I guess I'm more concerned with being able to get the order and actually guaranteed the product. My local area kinda sucks at stocking transformers, but with tfsource I'll pass a figure up 2 or 3 times before they deliver.

With bbts I usually get my stuff the same time or earlier than they hit the shelves. That could just be because of my location though. With Pulse I can't get jack. Everything is sold out immediately and by the time it's back in stock I've usually gotten it somewhere else.

 

Transformers is a fascinating franchise, where its collectors are concerned; such wide-ranging preferences! I'm one of those weirdos who'd be perfectly content if all the toys were just robots with no alt-modes or transformations, for example (whereas others dismiss even the most astonishingly engineered, beautifully painted, and highly articulated figures with no alt-modes as "not Transformers"), and while a lot of people in this thread are scorning The Ark's robot mode, that's the only reason I'm here; Omega-as-the-Ark transforming into robot mode in Animated remains one of my all-time favorite mark-out moments in all my decades of Transformers fandom.

 

Has anyone tried to remove the weathering effect on the shoulders?

Update: I was planning to weather him anyway, so I just opted to incorporate/obscure the fun but somewhat cartoony factory weathering with my own admittedly heavy-handed version. I've attached a hasty portrait set against the decidedly uninspired backdrop of my kitchen counter.

Hopefully I'll capture a proper portrait soon.