Joker and the Thief Original 3 decks reprints

[Joker and the Thief]

So, there's some actions from the creator after they finally realized that they cannot let if pass silently




We are unable to issue refunds to backers of this project due to all funds going directly into production and fulfilment of this project.

To me, better than nothing, but that doesn't save their reputation

All the money was spent on production and fulfillment my ass! More like James already booked his trip to Bali...What a bunch of assholes!

Hey Shermjack. Smartass. This is where someone would tell you to mind your own damn business.

To everyone else, thank you for expressing your concerns. They are certainly understood and have been taken onboard. We also apologise for our communication error. We are offering a fix to those who want it. Thank you for your cooperation.

[JuFiN]

So, there's some actions from the creator after they finally realized that they cannot let if pass silently




We are unable to issue refunds to backers of this project due to all funds going directly into production and fulfilment of this project.

To me, better than nothing, but that doesn't save their reputation

All the money was spent on production and fulfillment my ass! More like James already booked his trip to Bali...What a bunch of assholes!

Yea god forbid a hardworking individual working in a space I love (card creation) is able to afford a vacation! In fact if he isn't homeless under a bridge I want him tarred and feathered! How dare he steal his backers money to pay rent! /s [MURRAY]

But in all seriousness keep the business and the individual separate dude, I am happy that card creators are able to afford vacations from time to time, it's a good sign for the industry which is a good sign for my hobby. If you don't want to support the business due to it delivering an inferior product to what was expected, great we are on the same page. If you wanna attack the individual for going on vacation, I for one take issue with that.

[PipChick]

Hey Shermjack. Smartass. This is where someone would tell you to mind your own damn business.

To everyone else, thank you for expressing your concerns. They are certainly understood and have been taken onboard. We also apologise for our communication error. We are offering a fix to those who want it. Thank you for your cooperation.

ummmm, Sherman's one of YOUR backers - he supported YOUR project to help meet funding to even make it a reality - and so his very legitimate concerns, just like everyone else's, should be of your highest priority considering the support of backers is the foundation of your entire damn business and you probably should be keeping that in mind.

jeeze, you really are a piece of work and your arrogance is baffling considering that you created this mess and have certainly earned whatever mudslinging name thrown at you and your company for your incredibly poor judgement call in rippin' off backers. Bravo - you've managed to live up to your name - a Joker & a Thief.

But to be fair, considering how cowardly you were in ignoring backers comments when this obvious bait and switch scam first came to light rather than just addressing concerns and taking honest accountability, I'm surprised to see you even address it at all... even if only away from the public exposure of your campaign page to resort to name-calling like a petulant child here at UC in an attempt to evade further deterioration of whatever reputation you seem to think you still have worth preserving among the community. pathetic.

[PipChick]

Yea god forbid a hardworking individual working in a space I love (card creation) is able to afford a vacation! In fact if he isn't homeless under a bridge I want him tarred and feathered! How dare he steal his backers money to pay rent! /s [MURRAY]

But in all seriousness keep the business and the individual separate dude, I am happy that card creators are able to afford vacations from time to time, it's a good sign for the industry which is a good sign for my hobby. If you don't want to support the business due to it delivering an inferior product to what was expected, great we are on the same page. If you wanna attack the individual for going on vacation, I for one take issue with that.

I think you're mistakenly conflating the two issues - no one is upset to see a creator take a vacation; in fact, I love to see creators reward their hard work and efforts by taking some much earned time off to relax and enjoy themselves; but what burns people is realizing that the money they faithfully gave in backing the campaign did not go towards what was advertised and expected - nor was it ever communicated that such drastic changes would be made at any point - which naturally leaves people to wonder & rightfully question where the additional funds then go instead???

You're right that it's unfair to assume the creator pocketed it to use for his own needs - whatever they may be - but there still isn't a clear answer to what the additional funds for those "gorgeous letterpress collectors box with foil accents" went towards instead, other than the DIY in-house production of cotton screen-printed drawstring bags, and why backers weren't informed prior to receiving rewards.

[Bradius]

I am generally supportive of creators and forgiving of missed deadlines. I also liked this series, except the street edition. Anyway, I am baffled that the creators didn't realize that backers of the limited box tier would have had a slight (much more than slight) issue with what happened.

You pull a stunt like that, then expect to be flamed here. It is just going to happen. I hope you go to exceptional efforts to win back that group's trust. It is possible, but it takes a lot of effort. If you don't make that kind of effort, just understand there are going to be a number of folks here that got burned that will remember being burned in their opinion and will state that when new projects start up. Just remember, these folks were your biggest backers on Kickstarter.

[PipChick]

I am generally supportive of creators and forgiving of missed deadlines. I also liked this series, except the street edition. Anyway, I am baffled that the creators didn't realize that backers of the limited box tier would have had a slight (much more than slight) issue with what happened.

You pull a stunt like that, then expect to be flamed here. It is just going to happen. I hope you go to exceptional efforts to win back that group's trust. It is possible, but it takes a lot of effort. If you don't make that kind of effort, just understand there are going to be a number of folks here that got burned that will remember being burned in their opinion and will state that when new projects start up. Just remember, these folks were your biggest backers on Kickstarter.

I refuse to believe that they honestly thought backers would be cool with this sorta change - like c'mon; how gullible do they think we are to even try and claim such! It definitely was a stunt and they knew what they were doing in deliberately remaining silent and sending out rewards knowing that it wasn't nearly up to scratch to what was initially advertised; this wasn't just a common case of product misrepresentation - this was a textbook example of bait & switch fraud in which the product wasn't at all what backers had initially pledged for and they were calculating in how they decided to try to pull this stunt over on backers.

It really speaks volumes to how they conduct their business and treat supporters - sure, with time and their genuine efforts to try to make things right to regain community trust, I might consider forgiveness for this offence (never say never, right?) but I most certainly won't forget and I don't think many others will either. This is tarnish on their otherwise respectable reputation that I don't believe will polish away so easily, if at all.

[Joker and the Thief]

Hey PipChick,

Shall we remind you that there’s some petulant, childish name calling coming from you also. Particular calling us “Assholes”.

Some may have missed it, but we, the creators, have made a mistake, have openly admitted it, and are inviting unsatisfied backers to message us so that we can offer them the best solution possible.

We have some fantastic projects in the works that we’re sure you’ll be fans of.
Slander for the sake of slander is not going to rectify anything.

Our personal life is completely off the table by the way. That is why shermjack was labelled a smart ass. Regardless of whether he is a backer or not - stalking personal instagrams and complaining about someone’s personal life is completely out of line.

Thanks to those who have messaged us already. We apologise for the inconvenience caused by our decisions.

[shermjack]

Hey J&T,

The way you acted throughout this whole incident was with nothing but arrogance. Starting with not communicating with your backers and working with them to come up with a solution together, but instead assuming a cheap cotton bag would be a substitute for a limited letterpressed box and then assuming that writing a quick update about after backers started complaining was all right.

Need I remind you that you, in your comments and update, used some defamatory words about China and products made in China ‘cheap materials made with cheap labor’, so you really don’t have a right to be all high and mighty.

In regards to making it up to your backers, you only are doing so after a week of complaints from infuriated backers and to be honest, three decks that you have plenty of extras of doesn’t make up for the limited letterpress box set that was originally promised. In my eyes, the only real solution is to send the limited letterpressed box or refund backers their money, even if it comes out of your pockets. Been and a tand behind your words and commitments.

Finally, James, if you don’t want people to tie your work with your personal life, then don’t tie your instagram account with your business. You have no problem promoting yourself as the person who runs J&T and promoting your cards and projects, then you shouldn’t have problems people commenting on what you do in your personal life. It’s not like I was stalking you (get over yourself), it’s just that you open yourself up when you post things on your account.

In the end, regardless of what great things you have coming up, you have lost a backer who has spent hundreds of dollars on your past campaigns.

[Joker and the Thief]

There’s just no pleasing some people, yet we are trying our best despite the circumstances we are responsible for.

Sorry you feel the way you do Shermjack. Good luck to you. Feel free to unfollow my personal account if it causes you so much bother and cause for complaint. Cheers

[Bradius]

I am glad you are taking accountability and responsibility of this situation. You should. Those limited tier backers deserve what their quoted rewards were.

Heck, look at VXD. In their first campaign they couldn’t fulfill a number of pledges. They issued a FULL refund to the impacted backers and still had a lot of fence mending. This time they have huge financial, logistics, and delivery delay issues when a subcontractor took tens of thousands of dollars and left them hanging. They found a new subcontractor and are having to fund that out of their pocket. They have to tell backers bad news and take accountability because they hired the subcontractor. They are accountable to their backers.

If you want Kickstarter backers to fund rewards in advance, you have to deliver what you promise.

[sinjin7]

Hey Shermjack. Smartass. This is where someone would tell you to mind your own damn business.

To everyone else, thank you for expressing your concerns. They are certainly understood and have been taken onboard. We also apologise for our communication error. We are offering a fix to those who want it. Thank you for your cooperation.

If you guys had some moral high ground to stand upon, I might give you a pass for this comment. . .but you don't.

Hey J&T. Smartass. This is where someone would tell you that Shermjack is entitled to his own opinion and free to express it on a public forum.

This is where someone would tell you if you don't want people commenting on your personal lives, don't post personal stuff on social media.

This is where someone would tell you that your self-inflicted reputation immolation is not helped by comments like those above.

Be very careful about your next move, your viability as custom playing card producers hangs on the brink. You keep referring to your substitution of limited edition boxes with cotton bags as a "communication error". It's a straight up shady bait and switch. It's theft. I'll give you credit for at least coming on to UC to defend yourselves (albeit rather poorly and only after a long period of silence), and a flimsy attempt at "fix" is better than no attempt at all. Look, people screw up - it happens. But I always view people's attempt to make things right commensurate to how much they value their reputation. To offer common, excess stock to make up for an expensive limited item seems inadequate. But I guess that is commensurate with your reputation right now. You keep referring to future projects, I am going to be very curious to see how they go (or don't go) after this latest debacle from you guys.

[Joker and the Thief]

Sinjin, if you expect us to take your comments to heart. We’re not. You’ve been very public in your opposition to all of our work from day one.

This is also being blown up way beyond what it is, particularly by comments like this.

Look, it comes down like this. We made a genuine mistake trying to deliver a product on time. We have admitted this. And we are taking action on it. At this point, it’s better than nothing. We are handling this issue in the best way possible and took our time to consider our options. Any reasonable person will see this and take it us up on our offer.

Our reputation is fine outside of the little world of this forum. We are working on much bigger and greater things. For you, time will reveal.

Before we say peace out UC, we’d like to at least say thank you to the genuine supporters of our brand that have come from this forum. You have been amazing and we apologise if our decisions have rubbed you the wrong way. We mean to do right by it, and are doing so.

To remind you all. We have delivered on every campaign we have attempted. That’s 6 projects. And have amazing feedback on the way the product is received and it’s actual quality. Our best wishes to you all. And thank you.

[Decknowledgy]

Sinjin, if you expect us to take your comments to heart. We’re not. You’ve been a very public in your opposition to all of our work from day one.

This is also being blown up way beyond what it is, particularly by comments like this.

Look it comes down like this. We made a mistake. We have admitted this. And we are taking action on it. At this point, it’s better than nothing. We are handling this issue in the best way possible. Any reasonable person will see this and take it us up on our offer.

Our reputation is fine outside of the little world of this forum. We are bigger and greater things. For you, time will reveal.

Before we say peace out UC, we’d like to say thank you to the genuine supporters of our brand that have come from this forum. You have been amazing and we apologise if our decisions have rubbed you the wrong way. We mean to do right by it, and are doing so.

We have delivered on every campaign we have attempted. With amazing feedback. Our best wishes to you all. And thank you.

I'm not a backer, but I am a fan of your artwork, but J&T, sorry, as a spectator overlooking this mess I can only help you mark your arrogance out of your own words

Yes, you've apologized and you've corrected your errs, but in what condition? Have you handled this issue in priority? Or have you waited for the whole thing to blow up? It's the latter. Yes, doing something is better than nothing, but that is not for you to say at this point, not even mentioning you've come here to argue and attack folks. Look, having a vacation is fine, but the real issue is not whether you've taken the $$ for the vacation, but rather it shows a sign of ignorance against the issue and controversy going on. To all the folks here, the issue is NOT conspiracy-thinkingly considering J&T stole the money for their trip, but their lack of engagement to their backers and supporters in a TIMELY MANNER.

I don't mean feud, but going to war with the UC community and good luck getting any further support and feedback from the best people in the business, regardless of designers or collectors. Not to mention a lot of us WERE (past tense) your supporters. Well, you've shown your unwillingness to engage with this community and blatantly wage war on this forum. I guess next time you're creating something, it's going to be super hard for you to gain support from all the big names here.

Let's see how you're going to win back support.
Oh, I forgot, you probably don't care

[Jocu]

Sinjin, if you expect us to take your comments to heart. We’re not. You’ve been very public in your opposition to all of our work from day one.

This is also being blown up way beyond what it is, particularly by comments like this.

Look, it comes down like this. We made a genuine mistake trying to deliver a product on time. We have admitted this. And we are taking action on it. At this point, it’s better than nothing. We are handling this issue in the best way possible and took our time to consider our options. Any reasonable person will see this and take it us up on our offer.

Our reputation is fine outside of the little world of this forum. We are working on much bigger and greater things. For you, time will reveal.

Before we say peace out UC, we’d like to at least say thank you to the genuine supporters of our brand that have come from this forum. You have been amazing and we apologise if our decisions have rubbed you the wrong way. We mean to do right by it, and are doing so.

To remind you all. We have delivered on every campaign we have attempted. That’s 6 projects. And have amazing feedback on the way the product is received and it’s actual quality. Our best wishes to you all. And thank you.

I’m coming late to this party and trying to understand what’s happened. I’m no backer or follower of J and T. However the idea that your reputation is fine ‘outside this little forum’ is wrong for one reason.

I posted on reddit the other day about dos and don’t of a kickstarter campaign for own project. The first poster replied ‘just don’t stick decks in a cheap cotton bag and call it a limited edition’. I thought it was just a joke but now I get it - he was talking about you guys.

Everyone’s talking about it. And if your conversations with the community are anything like those from this thread I assume the hole you’re digging is far deeper than you expect.

I’m curious about the situation as a collector and a Kickstarter campaigner myself. But from what I’ve read so far there has been no acceptable resolution to the situation.

Transparency and humility is needed now.

I hope this all gets fixed for everyone affected.

[shermjack]

There’s just no pleasing some people, yet we are trying our best despite the circumstances we are responsible for.

Sorry you feel the way you do Shermjack. Good luck to you. Feel free to unfollow my personal account if it causes you so much bother and cause for complaint. Cheers

Your response just continues shows your ignorance and lack of character. Yes, you admitted you made a mistake, but only after a week of harsh remarks and countless feedback from your backers. Only then did you decide to offer three extra decks to those that back the limited letterpressed box, which again, if that's your best effort, is a JOKE. There is an easy way to please people, either return their money or deliver what you promised.

As for me, you still haven't addressed the fact that you used defamatory words in a generalization towards China and products made there. If you are man enough to apologize for those comments as well as stick behind your promises to deliver a letterpressed box or refund the money that you took from your backers, then I would be happy, but I doubt you care what I think as you have completely ignored my comments and are just sorry I feel the way I do.

As for delivering on every campaign, I guess you can say that you did that for 5 of your 6 projects as this last one has been a debacle or did I mistake the comments in your last project about the poor quality of your wonderful cotton bag or the lack of delivery of a limited letterpressed box? As for the quality of the decks that you delivered, I would credit the manufacturers for the quality of the cards and not you, as you just provided a design to be printed and then delivered them, something tons of other creators have done successfully as well.

In the end, I really don't care what you think of me or the UC community, but I do hope that one day you will really grow up and be a man who sticks behind his words and not a child that just lashes out when confronted with the hard truth.

[Jocu]

I think this all just came down to poor planning for the limited edition and made worse by the terrible response to it. What I find most baffling is that the limited edition set is limited to 72 backers yet he’s saying they couldn’t find manufacturers to do such a small minimum order. They didn’t find this out before limiting the reward?

Such a shame. I hope they do the right thing for the integrity of the KS card community more than anything.

[PipChick]

I seriously hope and implore all those backers that were affected by this bait & switch scam take it up with their credit card companies - explain the situation that you were charged for a product you did not receive and report it as fraud for a refund - offering additional decks from leftover stock just isn't enough and it's clear that J&T doesn't care about you anyways and is only even offering this "resolution" in a half-assed attempt to save face only after rewards were sent out and ignoring backer complaints of them for a week. Not to mention your complete avoidance in even addressing your ignorantly bigoted and uncalled for insults made against China's ability to produce quality products in the pathetic self-serving attempt to overstate the poor quality of your own - as if backers wouldn't see right through that shockingly shameful & reprehensible marketing spin made at the expense of an entire country and its people.

UC may be a small community but guess what? The whole playing card community itself is small and we here have some of the most passionate members, all connected and spanning across multiple platforms and are very in touch with one another regardless of whether or not they are part of the UC fam. As Jocu pointed out, this is not just an issue noticed and raised only here but elsewhere as well and it's drawing a lot of attention within the community as a whole - many more than just the 72 affected - because a slight against backers is perceived as a slight that can be made against any one of us who decide to potentially back/support whatever future projects you're involved with going forward. We also have many amazing designers & producers that stand in support and are great allies to the community and I think your arrogance & exaggerated sense of self-importance in this industry has you mistaken to think that the offenses you've made against not only your strongest supports, the backers, and the UC community will be so easily forgotten when your next campaign comes around. Not that you obviously care what I or anyone else here thinks, but you've essentially burned your reputation and lost any and all respect & integrity you and J&T may have ever earned with your past projects among the playing card community as you've now shown your true colors as a producer.

Good luck in whatever future projects you hope to achieve - you'll need it.

[CupcakeBaron]

Gosh... What a bunch of jerks. I'm throwing J&T in the trash with Natalia Silva.

[Gallagher]

As someone who's newly into this hobby, stuff like this is so disheartening. It sucks. As to what PipChick is suggesting, banks will totally do this for you if your case is strong and in this case, I think it is. You can get your money back.

[Bradius]

I'm throwing J&T in the trash with Natalia Silva.

Hey, there is no need for name calling here. At least they delivered something other than rare (very rare) promises. Not even close to her league.

[CupcakeBaron]

I'm throwing J&T in the trash with Natalia Silva.

Hey, there is no need for name calling here. At least they delivered something other than rare (very rare) promises. Not even close to her league.

They may have delivered but the unapologetic response to criticism has put them on par with her in my mind. Besides I didn't call them trash, I just said that I am placing them in the figurative trash.

[theCapraAegagrus]

LMK if you guys want me to jump in here.

Joker and the Thief - Please see my avatar.

[Smocito]

TwoPiece wrote:

LMK if you guys want me to jump in here.

[theCapraAegagrus]

Hulk smash...

So, Joker and the Thief, have you ever worked in customer service? Did you find that alienating your customers and potential customers, by insulting them and their opinions, an effective marketing strategy? For a group with alleged upcoming works, I'm finding it difficult to believe that you have any f^&*ing idea what you're even doing here, and abroad.

Give me a minute to find my sealed decks of your cards, light them on fire, and toss the ashes in the dumpster behind my building. I'll take a short video, voice-over with an explanation of how you went full-retard here, and post it all over social media for anyone and everyone to view and share.

If you had an ounce of intelligence and integrity, you could search through how many hundreds of threads that are here, with creators involved, to see exactly what does and does not work with our communities. Let me make it easy for you:

At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.

I suggest you f^&* off, reflect on the idiocy that you've forced the readers of this thread to suffer through, and reconsider your outlook and actions regarding this campaign and how poorly you've treated supporters past, present, and (not anymore, probably) potentially future.

[PipChick]

Gosh... What a bunch of jerks. I'm throwing J&T in the trash with Natalia Silva.

I'd say their actions are what had oh so (dis)gracefully threw themselves into the dumpster... like the trash they've proven to obviously be...

ezgif.com-gif-maker.gif (2.4 MiB) Viewed 2686 times

good riddance

[vasta41]

At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.

[theCapraAegagrus]

At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.

That was pretty much the entire tone of my post. I was so dumbfounded by reading their responses.

[Bradius]

The flames of Hades are high here. Let’s see how this closes out. Hopefully the creators can mend fences with their limited tier backers and move forward. We aren’t perfect and hopefully this was a learning experience for them. Let’s move on and see what comes in the future.

[theCapraAegagrus]

(1) ...Let’s see how this closes out. Hopefully the creators can mend fences with their limited tier backers and move forward...

(2) ...We aren’t perfect and hopefully this was a learning experience for them...

(3) ...Let’s move on and see what comes in the future...

1. It's obvious, to me, that they're not truly interested in this. How do you mend mocking your backers and not giving a f^&* about their opinion of you..?

2. How many learning experiences do they have to go through before getting things right? They've f^&*ed up on almost every campaign and apparently haven't learned anything.

3. Why even bother? Are you seriously considering supporting these jokers and thieves after this most-recent-in-a-long-line-of f^&*-ups?

[Bradius]

I guess I am a bit of a diplomat by training, and I have seen enough cases where it is possible. I would like to hope that improvement is possible, even necessary.

I do not recall having bad experiences with them, even in this campaign as I didn’t back the limited tier.

Would I consider backing their next campaign? Yes. Will I take into consideration what happened in this campaign and their responses here on whether or not to back a future campaign? Yes, of course.

When Jackson issued Flywheels and the mess up on the Federal 52 Second undersized limited tuck was produced, I was getting worried about Jackson. Then he went on an amazing creative tear. Nothing could have made me happier than see him succeed.