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 lord_blackfang wrote:
I'm kind of shifting back and forth between being sorry I didn't pledge for the Noh (they suddenly look really good) and being sorry I pledged anything at all...

You'll be able to pick the Noh up later on.

I'm still looking forward to getting my stuff. Soda Pop makes one of my favorite games (Super Dungeon Explore) and I've played RK before.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Project Update #98: Token Test Pictures
Posted by CoolMiniOrNot ♥ Like

Hello everyone,

As promised we have pictures of the test run of the new token mold. This test was done in clear acrylic so we can see how the mold did. The final tokens will be in colored acrylic based on faction along with the painted token face.



The two token sizes—30mm for AoEs and other effects, 50mm for objectives.



All of the tokens in their baggie to make sure they fit.



These are the toppers that go on each token baggie. Below the toppers are the color swatches showing the color each faction's tokens will be.



Token Designs. The top two are the primary and secondary objective designs. Below are the icons for the token effects.



This is the token key card. Using a card sleeve and dry erase marker you will use the key card to write the name of the effect each numbered token represents.



Primary Objective tracker card.



Secondary Objective tracker card. Each player has two secondary objective, hence the two health tracks on the card.

As you can see the tokens and objectives are a key part of managing your games of Relic Knights!

We will post as we soon as we have the next production update.

Deke, Soda Pop Miniatures

SP certainly seems to be way more proactive since they decided (finally?) to "take over" updating everyone on the RK KS campaign.

I'm grateful for it now - at last!

Still no idea when all of this is going to ship out though...

 Alpharius wrote:
SP certainly seems to be way more proactive since they decided (finally?) to "take over" updating everyone on the RK KS campaign.

I'm grateful for it now - at last!

Still no idea when all of this is going to ship out though...

It really makes me wonder what exatcly they were having trouble with... I would have thought anyone could make a clear plastic disk.

The guy they have running to updates for Soda Pop is a good guy.

I'm really hoping this level of communication shows the kind of support we will be getting once the game launches and goes into competitve play.

my guess the tool wasn't polished well enough so the test casts looked 'scratched'

another few hours polishing on the very expensive, busy cnc machine and all is ok

The sizes may have been too small or large. The game calls for 30mm and 50mm specifically and the factory may have just copied over 25mm bases or something since they deal in different sized circles all the time. We may never know the truth but at least the issue seems to be fixed now.

With the test run turning out well I hope this puts production and fulfillment on track to be completed before Chinese new year.

Whatever the issue with the base inserts was, it seems to have been resolved quietly and quickly.

Not a direct answer from Deke but I take from this that nothing at all has been manufactured yet just test runs

Question:
Has everything been produced except the inserts and tokens now? I guess I'm looking a status update for all of the items other than inserts and tokens.

Answer:
Unfortunately, with how China does manufacturing everything is essentially done in one big production push after everything has been approved. We will be providing you with the new production schedule as soon as we have it.

My last guess of March 2014 might even be optimistic on that basis :(

So the Soda Pop have hired a token mold guy to handle their communications for now on? Yay affirmative action.
Can we have our stuff now please?

They processed my refund, I'm pretty happy.

I'm not pushing for a refund because:

1) I like the overall 'look and feel' on the line
2) This KS was before CMON really learned how to bleed and soak us for a lot of money - it wasn't really *that* bad to get all that I wanted.
3) At this point, what's another 3 to 6 months delay? I'd pretty much forgotten about this one anyway!

 DaveC wrote:
Not a direct answer from Deke but I take from this that nothing at all has been manufactured yet just test runs

Question:
Has everything been produced except the inserts and tokens now? I guess I'm looking a status update for all of the items other than inserts and tokens.

Answer:
Unfortunately, with how China does manufacturing everything is essentially done in one big production push after everything has been approved. We will be providing you with the new production schedule as soon as we have it.

My last guess of March 2014 might even be optimistic on that basis :(

Whooooooaaaaaaa! Just passed that on to the local gaming group that pledged big for Relic Knights, they're not going to be happy... the prior communications did indeed make people start to think it was just the tokens left to manufacture, and nothing else.

And as we now know, that's not even CLOSE.

Ugh.

Well, hopefully we'll get them before Christmas of next year! But seriously, it gets harder and harder to get excited for this game with how long it's been overdue. If things haven't come around in March I may consider a refund as well.

 RiTides wrote:

Whooooooaaaaaaa! Just passed that on to the local gaming group that pledged big for Relic Knights, they're not going to be happy... the prior communications did indeed make people start to think it was just the tokens left to manufacture, and nothing else.

No, Soda Pop said somewhere that manufacture would go faction by faction once everything was approved, making it pretty obvious that nothing has actually been manufactured yet.

Does anyone else get the feeling that in inordinate amount of blame gets placed on the Chinese manufacturers when things run late?

It is probably almost impossible to accurately determine how much stuff gets made in China. Billions of dollars worth of product. I would presume that most of these Chinese manufacturers actually know what they're doing and that delays caused by the client (yes, it happens) don't get mentioned.

It seems like every year, every Kickstarter acts like 'Chinese New Year' is f'ing up their plans, that China does things weird, that they changed something without asking, etc. They toss out these excuses even if they've used China to make things before as if they're finally figuring out how Chinese manufacturing works.

I can totally understand a delay because the Kickstarter got too big, it was too successful, and there were simply too many models. I know that translation problems can occur, and errors are made by Chinese workers. I've also seen errors from American designers, that the public doesn't find out about because it gets fixed. Sometimes inferior products get greenlighted anyway. Don't even get me started on the Deadzone acrylic tokens....

Surely not every American company that deals with China has these problems??? Maybe these upstart companies need to be more realistic about their R&D timeframes. I suspect some of the big companies that aren't using KS are spending years going from design to product. The 'Now, Soon, Back NOW' mentality is biting way too many Kickstarters and their backers in the azz.

I'm pleased that Soda Pop is trying to get the product as high a quality as possible. I'd rather Relic Knights be 'close to perfect' than 'fast', but I don't feel like we are getting the full story.

 Dr Mathias wrote:
I'm pleased that Soda Pop is trying to get the product as high a quality as possible. I'd rather Relic Knights be 'close to perfect' than 'fast', but I don't feel like we are getting the full story.

Along with the remarkably permissive attitude many backers have towards delays, this is another topic I've been mulling over for ages.

It's a frequent refrain on almost any KS campaign I've looked over; "I'd rather have it good than fast!", and that's a totally reasonable stance to take, however there's gradiation present that so many seem to ignore. I liken it to buying a computer; you can get a hunk of crap for a couple hundred bucks, or a workable system for a couple hundred more, or a solid gaming rig for a grand plus, or a top of the line monster for 10 grand plus, with all the bells, whistles and a quartet of video cards that could run NASA in a pinch, but there are massive diminishing returns present.

I can see taking the time to tweak the molds and get them right. To run a test batch and give feedback to make sure the end result is something people should be happy with. But mold lines happen, eventually like any product one has to accept that in order to further refine it another 1% better would take days or weeks or even months, and when dealing with miniatures we're often looking at a level of detail that only a professional modeler/painter will be able to do justice to anyways. Many (most?) backers will probably just slap it together and throw primer and a basic scheme on it, if that.

But backers rarely know where exactly we are on that continuum, so calls for "take another 3 months to 'do it right'", without knowing how far from the (highly subjective) 'right', seems more like blind faith than informed support.

Edit: to be completely clear, I'm not referring to you directly, Doc. Your comment just triggered a post I've been pondering laying out for a while.

And later on, we'll get the "Customs Is Delaying Everything!" message too!

And yeah, sometimes that obviously is the case, but I think that's another bullet in the 'Our Kickstarter Is Really Late Ammo Belt' for some...

For reference, I can confirm that Chinese manufacturing can be a huge mess. Doesn't have to be, but for smaller players who are not well connected personally with folks inside the system, it can be really awkward. There are a lot of institutional issues that have nothing to do with incompetence that you just don't see when you deal with firms in countries like the US. It is not uncommon to see increasing delays over time as officials or managers push to get more and more in their pockets.

That said, this is getting a bit ridiculous. I am somewhat suspicious that CMON doesn't have sufficient relationships to get things done, given their previous experiences. It is possible that they are a relatively smaller player and other people are sort of bullying their way in front of the production line, but I am skeptical.

 lord_blackfang wrote:

 RiTides wrote:

Whooooooaaaaaaa! Just passed that on to the local gaming group that pledged big for Relic Knights, they're not going to be happy... the prior communications did indeed make people start to think it was just the tokens left to manufacture, and nothing else.

No, Soda Pop said somewhere that manufacture would go faction by faction once everything was approved, making it pretty obvious that nothing has actually been manufactured yet.

Yes, but plenty of people thought that was just tokens. So nothing manufactured in 2013

They've still got 11 days, and China doesn't get new year so while getting less likely it's not impossible

 OrlandotheTechnicoloured wrote:
They've still got 11 days, and China doesn't get new year so while getting less likely it's not impossible

You may (and it's still may) have to eat that flying pig!

UPDATE:

Base Insert Photos

With the tokens all squared away, we have a good update for you as we approach the holidays:


All Battle Box contents have been approved and are about to start production!

As production begins we will continue to provide you with updates on it's progress and shipping schedules as they are finalized and come available.

We also have some more pictures for you.

First up are the tokens. These images show the tokens in their correct colors with their paint overlay. We are going to do a slightly heavier coat of paint for the final production run to help make all the symbols really pop.



Next are the remastered base inserts. They look really sharp and we will keep you updated as they continue through the process towards manufacturing. Not pictured is the 80mm one but we assure you it is not forgotten!



Finally, we have pictures of the final production casts of the Super Dungeon Explore models. They are looking great and will also start production with the battle boxes very soon. We have also made pdfs of the Super Dungeon Explore cards available for you to preview on the Soda Pop Miniatures Media Page.







The holidays are here and like many of you Soda Pop Miniatures will be spending some time with our families and friends. We will, of course, continue working on production over the holidays, but Ross and I will not be answering comments, forums, or PMs from December 24-26th and December 31 through January 1st.

We wish you all a safe and happy Holiday Season!

–Deke, Soda Pop Miniatures

I like the look of the SDE minis for the most part. I hate the "falling down" pose of Cross. (So many SDE minis seem to have a lot of underside that's difficult and largely pointless to paint).

And (like pretty much everyone) am disappointed in the tiny head of the mini-boss. The other four will happily join my collection though.

Side note: I really wish they would make the plastic bar extend enough to cover the whole gap in the bases though. Filling that In is an obnoxious time waster when trying to prep SDE minis. Dunno why they were able to get that right for the core set and then move to having it all screwed up for the rest.

Nothing is being produced and I can't up my pledge despite lengthy requests. You'd think they'd want my money in order to fund a few refunds. ;-) :-P

 OrlandotheTechnicoloured wrote:
You may (and it's still may) have to eat that flying pig!

Seeing as I did up 2 racks of ribs and a couple Bacon Explosions on the smoker yesterday, I now have room for flying pig.




Honestly, I hope they do deliver you guys a great product and do it sooner rather than later.

"About to start production" describes the last few months too, though

Bases are looking pretty good. The SDE minis look like...typical SDE minis. Nothing really spectacular. Still disappointed in the Kasaro-To.

Despite my reservations about the KS, those bases look pretty impressive.

The Sedition Wars bases were great too. These are busier/have more on them, and look really good.

I hope these folks and McVey sell their bases separately at some point.

 CptJake wrote:
The Sedition Wars bases were great too. These are busier/have more on them, and look really good.

I hope these folks and McVey sell their bases separately at some point.

I'm sure they will(if they thinks there's enough money in it ).

Is this game just in a perpetual state of "just about to enter production"?