PLEDGE MANAGER PROGRESS UPDATE...WAIT, LOOK AT THOSE HEROES!
almost 5 years ago
– Sat, Apr 11, 2020 at 08:33:02 PM
Greetings Warcasters,
Despite our effort to have the pledge manager up and running this week, we needed a bit more time to make sure it was put together in a way that accommodates all the options and flexibility we want to be able to offer you. Where things stand now is that we have sent invitations out to a select group of testers to see if they can find any holes in the system. By Monday, we should be able to launch the "smoke test", which will send invites out to about 5% of the backers of each pledge level, as a sort of 'beta' test before it goes out wide to everyone. So, if all goes well we're on target for a full launch next week.
We apologize for the delay. Please know that the extra days spend on the pledge manager do not in any way affect our production schedule or the delivery of your rewards. All progress on the making of the game has been proceeding as scheduled.
Hopefully I can buy a little forgiveness by sharing the latest model renders to hit my inbox. I was saving these for next Wednesday, but no better time to share them than now! Have a look at Wild Card Hero: Voitek Sudal, Bounty Hunter, and Aeternus Continuum Hero: Hierotheos Raxis!
IT'S WARJACK WEDNESDAY! TIME TO GET HEAVY! (PLUS MORE PLEDGE MANAGER WALKTHROUGH)
almost 5 years ago
– Wed, Apr 08, 2020 at 11:54:11 PM
Greetings Warcasters!
It's Warjack Wednesday, which is that great time of the week when I get to show off the latest things that have come across my desk. This week, we've got renders to show off for the freshly-sculpted Iron Star Alliance Morning Star and the Aeternus Continuum Nemesis, heavy warjacks. And these things are packing some serious firepower!
To prepare you for the coming pledge manager, we'll continue our walkthrough of the process for anyone who might be unfamiliar with the Backerkit pledge manager system.
ADD-ONS
After you have made your reward selection, you'll move on to the Add-Ons screen. Basically, Add-Ons work just like an online store. You'll see a page of different categories like the one below (though hopefully with more pictures). You'll also see your rewards listed to the right so that you've got an itemized list of everything you have pledged for. Below that, any items you Add-On will show, along with a subtotal for the Add-Ons, a shipping subtotal, and the balance, if any, that will need to be paid for any additional selections and shipping.
Depending on whether or not you confirmed your country during the Kickstarter campaign, the shipping shown here may or may not be correct. Once you confirm your shipping details, though, the amount will adjust before you finalize your order.
When you click on a category, a window will pop up with more pictures and a drop down selector that allows you to put an item in your cart. If you want multiples, adjust the quantity. If you want more than one item in a given category, after you place the first one in your cart, select the next item from the drop down and add it to your cart.
Once you've made all your Add-On selections, hit the NEXT button, and you're off to...
SHIPPING
Just like any online store you've ever ordered from, you'll enter your shipping information here. Again, remember that we cannot ship to PO Boxes. And please make sure that the address you provide is safe and secure to receive shipments.
Once your shipping information has been entered, hit the 'NEXT' button and move on to...
CONFIRM
In this final step, you'll see any shipping costs updated and totaled with any costs for Add-Ons. You'll also have one last chance to look over your address details as well as your itemized pledge items. If you've missed something, you can always go back to make changes. Once everything looks correct, if you owe anything for any additional items, you'll enter your credit card information in the field in the upper right, and then hit the 'PLACE MY ORDER' button and you're done! And if you haven't added anything on and show a zero total, no credit card info should be required, so you can just hit the big friendly green button and be finished.
You'll have until April 30th to lock in your orders and update shipping info. After that, we'll lock the pledge manager and charge credit cards and begin preparing shipments. If something goes wrong or you have any problems, message us through Kickstarter and we will be happy to help.
We anticipate being able to begin initial testing on the pledge manager tomorrow, so it won't be long now...
Until then, be safe and well!
Matt Wilson
Chief Creative Officer
Privateer Press
PLEDGE MANAGER TUTORIAL (AND HOMEWORK!)
almost 5 years ago
– Wed, Apr 08, 2020 at 12:13:46 AM
Greetings Warcasters!
The pledge manager will soon be ready for backers to make reward selections, add-on items, and reconcile shipping details. We are taking a few days more on this for a couple of reasons: first, as you’ll see below, with the goal of making reward selections as flexible as possible, it has become somewhat complicated to construct, particularly for the Skirmish, Full Battle Force and Master of Time and Space tiers. So, we’re putting it through its paces to make sure we have everything organized correctly before we send it out to everyone.
Second, now that Kickstarter has released all of the Warcaster backer info to us, we are collating it carefully to determine freight costs for shipping rewards to our international fulfillment partners so that we can keep shipping costs as low as possible. And in doing this, we have some news that we believe is going to be great for everyone: we are going to aim to ship everything in two waves rather than our originally anticipated four. If we can manage this, then not only will it save on shipping for many international backers, it also means we should be shipping everything that was part of Wave 4 at the same time we would have been shipping Wave 3, cutting down on the time you have to wait to receive everything. International backers will still have the option of consolidating everything into one shipment, or receiving their rewards in two shipments — whichever you prefer. We’re working out the logistics of this change right now and we hope that you’ll agree its worth waiting another couple days while we finalize details.
Meanwhile, we are going to get you familiar with the pledge manager, and some of you have some homework to do!
GETTING STARTED
For those of you using Kickstarter for the first time, the pledge manager is a combination of a survey and an online store. When the pledge manager launches, you’ll receive an email invite to login to your personal account that we set up in Backerkit for you when we imported our backer info from Kickstarter. When you login, you will see the amount you pledged and the corresponding reward level that you selected during the Kickstarter campaign.
You’ll select your country from the dropdown menu and hit ‘Get Started’, and will proceed to reward selection. Or, if you wish to increase your pledge amount for a different level, you can do so at this time by clicking the super tiny little link below the Get Started button, which will bring up this menu below:
Click on any reward level that you’d like to upgrade to and then you’ll return to the starting screen where you can…Get Started!
QUESTIONS
The ‘Questions’ page is where you will confirm your reward selections and answer a few simple survey questions that allow us to better get to know the Warcaster community.
The first question is vitally important as this is where you will determine how many shipments your rewards are shipped in. For domestic US backers, unless for some reason you want to consolidate your shipments, simply click the second button and select, ‘No. Send each wave as available.’ Domestic US shipping is free and you will not be charged anything for shipping multiple waves.
For our international backers, select from any of the options available. The fewer shipments we make, the less you will be charged for shipping.
By the time the pledge manager is live, we will also be able to confirm if we’ll be shipping in just two waves, in which case the options will be to ship everything at once or everything as it becomes available.
After selecting your shipping option, it’s on to your rewards! You’ll see a column of questions to the right. This is where you will select the factions for your Command Group starter sets, and for many of you, it’s just a matter of answering the three survey questions at the bottom before moving on. But for backers of the Skirmish Battle Force, the Full Battle Force or the Master of Time and Space pledge levels, this is where you get to customize your entire order!
Each of the questions to the right will produce a pop-up window to the left with your options in each category. This is how we are able to allow you to choose variant models instead of duplicates, or swap heroes, wild cards, etc. Each category is constrained to the types of models in the category. So, you can’t swap a variant warjack for a solo. But you can swap between squad types or solo variants, etc. and tailor your rewards to exactly what you want. We have endeavored to make the selections as flexible as possible while still adhering to the template of each reward level, but if you don’t see something you expected was going to be possible, please message us and let us know so that we can help ensure you receive what you are looking forward to.
Note that your selections do not affect or adjust your pledge level. If you select the Aeternus Continuum for the Master of Time and Space level and choose three Grafters for three of your solo options, you will not be charged any additional. At the same time, if you choose all Weavers for your solos (not that you would) you would not be credited anything for not selecting a Marauder. (Just take the extra Marauder!)
Below, we have placed the reward selection pages for Skirmish Battle Force, Full Battle Force and Master of Time and Space reward tiers so that backers of this level can get a look ahead at the number of items you’ll need to make selections for. You Masters of Time and Space have a whopping 42 model selections to make!
Now don’t worry, the pledge manager will be open through April, so if you change your mind on something or wake up in a cold sweat and realize you selected four weavers when you really meant to get an extra hunter, you have plenty of time to make the change. And if things get confusing or they’re not working, you can always message us and we’ll be here to help you out.
STRETCH GOAL REWARDS
Unless you are a backer of the Skirmish Battle Force, Full Battle Force, or Master of Time and Space reward level, none of your stretch goal rewards are noted in the pledge manager. Selecting the faction of your Command Group will determine which variant solo you get, and everything else is locked in for you and will just be automatically included with your shipment.
If you are a backer of the Skirmish Battle Force, Full Battle Force, or Master of Time and Space reward level, then you will make selections for your Wild Card rewards. We’ve set things up so that you don’t have to make any selections that would not end up being useful to your selected faction(s) and you can instead substitute alternate models that will be useful regardless of how you select your Command Group factions.
Tomorrow, we’ll continue our pledge manager tutorial with some notes on Add-Ons and shipping. Plus, it’ll be Warjack Wednesday, and you know what that means!
Be safe and well,
Matt Wilson
Chief Creative Officer
Privateer Press
SKIRMISH BATTLE FORCE SURVEY LIST
FULL BATTLE FORCE SURVEY LIST
MASTER OF SPACE AND TIME SURVEY LIST
AETERNUS CONTINUUM BONUS ROUND!
almost 5 years ago
– Fri, Apr 03, 2020 at 01:51:16 AM
Greeetings Warcasters,
As promised, here is the first look at the complete Aeternus Continuum Command Group, painted by Privateer studio painter, Jordan Lamb!
If you haven't had a chance to watch Jordan demonstrate his fantastic painting techniques, check him out on our Get Your Paint On! series of tutorial videos on the Privateer Press YouTube channel.
Also, if you didn't catch sculptor Doug Hamilton's Insider and the first look at the Vassal Witch Hunters today, you can find that at PrivateerPress.com News.
Early next week, we will have detailed information on the Pledge Manager and how you will go about choosing your rewards. In order to provide maximum flexibility in making choices, it's become a mighty project, but we believe you'll be pleased with the control you have over your selections. We'll have a series of updates for you ahead of the launch that will walk you through each of the steps, so whether you're brand new to Kickstarter or a veteran backer of many projects, you'll have everything you need to know to lock in your rewards.
Until then, be safe and well wherever you are!
Matt Wilson
Chief Creative Officer
Privateer Press
IT'S WARJACK WEDNESDAY! SCOURGE & CAKE!
almost 5 years ago
– Thu, Apr 02, 2020 at 12:21:32 AM
Greetings Warcasters!
Once again, it's Warjack Wednesday and time for our weekly update.
With current stay-at-home orders in Washington as well as over most of the country now, many of our staff are working from home. But we continue to make progress on all aspects of Warcaster: Neo-Mechanika and have a lot of great things to show off in the coming weeks.
Today, we've got the first painted Scourge from Privateer's Studio Painter, Jordan Lamb! We'll have the rest of the Command Group ready to show in just another day or so, but the Immortal Weaver demanded extra time, and no one says no to an Immortal Weaver.
And tomorrow, be sure to check out the Insider going up on PrivateerPress.com by staff sculptor, Doug Hamilton, where among other things, Doug will be showing off the first looks of his recently finished Vassal Witch Hunters!
We also wanted to share a little cheer from behind-the-scenes, so make sure you read to the end! Privateer's games are made through the collaborative effort of many talented people, both in our offices as well as all around the world. Early in the development of Warcaster, I had the great opportunity to meet Aleksey Guk. Aleksey lives in Russia, and by day he creates fantastic video games, but by night — at least quite a few of them over the past few months — Aleksey has been contributing his amazing graphic design talent to Warcaster: Neo-Mechanika, designing, modeling and illustrating many of the elements you see that make up the cards and packaging. He even created our Warcaster logo, which is how we first began our collaboration. Below you can see some of the card designs that he's been finishing up.
Model info not final. Subject to change.)
Aleksey is also a long-time Warmachine player and an early adopter of Riot Quest and has even published video battle reports of Warcaster, so he knows this game well. He recently celebrated a birthday, and Warcaster has become such a preoccupation for him lately that his wife surprised him with an amazing birthday cake that we just had to share. Happy birthday, Aleksey!
Last, we're hard at working polishing the pledge manager and are on target to send out invitations next week! So watch for our updates and the invite and get ready to choose your faction!
