My Stamp Album: All You Need to Know

But enough about "them". Let's talk about you.

Where is your album? Is it abandoned in a corner of your Neohome? Or are you actually using it - collecting not only stamps, but coins, evil coconuts and seashells too?

If you answered yes to the first question, you are not alone. A lot of people aren't avid stamp collectors (not yet, anyway.) I hope this guide will change their minds... and yours too.

Before you go out and spend thousands (possibly millions) of Neopoints on stamps, you should know what you are getting into. Let me explain.

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Intro to Stamp Collecting:

I could bore you with a long history lesson on "how the stamp came to be," but I think I would lose a lot of readers quickly. So instead I will keep it short, sweet and to the point.

Stamp collecting is a hobby. It can be a lot of fun, but it also takes time to complete. I have been collecting for 52 months now (ever since I started playing Neo) and my collection isn't even close to being finished. Why? Because TNT is always creating more categories (the latest is Altador) and stamps' prices fluctuate often.

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Where Do You Find Stamps:

Place: Post Office Kiosk

If you are good at restocking, definitely try to nab a few rare ones at the Post Office. On the common stamps, the wiz usually has better pricing. Which leads me to my next place...

Place: Shop Wizard

My personal favorite place to find all my stamping needs. The wiz can get you the majority of your collection quickly. Now if only you had 5 million to spare...

Place: Trading Post

The TP is good for buying UBs (unbuyables). These stamps cannot be purchased in shops because their value is much greater than 99, 999 NP. I often use the trading post to gaze at stamps worth 1.5 million, 2 million, 4 million, etc. because my bank account only has 6 digits.

Place: Collectable Sea Shells shop

This store, located in Maraqua, is where you can purchase shells for that page marked "Sea Shells."

Place: Coconut Shy

You can't exactly purchase evil coconuts (as far as I know) but you can win them on Coconut Shy. If you're interested in buying some evil coconuts, I suggest the shop wizard.

Place: Advent Calendar

Sometimes in December, the gifts at the Advent Calendar are stamps. You can get them for free the day of, and afterwards they are usually available through the shop wizard.

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Stamp Rules for Beginners:

No licking required:

Sometimes you need to lick the backs of stamps. Lucky for you, so far all the stamps come with an adhesive back (like a sticker). Another reason not to lick stamps? They have a horrible aftertaste and leave your tongue feeling tingly.

Handle with care:

Stamps are great but they are flimsy. Be careful when handling them. Try not to get your paws, claws, or hands all over them. This could cause damage to the stamp and its design. Also I caution you not to feed stamps to Grarrls or Skeiths. They don't digest quite right...

Do not remove:

It isn't possible (at the moment) to remove stamps from your album. Once they are there, they are there for good. There is no turning back. What's done is done!

If it is ever possible to remove stamps from your album, I advise you not to. They always rip in the corners or curl... then no one will buy them from you!

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Where do I begin?

If you're completely lost on where to begin, let me help! Here are some places you may want to start.

Start by: Choosing a theme

If you absolutely adore Kaus (like jennifer345678) why don't you start by purchasing all the Kau stamps? Or, if you are more on the evil side *grin* then perhaps you would like to buy all evil stamps first! There are a variety of stamps... so there are tons of things to choose from!

Start by: Category

In your stamp album there are categories (I will explain more later). These include categories like Mystery Island, Lost Desert, Snowy Valley and Battle for Meridell. You may want to try filling one page at a time!

Warning: if you already collect avatars too, then you may know that there are stamp avatars too. It may be difficult (unless you are a millionaire) to purchase all 25 stamps for each section.

Start by: one by one

When I say one by one I mean one stamp per page. Then two stamps per page. Then three, four, five, up until 25. I find, however, this isn't the best way of doing things. It becomes hard once you reach about 10 or 11 per page.

Start by: randomness

Rock on, dude, for being random! Sometimes random is good (like in this case.) Just buy what you can afford and fill the pages you want to fill! Who needs order in their life? Like, honestly, man...

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Getting there:

Here are the simplest, clearest directions to get to the post office:

Click shops on your yellow sidebar. This will take you to Neopia Central. See the bright colorful rainbow? Look down and just below the Money Tree. Voila... there it is!

When you click on that, it leads you to the Post Office Kiosk. This is where you can purchase stamps. If you want to get to your album, however, click on the word "here" in:

Click here to see your album!

Another way to get to your album is on your lookup. Just click on the stamp in between your games and wishlist.

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Your Album:

So now you have reached your album. It's about time... isn't it? I think I will begin by explaining what you get when you click "My Album."

Naturally, it brings you to your stamp album! This is where you can view all your lovely stamps, evil coconuts, seashells and coins. It divides as follows:

STAMP PAGES: 15

SEASHELL PAGES: 1

EVIL COCONUT PAGES: 1

COIN PAGES: 2

TOTAL PAGES: 19

As you can see, stamps are the most popular thing in your stamp album (who would have thought?) But there are 4 pages of other neat things to collect too.

Now, if you click on "Overview," it brings you to an overview of your collection. Here all your stamps are displayed in a nice little graph, complete with percentages too (ooo... ahh... ) At the bottom of the page is your grand total. It says I may be eligible for the High Score Table but I'm clearly not... (why did they get my hopes up?!)

Lastly if you click on "High Scores" you can see many other stamp collectors who have much bigger collections than I do. You currently need 299 stamps to be on the high score list. You need well over 350 to possibly earn a trophy for your lookup. *sigh* I don't know if I will ever make top 100.

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Save, Spend, Save, Spend:

Like I mentioned earlier, stamp collecting is fun but expensive. The average Neopian can't afford to buy even a page in one swoop. What I like to do is save up for a while (until I reach 500k) and then treat myself to about 200k worth of stamps. It seems like a lot of money but it only bought me 12 stamps on my last shopping excursion.

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This is the end... there is no more... so when you leave... please shut the door...

Hope you liked it! Happy stamp collecting!