Digital Dabblings #43 – Wrestlemania Time!

Digital Dabblings #43 – Wrestlemania Time!
By William M. Noetling – Specialist

Remember the Who’s Elite Survey is still taking responses, Click Here to Vote

This time we’ll be a little short, normally I would include the sales and stats for the last month, but since it’s only been 3 weeks since my last update I shall eschew the statistics this time and bring them to you in a couple of weeks.  

It’s the End of the Road to Wrestlemania with the big event beginning today.  As I write this Smackdown has just ended and the Hall of Fame Ceremony is in a couple of hours.  Today we have a full lineup with NXT Stand and Deliver in the morning and Night 1 of Mania at night.  Sunday of course is Night 2.  For me, I also have the new episode of Dr. Who tomorrow as well as the Formula 1 race from Saudi Arabia on Sunday Morning. 

By the way, have any of my readers ever been to Wrestlemania?  I went to Wrestlemania 2000 in Anaheim, and that was a total blast.  

The State of the App for April 2025

 

It’s been nothing but Wrestlemania for the last week in the game.  Before that the Chrome set finally sold out of most of its good limited cards, and 1/1s sold very briskly.  One thing I noticed, the Main Event sets do well with their Rare variants.  If you have multiple copies by Friday, you can get massive overpays for them, so it might be wise to start stocking up on those relatively easy to get cards.

 

Two new basic sets dropped since last month and neither set my heart on fire.  Street and Rising Stars looked way too similar to me, and I didn’t really care about any of the checklists.  Of course your mileage may vary.  One set I did really like was the Decades: The 80s.  I loved the throwback design and of course the multiple Bret Hart cards didn’t stink.

Wrestlemania content began hitting last week with the drop of the main set, which isn’t all that different from previous years sets, which is to be expected.  I do like the overall design of the cards utilizing the Las Vegas gambling theme, but I also have a hard time differentiating between the variations of the cards, which renders them basically pointless.  

Also, starting with Chrome, Topps chooses two very very limited cards and whomever pulls them gets 250,000 Diamonds.  They did the same with Mania.

Additionally there’s an event for the weekend where you do a few very easy tasks and are rewarded with a pack of cards with a special exclusive set.  This is similar to the Elimination Chamber event, but the Iconic cards are a lot harder to hit (1:50 packs).  The event is repeatable and the tasks are super easy (Open 1 WM Pack, Open the mystery box, craft 25 cards, spin the wheel and open 3 more WM Packs.  All told you spend 1200 coins to get 1600 coins and a pack of cards.  You can do it basically every hour once the mystery box reloads.  The rewind set is pretty cool too.

Secondary market wise, Mania isn’t really setting the scene on fire, though lots of cards have sold.  The /5s are doing very well, but not as well as Chrome limiteds.  The /15 Hidden Gem cards actually sold better and for higher amounts.  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, sometimes Mania underwhelms with content (I personally am not all that invested or interested in most of the matches) and this year wasn’t an exception.  PERHAPS they should have held the Chrome content until after the big dance?

In any case the app is still robust and if Free Pack Friday is a good indicator of how many accounts there are, we’re doing really well, since the last card ended up over 24K CC!  That’s nearly 2x the number of accounts there were in the app toward the waning days of 2021.

New Sets April 2025

Topps Now

• Smackdown April 4, 2025 (2 Cards, Unc)
• Wrestlemania 41 Dream Matchup Posters (5 Cards, Unc)

Normal Insert Sets

• Street (24 cards, 3 variations Unc. to SR) [2 drops]
• John Cena April Fools Card Freebie (1 card Unc)
• Rising Stars [2 drops]
  • Base (20 Cards, 2 variations Unc. & Rare)  1 award
  • Relic (20 Cards, 2 variations SR to Icon)  1 award
• Decades: The 80’s
  • Base (25 Cards, 4 variations Unc. to Icon)  1 award
  • Managers (8 Cards, 4 variations Rare to Leg.)  1 award
  • Relic (12 Cards, 4 variations Rare to Leg.)  1 award
  • Champion’s Hall (15 Cards, 4 variations Rare to Leg.)  1 award
• John Cena Spotlight – The Time is Now (24 cards, 5 variations SR & Legendary)
• Hall of Fame Class of 2025
  • Base (6 Cards, 3 variation Unc. to SR) 1 Award
  • Motion (6 Cards, 3 variation Rare to Icon) 1 Award

PLE Based Sets

• WRESTLEMANIA 41 Predictors (9 cards, Unc) No Award
• Wrestlemania 41 
  • Base (52 cards, 5 variations Unc to Leg), 1 award
  • Signature (42 cards, 5 variations R to Leg), 1 award
  • Dual Signature (21 cards, 5 variations R to Leg), 1 award
  • Wrestlemania Legends Relic (21 cards, 5 variations R to Leg), 1 award
  • Wrestlemania Matchups Relic (10 cards, 5 variations R to Leg), 1 award
  • Hidden Gems (5 cards, Legendary ltd. to 15), No award
• Wrestlemania Threads
  • Base (11 cards, 3 Variations Unc. to SR) 1 Award
  • Signature (11 cards, 3 variations R to Icon) 1 Award
• NXT Stand and Deliver
  • Base (17 cards, 3 Variations Unc. to SR) 1 Award
  • Motion (17 cards, 3 variations R to Icon) 1 Award

New Additions to Ongoing Sets

Monthly:

VIP (Unc Bayley, Rare-Bianca Belair, SR-Tiffany Stratton)

Daily:
Main Event Famous Faction Daily Sets

Each has two Variations (Uncommon/Rare) 5 Daily cards, 1 Award

• Wrestlemania Legends
• Marquee Matchups
• Wrestlemania Rewind

Monday:
Superstar Portraits (3 Variations R to Icon), 1 Award

• Candace LeRae
• Roman Reigns
• Razor Ramon

Wednesday:

Editor’s Choice (3 Variations Unc. to SR) 1 Award

• Chris Sabin
• CM Punk
• Raquel Rodriguez

Thursday:
Throwback Thursday (2 variations Unc. & R) 1 Award

• Triple H
• Shawn Michaels
• Finn Balor

Friday:
Free Pack Friday (2 variants, UNC&SR, 1 award)

• 4-4-25 Wes Lee
• 4-11-25 Jake The Snake Roberts (ends Series 1)
• 4-18-25 Scarlett (begins Series 2)

Thankfully not as many sets to collect as March, though we’ll also get a new NXT Set on April 19.  Wrestlemania watch parties are tonight and tomorrow, so they’ll be giving away some free stuff in the app.  Also if you were AT Mania and got to the Topps booth during their adjacent show (Is it still called Axxcess?) they’re giving away code cards for free stuff.  Not sure if it’s anything special, so if anyone gets a code let me know what you get!

I’ll be shooting for Friday May 9 for the next column, until then if you have any comments, questions or concerns, send me an email to wmnoe@yahoo.com, or hit me up u/wmnoe on Reddit.com.  Remember, I’m GRENDELSEN in the app if you wanna trade!