February Recap

Well, I got a little bit more of hobby mojo rolling for the month of February.  Just a little though.

At the recent game day at Rocket Republic I got my first taste of Star Wars Armada in.  Despite owning a lot of Armada stuff already, this was my first game ever.  We threw down with full 400 point lists and I quickly, I think, caught on to the game.  Well, except for the fact that I had one of my ships move off the board.  I still managed to overcome the oppressive might of the Empire though.  I found the game a lot of fun and I am a bit excited that some of the local group are picking it up (6 of us total I think, just enough to play the Corellian Conflict campaign hopefully).  Of course it helps that I am a bit of Star Wars junkie.  Unfortunately I didn't remember to take any pictures.

I also continued to knock out assembly of more Dropfleet Command Scourge ships.  I'm down to my last sprue of Scourge frigates (unfortunately there are 4 ships per frigate sprue) and a cruiser sprue.

The Scourge fleet had to be aside though, because some parts finally came in for my Adepticon project:  Devil's Run.  I did not back this kickstarter but I'm anxious to try it out as I am somewhat obsessed with the vehicle combat genre.  For the event you are supposed to bring one modified Hotwheels car, which feeds nicely into a theme project that I've wanted to tackle for awhile.  So, with the bitz order in I have devoted myself to modifying hotwheels.  Hmm, yes, I only technical need one but I am working on 4.  It's going to be a tough slog to get through though, as I have discovered what a pain in the ass die-cast metal is to work with.  Anyway, eventually I post something up regarding them.

Lastly, I got this in the mail:

As one would have guessed, that is indeed the first edition box set.

My bitterness toward this game (now) is so sad.  Deep inside of me I wanted to tear it open and start assembling me some Aliens and Predator miniature goodness.  And the spiteful me wanted to take it to backyard and burn it.  As a compromise, for now, it has been relegated to sitting on my shelf in clear view with a self promise to stare at it for 5 mins before possibly backing another kickstarter of any kind.  Oh, included in the box was this too:

Your kidding right!?

Some "fun" quotes:

1. "It's been a difficult ride for the last 24 months..."  WTF are you talking about?  24 months?  Are you that lazy that you can't even update this form letter every couple of months? 
2. "Nonetheless, I would like to assure you that every action that Prodos Games has made was to assure that we will be able to fulfill KS rewards as soon as possible."  Really?  What about deciding to use Prodos capital to develop the second edition of this game?  Seems like that money could have been used to get people their kickstarter pledges sooner.  Just saying...
3. "...find enclosed 25% discount voucher to our Online store..."  OMG, you want me to give you more money!?  

To be clear in case anyone happening to read this is wondering:  I only backed the base game.  Not a bunch of crazy add-ons that were allegedly tied up in FOX licensing hell.  My pledge netted some free add-on options, none of which were subject to the additional issues with FOX, to my knowledge.  

*sigh*  Despite this, if Prodos at least has the common sense to send a free download link for the second edition rules to all backers, I may some day play this.  Or maybe I will burn it...  But I will promise to "try" not to talk about this anymore, unless it is something (somehow) positive.  

Anyway, that was February.  Probably won't have much for March until Adepticon, which I can't wait for.

Speechless (Language Not Suitable for Young Audiences)

Hmmm, wow.  I am absolutely speechless right now.  You really have to admire talent.  And this is some serious talent I am about to talk about.  So almost 4 years ago a company runs a kickstarter, for a pretty hot IP.  And to this day it still appears a non-trivial amount of backers still have not even received the core content (myself included), let alone everything they backed.  There has been a complete lack of proper communication and a number of faux pas.  Seriously, sending me email coupons for 25% off an order of the stuff I backed in the kickstarter but still have not received!? Also saying if I bought something from the webstore, they would ship my kickstarter along with it!?

So after 3 years (I'm giving a 1 year grace period for immediately after the kickstarter) of this type of behavior, it requires incredible talent to drop something on me that leaves me speechless (if it isn't obvious by now, I'm not really speechless).  Who and what exactly am I talking about?

Oh yeah, that's right:  Prodos Games and the Aliens vs Predator kickstarter.  But see, you might not have noticed what exactly that picture above is of.  Click on it for a larger image, you might have to zoom in on the box.  Go ahead, I'll wait.

See it?  Second Edition...  All new models, protective foam inside the box, no assembly models, redesigned (aka "fixed", maybe) game modes, revised (aka "fixed", maybe) rules and improved art!  How much better are all these things than the original edition?  I have no fucking idea, since I still haven't gotten mine!  And since I recently received notification that mine was now in shipment, almost a month ago, I'm sure I'm getting the "old" edition.

You might be thinking this might not even come out till 2020?  Nope, they claim it will start shipping on March 17th.  Of this year.

I am fucking speechless.  You have to be a seriously talented asshole, idiot, or both to even come up with shit like this.  It almost requires deliberate intent to fuck people over like this.  And this is not even a fuck you to those that haven't gotten our stuff yet.  It's a fuck you to those that have already received their's too.  Perhaps even worse.  Because there is an outside chance (yeah right) that I may actually get the second edition.  And there is an even slimmer chance that if I did, the models might not suck more than the 1st edition ones (I'm going to go out on a limb here but I speculate that 1st edition multi-part models will "look" better than one piece 2nd edition models).  But at least there is that chance.  All that people that have already gotten theirs have to hope for is that Prodos offers the "upgrade" pack (15 pounds retail) to them for free.  And that is pretty wishful thinking IMO.

Now, I suspect that I am actually making this out worse than it is.  I suspect what you see above, advertised as second edition, is actually a scaled down version of the 1st edition game to hit a reduced price mark and to hopefully gain market penetration due to that price point and simpler components.  And it just happens to "utilize" updated rules.  But if that is really the case, the way this was announced is just another faux pas demonstrating how incompetent this company and it's leadership are.  And that still leaves me speechless.

No matter the case, it is important to realize one thing.  For this to have occurred (2nd edition box set with all the mentioned "improvements/changes") Prodos Games had to have had positive cash flow at some point (hard to imagine I know).  And at that point they face a decision:  1)  Dump cash into designing 2nd edition assets or 2) Fulfill their previous promises (ie, deliver their kickstarter).  They choose wrong.

Fuck you Prodos.