You may have noticed the string of numbers and letters that I’ve put under nearly every item in this archive. You may have wondered what it all means.

It means I have some serious problems. But let’s put that aside for now.

The numbering system I’m using is essentially an expanded version of the one Spin Master seems to be using internally. You can see an example of this from Scott Beatty’s blog:

Spin Master apparently begins with the name of the figure and the sculpt (S) number, followed by the version (V) number that designates the different color/paint decos that sculpt receives. So the second color of the third sculpt of Batman is “Batman (S3) V2”.

I took this a step further. Okay, about half a mile further. Spin Master has the waves outside the figure descriptions, which makes sense for them but I’m looking at the finished product. They also don’t include the missions (and thus the accessory loadouts) that are a major reason I wanted to make this archive.

The end result of all of this is my wacky system. It also begins with the character name; I use just the “basic” name for the files but for clarity the visual guide has the full name given on the package.

Next is the wave number. For standard figures this is pretty obvious, W for wave and then a two-digit number. However there are also distinct waves for deluxe figures, vehicles with figures, vehicles without figures, and (so far) playsets do not have waves but DO come with figures. I ended up with the following:

• W = Wave (standard figures and multi-packs)
• D = Deluxe Figure (figures with “armor”-type small vehicle, the armor also has its own description)
• X = Figure With Vehicle (figures with a vehicle, I also gave the vehicle its own description)
• P = Playset (figure from a playset, the playsets do not have their own descriptions)
• Vehicles that do not come with a figure are not given a description but have a page in the visual guide for completeness.
• There are a handful of special edition figures that appear to exist outside of Spin Master’s descriptions, and to reduce confusion I’ve kept them that way.

Sculpt (S) and Version (V) are the same, sticking as close to Spin Master’s descriptions as I can. I’ve used two-digit numbers as a default simply because I like the consistency of it.

Mission (M) is the accessory loadout. Once again I defaulted to two-digit numbers, and had to fudge them to fit. If a mission wasn’t given (usually store exclusives) I defaulted to 00. When missions were given I put them in order by release, regardless of any given number. This resulted in the following:

So let me break down some examples:

• 

• 

• 

• 

• Batman, Wave 04, Sculpt 03, Version 03, Mission 06 (Rooftop Rivals)
• Nightwing Mega Gear, Deluxe Figure Wave 02, Sculpt 01, Version 01, Mission 00 (no mission)
• Batman ATV, Sculpt 01, Version 01, Mission 00 (no mission)
• Batman, Playset 01, Sculpt 01, Version 10, Mission 00 (no mission)

As an aside, there are some variants reflected in the visual guide that do not get their own description. I had to draw the line somewhere!

The end result of all this over-attention to detail is, ideally, a quick reference in addition to the actual visuals. Ultimately I may be the only person to get this far into the weeds and it’s useful to no one else. There’s only one way too find out!