Argh.. now I really don't know if I want the Kurgos or the Iron Empire for my Sisters of Battle :( Both have their nice parts but I also dislike some details... aaaarrgh!
Buzzsaw wrote: So, maybe I've allowed my annoyance at their hijinks to color my evaluation and I'm not being fair, but... I'm seeing a lot of things that I hadn't noticed before that are just dumb.
Which leads to a common problem with... well, all the models I have looked at so far: none of them are actually in a firing position. That is, for all the "movement" and "dynamics", none of the models shown seem to be able to put their rifles to their shoulders.
..
Why does the pistol look like they took a Mauser and a Luger and simply mashed them together? What is up with the face on the second from the left...?
Mostly good points, and reasonably made, but then - some counterpoints:
1) Rule of Cool. People (including myself) will accept unrealistic or unlikely elements if they look good enough, just like with Space Marines. These do. I also like Space Marines.
2) Same dealio with posing.
3) It probably is a mash-up of a Luger and Mauser. The IE are supposed to be Neo-Prussian, after all. Then again, we accept bolters that look like this that must hold all of 10 ounds, carried by guys who have no pouches for extra ammo on them. We also accept artillery pieces with barrel sizes like this. Guns in 40k (and not-40k) aren't exactly overflowing with originality or realism.
4) The big mouth is clearly an exaggeration for scale. Zoom that pic smaller a bit and you'll see just how small that mouth ends up on the finished model.
There are lots of things to complain about here, but the models turning out more-or-less how we expected Raging Heroes females to turn out rather than like the more realistic but also non-available Vic Minis females that people have been asking for for the last 2 years isn't really one of them.
A good representation of these problems is in the Iron Empire Heavy troopers (1,2);
The armor makes no sense.
It's not Heavy TrooperS, it is SOME Heavy Troopers. There are some wearing the armor and some not. I think all should were it but it is not correct to say all of them make no sense.
I'm not sure what you are talking about, but maybe you misunderstood me. In my post, "The armor makes no sense" is the topic heading, with the list of things under it explaining why it makes no sense. What do you mean by "SOME Heavy Troopers"? The two images I linked to are both of troopers made from the Heavy box, and all share the same complaints.
Certainly I can't seem to find any "heavy" troopers that have the articulated abdominal armor, which is the silliest bit of all. Super-heavy armor on the shoulders, and none covering the vital areas of the torso? Sure, that makes loads of sense!
--The Shoulders. Space marine shoulders are the subject of much derision (appropriately) for being ludicrous and impractical. The shoulders on the Heavy troopers can barely see ludicrous and impractical in the rear view mirror: The degree to which they would restrict the wearer's freedom of movement is simply amazing. By amazing I mean comical.
More than of Space Marines? Such shoulder pieces never made any sense anywhere. Btw. I looked up my existing figures and Forge World figures and honestly there is barely anyone having the gun near the shoulder. Most, if not all have the stock at the biceps. So this is less a problem of the TGGs but of miniatures in general.
After looking at a few things last night I realize that I was a) right about the practicality but b) not realizing that this is endemic. Even DFG's wonderful stormtroopers suffer from the same problem with their shoulder pads and modeling a realistic firing position.
To be fair in one of the threads on DFG, there is an argument between myself and Mark about proper firing position... which may be an indication very few people other then me care about this.
One thing: this actually makes me somewhat complimentary of GW (which I hate to do), but the way they solved this problem has a bit of genius to it: weapons carried by space marines don't have stocks. It kinda blows my mind that someone at GW over the years caught that bit.
Buzzsaw wrote: Which leads to a common problem with... well, all the models I have looked at so far: none of them are actually in a firing position. That is, for all the "movement" and "dynamics", none of the models shown seem to be able to put their rifles to their shoulders. Probably because they can't. Because of the combination of boob plate and impractical shoulders, the closest any model comes to a proper firing stance is a few girls that are bracing the stock of their rifles... against their biceps.
Now, would that necessarily break their arms? Who knows. But it is clearly a silly way to fire a rifle, so silly that it makes one wonder if anyone at RH understands why rifles have a stock.
I do know, and the answer is no. An M-16 has so little recoil that I've literally seen someone fire it with one hand extended like it was a pistol and hit at a range of perhaps a hundred meters on their second try. It's still not a good firing stance, but that doesn't mean it's going to break your arm.
Ehhhh. While entirely true, I'm not sure that's quite fair: the M-16 (and thus AR-15) are notable for their low recoil, so much so that it's a selling point for the AR-15 as a women-friendly gun. But that's a fair cop, I was thinking of more robust calibers.
BobtheInquisitor wrote: Buzzsaw, I'm not sure I understand your complaints. Isn't this Blanchian melange of cheesecake and grimdark exactly what everyone was expecting from a company previously known for its famous "Fantasy Dark Breasts", "Holy Roman Empire Breasts" and "Commissar Sister Breasts" kits? I mean, at least 2/3rds of these models are wearing a full uniform, right?
I do think the sculpt quality and nonbreast proportions are looking phenomenal, even if the outfits, equipment and poses are a little bit silly.
Anyway, I forget where I was going with this.
You make a shatteringly good point.
I go to recreate for the day, and see if the figures grow on me in the interim.
Mostly good points, and reasonably made, but then - some counterpoints:
1) Rule of Cool. People (including myself) will accept unrealistic or unlikely elements if they look good enough, just like with Space Marines. These do. I also like Space Marines.
2) Same dealio with posing.
...
There are lots of things to complain about here, but the models turning out more-or-less how we expected Raging Heroes females to turn out rather than like the more realistic but also non-available Vic Minis females that people have been asking for for the last 2 years isn't really one of them.
You've rather excellently boiled the problem down to its essential element: I loathe Space marines.
Which... well, that turned out rather poorly for me, didn't it?
Buzzsaw wrote: I'm not sure what you are talking about,(...)
Me neither. I looked the pics up again and I am sorry, you're right. From the side it looked like there was the armor but it is not. I agree that Raging Heroes should change that, it looks at least strange but in no way heavy.
Edit: Dammit, I just saw that you can make the pictures even bigger with anothr click. Now it is pretty obvious that they lack armor, indeed.
Buzzsaw wrote: I'm not sure what you are talking about,(...)
Me neither. I looked the pics up again and I am sorry, you're right. From the side it looked like there was the armor but it is not. I agree that Raging Heroes should change that, it looks at least strange but in no way heavy.
Edit: Dammit, I just saw that you can make the pictures even bigger with anothr click. Now it is pretty obvious that they lack armor, indeed.
Crikey, now I see that for the IE girls too... wat? Just plain wat?
Buzzsaw wrote: Which leads to a common problem with... well, all the models I have looked at so far: none of them are actually in a firing position. That is, for all the "movement" and "dynamics", none of the models shown seem to be able to put their rifles to their shoulders. Probably because they can't. Because of the combination of boob plate and impractical shoulders, the closest any model comes to a proper firing stance is a few girls that are bracing the stock of their rifles... against their biceps.
Now, would that necessarily break their arms? Who knows. But it is clearly a silly way to fire a rifle, so silly that it makes one wonder if anyone at RH understands why rifles have a stock.
I do know, and the answer is no. An M-16 has so little recoil that I've literally seen someone fire it with one hand extended like it was a pistol and hit at a range of perhaps a hundred meters on their second try. It's still not a good firing stance, but that doesn't mean it's going to break your arm.
Ehhhh. While entirely true, I'm not sure that's quite fair: the M-16 (and thus AR-15) are notable for their low recoil, so much so that it's a selling point for the AR-15 as a women-friendly gun. But that's a fair cop, I was thinking of more robust calibers.
Now, would that necessarily break their arms? Who knows. But it is clearly a silly way to fire a rifle, so silly that it makes one wonder if anyone at RH understands why rifles have a stock.
Quick question: While I know the actual physics of such a weapon are still debatable, aren't energy weapons (which these are supposed to be, yes?) generally accepted to be recoil-less in most science fiction?
In any event, these look awesome! Even the ones I had no interest in (the Iron Empire, and the Kurganova heavies) look great!
Dr. Von X came out perfect. I don't think I could have asked for more.
Buzzsaw wrote: So, maybe I've allowed my annoyance at their hijinks to color my evaluation and I'm not being fair, but...
I think this is probably very much the case. (Don't get me wrong, I'm hardly giving an objective review myself.)
You make some fair points, Buzz, (especially about the IE heavies and their exposed bellies) but I don't think that any of the aspects of the models that can be seen as 'flaws' are anything we didn't see coming. The 'largemouth' face you point out seems to fit in with the 'screaming sergeant' GW has given us many times over the years, but fortunately almost every box with a head like that (these included, it seems) will give us enough heads that we don't have to use them. I'm not sure how forgiving the posing on the models will be, but I assume they could go together in realistic poses if that's how you wanted them.
1. When it comes to the IE heavy bellies, I agree wholeheartedly that I would like to see the articulated plates extended down to the belts.
2. While the action-movie poses look awesome, there are people who want more realistic poses, and it would be nice if RH could show us if they will be satisfied: when the models are printed, show a few different ways they could be assembled, both in 'heroic' and 'realistic' poses.
Both of those points seem like reasonable, and constructive, criticisms. Other than that, I'm nothing but ecstatic about this. I was seriously worried about how these were going to look, but I'm thrilled.
About the renders, I like most of the models for their artistic qualities, but they feel a little too silly and cheesecakey for me to enjoy them guilt free. Maybe if they were a plastic kit...
Well the original Doctor Von X was in my must have list so no change there, I may have made 'special noises' when I saw she was pouring tea into a proper cup being British and all.
Troops look good but the original plan was to avoid them entirely and go for all heroines from the KS, after all I've got to somehow integrate them into a traitor guard army. I could see that sort of working with iron empire or maybe the odd jailbird.
I dislike how they changed the look of the Jetgirls... their "jumpsets" are just way too round and overall they don't fit into the asthetics of any of the three armies :(
I wasn't bothered by the lack of updates on this. I will say though that I'm pleased with what we're seeing. I was originally planning to get the Iron Empire Heavy Infantry Command set, but it looks like they're not in the first wave. Guess I'll just get the regular HI. However, I'm liking the basic Iron Empire infantry way more than I thought I would.
Automatically Appended Next Post: So we'll get the pledge manager in about a month and a half, then a month of production (easily) and we're in 2014. Ah well.
After looking at a few things last night I realize that I was a) right about the practicality but b) not realizing that this is endemic. Even DFG's wonderful stormtroopers suffer from the same problem with their shoulder pads and modeling a realistic firing position.
To be fair in one of the threads on DFG, there is an argument between myself and Mark about proper firing position... which may be an indication very few people other then me care about this.
One thing: this actually makes me somewhat complimentary of GW (which I hate to do), but the way they solved this problem has a bit of genius to it: weapons carried by space marines don't have stocks. It kinda blows my mind that someone at GW over the years caught that bit.
Well, Space Marine weapons have never had stocks, with the exception of a couple (like, literally a couple) of the very early sculpts. We're talking the pre-RT Naismith ones here. Since then, from RTB01 onwards, they haven't had them. It was more of a design choice though - and entirely to do with those chaos warrior shoulders that they have. (Marines were based on the Chaos Warrior "shape")
Just look at that Bolter arm:
Having said that, I can only think of a few GW figures that have fired from the shoulder. Pretty much all from the mid-90's era mixed into the metal IG regiment models for Cadians/Catachans/Mordians/etc and Necromunda figures. Even with those ranges, most fired from the hip, and as you suggest, they're just as rare elsewhere.
P
On the other hand, it seems that proper firing positions are par for the course in Historical 28mm figures, as my Eureka and Empress Moderns, and my Warlord, Perry, WGF and Renegade figures manage to use this most complex of poses...
Automatically Appended Next Post:
You've rather excellently boiled the problem down to its essential element: I loathe Space marines.
Which... well, that turned out rather poorly for me, didn't it?
Anything with shoulder pads in the heroic-scaled 28mm sci-fantasy genre is probably going to share the same issue, one way or another. Just look at Cadian infantry...
Automatically Appended Next Post: So we'll get the pledge manager in about a month and a half, then a month of production (easily) and we're in 2014. Ah well.
You're forgetting that this update of images took an extra month from when it was first promised and that this is not the entirety of Wave 1. They've also said something akin to showing off all of the sculpts before putting the pledge manager out, so people can make informed choices. There will be no figures for anyone, or even a pledge manager in 2013.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Compel wrote: I believe most of the 2nd edition bolters (not from the boxed game) for marines had stocks on them, but yeah, they never had any firing from it.
Point. They had those little wire ones on them, that you had to clip off if you wanted to actually assemble a figure holding a bolter. Only a couple of the more "heroic pose" metals from that period even had them.
The renders all look very nice. However I do worry that while the poses look nice as one-offs, that scaled up to a hundred-strong they will look less impressive. #firstworldproblem to be sure though, and I look forward to these hitting retail at some point in the future.
Krinsath wrote: The renders all look very nice. However I do worry that while the poses look nice as one-offs, that scaled up to a hundred-strong they will look less impressive. #firstworldproblem to be sure though, and I look forward to these hitting retail at some point in the future.
I would say that holds true for anything if there's a hundred of them - you lose out on the uniqueness of each miniature at that point, and they really become a horde. GW's new Witch Elves would be a prime example of this problem as well - the poses look nice on the box art and images they show off, except the miniatures themselves aren't true multi-pose, and there's really only 5 poses you can make with the box set. We've only seen 5-7 examples of each design for the Troopers boxes, and there's still the Command boxes and Heavy Weapos support boxes, many of which will have extra posed legs and other options. I'm not too concerned just yet.
It's worth noting, that with just the troops here, all of them are based on various leg, arm, head and weapons swaps. So you'd have to be pretty exacting to get the same thing twice, especially with the extra bits in the command box.
...I would like more beret heads though. I wonder if they'll do bits?
I would say that holds true for anything if there's a hundred of them - you lose out on the uniqueness of each miniature at that point, and they really become a horde. GW's new Witch Elves would be a prime example of this problem as well - the poses look nice on the box art and images they show off, except the miniatures themselves aren't true multi-pose, and there's really only 5 poses you can make with the box set. We've only seen 5-7 examples of each design for the Troopers boxes, and there's still the Command boxes and Heavy Weapos support boxes, many of which will have extra posed legs and other options. I'm not too concerned just yet.
~iPaint
I agree that anything at that scale is going to look broadly similar, it just seems like more of a waste here than say, GW Cadians. Maybe the variety of bits will make it similar to DFG's stormtroopers+accessories where you really have to try to make them the same. The new Witch Elves were what sprang to mind though; neat poses that even on the box art become repetitive even with subtly different bits on them.
Not a huge issue in the grand scheme, as I'd probably only get a couple squads for Inquisitorial Stormtroopers and not a full IG force.
...I would like more beret heads though. I wonder if they'll do bits?
Statuesque minis produce some cute heads with berets. I'm guessing they will scale pretty well. I have quite a few Statuesque minis and bits and for some reason never thought about combining them with the Raging Heroes stuff, so thanks for bringing up the question
I use a lot of SM's stuff for my Infinity army. The Resistance girls make great Metros. Good thinking Mathias. Even if it involves shipping from Britain. T_T
All of my Metros are Statuesque except for my Metro HMG. Rosa didn't exist yet.
If I built the Resistance squad I want (8 fighters, all special characters and officers, two head swap sprues, two weapons swap sprues) it would cost me over $120 (roughly) shipped at around $6.80 a figure. (16 total figures) which is why I haven't done that yet... much as I love the minis, they wouldn't be for a game, they'd just be fun.
I've given Andrew a fair amount of change already, he even air shipped me a part that was missing for one of my girls (One of the snipers from the S.O.E) at cost.
All Statuesque aside... can we also expect a 2 months wait between this update and the command boxes reveal? That would mean around April 2014 for Wave 1 minis, at an absolute minimum.
Having had a chance to digest the images, it's constructive criticism time. I'll be blunt since I know we're not all native English speakers, so don't hesitate to ask for elaboration.
First general points, and probably most important from a consumer point of view: shots of what the models will actually look like before assembly. "On-sprue" pictures is what I would be talking about if these were being made in injection molded plastic, but as these are renders, pictures of the parts that one will actually be receiving.
Related to that is the issue of stances: while it's nice that you have mixed things up with a number of action poses, the pictures shown seem to indicate precious few practical shooting poses. Almost everyone seems to be in mid-sprint or striking an "I'm awesome" pose, with only a very few that, if one squints a bit, are in the standing braced pose of an actual shooter.
Second, directed to individual kits/models;
-The Iron Empire Heavy troopers have some serious problems: first, they are actually LESS armored then regular troopers. That is, while regular Iron Empire troopers have an articulated piece of armor that covers their abdomen, "Heavy" IE troopers have only an armored breastplate, pauldrons (shoulder armor) and, most bizarre of all, a segmented armor codpiece.
Which leads to the second issue: the pauldrons on the IE Heavy troopers are almost comical. They are SO bulky and unwieldy, yet they don't manage to cover and protect as much as the counterpart on the Kurg heavy troopers (which are no example of good ergonomics). Combined with the lack of armor over the vital organs of the abdomen, the overall impact of the IE Heavies is of a strange caricature of fascist pomp.
To that point, the overall effect especially from the pauldrons is of the 1995 Judge Dredd movie starring Sly Stallone.
Spoiler:
versus
A final point on this is that even if parody is the point, the pauldrons are almost shockingly under-detailed. The Kurg Heavy troopers may have their faults, but their shoulder armor at least features detailing. They have articulation or laminated plates, the look of something that might be wearable at least. The IE Heavy shoulders just look like squared-off blobs on either side of the breastplate.
-The Iron Empire Regular troopers: While a good deal less confused then the their Heavy version, there are some odd things going on here as well. First, are the shoulders on these models meant to be epaulettes (ornamental boards attached to the coat) or armored extensions of their breastplate that are poking through their long coats? The former would make much more sense on a uniform, the latter though would seem to be how you solved the issue of hiding the arm-body join on the model. Again, without seeing the figures in a not-yet assembled state this is only conjecture (another reason why we need to see these).
A second issue is there seems to be some clipping between the breastplate and the coat lapels. The lapels of their jackets do not flow around and over their breastplate as a coat worn over body armor would, rather the edge of the coat simply disappears into the the sides of model's breast cups.
-Kurganovas Heavy troopers: The Kurg heavy troops fare a good deal better then their IE counterparts. They managed to not forget their abdominal armor when they picked up their shoulder armor, which is a more sensible looking spaulder the the massive and unwieldy pauldrons that the IE are using. That said it does seem rather off that their shoulder armor continues so far beyond their shoulders. The shown images give the impression of how limiting these are in terms of possibility, since they basically foreclose lifting the arm to the side or any higher laterally.
That's probably a good place to stop: there are other comments to make (Doctor Von X in particular I feel needs some polishing, especially her ridiculous gogo boots) but for the most part, this is a pretty good effort for a first look. Really the only things that are in dire need of a second pass are the Iron Empire Heavy Troopers; the combination of no torso armor and absurd, under-detailed shoulders is a real miss.
Otherwise, I'm actually growing cautiously optimistic about things!
Buzzsaw wrote: Combined with the lack of armor over the vital organs of the abdomen, the overall impact of the IE Heavies is of a strange caricature of fascist pomp.
Buzzsaw wrote: Combined with the lack of armor over the vital organs of the abdomen, the overall impact of the IE Heavies is of a strange caricature of fascist pomp.
I think "fascist pomp" is the intended aesthetic.
The problem lies in the caricature element: in Judge Dredd it works (to the extent that it does) because he's a policeman (sorta). The IE heavies are... well, heavy infantry.
Of course there is also the problem that the concept art doesn't really read as parody, but of a fantasy minimalist version of Prussian aesthetics... which I liked. If I wanted Judge Dredd, well, I would have bought Judge Dredd.
All of that is of course irrelevant to the other major problem: whether meant to be caricature or not, the pauldrons are shockingly under-detailed. They are practically boxes used for shoulderpads.
EDIT: Also, just as a thing to mention, what is this project? I certainly didn't feel during the campaign that the IE was meant to be a parody, but a design aesthetic to differentiate the otherwhise somewhat similar Kurganovas from the other heavily armored troopers.
Is the Egyptian theme also a parody? Are we going to find the creepy zombies have been reinterpreted into Ork-style shenanigans?
Is the creepy zombie pregnant woman a joke on a movie I didn't see? A French thing, perhaps?
See, my problem is if seemingly silly design decisions are to be explained as a joke, that needs to be... a bit more prominent. There doesn't appear to be anything indicating that 2/4 infantry boxes are meant to not make sense...
EDIT2: Not to be totally humorless about it, but seriously now, check out how the pauldrons have ballooned from... well, not being pauldrons but slight overhangs of armor into... well, that. They go from part of the breastplate armor to the dominant element of the figure.
I was thinking they were maybe trying to invoke the 'Brotherhood of Steel' from Fallout, as I had seen that kind of style before someplace. But they look completely different. - Maybe something a bit like the Enclave armour?
I think you're being a little overly critical of something that seems to rely very heavily on "rule of cool." Most of the aesthetics in this line don't make a whole lot of sense from a practicality standpoint. Look at the mechs and motorcycles for that. I think in terms of just looking kind of neat, they did exactly what they set out to do.
Now, with regards to the unarmored abdomens on the heavy troops, I'm just going to assume the heavy infantry is made up of their zombie/mummy class of citizens and they'll just shrug off whatever damage they get anyway.
Barzam wrote: I think you're being a little overly critical of something that seems to rely very heavily on "rule of cool." Most of the aesthetics in this line don't make a whole lot of sense from a practicality standpoint. Look at the mechs and motorcycles for that. I think in terms of just looking kind of neat, they did exactly what they set out to do.
If you need to cite the rule of cool, it does not apply. It certainly doesn't apply to the motorcycles - which are overpriced, nonsensical crap only because they abandon any semblance of reality.
Now, with regards to the unarmored abdomens on the heavy troops, I'm just going to assume the heavy infantry is made up of their zombie/mummy class of citizens and they'll just shrug off whatever damage they get anyway.
Hey! Now THAT is a cool potential piece of fluff. Heavy troopers aren't even alive any more, the heavy armor on the joints is to keep them upright and mobile.
Now, with regards to the unarmored abdomens on the heavy troops, I'm just going to assume the heavy infantry is made up of their zombie/mummy class of citizens and they'll just shrug off whatever damage they get anyway.
Hey! Now THAT is a cool potential piece of fluff. Heavy troopers aren't even alive any more, the heavy armor on the joints is to keep them upright and mobile.
It would be (well, not really, it would be head slapping stupid, but we're grasping at French straws here), but it's instantly undermined by the non-helmeted heads for the Heavy Troopers which are... the same kind of attractive female faces they have for everything.
Not to pile on, but an in-universe explanation is not all that useful given, and let's be brutally honest here, the number of people that will be playing these in RH's eventual game will be a tiny fraction of the people using them in other games.
Having had a chance to digest the images, it's constructive criticism time. I'll be blunt since I know we're not all native English speakers, so don't hesitate to ask for elaboration.
First general points, and probably most important from a consumer point of view: shots of what the models will actually look like before assembly. "On-sprue" pictures is what I would be talking about if these were being made in injection molded plastic, but as these are renders, pictures of the parts that one will actually be receiving.
Related to that is the issue of stances: while it's nice that you have mixed things up with a number of action poses, the pictures shown seem to indicate precious few practical shooting poses. Almost everyone seems to be in mid-sprint or striking an "I'm awesome" pose, with only a very few that, if one squints a bit, are in the standing braced pose of an actual shooter.
Second, directed to individual kits/models;
-The Iron Empire Heavy troopers have some serious problems: first, they are actually LESS armored then regular troopers. That is, while regular Iron Empire troopers have an articulated piece of armor that covers their abdomen, "Heavy" IE troopers have only an armored breastplate, pauldrons (shoulder armor) and, most bizarre of all, a segmented armor codpiece.
Which leads to the second issue: the pauldrons on the IE Heavy troopers are almost comical. They are SO bulky and unwieldy, yet they don't manage to cover and protect as much as the counterpart on the Kurg heavy troopers (which are no example of good ergonomics). Combined with the lack of armor over the vital organs of the abdomen, the overall impact of the IE Heavies is of a strange caricature of fascist pomp.
To that point, the overall effect especially from the pauldrons is of the 1995 Judge Dredd movie starring Sly Stallone.
versus A final point on this is that even if parody is the point, the pauldrons are almost shockingly under-detailed. The Kurg Heavy troopers may have their faults, but their shoulder armor at least features detailing. They have articulation or laminated plates, the look of something that might be wearable at least. The IE Heavy shoulders just look like squared-off blobs on either side of the breastplate.
-The Iron Empire Regular troopers: While a good deal less confused then the their Heavy version, there are some odd things going on here as well. First, are the shoulders on these models meant to be epaulettes (ornamental boards attached to the coat) or armored extensions of their breastplate that are poking through their long coats? The former would make much more sense on a uniform, the latter though would seem to be how you solved the issue of hiding the arm-body join on the model. Again, without seeing the figures in a not-yet assembled state this is only conjecture (another reason why we need to see these).
A second issue is there seems to be some clipping between the breastplate and the coat lapels. The lapels of their jackets do not flow around and over their breastplate as a coat worn over body armor would, rather the edge of the coat simply disappears into the the sides of model's breast cups.
-Kurganovas Heavy troopers: The Kurg heavy troops fare a good deal better then their IE counterparts. They managed to not forget their abdominal armor when they picked up their shoulder armor, which is a more sensible looking spaulder the the massive and unwieldy pauldrons that the IE are using. That said it does seem rather off that their shoulder armor continues so far beyond their shoulders. The shown images give the impression of how limiting these are in terms of possibility, since they basically foreclose lifting the arm to the side or any higher laterally.
That's probably a good place to stop: there are other comments to make (Doctor Von X in particular I feel needs some polishing, especially her ridiculous gogo boots) but for the most part, this is a pretty good effort for a first look. Really the only things that are in dire need of a second pass are the Iron Empire Heavy Troopers; the combination of no torso armor and absurd, under-detailed shoulders is a real miss.
Otherwise, I'm actually growing cautiously optimistic about things!
You make some really good points. I'll second a desire for pre-assembly pics. I can also get behind changes to the IE heavies. Can't back you on Dr. Von X's boots though. The high heels are, I think, vital to the delicate aesthetic of the model, and while I might like them a little slimmer, I think they're going to be snap-prone enough as it is. I certainly wouldn't want them any shorter!
Still, constructive criticism indeed. I hope we see some kind of response to the feedback.
Quick question in regards to that: I know that plastic and resin are both pretty snappable. Is restic better or worse in that regard?
Barzam wrote: I think you're being a little overly critical of something that seems to rely very heavily on "rule of cool." Most of the aesthetics in this line don't make a whole lot of sense from a practicality standpoint. Look at the mechs and motorcycles for that. I think in terms of just looking kind of neat, they did exactly what they set out to do.
If you need to cite the rule of cool, it does not apply. It certainly doesn't apply to the motorcycles - which are overpriced, nonsensical crap only because they abandon any semblance of reality.
Oish, I had forgotten about the horrendous motorcycles... that will be a fun update.
The other problem with saying "Rule of Cool, YOLO", is... there really isn't much in the concept art to signal that the IE is anything but a deeply grim faction. The concept art doesn't read as "goof on Prussian militaria", it reads as Prussians in space. Which is what I wanted.
Mathieu Raymond wrote: Can I please get a faction that has thigh armour on its heavy troopers? Please?
You know, that points out another problem with the IE Heavies: in the concept art there appear to be armored plates hanging down over their thighs, in addition to the obvious swish of... uh, what is that supposed to be on the heavies? It's clearly cloth, and bears a remarkable resemblance to the tails of the longcoats on the regular troops, but it doesn't seem to correspond to anything. Is it a reverse loincloth?
Mathieu Raymond wrote: Can I please get a faction that has thigh armour on its heavy troopers? Please?
No.... exposed thighs are critical to the success of all cheesecake property. Essential even. And lets be honest...we are here for cheesecake.....to some extent
Haha. Honestly, though, this is what's keeping me away from the heavy troops - not enough armor where there should be, and too much where there shouldn't. The regular KST and Jailbird troops even have a bit too much going on below the knee, but I'm not too concerned about that really.
From the concept art, I was sure I needed to go for heavy infantry. Now though... I guess I'll just go regular. And as much as I'm not a big fan of the pickelhaub (spiked helmet?), I'm not super impressed by the KST heads.
Mathieu Raymond wrote: From the concept art, I was sure I needed to go for heavy infantry. Now though... I guess I'll just go regular. And as much as I'm not a big fan of the pickelhaub (spiked helmet?), I'm not super impressed by the KST heads.
And I was originally going to go KST until I saw the first round of helmet renders in one of the updates, then decided to go IE. Then I saw these latest renders, and (providing the side breast armor and coat lapel issue isn't resolved) have switched back to the KST. I still may do 1 box of IE, though.
I did a quick photoshop on the lapels to see how it'd look.
I am, and I already passed the link on to other heralds and sent it to team (no I haven't heard back) but the originator of an idea is ALWAYS going to explain it much better then someone with only second hand knowledge of the idea and it's desired outcome.
Mathieu Raymond wrote: From the concept art, I was sure I needed to go for heavy infantry. Now though... I guess I'll just go regular. And as much as I'm not a big fan of the pickelhaub (spiked helmet?), I'm not super impressed by the KST heads.
And I was originally going to go KST until I saw the first round of helmet renders in one of the updates, then decided to go IE. Then I saw these latest renders, and (providing the side breast armor and coat lapel issue isn't resolved) have switched back to the KST. I still may do 1 box of IE, though.
I did a quick photoshop on the lapels to see how it'd look.
It really makes the breast cup armor pop less, and look less pronounced in turn. Much more realistic, as well.
~iPaint
That's really a fantastic job iPaint!
One of the reasons I have mentioned the lapels on the IE Troopers is that the way they currently look is so... digital. They remind me of in World of Warcraft, where armor and gear just disappears into other things. Your version is only a tiny change, but it really gives a solid, heavy feeling to their garments.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
RoninXiC wrote: They have been extremely silent for the last few days... two pretty much irrelevant comments and then.. silence.
KalashnikovMarine wrote: I am, and I already passed the link on to other heralds and sent it to team (no I haven't heard back) but the originator of an idea is ALWAYS going to explain it much better then someone with only second hand knowledge of the idea and it's desired outcome.
Really all they'd need to do is reverse how the lapels and armor interact with one another: currently, the armor is overlapping the cloth, when in reality the cloth would fold and lay on top of the armor. It doesn't make much sense the way it currently is...all of the troopers would essentially be tucking their coats underneath their chest armor, which seems silly. Hopefully they can make that change.
KalashnikovMarine wrote: I am, and I already passed the link on to other heralds and sent it to team (no I haven't heard back) but the originator of an idea is ALWAYS going to explain it much better then someone with only second hand knowledge of the idea and it's desired outcome.
Really all they'd need to do is reverse how the lapels and armor interact with one another: currently, the armor is overlapping the cloth, when in reality the cloth would fold and lay on top of the armor. It doesn't make much sense the way it currently is...all of the troopers would essentially be tucking their coats underneath their chest armor, which seems silly. Hopefully they can make that change.
~iPaint
It makes for a bigger "crack." As we say in French.
shingouki wrote: I think those iron empire girls would make great sisters of battle,mmm my aching wallet.
Indeed.. and they actually would finally look like they deserve a 3+ instead of the 5+ they look like now (If a deathworld cotton t-shirt is 6+, I assume head to toe leather should be worth 5+). Some of the jailbirds or even kurganova troopers would make for good female Warzone Free Marines as well. I do like the armor asymmetry on the female Kurg heavy trooper (special character?).
warboss wrote: Indeed.. and they actually would finally look like they deserve a 3+ instead of the 5+ they look like now (If a deathworld cotton t-shirt is 6+, I assume head to toe leather should be worth 5+).
Sisters are in head to toe power armor. How is that not a 3+? The 'leather' is stylistic and either over the power armor or metal made to look like corset, etc so on.
On topic though, I am really unsure about these. They do look cool but there's a lot of little things... Hmm.
warboss wrote: Indeed.. and they actually would finally look like they deserve a 3+ instead of the 5+ they look like now (If a deathworld cotton t-shirt is 6+, I assume head to toe leather should be worth 5+).
Sisters are in head to toe power armor. How is that not a 3+? The 'leather' is stylistic and either over the power armor or metal made to look like corset, etc so on.
On topic though, I am really unsure about these. They do look cool but there's a lot of little things... Hmm.
They look like they're all in skin tight leather fetish outfits and the only "power" that armor looks like it has would be over a Guardman's libido. Their look has never matched the fluff nor the rules. Those Raging Heroes heavy not-german models though *LOOK* like they're in something worthy of a 3+ save.
warboss wrote: They look like they're all in skin tight leather fetish outfits and the only "power" that armor looks like it has would be over a Guardman's libido.
Umm, okay. These are totally skin tight leather fetish outfits. :rolleyes:
Spoiler:
and these aren't (edited since you want to talk about heavies):
warboss wrote: I was referring to the heavy troopers which I thought was obvious but I guess that doesn't support your picture comparison so you assumed otherwise.
It's the same thing. Big boob plates, big pauldrons, crazy shoes. I don't get how SOB are skin tight leather fetish models when they're wearing the same thing basically. The only real difference is that iron empire have baggy pants instead of plate legs.
edit: I just grabbed the iron empire pic from this page. But just for you, I reupdated my post with the heavies.
Torso looks more heavily armored. But legs and arms are far more exposed. They look like they are in carapace, not power armor. They have shin guards and fore arm braces. Not fully articulated armor.
I am glad GW artist remembers the corset are cast metal
Spoiler:
or maybe not.
Can we please not pretend sisters are not a bunch of sexual fetishes slapped together?
From the "corset" power armour with boobcaps, the hair, the leather boots shaped power armour boots and the "tango cut" tabard.
They are quite well designed for what they are actually and would be a fantastic cheasecake/ teaser design in the hands of a more daring/ capable manufacturer, but criticizing RH "oversexualised design" with them as an example is a pot calling a kettle twice.
Buzzsaw wrote: Sooo... yeah. The really seem to have gone into hibernation it seems. Nothing on Facebook since 10/12, Nothing in comments on KS since 10/11.
Certainly they are under no obligation to my specific criticisms, but as near as I can find they haven't responded in any form to anyone's critique.
Par for the course, isn't it? They showed their level of willingness to interact with feedback during that singular troop render on the KS. The only appropriate reaction from the backer community (as they see it) should be awed silence, followed by endless praise.
RoninXiC wrote: But they waited with the update so they can immediately reply to comments!!!!!11111 :(
Yes. That's exactly what they said in one of their comments:
Loud'n Raging 6 days ago
5:31 AM - just about all the details have been sorted out, but there's at least another hour or two of work, and then, we'd post the Update but we wouldn't be available to answer questions, which I think is a bad idea. So, sending everyone home from some Zzzz's. More in a few hours...
As far as I can tell, they have not said anything for 5 full days... Zero on facebook, in the post or in the comments. And the last thing they said was "Sorry, we messed up the description of one of the pictures."
Again: Dissapointed not by their images, I think they rock, but by their freaking lack of communication.
FIVE DAYS?! What are they thinking? This could've been THE perfect oportunity to show all of us nagging naggers that they are absolutely capable of handling such a project..
RoninXiC wrote: Yes. That's exactly what they said in one of their comments:
Loud'n Raging 6 days ago
5:31 AM - just about all the details have been sorted out, but there's at least another hour or two of work, and then, we'd post the Update but we wouldn't be available to answer questions, which I think is a bad idea. So, sending everyone home from some Zzzz's. More in a few hours...
As far as I can tell, they have not said anything for 5 full days... Zero on facebook, in the post or in the comments. And the last thing they said was "Sorry, we messed up the description of one of the pictures."
I meant "did they answer questions?" I guess not, eh?
Clearly it's the only real possibility. I wonder what would happen if they dropped another massive update with the command boxes and a bunch of wave 1 heroines this weekend...
KalashnikovMarine wrote: Clearly it's the only real possibility. I wonder what would happen if they dropped another massive update with the command boxes and a bunch of wave 1 heroines this weekend...
They did respond to a few fawning comments, however. So it's not like they completely ignored us since Le Big Update dropped, just those that didn't worship them.
Surely 80% of the backers are those who've not been weaned on twitter and are happy to wait in the silence until RH give them another delicious update?
shamikebab wrote: Who would have guessed people would still moan when images dropped
What else is there to do? Sure, they posted some pictures. Lovely pictures. Of ~20 of 150 miniatures. With questionable design choices.
We are still waiting for any kind of update on castings, wave shipping, delivery dates etc etc etc. There is a LOT to do and RH ... well... they might think they do enough.. but they don't.
Some companies like to work in silence, I believe. GW isn't known to make a lot of previews of their new models, is it? And I won't talk about these other kickstarters saying it "would come soon" but in the end suffered horrible delays. Gak happens to anyone, nowadays.
We'll see in the very end what we will have. After all, waiting is all we can do at this rate. Complaining is sure good to let out some of that steam from inside, but it's not like this topic is where Raging Heroes come to read our feelings.
There is something I find curious, however; by reading the way how kickstarters work (as well as how successfull ones came to an end), I understood from the very beginning that this is something that would take a lot of time - and that estimated dates were exactly that (which means without garanty they would be respected). So I knew that I would have to be VERY patient before having wonderfull models in my hands (with a very interesting "group price" as well as bonus models, let's not hide our venal face here...). But by reading many comments here and there, I feel like people didn't really understand that...like they were thinking they were in fact buying products from an online store. Which is not the case.
Maybe that's a difference of point of view. I can understand it's frustrating having delays again and again...but maybe because I was expecting them, my reactions aren't as "extreme" as I can read over here.
About the arrogance...well, it's a french company. Sorry, it was a bad joke. ^^
I think you missed the point of most posters. I would say every person discussing things in this thread KNEW that Raging Heroes wasn't going to make their dates and accepted it. Even a the beginning of the campaign no one really believed they'd ship in September/October.
What people did expect though is communication. Probably wrongly based on how the KS went but they still expected it.
It boils down to people being ok with delays as long as the people they gave an interest free loan to communicate openly and often.
Communication is nice but it's not a right, as long as I can see they're working on things and don't just vanish for 6 months then I'm content to just be patient and let them do their thing.
But how can you see that they are working on things if they don't communicate? And when the communication that does come only consists of reasons why they can't show you the things that they've been working on?
Automatically Appended Next Post: Communication may not be a "right", as you put it. But it is polite, it is free. It is, therefore, the very very least that backers should be expecting.
The big update with all the pictures shows me they're working on something
Communication isn't free, it takes time. As we have seen, if it's done badly then it can create more negative PR than no communication. I'd be happy if they just kept quiet and released batches of images/info when they're happy. Saying they will be doing it by a certain time/date then missing that for whatever reason is far worse than just keeping quiet to me.
Well, we waited for that (not as "big" as promised) update for over a month. During which time all the communication was "tomorrow", "tomorrow", "end of the weekend", "next week", "tonight", "tomorrow".
And weren't those renders supposed to have been 100%, 80% complete by the end of the ks anyway? Or was that only the Heroines, of which there are no sign?
And it doesn't take time or money to post something along the lines of;
"This week we struggled a bit to get Natasha's head right, but I think we got it. Over the next couple of days, I'll hopefully finish her off, and Dave's going to start on one of the tank commanders. Speak to you next week, stay frosty."
yes they ran the campaign badly and promised too much, where have I said they didn't?
We're not their friends or their shareholders, it's not required that we get updates like that. I'm looking forward to Destiny by Bungie, I'm not expecting updates saying "Just finished another character model, going to do a weapon tomorrow, see you later" It's information overload.
Frankly, it sounds like some of you just shouldn't be buying things from Kickstarter.
@Sarouan: Seeing how often Belgians are the butt of French jokes, you're allowed a free pass.
Shami is right in saying that communication is not a right, but it makes sense to communicate not only with those who gave you an interest free loan, but also potentially the biggest pool of positive word-of-mouth force you can muster on almost zero budget. You're right also that time = money, so the more time they spend talking to us, the less is spent on "doin' their thang." But seriously, tumblr time could be spent on communication instead. Bam, found some spare time.
And, yes, it bears repeating that if the minis were 80% done, and they spent a year preparing the KS campaign, then the 20% remaining should take roughly 2-3 months. For the whole design effort. Let's be nice and say the devil is in the details, and add 2 months. That 4-5 months to release images of 150 minis (50 of which are multi-pose, so could take a bit longer, I agree) That still means that they could show a completed mini every... 2 days? Even that is padding even more in their favour.
shamikebab wrote: yes they ran the campaign badly and promised too much, where have I said they didn't?
We're not their friends or their shareholders, it's not required that we get updates like that. I'm looking forward to Destiny by Bungie, I'm not expecting updates saying "Just finished another character model, going to do a weapon tomorrow, see you later" It's information overload.
Frankly, it sounds like some of you just shouldn't be buying things from Kickstarter.
You didn't help fund Destiny though, did you? You didn't give Bungie hundreds of dollars in order to allow them to develop it, did you? Have you pre-ordered it? Well done, but Kickstarter is not a pre-order. It is a funding tool. We funded these products. No, communication is not required. But it is the polite, respectful thing to do. And one comment in the KS thread every week is not information overload.
And I'm just fine with using Kickstarter, I've really enjoyed the few campaigns that I've been a part of (including this one). All other ks creators that I've dealt with don't seem to mind communicating with their backers.
You expect politeness from the guy you buy a newspaper from every morning, why not the guys who you gave hundreds of dollars to in good (practically blind) faith?
It is a strange conversation here: on the one hand there are people saying that Raging Heroes is incompetent. That they cannot meet deadlines even when they set the times themselves, that they are petrified of speaking to their backers lest they enrage them, that they are hothouse flowers that will wilt in the cold air of criticism.
And that is the side that is defending them!
It seems as if they have decided to apply the soft bigotry of low expectations to RH, as if expecting them to act in their own interests is some Herculean effort entirely beyond them.
Then, on the other hand, there are people (myself included) who do not subscribe to this theory that RH is innately incompetent, but that they are simply confused and can benefit from some advice. Perhaps we are wrong, and in the end RH will be shown to be a company that must be dealt with in the manner of a severely impaired child: with utmost delicacy and above all a concern for their fragility. Only time will tell.
For now, however, it seems entirely too early to give up on their capacity to learn and grow as a company and in the eyes of their fans. For this is a time that defines a company in the eyes of its fans, and those fans in turn help to define the image of that company in the wider world. One can only imagine that RH should wish to avoid the following exchange;
Customer: Have you heard of these Raging Heroes people?
FLGS: Oh yeah, some people say that they miss deadlines and don't respond to emails/FB posts/comments... and then there are the people that don't like them.
Let's also for a moment remember that RH is planing no less then two more kickstarter campaigns, possibly more if they split their Sci-Fi and fantasy Nuns and Dark Elves. Now is not the time to establish a pattern of casual indifference to their backers.
How you run a campaign and deal with people afterwards can define a company: Mierce Miniatures has gone from the shadow of the Maelstrom Games fiasco to a 100k GBP campaign... and then a 140k GBP campaign! Does anyone think that this is entirely unrelated to their attempts at community relations? Or how about taking a gander at the respective comments sections for TGG and KD:M? About 10k comments... versus about 50k comments.
You might aver that it's down to the difference in timing, or the size of the campaigns... or you might notice that while RH's last interaction was 7 days ago, Poots' was 7 hours ago. That's not some serendipitous trick, where we just happened to catch Poots communicating: scroll through the comments section and you see that Poots is a regular poster in the comments. A consequence of that is the KD:M comments don't feel like the comments section on most campaigns, it feels like a forum for KD. Mind you, this is after the announcement of a multi-month delay.
It's entirely fair to say a company doesn't need to try and foster a relationship with it's backers. Completely true, they don't need to. But the backer also doesn't need to evangelize to their friends about the game. Doesn't need to put up unboxings, painted pictures and testimonials. Doesn't need to work things with their local game stores so people have times to play this new game. Doesn't need to participate on forums to create energy for a product. Doesn't need to register on resources for finding other gamers. Doesn't need, in short, to be a fan.
There is a lot more to running a successful campaign then just acquiring a big stack of currency. It's about building a business, and a big part of that is building good will.
I would like to suggest that if RH had put a line on their KS page along the lines of:
We reserve the right to not tell you anything about what is happening with the project for the entire duration. This includes a complete lack of updates, pictures or any other information on what is happening. This is regardless of delays or other alterations to the promises we make on this Kickstarter page. Raging Heroes' relationship with our backers is fulfilled by us taking your money, and most likely sending you the models we see fit to produce with that money, with no other obligations implied.
I am pretty certain they would have seen a lot less money come their way. Whether or not it is reasonable for backers to expect lots of updates, it is in fact the current culture surrounding Kick Starter.
Not to mention the fact that if they had attempted to raise the capital to fund the project in another way, there would be men with suits popping in to check on their process on a regular basis. Those men would be a lot less pleasant than some forums teasing them about their Tumblr accounts and wanting to give feed back on the miniatures they already bought.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Damnit Buzzsaw... totally stole my thunder, then magnified it ten fold. Well done... :(
Well put guys. I feel like I keep saying it, but in this ks I always expected delays, I never expected big updates with loads of pictures every week, I don't expect to be friends or on first name terms with RH, I don't expect every question/comment/ounce of feedback answered.
The only thing I fully expected from this kickstarter (and any other I've backed for that matter), is a quality final product and, again, politeness, courtesy and a certain level of appreciation and acknowledgement towards its backers.
I expected these things only because it is the decent way to behave. That is before even considering the implications that the lack of them could potentially have on RH's future projects, which Buzz and Wehrkind correctly highlight.
Oh, I don't think Raging Heroes is incompetent, quite the opposite. I just believe they are working at their own pace, because it is how they are doing things until now.
After all, they did things before the kickstarter. It's not like this company comes out from nothing (well...maybe in America, but here in Europa they're quite known for their distinctive models).
It is true that their communication is not at their best...but this isn't an easy thing and I must say many customers nowadays are very agressive (and very impatient). It's somewhat difficult to handle them while trying not to be seen as "the big bad company not caring for their backers". I know this very well from my work.
After all, the trick is not really listening to all the ideas the backers/customers think they are so best for the company (for now, what I read is in fact more like a subjective point of view of "how I want MY models to be" but less caring about "how the style of the company can fit in those so that it can be really distinctive from others on the market"), but giving them the FEELING they are listening to them. ^^
Yeah, that's also communication. That's why I'd rather like a silent but honest one than a talkative but manipulative guy.
Sarouan wrote: It is true that their communication is not at their best...but this isn't an easy thing and I must say many customers nowadays are very agressive (and very impatient). It's somewhat difficult to handle them while trying not to be seen as "the big bad company not caring for their backers". I know this very well from my work.
Nonsense. Communicating well is easy: each time you finish the sculpting on a kit, you post pictures of that kit. The only reason Raging Heroes is having trouble is because they're going out of their way to not communicate, and obfuscating when they could just be giving us the information we've been waiting for.
Sarouan wrote: It is true that their communication is not at their best...but this isn't an easy thing and I must say many customers nowadays are very agressive (and very impatient). It's somewhat difficult to handle them while trying not to be seen as "the big bad company not caring for their backers". I know this very well from my work.
Nonsense. Communicating well is easy: each time you finish the sculpting on a kit, you post pictures of that kit. The only reason Raging Heroes is having trouble is because they're going out of their way to not communicate, and obfuscating when they could just be giving us the information we've been waiting for.
The flip token to that, of course, is that there is always going to be a group of people who are never going to be happy no matter how much the company communicates with them.
Sarouan wrote: Oh, I don't think Raging Heroes is incompetent, quite the opposite. I just believe they are working at their own pace, because it is how they are doing things until now.
I have no issues with them working at their own pace. I don't think anyone wasn't expecting some delays with this KS.
Sarouan wrote: After all, they did things before the kickstarter. It's not like this company comes out from nothing (well...maybe in America, but here in Europa they're quite known for their distinctive models).
Though surely, the fact that they did so much work before the kickstarter means that, even working at their own pace, they can still meet their self imposed deadlines?
Sarouan wrote: It is true that their communication is not at their best...but this isn't an easy thing and I must say many customers nowadays are very agressive (and very impatient). It's somewhat difficult to handle them while trying not to be seen as "the big bad company not caring for their backers". I know this very well from my work.
The problem with this is that saying nothing gives the impression that nothing is actually happening. This makes people impatient / frustrated and that comes out with more ease when it's not face to face communication. If they did put out regular updates then people would have more patience and be willing to wait if (when) there are delays. There's a number of examples of other KS projects posted throughout this thread where this is the case.
Sarouan wrote: After all, the trick is not really listening to all the ideas the backers/customers think they are so best for the company (for now, what I read is in fact more like a subjective point of view of "how I want MY models to be" but less caring about "how the style of the company can fit in those so that it can be really distinctive from others on the market"), but giving them the FEELING they are listening to them. ^^
That's a dangerous path to take though. You have to listen to your customers when they're talking about the product. Sure, a large part of it could be safely ignored, but if there's a vocal group of customers who aren't happy with the way something is being done or the way figure X has been sculpted then its something that does need listening to and at least a response being provided, even if the end result isn't a change from how things are.
Sarouan wrote: Yeah, that's also communication. That's why I'd rather like a silent but honest one than a talkative but manipulative guy.
That may work for you, but I can see most people being annoyed / impatient with this. Having worked in customer service for a number of years, I've seen just how people react to a lack of communication on basic matters. The number of people who complain when they've not had an update on why their £10 a month broadband connection is still broken is surprisingly high. Whilst £10 a month ADSL isn't quite the same as $250+ pledges for a KS project the same basic principal of communication is there. Tell people what's happening on a regular basis and they're happier. Keep them in the dark, treat them like mushrooms, and they get angry and vote with their wallets. Open and honest communication should be something that every company strives for, whether it's a small one man company or a multi-million pound international.
I'd go so far as to say that in cases such as this communication and backer goodwill are even more important. We already know that RH have at least two more KS projects planned, potentially more, along with talk of a board game and tabletop rules. If they're looking to expand TGG / Dark Elves / Nuns into a full fledged game rather than just 'counts as' figures then they should start building a community now rather than having any existing good will eroded by poor communication and thinly veiled insults.
Sarouan wrote: Oh, I don't think Raging Heroes is incompetent, quite the opposite. I just believe they are working at their own pace, because it is how they are doing things until now.
After all, they did things before the kickstarter. It's not like this company comes out from nothing (well...maybe in America, but here in Europa they're quite known for their distinctive models).
It is true that their communication is not at their best...but this isn't an easy thing and I must say many customers nowadays are very agressive (and very impatient). It's somewhat difficult to handle them while trying not to be seen as "the big bad company not caring for their backers". I know this very well from my work.
After all, the trick is not really listening to all the ideas the backers/customers think they are so best for the company (for now, what I read is in fact more like a subjective point of view of "how I want MY models to be" but less caring about "how the style of the company can fit in those so that it can be really distinctive from others on the market"), but giving them the FEELING they are listening to them. ^^
Yeah, that's also communication. That's why I'd rather like a silent but honest one than a talkative but manipulative guy.
Yeah... I'm going to say you're just wrong here. I'll go so far as to say that "the trick is not really listening to all the ideas the backers/customers..." is a recipe for inevitable bankruptcy.
Now, I could put up well reasoned arguments underlying that idea or exploring the paramount importance of marketing in business, but I don't really need to, because they aren't doing what you are claiming they are doing.
Seriously, they aren't playing the Confident Artist, secure in their vision. Adam Poots is doing that. His updates have all the brash confidence of John Holmes walking up to a table of single women and asking if anyone ordered a foot-long. His vision is Grotesque. His vision is Beautiful. Most important, his vision is... his. You don't like his proportions, his monsters, his unsettling mixture of sexuality and violence? Then don't buy it, 'cause that isn't going to change. Yet because of this, because of precisely this confidence, he's not afraid to pull back the curtain and show us the process. But when people say "this doesn't live up to expectations"... he'll look at it honestly and say "we are going to make some adjustments... I personally felt that... it was fine, but I can see why some KD fans have some issues".
Raging Heroes seems more like a Flasher by contrast; they pull open the raincoat to show us the goods and then run. Seriously, it's been a full week since their magnum opus and they have gone full radio silence on Kickstarter, Facebook, email and forums. By the way, let's call attention to something: this thread was started by Raging Heroes! It's not so long ago that they saw fit to post and converse with their customers... until a few days into their campaign, when they left updating their own thread to the moderators to update. Where is their confidence? RH won't even let us see column headings.
Sarouan wrote: It is true that their communication is not at their best...but this isn't an easy thing and I must say many customers nowadays are very agressive (and very impatient). It's somewhat difficult to handle them while trying not to be seen as "the big bad company not caring for their backers". I know this very well from my work.
Nonsense. Communicating well is easy: each time you finish the sculpting on a kit, you post pictures of that kit. The only reason Raging Heroes is having trouble is because they're going out of their way to not communicate, and obfuscating when they could just be giving us the information we've been waiting for.
The flip token to that, of course, is that there is always going to be a group of people who are never going to be happy no matter how much the company communicates with them.
The problem with a hypothetical like that is it doesn't really say anything: might such people exist? Maybe, how about RH tries lots of communication and we see, hmmm? The biggest complaint isn't that they are missing weekly updates, but that they blow their own deadlines. That they say they want to drop their big update when they can respond to questions... and then disappear for a week.
No offense, but how exactly do you know there are "a group of people who are never going to be happy no matter how much the company communicates with them"? Where are those people in the KD:M comments, complaining that Poots posting about every day in the comments just isn't enough?
To say nothing of how convenient it is to imagine you can't satisfy everyone... when you aren't trying.
Now, all of the above sounds a bit harsh, and maybe it is. But let us remember some wise words; “Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfills the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things.”
- Winston Churchill
No one here (as far as I know) is offering criticism that they think is destructive, they are not engaged in an act of sabotage. Everyone here is acting to try and get the best possible product and have the best relationship with a company that they see as having a great deal of promise. When people I like do things I think are self-destructive, I warn them and try to get them back on the right path, even if they don't like what I am saying.
When people I don't like do self-destructive things? I somehow manage to hold my tongue.
Yeah, that's also communication. That's why I'd rather like a silent but honest one than a talkative but manipulative guy.
They're so honest they'll tell you their deadlines for themselves, miss it totally and just pretend nothing happened. And then when you bug them about it, you're an over-entitled twitter brat
No offense, but how exactly do you know there are "a group of people who are never going to be happy no matter how much the company communicates with them"?
Seriously? You had me up until this point.
First, just to clarify, I'm not talking about you, Buzzsaw, nor anyone in specific who is still posting in this thread. (That I'm aware of.) Your points are all rational, well thought out, and with a few exceptions, I agree with what you want and why you think it should be provided. But anyone who has ever worked retail (or hell, customer service in any capacity) knows that there are people who just want to complain, no matter what. I guess the only real problem with my statement is that it's too specific. I should have just said there would always be a group of people who were never going to be happy, period.
Do I think this has been handled perfectly? Hell no. I'd like to see some communication, especially in regards to comments about the previous update. I'd like to see requests get answered, even if it's only telling people 'no,' and giving some kind of reason why they aren't going to make the boobs larger, make the boobs smaller, add spikes, remove spikes, or what have you.
By the same coin, though, I recognize that when communicating with the public, and trying to meet their demands, there is always going to come a point with a product line where you have to say enough is enough, and that people who aren't satisfied are just going to have to be disappointed. Because you cannot please everyone. Especially with a product line. Cannot be done. I'm a little surprised to see you scoff at such a notion, honestly. You seem to have a good head for numbers, and I would assume that there is always going to be a dissatisfied subset of your target client base. Or am I mistaken?
As to why there isn't any complainers in the KD:M kickstarter, I assume you mean Kingdom Death. I don't have any numbers in front of me, but if I had to wager a guess, I would say that anyone who would be in the 'relentlessly insatiable complainer' category for a Kingdom Death KS wouldn't have shown up in the first place, since they are probably a little too self-righteous to deign to put their money behind torture-porn.
As to why there isn't any complainers in the KD:M kickstarter, I assume you mean Kingdom Death. I don't have any numbers in front of me, but if I had to wager a guess, I would say that anyone who would be in the 'relentlessly insatiable complainer' category for a Kingdom Death KS wouldn't have shown up in the first place, since they are probably a little too self-righteous to deign to put their money behind torture-porn.
You couldn't be any more off base here. You really couldn't. The reason there aren't really "relentlessly insatiable complainers" in KD:M is because the updates Poots releases are everything Raging Heroes isn't: they're informative, they show progress through the process, they directly address any raised concerned from the backers, they're not even remotely rude or condescending, etc.....
And quite frankly, your casual dismissal of it as "torture porn" is insulting and ignorant, particularly in light of this KS containing an entire faction if "warriors" with their tits hanging out that employ child soldiers.
cincydooley wrote: The reason there aren't really "relentlessly insatiable complainers" in KD:M is because the updates Poots releases are everything Raging Heroes isn't: they're informative, they show progress through the process, they directly address any raised concerned from the backers, they're not even remotely rude or condescending, etc.....
They're also not announced and then pushed back. That's a rather key difference as well and appears to be a lot of the angst around RH's updates; they say themselves they will do something and when they don't do what they said they would they blame their backers for being impatient... Also, every time I get the notice that KD:M has released an update I know I'm in for a treat, and to date I've not really seen an update that did not make me more excited for the project even if I didn't like every last thing that was shown. I'm not sure even RH's big update was an "ooo! yay!" moment, though that could be because of the "no really, this time we mean it!" dance on actually getting it out the door soured the experience.
I'm very glad I opted to wait for retail on this one. I'm sure the final product will be great and in the long-view that will trump any communications issues but if I had money tied up in it right now I'd be royally peeved.
As to why there isn't any complainers in the KD:M kickstarter, I assume you mean Kingdom Death. I don't have any numbers in front of me, but if I had to wager a guess, I would say that anyone who would be in the 'relentlessly insatiable complainer' category for a Kingdom Death KS wouldn't have shown up in the first place, since they are probably a little too self-righteous to deign to put their money behind torture-porn.
You couldn't be any more off base here. You really couldn't. The reason there aren't really "relentlessly insatiable complainers" in KD:M is because the updates Poots releases are everything Raging Heroes isn't: they're informative, they show progress through the process, they directly address any raised concerned from the backers, they're not even remotely rude or condescending, etc.....
And quite frankly, your casual dismissal of it as "torture porn" is insulting and ignorant, particularly in light of this KS containing an entire faction if "warriors" with their tits hanging out that employ child soldiers.
It was a joke, brother. Sorry if you thought I was maligning the stuff you like. (That's why I put a laughy ork there, instead of just saying it. To indicate that it was a joke, and not a serious assertion. )
And for the record, I never said I thought Kingdom Death was nothing but torture porn. I said that the people who would have been likely to be in the 'relentlessly insatiable complainer' group in a Kingdom Death kickstarter thought that. And I said it in jest. (Again: laughy ork! ) It was me trying to state that the people who would never have been satified with KDM no matter what they did are also the kind of people who wouldn't bother to give KDM a second look.
I never argued that Kingdom Death didn't have better communication. Or even a product with a broader appeal. (Two million dollars claims pretty strongly that they do.) But if anyone is trying to claim that there AREN'T people out there who looked at this Kickstarter, but didn't bid on it because they would never have been happy no matter what KD did, then that's ludicrous.
They're also not announced and then pushed back. That's a rather key difference as well and appears to be a lot of the angst around RH's updates; they say themselves they will do something and when they don't do what they said they would they blame their backers for being impatient... .
Just to add clarity: I'm not trying to assert that Raging Heroes is running things better than Kingdom Death. That would be silly.
No offense, but how exactly do you know there are "a group of people who are never going to be happy no matter how much the company communicates with them"?
Seriously? You had me up until this point.
First, just to clarify, I'm not talking about you, Buzzsaw, nor anyone in specific who is still posting in this thread. (That I'm aware of.) Your points are all rational, well thought out, and with a few exceptions, I agree with what you want and why you think it should be provided. But anyone who has ever worked retail (or hell, customer service in any capacity) knows that there are people who just want to complain, no matter what. I guess the only real problem with my statement is that it's too specific. I should have just said there would always be a group of people who were never going to be happy, period.
Do I think this has been handled perfectly? Hell no. I'd like to see some communication, especially in regards to comments about the previous update. I'd like to see requests get answered, even if it's only telling people 'no,' and giving some kind of reason why they aren't going to make the boobs larger, make the boobs smaller, add spikes, remove spikes, or what have you.
By the same coin, though, I recognize that when communicating with the public, and trying to meet their demands, there is always going to come a point with a product line where you have to say enough is enough, and that people who aren't satisfied are just going to have to be disappointed. Because you cannot please everyone. Especially with a product line. Cannot be done. I'm a little surprised to see you scoff at such a notion, honestly. You seem to have a good head for numbers, and I would assume that there is always going to be a dissatisfied subset of your target client base. Or am I mistaken?
As to why there isn't any complainers in the KD:M kickstarter, I assume you mean Kingdom Death. I don't have any numbers in front of me, but if I had to wager a guess, I would say that anyone who would be in the 'relentlessly insatiable complainer' category for a Kingdom Death KS wouldn't have shown up in the first place, since they are probably a little too self-righteous to deign to put their money behind torture-porn.
Jim, the problem with quoting one sentence and then being shocked by it is that that idea I mention is completely explained by the surrounding sentences. Which, in the interest of repeating, I will now repeat for you;
Buzzsaw wrote: The problem with a hypothetical like that is it doesn't really say anything: might such people exist? Maybe, how about RH tries lots of communication and we see, hmmm? The biggest complaint isn't that they are missing weekly updates, but that they blow their own deadlines. That they say they want to drop their big update when they can respond to questions... and then disappear for a week.
No offense, but how exactly do you know there are "a group of people who are never going to be happy no matter how much the company communicates with them"? Where are those people in the KD:M comments, complaining that Poots posting about every day in the comments just isn't enough?
To say nothing of how convenient it is to imagine you can't satisfy everyone... when you aren't trying.
The simple fact is that you're just making excuses right now Jim. You want to believe that Raging Heroes couldn't satisfy everyone, because "there are people who just want to complain, no matter what".
Ah, but if that is so, where are these people in the KD:M comments I ask? And your answer is... sex weirdos. Okaaaaay...
Oh, it was a "joke"... so the real reason KD:M is immune to your otherwise immutable law is... what?
As to why there isn't any complainers in the KD:M kickstarter, I assume you mean Kingdom Death. I don't have any numbers in front of me, but if I had to wager a guess, I would say that anyone who would be in the 'relentlessly insatiable complainer' category for a Kingdom Death KS wouldn't have shown up in the first place, since they are probably a little too self-righteous to deign to put their money behind torture-porn.
You couldn't be any more off base here. You really couldn't. The reason there aren't really "relentlessly insatiable complainers" in KD:M is because the updates Poots releases are everything Raging Heroes isn't: they're informative, they show progress through the process, they directly address any raised concerned from the backers, they're not even remotely rude or condescending, etc.....
And quite frankly, your casual dismissal of it as "torture porn" is insulting and ignorant, particularly in light of this KS containing an entire faction if "warriors" with their tits hanging out that employ child soldiers.
It was a joke, brother. Sorry if you thought I was maligning the stuff you like. (That's why I put a laughy ork there, instead of just saying it. To indicate that it was a joke, and not a serious assertion. )
And for the record, I never said I thought Kingdom Death was nothing but torture porn. I said that the people who would have been likely to be in the 'relentlessly insatiable complainer' group in a Kingdom Death kickstarter thought that. And I said it in jest. (Again: laughy ork! ) It was me trying to state that the people who would never have been satified with KDM no matter what they did are also the kind of people who wouldn't bother to give KDM a second look.
I never argued that Kingdom Death didn't have better communication. Or even a product with a broader appeal. (Two million dollars claims pretty strongly that they do.) But if anyone is trying to claim that there AREN'T people out there who looked at this Kickstarter, but didn't bid on it because they would never have been happy no matter what KD did, then that's ludicrous.
They're also not announced and then pushed back. That's a rather key difference as well and appears to be a lot of the angst around RH's updates; they say themselves they will do something and when they don't do what they said they would they blame their backers for being impatient... .
Just to add clarity: I'm not trying to assert that Raging Heroes is running things better than Kingdom Death. That would be silly.
So, just to be clear, "there are people who just want to complain, no matter what", these people are everywhere... except in KD:M because "the people who would never have been satified[sic] with KDM no matter what they did are also the kind of people who wouldn't bother to give KDM a second look."
Which, to translate that into something like English, is to say that KD:M is a niche product. But it's also "a product with a broader appeal" then TGG. Which, no offense, is why everything that you've said in the last two posts is just pointless.
Hey, you want to believe that a niche product like KD:M is able to avoid your otherwise immutable law of complainers, that's fine. But you don't seem to be even slightly interested in answering why TGG, which is an even more niche product, which is in every measurable way appealing to fewer people, which made much less money... why is it that TGG is afflicted with this unruly and fractious body of backers. Which, incidentally we should not is purely conjectural on your part: no one is pointing to any specific examples of "oh, it's that guy in the comments again hectoring RH...".
The simple truth is that the difference in attitudes derives not from the associated backers, but from the campaign creators. So if there is but a single sentence from this post that you ought to fixate on, it is the following;
The idea that you cannot please everyone is not an excuse to try to please no one.
I hold up KD:M because it is a sterling and undisputed (not even by Jim!) example of a campaign done right. But it isn't the only example; I could have held up Dreamforge's Isenkern campaign, Mantic's Dreadball or Dreadzone (perhaps not so much their first one...) or MYTH or others. Are any of these campaigns (even KD:M) perfect? No, but each stands head and shoulders above TGG in terms of the relationship between backers and creators.
Yet, if you were to tell us that the entire company had died in a freak bouillabaisse accident 10 days ago... there is nothing out there to contradict that.
Buzzsaw wrote: I'll go so far as to say that "the trick is not really listening to all the ideas the backers/customers..." is a recipe for inevitable bankruptcy.
Dunno. GW has been pretty successful at doing this for over 20 years now.
Buzzsaw wrote: There is a phrase Jim "when you're in a hole, stop digging".
Who's in a hole? We're all friends here, at least to my knowledge.
I apologize for making a joke at the expense of KD:M. Apparently no one took it that way. I didn't HAVE a serious answer as to why no one complains in their Kickstarter comments. Since you are obviously following it closer than I, I was hoping you could provide a reasonable explanation. I only made the torture-porn remark since it seemed like caustic sarcasm is the go-to tone in this thread. (Or at least 80% it ) It wasn't supposed to be serious. I assume you aren't claiming that NO ONE is complaining in the KD:M comments because they're running a paragon-perfect campaign?
The idea that you cannot please everyone is not an excuse to try to please no one.
I agree. Have since the jump. This whole things stems from a point I made just to make conversation. (Here it is, just to clarify.)
Sarouan wrote: It is true that their communication is not at their best...but this isn't an easy thing and I must say many customers nowadays are very agressive (and very impatient). It's somewhat difficult to handle them while trying not to be seen as "the big bad company not caring for their backers". I know this very well from my work.
Nonsense. Communicating well is easy: each time you finish the sculpting on a kit, you post pictures of that kit. The only reason Raging Heroes is having trouble is because they're going out of their way to not communicate, and obfuscating when they could just be giving us the information we've been waiting for.
The flip token to that, of course, is that there is always going to be a group of people who are never going to be happy no matter how much the company communicates with them.
And I maintain that's an accurate statement. I didn't intend for anyone to interpret it to mean that Raging Heroes is doing a good job of communicating. (They aren't.) I didn't intend for anyone to take it to mean that they shouldn't want more communication. (That would be silly.)
But you can't please all the people all the time. All I was trying to say, seriously, all I was trying to say, is that there comes a point where you have to stop trying. (And I was NOT trying to say Raging Heroes is at that point. )
To put the KDM thing back on a reasonable footing, though, why do you think no one is relentlessly complaining about their product in the comments? Obviously there are people who don't want it, right? People who never would have bought it? Or would never have been interested? I've seen several comments (especially earlier in this thread) from people who had no intention of ever purchasing from Raging Heroes, who showed up here just to complain about how horribly sexist the models are. Does KDM not even have THOSE comments?
To put the KDM thing back on a reasonable footing, though, why do you think no one is relentlessly complaining about their product in the comments? Obviously there are people who don't want it, right? People who never would have bought it? Or would never have been interested? I've seen several comments (especially earlier in this thread) from people who had no intention of ever purchasing from Raging Heroes, who showed up here just to complain about how horribly sexist the models are. Does KDM not even have THOSE comments?
Oh KDM has it's non-supporters that show up in its threads, but they wander away when they realize there's not really anything to do. People who support KD have a clear idea of what they're getting and whatever your particular views on the aesthetic, it's hard to argue they're not working to a high standard for their customers. There's proof of this all over provided regularly by the creator. Most of their complaints delve into the realm of personal morality which then has to be deleted as OT and, generally, impolite. Read page 76 or so of the KD:M thread and realize there were many posts excised accusing Adam Poots of racism.
Those people will not be happy, because they hate the idea that KD:M exists. Poots doesn't care, because they aren't his customers. He provides his backers with what they want to see, that they gave him money a year in advance completely on faith that he will be a good steward. His updates are his way of showing the community that he is indeed that good steward, and if he continues through to completion in this manner, his next KS will be ridiculously huge.
RH, on the other hand, have allowed this doubt that they are also looking out for things creep into the community. They've been non-communicative, insular and seem to not appreciate the debt they owe their backers beyond the product. The product is what the money is for, sure, but the lack of interest and other concerns that come with traditional credit are not without value. When that gift is cast aside, it makes people less likely to offer it again. This in turn means everything else you do has to be done that much better just to generate the same goodwill that setting aside a couple hours every week or every other week to send out an update to those people.
That's not to say on the backend that anything is awry. Just that leaving a vacuum where people can invent stories rather than having information seems to be an odd strategy for going back to the same well two or three more times...
To put the KDM thing back on a reasonable footing, though, why do you think no one is relentlessly complaining about their product in the comments? Obviously there are people who don't want it, right? People who never would have bought it? Or would never have been interested? I've seen several comments (especially earlier in this thread) from people who had no intention of ever purchasing from Raging Heroes, who showed up here just to complain about how horribly sexist the models are. Does KDM not even have THOSE comments?
Oh KDM has it's non-supporters that show up in its threads, but they wander away when they realize there's not really anything to do. People who support KD have a clear idea of what they're getting and whatever your particular views on the aesthetic, it's hard to argue they're not working to a high standard for their customers. There's proof of this all over provided regularly by the creator. Most of their complaints delve into the realm of personal morality which then has to be deleted as OT and, generally, impolite. Read page 76 or so of the KD:M thread and realize there were many posts excised accusing Adam Poots of racism.
Those people will not be happy, because they hate the idea that KD:M exists. Poots doesn't care, because they aren't his customers. He provides his backers with what they want to see, that they gave him money a year in advance completely on faith that he will be a good steward. His updates are his way of showing the community that he is indeed that good steward, and if he continues through to completion in this manner, his next KS will be ridiculously huge.
RH, on the other hand, have allowed this doubt that they are also looking out for things creep into the community. They've been non-communicative, insular and seem to not appreciate the debt they owe their backers beyond the product. The product is what the money is for, sure, but the lack of interest and other concerns that come with traditional credit are not without value. When that gift is cast aside, it makes people less likely to offer it again. This in turn means everything else you do has to be done that much better just to generate the same goodwill that setting aside a couple hours every week or every other week to send out an update to those people.
That's not to say on the backend that anything is awry. Just that leaving a vacuum where people can invent stories rather than having information seems to be an odd strategy for going back to the same well two or three more times...
That seems reasonable. I think there is room to quibble over just how much the company "owes" the backers, but that seems like a reasonable assessment.
To put the KDM thing back on a reasonable footing, though, why do you think no one is relentlessly complaining about their product in the comments? Obviously there are people who don't want it, right? People who never would have bought it? Or would never have been interested? I've seen several comments (especially earlier in this thread) from people who had no intention of ever purchasing from Raging Heroes, who showed up here just to complain about how horribly sexist the models are. Does KDM not even have THOSE comments?
Oh KDM has it's non-supporters that show up in its threads, but they wander away when they realize there's not really anything to do. People who support KD have a clear idea of what they're getting and whatever your particular views on the aesthetic, it's hard to argue they're not working to a high standard for their customers. There's proof of this all over provided regularly by the creator. Most of their complaints delve into the realm of personal morality which then has to be deleted as OT and, generally, impolite. Read page 76 or so of the KD:M thread and realize there were many posts excised accusing Adam Poots of racism.
Those people will not be happy, because they hate the idea that KD:M exists. Poots doesn't care, because they aren't his customers. He provides his backers with what they want to see, that they gave him money a year in advance completely on faith that he will be a good steward. His updates are his way of showing the community that he is indeed that good steward, and if he continues through to completion in this manner, his next KS will be ridiculously huge.
RH, on the other hand, have allowed this doubt that they are also looking out for things creep into the community. They've been non-communicative, insular and seem to not appreciate the debt they owe their backers beyond the product. The product is what the money is for, sure, but the lack of interest and other concerns that come with traditional credit are not without value. When that gift is cast aside, it makes people less likely to offer it again. This in turn means everything else you do has to be done that much better just to generate the same goodwill that setting aside a couple hours every week or every other week to send out an update to those people.
That's not to say on the backend that anything is awry. Just that leaving a vacuum where people can invent stories rather than having information seems to be an odd strategy for going back to the same well two or three more times...
First, an excellent statement on what makes some campaigns flourish in the post-pledge period.
Second, was that the great nigredo eruption that you refer to? That really was a special thing.
As for Jim's... let's call them concerns, it seems that there are 4 things on which everyone now seems to agree;
1) That there are campaigns (KD:M is one, DFG is another, MYTH and no doubt others) that don't have any appreciable degree of vocal dissatisfaction among the backers,
2) One of the defining characteristics of those campaigns is the significant conversation and communication between the creators and the backer community,
3) Raging Heroes's TGG campaign can be fairly described as not featuring significant conversation and communication between the creators and the backer community,
4) Raging Heroes has a non-trivial amount of vocal dissatisfaction among the backers.
While I would not say that we can draw conclusions to a scientific degree of accuracy, a general idea may be drawn from the above points. So let's consider that matter foreclosed for the time being.
The real question it seems is... what in the world is RH thinking here? I don't mean that flippantly, but sincerely: they will never have such a chance to turn so many people into long term fans, and with such a small cost!
The benefits of having a good relationship with your backers may be difficult to quantify, but anecdotal they certainly seem hard to dismiss. I know that for my part, the post-pledge actions on the part of companies like KD, DFG, MERCS (the guys behind MYTH) and JunkRobot (I basically pledged their second campaign almost entirely on the strength of their personality) have converted me from a backer to a fan. Granted, a delivery of shockingly bad goods isn't something that would be overlooked... but that's a bit of a given. Each of those have had their ups and downs after the campaigns ended, but the relationship endured.
Contrariwise, the Sedition Wars campaign is a fine example of how the post-pledge period can go wrong. So very, very wrong...
As for Jim's... let's call them concerns, it seems that there are 4 things on which everyone now seems to agree;
1) That there are campaigns (KD:M is one, DFG is another, MYTH and no doubt others) that don't have any appreciable degree of vocal dissatisfaction among the backers,
2) One of the defining characteristics of those campaigns is the significant conversation and communication between the creators and the backer community,
3) Raging Heroes's TGG campaign can be fairly described as not featuring significant conversation and communication between the creators and the backer community,
4) Raging Heroes has a non-trivial amount of vocal dissatisfaction among the backers.
While I would not say that we can draw conclusions to a scientific degree of accuracy, a general idea may be drawn from the above points. So let's consider that matter foreclosed for the time being.
Seems like a reasonable set of conclusions.
The real question it seems is... what in the world is RH thinking here? I don't mean that flippantly, but sincerely: they will never have such a chance to turn so many people into long term fans, and with such a small cost!
The benefits of having a good relationship with your backers may be difficult to quantify, but anecdotal they certainly seem hard to dismiss. I know that for my part, the post-pledge actions on the part of companies like KD, DFG, MERCS (the guys behind MYTH) and JunkRobot (I basically pledged their second campaign almost entirely on the strength of their personality) have converted me from a backer to a fan. Granted, a delivery of shockingly bad goods isn't something that would be overlooked... but that's a bit of a given. Each of those have had their ups and downs after the campaigns ended, but the relationship endured.
Contrariwise, the Sedition Wars campaign is a fine example of how the post-pledge period can go wrong. So very, very wrong...
I too would like some communication. As I've said many times before, this is the first Kickstarter I've seen that showed a product of high enough quality that I was willing to put the asked amount of money down on it. So this entire experience is still my baseline.
Well as of 12 days ago they were still collating names of people who'd pledged for one, either directly or as an addon. Though I'm not sure what's taking so long, given there's only 36 pledges at a level to attend the seminar and anyone who added Connnoisseur on top of another pledge had to contact them first, so RH should already have the details.
They do answer emails it seems, according to the comments section..
"Loud'n Raging says:
Hello Alan,
First, I want to apologise for taking so long to get back to you. We are normally much better at replying to emails quickly.
Regarding your question on the Snipers, it's a tough one to answer. At this point, I'd be inclined to say that they won't be in the First Wave, but things are always in a flux, so this is not set in stone.
You will be able to specify which minis you want with the Pledge Manager, which should be released in a few weeks, once we know what is in the First Wave.
At that time, we may be able to offer some sort of staggered shipping option for a lesser additional fee than the original 20$, but we're still sorting out the details for that to see if it's even feasible...
I'm sorry I can't be more definite about it :(
Regarding what's coming, we'll have a quick in-between update in a few days, and after that, I think we'll be able to show more Heroines.
I want to take this opportunity to thank you very much for supporting our TGG project!
If you have other questions, just let me know!
Best regards,
Mireille
Raging Heroes Team"
This silence is rather.. discomforting. But, if all goes well, pledge manager hopefully soon.
Given the lack of updates anywhere public, that have been reported, and the apparent delays in responding to emails, anyone else think that they've been on holiday for a couple of weeks to recover from the excitement of pushing out the first batch of renders?
There's no statutory holiday in France at the moment. (Unlike the month of August, where it is commonly larked about that France puts the key in doors and leaves town)
KalshnikovMarine: I agree that the command boxes were *supposed* to be part of Wave 1, but things have been ammenable to change in the RH constellation regarding deadlines, so I can also see goalposts moving to finally get something, anything, out the door.
Well that and she's a kinda complex model. Unless wave shipping's fairly reasonably priced. I'll probably just go "Ship When Complete" not like I don't have a metric feth ton of stuff to paint already.
Not according to update #21 from back in June (particularly the last line), but, you know, "fluid" and all that. Makes a good read now though....
"As you are probably aware, while our Kickstarter delivery date is planned for March 2014, the production of the Toughest Girls of the Galaxy is spread over several months.
Therefore, we already know that the minis will be produced in several waves.
While we know that everything will be ready to ship by March 2014 as stated, we have been very reluctant to share details of the “wave” production plans, because those plans are fluid.
Nevertheless, we know that having at least some idea of what's coming up can be quite exciting and can help with planning. So here is what we have in mind.
The first wave is planned to include up to 15 Heroines, as well as all the Regular Troopers (that is, the Troops Boxes and the Command Group Boxes) for all 3 armies. The Kurganova Heavy Troopers should also be part of this wave.
This, however, is not a completely FIRM schedule, since this first wave will also be when we finesse our production tactics and workflow. So there might be some more stuff, or there might be a little less.
Overall, we are aiming for 3 waves, or perhaps 4, by March 2014, but it is too early to commit to exactly how many there will be and what will be in them. Because if we do and things don't happen exactly has stated, then everybody gets understandably frustrated :-(
Sad but true: we have been burned too many times by our enthusiasm and our wish to communicate, and so we are now forced to proceed with caution :(
But again, what we can be FIRM about is that everything will be done by March 2014."
Think of it as a Zen exercise gents. Relax and let the stupid flow over you, meditate and seek a deeper understanding of yourself, the universe and French work habits, until extremely good minis finally appear, along with your own sense of growing enlightenment.
KalashnikovMarine wrote: Think of it as a Zen exercise gents. Relax and let the stupid flow over you, meditate and seek a deeper understanding of yourself, the universe and French work habits, until extremely good minis finally appear, along with your own sense of growing enlightenment.
KalashnikovMarine wrote: Think of it as a Zen exercise gents. Relax and let the stupid flow over you, meditate and seek a deeper understanding of yourself, the universe and French work habits, until extremely good minis finally appear, along with your own sense of growing enlightenment.
I'm Scottish, we don't do "zen" here, we do angry whisky-fuelled rage and resentment. Unless you're part of the Morningside/St Andrews set, in which case you do White Zinfandel-fuelled snippy passive aggressiveness
Azazelx wrote: Send Frankie Boyle over there to have a word with them.
We want to get them working and communicating, not reduce them to weeping gibbering shells of their former selves with no remaining sense of self-worth and an almost Lovecraftian terror of our pointless Stygian existence, which I hear is what happens to "normals" when they experience Frankie's humour
The trouble is I strongly suspect these chaps all have "proper" day jobs and just squeeze this in as and when, hence most of the communication and updates being out of office hours and always heavily delayed.
UNCLEBADTOUCH wrote: The trouble is I strongly suspect these chaps all have "proper" day jobs and just squeeze this in as and when, hence most of the communication and updates being out of office hours and always heavily delayed.
RH is a full time company so far as I know, they've been at this for a bit.
I'm noticing an increase of negative posts in the comments section of the KS itself. Granted, those will soon be buried away under a flood of people trying their hardest to give it a positive spin.
Now, I want you guys' opinions. I posted a comment on the KS. To me, it doesn't sound negative, just matter-of-factly.
Be honest, am I off the mark in my assessment of my tone?
For the work-blocked:
Mathieu Raymond just now
I agree with Alan's assessment. A Pledge Manager at this point in time would be rather pointless. We have no idea of what most of the products will look like. I liked the concepts, but if the deviate from that or there are things that I don't find appealing in 3D, then I don't want to have allocated money to it.
There is also another important thing to consider with the pledge managers. Maybe some of us who are tired of waiting want to cash out their pledge as early as possible, even if it means getting a sub-par selection (not quality wise, but selection wise) to sever the ties as early as possible.
Jan: I think expecting Wave 1 by March 2014 is actually very optimistic. There is still over half of Wave 1 not presented as WIPs so far. If it took 3 months for that, then tack on another 3 months... there is just no way this can be done. For all we know they have been super busy addressing feedback to the WIPs in the last three weeks and not non-linearly working on new stuff.
Tone seems fine to me, though in situations like this there can be seen to be a fine line between negative and just stating facts. Especially when people are already getting a touch emotional.
Mathieu Raymond wrote: Now, I want you guys' opinions. I posted a comment on the KS. To me, it doesn't sound negative, just matter-of-factly.
Be honest, am I off the mark in my assessment of my tone?
For the work-blocked:
Mathieu Raymond just now
I agree with Alan's assessment. A Pledge Manager at this point in time would be rather pointless. We have no idea of what most of the products will look like. I liked the concepts, but if the deviate from that or there are things that I don't find appealing in 3D, then I don't want to have allocated money to it.
There is also another important thing to consider with the pledge managers. Maybe some of us who are tired of waiting want to cash out their pledge as early as possible, even if it means getting a sub-par selection (not quality wise, but selection wise) to sever the ties as early as possible.
Jan: I think expecting Wave 1 by March 2014 is actually very optimistic. There is still over half of Wave 1 not presented as WIPs so far. If it took 3 months for that, then tack on another 3 months... there is just no way this can be done. For all we know they have been super busy addressing feedback to the WIPs in the last three weeks and not non-linearly working on new stuff.
Your tone is just fine Matthieu, perfectly reasonable, honest and intelligent... as I hope mine was ( I did resort to some sarcasm a week or two ago, about which I'm slightly embarrassed).
There do seem to be some rather loud voices on that comments section, however, who like to shout down sensible conversation as negativity. So don't be too bothered if your comment attracts any of that. In general, I much prefer to discuss this project here, rather than there.
Automatically Appended Next Post: I like your hat, by the way.
Your tone is just fine Matthieu, perfectly reasonable, honest and intelligent... as I hope mine was ( I did resort to some sarcasm a week or two ago, about which I'm slightly embarrassed).
There do seem to be some rather loud voices on that comments section, however, who like to shout down sensible conversation as negativity. So don't be too bothered if your comment attracts any of that. In general, I much prefer to discuss this project here, rather than there.
I like your hat, by the way.
Thanks, mate. You sound incredibly Canadian when you say you're embarassed about using sarcasm. I'd much rather see sarcasm than CAPS & !!!111!!!1!! or insults, if you ask me.
See, I'd have said March for the PM, at the earliest, with the way they're going with updates at present. They could, in theory, pull their finger out and get wave one to start shipping in March.
You're just stating the facts as they are and it is a valid point really, as there is right now no point in doing a pledge manager when we're still waiting for them to deliver on something that was supposed to be done months ago.
I'm not expecting a major update to this KS until well into December at this point. My expectations will be exceeded if something shows up in November, though, but I won't be holding my breath, that's for sure. I imagine we'll have the pledge manager and wave 1 finalized sometime in early 2014. We may have to contend with the end of year holidays at this point delaying shipping, production, etc, as it's a busy time of year with everyone traveling, on holiday, or shipping stuff.
UNCLEBADTOUCH wrote: The trouble is I strongly suspect these chaps all have "proper" day jobs and just squeeze this in as and when, hence most of the communication and updates being out of office hours and always heavily delayed.
RH is a full time company so far as I know, they've been at this for a bit.
You know, he might well be right. Certainly in terms of it not being a full-time concern - despite what they say.
UNCLEBADTOUCH wrote: The trouble is I strongly suspect these chaps all have "proper" day jobs and just squeeze this in as and when, hence most of the communication and updates being out of office hours and always heavily delayed.
RH is a full time company so far as I know, they've been at this for a bit.
You know, he might well be right. Certainly in terms of it not being a full-time concern - despite what they say.
They got nearly three quarters of a million dollars in this KS, unless their August holiday consisted of a special preview flight on the Virgin Galactic spaceplane loaded with Cognac and hookers, they have enough bloody money to work on this full time, and if they aren't I can only hope they're exposed and they go bankrupt due to the backlash.
UNCLEBADTOUCH wrote: The trouble is I strongly suspect these chaps all have "proper" day jobs and just squeeze this in as and when, hence most of the communication and updates being out of office hours and always heavily delayed.
RH is a full time company so far as I know, they've been at this for a bit.
You know, he might well be right. Certainly in terms of it not being a full-time concern - despite what they say.
While I can't offer any insight as to truth, their communication thus far would be massively disingenuous if this were the case. They have spoken pretty explicitly about expanding their "on-site team" and overall increasing their personnel.
It's mind-boggling, but while I joked some time back about the whole company perishing in a soup related accident, can anyone show any actual evidence that they haven't all shuffled off the mortal coil in the last two weeks?
That's becoming less and less of a joke; they really do seem to have achieved completely Zero communication. I know I sent a message to them weeks ago that has gone unanswered, and am seriously beginning to question at what point efforts to recover money become the only logical course of action.
Azazelx wrote: What's that? Ship the first wave in September?
I had already written that fantasy off as a fable, I was more hinting at them being there for us to answer our questions, which was why they delayed that update so much, but like you said yourself, I need to set my expectations lower already!
As for the actual first wave release? Maybe September 2014 at this rate if they deign to tell us what the hell is going on there.
Ouze wrote: you guys don't think they spent all the money on cocaine and hookers do you?
I doubt that, maybe make bad investments or put it all in their next project, just so it can run on time, but that, non!
Maybe they are taking this quiet time to prepare those seminars or something. Gotta please that niche of the backers after all.
KalashnikovMarine wrote:It's just facts, and much as I try to moderate and play nice... three weeks of radio silence is fething weird.
Dude, you had better be getting a pretty good deal out of "fronting" for them, and in your honour, the position should be renamed "Level-Headed, Bi-Partisan Herald."
RoninXiC wrote:Jan has a very soft J sound, so it's neither Ian nor Dzhan.
Try to pronounce it like.. yoghurt? yeah, I guess that's pretty close ^^
Ok, so exactly like we pronounce Yan (the Ian-isn't-cool-enough-let's-throw-in-a-higher-scrabble-value-letter-in-there version we have in Quebec). So parents would probably throw fits knowing they're not THAT original.
Ouze wrote:you guys don't think they spent all the money on cocaine and hookers do you?
Let's assume a party of four, at 300$ of blow per nose, per night. Also, I have no idea how much males hookers go for, but we can safely assume 400 a night per body, and even though they are French, let's assume they are conservative and do it one-on-one, because it's that much more romantic. That's 700$ per night, 4 people, 2800$ per night for the company (I'm keeping the extra help at the bare minimum, pun intended). That means the money amassed (post KS and Amazon fees) would last 225 days, or about 7 and a half months. We should still be hearing from them.
KalashnikovMarine wrote:It's just facts, and much as I try to moderate and play nice... three weeks of radio silence is fething weird.
Dude, you had better be getting a pretty good deal out of "fronting" for them, and in your honour, the position should be renamed "Level-Headed, Bi-Partisan Herald."
Hahaha. I'm not that level headed or bi-partisan I want my toys too!
I'm sad no one could call me out on the numbers. I was hoping to be far off the mark as I've never partaken of either of those vices.
I suspect you're underestimating the hookers, as for the Bolivian Marching Powder, it was never to my taste, but nearly £200 in a night? Either that is some really expensive blow, or they'd end up needing reconstructive nasal surgery within a month
Maybe, though if they do appear just to admonish people I hope they'll use a different insult this time around. Unless the powder on their cornflakes isn't sugar and it's addled their brains.
Right on, the last ten pages or so have been more about the lack of communication than actual communication with them. Rock my world, RH, Rock my world. It also indicates, maybe, that we'll talk about anything, up to and including people not talking to us. Lovely.
Will be interesting to see what kind of comeback they'll have with their next update or general sign of life. Will they give an explanation or just pretend like nothing happened?
They've got their whole internet setup in "sandbox" mode, so they keep trying to post info, but it never makes a live change anywhere.
I'm 80% sure this is not the case. But, I just can't come up with a reasonable explanation for them to stay so utterly silent. At this point I would write off my pledge as a loss to wishful thinking, but it was way more money than I feel like should be used on "wishful thinking"/"out on a limb" projects. It's getting harder and harder not to mind the no updates thing.
And to think, that last update of theirs brought with it that spark of hope that hey, things couldn't be all that bad then..
But yeah, regardless of the reason for the silence, it is unacceptable that they haven't chimed in even once with a quick "so and so was sick" or "due to critical hardware failure we lost everything, sadface"
Well thankfully we have a new update, so you can all complain about that for the next 20 pages.
Project Update #78: Remember, Remember, the Fifth of November... Posted by Loud'n Raging ♥ Like Hi guys,
First of all, on behalf of the whole Raging Team, we want to thank you from the bottom of our heart for the tremendous positive feedback we received after the last Update.
It generated many Likes and Shares all over the web, and we have you to thank for this. Since then, we've been receiving and replying to many emails from all over the world about the TGG. The fanbase is growing, and this can only mean bigger and better things for the Raging Heroes armies!
This summer work was so hard and intensive that we have not quite fully recovered yet But the efforts have paid off. We absolutely wanted to show you something special, to present you with a set of top notch minis, and it looks like, for most of you, this is what happened. So once again, thank you so much for your support and your enthusiasm. It's because of you that, today, we are bringing the Raging Heroes miniatures and every things that goes with them to the next level.
However, you may have noticed that we've gone a bit quiet since then... Well, it's true, we're not the best at posting frequent updates... but this should change soon as we are in the process of recruiting a new team member, just to take care of that ! So once again, sorry for not saying “Hello” and giving some news more often. This should soon be a thing of the past.
So why haven't you heard from us? Here are some of the reasons:
We had to concentrate of the very tedious and unglamorous task of finalizing the last technical details to send the sculpts to 3D printing. More than 250 parts to be cleaned, checked, polished, double-checked, and then ran through some sort of black magic software that conform them for the 3D printer... then triple-checked.... and then quadruple-checked...
During that time, we also prepared visuals and other materials for our new German distributor Martin Ellermeier, who quite largely featured Raging Heroes at his booth at Spiel '13 in Essen, Germany, the world's largest trade fair for board games, this past Oct 24-27. Most of the Raging Heroes minis were there, and even the test 3D print of One-Shot Blondie we featured during the Kickstarter.
And also, Benoit and I finally took a week off for some much-needed vacation time. Nevertheless, during that time, the Raging Heroes office continued to buzz with activity, with Sculpt Supervisor Jean-Romain overseeing a full team of freelancers, and with the arrival of Cédric, our friend / bass player / songwriter / Russian chopper model addict / anime fan / show-swordplayer trainee, who can now add packing&shipping Raging Heroes minis to his list of credentials.
We'll be writing up a longer update very soon with many images, as well as a special treat about the KSTs (no, don't even try to guess, it is not something that was featured in the Kickstarter... but if you had not yet completely fallen for the KST girls, well, this might just tip you over to their side...). There will also be a lot of info on other topics: of course, everything about the TGG minis and your feedback and questions from the last Update, details on the upcoming Webinar, your reactions to our Dark Elves (and a word or two on the Sisters of Eternal Mercy as well), and more…
Until later, All the best, Mireille Raging Heroes Team
Good to see that they really took that criticism on-board and changed.... uh... yeah.
But hey! The two principles did get a vacation... okay, "the Raging Heroes office continued to buzz with activity, with Sculpt Supervisor Jean-Romain overseeing a full team of freelancers, and with the arrival of Cédric, our friend / bass player / songwriter / Russian chopper model addict / anime fan / show-swordplayer trainee" but, it's important to remember that Meri has the keys to the comments section, so of course the "Sculpt Supervisor" was incapable of any communication.
...a special treat about the KSTs (no, don't even try to guess, it is not something that was featured in the Kickstarter... but if you had not yet completely fallen for the KST girls, well, this might just tip you over to their side...).
No, they did answer a lot of questions via e-mail, that's why they were so quiet all the time!!!!
But yeah, it would've been classier to just say it up front before the fact. I'm actually surprised they're still looking for an extra sculptor, I thought that was already in the bag by now.
And well, I guess the previewed models are now truly 100% sculpted now, as what I've gathered from this update, they've been fine-tuned to the point of perfection.
I am not a backer but follow this thread because I liked concepts very much. But after this "update" I can just imagine how do you feel, I believe my rage meter would pass that 80% mark
See, the title from this update just makes me add the following line in my head The Gunpowder treason and plot; which just makes me think that RH are still plotting something nefarious rather than actually planning on communicating with us.
Hopefully they won't take too long getting their new Communication Director (everyone's a director) in place so they can get him up to speed and we can maybe get some regular updates.
Half the issue with the updates that they do put out is that they don't really say anything.
If they were updating on a regular basis then updates that just say things are progressing wouldn't receive this kind of response. Instead, with the lack of updates, ones such as this that promise jam tomorrow are received poorly by the community.
So, is this trolling, or are you genuinely incapable of understanding what people are annoyed about?
Don't bother responding for a while by the way, I'm going to take a week's holiday now because the strain of making this post was just too much for my fragile constitution.
The issue here is that the update contains no meaningful content, for example, no images of works in progress or images we haven't already seen, no ETA's, and so on.
I myself am not butthurt about it. I figure they will eventually ship product, and it will eventually look pretty good; so may as well enjoy watching them flail about in the meantime, communication-wise.
Just so you know, we are currently working on finalizing a new batch of Heroines, as well as the Lulu's!
This was about the only line we needed of the whole text. Seriously. But I'm beginning to think they are infected by newer reforms in education where people writing texts are unable to synthesize, summarize and get to the bloody point. My employee (Did most of her education in France) was unable to get out of the introduction section of an essay because she would get mired in meandering thoughts.
We'll be writing up a longer update very soon with many images, as well as a special treat about the KSTs (no, don't even try to guess, it is not something that was featured in the Kickstarter... but if you had not yet completely fallen for the KST girls, well, this might just tip you over to their side...). There will also be a lot of info on other topics: of course, everything about the TGG minis and your feedback and questions from the last Update, details on the upcoming Webinar, your reactions to our Dark Elves (and a word or two on the Sisters of Eternal Mercy as well), and more…
Backers of TGG have pledged for TGG, not Dark Elves, not Sisters of Eternal Mercy, those comments are for your Facebook page or, better yet, your own damn website.
BobtheInquisitor wrote:So, they didn't address any concerns or criticisms at all, eh? Nice.
Also, "We delayed this update so we would be on hand to answer questions...then we went on vacation."
By not addressing it, they are addressing it. "Shove it, guys."
RoninXiC wrote:250 parts? parts of WHAT? New minis? Old ones? So you are changing things? Tell us!
So... you are fixing things to get them to the 3d printer.. what about our comments and (constructive) criticism...
Ah but see, we'll tell you about all the other things were doing, but not what you've paid us for.
Seriously. I am not fazed at all that some of them took a week of vacation, because I've seen my fiancee become increasingly less productive as she worked 7 days a week, and long hours to boot. You get to a stupid point and that would have... well... could it have made things worse? I don't know. Anyway, it's done.
They just set themselves up again for a big comms fallout though, by promising a long, concrete update again. What does very soon mean?
Mathieu Raymond wrote: They just set themselves up again for a big comms fallout though, by promising a long, concrete update again. What does very soon mean?
I can say with absolute, 100%, almost complete certainty that it means "before the dying Sun consumes the Earth." Beyond that, your guess is as good as mine.
The issue here is that the update contains no meaningful content, for example, no images of works in progress or images we haven't already seen, no ETA's, and so on.
I myself am not butthurt about it. I figure they will eventually ship product, and it will eventually look pretty good; so may as well enjoy watching them flail about in the meantime, communication-wise.
Maybe they don't have any? If they give an ETA and don't meet in then people again...moan.
If they don't update people moan, if they do update but not with people want then they still moan! You're not all shareholders, if they have nothing to share then they can't just invent something.
They even say they're hiring additional staff to help out, is that not what people want? Surely that counts as content in the update?
Raging Heroes have not been great, but 90% of the people in here have taken it to a level now where they're damned if they do and damned if they don't.
shamikebab wrote: Raging Heroes have not been great, but 90% of the people in here have taken it to a level now where they're damned if they do and damned if they don't.
I think it would be more accurate to say that Raging Heroes has gone past an event horizon of damnation. Anything they post in the next update is going to be stuff they said they'd have ready a month ago. They are already damned, the best they can hope for (short of HIPS and new, cheaper prices) is to not damn themselves further.
Sigh... So, in response to a question about what, if any, feedback was acted on we get this;
Loud'n Raging wrote:@Buzzsaw: Coming soon. As mentioned in the last paragraph above: "We'll be writing up a longer update very soon [...] everything about the TGG minis and your feedback and questions from the last Update..."
Please note, what they said they were doing in lieu of communicating;
We had to concentrate of the very tedious and unglamorous task of finalizing the last technical details to send the sculpts to 3D printing. More than 250 parts to be cleaned, checked, polished, double-checked, and then ran through some sort of black magic software that conform them for the 3D printer... then triple-checked.... and then quadruple-checked...
So they have absolutely final details on "250 parts". But despite nearly a month long lapse between communications, no time for a single new image, not even the time to describe any of the changes due to feedback.
shamikebab wrote: Raging Heroes have not been great, but 90% of the people in here have taken it to a level now where they're damned if they do and damned if they don't.
I think it would be more accurate to say that Raging Heroes has gone past an event horizon of damnation. Anything they post in the next update is going to be stuff they said they'd have ready a month ago. They are already damned, the best they can hope for (short of HIPS and new, cheaper prices) is to not damn themselves further.
And how do they do that exactly? If they don't update then people moan and if they do update but without what people want they do moan. They're in a no-win position at the moment. If they don't have anything ready to show then they just don't have anything ready to show.
The update tells us what they have been doing and what they are working on, I don't see a problem with that.
shamikebab wrote: Raging Heroes have not been great, but 90% of the people in here have taken it to a level now where they're damned if they do and damned if they don't.
I think it would be more accurate to say that Raging Heroes has gone past an event horizon of damnation. Anything they post in the next update is going to be stuff they said they'd have ready a month ago. They are already damned, the best they can hope for (short of HIPS and new, cheaper prices) is to not damn themselves further.
And how do they do that exactly? If they don't update then people moan and if they do update but without what people want they do moan. They're in a no-win position at the moment. If they don't have anything ready to show then they just don't have anything ready to show.
The update tells us what they have been doing and what they are working on, I don't see a problem with that.
See, it's not a no-win position just because you only mentioned two of the three possible options they have. For the record, the third option is "update with what people want", ie what us normal Earthlings would refer to as "competence". This project was funded four months ago; they still have not told us what scale these models are in, they've not confirmed either way if they are taking any feedback they've been given on board, they've lied repeatedly about how much work they've done or about their motivations for delaying updates, and of course the few updates they have put out have been virtually devoid of useful information but crammed with pointless waffling and discussion about future projects. Meanwhile, they accuse people who have justifiably tired of their antics of being "twitter-weaned children" or whatever the phrase was, they've taken two holidays totalling almost a quarter of the time since the project funded, and they still find they have enough free time on their hands to fart about on the internet looking for gifs to update their tumblr page with.
These guys are a complete joke at this point, and you will not be allowed to get away with trying to shame people for pointing out that they are, in fact, a joke.
Buzzsaw wrote: Good to see that they really took that criticism on-board and changed.... uh... yeah.
But hey! The two principles did get a vacation... okay, "the Raging Heroes office continued to buzz with activity, with Sculpt Supervisor Jean-Romain overseeing a full team of freelancers, and with the arrival of Cédric, our friend / bass player / songwriter / Russian chopper model addict / anime fan / show-swordplayer trainee" but, it's important to remember that Meri has the keys to the comments section, so of course the "Sculpt Supervisor" was incapable of any communication.
In fairness, I don't mind or care that they took a week off. That's fair enough in my book. I don't expect any KS producer to do nothing but work on fulfillment - people still need to lead their lives. The issues are all of the others around it, such as a lack of meaningful communication, saying that you'll update, then not updating, saying you'll answer questions, then not doing it, etc. I wouldn't expect the non-key players to write up updates, either - but it's not like Benoit or MIriabelle(sp?) haven't had more than enough of a chance to do them over the weeks.
The problem with this update is somewhat that it's a meaningless update - again, those are fine when they're part of a regular chain of updates. The issue with it being meaningless is that we're pretty much starved for updates, so people are keen for ones with actual content, and we'e only had... one? so far since the KS concluded.
They just set themselves up again for a big comms fallout though, by promising a long, concrete update again. What does very soon mean?
It depends on whether or not they're using it in a geological context. I suspect that they are...
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Alpharius wrote: I love this thread!
I really do!
I love it 2x when I'm in Australia too!
I'm serious - this thread is one of my favorites, and I do always hope that everyone that pledged for this stuff is eventually happy.
Enjoy that little flag up there while you have it!
shamikebab wrote: Raging Heroes have not been great, but 90% of the people in here have taken it to a level now where they're damned if they do and damned if they don't.
Which is why I'm staying as far away from this thread as I can (I only ducked back in here to see if everyone was complaining about the latest update, and, yup! First post after mine was another complaint!). I got into this knowing full well what to expect when it came to Ragin Heroes. Always over-promising, always late, always late at being late, and always delayed at being late at being late. Then you add the usual "all kickstarters are late" on top of that, and we have a pretty normal situation as far as I'm concerned. And nothing so far has surprised me, other than the outpouring of bile from this place.
shamikebab wrote: Raging Heroes have not been great, but 90% of the people in here have taken it to a level now where they're damned if they do and damned if they don't.
Which is why I'm staying as far away from this thread as I can (I only ducked back in here to see if everyone was complaining about the latest update, and, yup! First post after mine was another complaint!). I got into this knowing full well what to expect when it came to Ragin Heroes. Always over-promising, always late, always late at being late, and always delayed at being late at being late. Then you add the usual "all kickstarters are late" on top of that, and we have a pretty normal situation as far as I'm concerned. And nothing so far has surprised me, other than the outpouring of bile from this place.
Oh well, I do beg your pardon, oh great Seer. Some of us mere mortals didn't have any prior experience of these clowns, and mistakenly pledged thinking we would see some modicum of professionalism and an honest attempt to fulfill their promises, rather than endless delays, excuses, and even actual insults directed towards us. Frankly the only think that surprises me is that there is more than one person with any knowledge of this trainwreck that is willing to be an apologist for their behaviour, and the fact that you are going to try and turn it around on us as an "outpouring of bile" is frankly a bit of a ing joke.
Oh well, I do beg your pardon, oh great Seer. Some of us mere mortals didn't have any prior experience of these clowns, and mistakenly pledged thinking we would see some modicum of professionalism and an honest attempt to fulfill their promises, rather than endless delays, excuses, and even actual insults directed towards us. Frankly the only think that surprises me is that there is more than one person with any knowledge of this trainwreck that is willing to be an apologist for their behaviour, and the fact that you are going to try and turn it around on us as an "outpouring of bile" is frankly a bit of a ing joke.
You were clearly weened on twitter, pop-rocks and American style rock and roll music. Shamefully negative!
As an aside, I'm finding it amusing in the comments of the latest update that the consensus seems to be that, indeed, the IE Heavy Infantry have "flat featureless shoulder plates". The only disagreement seems to be that some people don't like that, and some people, in an aesthetic choice I find baffling... do.
I especially like the comment that they are "flat featureless shoulder plates", and are therefor the poster's favorite out of the campaign.
Or those that love flat featureless surfaces to paint unit markings and such. It's just an aesthetic choice, really, I'm not complaining about it. It makes my choices way easier (no heavies, only regulars). The only thing is they don't seem consistent with their less armoured sisters, shoulderpad-ingly speaking.
shamikebab wrote: Raging Heroes have not been great, but 90% of the people in here have taken it to a level now where they're damned if they do and damned if they don't.
shamikebab wrote: Raging Heroes have not been great, but 90% of the people in here have taken it to a level now where they're damned if they do and damned if they don't.
Not only do I think this is untrue, I think this is unlikely. I think the final stuff is likely to look awesome and people will let go of the butthurt.
I intend to just buy at 20% off from The Warstore, and periodically read this thread for the giggles and silly comments. There is a beautiful continuum of Stoicism to Stockholm Syndrome from some, distaste to blind rage from others, and then the periodic posts of great taste and distinction. Really, you could voice act this and show it on tv.
Wehrkind wrote: I intend to just buy at 20% off from The Warstore, and periodically read this thread for the giggles and silly comments. There is a beautiful continuum of Stoicism to Stockholm Syndrome from some, distaste to blind rage from others, and then the periodic posts of great taste and distinction. Really, you could voice act this and show it on tv.
So, you're aiming to only pay...80%?
I think the next update will either make everyone happy, or further extend this silly cycle they seem to be stuck in.
Wehrkind wrote: I intend to just buy at 20% off from The Warstore, and periodically read this thread for the giggles and silly comments.
So, you're aiming to only pay...
80%?
YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAH
Now make that into a .gif so RH can post it to their Tumblr.
On-topic, I am not surprised that some people like the featureless shoulders; Space Marines have a similar thing going for probably similar reasons. Hopefully the rest of Wave 1 will be shown soon, but after the ship Wave 1 to the backers is it going to retail, or is it only going to retail after all waves are completed?
Hey now. I might enjoy their artistic meanderings, but I really don't wish them to fail. Tortured artists have produced some of the world's greatest works of art, after all... could be somewhat true of miniatures, even
Wehrkind wrote: I intend to just buy at 20% off from The Warstore, and periodically read this thread for the giggles and silly comments. There is a beautiful continuum of Stoicism to Stockholm Syndrome from some, distaste to blind rage from others, and then the periodic posts of great taste and distinction. Really, you could voice act this and show it on tv.
So, you're aiming to only pay...80%?
I think the next update will either make everyone happy, or further extend this silly cycle they seem to be stuck in.
See, this is why I love you lads. I set them up, you knock them out of the park Too often in real life people just assume I am insane and miss out on all the little piles of humor I leave lying around.
I would love to see some dramatic readings of these threads though... we should make that happen.
Go back to bitching about every little thing that happens (or doesn't happen), and I'll go back to avoiding this thread for months at a time. That seems to suit everyone.
but after the ship Wave 1 to the backers is it going to retail, or is it only going to retail after all waves are completed?
From what I remember the idea was that wave 1 stuff would be available to retailers after going out to KS backers
so if you chose to wait till everything was done and not pay extra for wave shipping or get involved in the pick up from a store or a some sort of group backer shipping location (I could never figure out this bit) you'd have to watch ordinary mortals getting the minis before you
H.B.M.C. wrote: Bugger it.
Not worth it.
Go back to bitching about every little thing that happens (or doesn't happen), and I'll go back to avoiding this thread for months at a time. That seems to suit everyone.
I'm pretty sure it's mostly a humour thread at this stage. It's only shameful if you take the whole thing seriously, rather than as an expensive joke that will be played out over the next year or two...
but after the ship Wave 1 to the backers is it going to retail, or is it only going to retail after all waves are completed?
From what I remember the idea was that wave 1 stuff would be available to retailers after going out to KS backers
so if you chose to wait till everything was done and not pay extra for wave shipping or get involved in the pick up from a store or a some sort of group backer shipping location (I could never figure out this bit) you'd have to watch ordinary mortals getting the minis before you
but whether this is still the case ? who knows
This is how I understood it. But I certainly wouldn't be certain of what's going to happen.
I hope so. In their email to me they mentioned looking into lowering the $20 shipping rate for subsequent shipping waves after the first... I think. Which would be good, if they can manage it.
I'm not going to pay $60 to ship some first wave stuff, then the snipers that I want, then the freebies that we'll be due (I'm mostly guessing about waves here). I'd much prefer to wait and get them all at once. It would sting a bit though if I'm still waiting for my stuff months, or even a year after most of it is available in shops.
Well, that's why there was the question about personal drop ship options. For those who were either getting multiple pledges or small gaming groups, in both cases there'd have been a shipping charge of £20 per pledge to make up the postage costs.
I'm definitely feeling like a minority . I check for updates and such once a month, I don't really give a gak if there is one or not, I've paid my money and I'm getting miniatures, good looking miniatures.
To be constantly harping on about the same crap hoping for a different result seems to me to be an exercise in insanity. Different companies surprisingly are different. I'm fairly patient when it comes to KS , i trust I'll receive it when it is ready , I don't know what they are dealing with in regard to design, manufacture and logistics , and even if I did know through updates that wouldn't stop the weird negativity in this thread.
Why is it important to receive updates? You know the date for receiving the miniatures is going to be a while away and judging by the companies past you should have known this before jumping in. Being spoon fed pretty pictures every day or bits of useless info doesn't change anything, only one thing matters, receiving the miniatures , everything else is window dressing.
Seriously, some of you sound like a child asking it's mother for an ice cream. To be honest if i was raging heroes I wouldn't want to engage with you either.
Why is it important to receive updates? You know the date for receiving the miniatures is going to be a while away and judging by the companies past you should have known this before jumping in. Being spoon fed pretty pictures every day or bits of useless info doesn't change anything, only one thing matters, receiving the miniatures , everything else is window dressing.
I think you'd find that, for most of us, we have the same expectation.
That is, until the company SAYS they're going to provide one. Then they're late on it. By over a month. No one here is looking for daily updates, or even weekly updates. Heaven forbid that we try and hold them accountable to what they've said they were going to do.
Seriously, some of you sound like a child asking it's mother for an ice cream. To be honest if i was raging heroes I wouldn't want to engage with you either.
Awe, and now you want to "make your point stronger" by insulting everyone. Well played.
Bullockist wrote: This crap has been going on for about 38 pages now and it's the same people , about 6-10 posting the same thing over and over and over.
bleh.
Clearly you've missed the fact that it's, at this point, about 80% a joke thread at this point.
I'll be here at least twice before the miniatures arrive, but for the most part I avoid here (ive been back twice or 3 times since the KS finished) for the above reasons.
Bullockist wrote: I'll be here at least twice before the miniatures arrive, but for the most part I avoid here (ive been back twice or 3 times since the KS finished) for the above reasons.
Well the good news is that, at this point, our expectations of professionalism from Raging Heroes are so low that things can only go up!
Bewtween me asking for the ice cream and the ice cream parlour serving it up she also didn't have to listen to, " where's my ice cream, is it coming, you said it was coming, i hope that ice cream looks slighlty different, mum, where's my ice cream, mum, the ice cream is melting, it's melting, where's that ice cream again, you told me my ice cream was coming, mum this is the worlds slowest ice cream parlour, you said it would be coming in a year, where's my ice cream"
Bullockist wrote: I'll be here at least twice before the miniatures arrive, but for the most part I avoid here (ive been back twice or 3 times since the KS finished) for the above reasons.
Well the good news is that, at this point, our expectations of professionalism from Raging Heroes are so low that things can only go up!
I'll take that out of this thread as a positive cincy
Bullockist wrote: Bewtween me asking for the ice cream and the ice cream parlour serving it up she also didn't have to listen to, " where's my ice cream, is it coming, you said it was coming, i hope that ice cream looks slighlty different, mum, where's my ice cream, mum, the ice cream is melting, it's melting, where's that ice cream again, you told me my ice cream was coming, mum this is the worlds slowest ice cream parlour, you said it would be coming in a year, where's my mice cream"
Yes, because she didn't just take your money and go on holiday for a few weeks. Try to keep up.
Bullockist wrote: Bewtween me asking for the ice cream and the ice cream parlour serving it up she also didn't have to listen to, " where's my ice cream, is it coming, you said it was coming, i hope that ice cream looks slighlty different, mum, where's my ice cream, mum, the ice cream is melting, it's melting, where's that ice cream again, you told me my ice cream was coming, mum this is the worlds slowest ice cream parlour, you said it would be coming in a year, where's my mice cream"
Yes, because she didn't just take your money and go on holiday for a few weeks. Try to keep up.
Two staffers out of the full staff, and a single week. No need to be dramatic.
versus 
I'd much rather see sarcasm than CAPS & !!!111!!!1!! or insults, if you ask me.
ing joke.
