As promised, we hold onto rewards for one year after the commencement of primary fulfillment. In order to keep the cost of that service low, we move stock from our partner warehouse in Los Angeles to long term storage in ZOE's Seattle warehouse.

I'm happy to share that the remaining Grandmaster stock is now in transit to Seattle!

Currently 189 people have either not completed surveys or failed to pay for their pledges. We would love to get those rewards into your hands. Here's how that process will work between now and November of this year.

We're also aware of at least one more order that was lost in transit, thanks to a message from a backer wondering where their package was. If you think your package was lost, please email [email protected] ASAP. We're nearing the end of the window where we can file insurance claims for lost or damaged packages, so it's much better to let us know now, rather than later.

We expect to resume fulfillment for lost/damaged/late packages in 1-2 weeks, once all stock has been received and inventoried at the ZOE warehouse.

In the meantime, please stay tuned for official announcements about two new deluxe book projects from Mercedes Lackey, as well as a special crowdfunding Q&A livestream with me, Misty, and BackerKit on March 27th. (Art is already coming in and it's GORGEOUS.)

Thanks,
Ben & the Fulfillment Team

Hi Everyone –

We've confirmed that Wave Three has completed shipping at the warehouse, as of December 24th. Here are the current stats:

IMPORTANT NOTE FOR INCOMPLETE SURVEYS: Our policy is to honor late surveys for one year after the commencement of primary fulfillment. After November of 2026 all remaining stock will be released and we will no longer warehouse unclaimed rewards. Late surveys may take additional time to fulfill, as we will be moving all remaining stock to long-term storage in ZOE's Seattle warehouse in-January.

Everything from Wave Three should either be in the mail or in your hands. If you are a domestic backer and you haven't received your package by January 5, please reach out to our support. If you are an international backer and you haven't received your package by January 30, please reach out to our support team. International backers, you should not owe any duties on arrival: we covered those costs. Also, international backers please note that tracking may indicate delivery twice: the first time from USPS to ePost Global and the second time to your door. If your tracking page shows delivery in the States, that means that the package has been transferred to the international carrier. Tracking often stalls during import and customs clearance as well.

In January our team will send replacement postcard prints and signed bookplates to those who requested them, and Loremaster patches to everyone who is missing one. No further action is needed on your part. We have closed those surveys so that the team can get started.

Meanwhile, we are ramping up development on Deluxe Arrows (and another secret deluxe project with one of Misty's publishers). Stay tuned for more information about those in the new year.

As a reminder, Ben is on leave in January. Corvyn will be taking care of customer support and Rennie will be managing fulfillment logistics.

A massive thank you to everyone who shared their feedback, photos, and stories about the Deluxe Grandmaster here and on the Discord. It's been immensely satisfying to see your reactions. As there has been some minor confusion about the art book, the bonus black-and-white pages in the middle of the book are printed on an alternative paper stock that we specially chose for suitability for coloring. It should take crayons and colored pencils beautifully. The color pages in Art of Grandmaster are printed in the highest-possible resolution on heavy art paper suitable for framing. All pages are perforated to make removal easy.

Hi everyone –

I'm very happy to share that we have pushed all BackerKit orders to Easyship and the warehouse is making excellent progress on getting them out the door. We've also resolved the block on packages outbound to the EU—all EU packages should arrive with duties prepaid, which will be reflected in the IOSS system and directly on the shipping label if your carrier argues otherwise.

We've also collected the data that we need to fulfill missing Loremaster patches and defective foil bookmarks. We estimate that the cost to ship these will be around $3000. While a couple of backers have offered to assist with those costs, we're hopeful that we can cover them ourselves.

Based on reports from several backers, it appears that automated email notifications with tracking information sometimes don't go out until after the package has arrived. If you need a tracking number, please email [email protected] (but please not all of you at once—every hour we spend on support emails is an hour we're not spending on fulfillment logistics.)

So far we've had 6 damaged package claims out of more than 3000 delivered books, which is an excellent ratio. If you're one of the few unlucky ones, please do email our support right away. We're pushing replacements to the warehouse this week as well.

PERSONAL LEAVE

Hi, this is Ben, project lead for Grandmaster. I'll be out of office for 3-4 weeks in January while recovering from a routine surgery. Corvyn will be monitoring support requests on Discord and at our support email. They'll be empowered to solve most issues, but complicated edge cases may need to await my return to work. If you think that you have a complicated case and that you might need my help, please write to support this week so that you're not delayed until February. I anticipate that all orders, including patches and replacements for defective prints, will be at the warehouse and out of my hands before Christmas.

Thanks!

Hi everyone –

Here are the latest numbers on shipping, as of Monday the 15th:

It's obviously taking the warehouse a lot longer to fulfill everything than we had hoped, but the numbers of mailed packages continue to go up every work day. Realistically, however, their pace means that not every package will arrive before Christmas. We've asked them for an update on a new estimated completion date for Wave Two and will share that information when we have it.

(The 11 copies of Grandmaster ordered in the ZOE/Valdemar Holiday Market will only ship after fulfillment of this campaign is complete. All of you are first in line.)

The manufacturer has offered a reprint of the defective foil prints. We have proceeded to order replacements. Unfortunately, they won't cover the cost of shipping the new prints, so we will have to cover that out of pocket.

If you want a replacement foil print, please complete the form at https://forms.gle/97QgAoAgeazDLqeP6. Be sure to use the email address associated with your BackerKit account so that we can find your shipping address and push the order through our system.

If you received a postcard print that didn't include blue foil, please complete the attached poll.

The warehouse counted 234 defective prints out of the 1500 remaining and has pulled them from the product, so no more prints without foil should be shipped.

Here's what the postcard should look like (left) versus what the defective ones looked like (right).

The manufacturer has acknowledged the problem and will work with us to make it right. Their solutions include:

We have ordered replacement Loremaster patches and those are in progress. Those will ship separately when they arrive.

We currently have 50 support tickets in progress, representing about 1% of orders. This is a fantastic, low number, but it's still a lot for one person to get through. Most are reports related to the blue foil issue and we're very thankful to everyone who wrote in!

But as always, if you need help with anything, the email address is [email protected]. If your package hasn't left the warehouse yet, you don't have to worry or write in at this time. Now that the warehouse team is back from the four-day weekend they're again hard at work on pushing packages out the door. We'll let you know when that process is complete!