Dark Maenad: Fire and Steel

The progress update
about 2 years ago – Thu, Feb 17, 2022 at 11:14:09 PM

Hi Backers,

First the really good news. All metal pledges except those that had the War Elephant or the Coven Shrine are out the door. North American backers some of you may already have yours. The metal pledges that contained the War Elephant and/or Coven Shrine will be going out soon. Those are being cast now. See pictures at the bottom. 

Second, the less good news. The plastics are taking a long time to mold.  John does not yet have a clear timeline on when these will ship.  I apologize, it's not what I promised I realize. I will get them to you just as soon as I can and I  will post a new update as soon as we have a clear timeline. On a positive note the test pieces that have been produced so far are amazing and as the new process becomes more familiar production is ramping up. I hope you will conclude it's been worth the wait when you get your hands on them.  I have included a shot of one of Effincool's pieces to show how much detail these figures have. 

Finally I want to urge you guys to take a look at a new kickstarter that Effincool is running for the figures they produce for Kobold Press some amazing figures over there at really good prices.  Check it out here.

 https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/497254986/kobold-press-bestiary-miniatures-iconic-races-ii-catfolk?ref=3zl1du 

I'll be back soon with additional information on plastic shipping. 

All the best, 

Raymond

A short update about The Mercenaries STL files
over 2 years ago – Wed, Jan 19, 2022 at 08:00:14 AM

Hi Backers,

Several of you have written to tell me you can’t find the STL files for the Mercenaries. They are in the same section with the Nameless Thirteen. 13 cultists and 5 mercenaries.

As for the metal miniatures, John Popson at Effincool has graciously written an update for me as he is the man on the ground.

Update from John and Ed

First of all I want to say thank you all for being so understanding and patient with the lateness of different aspects of this project. I don’t want to spend the update giving excuses that you have already heard. A lot of this delay is primarily related to us moving our entire manufacturing operation to a new building that was not already completely set up to start manufacturing. We had to wait on electricians and various other contractors to get work done and it essentially meant that we could not do any production for 3 months.

I would like to take a minute to kinda talk you all through the process of what it takes to get your miniatures in your hands so that you can understand that failure at any of the stages can lead to more delay.

First we have to make 3-d prints of the pieces for a project. Those prints are fine sanded to remove any surface blemishes or support marks. Once this is done those pieces are molded using a low temperature vulcanizing rubber. This rubber is specially formulated to be as gentle as possible on the plastic part so as not to distort it in any way.

Next we use that mold to cast 6 good copies of each piece. Those casts are also gone over and sanded and cleaned to make them as defect free as possible.

Finally those parts are used to make a production mold that is used to cast the final pieces. After they are cast they go through a quality control step before they are packaged.

Now that I have outlined the process I can explain why there is still a delay on the metal.

Most of the Black Powder models were master molded and master cast well over a year ago, before Raymond planned on doing this Kickstarter. They were molded with a rubber that I purchase from a US source in Cleveland. When it came time to do the Cold Steel models, due to Covid, my rubber supplier was having a really hard time getting raw materials and since there is not a high demand for the low temperature rubber, he was not stocking any. I was forced to buy rubber from the company that I used to purchase from. The rubber from them is manufactured in Italy and comes over in large container ships. During the travel, the rubber becomes a bit comprimised. Long story short, the batch of rubber that I got from them was not in great shape but it was my only option to try to move forward.

We master molded and production molded all of the pieces and cast them. It was only in the Quality control of the product that we were picking up a fairly serious mold line, but it was only present on the newer masters, and not the ones for the black powder girls. So last week I decided that I would rather delay you all a bit longer than to send out a product that is far inferior to what our normal standards are. I spent last weekend re-printing all of those pieces and will be spending the rest of this week getting them molded up.

The good news is that if you have only ordered The Nameless 13 models of the Black Powder models, we have everything cast and packaged for those in metal and they will be being packaged up tomorrow and heading out the door with the rest of them to follow in the next couple weeks.

We are also in process on making the plastic injection molds, but the real limiting factor on those molds is that we are only capable of making 1 mold every 2.5 hours, so it is a very slow process.

That is all I have for now

Here are some pictures of your models as they are sitting in the packing area of the new shop!

The overdue but ever timely Christmas Miracle update.
over 2 years ago – Mon, Dec 20, 2021 at 09:41:43 PM

Hi Backers,

I apologize for not updating sooner, but lacking both news and product I really didn't know what to say. Now I have both. 

First STL's. They are uploaded and ready to be disbursed. You should have an email with the details by this evening. If you have any problems please contact us. One caveat, I am told that a couple of people requesting updates on the STL's hadn't actually pledged for them. So you might want to check your pledge again. 

Second metal miniatures. I believe they are almost all cast and should be going out before New Years.

Third Plastics. There were some problems obtaining some of the materials needed in casting but that's all taken care of now. They should ship in January. 

IF YOU NEED TO UPDATE YOUR SHIPPING ADDRESS PLEASE DO SO ASAP THROUGH YOUR BACKERKIT ACCOUNT. 

FInally, if you still haven't filled out your backerkit you may not get your reward until you do. We ship off of the information in backerkit and we send out emails on the STL's through Backerkit so if you haven't finished your survey you aren't on the lists. 

We are almost done, thank you for your patience. Have a Happy Holiday season and all the best for the coming year. 

Raymond

The yes, but what about second elephant head update.
over 2 years ago – Fri, Nov 12, 2021 at 11:15:59 PM

Hello Backers,

We are approaching the promised reward date and I know you are all anxious to get your stuff so here are the details.

STL's- They have all been pre-supported and we are preparing to upload them to DriveThruRPG.com. This may take a few days are even a couple of weeks as neither myself or Effincool has ever done something like this before, but STL's should be available within the next couple of weeks.  We will also be putting the individual files for sale on that site so if you didn't back the STL's now is your chance to pick up a few. 

Effincool is preceding with production of the physical rewards and metals are on track for December. Plastics may not get out the door until January. I apologize for this, there have been a number of reasons for that, a shop move, learning the new printer, a break down in the global supply chain, pandemic, etc. 

A few words about the future of Dark Maenad. I began this project as a labor of love and that has been my motivation all along. However, I find that for a variety of reasons I don't love it anymore like I used to.  I am still planning on opening a store front and producing the existing range for the foreseeable future, but I am not sure you will see additional releases from us going forward. 

On a more pleasant note Yannick has had time to produce the second elephant head and we have pictures of it in all of its multi tusked glory. 

All the best, Raymond

LISTEN UP- Pledge Manager closes tomorrow.
over 2 years ago – Fri, Oct 01, 2021 at 05:39:02 AM

Hi Backers,

The pledge manager closes tomorrow around 5pm USCT. If you haven't gotten your pledge finalized please do so now.  As I have said, I will continue to honor pledges as long as it is possible to do so, but you may not get your stuff in December if you don't get your order in now.  Also, I am not looking forward to the inevitable email next week from one of you about gosh golly I missed the pledge manager closing and why didn't you let us know. I will be polite, but only because you can't hear the lengthy explosion of explicatives that I fire off in your general direction before I respond. 

Further heads up. If you only pledged for STL's you still have to answer the pledge manager. So go do it. 

Finally, here are a couple of  renders of the Coven Shrine which is being prepared for casting even as we speak. 

All the best, 

Raymond

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