Good news, everybody!
over 7 years ago
– Sun, Oct 28, 2018 at 02:01:40 AM
We have a delivery! Well, we will.
The estimated arrival date of our freight shipment from the manufacturer is November 5! I have my fingers crossed it will make that date, but even if it's a few days or even a week later than that, it means our shipment marches inexorably toward us.
In the mean time, we have been preparing for a grand assembly crusade in Tacoma. There are six-foot-tall stacks of boxes filling Jeremy's living room and several thousand expansion pack cards, boards, and tokens carefully sequestered away from prying kitty claws. Once the big shipment arrives, there will be a brief, but critical fort-building period, and then all of your individual pledge rewards will be packed with care and sent out.
Since things are moving quickly now, we will keep you updated as frequently as we have good news. We'll let you know when the core shipment arrives, when the assembly is complete, and finally when everything is on the road.
Thank you all for your incredible patience as we have found our way through this process. We are so very sorry that we have taken so long to make good on your pledges and we only hope that you are just as pleased by the end result as we are to get it to you.
Regarding Shipping (and typhoons)
over 7 years ago
– Sun, Sep 16, 2018 at 09:47:26 PM
Hello Everyone,
First, some of you asked about Typhoon Mangkhut. The storm is making landfall in roughly the same area that our ton of games (yes, almost exactly 2000 lbs) will ship from later this week, but hopefully we dodged that rather large meteorological bullet.
We should be able to provide a revised estimation for delivery soon, as the time from China to Seattle should be fairly predictable (typhoons notwithstanding) and our Seattle crew is ready to process the games quickly. Our modest office in Washington is piled high with boxes and shipping materials... all we need are the games and other deliverables (actor-signed cards, etc) to arrive.
We charged all available accounts for shipping recently, along with all remaining pre-orders. We have 68 backers who haven't logged back into their survey to re-enter their payment information so we can collect shipping. We need to do be able to do this soon in order to fulfill those orders, so if you haven't done that yet, please take a moment to do so (the link is available in the recent update about shipping charges).
Delivery estimations coming soon,
The Berserker Crew
Time to charge for shipping! Also, we're exporting a person to China...
over 7 years ago
– Wed, Aug 22, 2018 at 12:41:13 AM
Hello Backers!
News Item #1: We've gotten word from the production folks that Mythica is nearly ready to ship and that we need to finalize our shipping arrangements. Sooooo... let's do that.
After researching a variety of fulfillment methods and pricing all the shipping options, we are going with BacketKit's USPS solution. It's a good fit for our size of campaign and our distribution of backers, and it's comparatively inexpensive.
Here's what needs to happen: We need you to go back into your Kickstarter survey (using the link provided below) and settle up. Your shipping charges will show up there and you will be asked to enter your CC information again. Once you all respond, we'll lock down the surveys again, charge the cards, and be ready to ship.
Here's the link: https://mythica-fate-of-heroes.backerkit.com/
- If you purchased add-ons, we charged for those recently, so it's kind of a pain to enter your CC info again, but we couldn't find a way around that inconvenience.
- If you didn't pledge to the original campaign but pre-ordered instead, you might have both your order and your shipping charges waiting.
- If you're an original KS backer, you should only see shipping charges... and just for the base box. We managed to absorb the shipping expense for all add-ons, expansions, and special edition extras (since they don't change the weight of the base box significantly).
News Item #2: We want to let everyone know that one of our crew, Karl Lehman, has been asked to teach at a university in China for the coming semester. His temporary hiatus from Berserker Labs won't affect Mythica or fulfillment, except that our indefatigable Jeremy Cole will be handling most everything and you won't see Karl's name on posts or email replies for a while,
As always, if you have any questions, shoot us an email at [email protected].
The Devil is indeed in the details
over 7 years ago
– Wed, Jul 18, 2018 at 02:26:11 PM
Hello Faithful Backers!
I'm just dropping by your inbox to say that production is rolling along. Well, bumping along. Lurching is a better word, but not plodding. It's fast when it's moving, but it gets hung up sometimes on the smallest snags. Overall though, I'm assured that things are wrapping up and that we will, at some near date, have a small mountain of games show up at our Washington base.
The production company sent an email this morning to double check our shipping information and to say that the packing slip and a physical sample of the game will arrive early next week. I replied, thanking her and saying how anxious we are to deliver the game to our backers. I added offhand that this has been a four-year process. She was shocked and said she is always amazed at the amount of time and effort that goes into a full-scale board game.
After the exchange, I got to reminiscing and thinking about how complex just one piece of that process ends up being. Whether it was concept, prototyping, playtesting, kickstarter campaigning, production, or (soon) fulfillment, each step has seemed like a war in and of itself, an exhausting campaign fraught with all manner of unpredicted and unpredictable obstacles.
I don't want to bore you with my musings, but a couple of you were curious enough to ask about the processes involved, so I'll detail some of the more recent foibles. Production alone, and I'm just talking about the reboot since LIYA Int'l replaced their less-then-functional representative with a functional one, has resulted in 211 email exchanges.
These discussions covered everything from exact Pantone colors for each meeple to design possibilities for the box's organizer insert. The production process is incredibly thorough, often resulting in tiresome but necessary discussions of the tiniest details that all must be understood and approved by both sides before production can lurch forward another step.
I fielded questions at every turn. Questions like: Is it okay to stretch the box bottom graphic by 5mm? The games comes with orange dice that do not correlate with a meeple color, is that correct? The black bleed border of some cards is slightly asymmetrical, not in terms of positioning, but the black is slightly bluer on one side or the other (not visible to the naked eye), was that intentional or would you like to revisit those files?
Also, there were tedious changes that really needed to be made before we could continue. Originally, the cards were arranged in sheets of 18 or 36, per the specifications of our prototype printer. The production printer, however, needed each card uploaded as a separate file. That's 504 files for the card fronts! Fortunately, our art guy figured out a way to automate the process of selecting each card on a sheet (spacing with a <1mm tolerance), cropping the file, converting its color mode, then naming it and saving it as a particular file type with exact settings. Even so, the process required two long days.
As exasperating as those hitches can be, we are grateful to the professionals at the LIYA factory for their attention to detail and exacting standards. In the end, all they are doing is increasing the quality of our game.
We're excited that production is coming to a close and we can get on with the busy work of fulfillment. We have received seven emails or messages with address changes, so if anyone else has moved, let us know at [email protected] or with a kickstarter message.
-Karl & Jeremy
No news is good news :)
almost 8 years ago
– Wed, Jun 06, 2018 at 03:38:34 PM
Dear backers,
I wish there was something interesting to report, but we're just doing what you're doing... waiting anxiously for the game. The folks at LIYA International have made good on their promises and, after a last round of file manipulations and minor tweaks (all the background blacks, for example, had to be adjusted to C:40 M:30 Y:30 K:100) the manufacturer is revved up and cranking out a quarter million cards for us.
So now, we are waiting. I don't know if the next phase interests you, but I'll tell you about it, just in case indie game design, production, and fulfillment is a mystery to you (as it occasionally is to me).
Since the game is brand new and a bit of a niche product, our initial sales (wonderful as they were) don't require a third party fulfillment (delivery) solution. When production is completed, the game will be shipped to Seattle where we will process it in-house. We found a domestic manufacturer to handle some of the extras (Collector's Edition campaign boards, for example) and those will arrive before the main order from LIYA.
At that time, we will sort and box everything according to each individual order (slipping in extras, because we appreciate everyone's support and patience so much), then we will charge for individual shipping, collect the funds for the website pre-orders, and ship everything from Seattle to you.
If you have questions about your order or you would like a PDF copy of the Mythica Rule Book, please email us directly at [email protected].
I'll keep you updated as we go, and I'll post pictures of the fulfillment process, just for fun, but unfortunately right now we're just, as my mom used to say, twiddling our thumbs.
Enjoy your summer, talk to you soon,
Karl & Jeremy
