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 judgedoug wrote:
I was saying "interestingly" because I also have the same experience that the retail-released restic stuff has generally been of higher quality than the Ks-releases stuff. I would pin that down to Chinese rush jobs and Mantic lacking good QC during fulfillment (which is probably why they replace bad models no questions asked).

Hmm, perhaps I don't post enough negative reviews? I hate Mantic's Abyssal Dwarf and Twilight Kin plasic/metal combos, straight up. I'm disappointed in their goblins because the army could have been the best goblins on the market (they are my favorite goblin designs, or at least tied with Red Box Games' goblins), but the plastics turned out pretty bad but I was able to turn my models into an army I like (which I do have a huge army of them due to the KoW KS). Uhh... the trolls made me sad. So did the Basileans, so I used Confrontation figures for that army. Some of my Dreadball stuff was crappy, and I recently cursed Manchu by giving him my extra Teraton team and he's been spending hours scraping away restic mold lines and swearing. I hope that Mantic's new hard plastics are good, but I honestly doubt they will be as fantastic as their original undead and elf sprues, but it's not like my patience is wearing thin or anything... if Mantic makes something I don't like, I don't buy it.... if they make something I like, I will. But I'm not one of those gamers that's beholden to a company, and 'official' miniatures are always secondary to my concerns of a good game to play. Hell I played a game of Kings of War this past weekend using my English Civil War Parliamentarian New Model Army figures, haha, and I recently bought Perry DAK for use in Bolt Action. For instance, the armies I'm working on for Kings of War are a Cult of Set army composed of Gamezone and Mierce models and then a Helsvakt Horde army composed of Red Box Games and Mierce models...three of my favorite miniatures companies in the world. The armies have no Mantic models (actually the Cult of Set uses the metal Mantic Elf archers as I really like those sculpts). If Warpath winds up being good, I have Urban War Viridians, Pig Iron, Copplestone, Khurusan Federal, SST Skinnies, and now yes Mantic Corporation to use - otherwise those figures will continue to be used in Tomorrow's War, Stargrunt II, or my own homebrew sci fi ruleset. I bought into Deadzone specifically to get loads of future terrain (especially for Judge Dredd) and lots of Enforcers (again for generic sci fi gaming) and it's a really really nice bonus that the rules are good and the models I got are actually nice. Shrug. I like what I like so I'll use what I like however I like

I'm also not inclined to buy crap... so there's not many negative reviews for me to post about! And I guess I've been really lucky with Mantic stuff, or it's just that usually the people who review things online are the ones that have had a bad experience with that product or service, and since I'm fairly active and don't have a lot of negative things to say then it sounds like I'm a water carrier or fanboy or whatever.

That's actually super helpful to me, judgedoug, thanks for posting it! I quoted the whole thing to avoid taking anything out of context, but highlighted one part in green... so you do have criticism of Mantic, it's just that you choose to curse Manchu with it instead

Thanks for the thorough reply, I really appreciate it!

 Polonius wrote:
To elaborate on my point, I think that kickstarters (or human endeavors of any sort, really) can succeed overall despite some failures, and fail overall despite some successes. It's often complicated because every person's reaction is going to be different, based on their own expectations and experience.

I've backed a decent number of kickstarters, and DZ is right now in the lower half, but I'd call it a qualified success. The KoW kickstarter, in all honesty, was a fiasco to me. Some great looking models, a lot of crappy looking models, and mostly stuff I won't use, regardless. I don't feel cheated, but I do wish I could have my pledge back instead of the models they delivered.

See, my reaction helps prove your initial assertion that "every person's reaction is going to be different, based on their own expectations and experience". You may have thought KoW KS was a fiasco, but for myself, I believe KoW KS was the best KS I've done out of 32 so far. My initial pledges (I pledged from two accounts actually) got me tons of pre-existing models at far less than retail and also got me into one of my favorite miniatures games. I've had more games of KoW and had more fun playing it than I have had since probably Starship Troopers (my favorite ruleset of all time). In the end I got like, what, for a $175 pledge, 100 orcs, 20 orc cav, some characters, (the undead pledge was even better) and then like a dozen or more free units of models for each of my pledges, kept the ones I liked and trade off the ones I didn't like. I have a huge orc army that I love, and a huge goblin army that took some work to make look good but is now completely painted and also looks good... and I love playing the game! Absolute success, and was also really my first introduction to Mantic. So my first KoW KS shipment containing hundreds of hard plastic models and stuff and the hardcover rules was great, and then when I started playing I was blown away... Warhammer had disappointed me with 8th and I had been without a mass battles ruleset for years by that point, and I literally could not have been happier. I'm sure another KS exists that is a better "deal" than the KoW one was, but not one that has given me literally dozens and dozens of hours of enjoyment... if not actually a hundred hours at this point, or more. I tend to play KoW every week since getting the rulebook 18 months ago.

So yeah, it's all relative.

Pics or it didn't happen, Judgedoug (of the painted army, I mean).

Seriously, though, I would like to see it! Even just an overall army shot would be sweet.

I don't know of many people (or any?) who soldiered through making a whole army out of those gobbos, so this needs to be documented . I bet it looks really good all together, and you're a trooper for having done it.

 judgedoug wrote:

 Polonius wrote:
To elaborate on my point, I think that kickstarters (or human endeavors of any sort, really) can succeed overall despite some failures, and fail overall despite some successes. It's often complicated because every person's reaction is going to be different, based on their own expectations and experience.

I've backed a decent number of kickstarters, and DZ is right now in the lower half, but I'd call it a qualified success. The KoW kickstarter, in all honesty, was a fiasco to me. Some great looking models, a lot of crappy looking models, and mostly stuff I won't use, regardless. I don't feel cheated, but I do wish I could have my pledge back instead of the models they delivered.

See, my reaction helps prove your initial assertion that "every person's reaction is going to be different, based on their own expectations and experience". You may have thought KoW KS was a fiasco, but for myself, I believe KoW KS was the best KS I've done out of 32 so far. My initial pledges (I pledged from two accounts actually) got me tons of pre-existing models at far less than retail and also got me into one of my favorite miniatures games. I've had more games of KoW and had more fun playing it than I have had since probably Starship Troopers (my favorite ruleset of all time). In the end I got like, what, for a $175 pledge, 100 orcs, 20 orc cav, some characters, (the undead pledge was even better) and then like a dozen or more free units of models for each of my pledges, kept the ones I liked and trade off the ones I didn't like. I have a huge orc army that I love, and a huge goblin army that took some work to make look good but is now completely painted and also looks good... and I love playing the game! Absolute success, and was also really my first introduction to Mantic. So my first KoW KS shipment containing hundreds of hard plastic models and stuff and the hardcover rules was great, and then when I started playing I was blown away... Warhammer had disappointed me with 8th and I had been without a mass battles ruleset for years by that point, and I literally could not have been happier. I'm sure another KS exists that is a better "deal" than the KoW one was, but not one that has given me literally dozens and dozens of hours of enjoyment... if not actually a hundred hours at this point, or more. I tend to play KoW every week since getting the rulebook 18 months ago.

So yeah, it's all relative.

Yeah, a big part of my problem was that I had started collecting mantic with the elves, and I picked elves for my army with the pledge. So I really have way too many elves, and they're charms have worn off on me. I look at the dwarves, ogres, undead, and even orcs wishing I had gotten them instead.

 Kroothawk wrote:

 agnosto wrote:
Wut? The model looks like a GW Koot model.

Scan the thread: The photoshop pic using my avatar pic was made to troll me and belittle everyone criticizing Mantic.

And the reference here had nothing to do with that. Alph just asked for the pic. Chillllll.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 RiTides wrote:
This isn't like cleaning mold lines off of hard plastic, and while you may respond "It's easy" that's simply not what I've heard from the vast majority of those who have dealt with it, as well as my own experience with Privateer Press restic.

The Blaine picture was just off the google and was the first pic I found. Yikes, shouldn't have chosen that one.

As for mold lines, I've done my whole strike team except for Wrath and none of them were difficult to clean. Some of them had more lines than others, but a sharp X-acto knife was more than enough to handle them.

I think the whole 'oh no mold lines' thing is a bit over done. I spent about as much time cleaning mold lines off of individual restic minis as I did cleaning mold lines off my Firestorm Redoubt and Vengeance Weapons Batteries (both Plastic kits).

Sedition Wars:

If cleaning Sedition Wars restic figures is no worse than cleaning Mantic's, it's also no better. Sedition Wars has it's fair share of "mold lines over the face" issues; I found cleaning Quasimodos without damaging fine details particularly difficult. That said, I definitely think it's worth investing in Sedition Wars if you like the Strain's space zombie aesthetic, particularly since Sedition Wars figures scale perfectly with those in Deadzone. In the USA, Sedition Wars is currently a steal on Amazon at $40 shipped.

For those planning to use Sedition Wars figures in Deadzone, how do you plan to use them? For me, the individual human hero figures are perfect Rebs additions, but standard Sedition Wars troopers are too uniform / elite looking to fit in a Rebs force. On the other hand, you could swap out Mars Attacks modern military grunts for Sedition Wars troopers and use the human Deadzone deck to field a great looking Corporation faction. As for the Strain, they make great Plague zombies; only the tech side of their bio-tech physiology needs a little fluff bending. I'd love to replace Plague 3rd gens with them too, but Strain zombies generally don't carry guns or other ranged weapons, making them awkward stand-ins for suppressive fire based Plague 3rd gens. Since Strain biotech is all about living weaponry built into / emerging from the body, I also don't want to mod standard external guns into their hands. Tyranid bio-guns could work well, but to really look good you'd need to green stuff / sculpt some transitional areas where the guns morph into the Strain figure's body, and I'm not eager to make every Plague trooper into an extensive sculpting job.

Maybe I'll have my Strain zombies issue suppressive fire from bursting pustules or something. If anyone here comes up with a better "Strain as shooty 3rd-gen" visual fix, I'd love to hear it.

Mars Attacks:

In the end I decided to reverse course and re-invest most of my Mars Attacks pledge back into Mars Attacks material rather than more Deadzone terrain. This is admittedly a gamble, since Mantic will be casting the Mars Attacks figures in the same rubbery plastic Fantasy Flight Games used for "Gears of War" plastic rather than the improved restic formula they used in Deadzone. There was nothing wrong with the LOKA figure I got in my Crazy Christmas box, but despite being cast in the same material as Gears of War figures, it didn't measure up to them. For that matter, most of FFG's own product line doesn't measure up to the quality of their Gears of War figures: Gears of Wars minis hold detail much better than Descent minis do, for example. Despite Mantic being entirely upfront from the beginning that Mars Attacks figures would be cast in a different material, I think the majority of Mars Attacks backers are expecting Deadzone levels of quality. If Mars Attacks figures really measure up to the Gears of War production standard, I think people will generally be very pleased, but if they fall short like the LOKA and Descent figures did, I think we'll see a lot of backer disappointment.

 Polonius wrote:
I've backed a decent number of kickstarters, and DZ is right now in the lower half, but I'd call it a qualified success. The KoW kickstarter, in all honesty, was a fiasco to me. Some great looking models, a lot of crappy looking models, and mostly stuff I won't use, regardless. I don't feel cheated, but I do wish I could have my pledge back instead of the models they delivered.

Wow, yeah, I can agree on the KOW kickstarter. I got into it for cheap D&D minis and then Reaper popped theirs, so it was entirely irrelevant for me. I got a ton of stuff that I tried to sell and ended up losing about $20 on the kickstarter. Really underwhelming for me even without the slight financial loss.

Deadzone though? Man, is this one great. I am probably going in for another grand after all the folks who are adding onto my pledge jump in. I love this game and the minis.

Exactly, it is all relative. I love the Abyssal Dwarf range,but the cleanup required on the metal add on bits is a massive amount of work. As I love the models I Had no problem doing it. If I did not like the sculpts that much I would leave them to one side. I have done this with the Basilean Paladins, knights and plastics. Just too much preparation for a model range I did not care for.

Then to Deadzone. I believe I was first on this thread to post some pictures of the models that I had received and bemoaned the mould lines on the mercenaries, some on the rebs and the odd one here and there. But I was lucky with my Marauders, Enforcers and Plague. Others have not been. It is this inconsistency that needs to be dealt with, and I think that requires them to leave their present suppliers.

It was these worries that led me to initially go with a vanilla strike team pledge and no add ons. I, again, was lucky to get everything I ordered and earlier than most. The fact that some Dakka members have not gotten anything more than 6 weeks after I got my pledge is way out of line. For those waiting on missing parts, and there are a lot of them, that is also out of line. Still waiting on KOW/Dreadball Ks items? Blimey.

Thus I can see why a lot of people are dissatisfied with their pledges. I am quite happy, and plan to dump about £100 on the 2nd survey. But again most of the past 3/4 pages are no news/rumours so we really do need a seperate thread for this type of discussion.

And that's just it. Look at Judgedoug, who felt he got the deal of a lifetime in KoW, to pretre and I, who got little more then a box of minis that's still unpainted in my closet.

And nothing in Deadzone is like the Basileans, which range from "not bad" all the way to "the goggles, they do nothing."

 RiTides wrote:
Pics or it didn't happen, Judgedoug (of the painted army, I mean).

Seriously, though, I would like to see it! Even just an overall army shot would be sweet.

I don't know of many people (or any?) who soldiered through making a whole army out of those gobbos, so this needs to be documented . I bet it looks really good all together, and you're a trooper for having done it.

Sure thing! Lemme find the pic..

This is a shot of my army from several months ago, this is my footslogger goblins with converted GW wolfriders, before the Fleabag Riders and Mincers were released. Now I have about 80 fleabags and 6 mincers to add to the army (which actually I have a full mounted 2000 point army of goblins now too) I've also added Mierce Trolls to the army.

the theme I was going for was a bunch of dirty brown and orange goblins running across a bright green grassy flowery field.

It's a crappy pic, I need to take some nicer pictures of the army.

 CptJake wrote:
It is worse than them not learning, it is them learning the wrong lessons. As SS mentions, they are rushing production and so the QC is gak and the shipped product is gak.

But, Mantic is learning that KS will give them a quick and LARGE injection of capital and that gak QC and gak product don't matter, as each KS still brings in the bucks.

So, they are learning, they are learning that they can feth the customers over and over and over.

The last KS, Mars Attacks, might show an effect as it did finish lower than the last two (excluding Loka which is in a different category altogether IMO). Whether it was the well publicized QA problems they were having at that time with KOW and Dreadball or just a lack of interest in the underlying IP (I personally had *no* interest in Mars Attacks) is another story.

Hi everyone.

New poster, been reading the forum for some time though.

Just wanted to give you folks an idea of my customer experience with Mantic and the DZ Kickstarter:

I went for Strike team, plus a few extra bits and collected it the open day. Got home and found I was missing the Enforcer and Plague factions, along with a couple of other bits. I filled out the query form that night (30.11.13).

I expected it to be sorted within a couple of weeks, but I still haven't received anything, despite attempting to contact Mantic a few times. I emailed James Hewitt yesterday and finally got a response from a guy called Chris Palmer, the 'Marketing and Kickstarter Co-ordinator'. The response was essentially 'we have kept you informed through updates, we haven't got your stuff, thanks for waiting'.

Everyone's opinion of what is acceptable service is going to differ, but to me, this is shocking service. Over 8 weeks to sort out something that should take 10 minutes. This has really soured my opinion of Mantic, making it far less likely I'll spend money with them again

 Polonius wrote:

Yeah, a big part of my problem was that I had started collecting mantic with the elves, and I picked elves for my army with the pledge. So I really have way too many elves, and they're charms have worn off on me. I look at the dwarves, ogres, undead, and even orcs wishing I had gotten them instead.

PM Alpharius, I believe he is selling his Ogres at a discount!

Polonius wrote:And nothing in Deadzone is like the Basileans, which range from "not bad" all the way to "the goggles, they do nothing."

lol Yeah, no horrible sculpts that were just bad and should feel bad.

chucklehead wrote:The response was essentially 'we have kept you informed through updates, we haven't got your stuff, thanks for waiting'.

Everyone's opinion of what is acceptable service is going to differ, but to me, this is shocking service. Over 8 weeks to sort out something that should take 10 minutes. This has really soured my opinion of Mantic, making it far less likely I'll spend money with them again

But if they don't have your stuff, how can they give you more? I.e. You are missing X. They have no more X and are waiting for it to come in from the manufacturer. The guy told you that. I mean, I know it sucks, but...

 chucklehead wrote:
Hi everyone.

New poster, been reading the forum for some time though.

Just wanted to give you folks an idea of my customer experience with Mantic and the DZ Kickstarter:

I went for Strike team, plus a few extra bits and collected it the open day. Got home and found I was missing the Enforcer and Plague factions, along with a couple of other bits. I filled out the query form that night (30.11.13).

I expected it to be sorted within a couple of weeks, but I still haven't received anything, despite attempting to contact Mantic a few times. I emailed James Hewitt yesterday and finally got a response from a guy called Chris Palmer, the 'Marketing and Kickstarter Co-ordinator'. The response was essentially 'we have kept you informed through updates, we haven't got your stuff, thanks for waiting'.

Everyone's opinion of what is acceptable service is going to differ, but to me, this is shocking service. Over 8 weeks to sort out something that should take 10 minutes. This has really soured my opinion of Mantic, making it far less likely I'll spend money with them again

thanks for sharing, that does seem to confirm the theory that Mantic focused on shipping out a box to everybody, and then shut down for a month, and is only now actually correcting stuff.

The prevailing opinion is that Mantic is obsessed with keeping their streak of making KS deadlines intact, at the expense of Quality Control (in production and in packaging).

 chucklehead wrote:
Hi everyone.

New poster, been reading the forum for some time though.

Just wanted to give you folks an idea of my customer experience with Mantic and the DZ Kickstarter:

I went for Strike team, plus a few extra bits and collected it the open day. Got home and found I was missing the Enforcer and Plague factions, along with a couple of other bits. I filled out the query form that night (30.11.13).

I expected it to be sorted within a couple of weeks, but I still haven't received anything, despite attempting to contact Mantic a few times. I emailed James Hewitt yesterday and finally got a response from a guy called Chris Palmer, the 'Marketing and Kickstarter Co-ordinator'. The response was essentially 'we have kept you informed through updates, we haven't got your stuff, thanks for waiting'.

Everyone's opinion of what is acceptable service is going to differ, but to me, this is shocking service. Over 8 weeks to sort out something that should take 10 minutes. This has really soured my opinion of Mantic, making it far less likely I'll spend money with them again

While I agree having to wait months really sucks, they did address that they can't replace missing stuff until after the 31st. Most of the stuff they used to fulfill the initial pledges were airfreighted from China instead of a slowboat, so they had to wait for the slowboat to be able to start sending replacement bits.

It really sucks you were missing the main factions though...

I hope Mantic sends people some freebies to the people missing a lot. Even if it's just a pile of Mantic points (hell there's some good deals, I'm gonna send in some Mantic points and get the Warpath Enforcer Peacekeeper Captain as I like him better than the Deadzone one)

Really think they should have left the Deadzone retail release until February, as originally planned.

KS backers have got to come first. no exceptions. 8+ weeks to replace something as major as 100% of the minis in the boxed game (the whole enforcer and plague starters) is too long.

They could have some spare stock right now to deal with this, if it hadn't all gone out to retail.

Then again, they expected an error rate of 2% (it was posted in a KS update) rather than 70% or whatever it is.

Even if the poll on the mantic forum represents almost everyone who had a problem (highly unlikely), that's still a 5% error rate total, more than double what Mantic were expecting.

I suspect the true error rate might be something like 5% major errors, 25-30% minor errors. There are problems at both the Chinese end (bags with missing or damaged nits inside) and the UK end (mispacks and missing bags).

Or just cut it from 5000 to 2500 and everyone would have been sorted. Even on the dice.

 scarletsquig wrote:
Really think they should have left the Deadzone retail release until February, as originally planned.

KS backers have got to come first. no exceptions.

I agree, especially with the retailers who pledged in the Kickstarter to help fund the game... the backers and those backer retailers should have gotten their stuff, and gotten problems worked out.

Mantic may have wanted the Christmas cash, but honestly, would that have been better than 99.9% great opinions and excellent word of mouth from pampered backers by the time February retail release rolled around? As it stands it seems very few people are totally satisfied. (I'm pretty much fine, just had a wrong AW resin terrain bundle... but imagine if everyone here felt like me)

Toatally appreciate that they can't send me what they don't have and I said as much to Chris in my reply. The issue for me is that they shouldn't be in that situation in the first place.

I sent my order query form on 30.11.13, so they would have had Enforcer and Plague starters then. It would've taken less than 10 minutes for someone to look at the form, contact the packing warehouse and get them so send it in the post. However, now that they've sold the remaining starter sets through their website and to other retailers, I have to go without.

They may have said that they'll look at query forms from February, but how can anyone with a straight face say that that is accepatable service? I've worked in customer service for many years. If I told customers that I'd get around to looking at their issues in a couple of months, I'd be searching for a new job!

Like I said, everyones opinion of acceptable is going to differ. Some folks might be happy to wait a few months for stuff, and fair play to them

 chucklehead wrote:
Toatally appreciate that they can't send me what they don't have and I said as much to Chris in my reply. The issue for me is that they shouldn't be in that situation in the first place.

Oh I totally agree. They need to have handled that better and I hope they compensate in some way.

edit: I am reminded of Parks and Rec last week, so I will just say 'That sucks, dude.'

 chucklehead wrote:
Toatally appreciate that they can't send me what they don't have and I said as much to Chris in my reply. The issue for me is that they shouldn't be in that situation in the first place.

I sent my order query form on 30.11.13, so they would have had Enforcer and Plague starters then. It would've taken less than 10 minutes for someone to look at the form, contact the packing warehouse and get them so send it in the post. However, now that they've sold the remaining starter sets through their website and to other retailers, I have to go without.

They may have said that they'll look at query forms from February, but how can anyone with a straight face say that that is accepatable service? I've worked in customer service for many years. If I told customers that I'd get around to looking at their issues in a couple of months, I'd be searching for a new job!

Like I said, everyones opinion of acceptable is going to differ. Some folks might be happy to wait a few months for stuff, and fair play to them

Yeah, I'm with Chucklhead on this one. I have been waiting on a part for about a month from something I bought at a FLGS and have still yet to receive. Sarah Clark has been "helping" me and while very polite, I have yet to actually receive my missing stuff. I can't imagine a job where you can ask someone to wait a month and think its acceptable. If that is normal in most lines of work, then I'm in the wrong buisness. Mantic's lack of decent customer service has really soured me. I'm afraid to buy anything from them, because if its wrong (which it seems to have a good chance to be) you won't be able to get it fixed, and pretty much just wasted your money. I'd rather pay GW prices and have the correct parts, or at least be able to get the correct parts, than spend Mantic prices and gamble on what I'm getting. If this were just my experience, I may chalk it up to a fluke, but this seems to pretty much be their MO now that they've had a little success.

 CptJake wrote:
It is worse than them not learning, it is them learning the wrong lessons. As SS mentions, they are rushing production and so the QC is gak and the shipped product is gak.

But, Mantic is learning that KS will give them a quick and LARGE injection of capital and that gak QC and gak product don't matter, as each KS still brings in the bucks.

So, they are learning, they are learning that they can feth the customers over and over and over.

This is exactly the conclusion I made when they released slightly modified Fantasy miniatures as their brand new SciFi range in November 2011, making it obvious that the Elf design botch was not a exception, but the rule. Ronnie works on the assumption that he can sell the bulk by just showing early concepts (called preorder in the beginning, now called kickstarter). And indeed he still can. He needs kickstarter after kickstarter to barely stay afloat financially. No wonder that his current communication reminds me of Maelstrom in its final days. Mantic is a level above Defiance Games, because Mantic actually delivers products, even when rushed out without QC. Mantic would already be bancrupt, if every customer had seen the actual product before buying it.

 judgedoug wrote:
the theme I was going for was a bunch of dirty brown and orange goblins running across a bright green grassy flowery field.

It's a crappy pic, I need to take some nicer pictures of the army.

That's a sweet pic, at least for conveying the massive feel of the army! Thank you very much for posting it

@squall: They are changing their methods.

Mars Attacks had its estimated delivery date set 2 months ahead of when they expected to be done with it.

DKH 4 is on hold. Warpath is on hold until quality hard plastic has shipped and feedback has come back positive.

The planned dwarf release for next month is now delayed to March/April so they can catch up on other stuff.

There's some actual news in Mantic's response to the comments in the latest Mars Attacks update.

Most interesting to me are the following:

1 - You can order Deadzone mats via the Mars Attacks ks if you specify you want Deadzone mats in the comments at the end of the survey. So what? 3 Mat deals are $5 cheaper on the Mars Attacks survey than they are on the Deadzone one.

2 - For the first time, Mantic have stated that you can add on to your pledge after the KS campaign and qualify for the hardback book. This seems to run counter to their usual practice, and I don't know if it's intended to cover other reward qualifications as well, or if perhaps it's just a mistake. But interesting.

Click the spoiler below for all of Mantic's comments, or follow this link: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1744629938/mars-attacks-the-miniatures-game/posts/730781

^ The $200 hardback book reward *always* counted post-survey cash.

It was the $300+ ones that did not count post-survey cash.

I'm not a fan of the "reward doesn't count survey cash" thing anyway. They'd have gotten a lot more money out of me on the next DZ survey if they'd just scrapped the whole survey limitation on the big spender rewards, I'd have raised from $250 to $400.

I guess they're just super-keen to pay the 5% KS fee that they don't have to pay on survey income. :p

 Kroothawk wrote:

This is exactly the conclusion I made when they released slightly modified Fantasy miniatures as their brand new SciFi range in November 2011, making it obvious that the Elf design botch was not a exception, but the rule. Ronnie works on the assumption that he can sell the bulk by just showing early concepts (called preorder in the beginning, now called kickstarter). And indeed he still can. He needs kickstarter after kickstarter to barely stay afloat financially. No wonder that his current communication reminds me of Maelstrom in its final days. Mantic is a level above Defiance Games, because Mantic actually delivers products, even when rushed out without QC. Mantic would already be bancrupt, if every customer had seen the actual product before buying it.

That's a little over the top...

And what is/was the elf design botch?