During the printing of Tecmo Bowl Edition, a mistake was made at the factory that may have impacted the final print run of the Retail Exclusive Helmet Icon Battlefoils for some or all of the six Highlighted Heroes in Hex weapon.
Our goal was for the Highlighted Heroes on the Helmet Icon Battlefoil to be Secret 1/1s in the Hex weapon variant (Featured Heroes do not appear on Helmet Icons). Unfortunately, that guidance was not followed, and the Helmet Icon Battlefoils for the six Highlighted Heroes in Tecmo Bowl Edition can no longer be considered true 1/1s.
We'll explain what happened, how it happened, and the steps we're taking to preserve the excitement of pulling one of these Double Mega exclusive hits.
But first, a little background.
At BoBA, we believe in a "Be Fearless" ethos and taking risks to make better products. That's why Secret 1/1s exist. They create depth for collectors to discover and have consistently made the product more enjoyable since Alpha Edition.
While we want Secret 1/1s to add depth, we also want them to be easy to understand once you've learned the system. The formula is intentionally simple. If you find a Featured Hero in Hex weapon, it's either serial numbered or it's a Secret 1/1. Historically, we've extended that same approach to Highlighted Heroes, which receive the same inserts and parallels as Featured Heroes in Hobby, minus autographs, and they appear on a few Retail Exclusives that Featured Heroes don't get. Base Heroes do not have Secret 1/1s, with the lone exception of the Pink Battlefoil, which is a 1/1 for every Hero.
Depth without unnecessary complexity. Once you learn the system, it's easy to remember.
That simplicity, however, does create meaningful manufacturing challenges. Our Secret 1/1 process is fairly unique, and it led to duplicate 1/1s at our previous print facility. We felt the number of previous control failures justified changing factories, even though it delayed Tecmo Bowl and increased our blended production costs by roughly 40%. Saving money had nothing to do with the decision. We moved because we believed it would produce a better product.
After those earlier issues, we've worked hard to remove duplicate Secret 1/1s from circulation whenever they've surfaced. So far, we've been able to reduce every known duplicate to no more than a single copy in circulation. Unfortunately, we now have another issue with the Helmet Icon Battlefoils in Hex weapon for the six Highlighted Heroes found exclusively in Tecmo Bowl Edition Double Megas. Remember, the Base Hero Helmet Icons in the Hex weapon were never intended to be Secret 1/1s, and Featured Heroes don't appear on this variation.
How did it happen?
Card production happens in stages. The cards are printed before collation and getting packed out. To ensure every Secret 1/1 makes it into packs, backup copies are kept on uncut sheets. If a 1/1 is damaged during pack out, it's destroyed and replaced by cutting a new copy from the backup sheet. These are new controls we mandated due to the mistakes made at the previous factory.
We worked with the new facility to make this process well understood by line staff and audit procedures to help flag any control failures. During Hobby production and the first several days of Double Mega production, our team was on-site and everything appeared to be working exactly as intended.
Unfortunately, somewhere during the later stages of Double Mega pack out, that process broke down.
Some sheets were damaged, leaving the factory short on non-1/1 cards from one specific sheet. A well-meaning factory employee printed additional copies of that sheet without informing us. What they didn't realize was that this sheet also contained six of our Secret 1/1s (the Helmet Icon Hex Battlefoils of the Highlighted Heroes). As a result, duplicates of those six cards entered the product.
The backup sheets held in reserve were never touched. They were fully accounted for and shredded at the end of production exactly as planned. The issue came from the additional production sheets that were printed outside the process we had established.
In hindsight, these cards should never have shared a sheet with non-1/1 cards. We assume the layout was chosen for manufacturing efficiency, but it ultimately created this problem.
That's what happened.
After a thorough review with the factory, we believe the issue is isolated to these six cards. And possibly only impacts the Joe Cool variation.
What do we do now?
First, we'd like to pass along a sincere apology from the factory leadership team. They understand how important this issue is to us and to our community.
They have agreed to fund a $500 buyback bounty for each affected card, and we are matching it with another $500, making the total offer $1,000 per card. This offer will remain open for one year from the date of this post.
Based on historical sales of Helmet Icon Hex Battlefoils (and previous set Icon Hex Battlefoils), we believe this is a fair offer. Of course, we can't force anyone to accept it, so we've also updated the checklist to reflect that these six cards are no longer considered Secret 1/1s.
Our goal is to remove as many of these duplicates from circulation as possible, although we don't know exactly how many additional copies made it into Double Mega packs. (Hobby products were not impacted.)
We are not going to "fire the factory" over this.
Yes, it's a big deal. Yes, it stinks. Yes, we hate it more than we can express with words.
But good manufacturing partners are difficult to find, and despite this mistake, this facility has shown many signs of being the right long-term partner for BoBA.
Every backup 1/1 sheet was accounted for at the end of production. We have no reason to believe this extends beyond these six specific Highlighted Hero Helmet Icon cards, and the factory's print logs indicate this was the only sheet carrying Secret 1/1s that was reprinted.
The reason we can't peg an exact number is because extra sheets have to print as "make ready" so that ink and color can be calibrated. These are immediately destroyed, but we don't know the exact number of how many were then cut and made into pack-ready cards. We do believe it's "single digits" of each card based on the limited number that have surfaced as our DTC orders have landed with collectors and players, but it's impossible to know for sure.
Our Buyback Offer
If you pull one of the affected cards, we'd like to buy it back for $1,000.
Simply email help@bobattlearena.com with a photo of the card. We'll respond with shipping instructions to complete the buyback.
The affected cards are:
- Helmet Icon Hex — Sevenring (HI1)
- Helmet Icon Hex — Joe Cool (HI2)*
- Helmet Icon Hex — Neon (HI3)
- Helmet Icon Hex — Sheriff (HI4)
- Helmet Icon Hex — Sweetest of Sweet (HI5)
- Helmet Icon Hex — Hands (HI6)*
This applies only to the Highlighted versions of Joe Cool and Hands. The Base versions were never intended to be Secret 1/1s.
Thank you for being part of this community and for holding us to a high standard.
Few things bother us more than making the same mistake twice, and unfortunately that's where we find ourselves.
Please don't read this as an attempt to make excuses or pass the buck. The mistake is unacceptable, and we own it. We simply wanted to give you complete transparency into what happened.
We ask for your forgiveness and thank you for the grace that so many of you have consistently shown us. We know not everyone will offer it, but to those who do, we sincerely appreciate it.
In return, we promise to keep giving our best effort to make the best trading card products we can. We won't let the fear of mistakes keep us from pushing the envelope. We will make mistakes—that much is certain—but we'll do everything we can not to make the same one twice.