Savage Sword of Conan = the ugly stepchild of comics? 2 2

[mephistopheles]

Have a bunch of vintage 80's issues. Looked up prices on ebay, and no love at all.

[ninanina]

When I looked at what was for sale, I did see a bunch of low to mid-grade books for sale and all were using a stock photo to show the copy. Not the best way to sell a book. When I looked at Completed Auctions and hit the from highest price....what is selling is hi grade and complete runs. So...yes...there is some love. You just need to know where to look. 

[mintcomics1]

Certain issues in high grade will still fetch a nice price.

The entire run has some excellent cover art.

[Jayman]

[Jordysnordy]

On 4/27/2023 at 8:23 AM, Jayman said:

For my money, you will be very hard pressed to find a run of 50 great consecutive covers better than SSOC 1-50

5 in 9.8 is high on my want list.

My raw copy

 

Edited April 27, 2023 by Jordysnordy

[LowGradeBronze]

The upside is all those bargain copies of SSoC to be had by those with good taste! (I moaned when my favourite Jim Starlin comics like Strange Tales 180 went under appreciated for so long, then I moaned louder when the prices shot up as I hadn't bought enough of them in high grade to satisfy my needs!)

[RedRaven]

Been the case for a looooong time. I paid a premium for a high grade collection around 2000 and I doubt I could recoup more than 1.5X that cost today (except on the early issues if I sold ad-hoc). The Conan magazine action is solely centered on Savage Tales 1. We need a revival in Conan to stimulate prices across all mags and our best bet is a streaming service creating the right product at the right time (not holding my breath). As @LowGradeBronze stated, now is a good time to buy reader and collector copies.

[minutekev@50]

Got a near complete run of these back in the early 2000s 

I’ve sold some later issues and a few duplicates but I still have 1-50 in very nice grade 

[mephistopheles]

On 4/27/2023 at 12:12 PM, LowGradeBronze said:

The upside is all those bargain copies of SSoC to be had by those with good taste! (I moaned when my favourite Jim Starlin comics like Strange Tales 180 went under appreciated for so long, then I moaned louder when the prices shot up as I hadn't bought enough of them in high grade to satisfy my needs!)

I can easily see this happening with SSOC. Some really sweeet cover art.

[Jayman]

Another fav!

[Jordysnordy]

On 5/9/2023 at 7:14 PM, Jayman said:

Another fav!

 

[OtherEric]

I really need to just go for the rest of the run, I've got 1-60 and 190-235.  (The Roy Thomas written runs, if anybody is wondering why I hadn't bothered with the middle yet.)

[Jordysnordy]

On 5/16/2023 at 12:46 PM, OtherEric said:

I really need to just go for the rest of the run, I've got 1-60 and 190-235.  (The Roy Thomas written runs, if anybody is wondering why I hadn't bothered with the middle yet.)

Funny enough I am re-reading the entire run now and am at issue 198 and Thomas definitely re-injected life into the title when he came back. Having Big John join was also a huge bonus.

[Tec-Tac-Toe]

I have all of my purchased off the newsstand SWC issues. I very much enjoyed reading them and have looked to purchase them in collected editions to reread but unfortunately I have never found them at prices I'm willing to pay.

[lou_fine]

Sadly, it looks like there's also not much love for its earlier incarnation in terms of the Savage Tales magazine with the Conan stories:  

https://comics.ha.com/itm/magazines/superhero/savage-tales-3-marvel-1974-cgc-nm-94-off-white-to-white-pages/a/122324-13207.s?type=lotlink--bidnotice-dailystatus

I highly doubt the consignor of this HG copy here of Savage Tales 3 would have even gotten their slabbing costs back as it sold for only $59, based upon a hammer bid of $30 plus $29 for the Heritage BP juice.  So, after factoring in the Heritage Seller's Premium plus shipping, was the consignor even able to get back any money at all on his copy here?    

[mintcomics1]

On 6/12/2023 at 6:38 PM, lou_fine said:

Sadly, it looks like there's also not much love for its earlier incarnation in terms of the Savage Tales magazine with the Conan stories:  

https://comics.ha.com/itm/magazines/superhero/savage-tales-3-marvel-1974-cgc-nm-94-off-white-to-white-pages/a/122324-13207.s?type=lotlink--bidnotice-dailystatus

I highly doubt the consignor of this HG copy here of Savage Tales 3 would have even gotten their slabbing costs back as it sold for only $59, based upon a hammer bid of $30 plus $29 for the Heritage BP juice.  So, after factoring in the Heritage Seller's Premium plus shipping, was the consignor even able to get back any money at all on his copy here?    

I think part of the low bid may be due to the artwork just not being as strong as some of the other covers in this run. 

The Buscema and Adams covers tend to fetch a decent price in higher grade, but on this issue there are 41 graded higher (17 at 9.8), with 19 at 9.4. 

The Vallejo covers from Savage Tales are striking too.

A lot of 9.4 books just don't do it for many collectors perhaps. 

[mephistopheles]

On 6/16/2023 at 5:04 PM, mintcomics1 said:

I think part of the low bid may be due to the artwork just not being as strong as some of the other covers in this run. 

The Buscema and Adams covers tend to fetch a decent price in higher grade, but on this issue there are 41 graded higher (17 at 9.8), with 19 at 9.4. 

The Vallejo covers from Savage Tales are striking too.

A lot of 9.4 books just don't do it for many collectors perhaps. 

Yeah that artwork is pretty bad, and I often like campy art in comics... just not in Conan.

[mintcomics1]

On 6/19/2023 at 7:38 AM, mephistopheles said:

Yeah that artwork is pretty bad, and I often like campy art in comics... just not in Conan.

A favorite artist of mine from the SS run is Earl Norem.

His work in this title and other Marvel Mags is superior.

Edited June 20, 2023 by mintcomics1
conciseness

[Randall Dowling]

On 6/20/2023 at 2:38 PM, mintcomics1 said:

A favorite artist of mine from the SS run is Earl Norem.

His work in this title and all other Marvel mags is superior.

FTFY.

[fett]

When I was a kid this was the first Savage Sword I was able to sneak into the house.  #1 was the holy grail I didn't ever see getting (my cousin had it and wouldn't even let me touch it.) Then I heard about Conan's pre-Savage Sword series with Red Nails. So I will always love all of those. 

Edited June 21, 2023 by fett