Noble Armada (Horton Hears a Who)

[MongooseMatt]

Hi guys,

The bottleneck we have at the moment is with the rapid prototypers. I had hoped to be able to bring in a second one, but we have not been able to arrange that as yet.

As soon as we have something solid (like ships in our hands), believe me, you chaps will be the first to know!

 

[Isoulle]

Any chance of any rules previews? Personally I've been anxiously waiting for the Vau fleet.

 

[Sawbones12]

Cough, cough, bull hockey! What happened to the miniatures already in hand that were just awaiting "a lick of paint" (after the last releases) before being posted for release or at least as previews? We read, we remember, we are obviously NOT respected... I hate to say it but I am really disliking this company and yet I hate to admit even more that I won't give up because I want the NA miniatures if they ever are released.

Rob

 

[MongooseMatt]

Cough, cough, bull hockey! What happened to the miniatures already in hand that were just awaiting "a lick of paint" (after the last releases) before being posted for release or at least as previews?

I am afraid I don't believe I said that - I believe I said they were at prototype, and that is where our current problems are.

However, please see the other NA thread, we have had an idea...

 

[Shloaksta]

Still, not all doom and gloom. The last Noble Armada ships are at the rapid prototyper right _now_. There are qwuite a few of them, so may take a little more than a week to crunch through the models but, as soon as they come back, they will be put into moulds, the first batch will be cast and sent to the painter. Figure he will take a week or two with them (there are quite a few...) and then, as soon as we have those painted models back in our hands, they will be photographed and Fleets of the Fading Suns will be off to print!

There is indeed light at the end of the tunnel, and it is not a Vau Sentinel coming to wipe you out!

That was May 1st.

You will soon have a fair boatload of new material for Noble Armada - the last few new models are being worked on right now...

That was a response to a thread from March 19th when I asked what happened to Fleets after being delayed to April 2012. So lets see....Announced for release in September 2011, delayed to October/November 2011....then pushed back to December 2011, and again Delayed to Jan of 2012...then nothing till March 2012...delayed to April, then May, and now no end in sight.
BUT we get responses such as there is a light at the end of the tunnel, and they are in rapid prototypes, then needing to be painted...and all along there are HUGE releases of models and material and even previews and support for Star fleet.

No more empty promises and vague responses. What is going on here? Are you supporting NA anymore at all because it doesn't seem like it?

 

[MongooseMatt]

No more empty promises and vague responses. What is going on here? Are you supporting NA anymore at all because it doesn't seem like it?

We are very much supporting NA - I am going to be painting a new fleet myself this weekend (either Vuldrok or Decados, haven't settled on which yet), and have just done a HUGE Li Halan fleet. I am still playing, so Mongoose is still supporting.

But...

We are not Games Workshop.

On the miniatures side we (currently) have one writer (that would be me), one 3D modeller, and two guys making moulds and packing boxes.

We all work an average of 9 or 10 hours a day (and a couple of us work much more than that). We really are trying to please as many people as possible in the shortest period of time and, on paper, everything gets done on time - unfortunately, Bad Things can happen and stall certain projects. Right now, it is a prototyping problem.

Now (more information than you wanted to know, I grant you), we could solve that problem instantly by going to another prototyper that would charge us four or five times as much as our current facility, but we just plain cannot afford that and, even if we could, I cannot be sure the models would earn that back in any reasonable time (it would be a BIG bill), meaning it would be an unwise business decision.

The benefit of supporting a small company is that we can give each and every one of you individual attention, be it on the status of a mail order, listening to your thoughts on the rules, or whatever. The downside is that there are certain things we cannot just take in our stride, and that can cause delays.


I am not sure I can be more honest than all of that...

 

[locarno24]

So lets see....Announced for release in September 2011, delayed to October/November 2011....then pushed back to December 2011, and again Delayed to Jan of 2012...then nothing till March 2012...delayed to April, then May, and now no end in sight.
BUT we get responses such as there is a light at the end of the tunnel, and they are in rapid prototypes, then needing to be painted...and all along there are HUGE releases of models and material and even previews and support for Star fleet.

I won't disagree that I find it irksome too. However, on the other hand, we've had the occultists, fighter upgrades, kurga and vuldrok rules published free, and updated with playtesting. I can't say I'm a fan of the NCC-series elephant in the room by comparison, but having got access to a license like that, they can't let grass grow under there feet*.


* On a related note, someone apply the motivating stick to Ms. Sexton again. Prime Directive is shiny and we wants it...