The Way of Kings 10th Anniversary Leatherbound Edition
Created by Dragonsteel Entertainment
Celebrate 10 years of The Stormlight Archive with Brandon Sanderson
Latest Updates from Our Project:
Challenge Coins! ...and a Shipping Update
almost 4 years ago
– Wed, Apr 07, 2021 at 09:04:43 PM
Coins are here!
We received the Challenge Coins this week!
Challenge Coins: Heads side
Pictures just can’t do these justice. The 3D sculpting of the Herald faces done by Steve Argyle just makes these coins pop. They are gorgeous.
With these in our warehouse, we will begin assembling the “All Orders Challenge Coins Packs”. Once that is complete, we can begin assembling the individual “Order Swag Packs” for each order. We are very excited to get these out to you, and will work hard to do so as quickly as possible! We love seeing pictures of how you are using and displaying your rewards!
Challenge Coins: Tails side
Current Progress:
Actively Shipping
As we have mentioned in our recent updates, we are shipping Dawnshard and The Way of Kings Prime hardcover books to our U.S. backers. Several thousand of these have shipped, with thousands more to go. Our team is working hard to get these out to you!
Leatherbound books Progress
The 2021 The Way of Kings leatherbound books are progressing nicely. Volume 1 will be bound soon, while work on Volume 2 continues. They will then be assembled into the slipcases, wrapped, and boxed. We hope to start shipping the first batch of these within a couple months, with the full shipment process taking a few months to complete. See our updated shipping estimate below.
Remaining Swag In Production
We are still awaiting the Stormlight Playing Cards. We are told the boxes are printed and assembled, and the cards are in the process of being printed and processed. We expect these to arrive in our warehouse before the end of April.
Future Expectations:
Leatherbound Book Shipping
We hope to begin shipping a small number of leatherbound books to our 2021 delivery tiers in mid-to-late May. It will take two to three months minimum to get all books shipped out.
Shipment dates: May - August
U.S. Dawnshard and The Way of Kings Prime
We will continue to ship these books to our U.S. backers. We are making very good progress.
Shipment Dates: April, maybe into May
All Swag Packs + International Dawnshard and The Way of Kings Prime
Swag packs to U.S. backers, in addition to swag packs combined with Dawnshard and The Way of Kings Prime for our international backers, will begin shipping after the Stormlight Playing Cards arrive. This process will be very labor intensive to combine all the different reward packs together and to customize the shipments with add-ons. We expect this process to take several months.
Shipment dates: May - August
Backlog/Missed Shipments
For those backers who completed their surveys after we shipped some of your rewards, as well as for those backers who noticed something inaccurate in your rewards that we have now corrected, we will be shipping your posters and other missed rewards while we also work on these other processes. We expect to start shipping these rewards by the end of the month.
Shipment Dates: Late April-Early May
All dates are subject to change, but we are picking up steam as we approach the end stretch of reward delivery! Thank you for sticking around with us, and for all your support.
-Team Silverlight
The Way of Kings Prime is here!
almost 4 years ago
– Fri, Mar 26, 2021 at 05:25:19 PM
This is just a quick update: We’ve received The Way of Kings Prime hardcover at our warehouse! Here is an in-progress shot of the truck as we unloaded your books!
Pallets and pallets of books to be unloaded
These books are beautiful. The foiled cloth hardcase looks great, and with the pages sewn together rather than just glued these “Sanderson Curiosities” should last. We hope you will enjoy them as much as we do.
We have unloaded the truck and ordered all our shipping supplies, and we have thousands of orders queued up to be shipped. We are now actively shipping packages containing both Dawnshard and The Way of Kings Prime to our U.S. backers as quickly as we can pack and label them. It will take a few weeks to get this many orders (nearly 20,000!) shipped so please be patient. You will receive an email after your order has been sent to the United States Postal Service.
The majority of the shipments we previously missed containing only Dawnshard have been shipped (thank you to those who let us know about the issue!), as well as most shipments containing only The Way of Kings Prime.
We are still waiting on the challenge coins and the Stormlight playing cards. We received confirmation that the coins are finished and shipped, and they should hopefully arrive within the next couple weeks. Expect our next update to be after we have them in hand to show off to you!
Thank you!
~Team Silverlight
"What's Going on With My Tracking Number?" and Other Updates
almost 4 years ago
– Thu, Mar 11, 2021 at 11:00:45 PM
Greetings and salutations from your favorite Kickstarter campaign! We’ve been asked for an update, and so we will provide!
The biggest news: No, your books have NOT been shipped to another state.
In summary: If you have only one tracking number in BackerKit AND you have already received your Bridge 4 poster, please ignore the tracking. It is wrong now.
Back in October, we shipped out tens of thousands of Bridge 4 posters. The tracking numbers for those shipments were added to your BackerKit account, which unfortunately does not label which reward the tracking number is associated with. It has been more than four months since these shipments occurred, and the tracking numbers are now being used by the carrier for new shipments that are completely unrelated to the Kickstarter campaign, your rewards, or Dragonsteel Entertainment.
This is causing a lot of confusion for our backers! We are receiving many questions about it and wanted to be sure to address it with you. Since shipping companies reuse tracking data, we are unable to change anything other than to let you know that this is happening. The tracking data for your poster is no longer applicable to your shipment and should be ignored.
In other news: A few new things to report!
In summary: For the most part, very little movement has happened in our backer rewards. See update #26 for our current shipment timeline.
Cards Update:
Our biggest update is with the cards. The manufacturer sent proofs that we have reviewed and approved, so now we’re waiting in line to have these printed and shipped to us. We’re still several weeks away from receiving these—however, the cards are likely to be the final items we receive for the swag bags. We expect it could be late April before these are printed and delivered. We cannot begin shipping swag shipments until these arrive.
Dawnshard Update:
The physical Dawnshard books have shipped to U.S. backers who are receiving that book only and not The Way of Kings Prime. International shipments will go out this week to backers who ordered Dawnshard only and not The Way of Kings Prime or any other swag.
The Way of Kings Prime Update:
The Way of Kings Prime foiled sample hardcase has been approved and the books are in the process of being bound. This should be finished soon and the books will be shipped to us within the next couple weeks. We will then start shipping Dawnshard and The Way of Kings Prime to all U.S. backers receiving those books.
Coins Update:
These are in the final stages of being manufactured and should be done soon. Then they will be shipped to our warehouse, likely within the next month.
2021 Leatherbound Book Update:
The leatherbound book pages have finished printing and are now being sewn together. After this, they will be cut and gilded, the leatherbound hardcases manufactured and foiled and later bound to the book blocks, the slipcases made, and the books packaged into them and shrink-wrapped. This is still a few months of work, but it is progressing!
Overall Schedule Update:
Overall, we are still very close to our schedule published in update #26. The physical Dawnshard and The Way of Kings Prime books should ship within the timeframes given previously. The swag packs will probably ship toward the later part of the planned shipping timeframe, and the 2021 leatherbound books will likely ship in the earlier half of our estimates.
As always, our heartfelt appreciation goes out to all of you!
Physical Dawnshard, Coasters, and Digital Art Pack
almost 4 years ago
– Tue, Feb 09, 2021 at 07:03:44 PM
NOTE: Except as specifically indicated in this update, the status of all rewards are still the same as they were previously listed in Update #26.
Physical Dawnshard Novella
As you may have already seen on Brandon’s livestream this week, we received the physical copies of the Dawnshard novella! They are beautiful and we are very pleased with how they turned out.
We hope that within the next few business days we can begin shipping this reward to:
U.S. backers who will receive this reward but did not also get physical copies of The Way of Kings Prime.
International backers who will receive this reward but did not also get physical copies of The Way of Kings Prime AND did not get any of the physical swag items.
This will likely take the remainder of the month to get every book shipped out to this group. Please be patient and watch for email notifications. You can also watch your BackerKit account for tracking updates if you fall in this group.
Dawnshard Audiobook
Michael Kramer and Kate Reading announced on Wednesday this week that they have begun recording the Dawnshard audiobook! Follow them on Twitter and Instagram for updates. This will be produced by Brandon’s audiobook company, Mainframe. You can get more information about Mainframe in Brandon’s most recent State of the Sanderson post. This is not part of the Kickstarter, but we get a lot of questions about it. We are not currently able to announce pricing or an availability date, but stay tuned to Brandon’s Twitter and Facebook accounts for a release announcement.
As soon as they are done with the Dawnshard audiobook, Michael and Kate will begin working on The Way of Kings Prime audiobook.
The Way of Kings Leatherbound – Signatures Signed!
In the same livestream mentioned above, Brandon also spent four hours signing the final pages that will be bound into Volume 1 of your 2021 copies of The Way of Kings Leatherbound. These pages are now packaged up and will be shipped to the printer first thing next week. The printer will then begin building your books! We are on track (maybe even a little ahead of schedule) for the timeline presented in Update #26.
Coasters
As we talked about in the last update, the coasters have arrived and are in our warehouse. While they will not ship out until the playing cards have arrived and swag packs are fully assembled, we wanted to share a picture of how they turned out! We are very excited to get these into your hands later this year.
The digital art package for backers of The Way of Kings Leatherbound Kickstarter is now finished! This package has begun distributing to your accounts and will be available within the next several hours.
During the campaign, we described this reward like this: “Digital art package includes 1920x1080 and 1080x1920 desktop and phone wallpapers of the Bridge Four poster and all relevant unlocked stretch goal rewards.”
Most files are in a horizontal format, and you may modify and combine these into new desktop/phone wallpapers and even print them for personal use within your household as long as this line is included “Copyright (C) Dragonsteel Entertainment, LLC.”
Each piece of art in the digital art package is Copyright (C) Dragonsteel Entertainment, LLC, all rights reserved. None of the art or files in this digital art package may be used commercially. Any digital archive you create with these files must include the ReadMe file.
There are more than 100 jpg format files included in this art pack, and we hope you enjoy the ability to use these images for your phone, tablet, and computer backgrounds and customize them to fit your personal ideals. We look forward to seeing your posts online showing these customized wallpapers in use!
Conclusion
As ever, we are extremely grateful to be on this journey with you. Thank you for your patience, your kindness, your positivity, and your many online posts about your enjoyment of the rewards you have received from this campaign. We would not be here if it were not for you, and the happiness and pleasure we find in your interactions with us gladdens our hearts and souls. We look forward to taking the next step of this campaign with you.
2020 Campaign Retrospective and Where We Go from Here in 2021
about 4 years ago
– Wed, Jan 27, 2021 at 03:22:32 AM
Happy 2021! 2020 was quite a year, with ups and downs, surprises, changed expectations, busy and slow times, and lots of insanity—and that’s not counting everything that happened in the world outside of this Kickstarter campaign!
As we begin 2021, let’s look back at last year, what we’ve done and where we’ve been. Then we’ll discuss what things look like moving forward. We will try to update your expectations, discuss concerns you may have expressed or felt, and bring us all back together on the same page. Grab a snack, this will be a long update.
2020 Campaign In Review
Early 2020 – Preparation: The first half of 2020 involved finishing the preparation and planning that we began in 2019. It was a lot of work, but we finally made it to the campaign launch.
July & August – Campaign and Add-ons: In July, things got real.
July 7: Our Kickstarter campaign launched.
3 minutes in: we funded!
11 minutes in: we became the first publishing campaign on Kickstarter to cross the $1M pledged threshold!
2 hours in: we passed all planned stretch goals.
July 7, end of day: We had over $4.2M in pledges and sold out of all planned The Way of Kings 10th Anniversary Leatherbound Edition tiers. We expected to sell 5,000 copies, but ordered 10,000 “just in case.” We sold all 10,000 the first day! We quickly enacted our “never to be needed” plans and opened new pledge tiers for an expanded printing with a 2021 ship date.
July 7 – August 7 (the campaign): We added additional stretch goals and watched as you blew past them. We ended just shy of 30,000 backers and $7M pledged.
August 7 – September 8 (BackerKit add-ons and preorders): We added more backers, ending with over $7.6M in pledges from more than 32,000 backers, putting us over the threshold of our last stretch goal—recording audiobook narration for The Way of Kings Prime. We sold nearly 23,000 copies of The Way of Kings 10th Anniversary Leatherbound Edition.
Bridge 4 Posters: Throughout the summer, we rolled up all the Bridge 4 posters we could, put them in protective shipping boxes, and filled two rooms in Cosmere House wall-to-wall and ceiling-to-floor. Then we rolled some more posters. We ordered even more posters to be printed.
September & October: Bridge 4 posters were shipped. We began the process of ordering and receiving swag items.
November & December: We finalized the binding and packaging process for the 2020 delivery of The Way of Kings 10th Anniversary Leatherbound Edition. Swag items began to arrive at Cosmere House, and the initial 10,000 copies of the leatherbound book shipped out. All 2020 delivery tier leatherbound books have now shipped.
2021: Where We Currently Stand
During January, and possibly into February, undelivered shipments of the leatherbound books will continue to make their journey toward their destinations. We do not have any way to track them for you that is better than the tracking numbers in your BackerKit accounts. If you see no movement or updates on the tracking for two months, let us know and we can look into taking steps for replacements. Until that time, please be patient and try not to reach out to us for updates, as we won’t have any.
We are moving! We have a new warehouse that will allow us to better process the backer rewards, plus our store orders. We are finalizing basic setup such as internet and office supplies, and we hope to start working out of the warehouse soon. This move is an ongoing process, but should be mostly complete within the next month.
We should note that moving to a new warehouse was in the cards before the Kickstarter campaign launched and was necessary to meet the demands of the growing Brandon Sanderson online store. The success of the Kickstarter just made it necessary to find space more quickly.
Reward status
Digital Rewards:
$10 Brandon Sanderson Store Gift Card (applicable backed tiers only): Delivered
Dawnshard Novella eBook (all tiers, plus Dawnshard add-ons): Delivered
Dawnshard Novella Drafts (all tiers): Delivered
Digital Art Pack (all tiers): Pending – see next section
Physical Rewards:
2020 NUMBERED The Way of Kings Leatherbound Edition: Shipped
2020 The Way of Kings Leatherbound Edition (Unnumbered): Shipped
2021 NUMBERED The Way of Kings Leatherbound Edition: Pending – see next section.
2021 The Way of Kings Leatherbound Edition (Unnumbered): Pending – see next section.
Bridge Four Poster: Shipped
Knights Radiant Order Art Prints: Arrived and moved into the new warehouse. Packs of all 10 orders are currently being assembled.
Knights Radiant Order Challenge Coins: Pending – see next section. These must arrive before we can assemble individual order packs.
Knights Radiant Order Patch: Arrived and moved into the new warehouse. Packs of all 10 orders are currently being assembled.
Knights Radiant Order Pins: Arrived and moved into the new warehouse. Packs of all 10 orders have been assembled.
Knights Radiant Order Sticker Sheets: Arrived and moved into the new warehouse. Packs of all 10 orders are currently being assembled
Backer Pin: Arrived and moved into the new warehouse.
Chicken Scout Merit Patch: Arrived and moved into the new warehouse.
Chicken Scout Sticker Sheet: Arrived and moved into the new warehouse.
Epic Bookmark: Arrived and moved into the new warehouse.
Journey before Destination Bumper Sticker: Arrived and moved into the new warehouse.
Stormlight Drink Coasters: Arrived and moved into the new warehouse.
Stormlight Playing Cards: Pending – see next section.
Dawnshard Novella Hardcover Book: Pending – see next section.
The Way of Kings Prime Hardcover Book: Pending – see next section.
Wit/Witless Challenge Coin: Pending – see next section.
2021: What’s Next?
Next, we need to receive the remaining swag items before we can move forward with assembly.
Shipments: While all 2020 leatherbound books have shipped, not all 2020 leatherbound books have been delivered. Please be patient. We are unable to track down your books beyond the information contained in the tracking number provided in your BackerKit account. Please do not contact us about these shipments unless your tracking does not show a change or update for two months. We know this is a long time to wait, but delays are common, and shipment methods can be slow, especially with lingering delays to all carriers from the holidays.
Digital Art Pack: This is being worked on. We expect delivery by early February and will release an update at that time.
Dawnshard Novella Hardcover Book: This is done and will be sent to us from the bindery soon. We expect this will arrive in our new warehouse sometime in February.
The Way of Kings Prime Hardcover Book: This is nearly finished and will be sent to us shortly after Dawnshard. This means we will begin shipping both Dawnshard and The Way of Kings Prime in March to those backers in the US who backed tiers that include these books. The process of sending these out will take two to three months before the final package is sent out. This will be a lengthy process simply due to the very large numbers of shipments we have to assemble, package, label, and send off. As mentioned during the campaign, international backers will need to wait until all swag has arrived, as we will ship one package with the hardcover books and swag all together. Speaking of which...
Knights Radiant Order Challenge Coins and the Wit/Witless Challenge Coin: We took extra time on these to get the molds just right, bringing in Steve Argyle and his amazing sculpting skills to really add polish to the faces. They look fantastic! Taking this time was the right move, as we can now truly say all 11 of these coins match our original vision. They are currently being minted, polished, and enameled. Once we receive them we will begin assembling the individual Knights Radiant order packs. But swag shipments will still need to wait on the playing cards.
Stormlight Playing Cards: This continues to be a slow process. All the art is finished, sent to the printer, and approved. But we’re now waiting in line behind all the playing card projects ahead of us. Printers have been hit hard by the pandemic and print times have been pushed back significantly, especially on popular printed items like playing cards.
Shipping Swag Packs: The cards will be the final swag items to arrive. When they do, we’ll assemble all swag into the appropriate packages. This process will be the most complicated and time-consuming of all our Kickstarter processes. If things go well, this will begin while we are still shipping the hardcover books, but the shipments of swag packages will potentially continue through the summer of 2021, with final shipments going out toward the end of the summer. We will work hard to ship everything as quickly as we can, but we want to set realistic expectations that reward shipments will not start for a couple months at the earliest and will take several months to fulfill.
2021 SIGNED & NUMBERED and SIGNED ONLY copies of The Way of Kings Leatherbound Edition: Brandon is currently working on signing the title page of all Volume 1 copies for this batch of books. You can watch him signing these on his YouTube channel while he answers questions and interacts with fans. Once he finishes signing all these pages, we will ship them to the printer. The printer is currently printing the rest of the book pages, and then all the pages for volumes 1 and 2 will go to the bindery. Binding will take 4 to 6 months once the pages have been received before the books are done and ready to ship.
So When Do I Get My Rewards?
Note that once your package has left our hands and begun its journey to you, it can take up to two months to reach its destination, depending on your location and possible delays. These dates are estimates only and are based on shipping dates, not the date you will receive your rewards.
March, April, possibly into May: Shipments of Dawnshard and The Way of Kings Prime hardcover books sent to US backers.
As early as April, possibly into July: Shipments of all swag sent to all backers worldwide, including Dawnshard and The Way of Kings Prime hardcover books for international backers.
As early as July, possibly into November: 2021 The Way of Kings Leatherbound Edition shipments. The dates for this are still very much in flux, and we will be much closer to these shipments before we will know exact dates. Our goal is to have them all shipped before the holiday season so that we can offer The Way of Kings Leatherbound Edition to non-backers for the 2021 holiday season.
Concerns, Complaints, and Resolutions to Issues:
Shipping
Shipping takes a while. To save on shipping costs, we use slower shipping methods. International shipping takes extra time—sometimes up to a month or two. Domestic Media Mail is the slowest way to ship anything within the US, and can take several weeks. We have also seen many instances in the past few months where tracking has not been updated until after your package has been delivered. While we completely understand that waiting on a package can be stressful and the excitement is real, we ask that you do not contact us about your package until your tracking does not show any updates or movement for two months. At that time, we can look into options and possible replacement. We are not the package carrier, however, and are unable to get any more information about your package’s location than you have from your tracking number, so status updates directly from us are not possible. When you do contact us, please use the methods found below.
When Will My Rewards Ship?
We will update you when we begin shipping the rewards listed above. Beyond “within the next two to three months” of that time we cannot give you an estimate of when your package(s) will ship. We cannot tell you that “we will ship to your state/country around this date,” and we cannot prioritize your specific shipment(s). Asking us for an update will only cause you to be directed back to these updates.The only exceptions to this are posted below.
How Do I Track My Reward(s)?
Log in to BackerKit at https://thewayofkings.backerkit.com/backer/review to find tracking details for shipped rewards and download links for digital rewards. Check this and other updates to determine what we were shipping at that time.
How Do I Know If I Have a 2020 or 2021 Leatherbound Delivery Tier?
Log in to BackerKit at https://thewayofkings.backerkit.com/backer/review and look under the “Pledge Items'' section. Your leatherbound book will be listed with either 2020 or 2021 in this section. All leatherbound books listed under “Add-on Items'' will be 2021 delivery even if no year is listed.
I Had to Pay Additional Charges For My International Shipment
As listed in our campaign and FAQ: “The shipping fee [you already paid] does NOT include possible customs fees or other associated costs on your end to bring the books or other rewards into your country.” We are not responsible for these extra costs, and are unable to assist with customs clearance, brokerage fees charged by carriers to get your items through customs faster, or self-clearing methods to bypass extra brokerage fees. We are able to provide you with your commercial invoice for customs if requested. Please use contact method #2 below.
When and How Do I Contact You for Help?
If your issue was not addressed above, these are situations in which you would need to contact us:
Tracking is not updating/Where is my package? Please do not contact us until tracking has shown no change for two months since the previous update. When you do contact us for this, please use method #2 below.
I didn’t get my reward. Please review our list of reward shipment statuses above. Also log in to https://thewayofkings.backerkit.com/backer/review and check for your tracking number. If you filled out your survey late, we may still be getting to your rewards. If your reward tracking shows it was delivered but you never received it, please contact us using method #2 below.
I never received my BackerKit survey. Go to https://thewayofkings.backerkit.com/ and enter the email address you use for Kickstarter, then click “Get My Survey.” Watch your email for a new survey link. Also check your junk/spam folder. If you do not receive an email after this, please contact us using method #1 below.
My reward arrived damaged. You must send in your contact request within two weeks of delivery of our shipment to you. Please contact us using method #2 below. We will reach out to you as soon as we can with a request for pictures of the damage. If you contacted us within two weeks, even if our reply is outside that timeframe, your request will be processed.
Contact Method #1
BackerKit's support is the first place to go for most requests. Go to https://thewayofkings.backerkit.com/ and follow the “Need Help?” and then “Contact Us” links. Please try here before you go anywhere else. An entire team of support people have been assigned to our project, so this is the quickest way to get an answer for most basic questions. Including a screenshot of your Kickstarter backer number is useful.
Contact Method #2
If BackerKit support doesn't have the answer, please try contacting us through our store contact page. For your order number, enter “Kickstarter.” If you have one, please include your Kickstarter backer number in either the order number field or the body of the message. Also include your full name and your BackerKit email address to make it easier for us to find your pledge.
Final Words
Thank you! Thank you for sticking with us. Thank you for your kind words of encouragement and joy when you see your books. Thank you for your patience with shipping times, delays, and the occasional difficulties we encounter. And most of all, thank you for joining us on this journey! We are honored to have you with us.
