When kickstarters go wrong,

[euansmith]

Have you never bought a Finecast Miniature then?

[pauljc]

I think people are too ready to jump on the hate wagon without any real understanding of anything involving product design and manufacture, and without being in possession of any real facts.

All you have there is a soulful complain from Alyssa, which is fairly short on fact or concise information. And then you have a much longer, more concise and informative response from Defiance admitting fully to their own problems and describing very precisely why they haven't delivered.

Either way, no skin off my nose, aside the fact that it is shame that the young ladies involved had their first venture into game design turn out so badly. Hopefully they keep on trying.

Personally, I think Kickstarter is going to end up the same way as D&D's Open Gaming License. A market flooded with 80% crap. Because, what we really need in these hard times, is another book about halflings...

[lattd]

Here's the issue defiance admitted they couldn't do something's, but refuse to give the money back, now that is very wrong, yes both sides made mistakes but to say oh we haven't got the money that should be in a seperate account is very questionable.

[eldargal]

I think people are too ready to jump on the hate wagon without any real understanding of anything involving product design and manufacture, and without being in possession of any real facts.

Yep, people are too ready to believe the words of a dubious businessman with a track record of non delivery and place blame on the creator for not doing more to compensate for events out of her control. He took her money for a service he has not delivered and refuses to return it or fulfill the contract. That is not in anyway the creators fault.

[MarneusCalgar]

So finally what happened then?

I got lost sorry

[lattd]

Good news on this game! So it will continue with the miniatures to come later but the first phrase will include the basic game. Second the response from the community has been fantastic with many companies offering to help.

Finally defiance game has made two offers to repay the money and failed to do so twice.

[GrauGeist]

I think people are too ready to jump on the hate wagon without any real understanding of anything involving product design and manufacture, and without being in possession of any real facts.

DreamForge did a nice writeup of the economics in question on Jan 24: "Kickstartes the Wild West of Financing Dreams"

Alyssa / Natalya might likely have failed, but it's hard to say when someone else is holding her money for no valid reason.

And as for the funds, Defiance's KS raised at least as much as they have stolen from Alyssa / Natalya. It's unconscionable that they would not return her money.

[thearcani]

This really does show how important it is to make sure that the team of people running the kickstarter have some knowledge of manufacturing when they are producing models. Of course the Chinese company upped their quote after they saw the project was fully funded. They tried to see if they could squeeze more money out of it however was possible. It also appears that they did not do their due diligence in selecting who to use when it fell through. While I feel sorry for them and hope it all works out, it just gives me another reason not to back kickstarters until the project is rolled out or comes from a company that has a good track record

[GrauGeist]

Torn Armor raised less than $68,000.00. Of which, Torn received a hair over $60,000 to cover all costs after 10% KS / Amazon fees.

Looking at the backers, at least 396 pledged $35+ and will get the Fat Dragon Games Dragonshire Deluxe Edition ($13 MSRP), for a nominal wholesale cost of $3k. Of those, at least 383 pledged $75+ and will get the Reaper Clockwork Dragon ($25 MSRP), for a nominal wholesale cost of $6k. Those $75+ pledgers also get 25 dice each (7,000 total), with a nominal cost of $1 each ($7k) Total 3rd party costs around $15k.

That leaves about $45k for all other costs.

Pretend rules and printing are under $5 each in bulk, and backer shipping is $20 each in bulk, for another $10+k in costs.

That leaves at most $35k for all miniatures tooling and production.

There are at least 388 backers who will get at least 39 miniatures, so minimum production is 15,000 models, pretending production and shipping is only $1 per model, that's $15k in models, leaving only $20k for molds.

The KS page shows at least 35 different sculpts (5 of which are LARGE), so average mold cost would have to be under $575 per mold. That is very low for cutting injection plastic:

[url]http://www.custompartnet.com/estimate/injection-tooling/[/url]

No Chinese company was about to take a bath on the project when the Alyssa / Natalia would meet original production volumes, hence the price increase.


And my prices are probably all on the low side - go ahead and cross check them yourself.


Torn promised too much for too little.

[daboarder]

Thats all well and good grau, but defiance doesn't get to just hold onto the cash and say NAH AH!

edit: see its **** like this why I dont touch kickstarter (though KD was tempting)