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Yeah,
Very interesting stuff.

I would say the best thing to do would be not back this.
Buy at retail... Risk free.

Panic...

Considering that a lot of people buy stuff from Mierce and CMoN the whole AVP debacle will be forgotten if Prodos manages to deliver a few kickstarter with shiny things.

If Prodos actually manage to deliver AVP in full, then they should be considered a lot more honest than the people behind Mierce and CMoN if held by the same standard.

What's the issue with CMoN delivery / honesty?

My experience with CMoN is that they basically deliver what they said they would. Now, some of the underlying gameplay is flawed, and there are occasional minor issues, but it's not like AvP at all.

I WAS a CMoN hater because they were a company called New Wave games a couple decades ago. I had ordered two box sets from them back in the day when they were running 30% off GW stock and they had a decent track record on the gaming sites back then. They took my money and ran with it and closed up shop with no contact info. I didn't find out that they became CMoN until I saw someone post on here a couple or three years ago and then I tried contacting them. I was basically told that it was a separate company and the could do nothing about it. It was just over $100 but it me off and I didn't want to touch them and actually skipped zombicide 1-3 because of it. I finally bought some zombies for painting later and got hooked after picking up one of the boxes on Miniaturemarket.coms deal of the day. I've since backed blood rage (received that) and ZBP (still waiting my wave 2), I missed out on the KS for B-Siegel because I didn't like the look of the heroes at all, but I grabbed that as a deal of the day as well.

As for shipping problems, some people are hacked off about the listed estimates compared to final costs. The prices went up for shipping, but then they didn't bother to adjust the costs on their next KS to show it so they are branded as dishonest even though it plainly says Estimate. I get it though because the deal becomes so much less sweet when you double, triple or quadruple the shipping costs.

There are also some who didn't get the ZBP core box before Christmas even though CMoN shipped most as soon as they could AT THEIR COST. Many of those didn't have their info saved in the system on time, but I'm sure there are exceptions. There are others who wanted multiple copies but only got one copy of the core box, but CMoN told everyone up front that they were only shipping one set to each backer so they could get something under the tree for Christmas.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
What's the issue with CMoN delivery / honesty?

My experience with CMoN is that they basically deliver what they said they would. Now, some of the underlying gameplay is flawed, and there are occasional minor issues, but it's not like AvP at all.

Theophony sums it up above. Google around about new wave miniatures, and there are a lot of stories of people getting more or less ripped off. The people behind CMoN are more or less the same as the one behind New Wave miniatures. Even though CMoN seems to be running more or less smoothly the same people caused a lot of bad feelings in the early 2000's. Prodos may have a mess on their hands with AVP, but they are still delivering (although painfully slow, and I am not really defending them) and seem intent on delivering, which is a lot more than the people behind Maelstrom/Mierce and New Wave/CMoN did when they switched companies.

I still find the progress (?) on this one fascinating to follow:

I can't remember another campaign with anything like that...

I was just looking at the kicktraq myself.

Definitely breaks the typical curve...

Yeah,
My issue with CMON was them selling the first boxes of zombiecide before delivering to backers.

I contacted them and complained about them selling before delivering to backers and they mocked me, refunded me and sold my pledge.

Saints compared to Prodos, but CMON are another company who don't deserve my money.
Proper bunch of wet ding dongs.

Panic...

The "Prodos Reveal" started a backslide that, essentially, hasn't stopped.

It shows just how much damage Prodos has done to themselves and their name.

I suppose it is a good thing that the majority of their backers and money came during the first 2 days.

 Alpharius wrote:
The "Prodos Reveal" started a backslide that, essentially, hasn't stopped.

It shows just how much damage Prodos has done to themselves and their name.

I suppose it is a good thing that the majority of their backers and money came during the first 2 days.

Yup. Only one day with a positive backer number (and that was only a single backer) since revealing they were behind it all.

Makes you wonder how high it would have gone had they not done so.

 Alpharius wrote:
The "Prodos Reveal" started a backslide that, essentially, hasn't stopped.

It shows just how much damage Prodos has done to themselves and their name.

I suppose it is a good thing that the majority of their backers and money came during the first 2 days.

The damage IMO is ongoing until later today with the deceit that this campaign was initially based upon and cummulative with the previous continuing mess of AVP. When I did a quick check yesterday, they backslid to day 4 in terms of funding (and day 2 according to you in terms of backers). If they had just bitten the bullet and shifted some money into Prodos towards immediate AVP fulfillment (as opposed to moving assets apparently over to Archon), I think they would have made that money back and more with an honest and open campaign in terms of total pledges compared with their likely total today. They basically chose the opposite of what would have most reformed their tarnished reputation (in the eyes of consumers but not apparently with other businesses) and I suspect it cost them more money in the end than just doing the right thing(s) in the first place.

I was in it for the 100$ pledge to do 30 more for the resin towers as I love MOBAS, but after looking at it more, think I would enjoy rum and bones more, and not have to worry about phobos. So I canceled it.

 warboss wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
The "Prodos Reveal" started a backslide that, essentially, hasn't stopped.

It shows just how much damage Prodos has done to themselves and their name.

I suppose it is a good thing that the majority of their backers and money came during the first 2 days.

The damage IMO is ongoing until later today with the deceit that this campaign was initially based upon and cummulative with the previous continuing mess of AVP. When I did a quick check yesterday, they backslid to day 4 in terms of funding (and day 2 according to you in terms of backers). If they had just bitten the bullet and shifted some money into Prodos towards immediate AVP fulfillment (as opposed to moving assets apparently over to Archon), I think they would have made that money back and more with an honest and open campaign in terms of total pledges compared with their likely total today. They basically chose the opposite of what would have most reformed their tarnished reputation (in the eyes of consumers but not apparently with other businesses) and I suspect it cost them more money in the end than just doing the right thing(s) in the first place.

Yes, exactly - and Exalted!

I read comments like the one below in this KS

Kin about 1 hour ago
"I hope @Load will deliver this on time as promise before the holidays and that will once and for all put Archon name out there as the only Kickstarter that will deliver on time."

And I'm like... *facepalm*

Btw just like @Artemis I can't know if this Archon will deliver or not, but should it not it will certainly burn the company down forever. Or so I think :-)
Edit: Which means they have a really serious reason to see this through...

 Grot 6 wrote:
I don't understand why it has to be so convoluted. they have the miniatures production capability, the game looked set, why so much drama for so little product?

While I wasn't going to back this for several reasons, one of those reasons was that the game itself seems to be the weakest part of LOAD. The rules were plagiarised and from reviews of AvP those rules are terrible and I've seen/heard mixed things about WarZone. I don't really need a big pile of more minatures just to add to the unpainted pile but that would be worth it if I thought the gameplay would be good. I have strong doubts of Prodos/Archon/whoever having the ability to write a cogent, well written, simple ruleset and the fact that they are asking for extensive volunteer playtesting while the kickstarter is ongoing (coupled with the plagiarism) give me real doubts that this game will play well out of the box and I don't have the time or inclination to house rule a bunch of stuff. I think Prodos/Archon will get the game made and shipped but I am not optimistic that people will be impressed at all at how much fun it will be to try to play it.

Thanks for the info about WarZone - I never dealt with them, so that was news to me.

Interesting how CMoN managed to simply step past it with their Zombicide successes.

Unlike Prodos / Archon / LoadBoardGame / whatever the hell they'll call themselves next.

They didn't step past it, really - it was a huge issue at the time, just like Maelstrom Games folding and taking a lot of people's money with it (with similar massive sales right at the end, and no follow up / refunds).

Both companies recovered in their new forms because they deliver well and make fantastic products... so, I hope Archon can do that, eventually, as well. Despite their terrible PR, as another poster noted they've actually continued to communicate and deliver, unlike the above two examples. I've backed, and will continue to do so, all 3 companies (in fact, I'll have backed one campaign for each just this month ).

But I don't think it's possible to completely vilify one and give the others a pass, when all went through a similar rough patch - it just remains to be seen if Prodos/Archon can come out the other side. I think they can, but a lot will hinge on how they deliver Load!

That's all well and good, and they might still be able to repair their image, but it would be nice if Prodos was spending a little bit more time/effort/money on improving things/fixing past mistakes vs. how they set up running this KS.

That's definitely true! And hopefully they will do so with this campaign ending. Even if it's not direct, the pledges and funding from this will have to help with finishing off AvP delivery, which they've stated is mostly stalled due to funding (the person who bought my pledge just made a purchase from their webstore so they could ship his altogether, as they've offered to backers. Not ideal, but lets them get it shipped!).

Funded with 1,558 backers and 215,471 $

Well good luck to all you backers, hopefully Prodos prove us skeptics wrong. And they deliver without the lies and other rubbish that's happened with with AVP

Wow, some backers really believe that Archon and Prodos are separate
Quote from KS: ''Zholtar unfortunately Deadwood is still pledged. Funny little guy that he is. Still thinks Archon is Prodos! Ah well. Atleast he'll be here when we are all talking about receiving our games. ''
The thread for AvP is 251 pages long. Let the drama begin ...

What a...fascinating finish!

I'd say I'd love to see a Buzzsaw-style Post-KS analysis here, but there aren't any real mysteries to solve.

This campaign backslid so hard that they effectively didn't add any new backers outside of Day 2, and no significant funds outside of Day 4!

But, at the end of the day, we're a community of gamers here, so I do genuinely hope that Prodos now has their act together, and all the backers get what they pledged for and are happy with it - best of luck everyone!

Appreciate the well wishes on our (the backers) behalf, guys . Will certainly let you know how it goes! I hope really well, we'll see

Final stats and tally since it is interesting (at least to me). It ended with 1558 backers at a total of $215,471

$99 Pledge - 939 backers ($111 US, $124 RoW) - $104229(US)-$116436(RoW)
$99 Pledge - 203 backers ($111 US, $124 RoW) - $22533(US)-$25172(RoW)
$249 Pledge - 196 backers ($261 US, $274 RoW) - $51156(US)-$53704(RoW)
$499 Pledge - 22 backers ($517 US, $530 RoW) - $11374(US)-$11660(RoW)
$999 Pledge - 9 backers ($1017 US, $1030 RoW) - $9153(US)-$9270(RoW)

That accounts for 1369 backers giving us an accountable range (not including $1 pledges) of $198,445(US/CA) - $216,242(RoW). That means at least 189 are unknown pledge levels, most likely $1 pledges that people dropped to. They'll wait to see how things turn out and then when the pledge manager comes out, have the ability to upgrade. There are also those that are just in for updates to track how the drama continues to unfold.

Top Cities where backers come from:
London, United Kingdom - 26 backers
Sydney, Australia - 26 backers
Seoul, South Korea - 19 backers
Singapore, Singapore - 15 backers
Los Angeles, United States - 15 backers
Paris, France - 14 backers
Madrid, Spain - 12 backers
Toronto, Canada - 11 backers
Vienna, Austria - 11 backers
Brisbane, Australia - 11 backers

Top Countries where backers come from:
United States - 655 backers
Germany - 128 backers
United Kingdom - 122 backers
Canada - 95 backers
Australia - 72 backers
France - 65 backers
Spain - 54 backers
Italy - 41 backers
Belgium - 28 backers
South Korea - 22 backers

81 backers are new to Kickstarter, never backing a Kickstarter project before.
1,477 backers have backed Kickstarter projects before.

 Panic wrote:
Yeah,
My issue with CMON was them selling the first boxes of zombiecide before delivering to backers.

I contacted them and complained about them selling before delivering to backers and they mocked me, refunded me and sold my pledge.

Saints compared to Prodos, but CMON are another company who don't deserve my money.
Proper bunch of wet ding dongs.

Panic...

Your tune seems have changed - I was on the same campaign, and you posted on the Zombicide comments section that they OFFERED you a full refund, which you accepted. You're making it out as if they forced you to take your money back. Seems pretty reasonable to me - if you don't like the way they run things, they return your money. Which is a far sight better than a lot of other campaigns.

Yeah,
I contacted them saying that selling to public who haven't invested in the project before backers who paid months earlier was unfair.

They hadn't set a date for when we would get our stuff?
I got frustrated and asked for a refund.

They publicly mocked me for asking for my money back.
As in I should be grateful for being a KS backer and lucky that I would get product?
After the general public at gen con?

It was very unprofessional.

Panic...

All I know is that I received both Zombicide 2 and Zombicide 3 *before* their estimated delivery date.

Also that CMoN now no longer promises that backers will receive first.

 Alpharius wrote:
What a...fascinating finish!

I'd say I'd love to see a Buzzsaw-style Post-KS analysis here, but there aren't any real mysteries to solve.

This campaign backslid so hard that they effectively didn't add any new backers outside of Day 2, and no significant funds outside of Day 4!

It's a little worse than that as most of the positive gains are the painting pledges. Over 15k of the final tally is for the painting company, they'd have ended under 200k if they hadn't added those.

I also think that's where problems will occur. That painting company now has to paint over 3500 minis, including a 'lot' of very large ones fr that $15k. That is one piss poor rate, it's an insane discount on their regular pricing. Will be interesting to see if pledgers do get 'standard quality'.

It's not blue table painting is it?