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They do seem large yeah. Didn't go in for the 15mm ones as I had no use for them. Don't know why I let that stop me... can always find a use ; p

Wow, sorry for letting this thread grow with questions/concerns. I have had another full time job for the last 45 days trying desperately to find a new place to live. A lot of long days, sleepless nights and crazy stress. We have two large dogs ‘Our kids’ that no home renter would accept and we are unwilling to give them up. This forced me and my better half to look at the option of purchasing a home. We soon found it that without endless wads of cash this prospect was a full time and maddening job. We literally put in 12 bids on houses to have them rejected as people were offering $20,000+ over the homes appraised value. California is INSAINE! I am happy to say that we did find and were accepted on a Duplex, so I can now get back to the work at hand.

There was an update just posted on the KS with shots of the weapon arm sprues. http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dreamforge-games/something-wicked-this-way-comes-crusader-plastic-m/posts

To answer your questions:

Regarding posts/previews and communications:
I do not show renders for stage three items because we have had so much time between stage releases that I need to have something to show as they work on that stage. After stage 2 is complete, I will start posting updates for stage 3. I hate doing that… You guys have been great with feedback but I have found that KS backers smack me around for not posting their first, so my inclination for getting feedback has been squashed a bit. I will be happy when we are done with the KS fulfillment and I can get back to having a free hand on how and when I post items.
WGF and I do not have an NDA, the decision to post or not is mine and I base my decision on my experience and feedback from the KS backers and my experience on the delays between stages.

Regarding WGF and DFG:
WGF is committed to producing not just the current items but in producing the rest of the range. The delays have been a real problem and have been very stressful and not good for me or my company as this industry wants/demands to see regular releases. Delays aside they have been great to work with and are getting better…. I have an account rep that contacts me nearly every day regardless of whether or not there is any new items to discuss.

Here is what I can tell you, they have been expanding as fast as possible. They brought in 4 or 5 new CnC machines and are purchasing a new EDM machine. They quadrupled the number of CAD designer/mold split workers but in order to pay for that expansion they took on new cash clients. This did not mean that I had access to these new personnel as they were brought in to deal with the new work load, as the new work is completed they ‘may’ become available to move between existing and new work.You need capitol to grow a business and that does not mean that any new resources suddenly become available to the legacy projects. There are some short term benefits from this growth such as machine time but the cad work area where my models fall has not seen the same growth because there are not as many clients making items that need large complex Solidworks files. We may see the heavy trooper turn around improved as that is another side of the house.

(Edit for clarities sake: As I said, most of my items are done in Rhino/Solidworks, the delays are not due to other projects stealing resources… That is another side of the house and different software….The delays are primarily due to the complexity and sheer numbers of tools required. I was simply trying to explain that they are growing and that does not mean that I suddenly get to use all the new resources).

Having said all of that I think both WGF and myself grossly overestimated their production capacity or underestimated the amount of work and molds needed to complete the KS at the time we started this project, sufficed to say, lessons learned, I will not be running another KS without having the items in T1 production, I.e. Here is a test shot of the plastic….
I am not making excuses for myself or WGF, just trying to inform you the best I can as to why we are where we are and where we are heading past this initial KS.

Thank you again for your understanding
Mark

 Yonan wrote:
They do seem large yeah.

I think, and don't quote me on this, that the insane size of the weapon arms is a perspective error in the photos themselves. While they are big, for sure, I think they'll look better proportioned in person.

 NoseGoblin wrote:
I have found that KS backers smack me around for not posting their first, so my inclination for getting feedback has been squashed by the backers. I will be happy when we are done with the KS fulfillment and I can get back to having a free hand on how and when I post items.

This is why we can't have nice things : ( If only people would chill. Legalise marijuana! ; )

Regarding WGF and DG:

Good to hear, really happy with how WGF have produced your stuff, easily the highest quality kits I've got. I'll take delays over low quality any time.

Having said all of that I think both WGF and myself grossly overestimated their production capacity or underestimated the amount of work and molds needed to complete the KS at the time we started this project, sufficed to say, lessons learned, I will not be running another KS without having the items in T1 production, I.e. Here is a test shot of the plastic….

Yeah a lot of KS creators ran into this problem. Personally I don't mind the waits and am happy to back up front, long before the plastic is ready but I understand why you'd feel the need to wait for it.


Thanks for the insight into what's been going on, and hope your life calms down now that you have a house sorted!

Thanks for the update Mark and hopefully your stress levels will drop a bit now that housing is less of an issue. That's never a fun situation to be in regardless of what's going on with the business side.

The test shots look nice, and I know I'll have great fun with them when they get here.

Random question, has anyone tried magnetizing the arm armor or some other method of making it removable to move between the Mortis and the Crusader? Hadn't thought about it until the latest update.

The important thing is that you're learning from your mistake, and facing up to it, you're not copping out on us or tell us that we're immature children requiring twitter-like updates all the time and that this is what keeps you from forging ahead.

With a little luck, one of my ATP friends will let me build their Mortis for them...

Lanithion wrote:

 Yonan wrote:
They do seem large yeah.

I think, and don't quote me on this, that the insane size of the weapon arms is a perspective error in the photos themselves. While they are big, for sure, I think they'll look better proportioned in person.

I hope that is right!

Also thanks for the post here, Mark.

Mark, you could just move to North Texas where cost of living is cheaper and you can eat good barbecue every day.

Anyway, I understand the issue about posting images of the Wave 3 stuff. But, you could still tease us with images of other stuff you might have planned...because I still drool at the thought of an Eisenkern tank.

 Necros wrote:
maybe this is totally unrelated .. but I think some of the delays are likely just difficulty dealing with China too. Just the other day I had a chat with Ghost Studio about doing plastics for my game.. I think them and WGF are one and the same, but I never asked.

Anyhoo, apparently there have been a lot of problems with china lately, their costs are pretty much the same as the US now for a lot of things, on top of 6-week shipping times and around of $7000 per container to ship. They were headed to a US based factory in Colorado this week to test out some molds.

I know it doesn't help right this second, but if it all works out it should mean things will go faster in the future. I was shopping around still, but for me personally if they're going to be doing everything here in the US that's a big plus, especially if the costs are the same or better, and delivery can be measured in days instead of weeks. Just waiting on a quote at the moment before we can move forward..

I hope they can get the kinks all worked out soon, I want me some APCs

Just to be clear WGF and Ghost Studio are not the same company, they parted ways about a year ago.

If Ghost Studios is handling your job just be aware that there is no connection between the two companies at this point. WGF will not be doing your digital sculpting, mold splits, tooling or production.

 Yonan wrote:
Mark/WGF really needs to let us add more for wave 3 pledge! I'd probably drop another $300 on Valkir and APCs. I'm sure they get a much larger cut than through retail and it's common KS practice. Might want to preserve their retailer relationships though I guess.

edit: Mark posted an update on Kickstarter. Those arms are looking great.

It would be a nice gesture, considering how late this one is running (Wave 3 is looking at being a year late at this rate) and how late in the campaign things like the APCs were added.

 Azazelx wrote:

 Yonan wrote:
Mark/WGF really needs to let us add more for wave 3 pledge! I'd probably drop another $300 on Valkir and APCs. I'm sure they get a much larger cut than through retail and it's common KS practice. Might want to preserve their retailer relationships though I guess.

edit: Mark posted an update on Kickstarter. Those arms are looking great.

It would be a nice gesture, considering how late this one is running (Wave 3 is looking at being a year late at this rate) and how late in the campaign things like the APCs were added.

We have talked about that... and adding to the current KS is a nightmare for them. How would you feel about a discount coupon that can be redeemed at the WGF website? I cannot promise anything but I did bat the idea around with WGF a couple months back.

Let me know your thoughts.....

To clarify - I'm talking about the Wave 3 items since it's likely too late to add to Wave 2. It'd also give you and WGF a bit of a cash injection and perhaps motivate WGF to add some priority for the gak that's already been paid for,,,

A co-pledger of mine had wanted me to badger Mark about this.

From what I remember, WGF programmed our orders into their system directly from the pledge manager, and for us to add stuff would mean redoing all of those people's orders, plus accounting for sent items, and the shipping charges changes... I think it was a real nightmare.

Coupon? Hell yes!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Or, you know, I nice bottle of Japanese Whisky.

Double hell yeah!!!

Speaking for myself at least, that won't really work for me. I've already paid for international postage of three separate waves of stuff. The Wave 1&2 bonus shipping for people who said "send it all at once" was definitely a nice gesture for those people, but gave those of us who paid more (for wave shipping) nothing. I'd rather not have to make another order with yet another set of payments for separate shipping for a fourth, with discount coupon that would likely not be that much different to many of the US retailers.

It'll probably work for people in the US/Americas, but not so great for the rest of us.

 NoseGoblin wrote:
We have talked about that... and adding to the current KS is a nightmare for them. How would you feel about a discount coupon that can be redeemed at the WGF website? I cannot promise anything but I did bat the idea around with WGF a couple months back.

Let me know your thoughts.....

I was asking about the signup at GenCon on the last page, where since the 15mm Crusader wasn't available for sale, they were letting people sign up to be emailed when it became available, and purchase at a discount from the WGF website.

I am looking forward to getting emailed about that since I was there and signed up for it, and would love for a discount coupon to buy more of wave 3 items when they become available. I'd likely use both . It would be a nice gesture to KS backers since wave 3 is coming so late, and also might get people to order it directly from them instead of through a discounter.

No pressure either way, I just can't wait to see and get more of your stuff!

 Azazelx wrote:
To clarify - I'm talking about the Wave 3 items since it's likely too late to add to Wave 2. It'd also give you and WGF a bit of a cash injection and perhaps motivate WGF to add some priority for the gak that's already been paid for,,,

The issue here is that the pledge manager and the WGF POS system do not talk, everything is force fed into the WGF POS system. To make a change to a single order would require blowing away your current order, hand entering your new order along with the changes then arranging payment with a third party processor, verifying payment, authorizing the new order and double checking the new total for the items... all manually, all done by one person.

Unfortunately the above process is not an option at this point. The option I am asking about would be to provide you a very deep discount (better than any retailer offers) so that you could make a purchase at your convenience and have it processed in a manner that is far less likely to cause errors and still net you a very healthy savings beyond what you can find elsewhere. The down side is that you would need to pay shipping for a separate delivery. The question becomes is this even an option worth considering?

WGF offers very reasonable shipping, to me at least. I wanted to order a single box from the Warstore and they wanted to charge me 25$ for shipping. WGF charged me 6$ for the same box, which amounted to a much better discount than the retailer. YMMV of course.

For people in the US/Ca/Mx I'm sure it will be an ideal solution.

For the rest of us the postage could make it cost as much as ordering from one of the UK 10% off retailers who offer free postage. I suspect it wouldn't work out as an especially good deal for people in my part of the world, but given that it'll work very well for those who are closer to WGF in the US, it's definitely worth doing.

Would non KS backers be able to throw in?

I missed your KS and would love a chance to order some Wave 3

The Warstore has always had insane int'l shipping for some reason. Anyway, I just had a look at the WGF site. One Leviathan and one box of infantry is $56 to sent to Australia. That pretty much makes my point.

...unless RoW coupon orders could be sent from China? They have quite reasonable shipping rates there. I get a few large 1:6 scale kits sent from CN and HK, and even using carriers like DHL isn't extraordinarily expensive.

 Azazelx wrote:
The Warstore has always had insane int'l shipping for some reason. Anyway, I just had a look at the WGF site. One Leviathan and one box of infantry is $56 to sent to Australia. That pretty much makes my point.

...unless RoW coupon orders could be sent from China? They have quite reasonable shipping rates there. I get a few large 1:6 scale kits sent from CN and HK, and even using carriers like DHL isn't extraordinarily expensive.

Let me ask... I honestly have no idea what the shipping prices are from China to Aus... but I am happy to see if this is an option.

Why is the RoW hatin' so much on Australia? It can't be the elections, that was only yesterday!

The biggest issue was the USPS international shipping hike at the start of the year. I made a HUGE order of AT-43 and Confrontation from Mini Market when I heard about the USPS increase, since I knew it wouldn't be nearly as reasonable an option down the line.

 Azazelx wrote:
The biggest issue was the USPS international shipping hike at the start of the year. I made a HUGE order of AT-43 and Confrontation from Mini Market when I heard about the USPS increase, since I knew it wouldn't be nearly as reasonable an option down the line.

Makes me wonder if the gaming community is large enough in Aus to justify a manufacturing plant locally? If you are as big or bigger into gaming as the US or EU then it may be worth some company taking a look....

You, sir, have just made my day.

I know it wasn't planned as an additional weapon to buy, but is there any chance of getting the scythe arm separate? I've started reprinting my marine chapter as Scythes of the emperor, and would love to get one for my crusader. I love the mortis, but I want my titans to have armor, so it'd be silly to buy a mortis for just the scythe.

Or if anyone out there is getting a mortis but is swapping out weapons and won't be using the scythe pm me, maybe we can work something out.

 Theophony wrote:
I know it wasn't planned as an additional weapon to buy, but is there any chance of getting the scythe arm separate? I've started reprinting my marine chapter as Scythes of the emperor, and would love to get one for my crusader. I love the mortis, but I want my titans to have armor, so it'd be silly to buy a mortis for just the scythe.

Or if anyone out there is getting a mortis but is swapping out weapons and won't be using the scythe pm me, maybe we can work something out.

When the Mortis is released you should find one on Ebay... I have seen a seller who parts out sprues so I would imagine that it will not be an issue. FYI the sword arm armor from the Crusader does fit the scythe as long as you make it a left arm.

 NoseGoblin wrote:

 Azazelx wrote:
The biggest issue was the USPS international shipping hike at the start of the year. I made a HUGE order of AT-43 and Confrontation from Mini Market when I heard about the USPS increase, since I knew it wouldn't be nearly as reasonable an option down the line.

Makes me wonder if the gaming community is large enough in Aus to justify a manufacturing plant locally? If you are as big or bigger into gaming as the US or EU then it may be worth some company taking a look....

Doubtful, sadly. 22 million people, and we don't make very much at all here anymore. Most everything (not just gaming stuff!) is imported from China. Even importing gaming stuff from the US and the UK is still almost always cheaper than paying local prices.

 NoseGoblin wrote:

 Theophony wrote:
I know it wasn't planned as an additional weapon to buy, but is there any chance of getting the scythe arm separate? I've started reprinting my marine chapter as Scythes of the emperor, and would love to get one for my crusader. I love the mortis, but I want my titans to have armor, so it'd be silly to buy a mortis for just the scythe.

Or if anyone out there is getting a mortis but is swapping out weapons and won't be using the scythe pm me, maybe we can work something out.

When the Mortis is released you should find one on Ebay... I have seen a seller who parts out sprues so I would imagine that it will not be an issue. FYI the sword arm armor from the Crusader does fit the scythe as long as you make it a left arm.

Thanks, I've seen that seller too as I have a search for older dreamforge on my eBay page.