I hate to admit it, but Games Workshops Customer Service is pretty damn awesome. They'll send you replacement pieces or hell, a completely new box if there was a problem with the product you ordered.

I ordered a copy of Runequest 6e through the Moon Design Publications webstore. After almost a month, didn't hear a peep despite the money already taken from my account. Contacted Design Mechanism, and I had my book in a Week. 3 weeks after that, my copy from Moon Design... Contacted Design Mechanism again asking fi I should return it, and they said keep it. I gifted it to ExploderWizard. Design Mechanism is awesome.

I bought a copy of the new 5e Hacklopedia of Beasts from K&C. The eyeball sticker on the front cover wasn't glued on properly and was fraying at the edges. Contacted K&C and got a new one no questions asked. Awesome books, awesome return time to resolving the problems.

As much as I love the game (Hollow Earth Expedition), I'm not overly happy with the Exile. Within weeks of receiving my copy of the book, the first 20 some odd pages started falling out... Looks like it was a bad binding job... I emailed them about it and no reply... Still no reply after 7 years... I kind of gave up on getting a new one...

Ooh, ooh! I forgot one!

Jeff Siadek of Gorilla Games! I emailed him with a question about Battlestations, and he invited me over to play with his group! It was a great afternoon!

Quote from: Baron;750025Ooh, ooh! I forgot one!

Jeff Siadek of Gorilla Games! I emailed him with a question about Battlestations, and he invited me over to play with his group! It was a great afternoon!

That's pretty awesome!

And one I'd like to forget.

Was talking with one of the coders for Natural Selection and at some point I asked him to stop bugging me with annoying comments I'd asked him before to not do. And he went totally psycho screaming and calling me "You fucking Jew!" and that was the last I ever dealt with that game.

Quote from: Baron;749856My personal experiences:

Marc Miller – goes above and beyond, extremely nice, goes out of his way to make happy customers
Carl Brodt – extremely friendly, chit-chats, helpful, even invited me to game sometime
Moon Design – the guys are friendly, but I always have to pursue them when I purchase a hardcopy from their website
Design Mech – always polite and friendly (unless provoked!), even if they don't agree with your preferences

I only had a brief contact with Marc Miller but he definitely does go above and beyond , he is a great guy.
I had a problem getting a Bundle of Holding I bought , so I emailed them and Allen Varney emailed me back within about 10 minutes telling me what to do. Great service !

You know who else are friggin' amazing?  Dwarven Forge.

I got two slightly cosmetically damaged sets and asked to exchange them, and they sent me replacements and told me to keep the originals!

I <3 Dwarven Forge.

Quote from: thedungeondelver;749999Good interactions:

From '99 until his passing, communicating and working with Gary Gygax was always enjoyable.  Yes, I know some folks had bad experiences with him over the years and I'm not denigrating or denying those, by any means.  But overall I had a positive experience.

Bad Experiences?

Heh...that'd be telling.

Agreed. Only met Gary finally in 2004 at Origins, however saw him just about every year after that either at Origins or GenCon. He spent quite a bit of time with Duke Siefried at the awesome minis setup at Origins and he was always friendly and polite.

Have to give a thumbs up to Grant Dalgliesh of Columbia Games, Henry Lopez of Arcanis fame, and Stephen Chenault of Troll Lord Games, As well as Jim Ward of Eldritch Enterprises, and Clash Bowley of Flying Mice.

These guys just keep on chugging, pretty much continuously turning out new quality RPG gaming goodness!!!

Also have to include Brendan Davis from Bedrock Games from right here as well... in the Awesome!!! category as Arrows of Indra is my favorite new RPG from last year.

Also want to include include Ryan Dancey here. He saved D&D. That puts him forever in the RPG Hall fo Fame.

Won't be dissing on any fail gaming folks today. Spent too much time on them already, and ...further, you fails already know who you are!!!

I'm still waiting on some RPG books (print and digital) to be released. I haven't given up hope they will see the light of day. I am very generous when it comes to people finishing creative projects. I know how hard it can be.

That being said, customer support should be job #1. Keeping the public in general and your customer base in particular well informed is key. My wife works in customer support (chat and phone) and I did public relations for years for the SCA. Positive interaction with the public is just so darned important. It can be taught. Even enthusiastic amateurs can be helpful. There is zero reason that people staffing a con table shouldn't be engaged in what they do. If they aren't, find new people. As the saying goes, you never get a second chance at a first impression. These stories of such lost opportunities are saddening.

Well, its not the exact same thing as what the OP was talking about, but I was very impressed by Goodman Games, and Harley Stroh's aplomb in dealing with the unfortunate situation when the first DCC book he sent ended up being one of the only times any review product sent to me was lost in the mail.

Quote from: GameDaddy;750100Also have to include Brendan Davis from Bedrock Games from right here as well... in the Awesome!!! category as Arrows of Indra is my favorite new RPG from last year.


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Thanks. Glad you like the Game. I have been getting lots of positive feedback about Indra.

My friend James & I were banned from a Games Workshop store in Basingstoke, somewhere around the mid 90's for talking to their customers about RPGs.

Quote from: UberMunchkin;751546My friend James & I were banned from a Games Workshop store in Basingstoke, somewhere around the mid 90's for talking to their customers about RPGs.

That is company policy to this very day

No. Really. The company mandate is to find reasons to fire the floor and shelf workers at the shops before they hit a certain time limit. They apply it to visitors too that dont meet certain criteria. Normally is just a "focus on age bracket X, ignore age bracket Y" stuff.

Quote from: Omega;751556That is company policy to this very day

No. Really. The company mandate is to find reasons to fire the floor and shelf workers at the shops before they hit a certain time limit. They apply it to visitors too that dont meet certain criteria. Normally is just a "focus on age bracket X, ignore age bracket Y" stuff.

Incredible. I've spent a whole lotta years in retail and never heard of a company doing this. Firing/banning staff for talking to customers about the products sold? (Or banning customers for talking to other customers about the products? Either way it's bad.) How do they stay in business?

Although I have heard of some companies who fire employees who accrue too many benefits or who's pay rise too high, but not in retail. And I've read an article about Monsanto who sues it's own customers.

More evidence that most managers are nuts.

Quote from: Omega;751556That is company policy to this very day

No. Really. The company mandate is to find reasons to fire the floor and shelf workers at the shops before they hit a certain time limit. They apply it to visitors too that dont meet certain criteria. Normally is just a "focus on age bracket X, ignore age bracket Y" stuff.

:eek:

GW finding more and more ways to suck.

I have lost count of how many GW miniatures I have purchased over the years for use in roleplaying games.

I have bought minis from games I don't even play just because I liked them.

To this day, still haven't played the LOTR battle game but I have a crapload of those minis.

Quote from: Omega;751556That is company policy to this very day

No. Really. The company mandate is to find reasons to fire the floor and shelf workers at the shops before they hit a certain time limit. They apply it to visitors too that dont meet certain criteria. Normally is just a "focus on age bracket X, ignore age bracket Y" stuff.

That's funny; there's a very tiny GW store here I've stood in and talked to customers and employees about how cool the LotR minis are for use in AD&D since they're closer to the "official" 25mm scale...!