What Constitutes A "Master Set" Today?
 

Collecting sets from the 1930's to the 1990's it was possible to include all variations and errors to assemble a "master set"

These days, with the proliferation of base set variations, 1/1 auto's and patches etc. is it even possible to consider something a "master set"?

What would you end a master set at with a high degree of satisfaction?

Almost impossible to qualify and certainly impossible to complete a modern set these days with supper short prints, cards #'s to 1/5 or 1/1, and all of the cards that might potentially be rare because they are signed.

Since this is a vintage Forum I'll speak for a set I'm currently working on.
1919-21 W514 Baseball Strip card set is widely recognized to have 120 cards. There are 4 variations in this set, (team changes) which brings the Master Set total to 124. Fairly confident that no other variations to this set will be unearthed with 100+ years having gone by.

Someone once said here that every thread needs a pic.
RayB

Leads to the age old question of what is a "variation"? Intentional print variation? Mistakes?

For most modern set collectors, parallels of the base set are not usually considered part of the master set.

Like for Allen & Ginter (not Ginter Chrome or Ginter X - two other sets that reprint ginter on chrome stock or where the cards are black), a 2025 collector would likely call this a Master Set:
Base set 1-350
EXT Mini set 351-400 (usually - some years they get these wrong)
All base Mini framed autos & regular sized autos (usually, these have different people on them)
All base mini framed memorabilia cards
All base insert/subset/mini subset cards, even boxtoppers
All Rip Cards, and now oversized Triple Rip cards - these are what the EXT Mini set come out of, as well as numbered autos (Parallel, so doesn't count), sketches (1/1 so don't count, not checklisted), stained glass minis (Parallel, so doesn't count), and micro mini parallels (don't count).

At least, that's what I would consider a Master Set of Ginter.

It's absolutely impossible with any set that includes Jersey cards. For example I classify each of these Ryan Miller cards as a different card:

https://hosting.photobucket.com/85c5...b6fdd193f7.png

That's why I have a whole sheet of my 2003-04 Pacific Titanium binder devoted to those Ryan Miller cards.

:)