TCG Goddess : The Convergence

August / September update
about 1 month ago – Sun, Sep 08, 2024 at 05:06:27 PM

Hello everyone,

This little update is coming a little later than expected, but with good reason: after several months of hanging on by email and on the phone with customs, the printer and the sea freight company, we've finally received our cards! And the good news is that all the merchandise has arrived, and there's nothing left to wait for or claim from the various partners. Nothing is missing, lost or damaged... In short, we're finally going to be able to dispatch all your orders with peace of mind.

As we told you, one of the first things we did was to open a dozen of displays per era, at the beginning, middle and end of production (pallets): excellent news, we found only a single box out of 40 with the anomaly we feared (explained in the previous update). The same very rare card was found 7 times in the same display, and another very card 5 times. The 39 other displays opened showed no anomalies, with sometime doubles or triples in SRR, more rarely in x4, but
never more than that. Below, a photo of the 16 very rare cards (the last card of each booster pack) found in the display with the anomaly, followed by a few photos of the other tests carried out (too much tests, so we just put here the baddest test, witch are very still very good :)

As the box with the anomaly was at the very end of production, this confirmed our theory. The problem of repeating the last card occurred ONLY when the ultra-rare special cards (the last 6 ranks) were boostered, and not for the SSR, UR and URR.
So as not to distort the distribution and redistribute the special cards throughout the whole production run, we reshuffled all the boxes as planned (with the exception of a few boxes taken at random from the production run for those who had already expressed a desire to receive sealed boxes only).

Important last requests:
1) All address change requests have been processed. Once the shipping labels will be printed, within the next 48 hours, we will not be able to change any addresses. Please notify us of any changes as soon as possible. We will not be able to reship an order sent to the wrong address if the cause is an oversight on your part.
2) If you would like to receive sealed boxes (i.e not re-mixed) but have not yet done so, please let us know within the next 48 hours. As a reminder, if it's important for you to receive an error-free display, we recommend remixed displays (in which case you don't need to contact us).

We're now ready to send out your pledges. This week, we'll be preparing all the parcels and sending them out gradually, starting at the end of the week. For orders to be collected in Strasbourg (France), this week we'll be calling the Fungames store and the Camphrier bookshop to organize several days of on-site pick up. We'll let you know the dates as soon as possible, but they'll probably be several Saturdays this month and next month.

One last time, we'd like to thank you all for your trust and patience.
Thanks to you, Goddess: the Convergence is now a confirmed reality that will be in your hands in just a few days' time.
We leave you with a few photos of the arrival and processing of your cards and goodies, and will get back to you to confirm the end of shipments.

From the whole team, thank you.

Irønia
Team 4Play

Second July update : delivery update & card shuffling
3 months ago – Sat, Jul 27, 2024 at 02:17:06 PM

Hello everyone,

I hope you're all well and having a great summer. It's a big update this month, with several important elements, some good news and some not-so-good, but don't worry, everything's fine, the cards have arrived and they're beautiful. As you'll see below, the little glitches we discovered are now being fixed :) For now, here's all the information I have that I can share with you.

Update on delivery dates:

First of all, the best news: I just received confirmation yesterday morning that the goods have arrived in France! They will now be cleared through customs (2 to 5 days) and then picked up by a local carrier who will transport them to our offices (6 to 9 days).

I immediately got in touch with the appropriate departments and was able to speak to a person who had been keeping detailed track of the boat since its departure.I was very surprised to learn that the reason (or one of the reasons) for the delay in delivery was that the freighter carrying our goods, like several other boats, had been completely unloaded on the road. Over a hundred containers were sent back to the shippers as a result of the blockade, but fortunately this was not the case for our dear goddesses! We've had a lot of worries over the last 3 months, but things are finally settling down... There's one shadow on the horizon: our merchandise has apparently been separated into 2 boats for the rest of the transport to France. I called several people yesterday to find out if this was a mistake, but my discontent was not enough to get an answer, just a few apologies.

One of the boats currently arriving contains all the cards and goodies, except for the sleeves and storage boxes, which were apparently grouped together in another pallet and loaded onto a second boat. I've simply been assured that this second boat should be arriving in the next few days as well, within the same timeframe.

So much for deliveries and lead times. With this information, we can therefore expect to receive the items around August 10 and ship them around August 20-24. Why the two-week delay between receipt and dispatch? That brings us to the second part of this news item.

Anomaly in some boxes:

Don't let the title fool you, things aren't as bad as they seem, but I just wanted to be 100% transparent with you. As you already know, last week saw the Paris Japan Expo, the biggest Jap'culture event in France. To prepare for this event, and to ensure that our TCG is distributed throughout Europe, in the media and on the Internet, we asked our printer to send us a few boxes by airmail (120 boxes, i.e. around 1% of the total), so that we'd have them in advance and be ready for the event.

The first boxes were opened and discovered at Japan Expo. In some of them, a shuffling fault seems to have occurred on the last card of each booster, the rarest. The other 9 cards are perfectly mixed and show no anomalies. However, some people often discovered the same very rare card in 6, 8, 10 or even all the boosters in the same display. Other displays, on the other hand, had no such defect.

After investigation and tense discussion with our printer, they discovered that a blending defect had occurred in some portions of the prints that had not been inspected, but as this only concerns part of the production and the game remains without any aesthetic, graphic or printing defects, they refused to reprint the complete season with a better blend. They have assured us, however, that for the printing of the expansion (Demonia) and season 2 (2025), which have already been signed off, they will be adding 2 extra inspectors to each production line to guarantee optimum shuffle quality.

What's next? Our solutions:

We have no idea whether or not this mixing problem will recur on other displays in the main production, but now the cards are here. I don't want any of you to receive your display of 16 boosters and end up with the same rare card so many times, which is why, as soon as we receive the pallets, in about ten days' time, we'll carry out a random check and open between 20 and 50 boxes scattered at the beginning, middle and end of production, for each of the 4 eras.

If no problems are found, we'll send you your pledge immediately, with no further delay. If the same type of mixing defect is found on some boxes, even in small quantities, we won't take the risk of sending you a disappointing display.

So I've already put together a large, organized team to open all the displays if needed, and re-mix all the boosters ourselves, by hand, using a method and algorithm developed specifically to optimize re-shuffling, before sending them to you.

By opening scattered displays at the beginning, middle and end of production, taking a single booster from each display and then reassembling them in a new display, the risk of this kind of defect recurring will be close to zero.

The disadvantage of this method:

The displays will be unsealed. As we don't want to impose unsealed displays on you, we'll send sealed displays to anyone who expressly requests them (by e-mail, private message here on KS, via our website or on our discord. However, in this case, we can no longer guarantee you a flawless display, and you may find that the same very rare card is used over and over in the same display.

Professionals who have ordered Retailers packs for resale in stores will be contacted individually to find a satisfactory solution.

For this first season, we discovered the working methods of our printer and learned to communicate with him to be more demanding on quality controls (nearly non-existent in China) and production follow-up. Let's not forget that all the cards, from the simplest Common to the rarest Legendary, are finally machined to the highest quality, and all the cards are beautiful and flawless. What's more, the printer is not responsible for shipping delays, so it's a pity that this shuffling anomaly should tarnish the picture, and rather than insult our collaborators, we preferred to try to communicate and strengthen our ties with them to improve their processes for the next print runs.

It's not an easy adventure, and it's certainly not without its twists and turns, but at the end of the day, as long as you have the cards you've ordered and the level of quality you're entitled to expect, we'll have done our best to manage the unexpected and overcome any obstacles along the way.

We're entering the final stretch, and we'll be back with a last news just before delivery!

Thank you again for your support, your patience and your trust,

Irønia
Team 4Play

July update: Final stretch
3 months ago – Sun, Jul 07, 2024 at 11:04:26 AM

Hello everyone,

A quick update this month, as the latest dates have been confirmed: the cards (and the rest of the products) are finally arriving in France! They will arrive at the port of Le Havre during the week of July 15.

Then they'll have to be cleared through customs and picked up for transport to our office, before we can finally get them to you! Yes, we've finally reached the end!

I'll be posting more news later this month to keep you up to date with the arrival of the cards and their delivery.

Another point: I can share with you a few photos of a single carton I had specially shipped in by plane instead of boat to present the game at Japan Expo 2024 in Paris. There are around 30 displays (they ARE awsome!), aimed especially at journalists, youtubers and professional booths, so don't worry if you happen to spot a few cards on the Internet: no, we haven't sold your beloved cards to other people, they're just advertising boosters due to this major event in Paris!

Once again, thank you all for your patience and support,
See you soon for more,

Irønia
Team 4Play

May update
5 months ago – Wed, May 29, 2024 at 06:07:45 PM

Hello everyone,

For this update, the news from May are disappointing: maritime traffic problems are making the situation even more complicated than it was at the start of the year, as you can see from the image below :

Since January, the geopolitical conflicts surrounding the Red Sea (Suez Canal and Bab el-Mandeb) have been slowing down maritime traffic. In some cases, traffic is even at a standstill, as was our case for several weeks. We didn't expected thoses delays. Some boats are forced to cancel their transit or to turn back, but fortunately this is not our case.

If you do a simple Google search, you'll probably come to the same conclusion as we did: maritime blockages around the Red Sea persist and we're totally powerless in this situation, so the only thing we can do today is: wait.

Fortunately, our shipping company (Shining Ocean) gives us regular updates, and as it's one of the biggest company, it's a part of priority traffic. Our delivery date has been pushed back again, and is now scheduled for mid-July. If we can remain positive, we can be happy that the merchandise is not compromised, and that our beloved and beautiful cards will indeed be with us very soon. What a hellish journey!

As always, we thank you for your understanding and your confidence. To prove that the wait is well deserved, here are a few photos and videos of what await you.
PS: at our request, the videos were taken at different stages of production, before the rank was inlaid, before the varnish was applied, before the final packaging, etc...
Until the next (and hopefully last) update, I hope you'll enjoy it.

Irønia
Team 4Play

The Common cards:

Other cards:

The booster packs:

 The boxes:

The Starter Packs:

Delivery preparation:

Quick April update
6 months ago – Sat, Apr 20, 2024 at 06:09:22 AM

This is not the next news item, but a quick update after the April news.

I've just spoken to the manager in charge of transport, and he told me that the products are still being stored in their warehouses, as the departure by ship is finally scheduled for the end of next week.

With an expected journey time of around 1 month, this pushes back the planned delivery date to late May/early June.

For those of you unfamiliar with Kickstarter campaigns, this kind of delay of a few weeks is quite common in this type of project, so there's nothing abnormal and nothing to worry about :)

We promised we'd let you know the shipping date as soon as we had it, and now we have!
See you in May for the next news :)

Irønia
Team 4Play