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To give them WAY more credit than they deserve, it wouldn't be a bad idea to aim to have Wave 2 in the warehouse around the end of Q2, ship to backers where possible (in the US to start, of course), take a bunch on the road to Gencon in July, then get back to shipping to backers, oops how did CSI get a bunch of stuff, oh well retail distribution remains a mysterious thing, surely they'll follow our reasonable requests that they just sit on that product for a month or six while we finish up backer stuff, Black Friday is the real hotness anyway...

Not that I'm disagreeing of course. Short Solicit Pre-orders do indeed need to go out significantly in advance of product launch (at least is my understanding from back when we went through this all in mid 2013 for what was supposed to be the first retail release.

Given the time lines from wave 1, with some wiggle room it's not literally impossible for them to still make Q2'ish in some capacity.

But as the days and weeks tick by, obviously it becomes vastly less probable.

I wouldn't have a problem with them doing retail first, provided backers are not relegated to oh when we get to them. Of course with the provision that Palladium DONT fething LIE ABOUT IT.

Merijeek wrote:
I can't remember, was Disposable Guy (the one who got fired and, presumably, was accused of stealing artwork of Kevin's mom's fridge) an expense incurred just to "handle" this project?

Er, what? That's another one I missed.

evilsmurf wrote:

Merijeek wrote:
I can't remember, was Disposable Guy (the one who got fired and, presumably, was accused of stealing artwork of Kevin's mom's fridge) an expense incurred just to "handle" this project?

Er, what? That's another one I missed.

Jeff Burke was hired full-time by Palladium to oversee the Robotech project around June of 2013 (i.e. - shortly after the project ended). He was reportedly let go around May of 2015 according to our older thread on Dakka (Page 333, almost to the end of the thread). About the same time or shortly thereafter Kevin was rambling about "priceless" concept art and sketches for various things that had been lifted by persons unknown with what is generally felt to be grossly over-inflated values for what they probably were. People often conflate the two events as being related, which they may be but I do not recall any evidence to that effect being presented. There was also a yelp review of PB that IIRC posted personal information and was very negative towards PB and their "rude employees" which could just as easily be Wayne based on the (not-entirely-credible) information from the KS comments.

An equally reasonable supposition would be the art was taken by a volunteer fan-friend there to help pack and ship RRT and Jeff was let go due to the way RRT was not moving and PB was stuck with huge amounts of stock and no money.

There's a writer on Kotaku that occasionally writes about Robotech.

http://kotaku.com/5990702/why-you-havent-seen-any-new-macross-in-the-west-for-nearly-15-years

I wonder what would happen if we could get this guy or a writer for one of the other geek culture media sites to do a feature on the project. Getting the story of this train-wreck out to a larger audience may shame Palladium into doing or saying something substantial.

 CaulynDarr wrote:
I wonder what would happen if we could get this guy or a writer for one of the other geek culture media sites to do a feature on the project. Getting the story of this train-wreck out to a larger audience may shame Palladium into doing or saying something substantial.

I think they run on the premise of "There is no such thing as bad publicity."
I figure as long as we leave warnings on the kickstarter, BBB and say RPGGeek those are targeted areas to keep people from getting burned by them.
Awareness brought to the public eye would be doing them a service: going from unknown to known... only thing worse than bad press is to be not talked about at all.
My thoughts anyway.
Now getting to be known by the AG and FTC is a good thing as well.
<edit> Plus it would give Kevin opportunity to get some more face time saying that all these people getting excited are just some over-entitled geeks that don't understand that great things take a great deal of time to produce.

 Krinsath wrote:

evilsmurf wrote:

Merijeek wrote:
I can't remember, was Disposable Guy (the one who got fired and, presumably, was accused of stealing artwork of Kevin's mom's fridge) an expense incurred just to "handle" this project?

Er, what? That's another one I missed.

Jeff Burke was hired full-time by Palladium to oversee the Robotech project around June of 2013 (i.e. - shortly after the project ended). He was reportedly let go around May of 2015 according to our older thread on Dakka (Page 333, almost to the end of the thread). About the same time or shortly thereafter Kevin was rambling about "priceless" concept art and sketches for various things that had been lifted by persons unknown with what is generally felt to be grossly over-inflated values for what they probably were. People often conflate the two events as being related, which they may be but I do not recall any evidence to that effect being presented. There was also a yelp review of PB that IIRC posted personal information and was very negative towards PB and their "rude employees" which could just as easily be Wayne based on the (not-entirely-credible) information from the KS comments.

An equally reasonable supposition would be the art was taken by a volunteer fan-friend there to help pack and ship RRT and Jeff was let go due to the way RRT was not moving and PB was stuck with huge amounts of stock and no money.

There was also a thing online (Yelp, again?) about a security company being brought in to do alarms or cameras because of a 'thieving employee'. bs or not, who knows? Again, around the same time that Jeff Burke "left".

 Krinsath wrote:
There was also a thing online (Yelp, again?) about a security company being brought in to do alarms or cameras because of a 'thieving employee'. bs or not, who knows? Again, around the same time that Jeff Burke "left".

Oddly enough, one of the few complaints I read with the BBB was a security company complaining about not being paid for services rendered but that would be "conjecture" since I cannot find that now (they no longer show complaint details)... which bugs me. Does anyone know if BBB "locks-down" the complaint details if it gets past a certain number?

Just noticed on the BBB that PB has a "No Rating" due to "The business is in the process of responding to previously closed complaints."
Great workaround for PB if you do not like the F rating and rather silly for the BBB if they want the incentive for closure.

I hope the BBB has a time limit. If not, Poor Kev will be "working on" that response for years.

Merijeek wrote:
I hope the BBB has a time limit. If not, Poor Kev will be "working on" that response for years.

Well of course it takes a while...he's already been working 18 hours days for the past few years so it's not like he has a lot of capacity left over from that to be writing responses to complaints.

Do you think those geese are going to watch themselves? Do you? DO YOU?!

No, no they're not. That's very important work because they must be monitored at all times since, as we all know, geese are jerks. You might be okay with the idea of geese running around rampant, but that's just not the level of service that people have come to expect from PB. They love you all too much to let the geese be un-watched.

Krinsath... you know better than that! Dice bags and mugs don't just magically design themselves; Poppa Kevin does that for the fans you know. He's also knee deep in grab bags right now and needs to explore the dark corners and crevaces of the warehouse to find unsellable items to fluff up the value of the final grab bags. And don't forget that someone has to print the previous week's update for Kevin so he can cut out the parts with scissors that will be reused for the next week and glue them onto the posterboard for the upcoming week. The next day he has to type out (after checking the ribbon of course)/cut/glue the new text onto the board so Wayne can do his timey wimey computer magic and get it up on the internets by Friday. Kevin's got that down to a science and it takes him less than half the time it would a lesser creator/artist on the old Gutenberg press. There just simply aren't enough hours in the day or even week for them to devote the same level of detail for paltry things like Robotech KS updates or more than one phone call for the project.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Krinsath wrote:

No, no they're not. That's very important work because they must be monitored at all times since, as we all know, geese are jerks. You might be okay with the idea of geese running around rampant, but that's just not the level of service that people have come to expect from PB. They love you all too much to let the geese be un-watched.

Something about Palladium attracted the flock of birds that just run around loudly and annoyingly squawking while simultaneously crapping over everything. Kindred spirits?

 warboss wrote:
Something about Palladium attracted the flock of birds that just run around loudly and annoyingly squawking while simultaneously crapping over everything. Kindred spirits?

Don't forget the beat the heck out of anyone who gets too close and make a lot of noise when they feel threatened. Plus are very territorial and will defend their IP... er... "area" viciously. Wow, that fits rather well.

Also, in this case, what's good for the geese is good for the gander.

Oh yeah, I remember about Jeff now. I just wasnt aware of the details at the time since he just suddenly left with no explanation.

And another thread gets locked, due to.. troublemakers;
http://palladium-megaverse.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=97&t=150148

So we're now back to december 31st for the last post, since everything else is getting removed.

So just mentioning the missing half of rewards is troublemaking?

I'm assuming that there were... less constructive posts in there that led to the locking.

The OP got the info they wanted, the RRT subforum continues to look like a ghost town, all is right in the world.

Well, pointing at things Palladium is owing or did not do as promised is pretty much a no-no on their forums.
What goes on in their minds I wonder?
Reminds me of "Meet the Pyro" for team fortress:


Where you can do the worst things and it seems ok.

 warboss wrote:
So just mentioning the missing half of rewards is troublemaking?

I'm sure our buddy Jeffar will be here to justify it.

Someone was probably on Double Secret Probation.

Unless there are missing posts I am not sure what in the thread justified it getting locker *shrugs*

 Talizvar wrote:
What goes on in their minds I wonder?

Everything still ''owed'' to our faithful backers was unfortunately lost at sea, and due to a lack of sufficient funds, because we wanted to deliver the best darn product possible as quickly as the factory could deliver, sadly uninsured by either ourselves, the carrier, and the shipping company.

You can definitely, totally, trust us on this. ®™


Or something else along those lines that will at some point prove equally fishy. (The above includes a link to a NSFW image/site.)

_
_

 Smilodon_UP wrote:
Or something else along those lines that will at some point prove equally fishy. (The above includes a link to a NSFW image/site.)

Just had a thought along those lines. What if the "relaunch" is literally exactly that? That their intent is to offer up another Kickstarter, not for another generation, but for the existing material?

"Due to high demand*, we're proud to offer up a chance to get in on one of the most successful* gaming Kickstarter campaigns of all time*, and changed the way people feel about crowdsourcing*. Not only will you be able to join the thousands of excited* backers in getting the rewards by the end of the year*, you'll receive the initial pledge shortly* after the campaign ends! So you can get into the game immediately!*"
* May not be a factual statement, at least in how we want you to interpret it. But we can construct an argument that says it's true. And the people who claim otherwise are haters.

I was thinking about the FireTeam Zero campaign, which is finally shipping, and their second Kickstarter, which was for essentially the same stuff as the first one. The second campaign had the option of French language components (rules and cards), but was otherwise the same.

If PB did that, I would definitely follow it. Because it'd be hilarious.

No, it'll be new and improved, the miniatures will be replaced by paper standees!

jaymz wrote:
Unless there are missing posts I am not sure what in the thread justified it getting locker *shrugs*

There's a couple posts missing from it. Someone had brought up this thread in it, and I asked for a link. Then a third had commented about this thread in that thread. However, those posts were removed about a day before the thread was actually locked.

I'm glad that I was able to get the link prior to it being removed though. I had known about the delay and lack of information you guys were getting. What I didn't know was how bad the issue is. This thread's the first I've seen it mentioned that there is no fracking money. Haven't seen it mentioned in any of the FB groups I belong to, and it sure as Hell won't ever be mentioned on their website. (If someone does get it posted, I can guarantee it'll be removed the second a mod finds out about it and the poster likely banned. PB themselves will never fess up.) That actually helps explain why the Rifter issues have been coming out late, or in the case of the latest issue, combined with the next one. I'm now glad I haven't renewed my subscription yet.

Honestly I don't even care if the "no money" thing is even true or not. There's at least one book I'd like to buy once it gets released, and maybe two more that at one point were planned (but likely won't ever be printed, even if they had the money). However I feel I can no longer financially support that company due to the way they've been screwing you investors with the wrong end of the stick, without so much as a reach around. I don't feel they've been honest with any of you regarding RRT. IMO, the money issue is the only possible reason I can see that explains why Wave 2 isn't in production yet. There's only two ways I could see myself purchasing another book from PB at this point. The first is if Wave 2 is in the backers' hands before my birthday (St Patrick's day). Unless PB's been really tight-lipped on Wave 2 being in production in order to surprise everyone when they finally announce it's ready, I doubt the it will happen. The second is if Kevin Siembieda leaves the company. That will only happen once he dies. Not meaning that in a bad way, or wishing him to die, or anything like that. I just don't see him as the type that would place his creation in the hands of someone else.

Hi, welcome to Dakka! You'll never find a more wretched hive of scum and... oh wait, no, that's PB. ;-p

I honestly kind of feel sorry for you having got yourself invested in the game (by buying in a retail) when it's looking so much like it won't come to fruition and it's launch to the mini gaming marketplace in general has been botched so badly.

It's still supposition that the money's run out; however it's a very probable supposition given the amount of time that's gone by and even basic calculations of the costs undertaken to date. From the evidence seen (that photo that let us know the size of the initial shipment of core boxes) it seems much like PB splurged the KS funds on a first, massive run of retail product, expecting it to shift like hot cakes. Completely, utterly, unforgivably irresponsible. Edit: And something that just doesn't happen with minis games, with the possible exception of x-wing, and even that has only really gained so much success because it's a damn good game, that is constantly updated and supported with new shinies and consistent, sensible rules updates.

So myself, and a lot of people who fronted up for this mess (way over 2 years ago) are now of the opinion that PB are in breach of their contract with us, and (for me personally at least) we're going to do our best (without throwing good money after bad) to see PB held accountable for it.

Here's a link to the Kickstarter and all it's wonderful 'we're working on it' posts. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/rrpgt/robotech-rpg-tacticstm/posts/

jaymz wrote:
Unless there are missing posts I am not sure what in the thread justified it getting locker *shrugs*

There are several things pruned out of that thread so that the answer to the OPs question could be given without a lot of trolling, flaming and similar.

It's not like the stuff not being ready yet is a forbidden topic. Some posters prefer to take advantage of the opportunity to troll Palladium and its fans, which is what gets things removed.

I didn't know until yesterday that Jeffaris a MOD over on the PB Official Forums.

DO we have any other PB MODs over here now too?

 Alpharius wrote:
I didn't know until yesterday that Jeffaris a MOD over on the PB Official Forums.

DO we have any other PB MODs over here now too?

I've only ever seen two mods there in the past (including Jefffar) but there may be more. The other mod that in my experience was historically much more stalinist in enforcing the party line is Jeff "NMI" Ruiz. Jefffar seems to have gotten much more active of late as I don't recall him previously moderating much; to his credit, his few and far between mod edits used to be quite fair in the past. I've only posted once or twice though in the last year since NMI handed me a 3 month suspension for precrime in 2014 ...I suppose that's a mission accomplished for him! I haven't seen him posting here ever but admittedly I didn't know his real name until the open house demo video surfaced last year in which every time he had a model interaction he made a rules mistake (at least until I stopped watching five minutes in). I learned that he's apparently also a coordinator for the official Palladium demo volunteer organization and maybe that is taking up more of his time with Jefffar seemingly picking up the slack.

That horrible let's play demo video is ironically still the only one on youtube that is run by an official demo rep.

edit: I don't think I was being completely fair above. The Palladium forums have always been odd in different ways and, despite my feelings now, NMI didn't used to be as heavy handed many years ago. Going back before the crowdfunding Palladium did, the biggest problem IMO were the white knight vigilantes. When they say a thread criticizing some aspect of palladium or their product, they hit the thread in force (all two or three of them) with a "best defense is a good offense" style of posting no matter how mild the initial criticism. Someone posts that a single rule didn't make sense? The response was that you just don't know how to roleplay and are too limited to understand and utilize the "freedom" that gakky rules give you to make your own. That would of course elicit an escalation on the part of the OP and others wishing for change and it would shortly spiral out of control. For the most part, both sides seemed to have posts removed but the white knight instigator in chief (can't recall his name at the moment) would never stay gone long. Jaymz might be able to comment more about the white knight vigilantes as I believe he interacted more with them than I did (with my average one post per month for years prior to Robotech).

It was only with crowdfunding and the taking of folks money years upfront from a poorly planned product did NMI's mod style change from just favoring slightly the white knights into cracking the whip until morale improved. Of course, the number and scope of complaints once palladium started screwing up for years WITH OTHER PEOPLE'S MONEY increased substantially compared with when they were simply screwing up with their own. That doesn't of course excuse punishing folks for simply stating uncomfortable truths about blatant broken promises or for speculating in the face of a purposeful year's worth of info blackout on Palladium's part.

 Alpharius wrote:
I didn't know until yesterday that Jefffar is a MOD over on the PB Official Forums.

DO we have any other PB MODs over here now too?

In his first post in this thread, he identified himself as such. Based on his join date of 2011 and his nearly couple-thousand posts (mostly under 40k), I think it's fair to say he's been "here" (as in Dakka) for a while. I know you probably didn't mean it this way, but it did read like an implication he was mainly here (as in this thread) for damage control. Not to say that he doesn't have reason to view PB in as sympathetic a fashion as possible, just that I don't see where he's done any of the untoward things that we've seen from other arenas of this project.

While I don't agree with the viewpoint he espouses, I'm glad he's here to present it. As Mike "I broke my iPod's repeat function because I hate hearing the same thing so much" 1975 () would point out, hearing the same viewpoint over and over again does tend to lead to be a bit of an echo chamber where things get to be out-of-hand.

Desmodus wrote:
Unless PB's been really tight-lipped on Wave 2 being in production in order to surprise everyone when they finally announce it's ready

I think them trying to hide it like that would enrage me even more.

It would definitely be a significant change in SOP for them.

They're so prone to exaggeration and a need to read in between the lines (we can start shipping in August!... more like October when container 2 arrives with the battle cry bonus bags...) that doing so would be both out of character and considerably counter productive.

Now, yes, it'd be a nice little passive aggressive "feth you" to those who want info, but that's gambling with pissing off the few vocal supporters that remain just to stick it to 'the haters', whom everyone on 'the other side' is quick to point out is just a couple of angry dudes on the internet.

I wouldn't rule it out, but it'd just be... so sad. "Awww, look, you embraced even worse business practices for no good reason and to no appreciable benefit, just to annoy a group whom are allegedly a rounding error in the user base..."