all the items registered were offered for sale by Sunday.
What was available
There were some really good things to be had. Simulations Publications Inc. (SPI) games were as usual the prime topic of interest, with the value of many of the games exceeding even the original full retail value. For an item like Campaign for North Africa, this is a clear reflection of collector interest, since playability is highly suspect.
In general, SPI was up from previous years. Selected thin bookcase-sized games from the later years sold for $10 to $12. Flatbox and bookcase-sized games sold consistently for $10 to $15, with even the dogs going for $5 to $7. The Avalon Hill Game Company games, even the classic collector's items such as U-Boat and Gettysburg, sold rather poorly. There was some really hot action on Friday and Saturday on Dragon magazine, although as usual for Origins, the amount of fantasy material was sparse.
In the area of general games, there were a number of classics and "oldies but goodies" that sold quite well. included were old style Diplomacy's, Kingmaker's, Risks and the original Milton Bradley Company and Parker Brothers games in the general war game category, like Dogfight. The piece de resistance, for me at least, was a very early Monopoly game, from the 1930s, that was still in the original cellophane, and the inside was totally MINT I paid only $90.00, and then turned it around to Darwin Bromley, a fellow collector for whom it was purchased. His look of delight and joy was plain to see.
In the magazines, besides the Dragons noted earlier, there were a set of White Dwarf, numbers 1-5 ($32.00); Fire & Movement, number 1 ($25.00); Strategy and Tactics, number 1 !!! ($25.00, a steal ... ); and a beautiful set of Moves sold in groups of 5 issues per group that sold very well. SPI is obviously still loved by collectors, even if it was not so well received while still around as a company.
Where the dollars were spent
In the big ticket items, a set of Dragon, numbers 1-3 sold for $130, War in the Pacific, (SPI) sold for $130-150 (3 sold), War in Europe (SPI) sold for $97 all three times it came up for auction, and a Trafalgar sold for $200. The Trafalgar was the auction's top item, though this was below the $250 final bid for a single copy of War in the Pacific at Dallas Origins in 1984.
Available for the true collector
In the specialty and unusual items, Early Pacific Battles, Witchcraft Ritual, and Black Magic Ritual from The Avalon Hill Game Co. all came up and sold for $35 to $50. A set of the Yaquinto games from their library came up for bid. The game that excited the most interest was Battle!!! Also, an original copy of Ship of the Line, an early design by the Battleline-Yaquinto group was sold.
Maybe later I'll write something on auction strategy, but until then, Happy Hunting.
William W Jaffe is president of the Game Collectors Guild.
More Origins '85
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© Copyright 1985 by Dana Lombardy.
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