These days, I prefer to go toy hunting with my wife. It's just not as fun solo, together there's some one to gripe to when the shelves are empty and someone to be excited with you when you do find something fun. I don't even remember when I even started doing it, but for years when we'd get close to the toy aisle, I'd tell her, "FLY CRYSTAL BATS, TAKE TO THE AISLES, FIND ME THE TOYS!" (a butchering of the Dark Crystal line). The idea being, it seems like whenever we DO find a good score, she's the one who spots its. (Having seemingly struck out at Ross, she spotted a three pack randomly near the front of the store).

So we hadn't been in a while, and a few weeks ago we were trying TRU as I'd heard Night Vipers had begun to show up, and I'd never seen one. Sure enough, I did the Crystal Bats line and the pegs were freshly stocked. I told her after finding a Night Viper, we might have to retire the Crystal Bats on a high note.

So today we were back near TRU and decided to swing by. We're expecting our first child, she's about 5 months pregnant and starting to show it, so I've been teasing her relentlessly. Before we got out of the care, I rubbed her belly and said, "Okay, since the crystal bats retired, baby has to find me another night viper." Sure enough, score!

Anyone else have any toy hunting traditions or superstitions to help your odds?

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Almost every time I meet another collector in person, we go hunting and I'll end up finding something cool. Seems every time I go with RogueTiger, he always finds things I'm looking for and at a good price.

As for eBay, I find patience is a virtue. I've found some awesome deals just by thinking about if I need a specific figure right now or if I can wait on it. I scored both L&F Tripwire and SP Grand Slam for less than $30 a piece simply by waiting. Same with my first Tomahawk and Night Raven. Both were complete and I manged to get them for $35 a piece. However, when I jump in coz I gotta have it right now, I'll over pay and find the same figure for half the price a week later.

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I don't know if it counts, but I have a specific plan of attach whenever I'm at a big flea market/antique mall/any place with multiple dealers. Start at the door moving counter-clockwise around the outside ring, and then move inward in a closing spiral. Make sure to scour EVERY booth (many times have I found an action figure hiding in a booth that is otherwise just doilies and horribly racist ceramic figurines). I know it makes me sound obsessive, but those places are huge and the booths can start looking alike, and if I don't have a plan, I often end up missing entire sections.

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I always look last for the stuff I want the most when I get an opportunity to look at toys in a store. Meaning if I am looking for Joes, I tend to browse over the WWE stuff, Superhero stuff, and random stuff before I go for the things I came to look for. I'm not sure why I do it or where I picked up the habit, but I do it alot. Kind of an odd tic I have and not really a superstition.

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Hadn't even thought about it, I realized I do this too. Start off browsing LEGO, look around Playskool for dio ideas, weave around the action figures saving the 4" lines I'm interested in for last.

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No, no particular patterns, although I do seem to fare rather well when I'm out with a friend of mine. Granted, it helps that he has a car, so we can get to places that I cannot on my own.

In years past, before gas prices were what they are now, we'd sometimes head out of town to more remote communities to see what their Walmarts and Targets might offer. This paid off more than once. On one such trip, he said he had "a hunch" about something, and we ended up at a Walmart about 40 miles away. Found a DC Universe Classics Donna Troy. That completed that particulart wave for me.

On another occasion, we visited a Walmart in a community we'd never been to before. I not only found the entire Walmart-exclusive Wave 10 of DC Universe Classics, but also the newest series of Power Rangers. Fortunately, I also had the money for them at the time.

But I've never really adopted any tricks or traditions, likely because I've never been able to discern any particular pattern to what I find where or when.

The only two things I have goin' for me is, I usually get at least 1 GI Joe for Christmas, and I usually come away from the Shipshewana, Indiana Flea Market with one GI Joe-related thing.

Nothing superstitious, not really tradition, I just happen to luck out that way.

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Since I don't fly, any time we go out of town, we end up driving through a bunch of middle-of-nowhere towns. This is where I'd usually come across hard-to-find things. However, lately, there hasn't been squat.

My trick now is just rarely going to the stores anymore. My go-to toy lines have all thinned out a lot in terms of volume over the last several years. Toy hunting usually results in wasted time for me. So I just usually get what I really want online and save myself the hassle. But if I happen by some stuff, then is a bonus.

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I agree with Dan...it's more fun to go toy hunting with my wife. I'm also pretty sure she's my good luck charm. For a long time, I could never find any new MU figures. At 7 AM one day, I got an excited call from her when she stopped at Walmart before her shift..."Who is Omega Red? He looks cool! Do you have Black Knight?" As I tried to pick who I wanted most from the wave, she just decided to get them all for me. A few months later, she also found me A-Bomb, and I had never seen either of the Abominations in person. But, I also found that with her, she seems to get excited, too, and toy hunting together is really great, because she seems to enjoy learning about stuff I've loved my whole life.

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I have found there are times when I happen to go to a different store I haven't been to before, I stop inside the door, take a deep breath through my nose, then head in the direction I believe the toy section is in.

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How often does that work, DarkJedi?

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You'd be surprised.

I have a nose for the toy section...

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When I used to Ebay for Joes and vehicles, I always thought to myself that there are tons of Moms and Dads selling their now adult childrens' left home collections, with really no memory or idea what things are called. I remember researching Terrordromes many years ago, and typed in "space base", and sure enough, in sections unrelated to GIJOE, there were Terrordromes, many that were in incredible shape and having most their parts, going for mere dollars. While I didn't partake, I shared the info here and one of my friends indeed scored a Terrordrome on the "space base" search.

Same for the Crusader space shuttles. A generic typing of "plastic space ship" brought a wealth of Crusader space shuttles, one of which had everything intact including the consoles on the gears. Turned around three of them on such finds.

For toys now, given that all I have is one ToysRUs that is literally wiped out by the Ebayers and scalpers and such upon opening, I rarely have hope of finding a single thing. While I enjoyed toy shopping with the Mrs. all the time, it gets a bit depressing knowing she can find every single Monster High or Zelph figure she is looking for, and I cannot find any wave of GIJOE or MU, save for what is leftover from long passed waves and the most ubiquitous of that line, like a Hercules or the multitudes of the different Spiderman renditions. Same for StarWars. I had much better luck when the comic packs were the coin of the realm than these themed series. I still am in shock from having found the one and only T'Ra Saa and Tholme pack here, given how most midnight SW debuts and runs, there would be shopping carts filled with those buying in gross amounts. Luck of the draw that day. Come to think of it, it was the Mrs. that found it that day to boot, commenting on T'Ra's look and saying "Sweetie? She looks cool."

Nowadays I have better luck simply asking here, in the Marketplace.

We have a few flea markets within driving distance, but I loooong since gave up trying to deal with them. Those that have any toys usually have them in abominable shape, like a cardboard box of crotch broken Joes and Cobras covered in dust and grime, and the guy trying to convince me that "you'll never find these guys in better shape for this kind of money..." Or worse, they have a laptop open to Ebay and immediately check largest priced versions and try and convince me that "This is what they're going for, see for yourself."

Used to have great finds in my local comic book store, but they left for Pinellas Park. Sucks, miss them I do. Was absolutely great for hard to find Star Wars or older toy lines thrown into the $3 bin.

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Clearance shelf.

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