Bonus prints added to qualifying Backerkit orders
over 2 years ago – Sat, Jan 15, 2022 at 08:23:14 PM

Happy Saturday, everyone!

Just a quick update to let you all know that the Pre-registration, Day-1, Week-1, and Week-2 bonus prints have now been applied to all qualifying orders in Backerkit. Please check your Backerkit cart to make sure you see any that you are expecting.

If you don't see them and believe you should qualify, please send us a message.

Note: this time, we only added them to orders with physically shipping items. If you are a digital-only backer and wish to still receive your earned prints, let us know and we will add them to your cart. But beware that this will then incur shipping fees.

Thanks, everyone!

Backerkit surveys are out!
over 2 years ago – Sat, Jan 15, 2022 at 02:26:03 AM

Hi everyone!

Sorry for the delay but we're happy to say that Backerkit surveys have all been sent. You may have already received the invitation from Backerkit, but it could take up to 24 hours to arrive. Check your spam filter, too, just in case.

A few points to mention, as some of you have asked:

- The bonus prints (Pre-registration, Day-1, etc) have to be added to qualifying orders manually, so we will be doing that shortly. Once we have added those, we will post another update so that everyone can check to confirm they are there as expected. We'll try to do this before the weekend (if not end of the day today)!

- Please note: Backerkit does not charge any credit card until we LOCK ORDERS. When you fill out your survey, you are just entering the Credit Card information that they will use when that time comes. Currently, we estimate locking orders in late March or early April.

- Digital Rewards will be distributed once we have locked orders.

A special note to Backers receiving original drawings:

Please fill out your surveys as soon as you are able to so that Bertrand can work on your pieces soon. He's very keen to make them special. 😊 

If anyone would like to add an original drawing to their order, an Add-on item has been created in Backerkit that you can select during your survey.

Please visit campaign update #6 to view the unfinished pieces available to choose from, and let us know right away your 3-5 preferred selections. They will be claimed on a first-come basis (with Original Drawing Tier backers given priority).

Thanks, everyone! More news to come!

Backerkit Survey Delay, plus slipcase dummy pix
over 2 years ago – Sat, Jan 08, 2022 at 02:57:43 AM

Happy New Year!

Hope you all had a wonderful set of holidays. Ours were great - very relaxing, although we didn't think to factor in at least a day of travel decompression coming home from it all... Got home this past Monday night and hit the ground running again first thing Tuesday morning. Like a sobering bucket of ice water over the head. 😆

We were excited to find a package of advance copies and dummies from our printer waiting for us, however, including an unprinted build of the OGRE GODS Box Set slipcase -- check it out!

For anyone who also backed last Fall's SHANGRI-LA campaign and has been following some of the comments posted about poorly packed slipcases arriving damaged, please note that A) the actual number of damages reported is less than a dozen (out of nearly 1000), B) they have mostly been issues that occurred during transit by the carrier (which is always the case when shipping hundreds of orders -- there will always be unfortunate exceptions), but most importantly C) Quartermaster will be applying styrofoam corner protectors to each packed slipcase to protect them in transit. QML does a great job of packing with care, but these Boxed Sets are relatively heavy items,  so they will be taking measures to make sure things are secured well when packing. 😊

The rest of the print files have all been approved by Bertrand and the licensor, and the stretch goal items will be ordered shortly. So we're not worried about the promised May ship dates. Yet. (If we've learned anything these past two years, it's to be ready for anything!)

BACKERKIT SURVEYS

A small handful of you may have gotten your surveys as part of the initial "smoke test" -- a subset of surveys sent to just a few people so that we can debug the system if any errors pop up. Well, just as we did that, brand new shipping rates came in from FedEx and Quartermaster, and unfortunately, they require us to revisit our shipping tables. We have had several meetings with QML this past week to discuss the matter, and the changes are pretty much out of their hands; they are just passing the rates through to us (and thus onto you) without markup. So we are now reviewing the shipping table to see if anything needs to be updated. Please know that we're trying to keep things as fair and reasonable as possible. The shipping situation plaguing the globe is rough on all of us, at all levels, but we want to continue to do what we can to offset or stave off as much of that inflation as possible.

One thing that we will be doing is offering two more "Free Shipping" campaigns after this one wherein backers who supported two or more of those qualifying campaigns can save money by having them all ship together. This worked out pretty well on our SHANGRI-LA + FALSE GUARD + THE WALL campaign bundling that just shipped (domestically; International orders are going out shortly), so we want to do it again!

Both of those qualifying campaigns will be ready to ship in May with OGRE GODS. Both will be relatively shorter campaigns, but very cool books nonetheless. 😎 The next one will be revealed in the next week or so, and we're pretty excited to pull back the curtain on it very soon!

Thanks, everyone! More news to come!

Backerkit surveys going on next Monday, January 3rd!
over 2 years ago – Tue, Dec 28, 2021 at 10:35:34 PM

Hi everyone!

Hope you had a wonderful Christmas and/or holidays and are looking forward to a fun New Year's Eve. We just wanted to post a quick heads up on the surveys as we've been working back and forth with the support folks at Backerkit -- since Kickstarter only just completed their collection of funds on Christmas Eve Day, and Backerkit offices and support are closed until next Monday, January 3rd, they have asked that we not send out smoke test surveys until then so that they can be ready to address any issues that might arise. Makes sense, and there really isn't a huge hurry, but we apologize for suggesting they might have been able to go out by now. Honestly, we didn't realize their offices would be closed for the full week between Christmas and New Year, but it is fair for them to take a well-deserved break... they've been a huge help and a key partner in all of our campaigns this year (all 8 of them! Yow!), so who are we to deny them some rest? 😋

In the meantime, the book and slipcase have been translated and laid out and files are ready for the printer. We're only waiting on final approval from the licensor and Bertrand before uploading. With the holidays, it's reasonable to think they might not get back to us until next week, but that should be fine; our timetable is comfortable.

So until Monday, please have a safe, happy, and healthy New Year! 

See you in 2022!

Backerkit is ready, just waiting on Kickstarter to finish collections...
over 2 years ago – Mon, Dec 20, 2021 at 10:10:23 PM

Hi all,

Just a quick update to let you all know that Backerkit is set up and ready to go, we're just waiting on Kickstarter to complete their collection process, which usually takes 14 days from campaign end. So they should be done by Friday (Christmas Eve!), but we're hoping sooner (rather than them pushing it to after the holiday).

Once we have confirmation from Kickstarter, we will send out the Backerkit surveys.

One way or another, it should be well before the end of the year. 😋

In the meantime, the production files have been approved to upload to the printer, so pre-flight proofing is on its way! (Granted, also affected by the holiday, but that was expected.)

Thanks everyone! Stay tuned for more news to come!