New Release: 2017 Epoch Swallows

The Epoch Swallows team set follows the same basic structure as the others. Epoch has released some details for some of its team sets, and Swallows is one of them, so I can provide a bit more detail. For the Epoch sets I've already written about, only the Carp set has additional released data, and I've already updated that post.

For the Swallows, I chose a card of David Buchanan, partly for the Newcomer graphic on the front.

My scanner cropped off the star on the back, but this is the first level of variation. Notice that a tighter crop was used on the front photo.

Here is a two-star parallel. Buchanan doesn't have a two-star parallel, so I went with Ishikawa.

I have yet to see three and four-star variations in person, but they do exist. Three-star variations have photo variations, and I'm guessing that four-star variations have tighter crops.

There are two levels of parallels with signatures on the front. Regular PS parallels have black signatures.

A second parallel with gold signatures was also produced.

Epoch didn't release information about what each variation is, but they did release a comprehensive checklist.

• base set: 30 cards
• * (crop): 24 cards
• ** (tighter crop): 12
• *** (photo variation): 6
• **** (unknown): 6
• signature parallel (black): 30
• signature parallel (gold): 6

Note that players appear in all previous variation levels (**** variation players also have ***, **, and * variations, for example).

Five foilboard insert sets were randomly included: Holografica (12 cards), Newcomers (6 cards), Rookies (6 cards), Combos A (6 cards), and Combos B (6 cards). The checklist for the two Combos sets is the same, so they are variations. The image above is a promotional image from Epoch.

Finally, autographed cards can be "won" by collecting 100 points. Points are randomly found in packs. There are 10 different autographed cards.