Quote Originally Posted by Ancalagon View Post
There is nothing wrong with pre-orders and I fear the "lesson learned" is the wrong one.

The problem here are not the issues with the products that got delayed but with the communication about that problem. We all understand we are dealing with small companies here and that issues can happen. What cannot happen is there's no openness about it because we are dealing with small companies that do not have a wide, wide circle of customers but customers who are tied to two websites (the shop and this one).

The lessons learned should be a) do not promise optimistic dates and b) communicate early if there is stuff instead of waiting week after week. That works if everything works out but it bites your behind if some other delay happens.

That said: I'd preorder again. Simply because I do know we are dealing with a small business which gets helped by the money to get the stuff going that I like.
Preorders are probably the thing to get War and XPs back in print. If I had not already in my shelf, I'd preorder it (and pay for it) should that become an option.

Why would I preorder again? Because I already bought six books from Rich Burlew and he never ran away with my money without giving me what I paid for. That's what "past experience" is doing in my head and therefore it is as important as it is - and it is why I do not get how all this "let's not tell people anything" here went how it went.

Now that we got the update this thread here is probably somewhat pointless.
This is a quote from the "SS&DT update?" thread on the Order of the Stick Comic sub-forum which is in response to the previous post. I obviously can't speak for others, but this adequately describes what I think. Despite the delays and setbacks I would also absolutely pre-order one of Rich's books again. I love this series as do a lot of people and we want to support Rich. If pre-ordering helps alleviate some of the weight of whatever up-front cost there is to print a book then I'm all the more for it.