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So, I ordered the Zombie Apokalypse set in order to goof off and make/paint some conversions. When it arrived there were 20 Marine miniatures inside where there are supposed to be 70. That's 50 (yes, FIFTY) miniatures missing. This is bad enough, but when I tried to contact them using the missing items form the only response I got was a form reply. A week later I emailed them using the link provided. I have received no reply at all from them.

Now here I am, nearly 20 days after contacting Mantic about this error and all I have received is complete silence.

I understand that Gen Con is coming up, and that this is a Very Big Deal, but I haven't even gotten so much as a "sorry, we'll get you your product when we return from the con" from them, let alone my product. Honestly, I was really looking at getting into Deadzone, but with this sort of treatment of their customers I'm really reconsidering giving them more of my money (beyond DreadBall Xtreme, which I'm already in for via Kickstarter).

Is this common for them?
Has anybody else had this sort of a problem?
Am I jumping the gun on their glacial turn-around time?

That's pretty weird, honestly. I've had missing parts, got a super fast reply and models in my hands in less than a week, and I'm across the pond. This was prior to Kickstarter, but any issues since Kickstarter pledges have also been resolved within a couple days as well. Try emailing Stewart Gibbs. He's always done right by me.

I'm a Mantic fan. You'll eventually get your stuff I'd wager. That doesn't make your delay in response any more palatable or right.

Stewart Gibbs has always helped me with stuff. He's usu. very quick on getting back with folks.

GENCON is a thing. Plus they're wrapping up send outs for one/more Kickstarters and are conducting yet another KS as I type this. Those do not excuse lack of response.

I like mantic, but yeah, their service is pretty bad. It took me over a month to get a missing deadzone piece that I bought at retail. I suggest writing another email, as they seem to lose a lot of them.

I'd suggest calling them on the telephone. They're in typical "running a kickstarter" mode as well as "packing a kickstarter" mode right now, so their service is going to be exceptionally poor, even aside from Gencon.

I finally got a reply today. The missing items slip is "with the warehouse" (whatever that means). Hopefully I'll get my stuff soonish.

It's really kind of sad that people have chimed in saying that they have had similar experiences with Mantic.

Here's hoping DreadBall Xtreme isn't a repeat of this. I've already gotten fethed over with my Robotech pledge. Several times. Another Kickstarter going to hell would really suck. At least Soda Pop has been up front and on time with their updates... If only all companies were so good at communication. DBX has been far too silent for far too long in my opinion.

I'm straying WAY off-topic here though. Thanks for the feedback.

Mantic customer support used to be first rate but with the rapid rate of expansion things have slipped. They do have a dedicated customer support person but by the sounds of things she is kept very busy.

With the shift to the larger HQ and warehouse Mantic are hoping to cut down on the packing errors which seem to have become too frequent. If this works then hopefully we will see a return to how things used to be.

I've always had good service from mantic ( but then I'm only down the road) and their kickstarter completion is very solid. I certainly wouldn't put them in the same ballpark as Palladium books - that kickstarter (notvto mention the whole company) is a travesty (I'm in far too much money on that one myself). Hope your bits arrive soon.

Two weeks later and still no minis. I'm... Well, I'm not happy.

My wife opened a case with PayPal (since the account is in her name). I wonder if that will get their attention?

I know Mars Attacks and Deadzone wave 2 are their priorities, but damn it I paid for this stuff. Mantic continues to fail to impress me. I was hoping to start playing Warpath with my buddy, but that's kind of hard with no minis. I wonder if I can get him past his dislike of historicals and into Bolt Action?

I don't blame you at all, EV. I'd be mightily pissed off as well if I were in your situation. And PayPal only protects you for so long as well.

I just posted on their forum about this mess. Let's see if it makes it past approval.

Unlikely.

I'd ring them up and just keep calling back till it's sorted out. Like twice a week.

Their forums are a bit useless.

 Maccwar wrote:
Mantic customer support used to be first rate but with the rapid rate of expansion things have slipped... hopefully we will see a return to how things used to be.

This. Dealt with... Clive, I believe his name was, some time ago when an order was taking forever to arrive. Turned out I had botched a field in the order form - totally my fault, but he fixed it right up and my models arrived shortly thereafter. Living stateside and buying non-Kickstarter products, I'm luckily able to order anything I need from The Warstore, instead. Their service and shipping remains top-notch, but they're only an option for in-stock, "normal run" product (hence my order from Mantic - wanted to grab one of their "direct only" deals when they had a sale).

According to just about every thread I've followed, the Kickstarter boom overloaded them and they haven't recovered... because they keep jumping from one campaign to the next. They've cut themselves a decent foothold, at this point, and I'd love to see them dial back the pace of expansion, focusing on customer service, order fulfillment, and product support, instead (at least for a while). I seem to recall this being hinted at in an interview, which was promptly followed by the current dungeon crawl Kickstarter campaign.

For your and any other current issues, calls are always better than emails, as they can't sit around in inbox limbo. Even if it takes them a while to resolve it, a direct call gets on record and in the queue all the quicker, which certainly can't hurt.

I posted on Mantic's forum and somebody immediately went for my throat saying that they didn't promise me the 70 marine minis listed on their page. Classy.

Also, PayPal refuses to help us out.

Oh, well. I'll chalk this one up as a lesson learned. I'd just like to be sure that those of you out there know what you're getting into.

Just to check, you know what the 70 Zombie Apokalypse Marines look like in the box right? They're a mix of restic Marine parts, and Zombie & Ghoul sprues from Kings of War.

Also found your thread, not seeing the throat part, just people asking the same question I did in a pretty nice and civilised manner.

Well, it's now 2 working weeks (less 1 bank holiday monday) since I filled in my report.

I paid for the Deadzone box set to come from Amazon by next day delivery a fortnight ago but it had no 25mm mantic bases in it.
I had already bought myself a Marauder starter so had 10 bases. I used these to make my Plague figures.

So, as it is, despite spending £7.99 on next day delivery from Amazon, I'm still sitting here a fortnight later with a set of Enforcers and a set of Marauders which I'm unable to start on.

As a new customer, I'm so far less than impressed with Mantic.

I know we all whine about GW's absurd pricing, but if they cock-up an order, the correct parts are posted out the day you complain.


PS: I have tried ringing Mantic (over and over and over and over - you get the idea), but I can't get through to anyone.

Yeah that part isn't cool and they clearly have some warehouse and CS issues to fix.

Have you tried emailing the CS person direct, rather than just the form?

Yeah, I've never used the form. Always an email to Stewart Gibbs. Other than the time he was on vacation, he's always had me cleared up within 48 hrs. That's during and after multiple KSers, btw.

Well, as of this morning the long nightmare is over.

I got an email from Chris Nicholls saying that he could understand how I would think that there were 70 Corporation Marines in the set, but there were only supposed to be 20 in the first place. He apologized for the "lack of communication", but Mantic would not send me the minis. They would instead be changing the listing so that it would be clear what is in the box from now on.

...But hey! I got a voucher for a percentage off my next order with them- which will happen never. This is by far the worst customer service I have ever gotten from a company. Maybe I was just spoiled by Privateer Press and Games Workshop?

Oh, he offered to refund my DreadBall Xtreme Kickstarter money (less 10%).

Awful, just awful.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

NTRabbit wrote:
Just to check, you know what the 70 Zombie Apokalypse Marines look like in the box right? They're a mix of restic Marine parts, and Zombie & Ghoul sprues from Kings of War.

Also found your thread, not seeing the throat part, just people asking the same question I did in a pretty nice and civilised manner.

Yeah, I knew that they would be a mix of parts. I just thought that there would be a better mix of them. 20 marines to a bunch of zombies supposed to make 70 minis is really a stretch.

I was really upset when I posted about them going for the throat. I still am, but upon reflection I agree with you.

The point remains the same though. It was really, really unclear what was supposed to be in the box, and this has taken far too long to resolve.

Really surprised they didn't just chuck a bunch of extra minis in the mail if for inconvenience of the delayed response if nothing else.

I'm just sad now. If the listing had been accurate (the actual numbers of the actual parts in the deal) I wouldn't have placed the order.

If they had gotten back to me quickly and told me that the number of minis I got was the number they were going to send, not a single piece more, I would still be upset, just not this badly.

If they had fixed the listing as well as sent me some minis to make up for the confusing (if not downright wrong) listing I would have been greatly pleased.

In the end this ended about as badly as it could, short of... well, I shouldn't go any further.

I was honestly going to flee 40k for Warpath. I was going to take my friends with me (they really haven't liked the last two editions). Now I'll just recount this story to them.

I'm really saddened how the wargaming industry has been going recently. Maybe I should take up knitting instead?

Robotech, GW, Mantic... It seems no matter where I step I get disappointed these days.

Nah, that last knitting KS wound up in knots.

Eagle & Empire (Alexandria) and Dropzone Games (Glen Burnie) carry Warlord's Bolt Action and of course you can get it on-line from several discounters.

Two boxes of infantry set you up for pretty much everything you can do in 1000 pts minus a tank and some specialized units like heavy MGs. You may want to look into that. Rules are a lot of fun but less special case (though there are some) than 40k.

I just wanted to jump in and say that I've emailed Mantic twice about some very horribly miscast models and have yet to receive a response. I think it's been about 7 weeks.....

I will not give them another dime.

Okay, today I actually have a bit of positive news to report.

Today I got an email from Chris Palmer at Mantic, and he seemed truly apologetic for the level of service I had received. He said that this was not typical of their company.

Well, the bridge has already been burned, and I won't be buying anything else from them, but I am much less upset now. He said that they were wrong not to have fixed the misunderstanding by throwing a few more minis in the mail, and that not only would they be refunding me my DreadBall Xtreme money (less the 10% that Kickstarter takes), but they would be refunding me the amount of the Zombie Apokalypse purchase.

This is well above what I expected of them, and I'm more than okay with this resolution.

Now to see how long the turn-around time is on my refund. (^_~)*

After posting a rant on the Mantic forums, my missing bases problem was brought to their attention. I had several apologetic emails, a voucher (in liu of wasting next day delivery postage), and an email saying my bases had been posted. Granted, this is not quite on the scale of EVs problem, but hopefully they've sorted my problem out - just a little slower than I'd like.

My faith in Mantic is about restored and I can get on with trying out Deadzone - and maybe finally dumping WHFB and 40K with KoW and Warpath.

I have generally gotten decent (not great, not terrible) service from Mantic.

Sorry that it went so off the rails for you folks.

The Auld Grump

I had to post several times on Mantic's Facebook and actually hijack a Kickstarter thread to get them to answer me about an awfully miscast Deadzone starter box I received.

My set had miscast and misshapen models, an incorrectly cut mat and broken terrain pieces.

I ended up eventually getting the social media guy who apparently works only a few days a week. They finally agreed to send me replacement minis but first only offered me 20 GBP of online credit instead.

Terrible customer service, mediocre quality minis from what I've received and pure arrogance when it comes to how they interact with supporters. The company turned me off so hard I don't think I'll ever buy another item from them again.

Personally- not had any bad experiences with Mantic's customer service, but it sounds like there's been some horror stories.

I wonder if it's the same deal as GW: depends on who you reach. While I've usually had amazing CS from GW, I had a couple where they only sent one missing bit (which is still totally fine, just doesn't qualify as "amazing"). I also had a friend with drop pod issues and they told him to stuff it. He called back two days later, talked to someone else, explained the rude service he got, and received a replacement AND a free drop pod as an apology for rude service. I'd imagine its the kind of thing that's hit or miss at times. Then again, I'm also sure there are less Mantic CS members than there are at GW.

There's less Mantic staff, period.

I think they might, possobly , maybe be at around 30 now, including Ronnie and part-timers.

So less than a small supermarkets worth of staff.

In saying that, a lot of the problems with mantic seem to be because either they overstretched or are overstretching. Hence the joke of 'Mantic... Almost'

However... Once you get through to them and get a response back, they are amazing and go beyond the call (even though their vouchers don't always work).

Its still a young company and when 8.74Kg of Deadzone arrived at my door today, I can see why there may be issues. However, they do seem to be constantly improving. "Mission Control" was a great step forward, for example.