In all seriousness, Unca Kev does have a large selection of original art of the RPG world on his office walls. They aren't his scrawls. They're original pieces by Parkinson, Elmore, Brom, Corben, and others. They're not even exclusively Palladiumbooks covers.
I don't think the comment about the police officers being impressed by the art on the walls was typical Palladium self promotion. It was probably genuine in this case. Because Unca Kev's art gallery IS impressive.
GabrielV wrote: In all seriousness, Unca Kev does have a large selection of original art of the RPG world on his office walls. They aren't his scrawls. They're original pieces by Parkinson, Elmore, Brom, Corben, and others. They're not even exclusively Palladiumbooks covers.
I don't think the comment about the police officers being impressed by the art on the walls was typical Palladium self promotion. It was probably genuine in this case. Because Unca Kev's art gallery IS impressive.
But still, not necessary to the conversation. All it does is demonstrate how desperate Palladium are for approval.
Ah, PB and it's various missives is just to stroke the ego of it's owner.
It would die like a dog the day it cannot do that.
They probably got on the topic of why on earth anyone would break into the place?
Kev probably pointed out his "priceless artwork" and got the reply: "Ah, yes... very... impressive. We need to go.".
Silly question .. anyone happen to know the exact contents of the Battle Cry pledge, with all of the stretch goals.. what was shipped so far and what is still left? No add-ons, just the pledge itself?
Necros wrote: Silly question .. anyone happen to know the exact contents of the Battle Cry pledge, with all of the stretch goals.. what was shipped so far and what is still left? No add-ons, just the pledge itself?
I'm bored and feeling like being slightly nice to someone on the internet so here you go (BTW tracking what we already got from memory so mistakes may exist)
Battlecry pledges are still missing:
- Rick Hunter VF1-J
- Roy Fokker VF1-S
-Khyron Glaug
- Miriya Queadluun-Rau
- 3x Gnerl fighters
- 3x Nousjadeul-Ger male power armour
- 2x Super Valkyrie
- 3x Queadluun-Rau
- 2x SF-3A Lancer II
- Experimental Queadluun-Rau upgrade kit
- 2x QF-3000 ghost fighters
That's just the Battlecry pledge, without any additional purchases. I didn't bother with templates and tokens since there's no way I'd remember any of that in the first place
Is there anything new and/or of substance in this?:
Update #205
Aug 15 2017
My Fifth Update
Hi all, Scott here. This will be a very short update, as I have had to split my time over the past two weeks between RRT and several other projects, as well as help prep for Gen Con.
Wave 2 Progress
We have reviewed the quotes and pared down the selection to our top candidates for the job. We are looking forward to reviewing their manufacturing samples and terms before making our final selection.
Force Organization Charts
Several of the Backers and other people who I have been collaborating with on the Force Organization Charts are also attending Gen Con. Many of them are running events. Out of respect for their needs I have not pushed the testing and finalization of the Charts. Once Gen Con has passed we will be finishing the play-testing, then releasing the Charts for you to download.
Speaking of Gen Con...
I’ve seen from posts and feedback here and on Facebook that some of you are discussing the RRT Tournaments in one way or another. For those of you who are going to attend Gen Con, for your convenience I thought I would reprint here some of the information published in the Weekly Update about the tournaments. Please see below if you are interested:
This will be the first year that an official two Robotech® RPG Tactics™ tournament (two of them, actually) will be held at Gen Con.
Gen Con 2017's Robotech® Tactics Showdown – 200 Point Tournament Gen Con's first RRT tournament! Bring your assembled 200 point force to the table to throw down against UEDF and Zentraedi from all across the galaxy! Prizes for the top 3 players and best painted Squad!
Game ID: NMN17110891 When: August 18th, 2017 – Friday, 1:00 PM. Where: ICC: Hall A: Red: 10-15 Duration: 5 hours. Maximum Number of Players: 12 Cost: $2
Prizes!
First Place: 100 Robotech Bucks for making purchases at the Palladium Books booth at this year's Gen Con.
Second Place: 60 Robotech Bucks for making purchases at the Palladium Books booth at this year's Gen Con.
Third Place: 30 Robotech Bucks for making purchases at the Palladium Books booth at this year's Gen Con.
Best Painted Squad: 50 Robotech Bucks for making purchases at the Palladium Books booth at this year's Gen Con. (This award goes to the player with the best painted Squad. This means that the number of models painted needs to consist of the minimum models purchased for a specific Squad card. Some squads can consist of 2 models while others may contain 6 models that complete one Squad card. This works well for new or novice players who may have only had time to paint up a Squad.)
Gen Con's 2017 Robotech® RPG Tactics™ – Commander's Call – 300 Point Tournament This is the BIG ONE!!! Bring your assembled 300 point force to the table to throw down against UEDF and Zentraedi from all across the galaxy! Prizes for the top 3 players and best painted army! (PLEASE NOTE: the Gen Con website states its a 200 point event, but it will be a 300 point tournament.)
Game ID: NMN17110892 When: August 19th, 2017 – Saturday, 1:00 PM. Where: ICC: Hall A: Red: 8-13 Duration: 5 hours. Maximum Number of Players: 12. Cost: $2
Prizes!
First Place Winner of the Commander's Call Tournament will be awarded the title "Commander 2017," receive a commemorative certificate, and receive 150 Robotech Bucks for making purchases at the Palladium Books booth at this year's Gen Con. The Commander can also have his or her picture taken and have an interview to go over their very own Robotech RPG Tactics character that will be made an OFFICIAL character for the RRT game which will be illustrated in an anime style bust shot. The character's personal mecha will also be discussed and we will coordinate discussions to establish a paint scheme for that mecha. Once completed, that character's write-up and playable RRT card will be uploaded to DriveThruRPG.com so that other RRT gamers can download and play that official character for free.
Second Place: 100 Robotech Bucks for making purchases at the Palladium Books booth at this year's Gen Con.
Third Place: 50 Robotech Bucks for making purchases at the Palladium Books booth at this year's Gen Con.
Best Painted Army: 100 Robotech Bucks for making purchases at the Palladium Books booth at this year's Gen Con. This award goes to the player with the best painted army (NOT just a Squad).
That might eventually work against him, if we get to, say, maybe "MY ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY-EIGHTH UPDATE"...
It would be nice if this one:
Matt Saia about 2 hours ago
One question. Same as last update and it is a Yes, No question so it should take about 60 seconds of your time to handle. Is the money for wave 2 currently in an account, as liquid assets, to be spent on the production of the items?
gets addressed.
Probably not though...other than here:
James Edwards 17 minutes ago
@Matt Do you honestly think PB, as incompetent as they are, had the sense to keep KS money separate from general finances, as they are required to, or even track those finances?
You give them too much credit.
I would like to point out that I just got out of my six month "Kickstarter put baby in a corner (and coincidentally got $0 from me for six months) temporary ban" and in that time, while they got a new spokesman to lie for them...
Merijeek wrote: I would like to point out that I just got out of my six month "Kickstarter put baby in a corner (and coincidentally got $0 from me for six months) temporary ban" and in that time, while they got a new spokesman to lie for them...
Things are still where they were six months ago.
Please let me heartily welcome you back to a whole lot of nothing.
I think the HBS Battletech kickstarter is all I got left running which incidentally HG is suing... really not liking anyone associated with Robotech lately.
Two Gun Bob is my hero! And my recent post on my blog was inspired by his comments... About Quotes. A link is below though the entirety of the text minus pics is in this post.
Very recently, the delivery concerning wave 2 of Robotech RPG Tactics (RRT) was again pushed out to an unspecific date in 2018. Who will take the plastic throne of Robotech RPG Tactics? Who will break the never ending wheel? First this manufacturer is on top, then this one, then Kevin Siembieda, then Essen Spiel, then that manufacturer, a power outage, the internet is down, and a spider stops by for a visit… And oh look! A squirrel! In honor of this “development,” let’s talk about that. But, as I learned from the last time I posted about this project, (and for those new to this debacle) let’s recap.
Note: And yeah I'm a blogger with a grudge, while my friends are currently out their wave 2 "rewards."
Robotech RPG Tactics (RRT) surpassed its initial funding goal of $70k, to the tune of just over $1.4 million. Funding of the campaign ran April 18th thru May 20th 2013. In total, the crowdfunding roped in 5,342 backers. With a rough estimate that’s an average pledge, a bit over $260. While Kickstarter lists the project as completed, this is not actually true; as Palladium Books claimed dividing the project into two waves was the more efficient way to proceed. While the first wave was pushed back it was eventually delivered, with international shipping completed by May 13th 2015. While four years, and three months after funding... Wave 2 remains only a twinkle in Rick Hunter’s eye.
During this time the main comments section continues to roll (it will hit 100k soon). During the process of wave 1, complaints related to delays, the overall part count, positions of the seams and the skill level required for assembly of the game pieces, were many. However, in the last 2 years and while the (second wave of the) project has remained in ether, or as I like to call it the Game of Quotes, complaints have shifted, to outright anger and contempt. Most of this in regards to a clear lack of transparency by Palladium Books.
Since May 2015, despite the claim of Kevin Siembieda that the project will deliver... What has Palladium said, or more importantly shown, that this is in fact the case? The answer is not much. But let’s take a look back:
Update #186: Aug 26 2015 By: Kevin Siembieda
· “…I want you to know there has not been any misappropriation of the funds raised by the Kickstarter, nor any wrongdoing of any kind. Not by me or anyone at Palladium Books.”
· “…we have not been able to show you physical work, because we are exploring different possible solutions…”
· “As stated, we’re shooting to release RRT Wave Two around the end of 2015 or sometime in the first quarter of 2016.”
Update #189: Dec 11 2015 By: Kevin Siembieda
“…as we explore a number of different possibilities. For a variety of business reasons we cannot yet discuss or reveal exactly what we are looking into and considering.“
Update #190: Jan 29 2016 By: Kevin Siembieda
· “As I have stated, for strategic and business reasons we have been unable to share with you everything Palladium has been exploring, considering and working on.”
Update #196: Feb 3 2017 By: Kevin Siembieda
“We are working on something exciting right now that, if it pans out, could change everything and help us bring you RRT Wave Two by the end of 2017.”
“We have not released details these many months because everything has been in motion, and still is.”
Update #197: Feb 19 2017 By: Kevin Siembieda
· This update Kevin Siembieda reveals that one of his freelancers (a co-creator of RRT) has attempted suicide after wading into the comments section of RRT to discuss the Rift Board Game.
Update #198: Feb 23 2017 By: Kevin Siembieda
· “…we are trying to make improvements and headway on Wave Two rewards, via reduced part counts for easier assembly, reduced seams and better sprue layouts. This is happening right now, as we compare quotes utilizing new manufacturing approaches and technologies in the production processes to help attain what we are seeking, while preserving the high detail and quality.”
· “…With Wave Two rewards having so many unique unit designs to be broken down and quoted, and with Essen Spiel (one of the largest gaming/miniatures conventions in Europe that is visited by many miniature manufacturers - just transpired in October) and the Chinese New Year over, we are hoping the congested pipeline for quotes will move much faster now.”
· “Once we have the quotes, we can then decide which manufacturer(s) to move forward with. Unfortunately, this process does not yield visual results that can be publicly displayed.”
What has Palladium Books been working on? Working on getting quotes (of coarse) and reducing the part count. But even being conservative, from the finished delivery of wave 1 (May 13th 2015), to KS last update (Feb 23 2017) that’s 22 months (counting days) or nearly two years. Two years of getting quotes!? C’mon man? Many are asking: what is the reason it’s taken two years? More recently Scott Gibbons recently announced himself as Palladium Books business manager (or fresh face of the Game of Quotes) and apparently… comment wrangler extraordinaire. And in his first update he actually provided something a bit different than: “For business reasons, we cannot share details about reasons… of um, err business.”
Update #199: Jun 20 2017 By: Scott Gibbons
· “First, Wayne and Kevin spent half of Friday morning (7/16/2017) on a conference call with a manufacturer (I did not sit in on the call due to another pressing business need that morning). During the call they discussed the manufacturer’s initial quote on producing Wave 2 which we had received the day before. There were some points in the quote that needed clarification, as well as setting expectations for what we need in the finished game pieces. All in all it was a productive call and we are looking forward to getting a revised quote soon.“
· “From here on out, I personally will be posting updates every two weeks - even if nothing has changed I will check in to let you know.”
Update #200: Jun 21 2017 By: Scott Gibbons
· "Part of the conference call with the manufacturer on 6/16/2017 was spent discussing delivery in 2017. The manufacturer expressed that they believed a fourth quarter delivery was probably possible. We asked them to look closely at this while working up the revised quote and see if they could give us a firm commitment for delivery."
Update #201: Jul 4 2017 By: Scott Gibbons
· “We have been in contact with the manufacturer I mentioned in the last update several times over the past two weeks, giving answers and clarifying our expectations on a number of issues. We had hoped to have their revised quote by now but are still waiting.”
· “In the meantime we have reached out to several other manufacturers (ten in total) in case the manufacturer we are currently working with is not able to satisfy our need for quality assurance, delivery time frame, etc. On that front, we have received responses from several that are interested in the project and a few that aren’t due to already full production schedules.”
· “With the extended delay in getting back the revised quote, an end-of-year release for Wave 2 is beginning to appear less and less likely. However, we will not know until we see the quotes and hammer out all the final details.”
· “Several people have asked for renders of the Wave 2 game pieces - I will work on getting those posted here for you.”
Update #202: Jul 18 2017 By Scott Gibbons
· “We got three new quotes at the end of last week, a refined quote from the factory that we’ve been dealing with as well as initial quotes from two others that we had reached out to. We are currently analyzing the information in the quotes - a task that is not as simple as it may sound.”
Update #203: Jul 28 2017 By Scott Gibbons
· One new Rendor…
Update #204: Aug 1 2017 By: Scott Gibbons
· “We’ve gotten several quotes now from manufacturers, some of which are encouraging while others were not. “
· "The manufacturer Palladium had been talking with when I came on board at the end of May has updated their quote to us. It is not what we were hoping for however, as their quoted price went up significantly. We’ve asked the broker who has been our go-between to seek additional details from the manufacturer about why the price jumped so much.”
· “Of the quotes we have gotten from other manufacturers, we are actively reviewing and comparing several of the most promising and there are two that are very promising. In fact, we were happily surprised with one particular quote, as everything we had heard about this broker and manufacturer said they did excellent work but tended to be expensive. We will be meeting with their reps at Gen Con, along with several other companies.”
· “We also had a soft-introduction this week with a domestic injection-molding company (our thanks to the gent who sent them our way).”
· “With the dragged out quoting process we’ve been going through, unfortunately, I sincerely doubt that RRT Wave 2 will be finished with manufacturing by the end of this year.“
Update #205: Aug 15 2017 By: Scott Gibbons
· “We have reviewed the quotes and pared down the selection to our top candidates for the job. We are looking forward to reviewing their manufacturing samples and terms before making our final selection.”
At this point even if Palladium Books completes wave 2 they have failed. They needn’t concern themselves with the 200-300 semi-irregular (and rightfully ticked) posters in the comments page. What they should be concerned about, is the 5k plus backers who aren’t commenting at all… They should realize that whatever they do, if wave 2 is finished, that alone doesn't build a game. The unfortunate mis-management of this project, the lack of transparency is and has been, just too much. Play the game of getting and squiring quotes long enough, and despite Scott Gibbons attempts, there really is little difference between what had come before:
“For business reasons, we cannot share details about reasons… of um, err business.”
And what is coming now, since Scott Gibbons has claimed the plastic throne. Or as one backer put it…
“Yeah, the WE'RE GETTING READY FOR GENCON!!!!!!!!! update. Can't wait to firm up those quotes at Gencon! Quote me on this, Wayne and Kevster are quoting the quotes to get a quota on some quotes. You can quote me that even though I Scooter the Magnanimous will not be there in person, Kevayne is totally Mouth watering to get some highly detailed quotes that will forever change the quote market with reduced parts to the spreadsheet. Have you ever tried to quote a spreadsheet? Don't quote me but the quotes will be quoted after Gencon. Buy sum product! Robotech bux!”
Who will take the plastic throne of Robotech RPG Tactics? Who will break the never ending wheel of quotes? It won’t be one of the ten quotes fielded from some random Chinese manufacturer…
Palladium Books can spin it how they like (and have), but the wheel is already broken.
Something to note here. It is sort of interesting to me that Palladium Books has somewhat changed the tactics of their presentation in the updates. Quotes weren't mentioned at all in regards to progress of this project by KS until late Feb. Then as Scott takes over it is all about quotes... Again this is but another example of either Palladiums lack of transparency (because if they were attempting to get quotes, that is super secret need to know info) or ineptitude... Or, as in most likely a combination of both. Speculative, but I think them handing NDAs might have been part of the problem and what has actually happened in the last two years is that they have spent time communicating with these companies about their NDAs and how to come about and a mutual agreement in regards to the NDAs... That wouldn't be something you'd put in a update... "Oh, trust us we are working on it, but these companies don't want to agree upon our super-restrictive NDA agreements and until one of them is foolish enough we cannot even begin the process of wave 2 "rewards." And now these latest updates are all about quotes...
Link to Blog:http://withinthedungeon.blogspot.com/2017/08/robotech-rpg-tactics-game-of-quotes.html
I find it rather telling that prior to the KS launch Ninja DIvision was somehow able to get all the models and renders done, develop art assets and rules for the game all within a 4 month time frame and at the same time dealt with lining up quotes and arranging shipping. Meanwhile PB can't even handle the remaining quotes in a two years span, much less get anything physically made.
stanman wrote: I find it rather telling that prior to the KS launch Ninja DIvision was somehow able to get all the models and renders done, develop art assets and rules for the game all within a 4 month time frame and at the same time dealt with lining up quotes and arranging shipping. Meanwhile PB can't even handle the remaining quotes in a two years span, much less get anything physically made.
All in a few years work for them.
Palladium Books: making the printed word seem like rocket science since 1981.
Palladium Books: making model making seem like self administered brain surgery.
stanman wrote: I find it rather telling that prior to the KS launch Ninja DIvision was somehow able to get all the models and renders done, develop art assets and rules for the game all within a 4 month time frame and at the same time dealt with lining up quotes and arranging shipping. Meanwhile PB can't even handle the remaining quotes in a two years span, much less get anything physically made.
All in a few years work for them.
Palladium Books: making the printed word seem like rocket science since 1981.
Palladium Books: making model making seem like self administered brain surgery.
I have a question about some of the models shown in that Battle Cry picture... The Rick Hunter and Roy Fokker Veritechs... what makes them different from the basic Veritech in the base set? It says on the picture that the 7 basic Valkyries can be assembled as VF-1A, J, or S versions... Isn't Roy's VF just a VF with a distinctive paint job? Couldn't you assemble any of the base Veritechs into a VF-1S and paint it up like Skull One?
What is the practical difference between a Glaug Officer's pod, and Khyron's Glaug Officer pod? What about Miriya's powered armor?
Basically, what I'm saying is: a noticeable chunk of the missing Wave 2 is just stuff that is already available, with a different paint job.
So Palladium Books is failing to deliver on items that, for all intents and purposes, they should already have sprues for. Why not cut open a few of those thousands of starter sets they have piled up in the back of the warehouse and ship some Veritechs and Glaugs and Destroids out to the backers as a partial Wave 2? I mean, sure it doesn't show much respect or concern for the backers, but at this point I'm fairly certain Palladium doesn't actually have any respect or concern for the backers.
With the Rick, it's about a distinctive pose. With the Roy, it's a distinctive pose, AND embossed Skull Squadron insignia. Both Khyron and Miriya are supposed to have the option of open cockpits, but given how badly designed the Wave 1 models were, I shudder to think of the parts count.
There's also the cost of shipping. Even if they decided to do this, given that they would have to sabotage a minimum of $70MSRP in retail stock per set of 3 (FPA excluded), and even if labor and shipping was only $5 per backer, that's hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost product (because that's how Kevin thinks, as can be seen by his argument regards not really owing for refunds), and more than $25K on labor/shipping. And that's just not going to happen.
Also given that they were promised as Exclusives, just regifting them from existing stock would be seen as yet another in a long line of clusterfeths that will do proportionally more harm than good.
I'm just curious... But did anyone get over to the Palladium booth at Gen Con?
Also Friday and Saturdays Events filled up with... The minimum number of required players... Saturday is one short, but they will fill that up I assume. Oh yeah, RRT is boiling all right...
Edit: And instead of having people pay $2 to play... And focused on prize support. Maybe they should have realized and put together their own Forces for the tournament and seen if they could snag the random passerby to participate. I guess putting those models together is too much work ehh, Kevin? Still as some have said it's not the worst game, might be a good way to drum up some customers? Probably not, but it would still have been better then what they are attempting.
Because I REALLY enjoy being an donkey-cave, I posted this on the FB Page under their 10 pics.
Is that a stack of quotes you're going through? Glad to hear the minimum number of players required (4) showed up for one of the 2 Tourneys. This game is FIRE!
Also, I'm pretty sure the dumpy Hispanic grognard "Demoing" a game is NMI / Jeff Ruiz.
To be fair, I swung past the Robotech tournament tables and there were at least three games underway, so at least six players. Still not a rousing success, but not the abysmal failure it could have been.
EDIT: That was the Saturday tourney. Too busy with games I was actually interested in on the Friday.
There was one person who wasn't playing that was composing an army that included MPA's, FPA's and Gnerls. Not sure if that was for the tourney, but if it was, I'd have been miffed. Mostly because of the latter, but the power armor would piss me off too.
This is going to all around have huge implications for Robotech/Battletech/Macross/General Geekdom.
I don't think that is to be the case. It will have more impact on Robotech/Macross than it will on the overall community of the Battletech community for that matter. Harmony Golds' bone of contention with Tatsunoko is over what HG believes is a licensing issue over the Macross/Southern Cross/Mospeada intellectual license. HG believes they have unrestricted license to the IP over the rest of the world. Which is why its a pain in the ass to get a hold of anything Macross related outside of Japan. Tatsunoko tried to sue HG in California over the licensing issue, but by some fluke of luck GH won the case. Without reading the actual licensing agreement, or subsequent settlement agreement, this is conjecture that seems substantiated with the behavior thus seen by HG. If Tatsunoko granted license to Sony over the IP, its likely because Sony has bought Funimation, and because Sony wants to do something with the IP. Again, without reading agreements, this is conjecture.
It comes across as HG is trying not to get this to court, by tossing out suits. Its going to be a question of how willing Tatsunoko will fight it in California. For a company that is doing as little as possible with the IP, they are dead nuts obsessed with keeping hold of it. What boggles my mind is that a company like Palladium, which has licensed all the Robotech IP from HG (the exception being the company doing the one board game where you defend the SDF-1), has been able to keep hold of it when they seem to have done just as much as HG to ruin the license.
As for Battletech... well... the original lawsuit is as muddy as office coffee. So I won't comment on that. This new lawsuit with Piranha Games and Harebrain Schemes comes across as HG trying to be relevant and desiring a settled outcome instead of actual litigation. I think, with some of the things posted in their complaint, they have a good chance of losing it if it goes to jury trail. This will likely be a question of how the defendants in both suits are willing to fight it in courts.
My hope is that they do. HG has done nothing of substance with the IP, save sitting on it, and has been a thorn to the anime and gaming community just because they could. We'll see.
This is going to all around have huge implications for Robotech/Battletech/Macross/General Geekdom.
I wonder what they are suing over, they own the rights in the US, seems like trying to sue them over something just opens the door for their right ownership to be questioned and HG to lose out. This could easily spin out of control and sink the Robotech movie Sony is supposed to be working on, I doubt Sony will want to have to deal with a rights battle while making the movie.
This is going to all around have huge implications for Robotech/Battletech/Macross/General Geekdom.
I wonder what they are suing over, they own the rights in the US, seems like trying to sue them over something just opens the door for their right ownership to be questioned and HG to lose out. This could easily spin out of control and sink the Robotech movie Sony is supposed to be working on, I doubt Sony will want to have to deal with a rights battle while making the movie.
If HG lost their 'ownership' of the Macross designs, Sony would just say 'meh' and license Macross from Tatsunoko / Big West instead and keep effectively the same screenplay in a bout of extreme irony.
My guess with the latest lawsuit is the usual HG exerting their rights AND trying to get some revenue out of settlements.
Funny how in the scheme of things, HG is far worse than Palladium Books.
We could have seen all kinds of Macross long ago if it were not these guys pushing a flaky license to the max.
This is going to all around have huge implications for Robotech/Battletech/Macross/General Geekdom.
I wonder what they are suing over, they own the rights in the US, seems like trying to sue them over something just opens the door for their right ownership to be questioned and HG to lose out. This could easily spin out of control and sink the Robotech movie Sony is supposed to be working on, I doubt Sony will want to have to deal with a rights battle while making the movie.
If HG lost their 'ownership' of the Macross designs, Sony would just say 'meh' and license Macross from Tatsunoko / Big West instead and keep effectively the same screenplay in a bout of extreme irony.
Movies are an extremely expensive gamble now, it's the reason you see so many sequels and rehashes of previously successful franchices. The movie studios are very careful about where they spend $100+ million and if there is even the hint of a legal battle that could possibly keep a completed movie from being released in theatres or overseas in places like China where many movies make the majority of their revenue now you can bet Sony will be doing a lot more than saying "meh".
This is going to all around have huge implications for Robotech/Battletech/Macross/General Geekdom.
I wonder what they are suing over, they own the rights in the US, seems like trying to sue them over something just opens the door for their right ownership to be questioned and HG to lose out. This could easily spin out of control and sink the Robotech movie Sony is supposed to be working on, I doubt Sony will want to have to deal with a rights battle while making the movie.
If HG lost their 'ownership' of the Macross designs, Sony would just say 'meh' and license Macross from Tatsunoko / Big West instead and keep effectively the same screenplay in a bout of extreme irony.
Movies are an extremely expensive gamble now, it's the reason you see so many sequels and rehashes of previously successful franchices. The movie studios are very careful about where they spend $100+ million and if there is even the hint of a legal battle that could possibly keep a completed movie from being released in theatres or overseas in places like China where many movies make the majority of their revenue now you can bet Sony will be doing a lot more than saying "meh".
My point was that if HG lose their ownership of the Robotech franchise, then the obstruction to using Macross (far, far more popular) is also gone. The mech designs, characters, overall screenplay would all remain unchanged (no cost to preproduction budget or schedule). It'd be a massive win for Sony (improving their profitability outside the US with a more established brand license), Tatsunoko, Big West, Studio Nue (royalties), and probably Bandai with the toy and model kit rights (and in counterpoint Sony with royalties for the live action designs). It'd become a money-making machine for decades. Model kits and toys of the VF-1 are still hugely popular. Hell, Ultraman is still hugely popular in Japan.
Of course, all this relies on HG losing the ownership (which realistically means bankruptcy). Pretty unlikely.
This said, I wouldn't be surprised if the 'Robotech' film is marketed in Japan as Macross. And that we see no mention of 'protoculture' as an energy source rather than a, well, culture, in the script. I suspect the Robotech license is purely to access the US market.
You are working under the assumption that Sony is able to license the Macross/Robotech IP from whomever the new owner becomes if HG loses it. Sony will not be that new owner, they have never (to my knowledge) been involved with the creation of Macross or the series that followed it.
So if HG loses their ownership Sony has to make a new deal and the new owner could license it to them, in which case you are right they would come out ahead. Or the new owner could license it to someone else (or not at all) and Sony is out a crap ton of money. And thus the potential gamble they may face. Currently HG is not an obstruction to Sony, they licensed the Robotech IP out to them for the movie.
It's unlikely that the trademarks that HG hold are sufficiently defensible should someone with enough motivation and/or pockets deep enough see fit to challenge them. If HG went into receivership (I think you call it 'administration' over there), it's very likely indeed that Big West / Studio Nue would snap those up quickly in order to complete their ownership of the franchise.
Apparently 4 people turned out for the Robotech event at Gen Con, the excitement must have been HUGE.
A lot of other companies use Gen Con as their flagship event or national championship level event, promote the heck out of them and see some pretty big turn outs numbering in the hundreds. The turn out for Robotech meanwhile could have been housed on a single table, things aren't even on life support level. Games that are 15+ years out of print manage to get a bigger draw at gen con. I think it's safe to declare that RRT is well past dead.
stanman wrote: Apparently 4 people turned out for the Robotech event at Gen Con, the excitement must have been HUGE.
A lot of other companies use Gen Con as their flagship event or national championship level event, promote the heck out of them and see some pretty big turn outs numbering in the hundreds. The turn out for Robotech meanwhile could have been housed on a single table, things aren't even on life support level. Games that are 15+ years out of print manage to get a bigger draw at gen con. I think it's safe to declare that RRT is well past dead.
As I said in an earlier post, I did swing past on Saturday afternoon, and while I can't confirm that all participants were tourney attendees, there were at least three games happening at the same time, and another player with an army out (the FPA/MPA/Gnerl one), so that's 7 potential players. They all seemed to be enjoying themselves, so I wasn't going to interrupt.
It's still pretty small, but not as small as I was expecting. GenCon ticketing only had 3 registered in the week leading up to the convention, and just checking, still have that number. Still, as you say, there are games with much less prominence that have significantly greater attendance. I still maintain that the lack of promotion or interest from the company is a big factor.
On an otherwise unrelated note, did I miss something in the recent lawsuit debacles regards the movie? Given the way it's been discussed, I figured the way it was reported, that Sony had signed a licensing deal with HG, and that my cynicism was that unless it was ALSO signed with the Japanese companies, it'd be a legal stumbling block. But people seem to be suggesting Sony signed with the Japanese companies, and edging out Harmony Gold. Is that the jist of things? Cause if so, that warms my heart.
Also, the 2021 date mentioned is interesting. Because even IF Wave 2 happens by then (and I'm not betting on it), it WILL put the kibosh on the whole "Gen 2/3 in the same scale" crap that PB promoted as a significant selling point. There's simply no way PB can get it done, marketed and sold, with four years remaining. Not unless Scott is some business genius.
Which brings up a further unrelated note, I saw someone mentioning that Scott doesn't even work out of the Michigan office? That he lives in Texas or some such? If that's true, then I guess I can write off pretty much anything he says, because if he's only getting his information through a filter of Kevin and Wayne statements (like in his first Update, he mentions the phonecall he didn't sit on, but was "productive"). Sorry, if he doesn't have first hand knowledge of the goings on at PBHQ, and is relying on being updated by Kevin and Wayne, then anything he says is even less credible than I initially thought.
I would be very interested to see some proof of the 2021 claim to be honest. It would make me insanely happy if it were true but the cynic in me wants some proof.
*Edit* Actually looks like the 2021 claim is true, a disbute between HG and the Japanese rights holder resulted in some court documents confirming the 2021 date along with the fact that since they tried to sue HG they won't likely be renewing their license. So just four more years before we'll get legit copies of Macross Frontier and Macross Delta.
Sony for sure has signed an agreement with the Japanese owner of Macross rights because HG only owns them here in the US and Sony is not going to lose out on the world wide profits. If the 2021 thing is true though I could totally see Sony sitting on the rights or just delaying release until 2021 and cutting HG out, 4 years doesn't mean much to Sony.
Tatsunoko vs HG. So this is why the movie finally got greenlighted. Wow.
Also why wave two will never happen.
And according to one backer on the Kickstarter commentary who called them, PB had no idea about the 2021 deadline. So that's going to be fun!
Watched the video, and while I liked the information on how it played out, I didn't like the claim that Harmony Gold aren't "the bad guys". There's a huge frikkin difference between being legally approved, and being "a good guy". It's not Harmony Gold's legal status that makes them a good or bad guy. It's what they've done with it. And that very much makes them a bad guy. There's a legal distinction, and a moral/ethical one. And they only count for the former.
Well we're never getting our Wave 2 stuff from PB but having some light at the end of the tunnel for finally being able to own an official copy of Macross Frontier and not having to import models from Japan is going to be awesome.
If you are a fan of Robotech but have not watched Macross Frontier you need to fix that. Robotech is how I was introduced to the whole mech franchise thing so it holds a special gilded place in my heart but Macross Frontier is seriously good without having to have the "Watched it when I was a kid" gilded memories that Robotech has.
If you are a fan of Robotech but have not watched Macross Frontier you need to fix that. Robotech is how I was introduced to the whole mech franchise thing so it holds a special gilded place in my heart but Macross Frontier is seriously good without having to have the "Watched it when I was a kid" gilded memories that Robotech has.
Macross Plus is great also... love the soundtrack...
But I don't think Palladium will ever ship wave 2, even if this wasn't happening..
Sometimes I feel we gave money to a nice street performer that was playing the guitar and seemed to have talent..
Then a crazy homeless man rushed up, took the money out of the case and started yelling at everyone.
One thing someone should ask Scott is what does he think as a new professional person working for palladium.
How does he feel the Robotech kick-starter effected Palladium's corporate image.
Personally.. in the past it was fair to poor corprate image on average.. slow to ship and average products.. after RTT its a dumpster fire at low tide..
And ask any magic or x-wing player.. most will say.. "that old game company??" or "Who??"
Alpharius wrote: Can someone bullet point and 'bottom line' what the big news is here, and why 2021 is looming large now?
Thanks!
Alright:
-Tatsunoko Productions in Japan owns the rights to Macross/Robotech everywhere in the world except the US, where Harmony Gold claims ownership.
-Recently it came out that Tatsunoko Productions claimed that Harmony Gold owed them money for their usage of the Robotech/Macross license here in the US. The issue went to arbitration and recently the results and notes from that arbitration became publically available.
-In those notes it was stated that Harmony Golds license to the Robotech/Macross IP runs out in March of 2021 and that Tatsunoko Productions could not renew said license if they chose.
-This action seems likely since Tatsunoko Productions lost the arbitration and did not get any of the money they wanted, so it is fairly safe to assume that they are not on good terms with Harmony.
-All of this is entirely separate from the current litigation that Harmony Gold is attempting against the companies currently making use of the Battletech IP.
SO, since PB gets their license from HG, and IF Tatsunoko doesn't renew in 2021 (as you note), then PB has until then to get Wave 2 and/or anything else done and sold.
4 more years of can kicking, or an honest attempt to make as much money as possible before The End.
Of course, I guess Tatsunoko could always license with PB directly too, at that point...
If Tatsunoko does not renew it will be the end of Robotech. They have no interest in it as a derivitive work. They would make more money just reselling the one thing they actually own, the animation of SDF Macross.
Alpharius wrote: I guess I don't understand much about 'Robotech', what makes "Robotech" actually be 'Robotech' or where it comes from then... :(
Because the first era of it with the Tomcat / F-14 looking Veritechs are from the original works of the show "Macross", then the other era of "Southern Cross" and then finally "Mospeada".
In a nutshell, Robotech is the anime equivalent of a manufactured boy band, comprised of three individually quite different singers, er, series - Superdimensional Fortress: Macross, Southern Cross, and Genesis Climber Mospeada. Overdubbed and adjusted in plot to munge them all together.
The name itself was put initially used by Revell (yes, the model kit / toy company) who wanted something to allow them to market their licensed japanese model kits (some of which were from other series than ended up in the Robotech melange).
Harmony Gold had problems with merchandising as the Macross kits put forward by Revell were already in production under the Robotech name, so both parties effectively agreed to colicense, and Robotech became the name for the imported animation.
Anyway, Harmony Gold's license comes from Tatsunoko who didn't quite have the authority to issue the license in the manner it was - designs and merchandising rights are actually under the authority of the authors of Macross (Studio Nue) and the money men (Big West). Tatsunoko have the distribution rights to the physical animation ONLY.
So, when the license Tatsunoko put out expres in 2021, they will not be able to license out the designs of the mechs, any merchandising or derivative work rights or so on. Tatsunoko and Big West / Studio Nue weren't on friendly terms last I checked either. Hence, Robotech (as a franchise based on licensable assets) dies.
winterdyne wrote: So, when the license Tatsunoko put out expres in 2021, they will not be able to license out the designs of the mechs, any merchandising or derivative work rights or so on. Tatsunoko and Big West / Studio Nue weren't on friendly terms last I checked either. Hence, Robotech (as a franchise based on licensable assets) dies.
So with a cup half full viewpoint: buy up all those wave1 starter kits while you can!
We stopped at a McDonald’s to grab some lunch. We sat by the windows talking and watching people as they came and went. A particular group of guys stepped out of a car and I said to Wayne and Chuck, “Those guys look like gamers. I wonder if they’re heading to Gen Con?”
A few minutes later, a tall gentleman from that group, wearing a Fallout T-shirt, walked over to our table to ask if we were going to Gen Con. I was wearing my Rifts® Promise of Power T-shirt with the big, red and white Rifts® logo, so I imagine it caught his eye. I know Chuck was also wearing a Palladium T-shirt (Rifts® Cyber-Knight Game Master). We said yes, and we all enjoyed a good laugh about it. The man, whose name was Tim, asked me if we worked for Palladium Books. We laughed and said, “yes.” Tim then asked if we were booth help or actually worked at the company. I smiled and said, “I am Palladium Books.” “You mean like ...” “Yep, I’m Kevin Siembieda, the owner and main game designer,” and introduced Chuck and Wayne. Tim was surprised. We shook hands and laughed some more. We wished him a safe trip and fun time at Gen Con, and invited him to stop by the Palladium Books booth.
I know this is a common thing and goes forever and a half years back, but this particular snippet caught me when it showed up 3 times in like 30 words.
I'm sure there are more egregious displays, but here we are.
I know this is a common thing and goes forever and a half years back, but this particular snippet caught me when it showed up 3 times in like 30 words.
I'm sure there are more egregious displays, but here we are.
No. As this goes it's probably setting a new bar.
Assuming this is a direct copy/paste (as is appropriate for anything regarding PB), notice his inconsistency with applying the registered trademark symbol to "Palladium Books." He doesn't apply it at all here, and he is intermittent with it elsewhere. But he NEVER types "rifts" without putting the registered trademark symbol next to it.
So... I finally got around to looking at the PBWU and Kevin continues to be a tool, who sees mediocrity as phenomenal.
The first RPG book in nearly 10 months, and it takes what, 20 hours to sell 120 copies, and that's seen as something to crow about? That's simply NOT impressive.
A 10x10 booth cost $1600 last year. I'm pretty sure PB's booth was at least twice that. 120×24.95 = ~$3000. Meaning their sole big ticket item barely (or not even) covered booth price, let alone salaries, transpo or hotels. Or more mundane costs, like production, art or author/editor time.
Sure, they had other things for sale (I saw the tumblers!), but if GenCon wasn't a significant loss, I'd truly be shocked.
Continuing on, Kevin gets a bug up his ass about the potential for screwups with regards preorders of the Atlantean Hardcover, pulling his best Marcus Kincaid impersonation, literally "NO REFUND" in all caps. Yeah, Kevin. We know PB's policy on refunds. Normally this wouldn't be an issue for me, but the PB tendency to have books available for preorder years, if not decades before release, might be cause for some tolerance or double check.
The RRT section is the usual pablum. Everyone is excited! Every is looking forward to more! No criticism was heard (or at least absorbed). Spoke to 5 manufacturers!
Zero actual information. Were these manufacturers ones that were already part of the quotes process? Or new ones that get to extend the "waiting on quotes" another couple of months? Was any kind of decision reached? Or was it just a handshake meeting that was otherwise meaningless? Were all five manufacturers capable and willing to do the project, or were some considered unsuitable?
See, that's five questions off the top of my head that could have been answered to provide concrete details to backers, WITHOUT going into detail that is understandably not supposed to be revealed (pricing, names, proprietary information). I'm sure a couple minutes of thinking could have come up with significantly more details beyond "everything is awesome!".
Nothing else of note, really. Just now waiting on Scott's next Kickstarter update, and what excuse, if any, he'll provide for atill not having Force Orgs up.
We stopped at a McDonald’s to grab some lunch. We sat by the windows talking and watching people as they came and went. A particular group of guys stepped out of a car and I said to Wayne and Chuck, “Those guys look like gamers. I wonder if they’re heading to Gen Con?”
A few minutes later, a tall gentleman from that group, wearing a Fallout T-shirt, walked over to our table to ask if we were going to Gen Con. I was wearing my Rifts® Promise of Power T-shirt with the big, red and white Rifts® logo, so I imagine it caught his eye. I know Chuck was also wearing a Palladium T-shirt (Rifts® Cyber-Knight Game Master). We said yes, and we all enjoyed a good laugh about it. The man, whose name was Tim, asked me if we worked for Palladium Books. We laughed and said, “yes.” Tim then asked if we were booth help or actually worked at the company. I smiled and said, “I am Palladium Books.” “You mean like ...” “Yep, I’m Kevin Siembieda, the owner and main game designer,” and introduced Chuck and Wayne. Tim was surprised. We shook hands and laughed some more. We wished him a safe trip and fun time at Gen Con, and invited him to stop by the Palladium Books booth.
Good times with a wacky crew.
Gee, anyone notice how quick they were to get out of there once they realized who they were talking to - not even a request for "sign my whatever". Somehow I'll bet "Tim" was never seen at the booth...
Anyways, great news with Tatsunoko - four more years of this dumpster fire and the sea will finally put us (and PB) out of our misery.
Despite their best efforts, working like demons day in and day out, braving storms and cold/dark warehouses, sadly 6-7 years wasn't enough to produce the perfect culmination to RRT, and now dastardly legal requirements make it impossible to continue. Such a shame, so sad, truly they will be beside themselves over it.
Oh, and because I was curious, I crunched the numbers. I'm assuming March 31st as the end point, but I'm thinking it was earlier than that?
As it stands, the midway point between when RRT was to deliver in full, and the license reverts, will be... Thursday before last.
Literally as PB were opening for the first day of Gencon, there was as much time remaining as time passed.
That doesn't take into account other factors like producing, freighting, and shipping product, so if you want to take the 7 months or so that'll take (based on Wave 1), and assume they don't want to sell any retail, they've pretty much got three years. Which is less time than since they started shipping Wave 1.
I would really love to see (and then have explained to my legalese-is-deliberate-bs brain) the actual text of the contract between KS and PB on such failures.
I have a feeling it's more of Kickstarter's "Creators should totes give the money back or that'll be, like, bad and stuff."
Not to rain on anyone's parade, but in practical terms, I think very little will change in 2021. It's unlikely given performance to date that Wave 2 will be done and delivered. They won't / can't refund. They won't release the financials (since it would likely expose their use of the funds as fraudulent).
PB will still be in breach of their kickstarter obligations (they won't release the financials, they won't refund, they won't have the product). Right now, they are not making nor have they made a good faith (in Michigan commercial law 'of a reasonable professional standard' for the industry) effort to complete the project.
It will still need bringing them to court to force a discovery process, which means throwing good money after bad.
I reckon they'll just go very, very quiet about it.
Oh, I fully expect PB won't roll over and submit. Because I have no doubt that doing so woul lead to bankruptcy, if not immediately, then at least as a consequence.
And while it's interesting that Michigan law may arguably already see them in breach, there's always been the issue of Kickstarter's TOS protection shield.
Trying to fight PB when they're living to the letter of that bs clause is a lot more difficult than fighting them when they're literally incapable of finishing due to loss of license.
It's like putting your car in the shop, and them putting off working on it after they've fixed a third of the problems, but not wanting to give it back and the terms of service being vague on timeframe. It's one thing if it's in the workshop in parts, and they claim it's being worked on. It's completely another if they've crushed your car into a cube.
So yes, it's likely still going to require legal action. But that legal action becomes a lot simpler if they are unable to secure a license to produce.
I mean, it's a bit harder to argue that they're totally working on it and things are heating up if they no longer own the license and producing new works for the IP would be some measure of illegal and/or actionable by companies that have no problem lighting others up with litigation.
Note, I'm certainly not claiming that PB would totally change their tune and say "oh, sorry, our bad, guess we owe you guys something". If anything, i imagine it'd become a "CRISIS OF TREACHERY 2: TREACHERY HARDER!" and they'd have weeks (probably months) of sad newsletters about how hard they worked on RRT and how much money and time was spent and they were so close but then the dastardly Others caused them to have to stop, they're so sorry and know it hurts, it hurts them even more, but don't worry they're working on getting the license back soon(tm) and will get right back to work as soon as they're legally allowed to.
A reasonable person would see this as "a big fething problem", but they'll just use the same song they have been for years; lies, obfuscation, and hoping that more backers get bored or die off as the months tick by until they retire or can't work anymore.
As Morgan points out, it'd be quite a change in ones avenues for calling them out, but that problem always boils down to it taking money to do so, and the risk of possibly spending more to recoup little or nothing. For a few local'ish backers that might be feasible, but I imagine that for the ~2,400'ish international backers in particular (~45%) that's not a viable option.
The average backer contributed something like $300. Very few are going to have the ongoing frustration/anger/desire for justice to spend hundreds or thousands more to try to recoup that.
So PB waits out the clock and RRT remains a stain on their already lackluster reputation and the world keeps turning.
Though if Scott (or whomever) continues to deliver a non-update every 2 weeks for that timeframe, means things would go sideways somewhere on the cusp of #300.
Well, I am sure the true "Crisis of Treachery: Crisis Harder" will be not getting all those Wave 1 boxes sold off before the license expires.
Anyone want to imagine a fire sale like no other?
I would dearly love to see them try to sell them after the license expires and rat on them to the IP holder.
I would like to see what "big plans" they have to expand the game. What little they were toying with will be as dead as it can get. Now even the warehouse items have a drop-dead shelf-life.
I imagine that every Christmas Surprise Package will have a free box of RRT.
Or, perhaps, if rumor is to be believed and it was Wayne's decision to buy so much Wave 1 stock, Kevin will start compensating Wayne with that stock (at full msrp value).
I'm sure they stuff the Palladium grab bags friggin full of Robotech garbage. It's already dead stock even after 2021 it'll be dead stock as there's so much of it Palladium will never get rid of it all short of creating an artificial scarcity by E.T. Atari 2600ing the stuff by sending it off to a landfill so there's fewer around and it can be RARE! OOP! on Ebay.
If Scott keeps to schedule, we should get his sixth non update tomorrow..
But if Harmony Gold wants to sue someone, I feel that Palladium games damaged the Robotech license with
the way they handled the RTT kickstarter.. Just look at about all associated kickstarters ended up canceling
because of non funding..
It is really sad because RTT could have strengthen both companies if done right. But it was handled with almost no care.
Karma seems to be taking a slow boat to China to get around to PB (and HG).
I suspect Scott's next update will be that Kevin and Tommy Yune had an important phone call and was reassured that everything will be fine come 2021 with the Robotech license. In fact, Tommy advised Kevin he should move forward with the Mospeada/Sentinels/Shadow Chronicles kickstarter and get that ball rolling right away for the next Robotech anniversary - the end of the Macross War (in more ways than one)! In unrelated news, Kevin is heading north to Canada - for an undisclosed amount of time - to help the Rogue Heroes shell company produce all future Rifts products!
winterdyne wrote: In a nutshell, Robotech is the anime equivalent of a manufactured boy band, comprised of three individually quite different singers, er, series - Superdimensional Fortress: Macross, Southern Cross, and Genesis Climber Mospeada. Overdubbed and adjusted in plot to munge them all together.
The name itself was put initially used by Revell (yes, the model kit / toy company) who wanted something to allow them to market their licensed japanese model kits (some of which were from other series than ended up in the Robotech melange).
Harmony Gold had problems with merchandising as the Macross kits put forward by Revell were already in production under the Robotech name, so both parties effectively agreed to colicense, and Robotech became the name for the imported animation.
Anyway, Harmony Gold's license comes from Tatsunoko who didn't quite have the authority to issue the license in the manner it was - designs and merchandising rights are actually under the authority of the authors of Macross (Studio Nue) and the money men (Big West). Tatsunoko have the distribution rights to the physical animation ONLY.
So, when the license Tatsunoko put out expres in 2021, they will not be able to license out the designs of the mechs, any merchandising or derivative work rights or so on. Tatsunoko and Big West / Studio Nue weren't on friendly terms last I checked either. Hence, Robotech (as a franchise based on licensable assets) dies.
Thanks for the summary, I never knew the bit about the Revell models. At last the mystery of the Robotech Defenders is solved!
That's cool! I recognize the Shadow Hawk at the front, what looks like a Griffin in the top left, an obvious Thunderbolt at the bottom, and what looks like a Battlemaster on the right. Can't make out the other three, but none of them appear to be Macross/Robotech illustrations.
They are from the anime Dougram, an actually pretty decent early 80s giant robot anime. Subtitled episodes can be found on Youtube, if you are curious, though I suggest starting with episode 2. Episode 1 is a flash-forward episode in a series that hadn't even started yet and was only made because the producers wanted the titular giant robot, the Dougram to appear in the first episode when it otherwise wouldn't show up till the 8th. A lot of the mech designs in the show turned up later in Mechwarriror and Battletech, but without the copyright issues that dogged the Macross designs. I wonder if that was because FASA got the usage rights from the correct company (as opposed to that Studio Nue/Tatsunoko snarl associated with Macross) or if Dougram is so forgotten in Japan that nobody bothered to check if the copyright was being infringed in the first place...?
squidhills wrote: They are from the anime Dougram, an actually pretty decent early 80s giant robot anime. Subtitled episodes can be found on Youtube, if you are curious, though I suggest starting with episode 2. Episode 1 is a flash-forward episode in a series that hadn't even started yet and was only made because the producers wanted the titular giant robot, the Dougram to appear in the first episode when it otherwise wouldn't show up till the 8th. A lot of the mech designs in the show turned up later in Mechwarriror and Battletech, but without the copyright issues that dogged the Macross designs. I wonder if that was because FASA got the usage rights from the correct company (as opposed to that Studio Nue/Tatsunoko snarl associated with Macross) or if Dougram is so forgotten in Japan that nobody bothered to check if the copyright was being infringed in the first place...?
Yeah, I am unsure why the "Shadowhawk" was my favorite 50 ton mech, but I always liked the look of it and it seemed to have something for anything.
I really enjoyed the incredibly old "Crescent Hawk" games which could never be repeated due to the mess of "unseen" models.
I loved those old model kits, they were the first I came across with the rubber bushings so the models were poseable and separate weapons you could swap-out.
The best "action figure" hands-down when I was a kid was the Cyclone that was a plastic metal mix and could transform (before there were transformers) that was about $20 way back then.
The Alpha fighter was amazing that came out the similar time also was transforming, weapons swap, a poseable pilot.
Yeah, great nostalgia, really highlights the fact that various kinds of copyright law can kill dead availability of cool stuff... this is why we cannot have nice things?
The intent is for the original creator to get their money so hopefully they are motivated to create more good things.
Robotech seems to be a prime example of when copyright may not be performing as intended.
So, we all reconvene in 2021 and see if we can get more cool Macross stuff into North America and we shall never speak of HG again.
I'm not going to lie. I couldn't care less about Macross. Sure, I occasionally watch Do You Remember Love? I enjoyed Macross II when it snuck into the home video market.
But I'm a middle-aged fuddy-duddy that wants my Macross to be called Robotech and have the epic story of three generations.
n815e wrote: I'm not going to lie. I couldn't care less about Macross. Sure, I occasionally watch Do You Remember Love? I enjoyed Macross II when it snuck into the home video market.
But I'm a middle-aged fuddy-duddy that wants my Macross to be called Robotech and have the epic story of three generations.
I'm exactly like That. Only, you know, the direct opposite
Claims that resins and exclusives are being worked on. Renders of the resin bases and a call for feedback on them. They're OK. Vagueness regarding everything else.
A GenCon report that mentions LESS than Kevin did. Gives almost no details on the tournament. First name of the winner, congratulations to other "winners" of the tournament who shall remain anonymous, no mention of numbers, no mention of forces fielded, no mention of the winning army, nothing. Also, no mention at all of the meetings with manufacturers Scott had mentioned in a previous KSU, and Kevin again provided more details of (in that he acknowledged that it happened), in his PBWU. When you're losing out to Kevin f'n Siembeda on providing information.....
Hurricane Harvey, and best wishes for people in harm's way.
And that's it.
Still no update on quotes, some 10 weeks after Scott took over, and the theory that it could start manufacturing this year. Despite mentioning working on it, and it being a big factor of the previous Update that there'd be in-person talks.
Still no Force Orgs, some 8 weeks since it was broached, and 6 since it should have been up.
We got to see our second lot of renders, over the last ten weeks. At this rate, it'll take until midyear 2019 (19 packs x 5 weeks per render) if they're grouped by pack like the bases are. Or as much as three years (or as it'll be better known, 6 months before PB lose the license) from now if they're split up by individual model, as they did with the Zentradi Infantry. Assuming they don't drastically accelerate (or more likely stop doing them).
It does look like Scott's at least kinda trying. But it's really just smelling like business as usual. ie, freshly made and amply supplied manure pile.
Well, we went something like a full year without a usual 'sign of life' render, and now we have a few.
Is it swift or stellar work? No.
Is it more than we'd been getting? Yes.
Is that a high bar to clear? No, god no, it's so low even a global limbo champion would struggle to get under it.
It is possible, in a world of subtle greys, for something to be 'better' and still 'not good'.
Edit: had they been slowly parceling this kind of info out, say, 2+ years ago, it probably would've been much better received. For a while leading up to Wave 1 they gave us a new render or prototype or whatever once every couple of weeks or so and that was generally fine (until Spartangate and things started going completely sideways).
They've been asked for progress, this is progress. It's not a lot, it's fairly slow, I have no faith in them completing the project (prove me wrong, donkey caves!), but it is objectively more/better than we were getting for a long while there.
So, for the barest of effort they get the faintest of praise.
General summary? I'd watch it myself, but watching and hearing Kevin speak makes me want to do bad things. Hoping someone with lesser issues can break it down for people.
And isn't that the guy who's given flowery puffpieces in the past? Because it gives him access?
It turns out that the t-shirt has almost as many words about robotech as the interview. He asked about imaginary rpg books (since he does zero prep seemingly for interviews) and Kevin says they're in the pipeline.
Merijeek wrote: So, did they ever actually release whatever exciting book that was supposed to be coming out? I think it was REF Marines or whatever?
Yes, they did release it - I did actually pick that book up (from a second-hand seller). Six new cyclone motorcycles, everything else was rehashed from the Sentinels book with "new" artwork for the REF mechs by Chuck (Personally I liked the older versions better, but ...eh). Wouldn't say it was worth it - especially since it was five years late. I only picked it up because the material available about the Sentinels is so sparse - even the comic book for the series was unfinished. About the only value *I* got out of it was the Sentinels timeline at the beginning (which for whatever reason, wasn't in the first Sentinel release book).
Funny thing is, I will never use the Palladium system for any Robotech RPG games - I'd much rather use the likes of Savage Worlds, or Battletech if I was really pressed. I just happen to have received the old Robotech RPGs from a friend years ago, and when the KS showed up, I learned they had redone some of the books, and picked those up to see what had changed. Still have them, don't suspect I'll get rid of them, but at best they're reference material and nothing I'd use the actual stats for.
warboss wrote: It turns out that the t-shirt has almost as many words about robotech as the interview. He asked about imaginary rpg books (since he does zero prep seemingly for interviews) and Kevin says they're in the pipeline.
I watched one of his interviews back in the day, and I have to say, I've watched one too many.
Am I the only one who thinks those bases look terrible? Seriously I thought Scott may have made them real quick himself just to have something to post for this update.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Am I the only one who thinks those bases look terrible? Seriously I thought Scott may have made them real quick himself just to have something to post for this update.
Wouldn't surprise me in the least to find out Scooter had fired up a quick send off on those bases, you could make those in google draw in about five minutes after all. I'd think Kevin was running around on the down low trying to find a fan friend to do the renders for free because I am Palladium and you should help Unca Kevster, but someone would have broke the silence about being approached to work on spec by now I'm sure. Kev can't slap a NDA on them before telling them he loves their work and thinks that Palladium would be great exposure and they should work for free. At least I'd assume not. If I got an email about work that started with agreeing to a NDA before telling me what the job was I'd pretty much drop it in my spam folder. Course that could be happening.
Hi, this is Kevin 'I am Palladium' Siembieda and I noticed your design work and would love to talk with you. Included is a Non-disclosure agreement you must sign off on before we can discuss the fabulous opportunity that awaits you! Excelsior! Trademark! Copywright! Be sure to send the NDA signed, sealed, authorized, filed in a disused lavatory in a filing cabinet marked "Beware of the Leopard" with the first response as we cannot proceed with the modalities.
Signed,
Unca Kevster 'Nigerian Oil Minister of Palladium' S.
vonjankmon wrote: Am I the only one who thinks those bases look terrible? Seriously I thought Scott may have made them real quick himself just to have something to post for this update.
They've received some stinging rebukes. But I'm not THAT critical of them. They'd arguably be "adequate" at best, and just like the miniatures, if they're handled by a skilled modeler, they might come off looking reasonable.
The two flaws that make them problematic for me, firstly is the etching. If the bases are only a few mm thick (much thinner than the resin bases I'm usually working with), how thick can the etching be, that it won't compromise the base's structural integrity. On the 50mm one, the twin parallel lines just off centre look like a VERY easy breakage point. So the only two options are to make them substantially thicker than the existing bases, or to have the etching so thin as to be almost pointless (ie, better to have a stencil kit that you could spray detail onto).
The other issue is the placement of the ID tab. Several of my Malifaux crews have used resin bases or metal base inserts, and one way to add variety is to just reorient the bases, so that it doesn't look like they're standing on the same ground. The ID tab means that each model is going to have that dumbell thing under their left foot. And it doesn't seem like there's going to be more variations, just a single version of each, though that could change.
That brings up a third point I hadn't considered. Why, on the 40mm base, would you put a raised protrusion in the exact spot you're most likely to have a contact point with the model, the point where you're gluing the left leg to the base? This'd be OK if the models weren't created with mostly parade rest stances, or if they had points of articulation that allowed for altering the stance in an easy way.
This'd all be okay, if the pricing was reasonable. But Back2Base-ix for example, does bases for approximately the same price, $8AU (~$6.30US) for 5x40mm or 3x50mm, for much higher quality.
TwoGunBob wrote: Wouldn't surprise me in the least to find out Scooter had fired up a quick send off on those bases, you could make those in google draw in about five minutes after all. I'd think Kevin was running around on the down low trying to find a fan friend to do the renders for free because I am Palladium and you should help Unca Kevster, but someone would have broke the silence about being approached to work on spec by now I'm sure. Kev can't slap a NDA on them before telling them he loves their work and thinks that Palladium would be great exposure and they should work for free. At least I'd assume not. If I got an email about work that started with agreeing to a NDA before telling me what the job was I'd pretty much drop it in my spam folder. Course that could be happening.
Hi, this is Kevin 'I am Palladium' Siembieda and I noticed your design work and would love to talk with you. Included is a Non-disclosure agreement you must sign off on before we can discuss the fabulous opportunity that awaits you! Excelsior! Trademark! Copywright! Be sure to send the NDA signed, sealed, authorized, filed in a disused lavatory in a filing cabinet marked "Beware of the Leopard" with the first response as we cannot proceed with the modalities.
Signed,
Unca Kevster 'Nigerian Oil Minister of Palladium' S.
NDAs are fairly common if you work with design. Anytime people want me to produce an OEM design for manufacturing, I usually have to sign a NDA before they will even discuss the design with me.
You'd sign a NDA and then find out they wanted you to work for 'exposure' and 'spec' and for the awesome chance to work for Palladium the '142nd fastest company in the west' but no money and find it binding to the NDA that you couldn't even say you were approached to work for nothing?
Edit: Cause I'm honestly curious, I'd consider it my time wasted and any contract was in bad faith to begin with if a company were trying to muzzle me about them fishing for work to be done for free.
I've done editing work for free under NDA but they were up front about it and asked if I could work for free and well, you get what you pay for. Never had anyone approach me waving a NDA and THEN tell me they were seeing if I would work for free but don't tell anyone because the NDA was binding me to silence.
Well... it looks like Kickstarter are taking a much harder line on people's comments than they previously have.
I sent Merijeek's post from earlier today in the Update commentary, to a friend, and it's gone. And Meri is claiming in the commentary it was deleted.
The post read "Well, Kevin specifically said it wasn't spent on a yacht. So I'm going 98% chance it was spent on a yacht."
So... that's a change. Speculation, especially snide speculation, is a deletabe offense. Meri being Meri, doubled down on this by posting in the general commentary. So I expect a suspension sometime in his future. But feth that. I want an " I'm with Meri" tshirt.
Better to quell dissent than actually answer reasonable questions. So feth them.
Funny thing a gRifts: The Bored Game is that I'm sure all the work put into reconfiguring the kickstarter is how to silence Robotech backers and voices of criticism rather than actually making the game presentation BETTER. There will still be no rules available, no manufacturer information, the board itself will still be a cocktail napkin. They will just try to stop people asking basic questions and pray they can delete comments that ask for accountability BEFORE giving over any money.
Unca Kevster sees this as a, "how can I silence my critics?" versus "how can I make this project can I make this project so awesome and irresistible that people will overlook my failure on Robotech and still invest?"
I don't think there's anything Unca Kev, Wayno, Car-man and Scooter can do to make gRifts a success short of finishing Robotech and that's the one thing they blatantly refuse to do apparently. All this work to weasel out of their obligation and they are surprised and disappointed that the gaming community is holding them to their agreement to produce a product people paid for.
That's one of "the things", right? Their communication basically comes down to Kevin feeling entitled to our money and perhaps giving us something in return for it "soon".
What amazes me is that Palladium fans actually enable this behavior, they defend it and claim to happily cough up their own money (I sincerely doubt many of them do) for the privilege.
Palladium is the actual welfare queen of the gaming industry.
It comes as a real shock to them that there are customers who hold them accountable, that their reputation has an impact on their bottom line.
Well, I hope there is sufficient negativity out there so a quick search can show that pre-order or any other money up front investment is a proven fools game with Palladium Books.
Why do you think I always type their full name every time I post?
It gives me that warm fuzzy feeling every single time I post some negative comment about them.
I am not normally a petty guy...
Alpharius wrote: I *think* KS recently gave creators more abilities to 'police' their comments sections?
Maybe?
That's plausible because I don't think Kickstarter has started monitoring projects that are over three years old and still not completed..
You would think a service would worry about that kind of thing.. Sad thing is if Palladium has power to prune their comment section..
It will start to look like a government document discussing area 51.
But the other thing is I watch the interview video and Kevin was very happy to have sold 70 copies the first day and plans on selling
all he brought of 120 copies.. That's only about $2500, I don't think that would even cover table cost.
Then you think at the same convention.. Piazo released Star Finder.. I feel they are a small press company too, but made a lot better
decisions and continued to grow.. If they only sold a 120 copies of it for the whole convention of 60k people attending it would be a
complete bust and think the game would be a failure.
Alpharius wrote: I *think* KS recently gave creators more abilities to 'police' their comments sections?
Maybe?
That's plausible because I don't think Kickstarter has started monitoring projects that are over three years old and still not completed.. You would think a service would worry about that kind of thing.. Sad thing is if Palladium has power to prune their comment section.. It will start to look like a government document discussing area 51.
But the other thing is I watch the interview video and Kevin was very happy to have sold 70 copies the first day and plans on selling all he brought of 120 copies.. That's only about $2500, I don't think that would even cover table cost.
Then you think at the same convention.. Piazo released Star Finder.. I feel they are a small press company too, but made a lot better decisions and continued to grow.. If they only sold a 120 copies of it for the whole convention of 60k people attending it would be a complete bust and think the game would be a failure.
Yeah, I mentioned that on the previous page, a 10x10 booth cost $1600 last year. The PB booth was definitely larger than that. That he's proud of selling out a print run of 120 is just showing how deep into the rabbit hole he is. Everything he does is awesome. Any critique is ignored.
Hell, this is the ONLY book they had produced this year, to that point. If 120 books is a significant marker on your balance sheet, it really does call into question as to how they keep the doors open.
Yeah, I mentioned that on the previous page, a 10x10 booth cost $1600 last year. The PB booth was definitely larger than that. That he's proud of selling out a print run of 120 is just showing how deep into the rabbit hole he is. Everything he does is awesome. Any critique is ignored.
Hell, this is the ONLY book they had produced this year, to that point. If 120 books is a significant marker on your balance sheet, it really does call into question as to how they keep the doors open.
That's what I see also.. They are a old company and have a bunch of baggage that Scott will needs to deal with.. First is the fix the RTT wagon because it is pulling everything down..
Next is to have Kevin stop announcing product until it is leaving for printing.. This "we are working on it and its coming out soon" is making them look like fools.
Even looking at Gen Con, they had four days of chances to sale product to over 60,000 gamers (not regular people) and they are happy to sale 120 books.. That is a less than a one percent
of possible customers being sold to. My other worry is Palladium will finish RTT and slob out everything, so it will be a dumpster fire at low tide when it arrives with no chances of resurrection.
Genoside07 wrote: But the other thing is I watch the interview video and Kevin was very happy to have sold 70 copies the first day and plans on selling
all he brought of 120 copies.. That's only about $2500, I don't think that would even cover table cost.
Wait a minute, was he talking about core boxes?
Because those are $100, but that'd be down to $70 with the booklet coupon, as I recall.
That's still $8,400 (70 x 120). Where are you getting $2,500 from?
Even just those 70 copies at discount would be nearly 5 grand.
Obviously that's still pocket change compared to the scope of wave 2, just curious why one of us seems to be having a massive math fail.
Unless you were talking about the expansions? Which, yeah, sure, go ahead and keep the lights on $20 or $30 at a time.
No, Kevin in the interview was talking about the new Rifts book release that should be around $20-$25
So I was doing quick math of 120 (copies sold) at $25 should be $3000 and table cost should be alot more
than that... Also including the fact that 120 books for 60,000 people is not a whole lot..
Even moreso, that $3,000 wouldn't all be profit - gotta pay the freelancer, artist and print costs to have made that book in the first place. Well, at least the print costs.
I just have to wonder what - beyond RT funds - keeps these guys in business that they can can even keep their doors open anymore. There is no way one book release per year can do it, nor the sale of T-shirts, playing cards or tumblers. They have GOT to be close to having draining those RT funds, if they hadn't already done so long ago.
n815e wrote: I wonder if there is still RRT money and perhaps they are living off of the interest it generates.
Kevin knows he will never see that kind of cash again.
It is really sad that Kevin thinks it is okay to just keep the money and not work on it..
He acts like he is working on RTT.. but the years of nothing is the proof of whats really going on.
I agree with most as our current situation is Harmony Gold will loose the licence in 2021 and Kevin
will be forced to say what happened to the kick starter money.. and that will not be pretty, I am sure of that.
I imagine that Kevin will claim that there's an NDA in place and he can't speak to what happened to the money.
Of course, what's really happened is that the money was given to Palladium Books, and Kevin is Palladium Books. And he can do whatever the hell he wants with HIS money. So go to hell, peasants.
Perhaps hes doing like other shonky businesses and been telling staff 'money's a bit short, I promise to pay you next week'.
Or in the case of freelancers they havent been getting paid anyway. And why should he? The amount of time Kevin has to waste rewritting submissions so they meet his standard.
Unfortunately Palladium Books and Kevin have pointed out the error of Kickstarter: if a creator really does not want to give the money back and is not getting the rewards done,he only has to take a few simple steps.
There is only one method that they cannot dodge: do not send them any form of money... ever.
This is why what few "White Knights" they have, I have no patience or time for: if it suits PB's purposes, they can take these people's orders and say they are "working on it".
How many times does it need to be demonstrated that PB feels only a token need to make good on a consumer exchange?
Their Christmas package is a fine example of that: we give you whatever we feel like and will receive your wishes but will not necessarily fulfil them.
I just bet Kevin looks up the name, would find me and throw the lump of coal in the package.
I am pretty sure he considers himself a saint.
Talizvar wrote: Unfortunately Palladium Books and Kevin have pointed out the error of Kickstarter: if a creator really does not want to give the money back and is not getting the rewards done,he only has to take a few simple steps.
There is only one method that they cannot dodge: do not send them any form of money... ever.
This is why what few "White Knights" they have, I have no patience or time for: if it suits PB's purposes, they can take these people's orders and say they are "working on it".
How many times does it need to be demonstrated that PB feels only a token need to make good on a consumer exchange?
Their Christmas package is a fine example of that: we give you whatever we feel like and will receive your wishes but will not necessarily fulfil them.
I just bet Kevin looks up the name, would find me and throw the lump of coal in the package.
I am pretty sure he considers himself a saint.
I'd be willing to buy you a Palladium Christmas Bundle/Sale/Grab Bag thingie just to see if it would happen!
I'll PayPal you the money this December - just shoot me a reminder!
Alpharius wrote: I'll PayPal you the money this December - just shoot me a reminder!
I think... I may view this as being a rabble-rouser.
I am curious myself.
It could be an interesting "place your bets" moment.
But the devil is in the details: should I insist on the Starter Box or ask for Robotech RPG books?
Would I get the starter box because they need to get rid of it, or do they get me everything else I did not ask for?
To be sure, your money may be better spent on Morgan ordering a package.
Morgan would also be a good choice, but given their hefty shipping charges, we'd be pissing away a substantial amount of money on a gag, and the best case scenario is someone receives '$90 to $95 worth of product' (or whatever it is they boast about) they don't actually want, and probably can't even resell at a loss.
Given them like $100+ or whatever to send him a pile of crap would really be a 'jokes on you' kind of moment.
Hell, even if they didn't go the coal route, a pile of dusty Rifters would be about as valuable (give or take, as a fire starter).
evilsmurf wrote: Perhaps hes doing like other shonky businesses and been telling staff 'money's a bit short, I promise to pay you next week'.
No. It's on record that he just flat out tells them they'll be working for him for free. Everyone in the office has to take a "turn" at working for several months for no wage.
This came out some years ago when some writer or other in his employ quit when presented with the requirement to work for free. Unca Kev wrote a murmur or something where he treated it like the most natural thing in the world that people should work for him for no wage as well as cast a bit of subtle shade on the writer as not being dedicated enough.
vonjankmon wrote: If you are a fan of Robotech but have not watched Macross Frontier you need to fix that. Robotech is how I was introduced to the whole mech franchise thing so it holds a special gilded place in my heart but Macross Frontier is seriously good without having to have the "Watched it when I was a kid" gilded memories that Robotech has.
+1
The whole idea of mashing up an idol series and a mecha combat series sounds mad, but Macross Frontier really makes it work. The intercut concert scenes and mecha combat in the first episode are truly epic.
Alpharius wrote: I'll PayPal you the money this December - just shoot me a reminder!
I think... I may view this as being a rabble-rouser.
I am curious myself.
It could be an interesting "place your bets" moment.
But the devil is in the details: should I insist on the Starter Box or ask for Robotech RPG books?
Would I get the starter box because they need to get rid of it, or do they get me everything else I did not ask for?
To be sure, your money may be better spent on Morgan ordering a package.
Well, you're either getting a lump of poop or an RRT starter box.
So..I'd request anything BUT a starter box. Though I expect you to get one anyway.
WithintheDungeon wrote: Has anyone ever estimated how much money just the shipping would cost?
Would we guess it was more or less than 1/10? 150K etc.
~73% of the backers are located in the US, based on the Community data page on the campaign. Glancing at the USPS site, there isn't a flat rate box large enough that would hold a core box and battle cry extras bag, and the one closest to the core alone is $16.55 (no idea what the cost was back in 2014/2015).
Let's say $25, on average, just to ballpark it, and average out between the smaller orders that maybe they got away with something roughly around $20'ish, some that were substantially more in the $30 range, and not sweat the exact breakdown of who got what (with Showdown and Reckless backers, one person might account for multiple boxes, but we have no idea what the actual distribution is on that).
That'd be about $100k right there. And again, that's probably a low estimate.
It also leaves about 1,400 backers who weren't in the US, and had presumably higher shipping costs involved. My group that got a double reckless had 2 large boxes shipped to us containing wave 1 (4 cores plus bags per), and I think it was $50 per box. Even if we assume an average of around $50 per non-US backer, that's another $70k.
So, low end, that's an estimate of $150k, and something closer to $200-250k+ wouldn't surprise me at all.
"But Forar, you just said 100k and 70k, but you're starting around 150k? Lawl you fael @ mathz", some might point out.
The reason I did so was that there are 343 backers listed at the "new dawn" level just getting Rick's VT, which obviously they have not gotten. Now, yes, I'm sure some of those might have upgraded to a Battle Cry or higher during the Pledge Manager, but we don't know. They're an unknown variable that could lighten the load on shipping they had to do, and a couple hundred backers would add up pretty quickly.
And because this thread is full of pedants ( :-P ) I'll also point out that yes, this obviously ignores the costs incurred with design and production and shipping and the omgwtfbbq levels of overstock they seem to have procured and a half dozen other elements that have come up. This is just musing about shipping, and I think it's pretty safe to say they probably dropped 10-20% of the funds received on shipping to backers.
"So doesn't that mean they'd need hundreds of thousands more to ship the rest, even if they could produce it?" Well, yeah, I mean flat rate boxes for US backers would probably be cheaper, because for many it'd just be a bag or two of extra sprues and maybe an add on or two (based on the average contribution being ~$270, and Wayne saying they got roughly another 10% in the pledge manager, so ~$300 per backer either becomes a Showdown with minimal add ons or a Battle Cry with substantial add ons, as an average, balanced against the New Dawn (Rick Hunter VT) low end and the 'why did you think you needed 20+ core boxes?!?' high end.
However, even if the 27 figures fit in a Large Flat Rate box, that'd be another ~65.5k to the US backers alone. I'm ruling out the Small and Medium boxes because some of the larger figures (MPA, FPA) probably add up where the medium might not work out, and the small definitely wouldn't. If they pulled off the Medium box, that'd still be nearly 50k. And again, that's before ROW backers, which would presumably be double that, if not more. 100-200k as a ballpark, in shipping alone?
And again (hi guys), this includes the usual caveats about challenging whether they have any funding at all, whether whatever has been left over might have been put into an investment vehicle of any sort beyond getting 0.01% in a bank account, whether they've been drawing off the interest and/or principal to keep the lights on or cover other costs, etc, etc, etc. This isn't intended to be a PHD dissertation on their funding, but a semi-stream of thought bit of napkin math while glancing at the publicly available information and trying to note where variables exist.
Short of PB collapsing in an embarrassing way and Wayne or someone else deciding to drop the whole story through a thinly veiled intermediary.
We can waffle and debate the particulars, but in general I think it's a safe assumption that they spent 'a gakload' on shipping alone, and would be shocked if it cost less than half that again to finish the job (if they could/were interested in more than just stringing us along for half a decade, etc, etc).
Forar - your shipping estimates are interesting, but depending on how the work is done, it can actually come out to be significantly less if you are buying the postage online and printing the labels yourself. And doing the sorting before the PO picks it up, too.
Just as a frame of reference, I get about a 9% discount when printing my own labels on eBay, and I am not a Power Seller, or anything like that. The discount was even more when I was. So, just sayin, the published rates ain't the be all and end all, if you're smart about it. Then again, this is Palladium we're talking about, where your average houseplant can outthink Kevin most days...
Yeah, I recall Dwarven Forge and Bones (I think) talking about getting discounts for massive bulk shipping.
But even shaving 10% off 'a gakload of money' is 90% of a gakload of money.
Unless they had some deal sorted out involving *insert sexual favor here*, I doubt they were getting enough of a discount to matter in the grand scheme of things. Sure, 10-30 grand is a lot of money to the average person, but if getting the project finished costs substantial fractions of a million or more, it's more of a rounding error.
Sounds like it might be one of the more...interesting things that KS has written in a long time!
It's in the old Bill Coffin rant, though I'm unable to find a link to the actual posting he made (think it's on RPGNET somewhere).
Automatically Appended Next Post: On shipping, if I recall correctly, the super-massive post/rant Kevin did a year or two back listed ROW shipping at $150K.
I badly wanted to include additional shipping fees in the Kickstarter. Something that almost everyone does today, but back then, we were strongly advised not to. We were told that nobody (back then) charged shipping and that if we charged a shipping fee in addition to the backer pledge levels, it would severely reduce the chances of a successful Kickstarter. This was the subject of many discussions. I finally acquiesced, but it would be something that would haunt us later, as shipping worldwide would be in the neighborhood of $150,000 all by itself. Just for Wave One!
Which is bull. Even back then, it wasn't that 'nobody charged for shipping', it was expected that domestic shipping would be included in the base tier (and then extra charged for international backers).
They also rescinded the original claim that international backers would only pay shipping once for a combined package, and charged multiple times for larger orders. I don't know how much it amounted to, likely only a drop in the bucket, but in retrospect I can only assume it was made to try to stem some of the hemorrhaging they were likely expecting at the time.
Let's not forget that they also have to pay taxes on those funds, and likely any funds made with interest. It would be sort of interesting if they put a bunch of funds in five year bonds, so as to maximize they're profits (more speculation) I mean how else does a company that had produced 2 RPG products this year with a staff of 3 (+1 or 2) and Scott Gibbons keep the lights on... Truthfully I'd like to know... It's damn amazing... Either no one is being paid, or the "crisis of treachery" was a double cross? Remember Kevin had said hundreds of thousands of dollars were stolen and in the end he got a small five figures (or was it four?)...
And to the other stuff...
Bill Coffin:https://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?74137-What-s-up-with-Palladium-and-BTS&p=1445566#post1445566
Josh Hilden:http://www.therpgsite.com/showthread.php?12632-Palladium-Kevin-backstabs-Dead-Reign-authors
And Don't forget Kevin Siembieda:http://palladium-megaverse.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=97573
I don't' remember Bill saying that folks weren't paid or worked for free at Kevin's request, I think that is inaccurate.
WOAH! WOAH! HEY HEY NOW! WHAT'S WITH EVERYBODY WANTING TO HAVE PALLADIUM SEND ME THE GAMING EQUIVALENT OF POOP IN A BOX?
Besides, I'd rather get repeatedly kicked in the nards than have PB receive any money on my behalf. Especially given that you know Kevin would gouge the crap out of things on shipping to make sure he came out on top.
Re the shipping estimates, just look at how much PB charge for shipping, and tell me that PB have any frikkin clue about how to save money on shipping.
I badly wanted to include additional shipping fees in the Kickstarter. Something that almost everyone does today, but back then, we were strongly advised not to. We were told that nobody (back then) charged shipping and that if we charged a shipping fee in addition to the backer pledge levels, it would severely reduce the chances of a successful Kickstarter. This was the subject of many discussions. I finally acquiesced, but it would be something that would haunt us later, as shipping worldwide would be in the neighborhood of $150,000 all by itself. Just for Wave One!
Which is bull. Even back then, it wasn't that 'nobody charged for shipping', it was expected that domestic shipping would be included in the base tier (and then extra charged for international backers).
They also rescinded the original claim that international backers would only pay shipping once for a combined package, and charged multiple times for larger orders. I don't know how much it amounted to, likely only a drop in the bucket, but in retrospect I can only assume it was made to try to stem some of the hemorrhaging they were likely expecting at the time.
Of course, like most things, Kevin is the prescient one. He's the one that saw the problem immediately, and it was the failure of the people around him that As is always the case. Like it was with parts count. Like it was with 98%. Like it has been for everything. Kevin's only mistake is trusting the people around him.
I badly wanted to include additional shipping fees in the Kickstarter. Something that almost everyone does today, but back then, we were strongly advised not to. We were told that nobody (back then) charged shipping and that if we charged a shipping fee in addition to the backer pledge levels, it would severely reduce the chances of a successful Kickstarter. This was the subject of many discussions. I finally acquiesced, but it would be something that would haunt us later, as shipping worldwide would be in the neighborhood of $150,000 all by itself. Just for Wave One!
Which is bull. Even back then, it wasn't that 'nobody charged for shipping', it was expected that domestic shipping would be included in the base tier (and then extra charged for international backers).
They also rescinded the original claim that international backers would only pay shipping once for a combined package, and charged multiple times for larger orders. I don't know how much it amounted to, likely only a drop in the bucket, but in retrospect I can only assume it was made to try to stem some of the hemorrhaging they were likely expecting at the time.
I truly think Palladium got involved in this purely because of the money they could potentially make in getting it funded and lost sight of the nuts and bolts in what it will take to make it work. The trouble is that when you read gems like this from RRT Update 176, it makes me wonder if they truly did their Due Diligence getting involved in a Kickstarter:
Spoiler:
It was my friend Jolly Blackburn, creator of Knights of the Dinner Table, who first told me about Kickstarter and that I should look into it. A couple weeks later, out of the blue, Carmen Bellaire began ranting about the value of Kickstarter and that it was something Palladium needed to look into. This was before Robotech® RPG Tactics™ was even an idea.
Carmen was the first to restart the Kickstarter conversation, saying we should fund the Robotech® RPG Tactics™ project via Kickstarter. That it would be easy. Tom Roache concurred. We were hesitant. It sounded great, but we knew it had to be a lot more demanding and difficult than it sounded. And it had to be done right to be successful.
If we apply a reasonable person standard to the above quote, it would lead us to believe that Kevin and Company did their due diligence in what it would take to run the kickstarter from start to finish. Hoever, we know this to not be the case.
Spoiler:
Enter Ninja Division. At the time, Soda Pop Miniatures and Cipher Studios had done something like eight Kickstarters between them, and had the experience we lacked in all areas. The Ninjas said they could handle the Kickstarter 100%, from start to finish. From the graphics, writing and the video presentation, to the stretch goals and Q&A. This was a huge relief, as we knew nothing about doing a Kickstarter. We let the Ninjas run with it, sat back and watched in awe. Of course, we made some suggestions and did some editing, but this was Ninja Division’s show. We trusted their expertise and what needed to be done. And look as the result, wow. The Kickstarter was a tremendous success and there was much rejoicing.
Seawolf bone of contention #5,876: If Ninja Division was running it, and everything was ready to go, all of the ensuing drama not have occurred... In other words, everything was ready, and all that was needed was funding. It sounds highly likely that there was no communication between Palladium and Ninja Division with a major dose of no one really having an idea who is responsible for anything beyond the scope of work that either party contracted to.
Speaking of bone of contention #5,877:
Spoiler:
First, not knowing anything about Kickstarters, we did not realize the real job of managing a Kickstarter begins AFTER the Kickstarter is funded. We thought that when Ninja Division said it would handle the Kickstarter from start to finish, that they would be handling everything. Again, we didn’t know what “everything” entailed.
As it turned out, they meant “finish” as a successful funding. Again, not knowing exactly what’s involved and with miscommunication by both parties, Palladium did not realize it would be our responsibility to handle the thousands of emails and questions that would follow the successful funding of the Kickstarter. Remember, we were still figuring out and learning everything about Kickstarters, including establishing the BackerKit storefront to manage the pledges of our 5,000+ backers, among many other things. Consequently, something like six weeks went by without Palladium answering a single question or email on the Kickstarter page. It was only when one of the Ninjas reached out to Palladium, asking why were we ignoring the backers on the Kickstarter page, and the discussion that followed, that we at Palladium realized it was our job to manage the page. We jumped right on it, but by then, backers were frustrated and we had a thousand plus emails to answer, plus regular posts and updates to make. Like I said, it was crazy as that express train was rocketing down the tracks with more unexpected challenges and surprises to come.
How the deuce did either party not know what that meant? Did either party read the bloody contract? Apparently not. Again, if we apply a reasonable person standard in a contract environment if a term was vague or ambiguous you call the other party for clarification before signing your name to the document. Also, this illustrated the other glaring issue in 176 - Did Kevin presume he didn't have to interact with the fanbase? Its his company's name on the box, its his product to hype. You would think you want to have that interaction.
Spoiler:
Second, we discovered we were not “98% done” and ready for manufacturing. This was a huge surprise, the details and depths of which we did not come to fully understand till some months after we had missed our 2013 Fall Release. I’ve caught a lot of flack for saying we were 98% done, but that’s what we thought. All of us.
Our past experience was the old school method of making game pieces in which once you have your sculpts – in this case, the 3D renders – you make your mold and you start spitting out and packaging pieces. 98% of the 3D sculpts were done. The rules, done. The artwork, done. Final book layout easy, breezy and something that should be done in a matter of days; a no-brainer. Game card designs, mostly finished. When we launched and finished the Kickstarter, we truly thought we were 98% DONE. Here’s something you’ll laugh at, when we first estimated a November 2013 release, we actually thought we were being cautious. There was no doubt in our minds at Palladium that Robotech® RPG Tactics™ would ship that Fall. December at the latest. We spent money on ads saying as much.
Spoiler:
It turns out the type of manufacturing we’re doing is fairly new to the hobby game industry. There are serious conversion and incompatibility issues in converting the 3D models done by the sculptors to what needs to be done in China to make the molds and go into manufacturing. This is not just something Palladium and Ninja Division ran into, it’s true for EVERYONE using this type of manufacturing process. Only we didn’t know that at the time. Neither did Ninja Division, who were only starting to get the picture after the Kickstarter ended and they sent the first digital files over. (Or if they did, they didn’t realize the conversion process would be as arduous.) It would take Palladium months to grasp exactly what the situation was. Mainly because at that time, we weren’t directly involved in the conversations with the factory and the Manufacturing Broker. As the seemingly inexplicable delays went on, it seemed insane to us. How could someone not have made a conversion program for these incompatible files (3D sculpts versus what the manufacturer/factory needs)? However, we have since had this confirmed by the folks at Dust and several other game companies that this is, indeed, the case, and there is no way around it at the present time. Crazy, right?
Crazy is not doing your due diligence. If a reasonable person standard was applied here (I know I am applying it the wrong entity, silly me) then either Palladium or Ninja Division should have asked the manufacturer broker what rendering software do they use BEFORE turning over the renders. These errors should have been caught before being turned over to the manufacturer.
Lack of due diligence on Palladium's part is not an excuse for the lack of due diligence of the remaining parties. Palladium mismanaged this. Pure and simple. and for it to progress as long as it has, damages the IP further. Robotech RRT is tainted property at this point in time, purely because of the gak-fest its become. Even if they manage to get Wave 2 off, they still will be sitting on tainted property. The support is non-existent from Palladium, and will continue to be so as long as they continue dithering about.
Even if Wave 2 ships, the conversation will likely go like this:
"Hey I got my Wave 2 awards for Robotech RPG Tactics."
"Really? Cool! Want to play Star Wars Legion?"
"Lets!"
The opportunity to correct this was back when Wave 1 was received and prepped for shipping. Not almost three years later.
I finally figured out how they came up with the 98% done, BTW - from that update.
Kevin Sembedia wrote:
In 2012, my original plan was to only make game pieces to sell as an add-on to the existing role-playing game market. Research is 90% of everything in business, so we started to quietly talk with fans to find out whether they had any interest in Robotech® game pieces. They did.
So, 90% of their work was asking the fans if they wanted the game. The remaining 8% was what they had worked on for Wave 1.
Morgan Vening wrote: WOAH! WOAH! HEY HEY NOW! WHAT'S WITH EVERYBODY WANTING TO HAVE PALLADIUM SEND ME THE GAMING EQUIVALENT OF POOP IN A BOX?
Besides, I'd rather get repeatedly kicked in the nards than have PB receive any money on my behalf. Especially given that you know Kevin would gouge the crap out of things on shipping to make sure he came out on top.
It is precisely the reason for getting this gratifying response that the proposal was made. I do admit it is just toying with the thought.
It goes completely contrary to my need to ensure Palladium Books does not get any money in any way.
A Christmas package purchase could allow Kevin to operate for days on that.
I am glad our sentiments are aligned, maybe yours are a bit more dramatic and vivid but still good to see.
I selected ACD because its a decent sized game distributor that lists release dates on their products.
Looks like the tumblers, 2 rifters and Rifts® Secrets of the Atlanteans that just was released right before GenCon.
So it is now September and they officially have 2 (Originally called Bi-monthly) magazines and one official book out.
Nightbane is listed as Pre Order on ACD website and I trust the book has not been released.
The tumblers are no real work internally I am sure.. Just send in art work a certain size and everything else is done..
There is a dozen websites that do that from coffee mugs to T-shirts.
So only One real release this year in 9 months of 2017, but yet they promise each year that RTT will be released this year..
They added Scott to help out, so Kevin can do more work, but I think it will be more the same.
But yeah, sure, no KS money is being used on anything not related to the Robotech project...
Though I'm sure that some simple mental gymnastics can get them to the 'but...but...we need to pay the bills in order to be able to keep working on the KS project!"
Palladium really is to blame, in every way, for what the discussion has become, and is, in terms of their KS campaign and how they've decided to run it.
Alpharius wrote: Though I'm sure that some simple mental gymnastics can get them to the 'but...but...we need to pay the bills in order to be able to keep working on the KS project!"
I suspect that is the exact thought process.
No gymnastics at all.
Paying overhead costs is part of expense toward the KS project in their eyes.
"Despite what some have suggested, I want you to know there has not been any misappropriation of the funds raised by the Kickstarter, nor any wrongdoing of any kind.
Not by me or anyone at Palladium Books. There is absolutely NO merit for such conjecture or inferences.
If there were ever any type of investigation, Palladium has accurate records, receipts, correspondences and documentation for every expense and transaction we’ve made regarding Robotech® RPG Tactics™.
I have not spent the money on a new car or boat, there is no new house, no purchase of stocks and bonds, no salary raise, no luxury vacation (heck, no vacation at all), no parties, or any misuse of Kickstarter money whatsoever.
We are all hardworking people dedicated to our fan base.
Furthermore, we have produced and shipped a substantial portion of the Robotech® RPG Tactics™ rewards (Wave One) around the world, and are actively working towards the production and delivery of the rest (Wave Two).
I don’t know what people think when they see a Kickstarter net 1.4 million dollars, but it’s not free money.
It’s not hitting the lotto.
And it sure as hell is not ours to just take and spend as we may please. It is an obligation to thousands of people.
That money is designated to make the shared dream of a new, different Robotech® game line a reality, and it’s a responsibility we take very seriously.
The money has gone into making this shared dream of the Robotech® RPG Tactics™ game line.
We have poured our hearts and souls into this game." - Kevin Siembieda
It is funny how he lists where the money was NOT spent but to this day, we keep guessing where it IS spent like on shipping.
You can also review the Wave 2 renders and remember it was 2 years ago.
Side note here:
Spoiler:
I have an observation that has bugged me for a while.
Kevin is a publisher and editor of what is a largely text publication.
I increasingly find Kevin's writing rather poor in structure which I rarely see from his peers in other businesses.
Maybe I am overly picky but starting a sentence with "and"?
I am not part of the grammar and punctuation police by a long shot but people usually take some pride in their craft.
He seems to exhibit little care even in what is his claimed profession.
After 2 years of no progress from that posting, I am wondering on the amount of "hearts and souls" on offer.
I think even the Devil could not be bothered to strike a deal for such a meager ration.
I was looking at that "New Release" page, and just have to wonder when the 8 1/2 x 11 version of Southern Cross was finally released. I have the magna size and had been lkeeping an eye out for when the full-sized was going to come out - it snuck past me.
Grrr. Completionist me wants it so I have a full-sized set. Rational me says not to give money to PB. Wonder if I can get a used copy somewhere and satisfy both sides...
Easy E wrote: I have this niggling feeling that this thread serves no further purpose and is instead just sucking the air out of the rest of the Misc Sci-Fi Forum.
I mean, how much can we say, "Grrrr. Palladium! You suck!" before it just doesn't matter anymore?
Edit: On Topic. Still have 2 core boxes and extra Destroid boxes that I have not even opened.
Have you tried to post your concerns constructively to the Palladium Books Forums? I think the only person that has done so without being censored or banned for trolling is Forar. You literally are policed for saying anything that can be construed as negative towards the company even if you attempt some semblance of diplomacy. So this forum, and others similar to it, are the only outlet to vent our frustration (or increasing, as it were) at a company that has a rather well documented history of not delivering on a timely basis.
Don't get me wrong. I do want to see Wave 2 make it to reality. But clearly PB did not due their due diligence and jumped onto a bandwagon they were neither capable or prepared for.
Do they deserve every ounce of my contempt and frustration? By the Divine Emperor's toilet plunger, feth yes. I contributed to it. Like others involved with this, I gave my money, as others did to the tune of 1.4 million, to help finance a project that I wanted to see on the tabletop. So as long as the discourse is civil, I will voice my displeasure at PB in a constructive manner... and if it prevents some poor soul from committing their coin to a company that is run as shoddliy as this one, the better off they will be!
Easy E wrote: I have this niggling feeling that this thread serves no further purpose and is instead just sucking the air out of the rest of the Misc Sci-Fi Forum.
I mean, how much can we say, "Grrrr. Palladium! You suck!" before it just doesn't matter anymore?
Edit: On Topic. Still have 2 core boxes and extra Destroid boxes that I have not even opened.
We post here because it's cheaper than driving to Kevin's house and punching him in the face.
I would say it's cheaper than trying to find a lawyer to file suit against Palladium for a refund probably totaling on $30-$55 in the end.
Hmmm, my youngest hopes to become a lawyer. Perhaps he'll be done with law school and take the case on behalf of his dear old dad pro bono as a favor? I mean, we have the time he's in 7th grade right now and this will still be in the same status by the time he finishes law school I'm sure.
Easy E wrote: I have this niggling feeling that this thread serves no further purpose and is instead just sucking the air out of the rest of the Misc Sci-Fi Forum.
I mean, how much can we say, "Grrrr. Palladium! You suck!" before it just doesn't matter anymore?
Edit: On Topic. Still have 2 core boxes and extra Destroid boxes that I have not even opened.
Have you tried to post your concerns constructively to the Palladium Books Forums? I think the only person that has done so without being censored or banned for trolling is Forar. You literally are policed for saying anything that can be construed as negative towards the company even if you attempt some semblance of diplomacy. So this forum, and others similar to it, are the only outlet to vent our frustration (or increasing, as it were) at a company that has a rather well documented history of not delivering on a timely basis.
Don't get me wrong. I do want to see Wave 2 make it to reality. But clearly PB did not due their due diligence and jumped onto a bandwagon they were neither capable or prepared for.
Do they deserve every ounce of my contempt and frustration? By the Divine Emperor's toilet plunger, feth yes. I contributed to it. Like others involved with this, I gave my money, as others did to the tune of 1.4 million, to help finance a project that I wanted to see on the tabletop. So as long as the discourse is civil, I will voice my displeasure at PB in a constructive manner... and if it prevents some poor soul from committing their coin to a company that is run as shoddliy as this one, the better off they will be!
Exalted!
Dakka Dakka - your place to vent peacefully!
TalonZahn wrote:
Easy E wrote: I have this niggling feeling that this thread serves no further purpose and is instead just sucking the air out of the rest of the Misc Sci-Fi Forum.
I mean, how much can we say, "Grrrr. Palladium! You suck!" before it just doesn't matter anymore?
Edit: On Topic. Still have 2 core boxes and extra Destroid boxes that I have not even opened.
We post here because it's cheaper than driving to Kevin's house and punching him in the face.
...so this ^ doesn't happen out there in Real Life!
TwoGunBob wrote:I wouldn't say that...
I would say it's cheaper than trying to find a lawyer to file suit against Palladium for a refund probably totaling on $30-$55 in the end.
Hmmm, my youngest hopes to become a lawyer. Perhaps he'll be done with law school and take the case on behalf of his dear old dad pro bono as a favor? I mean, we have the time he's in 7th grade right now and this will still be in the same status by the time he finishes law school I'm sure.
I selected ACD because its a decent sized game distributor that lists release dates on their products.
Looks like the tumblers, 2 rifters and Rifts® Secrets of the Atlanteans that just was released right before GenCon.
So it is now September and they officially have 2 (Originally called Bi-monthly) magazines and one official book out.
Nightbane is listed as Pre Order on ACD website and I trust the book has not been released.
The tumblers are no real work internally I am sure.. Just send in art work a certain size and everything else is done..
There is a dozen websites that do that from coffee mugs to T-shirts.
So only One real release this year in 9 months of 2017, but yet they promise each year that RTT will be released this year..
They added Scott to help out, so Kevin can do more work, but I think it will be more the same.
Minor point of correction, but the Rifter has always been a quarterly publication.
I think posting here allows me to "think out loud" enough so I do not appear completely insane when I post on the Kickstarter page.
I will not need any comments on how well that is working out for me...
Talizvar wrote: I think posting here allows me to "think out loud" enough so I do not appear completely insane when I post on the Kickstarter page.
I will not need any comments on how well that is working out for me...
All things in perspective, Talizvar, its likely working as well as my posts. A part of me feels sorry for Scott, as he is in the unwelcome position of getting his backside handed to him by the backer community over things he had no control over from the beginning. However he has put himself in the firing line, and while he has made some effort to try and be positive, Palladium has hung the poor lad out to be broadsided by the entire community. Its not his fault for trying to put forth an olive leaf, and not his fault for the gak-fest this kickstarter has become. So I am more than willing to cut him a level of slack that I won't give to Kevin. I rightly don't care how personable he is, or approachable, or if he is gosh-darnit a good human being. He fethed up on an epic scale reserved for those that talk in theater and won't fess up to it.
Seawolf wrote: I think the only person that has done so without being censored or banned for trolling is Forar.
They did give me a time out once, I think it was before Gencon 2014, maybe to silence some local criticism while a few extra eyes might be on their forums.
The weird thing is that they haven't banned me, but instead go through the (likely meager, but ongoing) effort to delete some of my posts without applying any kind of disciplinary action (like a warning message or further temp/perma ban). I noticed this once and called them out on it, it was never really addressed, the people involved just kind of figuratively looked at their shoes for a bit.
They do it to Morgan too, and even weirder will do so repeatedly as he just reposts the same comment again and again. I don't recall the highest number of times he reposted something to find it deleted again, but I think it was double digits. It's not even that their moderation is a bit draconian, it's that it's so... passive aggressive. If one of us acted out in these forums, I have full faith that a mod would likely give us a slap on the wrist and advise us to shape up, but while the PB forums have a reputation for being moderated by some particularly zealous individuals, they would rather quietly delete dissenting opinion and hope nobody notices than just ban those voices entirely.
I mean, their house, their rules, but it seems like it'd just be easier to show Morgan and I (among others) the door than keep removing posts. They certainly weren't shy about blocking dozens (possibly hundreds, but it's impossible to know for sure how many) people from commenting on their FB page.
I know we're drifting a bit from RRT to discuss the PB forums moderation practices, but I think it shows that a lot of the problems with this campaign aren't restricted purely to said campaign, they may be endemic to the culture that PB staff exude and the people they give power to.
Maybe they just figure the banned people would come back under new aliases and can't be bothered (or aren't able) to block by IP, but spoiler alert; I don't remotely give enough of a feth to jump through many hoops to post there.
Desmodus wrote: Minor point of correction, but the Rifter has always been a quarterly publication.
Ehhhh. It's "quarterly", as in I seem to recall not too long ago that they had a massive backlog on them and released 2 back to back. So there might have been 4 that year, but half of them came out something like a couple of weeks or days apart (if not literally at the same time).
Though at a glance, Google seems to indicate that the first one was released in the late 90's (possibly early 98?), which would about fit for back when I was still collecting their stuff, and that'd mean 19 years later we're up to the high 70's (the latest newsletter talks about 78 and 79), that's more 'on track' than I would have expected for them.
Easy E wrote: I have this niggling feeling that this thread serves no further purpose and is instead just sucking the air out of the rest of the Misc Sci-Fi Forum.
I mean, how much can we say, "Grrrr. Palladium! You suck!" before it just doesn't matter anymore?
Edit: On Topic. Still have 2 core boxes and extra Destroid boxes that I have not even opened.
I gotta admit, this thread helped to ground me when I was frustrated over the delivery snafus with the Dropfleet Commander KS.
It doesn't need to be a competition on who has it worse, but yeah, this is my go-to campaign when talking about complete clusterfeths.
I've heard a saying in many places; 'good, fast, cheap, pick 2' (or a variation thereof, like "you're lucky if you get 2").
While they clean up okay under skilled hands, the raw work necessary even to build a single squad makes me question the 'good' part, and the rules seem weighed down by ties to the RPG stats as well. It's nowhere near fast at 4 years and counting for full delivery, and even standard prices at CoolStuffInc don't put us ahead much at all without the remainder of what we are owed.
0 for 3 for many, maybe 0.5 or 1 out of 3 (if I'm counting those who do seem to enjoy the game, but realistically we can't ignore the massive delays or negligible savings, not matter how patient or forgiving some people are).
Just kind of musing aloud how it's almost impressive how spectacularly this has failed, and continues to do so.
If Wave 2 had delivered, we would have at least have gotten the "cheap" as about each model would be about $2.50. With, I think, only about 40% of the delivery we've recieved, that's about $6 a model - that's GW territory prices.
And nowhere NEAR the quality.
I am somewhat surprised that PB hasn't attempted a Mospeada/New Generation kickstarter to try and deflect from/fulfill this KS, but I guess that would have required honest-to-goodness work to set up and they can't connive ND into doing their work for them anymore.
Automatically Appended Next Post: The one thing that bothers me about this whole mess is that every time I intend to start with a positive comment, it sails off the burnt bridge from PB and crashes into the flood waters below. :(
Nah, we're a lot higher than 40%, at least in tiers.*
A Battle Cry tier ended up with 96 models in it, and eventually settled at 97 because they realized 'oops we're putting 2 Battloids on a sprue'. Of those we got 70, so we're over 2/3 of the figures delivered by raw numbers.
What we got more like 1/3 of was figures by unique count, of which there's something like 3 dozen different figures (counting VT/Guardian/Battloid as different figures, of course), though that eventually dropped slightly with the admission that Rick and Roy's 'unique figures' were just going to be Battloid only, like Max's.
* Yes, when you include add on packs, a given backer may have gotten more or less than that 70'ish percent, but as a whole, that's kind of the rule of thumb. 70/97 isn't quite 3/4, but for napkin math I'd accept it. My group ordered mostly tiers, so when those plus some extra Destroid kits arrived from our 'Daedalus Attack' add on, I think we came close to 600/800 figures we were owed, give or take a few on both ends. But a lot of 'value' (in terms of game diversity and actual financial worth if bought) is wrapped up in that missing 1/4 or so, probably a bit disproportionately, but I haven't looked at the math or spreadsheets for that in years.
vonjankmon wrote: If you are a fan of Robotech but have not watched Macross Frontier you need to fix that. Robotech is how I was introduced to the whole mech franchise thing so it holds a special gilded place in my heart but Macross Frontier is seriously good without having to have the "Watched it when I was a kid" gilded memories that Robotech has.
+1
The whole idea of mashing up an idol series and a mecha combat series sounds mad, but Macross Frontier really makes it work. The intercut concert scenes and mecha combat in the first episode are truly epic.
I am somewhat surprised that PB hasn't attempted a Mospeada/New Generation kickstarter to try and deflect from/fulfill this KS, but I guess that would have required honest-to-goodness work to set up and they can't connive ND into doing their work for them anymore.
You bring up a VERY good point there - do we think Palladium has done ANYTHING since Ninja Division said "We're out!"?
Alpharius wrote: You bring up a VERY good point there - do we think Palladium has done ANYTHING since Ninja Division said "We're out!"?
Probably not, right?
Yikes.
In all honesty, I think only ONE thing that was done after ND was the Armored Valkyrie.
Looking close, I "think" they took the original model and made very slight changes (head swap, mirror left arm to remove gun arm)
I seem to remember grabbing the card from the CAD model group fan/friend they had print it for them.
I think they still have the test print model around, I even held it at Anime North a while back (Wayne was freaking out a bit about being careful... if that worried, do not offer for the person to see it.).
WithintheDungeon wrote: I don't' remember Bill saying that folks weren't paid or worked for free at Kevin's request, I think that is inaccurate.
I don't have a citation. My days of documenting that stuff are long gone.
I think the employee's name was Justin? There was an announcement from Unca Kev that this employee was leaving for other pursuits as well as a kind of subtle jab that the former employee couldn't hack it in the RPG business. Later, the employee explained that Unca Kev asked him to work without pay and explained that at Palladium Books nearly everyone was expected to "take a turn" not being paid. I'm fairly certain Bill Coffin popped up and confirmed that this type of thing was common even when he worked at Palladium. It was years after the epic Bill Coffin rant.
It might have been stated on theRPGsite. If it was elsewhere, it was probably at least linked to from there.
I think it was Jason Marker. I seem to recall seeing a post about how things were done at PB and it included things like how the lights were rarely turned on in the offices and when he had joined, the Robotech RPG line was floundering with noone at the helm.
Funny how things still haven't changed and Palladium somehow still hasn't gone under.
Can anyone here sing? The most obvious answer to fix this whole situation that we have been missing the whole time is to sing songs like "We will win (when wave 2 ships)" and "Lonely toy soldier boy"
How have none of us figured this out when using evil catchy pop songs about love in the face of adversity in order to chill everyone out is the primary lesson of our much beloved series?
Just one more reason why Rick sucks. He is totally a model abuser.
But seriously, we could totally win this if we inspire Kevin with the power of song and convince him that we, the little kickstarter backer peasants are really just people who need love too!
It would totally work. I suggest "To be in love (with Kevin)" as a start. We could totally serenade wave 2 right out of china with that number.
How about 'I am a fan-friend. And a fan-friend just believes!'
Hmm. I might have to try spoofing the Book of Mormon as Books of Palladium.
Follow the misadventures of 2 Palladium Fan Friends/White Knights in their (futile) quest to become Megaversal Ambassadors.
Swabby wrote: Can anyone here sing? The most obvious answer to fix this whole situation that we have been missing the whole time is to sing songs like "We will win (when wave 2 ships)" and "Lonely toy soldier boy"
How have none of us figured this out when using evil catchy pop songs about love in the face of adversity in order to chill everyone out is the primary lesson of our much beloved series?
"Jason Marker told me he wasn’t surprised by this turn of events, and that I probably shouldn’t expect him back in 6-8 weeks. That he felt with the baby coming he needed to find work someplace where he felt more secure (and I imagine, a job with a medical plan). I was disappointed by the news, but told him, “I understand.”
I do understand. I respect Jason's decision. I'm sure it was a difficult one, and I wish Jason well. A man has to do what is best for his family, and the role-playing industry is going through some rough times. I think things will level out, but God only knows when. I can’t give Jason any assurances in these wild times, so he has decided to look for other work. We all hate to see Jason go, but we all understand if that’s what he feels he needs to do.
Wayne Smith ain’t going anywhere. You can count on Wayne being around for as long as Palladium. Back during the Crisis of Treachery, Wayne, Alex, and all the guys worked three weeks without pay. Alex, Hank and Julius were laid off for a couple of months, this time around it was Wayne’s and Jason’s turn."
RW: What is something really bad about working in the RPG industry?
Jason: Everything else. The pay is lousy, the hours stink, it's feast of famine all the time with either too much or too little work, writing is lonely, and I'm either too busy or too broke to do other extracurricular activities. That being said, it's very much worth it and I wouldn't change what I do for anything.
And this was in 2013 (something awful) assuming it Jason Marker (in the comments)
Well, one thing I can talk about is the general office atmosphere. I worked from home mostly since the office is about thirty miles away from my house (I'm in NE Detroit), but once a week I'd go in for various things and it was always weird. The office is dead quiet, all the doors are closed, most of the lights are kept off (to save electricity)... it's like a tomb in there. Also, Kevin has no personal boundaries, wants everyone to be BFFs, and will tell you the most intimate details of his personal life at a moment's notice. The man has no filter. It's a pretty strange, inappropriate, and toxic environment.
Yeah, the "editing" is a joke. If Kevin writes it, Alex and Julius (both of whom are incredible sperglords and total yes-men) "edit" it, all the while telling Kevin that it's awesome and the best thing they've ever read. If someone else writes it, then Kevin re-writes it, gives it to Alex and Julius who then "edit" the manuscript, all the while telling Kevin that it's awesome and the best thing they've ever read and only he could have fixed the obviously deeply flawed original manuscript.
This is, as you can imagine, a total joke. I one time went through a manuscript after Alex and caught a ton of super basic spelling and grammar mistakes, not to mention a couple of structural problems with the manuscript. This is after it'd gone through two sets of eyes and about a month on various desks. I brought this up to Himself and his answer was, Well, you have to remember, he's not a professional editor... He's been an Editor for twenty goddamned years! For money! That's the loving definition of a professional!
Anyway, there's also zero editorial guidance. There's no styleguide (just read any of our books and do it that way!), Everything seemed, to me at least, to be a guessing game as to what Kevin wanted, and the sum total of his editorial direction usually amounts to little more than, That's a great idea! Just write it!. Kevin doesn't believe that writers can edit/re-write their own work, nor can they follow directions. He told me that to my face. I didn't get a single re-write or piece of editorial direction until after I got laid off and started working for Fantasy Flight in '09.
(sorry if this is a little ranty/rambling, I spent all day in the sun doing yard work)
So I wrote half of the Shadow Chronicles core rulebook and did some other things, including giving myself a job as "freelance liaison" which I never really got to do fully since Kevin's a crazy micro-manager. In June of 2008 I worked my last studio job and went full time at Palladium, where I became the de-facto "line editor/Creative Director" for the new Robotech RPG. (I gave those titles to myself, mind you. I busted my rear end on Robotech, brought the sexy back, and dealt directly with Harmony Gold). I had my ups and downs, had a little meltdown while working on the Southern Cross sourcebook, and became more and more convinced that I was in a dead end position. Like I said earlier, it was a pretty toxic working environment, there was no real guidance, and, whether or not it was fair or true, I was terrified that one day I'd show up and the whole place would be locked up and out of business.
I got laid-off in September of '09, with my first daughter on the way. The story of me getting laid of and then mentioning it on Facebook was a huge drama bomb, as you might imagine, and I threw myself into drinking a lot of bourbon and working on my motorcycles while I collected unemployment and looked for jobs. I started the serious job searching in October, and got picked up by FFG for the first Rogue Trader sourcebook based on the strength of my Robotech work. The rest is history.
Interesting Factoid:
As for R:tSC's layout, I couldn't tell you. My job started and stopped at . Layout was all Kevin on that one. Speaking of that book, the manga size version was the very last book PB did that was laid out by hand without use of computers. The first book PB digitally laid out was the special edition hardback of Shadow Chronicles.
I'm still, after all these years, sinfully proud of my work on Robotech. There I was, writing primary continuity for an IP that had a huge impact on my stupid, small-town central Ohio childhood. My first published books with my name on them, my first projects where I carried a lot of the responsibility and guided a lot of the creative decisions (along with HG, who honestly, were pretty good to work with). There were some decisions, specifically on Southern Cross, that I didn't agree with but that's the bidness. Man, I had so many plans for that game line. I have to admit, I'm still a little bitter, and you'll notice that since I got laid off in September of 2009 pretty much fuckall other than the abysmal New Generation sourcebook has come out.
For Southern Cross, part of my desperately wanting to bring the sexy back to that IP was making it into an army, Band of Brothers kind of drama. I mostly succeeded, but got stymied by some editorial decisions above my pay grade.
I've got three d-bees in that book. That whole thing was one of the rare collaborative efforts between freelancers. Kevin discouraged us from collaborating.
Wayne Smith ain’t going anywhere. You can count on Wayne being around for as long as Palladium. Back during the Crisis of Treachery, Wayne, Alex, and all the guys worked three weeks without pay. Alex, Hank and Julius were laid off for a couple of months, this time around it was Wayne’s and Jason’s turn."
Did anyone else read that with a super creepy Misery style held captive undertone? Everybody loves it here and nobody... is... going... anywhere....
Sorry, been away for a couple days for work. I remember the stuff WithinTheDungeon linked to, and on reread Kevin and his employees come across as just as dumb and pathetic as I felt they were when I first read it.
Forar wrote: The weird thing is that they haven't banned me, but instead go through the (likely meager, but ongoing) effort to delete some of my posts without applying any kind of disciplinary action (like a warning message or further temp/perma ban). I noticed this once and called them out on it, it was never really addressed, the people involved just kind of figuratively looked at their shoes for a bit.
They do it to Morgan too, and even weirder will do so repeatedly as he just reposts the same comment again and again. I don't recall the highest number of times he reposted something to find it deleted again, but I think it was double digits. It's not even that their moderation is a bit draconian, it's that it's so... passive aggressive. If one of us acted out in these forums, I have full faith that a mod would likely give us a slap on the wrist and advise us to shape up, but while the PB forums have a reputation for being moderated by some particularly zealous individuals, they would rather quietly delete dissenting opinion and hope nobody notices than just ban those voices entirely.
I mean, their house, their rules, but it seems like it'd just be easier to show Morgan and I (among others) the door than keep removing posts. They certainly weren't shy about blocking dozens (possibly hundreds, but it's impossible to know for sure how many) people from commenting on their FB page.
It was ten times reposting, so 11 times actually posted. The excuse I got apparently only happened because Forar mentioned it, else it'd probably STILL be going on. Because I'm stupidly stubborn, and they're stubbornly stupid.
When presented with an arguably reasonable explanation, I stopped. When they just deleted it, with no notice, no explanation (so I knew what the offending thing was, because my posts on PBForums are fairly benign), and no idea who to appeal to, I figured what the hell. Due to past issues, I've taken to Print-SaveAsPDF most of my posts, or the posts of people that have a good point or information that might be useful at a later date, so it was easy to cut and paste my response. I took to doing this because of the Mod's heavy handedness with deleting not just specific posts, but entire threads. If a thread is fairly negative, and someone gets overly offensive, instead of just deleting that post and issuing a warning, it gives them a "good" excuse to delete the thread outright.
The issue at stake was that my post was considered off topic because it was in a dead thread (inactive for more than a year), resurrected by someone else, and I was answering the new guy's question. The new guy's post wasn't deemed off topic, but mine, which was just a response, was. When it finally came down to it, a mod said there was only three possible options available to him. Delete my post, delete my post and lock the thread, delete my post and lock the thread and issue infractions. That it never seemed to occur to him that TALKING TO ME about it was an option seemed to be a completely foreign concept. Personally, I think the argument for deletion was questionable, but I could at least understand the argument.
I'm not a completely unreasonable donkey-cave. As Forar and Mark Johnson can attest, IRL I'm a perfectly reasonable donkey-cave. A little bit of fair communication goes a long way. But how can we expect the mods to do that when the PB rulership don't. Fish stinks from the head down.
But, I got the temp ban for posting business info in the Rifts Board Game Kickstarter. The email with Kickstarter was... "You cannot post private information, so on and so forth." The issue was I didn't post anything private (which I pointed out to them) but the address as Rogue Heroes place of Business... And direct documentation of Rogue Heroes LLC (which was good for one year on a two year project, but 'oh but no red flags there...), which is also not private information...
What's always been funny about Kickstarter... Is they continue to make legal distinctions, without any understanding of legal terminology. (and no I'm not a lawyer). As if they're day is not coming, but I'm pretty certain it is eventually.
Swabby wrote: Can anyone here sing? The most obvious answer to fix this whole situation that we have been missing the whole time is to sing songs like "We will win (when wave 2 ships)" and "Lonely toy soldier boy"
Nope, but that didn't stop whoever it was that dubbed Minmay for Robotech, so...
Look, I know this is probably obvious, but I'm still shocked at the 'revelation' that PB has more likely than not (!) done NOTHING in terms of actual work on this project since ND left.
Well, aside from the physical 'work' of shipping Wave 1.
Alpharius wrote: Look, I know this is probably obvious, but I'm still shocked at the 'revelation' that PB has more likely than not (!) done NOTHING in terms of actual work on this project since ND left.
Well, aside from the physical 'work' of shipping Wave 1.
But NO work done on Wave 2 stuff at all.
Zero.
I am sure it is very hard work trying to come up with a reason week after week why nothing has been worked on.
Sad truth is Scott's next update will be more the same...by Christmas most will think he is just Kevin's alter ego..
Everyone knows the game is dead except Kevin.. he has just not taken time to look
Swabby wrote: Can anyone here sing? The most obvious answer to fix this whole situation that we have been missing the whole time is to sing songs like "We will win (when wave 2 ships)" and "Lonely toy soldier boy"
Nope, but that didn't stop whoever it was that dubbed Minmay for Robotech, so...
"I have to admit. Sometimes I feel like I have multiple personalities. Back in the 80’s when we were working on tons of weird Japanese animation projects, we didn’t have a contract with the union. It wasn’t until Robotech came along that we realized that maybe we should protect ourselves and most of us came up with fake names. Mine was Reba West. For some reason it stuck. "
Alpharius wrote: Look, I know this is probably obvious, but I'm still shocked at the 'revelation' that PB has more likely than not (!) done NOTHING in terms of actual work on this project since ND left.
Well, aside from the physical 'work' of shipping Wave 1.
But NO work done on Wave 2 stuff at all.
Zero.
It is a shock for the "normal" world of commerce.
It is oddly pretty darn common working in the orbit of a narcissist.
If it is not "convenient" to give return on investment, then the customer can wait and be grateful for the opportunity to prolong the transaction.
Stormonu wrote: I don't understand the comment Swabby. She's a scumlord because she took a stage name? Or are you refering to PB & HG?
"didn’t have a contract with the union. It wasn’t until Robotech came along that we realized that maybe we should protect ourselves and most of us came up with fake names. "
It isn't that it is a stage name, it is the reasons for taking it.
I want thanks you guys for the link for the youtube of GenCon 50 interview of Kev. I watch it and the back ground of it. I wonder if the people who were buying the books were real or staged . The other is I read that Scott Gibbons live in Texas and he work from home? Which mean he no where near Michigan and the PB office warehouse in Westland . So what all of your take on this. I hate to say this is major joke because he don't know what going at the office. Later
I haven't watched the video, but when I was at the con and happened to swing by, I'd see a number of people milling about checking things out at a given time. People will stop and look at just about anything at a con, you could have 'limited edition sculpts made of dog poop' and someone would probably stand there eyeing them for five minutes.
We have to remember that as much as we know that PB's name is dirt, this isn't a universal thing. They're a niche of a niche of a niche market, and while their reputation certainly precedes them to some degree, you're also packing tens of thousands of potential customers into an area, some or even many of them who might have no idea who PB is. They're a little fish, if an old one, and I could totally see myself walking up to a place with a bunch of book covers like that and mulling around a bit.
Now, if the video has them ringing up sale after sale of encyclopedia thick stacks of books and thousands of dollars in artwork (some sketches were sitting on the table listed for up to $600, probably more, though not protected or framed as I'd expect something allegedly that valuable to be), I too would call shenanigans.
But if you're just referring to people standing around perusing their shelves, yeah, that happened. As much as we might have wanted it to be a ghost town for a touch of Karma, it wasn't generally whenever I walked by. And due to their location, in general and in proximity to some places I actually wanted to be, it was a fairly solid number of times.
Hey Forar I just watch it again it was about 5 people buying books and at the start of the interview Kev had to sign book for a customer. Now want know any of you all here new that Scott Gibbons the business manger of Palladium Books. Live and works out of Texas, so how hell does he know what hell going on at Palladium Books office warehouse in Westland Michigan. So all those conference calls back and forth is what going on. I'am surprise that no one talking about this. Scott Gibbons is nothing more then a spin master here. No wave 2 at all.
The big problem I have with him being out of state, is that it means all information (except for easily verifiable stuff*) comes to Scott through the filter of Kevin and Wayne. And those two have proven to be as untrustworthy as feth.
* While I'm not saying that Kevin would lie on balance sheets and other financial/business documents, I would not take it as guaranteed that he wouldn't.
So, unless Scott is conferenced in on all calls, and has a mosrtly permanent video link, the information he is given is suspect at best.
His last update looked like he edited down an email he got from Kevin.
Scott's effectiveness is going to be very limited by not seeing for himself what goes on day-to-day. There was no excuse for him to not be at Gencon, meeting with suppliers and relying on Kevin.
I imagine Kevin wasn't willing to pay to fly Scott out. It wouldn't surprise me if all of PB staff is jammed into one cheap motel room, with Kevin getting the bed.
I'd love to see an episode of The Profit featuring PB.
We are likely never going to get any real satisfaction out of this.
In D6 terms, the chance of us getting Wave 2 is rolling a 6 on a D6 and being forced to re-roll successful rolls 57,000,000 times.
MI has a 6 year limit on debt. So, we've got to be close to that.
We'll get an update from PB saying blame is everywhere but on PB's shoulders.
Something like:
1) We attempted to work with new suppliers to reduce the part count, since PB fans were clamoring for that
2) #1 took XYZ years, and during XYZ years, HG lost the Robotech license! Oh noes!
3) Based on #2, new Robotech folks asked us, PB, for 1 billion dollars! We miss those fine gents at HG.
4) If the supplier was faster and if you all could handle models with the existing part count, you'd have wave 2. If the new Robotech folks didn't try to rob us, you'd have wave 2. Us, Kevin, Wayne, Kev-I mean-Scott tots did everything, but whatever. The world is a mean and unfair place. We just wanted $1.5M, I mean to make a Robotech mini battle game, I mean $1.5M,
I get that technically it matters where Scott is to do a job he claims he was hired to do... But so far his job seems to be the RRT update guy... I'd have to think it paid something, though I wouldn't expect it to be very much.
It wouldn't matter if in was in Michigan and under the table during the "business call." Whatever Scott posted (as an employee) would still be filtered through Kevin or he wouldn't have job. If he reveals any truth, that Kevin doesn't approve, he won't have a job. If Scott is getting paid as a business manager and anything legal gets aimed at least the dude will have plausible deniability...? If he is in Texas.
What I'd like to see is the evidence of his whereabouts... Texas has been mentioned; where did that come from? Where is the proof? (links?)
I doubt Scooter talks directly to Kevin but rather emails Wayne. The only time Scooter hears from Kevin is angry calls wanting to know why the Robotech backers are still pissed because Scooter is being paid to shut those ungrateful peasants up already.
Keeping in mind that Scooters info from Wayne is probably the same as what is in the Palladium updates so Scooter has nothing to work with anyways. Asking Wayne for renders and whatnot falls on deaf ears so Scooter is left with nothing to update about so he's doing a mad scramble to keep Unca Kevster happy which is impossible because he's dependent of Unca Kev telling him something, anything.
I'd feel sorry for Scooter but he had to know he was hiring on to be the Kevin's target of abuse because this whole Robotech mess isn't Kev's fault but rather a marching column of BETRAYERS, one after the other and Scooter appears to be the latest one.
If only he'd have just let Paulson go ahead this would be over with and probably a popular game but alas wishes and all that.
n815e wrote: I don't see how Paulson would have done better than ND.
ND did a very good job with the stuff before they were hamstrung by PB and there's no way I could have gotten things made in plastic as I simply haven't had that type of resources (although I know who to contact). They also did an outstanding job on the graphic elements which is not my forte. I just make resin and metal minis, the size that this KS grew to was much larger than anything I would have wanted to manage and also accounts for a lot of PB's problems as it's not something I think they were expecting either and it's swamped them with responsibilities they cannot deliver on, maybe they should have thought twice about burning bridges with ND? Since they broke away from dealing with PB, ND seems to be doing just fine with putting out their own quality lines and handling sizeable KS projects so Robotech's failures certainly don't reside with ND.
paulson games wrote: Since they broke away from dealing with PB, ND seems to be doing just fine with putting out their own quality lines and handling sizeable KS projects so Robotech's failures certainly don't reside with ND.
You are very kind; however, ND / SPM's world isn't entirely smooth sailing lately. While the Super Dungeon Explore: Forgotten KingKS was reasonably delivered, their more recent Super Dungeon Explore: LegendsKS originally estimated to deliver Dec. 2016, then "spring 2017", currently has no delivery date, with nothing visibly produced. We don't know if they'll deliver this year or next, as SPM ignores any such questioning; many backers are estimating actual delivery Q1 2018. SPM also appears to be ignoring numerous refund requests.
In the mean time, SPM has launched several other projects, both KS and in-house. Many suspect that SDE:L funds were diverted to fund unrelated projects, which is why SDE:L is so late.
The project management has been awful, and I'm sorry to have defended them in the past.
Merijeek wrote: Read his updates. It's not speculation, he has flat out stated it.
Thanks... I just re-read all of Scott's "Updates" on the RRT page and I don't see him mention his physical location... He does reference in one that he is at the Palladium Books offices... I will go Check the Murrmers... (?)
Edit: Just Check the Murmers nothing there... Mentions he was at the office when the gal who made the tumbler stopped by...
So yeah, breezed through Twitter... Nothing there...
Merijeek wrote: Read his updates. It's not speculation, he has flat out stated it.
Thanks... I just re-read all of Scott's "Updates" on the RRT page and I don't see him mention his physical location... He does reference in one that he is at the Palladium Books offices... I will go Check the Murrmers... (?)
I just went through them and didn't see any mention either. I think one of the backers looked up his address somewhere (via Linked in?) and posted about it in the comments. Maybe it was Meerijeek?
Merijeek wrote: Read his updates. It's not speculation, he has flat out stated it.
Thanks... I just re-read all of Scott's "Updates" on the RRT page and I don't see him mention his physical location... He does reference in one that he is at the Palladium Books offices... I will go Check the Murrmers... (?)
I just went through them and didn't see any mention either. I think one of the backers looked up his address somewhere (via Linked in?) and posted about it in the comments. Maybe it was Meerijeek?
Meerijeek, says he flat out read it... In the updates.
And I'd like to add a bit ago I did some sleuthing of my own, but I didn't find anything linking Scott to Texas. What I found was residence in MI, as a plushy toy creator... But I really couldn't confirm that-that Scott Gibbons, is this Scott Gibbons.
I'm half surprised this email at this point wasn't a 'We had Wave 2 packages arriving, but they all got wiped out by the hurricane' type blatant lies, given how apparent the current ones are.
Manufacturers are quoting. As they have been for almost three months now under Scott's tenure. But they're getting close. Promise! No general timeline for when that'll be locked down, obviously. Details are of the debbil!
Issues with the bases are completely handwaved. But he still wants to hear feedback! What's the point if you're going to ignore the general lack of detail, the issues with the scoring, or the raised detail issue? It's not stated, but it does look like they're only going with a singular base for 40mm and 50mm. So if you wanted any kind of diversity, you're gak out of luck.
Thoughts and prayers for peoples in harms way, and that's basically it. Woo!
Still no mention of the revised Force Orgs. 10 weeks since it was first announced, 8 since they'd do it, 4 since "putting it off until after GenCon" and the last time it was mentioned. 3 since GenCon finished. If this isn't a microcosm of exactly what's wrong with PB, I don't know what is. It's simply the smallest job they've had to do. And they can't NOT feth it up.
Oh, it needs to be playtested. You know what'd be good for the fething community? Allowing them to be part of the playtest. PB's fething fascination with "it it's not fething perfect, we're not gonna fething do it!". Which would make sense if anything they did was even close. Miniatures? Not perfect. Rules? Not perfect. Blast Template? Not painted. Certain cards? Not printed.
Heck, Wayne's twentysix month late report on the "status of everything", if you take his word for it, sounds like it was derailed because a few things were in flux, and instead of passing on the information on the first two bits of "some have been approved for tooling, some are still pending minor changes, and a couple are being reworked to reduce part counts while preserving detail", not having detail on the last bracket meant the whole thing got held up indefinitely.
Basically, unless the Force Orgs are a complete rewrite that makes everything prior moot, then it's at best, a couple of quibbly issues, where points might need to be shaved or expanded, or access to certain units/upgrades/characters needs to be modified. It's not f'n rocket science. And it shouldn't take more than a couple hours to do, from scratch, for a relatively robust version, including the graphic design (they already have the art/font/templates). They've had ~320 business hours, give or take. That assumes not breaking for GenCon, but also assumes only a 40hr work week, which Kevin would die before admitting was all they do.
I know they're in a bind for bigger reasons (funding, manufacturing, etc) than trivial stuff like Force Orgs. But it's the constant screwups of the little things that make people untrusting that PB can handle the big things.
Do ONE thing right, gaks. Just one. That's all that's needed to start.
Scott is going off the information that he is given, since nothing is being done there is no information to be had, but thought it would be a good idea to update every two weeks with nothing to report.
Something like what Kevin was already doing.
No one has asked him if he had a supplier for a product that he already paid for had dragged his feet for three years, how would he hand it?
I am sure the answer would be legal action.
But most backers have already wrote it off as a lose and don't care what happens and the rest is like herding cats.
Even if everyone pulled together having any kind of agency (government) to put down the hammer on Palladium, we would need to have some type of video go viral to push it forward as in the police
abuse of a nurse in Utah. That was crazy bad and until the lawyers release a video, anyone from the local government finally reacted to it because they could no longer avoid it.
Because people asked - Gen Con went very well for Palladium on a number of fronts. With regard to RRT Wave 2, we spoke with representatives of several manufacturers and reviewed samples of their work. We are now awaiting refined quotes as we were able to discuss what we want to accomplish with Wave Two. That included confirming with them the level of detail that we are seeking to preserve while reducing part counts.
All in all, the meetings went very well and hopefully we will be making a selection on a manufacturer to move forward with very soon.
Reviewing way back then (2014 / 2013) it is surprising seeing the other wave 2 prototypes and needing to ask the question of what the heck happened??
I honestly think the models were designed and many layouts may have been completed as well.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/rrpgt/robotech-rpg-tacticstm/posts/1150566 Feb 28 2015
Sorry, just going back down memory lane and just with the details and timing of it all, I really am about as certain as I can be that they plain ran out of money.
Since there is ZERO word on the prior manufacturer I suspect Palladium Books owes them money.
"Luckily" PB ordered a fair bit of stock.
Want to place your bets that if they manage to run out of stock there will be zero chance of resupply?
Unless we look around in the Chinese market for some "Robo-models" or something around that line.
Anyway, a good recap of what is owed and just how close we were to wave 2 was actually ready and how now everything is just getting dusted of to give the impression of "progress".
Automatically Appended Next Post:
n815e wrote: Future updates are 98% complete!
Classic NMI:
Wow, where/when was this?
Makes me "happy" to put to rest that "some blame is with Ninja Division", what he said there is a fine example of feeling some ownership to that work.
Good to see, thanks n815e!
NMI / Ruiz... painful guy.
Just HAD to be clarify to everyone what their entitlement and involvement is... like we don't know.
Oh well... back to our regularly scheduled forum crawling of games that are alive and supported.
Comments on Mike's page following the latest 'update'.
I appreciate it being shared here, as NMI has me blocked on Facebook so I only saw half of the exchange when I went looking for the source. Getting it here gave us the full story.
Oh wow, that is more enlightening than the last three years of Unca Kevayne's speeches. How long before Unca Kev tries to sue Cadice for breaking the NDA that is supposed to keep him completely mute?
Nope. And I expect a deletion and pretense that it didn't happen, rather than an apology. Because that's how Ruiz rolls.
Cadice's asterisk before literally is setting off my OCD sensitivities. Makes my eye twitch.
EDIT: And it's not like Ruiz shouldn't have known. AFAICR, Ruiz being who he is (Kevin's lapdog) had dealings with Cadice at the 2013 GenCon. So I don't think that they were complete strangers.
Then again, I don't think Ruiz thinks before he acts. He has a history of losing it when Kevin's "honor" is on the line.
My first account on Palladium's forum was deleted years ago, after I questioned why they had a stickied post telling users to show respect to ND while NMI was harassing them on FB.
They can delete what they want I just shat this all over... And asked Tenkar for the assist.
Would appreciate if someone posted a link to that, image in the Update #207 and Regular Comments Section. Sometimes pictures speak louder in words... especially if those pictures are of words? (lol)
"Winning the lottery and suing Kev into homelessness and a card board box at the side of the road and then stealing the box is The Dream that keeps me living..."
OK I am saving that screencap. Typical behaviour though on Jeff's part lol.
Automatically Appended Next Post: On further reflection johns statement lifts sdone of the blame off of ND and shifts more blame onto PB if that is even possible lol
Merijeek wrote: Read his updates. It's not speculation, he has flat out stated it.
Of course his updates on the project status are all lies, so I see no reason to believe that, either.
Stating the obvious here, but I'd really like to get a source for the claim that Scott is in Texas; I think it would make a good point (of the subterfuge Palladium is rolling out) on my blog. But I need a source for that... Because I source stuff... However I can contribute, in some small way to shedding light on this shat-show, which leads to any sort of resolution I'm all for... Whether it's just been gross mismanagement or fraud with intent only time (may) tell. Personally, I think it's just been gross mismanagement but that doesn't change any of the many facts that it could be the other.
For reference (those willing to help) I've looked over The murmurs (twice) on Palladium Forums, Through Kevin's Updates and Palladium Books main page (once) & Scott Updates on the KS (thrice). I have not seen Scott being in Texas, mentioned once. (help!)
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ctaylor wrote: Did NMI reply to Ninja John? Inquiring minds and all that...
Him and John said the had a chat...
Here's what I wrote: +John Starck Cadice respectfully, I think a few would disagree "that it's all good." But, it's Nice that you anD Jeff were Able to sort it out.
Notice: NDA is capitalized & bolded, but it didn't come out that well
Stating the obvious here, but I'd really like to get a source for the claim that Scott is in Texas; I think it would make a good point (of the subterfuge Palladium is rolling out) on my blog.
The earliest mention I found was when James Laflamme posted it on August 16 in the general comments. Perhaps he could shed more light.
As for other leads:
I vaguely recall having heard this before then though in relation to Gen Con when someone asked if Scott was going and he revealed he was in the D/FW area and wouldn't attend. That generated some surprise and response (particularly since all his kickstarter updates read as if he's in Michigan, further adding to the theory he's simply cut and pasting Kevin screeds). If Scott doxed himself it may have been removed if it was on FB or the PB forums, or even Kickstarter for that matter. Come to think of it, I don't really follow the PB forums or FB page unless someone posts a link, so perhaps it was on kickstarter and was removed for reasons. Hope this helps.
WithintheDungeon wrote: Stating the obvious here, but I'd really like to get a source for the claim that Scott is in Texas; I think it would make a good point (of the subterfuge Palladium is rolling out) on my blog.
Posts by Jeff/NMI are now showing in grey which indicates he is no longer part of the group. Since he doesn't have mod powers to ban people or delete their posts he probably got pissy over being called out and left.
When I was checking previous posts Ninja John had posted in response to the prior update, I screen grabbed but don't have a picture host atm so here's the text in response to PB's update about still seeking quotes.
John Starck Cadic: The entire mk1 range was sculpted and ready for production in less than 8 months, with changes. Mold making for the entire set would have taken 4 months with slow approvals, putting us on time to deliver in 14 months with all the back and forth. This continues to make me sad. July 19th
Given the production time of wave 1 and if they could get all of that done in 8 months wtf has taken PB 4 years to produce NOTHING?
Besides the long running question of PB being out of money the thought occurred to me that a large number of items in wave 2 were ones that were ones that might not be something that were expressly covered with IP rights. With the recent legal rumblings between HG and Tatsunoko it could be a point of contention. A number of those mechs were in the series only as Easter Egg style tribute items and properly belong to other series and not the Macross/Robotech proper. It's possible that there was some over reaching going on and maybe the reason wave 2 hasn't happened is because they don't actually own the rights to most of those designs?
"Winning the lottery and suing Kev into homelessness and a card board box at the side of the road and then stealing the box is The Dream that keeps me living..."
As I've mentioned, not entirely in jest, I keep hoping that Kevin will be rendered bankrupt with nothing but a barrel to wear.
But yeah, if he were living in a cardboard box, I wouldn't be adverse to pouring a bunch of water on it.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
paulson games wrote: Besides the long running question of PB being out of money the thought occurred to me that a large number of items in wave 2 were ones that were ones that might not be something that were expressly covered with IP rights.
I'm pretty sure the MAC-II Monster would clearly have been covered. I'm also pretty fething pissed that never got made or delivered, given that we paid a LOT extra for it.
Yeah I know that there's some designs like the Mac II that wouldn't be an issue but because they were bumped to part of wave two would unfortunately become collateral damage . If there's one thing Kevin is completely governed by it's paranoia about lawsuits, which could easily account for why everything has been on ice if he even caught the faintest idea there might be a legal issue. Don't have anything tangible to support this but if lack of money isn't the issue as PB claims, there has to be a major (& unannounced) issue to cause this all to ball up like this. It has to be something serious that threatens the entire project otherwise they'd be able to talk about it and all we get is spin or silence.
paulson games wrote: Yeah I know that there's some designs like the Mac II that wouldn't be an issue but because they were bumped to part of wave two would unfortunately become collateral damage . If there's one thing Kevin is completely governed by it's paranoia about lawsuits, which could easily account for why everything has been on ice if he even caught the faintest idea there might be a legal issue. Don't have anything tangible to support this but if lack of money isn't the issue as PB claims, there has to be a major (& unannounced) issue to cause this all to ball up like this. It has to be something serious that threatens the entire project otherwise they'd be able to talk about it and all we get is spin or silence.
That's definitely a sound theory. And if I could accept Kevin as much smarter and less lazy than I think he is, I could totally buy in to that argument.
The argument against the money issue is that IIRC they've never actually said that. Despite repeated requests for a statement saying such, the only thing they have said is that it wasn't misappropriated for personal luxuries. They've not explicitly said that they have the money, and what they have said, doesn't exclude them misspending in other areas. For example, Kevin lamented that he had spent thousands of dollars advertising the 2013 release. That money shouldn't have (and to be fair, may not have been) spent using Kickstarter funds. Retail launch has nothing to do with the Kickstarter obligations. Similarly, speculated expenditure on retail Wave 1 isn't personal luxuries (misappropriation, just not a house or boat). The refusal to state they have the funds, and the weasel words to imply they do, is telling IMO.
On a side note, I saw on the KSCommentary that Riache and Co were playtesting future generations using fan made product. Kinda cart before the horse there, I think. With 3.5 years until the expected lapsing of the license, it seems highly ambitious to think that there's time to do more than complete Wave 2, and still have a reasonable timeframe to market and sell it. But that's PB's motto. "Dream big, do jack squat".
paulson games wrote: Yeah I know that there's some designs like the Mac II that wouldn't be an issue but because they were bumped to part of wave two would unfortunately become collateral damage . If there's one thing Kevin is completely governed by it's paranoia about lawsuits, which could easily account for why everything has been on ice if he even caught the faintest idea there might be a legal issue. Don't have anything tangible to support this but if lack of money isn't the issue as PB claims, there has to be a major (& unannounced) issue to cause this all to ball up like this. It has to be something serious that threatens the entire project otherwise they'd be able to talk about it and all we get is spin or silence.
AFAIK, the designs that might be subject to that would be the Orguss design, the redesigned VF-4 and the variant heads for the VFs. Other than those, I'd said nothing else should be affected, and even in that case the variant heads are already released.
If those were major sticking points, they do have the information to recognize the scope of the problem. I mean, we completed the pledge manager years ago, it shouldn't be all that difficult to ascertain how many people even ordered those things, as I don't believe they were made part of the Battle Cry/etc tiers, but would've been explicitly bought as add ons.
Yes, yes, usual caveats, this is PB we're talking about. I'm simply noting that if one or two designs were problematic, and only a small fraction of the backers are actually getting them, working something out wouldn't be the toughest thing in the world (yes, again, for a company less committed to fething things up).
Offer up an option to get different add ons or a refund on those specific pieces, express regret that it has come to this, find a small silver lining that having a couple of models off the project does make it a bit easier/faster to work on the remainder, etc. Standard corporate speak and maybe some tiny kudos for having the courage to actually admit to/talk about a problem and take steps towards resolution.
And yes, obviously some people would lose their minds over that. Why offer refunds when you won't offer them to everyone?! Lawl PB failure, etc, etc. But as I've been saying for years, catering to what they fear the lowest common denominator online will do only punishes the entire community because a few voices will chew them out for doing or not doing anything. Letting them set the conversation with this head in the sand approach is a big part of the problem.
It does bring up a good point though. IF (again, IF) someone like Scott were looking over this project, and looking for ways to get things moving, and time/cost were a factor, looking for something to cull from the To Do list might not be a terrible idea. Go over the numbers; if you have something only a few dozen or hundred backers are getting, maybe 5-10% or less, ask if it's not more valuable to just axe that part and work something out with those affected. Obviously anything in the Battle Cry (which affects the vast majority of the backers) is going to be exempt by raw numbers alone, but if the often mentioned resin bits are only going to a tiny portion of the backer base, it's realistic to at least ponder the time/resources required satisfying those more fringe cases.
And that's even fitting in Kickstarter's Terms of Use, or at least the current ones, which are realistic about projects needing to change, not working out exactly as intended, etc. 'It is regrettable that we're in this position, but removing X, Y, and Z portions of the campaign (which will affect ~_00 backers) allows us to shave A% off production and B months from the timeline. Backers affected will be offered an opportunity to change their add ons, or refunded their contribution for those specific items.'
Posts by Jeff/NMI are now showing in grey which indicates he is no longer part of the group. Since he doesn't have mod powers to ban people or delete their posts he probably got pissy over being called out and left.
I sort of wonder if it is because he was embarrassed by it, or because Cadice is making his beloved PB look bad there, or because he can't moderate the conversation.
In terms of the money... Here is NMI trying to protect the reputation of PB. It sort of implies that the money was all spent.
paulson games wrote: Yeah I know that there's some designs like the Mac II that wouldn't be an issue but because they were bumped to part of wave two would unfortunately become collateral damage . If there's one thing Kevin is completely governed by it's paranoia about lawsuits, which could easily account for why everything has been on ice if he even caught the faintest idea there might be a legal issue. Don't have anything tangible to support this but if lack of money isn't the issue as PB claims, there has to be a major (& unannounced) issue to cause this all to ball up like this. It has to be something serious that threatens the entire project otherwise they'd be able to talk about it and all we get is spin or silence.
That's definitely a sound theory. And if I could accept Kevin as much smarter and less lazy than I think he is, I could totally buy in to that argument.
The argument against the money issue is that IIRC they've never actually said that. Despite repeated requests for a statement saying such, the only thing they have said is that it wasn't misappropriated for personal luxuries. They've not explicitly said that they have the money, and what they have said, doesn't exclude them misspending in other areas. For example, Kevin lamented that he had spent thousands of dollars advertising the 2013 release. That money shouldn't have (and to be fair, may not have been) spent using Kickstarter funds. Retail launch has nothing to do with the Kickstarter obligations. Similarly, speculated expenditure on retail Wave 1 isn't personal luxuries (misappropriation, just not a house or boat). The refusal to state they have the funds, and the weasel words to imply they do, is telling IMO.
Misappropriation definitely occurred - how do you think NG1 and NG2 magically got produced?
I would love to see a forensic accountant audit PB's books, with the specter of criminal charges lurking in the background.
Which when spending a big chunk of funds for retail stock for RRT is a "truth" of sorts when really the money is to be spent on the kickstarter items and rewards not retail.
Forar wrote: And that's even fitting in Kickstarter's Terms of Use, or at least the current ones, which are realistic about projects needing to change, not working out exactly as intended, etc. 'It is regrettable that we're in this position, but removing X, Y, and Z portions of the campaign (which will affect ~_00 backers) allows us to shave A% off production and B months from the timeline. Backers affected will be offered an opportunity to change their add ons, or refunded their contribution for those specific items.'
The first Kingdom Death : Monster KS did this when the Lantern Festival expansion was cancelled, and backers were refunded 100% of what they paid for it.
I'd wager the next update could be from Jeff Ruiz and called-
I have no ass, but I must sit!
As I'm pretty sure Unca Kev chewed off whatever he had for this boner of a move on his part. Poor Jeff, first he got his ass handed to him, then Unca Kev bit it off. I've got my entertainment for the next few days. Go Team NMI!
I have to say, what a nice guy... lol (seriously) Needless to say, I won't be posting the specifics of that conversation and they're wasn't really a lot to tell anyway, but unlike PB it's really obvious that he feels bad about the craptastic state of this Kickstarter. He even admitted that they could have handled the reward levels a little better for the campaign (I assume on the financially and shipping end), but didn't really go into that specifically. But I didn't get the impression that it was a plausible reason, that RRT shouldn't have been successful
Forar wrote: And that's even fitting in Kickstarter's Terms of Use, or at least the current ones, which are realistic about projects needing to change, not working out exactly as intended, etc. 'It is regrettable that we're in this position, but removing X, Y, and Z portions of the campaign (which will affect ~_00 backers) allows us to shave A% off production and B months from the timeline. Backers affected will be offered an opportunity to change their add ons, or refunded their contribution for those specific items.'
The first Kingdom Death : Monster KS did this when the Lantern Festival expansion was cancelled, and backers were refunded 100% of what they paid for it.
Yeah, I heard about that. I wasn't a KD backer, but I've read through some of the updates, and in terms of 'massively successful campaign that takes waaaaay longer than anticipated', they seem to be among the gold standards for ongoing communication.
... or people might need to ask if some of those months of delays weren't based on them writing small novels for updates explaining why they were so late. :-P
Kidding aside, it was nice to find out that some companies can maintain a good relationship with their community of backers with quality updates. I really think some others (even companies I love, like FFP and Dwarven Forge) would do well to have an explicit, regular update policy, like Reaper does. Just pick a day of the month and use that. Nothing fancy, take a little progress and talk about it. Show off a piece of concept art or two, mention what's going on behind the scenes, check back in next month, it doesn't need to be a seven page essay.
Forar wrote: And that's even fitting in Kickstarter's Terms of Use, or at least the current ones, which are realistic about projects needing to change, not working out exactly as intended, etc. 'It is regrettable that we're in this position, but removing X, Y, and Z portions of the campaign (which will affect ~_00 backers) allows us to shave A% off production and B months from the timeline. Backers affected will be offered an opportunity to change their add ons, or refunded their contribution for those specific items.'
The first Kingdom Death : Monster KS did this when the Lantern Festival expansion was cancelled, and backers were refunded 100% of what they paid for it.
Yeah, I heard about that. I wasn't a KD backer, but I've read through some of the updates, and in terms of 'massively successful campaign that takes waaaaay longer than anticipated', they seem to be among the gold standards for ongoing communication.
... or people might need to ask if some of those months of delays weren't based on them writing small novels for updates explaining why they were so late. :-P
Kidding aside, it was nice to find out that some companies can maintain a good relationship with their community of backers with quality updates. I really think some others (even companies I love, like FFP and Dwarven Forge) would do well to have an explicit, regular update policy, like Reaper does. Just pick a day of the month and use that. Nothing fancy, take a little progress and talk about it. Show off a piece of concept art or two, mention what's going on behind the scenes, check back in next month, it doesn't need to be a seven page essay.
KD:M 1 was massively successful because the end product was AMAZING beyond anyone's previous experience. Backers received a legit $400 game that looked every penny of those $400 over the $100 that they originally paid. Irregular communication was good enough because it was obvious that Adam was putting his everything into the game, and it showed in the sculpts and prototypes. There never was a doubt that Adam wouldn't deliver. We could see stuff that surprised and delighted, to the point that people (self included) were begging to order more at whatever price point Adam deemed fair. The sheer amazement of his substantial updates outweighed their lack of frequency.
Counterpoint would be SPM's weekly updates for Super Dungeon Explore: Legends, which have told us, and shown us precious little over the past year. Very much like Palladium, we usually get a weekly Update for the sake of doing an update. Except that SPM usually asks us to help develop the game for them.
Posts by Jeff/NMI are now showing in grey which indicates he is no longer part of the group. Since he doesn't have mod powers to ban people or delete their posts he probably got pissy over being called out and left.
I sort of wonder if it is because he was embarrassed by it, or because Cadice is making his beloved PB look bad there, or because he can't moderate the conversation.
In terms of the money... Here is NMI trying to protect the reputation of PB. It sort of implies that the money was all spent.
Also, "all the funds from the KS were used for RRT" and "all the funds from the KS were used only for the KS" are not exactly equivalent, either.
Also, "all the funds from the KS were used for RRT" and "all the funds from the KS were used only for the KS" are not exactly equivalent, either.
Does anyone actually think NMI knows any actual facts about the KS money? He only knows whatever BS Kevin's fed him.
Ignore NMI, he knows nothing. He couldn't identify Ninja John by name, that'll tell you how involved in the process he is/was. He has no access to real information because Kevin doesn't give out information, because he's legally paranoid (trademark, disclaimer, copyright, sign your non-disclosure on the way in, thank you very much).
Also, "all the funds from the KS were used for RRT" and "all the funds from the KS were used only for the KS" are not exactly equivalent, either.
Does anyone actually think NMI knows any actual facts about the KS money? He only knows whatever BS Kevin's fed him.
Ignore NMI, he knows nothing. He couldn't identify Ninja John by name, that'll tell you how involved in the process he is/was. He has no access to real information because Kevin doesn't give out information, because he's legally paranoid (trademark, disclaimer, copyright, sign your non-disclosure on the way in, thank you very much).
While you're probably right, I wouldn't be surprised if NMI was as familiar with the inner workings of PB as he claims, if not moreso. Only because he's been a fan-friend for a long time, puts in a LOT of hours for Kevin, seemingly unpaid, and from what others have let slip, people friendly to Kevin find out things they probably shouldn't. EDIT: Of course, that's through the filter of Kevin's word, but still.
It MIGHT just be the unpaid nature of the relationship (cause Kevin is cheap), but given the caustic nature of NMI, I'm thinking there's a small chance he's more integral than expected. Else any reasonable person (HA! Kevin! Reasonable!) in Kevin's position, would have dropped him years ago. I honestly can't remember the last time I read an NMI conversation where he didn't completely lose it, and start calling people out. I dunno. Maybe Kevin gets off on having his attack poodle go after "haterz", and that's the only reason he still has an (unpaid) job?
Morgan Vening wrote: It MIGHT just be the unpaid nature of the relationship (cause Kevin is cheap), but given the caustic nature of NMI, I'm thinking there's a small chance he's more integral than expected. Else any reasonable person (HA! Kevin! Reasonable!) in Kevin's position, would have dropped him years ago. I honestly can't remember the last time I read an NMI conversation where he didn't completely lose it, and start calling people out. I dunno. Maybe Kevin gets off on having his attack poodle go after "haterz", and that's the only reason he still has an (unpaid) job?
I'm guessing Kevin figures NMI is unquestionably loyal, and keeps him around for that (and free labor). That's all some people seem to care about when it comes to employees.
Morgan Vening wrote: It MIGHT just be the unpaid nature of the relationship (cause Kevin is cheap), but given the caustic nature of NMI, I'm thinking there's a small chance he's more integral than expected. Else any reasonable person (HA! Kevin! Reasonable!) in Kevin's position, would have dropped him years ago. I honestly can't remember the last time I read an NMI conversation where he didn't completely lose it, and start calling people out. I dunno. Maybe Kevin gets off on having his attack poodle go after "haterz", and that's the only reason he still has an (unpaid) job?
I'm guessing Kevin figures NMI is unquestionably loyal, and keeps him around for that (and free labor). That's all some people seem to care about when it comes to employees.
Yes. A few years back there was an online petition set up to oust NMI from his position due to abuse of power. Despite the amount of signatures it got or maybe because of it, Kevin's reply was basically "feth all of u, he's doing a wonderful job". To Kevin's thinking so many people complained that it must mean NMI is doing a good job.
Well it look like they reach 100,000 post on the RTTKS site. Oh another thing is I just check PBFB page and there is a page about Scott having a snack milk and cookies. I think they were showing off the Rift coffee mug. But in the upper left corner of the page it stated Bushy Creek Texas. So it confirm that Scott is from and live in Texas. I hope this help some people here asking about it. RTT WAVE 2 is not coming.
While I'm not one to shy away from slapping PB, I really only see two confirmed pallets of RRT. I don't doubt the others COULD be RRT, or that PB still have a crapload of existing stock, or that I can't think of another product PB would have that much of, given Kevin's glee at selling 120 Atlanteans at GenCon, but I can't read what's on the side of the boxes on the left or far right, and they don't look like the right shape to fit three cores into.
Could be wrong, but I'd rather not rush to judgement without a clearer image.
Morgan Vening wrote: It MIGHT just be the unpaid nature of the relationship (cause Kevin is cheap), but given the caustic nature of NMI, I'm thinking there's a small chance he's more integral than expected. Else any reasonable person (HA! Kevin! Reasonable!) in Kevin's position, would have dropped him years ago. I honestly can't remember the last time I read an NMI conversation where he didn't completely lose it, and start calling people out. I dunno. Maybe Kevin gets off on having his attack poodle go after "haterz", and that's the only reason he still has an (unpaid) job?
I'm guessing Kevin figures NMI is unquestionably loyal, and keeps him around for that (and free labor). That's all some people seem to care about when it comes to employees.
Actually, knowing from experience, narcissists thrive on divisive behavior and controversy.
By people getting upset, he can say "You think I have bad behavior? Look at yours!".
Fantastic for "projection", claiming their own motives on others.
NMI is rather heavy handed and tends to misinterpret what people say and mean while feeling free to do whatever springs to mind at the time.
I remember that bit on the KS comments where he got people riled up and then commented "Sweet, sweet, apple pie."... it was oddly infuriating.
That was when a plague of bans happened shortly after on KS so he was literally trolling.
It is rather distressing coming across someone who likes to make discussions including their own disappear if it does not suit them, even for the most frivolous of reasons.
This seems to fall in step with Palladium Books marketing policy: "convenient forgetfulness" or "historical rewrite".
Morgan Vening wrote: While I'm not one to shy away from slapping PB, I really only see two confirmed pallets of RRT. I don't doubt the others COULD be RRT, or that PB still have a crapload of existing stock, or that I can't think of another product PB would have that much of, given Kevin's glee at selling 120 Atlanteans at GenCon, but I can't read what's on the side of the boxes on the left or far right, and they don't look like the right shape to fit three cores into.
Could be wrong, but I'd rather not rush to judgement without a clearer image.
OK you could be right but still they could be small box sets. I did see core sets to the upper left in the rafter. Still that a lot of books if you right.
fellowhoodlum wrote: Looks like the incriminating picture has been removed from PB's FB page
Yeah.... that's in no way suspect if that's the case (can't check at work).
And of course, handled in a clumsy and hamfisted manner. It's like they don't understand screencaps are a thing.
I read this post so went the RTTKS and it was posted their as well PBFB warehouse pic is gone. Well kat out of the bag now. I wonder where or who blew a nut about it. I save two picture of it. Later
I won't lie, this whole ordeal is an interesting thing to watch.
Big fan of giant mecha but was in the middle of a divorce when this hit Kickstarter. The divorce was good for something!
I kinda wish a bigger youtuber would cover this fiasco.
As it stands I myself just want to write a book about it. Even comparing it to videogame crowdfunding projects, this is in a high spot of screwups or scams.
IIRC correctly we already knew from a previous picture that Palladium had overproduced RTT in the thousands (based on "Box #X of Y" for the starter box, which some back of the envelope math would show was 2-3 times the amount of boxed sets the backers ordered without counting add-ons. You'd have to rifle through the old updates to find it, though.
Kevin thought he could fund wave 2 on wave 1 sales. That's where a good portion of the money went. It was probably 2 more shipping containers than they needed to produce. And yes, the Northern Gun book timing is suspicious as heck.
John Prins wrote: IIRC correctly we already knew from a previous picture that Palladium had overproduced RTT in the thousands (based on "Box #X of Y" for the starter box, which some back of the envelope math would show was 2-3 times the amount of boxed sets the backers ordered without counting add-ons. You'd have to rifle through the old updates to find it, though.
Kevin thought he could fund wave 2 on wave 1 sales. That's where a good portion of the money went. It was probably 2 more shipping containers than they needed to produce.
I think that this is the most likely explanation for the missing Wave 2 stuff, unfortunately.
It also means that PB will be able to kick this particular can down the road almost indefinitely, or at least think that they...can.
Alpharius wrote: It also means that PB will be able to kick this particular can down the road almost indefinitely, or at least think that they...can.
Because they "can"?
Forgive me, it is time for a song and dance number:
Why do we make fun of Palladium? Because we can!
Why do we complain about them keeping our money? Because we can!
Why do we not shut up and just hand them our money anyway? Because we can!
...
Anyway... I think I will continue trying not to care anymore...
John Prins wrote: IIRC correctly we already knew from a previous picture that Palladium had overproduced RTT in the thousands (based on "Box #X of Y" for the starter box, which some back of the envelope math would show was 2-3 times the amount of boxed sets the backers ordered without counting add-ons. You'd have to rifle through the old updates to find it, though.
Kevin thought he could fund wave 2 on wave 1 sales. That's where a good portion of the money went. It was probably 2 more shipping containers than they needed to produce.
I think that this is the most likely explanation for the missing Wave 2 stuff, unfortunately.
It also means that PB will be able to kick this particular can down the road almost indefinitely, or at least think that they...can.
Alpharius... I don't want them to kick the can down the road. Nor think that they can, because Kevin thinks he can get away with it. I want them to be held accountable. If Palladium is that wrapped up in protecting their reputation (what little of it as they have) then they should be making every reasonable effort in finishing this in a timely manner.
Many here are, and on the Kickstarter, are rightly enraged at how this is being handled, and rightly enraged that Palladium is being rather tone-deaf about it. Palladium cannot point fingers at Ninja Division, o the manufacturer, or the failure of the Rifts Board Game or whatever excuse of the moment Kevin Siembieda wishes to use to justify fething this up from one end to the other. If Palladium really gave a tinker's cuss about their fanbase, like they repeatedly claim, then this should already be resolved and a dead issue. But know, they abuse their fans' faith in them repeatedly and their fans keep coming back like an abused partner in a rather toxic relationship.
@Seawolf, that's really the point. From PB's perspective, the real fans come back. The complainers aren't real fans. And they don't care about people that aren't fans.
Well yes, no one *wants* them to do that, but because KS is a toothless slug when it comes to project/creator accountability, they *will* be doing just that - Can Kicking for 4 years and counting, with no end in sight!
It is actually *easy* for them to 'justify' doing it too, again, per Kickstarter's rather weak "update the masses" standard too...
Its certainly shady they took the pics down, i certainly grabbed a copy of both, it would be interesting running it through a decent magnifying program so we might be able to make out whats what a lot easier, unfortunately i dont have one!
Original Timmy wrote: Its certainly shady they took the pics down, i certainly grabbed a copy of both, it would be interesting running it through a decent magnifying program so we might be able to make out whats what a lot easier, unfortunately i dont have one!
Anyone who has good resolution of those images, and want to compare them to the recorded box on file, it was in Update 155
Here's the picture in question.
Does that text formatting match up with the sides of the boxes on the pallets on the right in the "Atlanteans signing" photos? Lets see, shall we?
Sure as hell looks like it. SEVEN pallets shown, just on the LEFT, not including the pallets at the back or on the RIGHT. So... 8 boxes per layer, 7 layers, 3 copies per box = 168 copies per pallet. So, 1344 copies, just on the LEFT hand side fore/mid ground. Good to know they have plenty of supply.
EDIT: Correction, only 7 pallets in that run. But I figure the boxes on the right make up the numbers assuming the pallets in the other locations aren't this (and at this point, who'd argue otherwise). I also screwed up my left and right, cause I'm a f'n moron (Hey, PB, HIRE ME! I'd be a good fit!), and so I changed them, but capitalized the corrections, just so you know just how stupid I am.
Morgan Vening wrote: @Seawolf, that's really the point. From PB's perspective, the real fans come back. The complainers aren't real fans. And they don't care about people that aren't fans.
Actually youre spot on. Kevin has said exactly that a few times publicly. Basically if youre not a fan your a hater.
Morgan Vening wrote: @Seawolf, that's really the point. From PB's perspective, the real fans come back. The complainers aren't real fans. And they don't care about people that aren't fans.
Actually youre spot on. Kevin has said exactly that a few times publicly. Basically if youre not a fan your a hater.
Ah... how silly of me... I forgot who we were talking about... thanks.
JohnHwangDD wrote: I could understand producing 10,000 units given 5,300 unit backer demand. But 17,500? That's delusional. Oh, wait...
Not to completely defend PB, but in a world where Forar exists, 10k units isn't unreasonable. Likely quite a few people ordered 2+ core sets, and Forar's cult had I believe 8 boxes on 1 backer? So, 8-9k could have actually been needed for the backers, because of the bizarre things Canadians get up to in the winter.
Of course, 17k would be delusional IF you understood that KickStarters magnify the apparent demand in a niche and you can't equate number of backers to number of traditional pre-orders. PB likely was wholly unaware of this and plugged the number into their "pre-order calculator" (or abacus...) and thought they'd be shifting tons like with a regular product offering. Sadly for the backers, reality is that most of the initial demand was satisfied by the KS itself, and any residual demand was likely easily satisfied by disaffected backers and/or stores unloading the product. I don't think that's really a-typical of most KS projects that the after-campaign demand is less than that of the campaign by a wide margin, some notable exceptions aside. Also this campaign was so long ago I'm not sure that factor was as widely understood as it is today. Four years is a lot of time to gain perspective as anyone who had a child when the campaign ended can tell you. Such a child will be starting school soon!
So, still PB not knowing what the feth they're doing, but a different flavor than it might seem at first.
As I said, 10k wouldn't have been unreasonable given the KS demand for 5.3k. While some ordered multiple sets (for clubs, etc.), the grand total known demand was only 5+k.
Post-KS demand is highly variable, but the incremental cost of a 7.5k second printing when you already have the tooling completed is very attractive - the pennies saved don't justify the risk. That's why it's delusional.
@Morgan - sadly, the boxes on the pallets to the left are not wide enough to be Main Box sets. If you look closely, they are stacked "one sideways, two face on", with the "face on" boxes almost half the width of the sideways box. As you may notice, the main box case you posted above the picture is almost square in it's dimensions, not rectangular.
They could, however, be add-on boxes like Valks, Destroids and Battlepods.
And I have to ask - who are the two guys signing the books? And are they signing Kevin's name into the book?
But even if half the backers bought 2 copies of the game.. that should only total 7,500 copies...
That makes it seem we also paid for the 10,000 copies he planned to sale at retail..
So there is your answer.. your RTT kickstarter money is sitting in the warehouse collecting dust..
Counting the campaign page on KS, there were 6,684 main box sets purchased during the campaign. If we're generous and believe the statement they got 10% more in the backer kit, we're only looking at 7,352 sets for the KS campaign.
Stormonu wrote: Counting the campaign page on KS, there were 6,684 main box sets purchased during the campaign. If we're generous and believe the statement they got 10% more in the backer kit, we're only looking at 7,352 sets for the KS campaign.
There were people who ordered extra boxes a la carte, but for the most part, 10k units should have been the max. It still would have left several thousand to retail, which could have paid for a second run all on its own.
Yeah, I suspect the temptation to help fund retail sales at the same time as KS fulfillment was too great to pass up, and I'm sure there was some way to internally justify this, at least to PB.
Stormonu wrote: @Morgan - sadly, the boxes on the pallets to the left are not wide enough to be Main Box sets. If you look closely, they are stacked "one sideways, two face on", with the "face on" boxes almost half the width of the sideways box. As you may notice, the main box case you posted above the picture is almost square in it's dimensions, not rectangular.
They could, however, be add-on boxes like Valks, Destroids and Battlepods.
Even if the boxes are not the main box, it is still a ton of product that has sucked up all the liquid assets.
Anyone here going to PB open house?
I would to see what boxes are around but that would mean giving them money, so no.
Stormonu wrote: @Morgan - sadly, the boxes on the pallets to the left are not wide enough to be Main Box sets. If you look closely, they are stacked "one sideways, two face on", with the "face on" boxes almost half the width of the sideways box. As you may notice, the main box case you posted above the picture is almost square in it's dimensions, not rectangular.
They could, however, be add-on boxes like Valks, Destroids and Battlepods.
Even if the boxes are not the main box, it is still a ton of product that has sucked up all the liquid assets.
Anyone here going to PB open house?
I would to see what boxes are around but that would mean giving them money, so no.
It wouldn't be too hard to slip in unnoticed, you'd just need a spider suit to get past their security.
Stormonu wrote: @Morgan - sadly, the boxes on the pallets to the left are not wide enough to be Main Box sets. If you look closely, they are stacked "one sideways, two face on", with the "face on" boxes almost half the width of the sideways box. As you may notice, the main box case you posted above the picture is almost square in it's dimensions, not rectangular.
They could, however, be add-on boxes like Valks, Destroids and Battlepods.
Even if the boxes are not the main box, it is still a ton of product that has sucked up all the liquid assets.
Anyone here going to PB open house?
I would to see what boxes are around but that would mean giving them money, so no.
It wouldn't be too hard to slip in unnoticed, you'd just need a spider suit to get past their security.
If PB's Crisis of Treachery is anything to go by, you could be literally on fire, and their Security wouldn't notice anything amiss.
When Morgan and I ran the numbers years ago, we came to a similar estimate of around 7k core boxes for the backers (give or take). 17.5k to cover backers plus 10k for global supply doesn't really seem like that crazy a number, IF you think like Kevin and co with big dollar signs in their eyes and a belief that they'll probably move that in the first year, bro!
Plus, I wouldn't be shocked if there wasn't some kind of Economy of Scale in play here. Like, maybe they wanted 8 or 9k, but at 15k+ the price per unit dropped substantially and they talked themselves into a position where covering backers+10k looked good. While there's often diminishing returns in play, as I've commented before, depending on what you're making and who you're working with, there can be a point where getting X costs you one price, and then getting 2X costs only a pittance more.
Granted, with something as big and heavy as pallets of core boxes, the extra weight and volume probably hit them with increased shipping costs as well (reducing the savings from the production run), but again, if they were paying like $20 a core and expecting to sell them wholesale for $50 and maybe even some on their shop for $75-100, it can be easy to talk yourself into seeing it as an opportunity to double or triple your money (or better), so why not! Even if they only sold a fraction of the excess, they'd still be covering the extra fees!?
And then a few years later they still have enough boxes around to build rather substantial forts out of, and even if they basically broke even on the sales, all that extra product didn't turn into piles of money as anticipated. And factories won't take RRT cores as payment, so having 10k extra just laying around does them no good (and is actively detrimental if what I'm hearing about taxes on existing stock is true, I'm not a business guy).
There are dozens of other factors that could be in play, and yes the debate will forever rage on about who paid for all those extras (probably backers, it'd be overly charitable to think that these fethmuppets treated those funds respectfully and entirely separately from their other expenses).
I've gotta jet to a dinner, just some musings as I catch up here.
They vastly overestimated the demand, when GW does a release it's typically a run of 5-10k units to cover worldwide supply that's fething GW the giant of miniatures gaming not a joke company like Palladium. With start ups most of the demand is filled with the initial KS offering, established companies (like CMON) can count on retail sales to carry on after the KS but a start up will be lucky if they can even get close to matching their KS numbers via retail. They saw stars in KS numbers and got seduced thinking they'd hit it big, not realizing post KS sales wouldn't continue like that without a lot of extra promoting and support which they can't provide.
CMON games run about $8 for a game like Zombicide and most of that cost (about 2/3rd) is the heavy cardstock tiles, packing materials and the boxes themselves, the RRT boxes are largely just plastic components and shouldn't run more than $10-$12 tops, if they are paying more than that they got taken to the cleaners.
While I don't have the specific quote, from other bulk quotes I've seen, PB saved less than 10% per unit cost by producing 17.5k vs 10k. Probably less than 5% difference. The key was getting over 5k units, which they already had committed.
They'll never move all that product. I had a LGS that ordered 6 box sets.
All 6 remained on the shelves for over a year. They were eventually marked down to 15 dollars. Still didn't sell.
Someone did seem to dumpster dive them after they were left out in the back at least.
Right, with hindsight we all know that. Hell, at the time people pondered if the Kickstarter didn't represent a very substantial portion of worldwide demand at the time (before we even knew what a gakshow it'd become).
But if I just took in ~1.5m USD, saw crowds eager to buy thousands of boxes, and an economy of scale breakpoint could save me a pretty hefty chunk of change (even 5% of a couple hundred grand is still around 10k, though as I noted above they probably lost a chunk of that in the extra shipping), I could see how they got greedy and decided that worst case scenario they could do a few steep sales to turn $12 boxes into $50 boxes and still be ahead of the game in some fashion. (4x ones money not being nearly as great as 8x ones money, but surely people will snap 'em up, right!?)
Except it seems they can't. They've been dragging those boxes to conventions for a few years now, running sales, shipping to distributors, and a random pic of a section of the warehouse might show a 1000+ just sitting around, with who knows how many more pallets off camera?
I'm not saying it was a good idea, but I can see how they might've gotten themselves into this mess, further compounded by being pathologically unable to admit that they're in a mess in the first place.
