First things first. Where do you buy your stuff. Even st 50% off 6 Junkheaps (I hate you for having them) would cost me $54 + 13% tax) not $50. I need to start shopping where you do. About the $300 Giant price. Ignore it, we know nothign about price. But as I said in the thread you have people using the low Giant price and the high Herc price WITH shipping. Thats just dumb and makes for a very skewed arguement. The rest I agree. $50 is $50 and you can get a lot for $50.
Group-on codes he saved up. Ordered from HTS. Using 3 different orders to buy the limit of 2 each (which will probably be cancelled by HTS anyway). See what all the info can do to an argument?
I like Hercules. I love Giant. As for the price, seems it does add up close to $600 North American. Even if you shop Robot Kingdom, it'll most likely amount to $550-$600 with shipping (this is assuming the retailers don't increase the price any further on the last 4 bots; knowing BBTS/TFSource, they probably will). Leaving shipping out of the equation is disingenuous at best because importing any collector's items will cost extra. So.... unless folks have a hook-up somewhere in China (which most people here don't, by the way) or actually live in China or are participating in group-buys to limit import costs or something, claiming that Hercules won't cost upwards in the $550-$600 USD range with shipping seems misleading to me (and more than a bit of gloating; why not share your secret hook-ups, eh? XD). Enlighten us, por favor. =)
I haven't tuned into Herc news since everything was still in the prototyping stage, but reading how this is only 30cm, I'm very surprised its not bigger. $600 for a 12" figure doesn't justify the cost for me. I collect a lot of Soul of Chogokin, Brave Gokin and other super robot gokin figures that even have die-cast content to it and they are in the $230-350 range. Not that die-cast content is needed as it limits poseability, but I was more so hoping the height of this figure at $600 was going to be 15"-18" like people originally speculated.
Devy should be for kids, or anyone who wants him. although this isn't Devy. its a 3rd party set. and the flaws are only worsened by the price. of course theres going to be whatever people want for hercules to look like Devy but 600 for base parts is ridiculous.needing to modify a 600 piece is ridiculous. adding to it is a fringe desire in my mind. its just like they built it to be bulky and sturdy but whats the point if it has to be so valuable? I just think they went for a too kid friendly design were if it was always for us it should be a little more delicate and manageable like a model kit. or bionicle style light weight snap together. If i were these guys i would just hand over the molds when i don't wanna deal anymore. let the next guy do what they can aswell. who wouldnt wanna mass produce devestators anyways, jesus christ.
Good thing he isn't devy hey. I never associated him as such. He's not accurate to any version but I do like the non parts forming forearms. To me he may as well be a gobot or a roadbot. He's no transformer.
I love how people assume random things and perceive them as facts. Giant is not going to be 300 USD. Each pair costs around 10000-12000 yen last I checked. With the exchange rates as they are, and the fact that american retailers STILL have to import them, each pair is going to be marginaly less expensive than a hercules pair. I got Heavy Labour delivered from HK to Europe for 94-97 USD. Instead of blindly shopping from american retailers, one can save 5-9 USD off the price and around 10 USD shipping from one state to the other. That's around 60 USD and more saved from the total "600 USD" everybody has been quoting. Hercules appears to have Cybertron\GF -era engineering into his connector points, joints and overall appearance. I'm a tad angry at the fact that so far, two out of [just released] three figures had faults, but so far TFC has been correcting them. The fact that replacement parts are available this way [let's face it, once you buy one you will either sell him or buy the rest] whilst I had no replacement parts or even a refund for an original takara masterpiece item speaks for itself. Has hasbro given us a 5 or even 6 member gestalt since 2004? No. I understand the limitations with price points, size classes and all, and I don't expect them to come up with something like that. So I appreciate Hercules for what it is.
Talking about Bruticus\Superion or the legend sized ROTF Devastators? Both help make the point I'm trying.
I wasn't arguing, I like saving money just as much as the next guy. I was asking for the secrets. Which you shared one so thank you. -It is a $480 figure, the rest of the price is shipping costs. -3rd party products always cost more -Triple changing combining bots, those always cost more -He is the size of Primus and although Primus is no Unicron he is still a full sized Supreme Class Add to this that it is the First full out combiner we have seen in 25+ years and it is of Devastator and that will allow TFC to ask more for a figure. The price is a little high but then again not really, even compared to FP. Remember TFC released these so that RK is making a profit at $77.90 so they did their job. The $100 a figure happened for one simple reason BBTS.
So I guess size DOES matter I understand how this might bother some people, especially all the scale junkies, but as far as the fandom goes in my opinion, people have been wanting a Devastator with "deluxe" or "voyager" sized individual bots for a long time whether it be from Hasbro or whomever. That's what TFC has produced for us (somewhere between deluxe and voyager size anyway). The final height of the figure is secondary to me. Is it overpriced? Sure it is, but thats what things cost for non-massproduced toys. Someone has to make money off of it, right? They will sell out regardless and no one on the production side of things will say later that "we should have lowered the price". It is what it is, unfortunately.
You probably don't understand a lot about toy-making or who this piece is marketed to. I could argue all day about how cool the animated botcon stunticons are and why kids should have them. They are 5 figures and their market price is 300-450 USD at the moment. They are not for kids. They are not for everyone. I wouldn't want a third party devastator figure or kit with different plastic from what we have. The release we're getting right now has to connect 6 voyager sized figures that transform by themselves and retain enough articulation to move them around so it's playable. I'd hate to see him with balljointed shoulders, knees and so on. Masterpiece Starscream [green takara version] proved well enough that a SINGLE, non combining, just transforming figure can break easily enough with a sharper yet weaker plastic. Why would TFC give away the moulds? By your saying everybody should produce Devastators and they all would sell. Please input a little more thought into such generalizations.
Pretty much. I plan on getting both since I'm a combiner nut. They're distinct enough from each other to warrant having both. It just means that I need to allocate my hobby funds exclusively to this, which works pretty well seeing as how I only really collect Classics et al. I don't really plan on picking up the Prime figures, unless it's for kitbashing. I also passed on MP-10 and may be doing the same for MP-11. I think the money is better served on something unique anyway.
Let's figure out how much Hercules is really worth. First, you get six basically voyager sized figures. That's a value of 20*6 by Hasbro standards, which makes $120. Then you get a big figure out of the entire set the size of Primus and Unicron, who retailed for around $60. That takes our total to $180. Now let's factor in the 3rd party and limited run aspects of the situation. Without having solid numbers about TFC's operation, this would be hard to accurately guess. I'm going to estimate this adds $30 to the value of each figure as a voyager. 6*30=180. 180+180=360. Now let's factor in the middle man. Without accurate numbers I can only guess. I'm going to make a liberal estimate that it may cost $50 per figure, plus $5 per figure to ship it to the middle man. 360+30=390. Now the middle man needs his markup, otherwise he can't stay in business and he can't provide his services. This is a niche item, so the markup will be higher as the demand that exists will only taper off so much for the higher price. I'll assume a $20 markup. 390+120=510. Then there's shipping. Let's assume 10 per figure for that, bringing our total to $570. I think the $600 price tag is basically fair, once you factor in everything that makes it worth more and makes it cost more.
