Cue the Lost Ark theme...


Do you see what I see?

First, a quick note about Origins. We had been looking forward to seeing you there, but unfortunately we won't be there this year in a booth. Our brother Tim Peaslee will be running demos, so be sure to say hi to him when you're there. We can't do a proper booth this time around because we simply can't spare the labor right now.

Why can't we spare the labor?

Friday, June 7th, we received two 40ft containers full of Bones! For those of you keeping track at home, those containers were filled with over 470,000 models. We're still looking for the last container to be delivered next week, but we have enough to start shipping now.

What's next?

We've unloaded the containers (we have the bruises to prove it). We're getting those models organized into our system and firing up our fulfillment line this week.

We know we're behind our estimated ship date of March, so we've added a second shift for fulfillment so we can process the packages very nearly 'round the clock. We're doing everything we can to blast through these pledges so you can receive your Bones as quickly as we can manage it.

Thanks for your continued patience and support.

Time to update and try and answer the question: Where's my stuff?

First, our Canadian customers.

During the run of our Kickstarter campaign, we promised that we'd get you your stuff without you being nailed with a bunch of customs fees. To that end, we've had to apply for non-resident importer status to Canada. This way, we absorb the cost of the customs fees, and you get local delivery of your pledge packages. Unfortunately, we're caught in a bureaucratic morass of red tape. We were led to believe that we would be finished with this part of the process in December 2012, but we've been there for months now. Happily, we've received word from our customs broker that we're very close to having our application finalized, and as soon as we have the all clear, you'll start receiving your things. We're terribly sorry for the delay, but this was the only way to do it without saddling you with the import fees.

tl;dr: We're stuck in red tape, but the end is near, and we start duty-free shipments to Canada soon.

Now, everybody else.

You know we've been partnering with a company in China to manufacture your Bones figures. They sent us the first of several staggered shipments for fulfillment: five shipping containers with the Vampire boxed sets. We've received and processed those containers, even renting more storage space to hold it all. We also broke down a number of those vampire boxes to process add-ons that were included within the Vampire box. Then we started fulfillment, and we blasted through several thousand pledges much more quickly than we anticipated.

Now we're waiting on shipment two from China. These containers include many of the larger add-ons. We have documentation that we will receive them any day. As soon as we do, we'll continue fulfilling the orders that include the items that arrive in this wave of containers. We didn't expect to go so fast with the first wave, and China took longer to ship wave two than originally promised.

On the bright side, if past performance is any indication, there won't be a huge turnaround time between our receipt of the Bones and shipping them to you. Once we get to your order, our system will send you an email with tracking information for our US customers and a customs confirmation number for our international customers.

tl;dr: We've shipped all we can and are waiting for more stuff from China so we can send out the rest. We'll email when we fill your order.

There isn't anything we would rather be doing that sending you your stuff, and we will be resuming that process as soon as humanly possible.

We appreciate your continued patience and again thank you for your support.


Sincerely,
Ed Pugh
CEO, Reaper Miniatures

With Reaper Con only a week away, we just wanted to remind you of a few important things.

Tickets are no longer for sale on our website, but don't fret. You can still get tickets at the door for the same price: $10 for a one day pass, or $30 for a four day pass. If you buy the four day pass, you get the Reaper Con swag bag for free!

Parking is going to be a little tough this year, so we're encouraging everyone to park at the Hilton and use our shuttle service. If you insist upon parking at Reaper HQ, just be sure not to park in any unauthorized areas or you might get towed. And we don't want that to happen, do we?

We've got tons of guest sculptors and painters this year, namely:
Aaron Lovejoy
Alison Bailey
Anne Foerster
Bob Ridolfi
Bobby Jackson
Chris Lewis
Derek Schubert
Gene Van Horne
Jason Wiebe
Jennifer Haley
Jennifer Kaufman
Jessica Rich
John Bonnot
Julie Guthrie
Kevin Williams
Laszlo Jakusovszky
Martin Jones
Michael Genet
Michael Proctor
Nic Daniel
Pat Keith
Rhonda Bender
Sue Wachowski
Tim Collier
Tre Manor

And, special guests:
From Hasslefree Miniatures Kev and Sally White. Kev and Sally will be on hand to answer all your questions about sculpting, gaming, and spotted dick
From Monte Cook Games, Monte Cook. Monte will be running a special sneak preview of his new hit game Numenera!

Finally, don't forget to wear your costumes! The theme this year is Dark Carnival, but feel free to wear your Steampunk, Victorian, or Goth stuff as well!

See you in one week at Reaper Con!

Alyssa Faden over at Torn Armor RPG is running a Kickstarter campaign for a fantasy skirmish board game. Alyssa is a friend of ours. Her company employs some really talented people with excellent pedigrees for fantasy world-building. The artwork is solid, the models are cool, the price is affordable, and the gameplay looks pretty fun.

We liked Torn Worlds enough to throw in some Clockwork Dragons as a stretch goal. First 500 people at the $75 level for Torn Worlds gets one of our Clockwork Dragons thrown in with their pledge. If you missed Julie Guthrie's and Bob Ridolfi's dragon the first time, this could do the trick for you.

Even without the dragon, what it comes down to is that we love supporting these indie projects. The more diversity we have in our industry, the more our industry thrives! As they say, "All boats rise with the tide." So we backed their project.

If you have a minute or two, go and take a look at the Torn Armor Kickstarter. They're a good group of people with what looks like a fun game on their hands.

I'm really excited about this one. Some of you may have already seen her in our preview gallery, but for those who haven't here's our latest ReaperCon Sophie design:



She's been sculpted for us this year by the excellent Derek Schubert. Sophie will be availabe here at ReaperCon, in the swag bag you get for registering, and in our online store for the duration of the con. So, really, there's no good excuse to not get one for yourself.

Speaking of Sophie, here's Tim "Talin" Collier's rendition of her for this year:



She's going to be on your con t-shirt, if you pre-ordered one. Full color on black. It's pretty cool. And the only way to guarantee one in your size is to pre-register for the con.

Last thing: in order to get all the t-shirts printed in time, we're going to be shutting off pre-registration for ReaperCon a couple of weeks. So if you're on the fence about going or about not going and registering just to get your hands on the swag bag and t-shirt, you're running out of time. See you at ReaperCon in a few weeks!

In all the hustle and bustle of getting the ReaperCon Classes online last week, I completely forgot to post a batch of releases here on the front page! You'll find some great monsters in the Dark Heaven release, and some terrific character models in the Pathfinder. Check them out!

Dark Heaven Legends
03645: Kelpies (2) by Patrick Keith ($11.49) [+1]
03650: Fire Elemental (Medium) by Bob Ridolfi ($6.99) [+1]
03651: Storm Dragon Hatchling by Kevin Williams ($6.49) [+1]


Pathfinder
60146: Kassata Lewynn by Julie Guthrie ($5.99) [+1]
60148: Sandru Vhiski by Derek Schubert ($5.99) [+1]
60149: Winter Witch by Patrick Keith ($8.49) [+1]
60150: Kaer Maga Duskwarden by Bob Ridolfi ($6.29) [+1]


I also wanted to take a moment to remind everyone, that even though you guys totally decimated my class supply, we still have pre-registration tickets available for ReaperCon. Pre-registration is the only way to guarantee yourself a shirt in your size as well as one of our famous swag bags. And here's another poorly kept secret about the ReaperCon tickets: if you get one of the tickets, even if you have absolutely no intention of attending, we'll send you swag bag and t-shirt to you when the con is over. Unless you love the thrill of the hunt on eBay, there's no better way to lay your hands on the limited edition con stuff we're offering this year.

Last bit of business. We're having an unprecedented surge in internet orders. Seriously. We're buried. This is a good problem to have, but the gang down in the internet fulfilment station, who pride themselves on a 24-48 hour turnaround on orders, are beside themselves. It's taking us up to 7 days to get some orders turned around, emails answered, phone calls returned, that sort of thing. Please bear with us! We've got some new processes working and we're getting caught up as fast as we can.

Here you go: http://www.reapermini.com/ReaperCon#classes

Classes are online. Peruse them at your leisure. The mad rush for purchasing goes down at 11AM CST this Friday.

And as always, don't fret if the class you want sells out quickly (it will). We always reserve two tickets to sell at the door during the Con.