Ascended Kings Board Game & Graphic Novel

USA and Canada products have been shipped!
over 3 years ago – Wed, Sep 16, 2020 at 02:22:14 AM

Hello Ascendants!

I bring good news today! Quartermaster Logistics have announced today that the Ascended Kings products for US and CA backers have been shipped! You can find their announcement on Twitter by following this link:

https://twitter.com/QMLogistics/status/1305610184065249280

Thank you Ken Hawkins for posting the Twitter link in the comments.

Also, I have more detailed information regarding some questions in the comments from QML via email:

"Backers certainly should have received their tracking emails by now as I show that we wrapped up shipping Ascended King from QML today. If there is a wrong shipping address, we will need to have our CS team handle that reroute (if possible), or prepare for a return/replacement shipment to the backer at the appropriate address."

For all US and CA backers: please check your email associated with your Kickstarter account to verify that you have received your tracking email. If you live in the United States or Canada and you have not received a tracking email, please notify me directly using the direct message feature here on Kickstarter and I will work on resolving your issue. If you live outside the US or CA, please hang tight as we will be receiving more information about your shipment in the near future.

I was certainly excited to see this news today and I hope you are excited as well! I will keep you all posted as more information becomes available. Have a great week!

Best, 

Jason M. Allen

Spiritual Meddling? Fulfillment status update.
over 3 years ago – Wed, Aug 26, 2020 at 07:41:12 PM

Hello Ascendants!

This is just a quick update regarding the status of fulfillment. Quartermaster Logistics (QML) received the shipment of Ascended Kings products last week. Interestingly, it seems our endless stream of obstacles has continued to occur! I will not attribute this to bad luck, but it certainly is ironic that this project continues to face misfortunes, almost as if spiritual interventions are deliberately causing problems. I am only kidding, of course, but at a certain point you have to wonder given the allegorical nature of Ascended Kings content, could that be a possibility? Perhaps someday we will know...

Anyway, aside from what many might consider as superstitious theories, UPS Freight did quite a number on our shipment to QML. Here are some images of just how terrible our freight was handled! 

The damages reported on the Warehouse Receipt consisted of a total of 6 Ascended Kings games, 20 Sentinel boxes, and 1 Ascended Kings miniatures box. We are thankful that this was all that was damaged, it could have been a lot worse considering that it appears that UPS slammed the forklift forks right into the boxes more than once. I am especially grateful that no books were reported to be damaged, that would have made me more than upset. We have filed a claim with UPS. 

You can all be at ease, however, since we had sent more of each product than was required for the complete fulfillment, just for this exact reason. This means that QML has more than enough undamaged products remaining in order to do the fulfillment in its entirety. 

The pre-fulfillment invoice from QML to begin shipping all of your orders has been paid in full as of yesterday, meaning that at this point the preparation for your shipments should be in full swing. I will keep you all updated as news becomes available regarding your product shipments!

Thank you all again for your support! I will talk with you again soon.

Best, 

Jason M. Allen

QML Shipment has been sent!
over 3 years ago – Wed, Aug 12, 2020 at 05:16:17 AM

Hello Ascendants!

As promised, here are the photos of the Ascended Kings Kickstarter shipment being loaded onto the truck. The shipment is in transit and is scheduled to arrive at Quartermaster Logistics by Tuesday 08/18/2020. I will keep you posted when further updates become available. 

Best,

Jason M. Allen

Locking Orders with a Final 48 hour Notice
over 3 years ago – Wed, Aug 05, 2020 at 04:13:30 AM

Hello Ascendants!

Your orders have been set to automatically lock in the next 48 hours. I chose to do this as a courtesy rather than just locking them outright. For some reason, there are still 42 backers who have not completed their surveys, and while I have sent multiple reminders and stated that I would no longer be sending reminders, I went ahead and did a FINAL last reminder to the 42 who have yet to complete the survey. I anticipate that I will be working with these individuals on a one by one basis, which is less than ideal but we will make sure you are taken care of.

For those of you who have completed your surveys, this 48 hour period will give you enough time to make any last-minute changes to your orders. This includes a last chance to add any add-ons. After 48 hours, all orders will automatically be locked. You will still be able to update your shipping address, however, if you need to change the address you must do this no later than Thursday night (August 6, 2020). 

IMPORTANT INFORMATION FROM QML:

-We cannot ship to PO Boxes in CA - please provide the alternate address for any backers in CA that provided a PO box.

-We will need phone numbers for all international orders to ship. This is not a necessity for the US domestic backers, though we encourage this during the COVID 19 situation.

-All backers will need a valid email address on the backer data

PLEASE BE SURE THE ABOVE CRITERIA ARE MET FOR YOUR ORDER.

All of the products have been thoroughly checked and rechecked for quality assurance by me, by hand. If there was any sign of damage to any product, these were set aside and not included for palletization to be shipped to QML. I did this to ensure to the best of my ability that no one receives a broken box or any other problems with their order, so when you receive your product you can know that it was personally handled by me. Every box. Every poster. Every book. If for some reason your product is damaged when you receive it, please let me know directly; then after I take a deep breath and count to 10 (just kidding), I will make sure you get a replacement.

To reiterate, the reason you must be sure to make any final changes to your addresses no later than Thursday night (August 6, 2020) is because all of the products are finalized and palletized specifically for the entirety of the Kickstarter lot order and these pallets are being scheduled for freight pickup on August 10, 2020, leaving the warehouse here in Colorado, being shipped to Quartermaster Logistics in Orlando, Florida.

For those of you who may need to know when you would be personally receiving your package in case it may fall within a window of time wherein you are moving to a new location, we can do a bit of estimating here. According to QML, the turn around time from when they receive a shipment until they send your individual packages out is about a week or two for a campaign of our size. We can safely assume they will have the freight by August 14 and begin processing on August 17.  Then, assuming we overestimate that they will take 2 weeks to send your package out, they will be sending it to you on August 31. Finally, if we overestimate again and assume the package will take a week to get to you, you should have it on September 7th. If you know that you will no longer be residing at your submitted address on or before September 7th, please let me know by messaging me directly.

With all that said, yes, I still plan on taking the picture of the pallets getting on the truck, but in the meantime here is an image of 1 of the pallets of Ascended Kings games ready for freight pickup (this was before the packing slips are placed on it). I made sure each carton was filled only with games in pristine condition (there were a lot of damaged games, unfortunately, which is why I mention it.) Rest assured, the cartons we are shipping to you have no damaged games in them as of right now. I can't speak to how they will be handled in transit, but I certainly hope everything will go smoothly.

As a final note, I just wanted to say briefly that, yes, there were more delays that I didn't relate to you all in updates over the past couple of months. The reason for this is that they weren't necessarily business-related delays and I simply did not feel the need to burden you all with these things by broadcasting those problems. Contrariwise, were I to tell you that "nothing has changed" or some other generic update like that, I personally feel that would be disingenuous and open to misinterpretation. I always remember this old Chinese man telling me years ago: "No excuses... Only solution." 

Best, 

Jason M. Allen

Final Reminder and Message from QML
about 4 years ago – Tue, Mar 31, 2020 at 10:43:45 AM

Hello Ascendants!

This will be a shorter update than usual, but I hope that you all are remaining safe and healthy during this difficult and unprecedented time.

We are sending the final reminder for surveys through BackerKit today. If you have not done so already, please complete the survey from BackerKit as soon as possible. Those who do not complete the survey from this point forward I will have to reach out to directly on a case by case basis.

Finally, I would like to share a message from Quartermaster Logistics so that everyone can be informed and prepared for the possibility of further delays:

From the Program Manager at Quartermaster Logistics - "At the moment, we are able to continue fulfillment as our warehouse is still operational, as are postal, courier, and freight providers. We plan to continue operations as long as it is safely possible to do so.  COVID-19 is a global concern and our partners or we may need to take necessary steps to keep our teams and families safe. Please understand that this could cause potential delays, but also that we will communicate with you promptly should the situation arise."

With that said, we continue to move forward with current fulfillment while staying in compliance with all federal, state, and local laws. We are also taking extra precautions while preparing the freight to be shipped from our warehouse. This may slow down the delivery time slightly, but the phrase, “better safe than sorry” is more applicable now than ever. Please stay safe and I will update you again soon.

Thank you all for your patience and understanding. We really are all in this together!

Best,

Jason M. Allen