Slave IV

From all the preorders at lower prices that they are going to cancel due to "not having enough stock".

Sounds about right. I ordered them about 4 months ago and have no idea what the status is.

I ordered the Angel Bird and CF. Those should be nice to help fill out the collection. But I have no idea when they are supposed to ship.

Or switch to ferry, get store credit and your same toys....

Hey, we're nerds talking about sci-fi toys and everything around the culture of collecting these things.

Yep! Nice way to paint a picture of some different scenarios. I keep saying it's no one's place to tell others "not to feed scalpers" or pay whatever amount because they can get a better deal here or there. Like I said in my post, either way it often takes time and effort to find those deals. The fact that these things sell at higher prices means there are people who find those prices worth it to them and we have no way of knowing what their situation is so have no place in judging them for spending their money how they chose. I just hope everyone who does end up buying these for their collections are able to enjoy them however they want to.

@lavinrac That is an awesome picture and Christmas for you! I had some Robo Strux too...loved all that stuff. Getting the Japanese Macross toys back then was basically one of the coolest things ever for a kid. I totally agree with the "worth" part and the explanation for it. I keep saying that we are lucky that it is even this easy for us to get Macross at all, let alone for the same price or less than people in Japan pay (since we don't have to pay their tax). That is the main thing that bugs me when I see mass amounts of complaints and why I sometimes chime in regarding some of them. That being said, if we have the opportunity, I will do what it takes to get my full value out of it. That includes the "fun" of preorder madness. I see it as the new "hunt" since shopping at stores is basically a novelty at this point. Because of this and the limited availability, some effort is involved so if you aren't in the trenches hitting F5 like a madman with all of us on preorder nights, I don't think you have much to say about missing out on the preorder discount and you should just be either focusing on keeping an eye out for openings or paying a markup graciously like @sqidd. Once you start going into the kind of effort it takes to get these things, you are damn right I care about getting my penny's (or hundreds of dollars) worth. I don't want to pay an extra $20 or more for shipping if I don't have to. When you buy as many Valks and other high end toys as I and many people here do, that adds up fast! 10 items paying an average of $20 more for shipping equals a whole extra Valk I can get and I buy a lot more than 10 items in a short period of time.

Haha yeah. I won’t pay markups for this stuff but just a few years ago, $100 for a single figure was a major decision and usually out of the question. Now, I buy $200-$400 figures regularly like they are candy. I buy $100 basic action figures at a blink of an eye like it’s nothing. Only thing I can say is I’m glad I make more money now and the figures have improved to a point where I feel they are worth it. I mean, all this stuff is still way overpriced imo but if a basic, low quality figure I can find at a department store costs $30 these days, I sure as hell would rather pay 2-3 times that to get an extremely high quality figure that has detail, articulation and quality feel that was unheard of ever before. At that point, paying $200-$300 for a big, high end, engineered, transforming Mecha seems like a no brainer.

Yep! We’re all waiting to give you money @ChaoticYeti! Hope you are doing well, safe, healthy and able to open up shop again. But you know me, I can keep waiting.

Haha, that’s what’s up!

Sweet! @Rogueload!

While we are on the wish list kick, I would like an adapter to use with the Arcadia launch arm diorama stand. Being able to attach clear Yeti arms to that will make the stand much more useful to me. Thank you!

Haha, all good! Only thing is I hope they really do give me some perks because of all this sometime. My 0D did ship a while ago without me asking anything so there is that...

Nice @Podtastic!

Thanks @vlenhoff!

Not sure about the shipping part but based on the way it is setup, that could be true. I've only got credit once for something that was not their fault over the several years I've used them so I'm not too worried about any of it. If I have to get credit for something again, I'm fine with it because it is pretty easy for me to use it on something worth more especially because I know it works for orders with multiple items. The main reason I use NY is because they usually have lower prices but that seems to be changing lately. Their preorder discounts for most items I'm interested are more inconsistent now and they often charge more than other shops recently. They are one of the only shops that offer ferry shipping which is still usually considerably less than options other shops offer so the overall price is still competitive. As for the other stuff, I've also had no trouble getting full refunds, cancellations and general support when needed but I rarely need to contact support with them or any other shop. These days, some items are buy wherever you can situations but I do also appreciate that NY seems to be the only shop to have improved their website so that it does not crash or have any wheel of death anymore. Some people noted that they also proactively sent out messages to get shipments moving recently. Those are all good steps that to me, are a sign of a shop that is trying to improve. Other shops that have been known in the past to be good have gone backwards on their website functionality and other than that, have stayed static in their overall CS so that shows me they are not as flexible and usually those are not great signs. Whatever the case, I'm glad there are options and I always say we are way better off now than we ever were before when it comes to getting Macross products.

Ah, I thought you meant in your previous post that you need to shave part of the clear shield, not the helmet. That’s a dealbreaker for me because I’m not shaving anything off the helmet. Looks awesome though.

I can’t say for sure at the moment but I’m fairly certain you can use the credit towards preorders. I do think the credit is a one time use so if the value of the credit is more than the item(s) you buy, you lose whatever extra it was over by. Edit, actually I’m definitely sure. I just checked a order that I partially paid using credit. The remaining balance was requested when the items were coming into stock and I just paid the rest then. I think I remember seeing something about even being able to use credit for previous preorders once they ask for payment but I can’t confirm that until next time I have credit and need to pay for something.

Yeah, either way if you are unhappy with the service or lack of service received, you should get your money back. If they won't do it, your credit card company will. Always use a credit card through Paypal to give yourself the most leverage when dealing with companies that don't specifically serve your market (or even when they do since it never hurts to protect yourself as much as possible).

I love this kind of thought and effort for us to get our fixes! I do see the address thing as a pretty big issue though. Anyone getting involved is going to deal with a lot of liability. And we all know how this crowd can get if anything hinders or even delays their Macross fix. Even though it sounds reasonable and simple, I have a feeling the shops won't easily agree to sending all these different orders to the same address and even if they do, there is another potential issue of liability on them and many points of failure arise from something like one digit of one order communicated incorrectly. If this issue goes on for years, I feel like at that point, the shops will figure something else out and it opens up a bigger opportunity for new shipping companies and services to arise. Not discouraging this idea at all though. Just want to make sure any effort is well thought out for the best chance of success. @vladykins Congrats on that purchase! I was eyeing some of those too but I didn't want to deal with the shipping issue at hand.

The first issue I see to overcome here is having a bunch of people shipping to the same address. Most shops have limits on how many you buy and if they see a whole bunch of orders from different accounts going to the same address, they might take that as someone trying to circumvent their system and start cancelling orders and accounts.

That's what I was mentioning with the print settings earlier. Thankfully, the image is very high resolution but it is not sized to just print straightforward at least on most people's printers. The first time I printed it, I resized it in photoshop and that's how I got the softer printout. Then I tried just setting the printer to reduce the print size by the amount needed and it came out much better that way. I've never printed anything directly from a phone before but if you can access print settings from the phone and reduce the size by a calculated percentage (or actual size), that's what you should do. If not, try seeing if you can adjust the print size directly on the printer.

@SUPERULTRAROBORIDER Cool pics! Yeah @Lolicon you asked more people to share their experiences and that's all that's happening. Anytime we discuss these shops, I definitely am not discounting anyone else's problems with any shop, I'm just sharing my experience. I have never had a problem with AE but I still use them as a last resort mainly because their prices are typically higher and they require up front payment for all orders instead of just TWE. Nice find! Yeah, I'm sure there are deals to be found if you know where to look and then keep looking at all the places. It's a long ordeal from Preorder day all the way to release time to be constantly searching all these avenues though. If I had to, I'd certainly do it to try to find a deal. The point is still that there are a lot of different people in the world with different income and spending ability levels so we can search for deals and never pay a markup but that's still not going to stop people who have the income and are willing to spend more to get what they want without the effort involved in Preorder madness or searching. All the Valks I see being sold at high prices even when lower priced ones are available out there is clear proof of this.

I’ve had items held over a year at AE on a couple occasions and when it came time to deliver, they still had my items and delivered them in excellent condition. That’s the best thing about AE to me is their indefinite Private Warehouse.

Thanks for finding it and the original source!