How-to and explainer pieces on graded cards, grading, and ripping.
Every Pokemon machine we can score, ranked by Net EV (EV as a share of price times the buyback rate): one $50 pack at 96 percent, Collector Crypt at 94 to 95, the rest from 93 down to 81. Dated, sourced, honest about the one-point margin.
Read itInstant buyback is the sell-back offer attached to every online pack pull. What it is a percentage of, who sets that number, how windows differ across platforms, and a decision rule for keep, ship or sell back.
Read itThe three graders behind almost every slab in a pack machine, how their scales differ, why the same card in the same number sells for different prices under different labels, and when the label stops mattering.
Read itNine checks that separate a platform you can hold to its word from one you cannot: operator identity, custody, published odds, buyback basis, shipping terms, payment rails, shutdown clause, reviews and a test redemption. Applied to Rip Station, with the gaps named.
Read itThe three numbers on every graded-card machine, what each one means, a worked example with real figures, and why a positive EV and a negative buyback can both be true at once.
Read itHow a graded Pokemon card becomes an object on Sui, what the record does and does not mean, how to look one up, and why email sign-in is enough to own one.
Read itA tokenized Pokemon card is a graded slab in a vault with an on-chain record of who owns it. What the token is, what it is not, how to check it is backed, and the risks that custody introduces.
Read itWhat ripping a graded slab online actually means, what you get, the three choices after the reveal, and the seven things to check before you pay. With a worked cost example.
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