Volks News 86

@cfx Yeah that looks like the right jacket. As usual Volks did their clothes no favors. Here’s just a pic of my girl with the hood up as well. 
 

edit: when I attach photos here lately the quality looks pretty mangled. Are they showing blurry for others too? 😕

Edited February 24, 2020 by Beani

That looks nice even with the hood up. In general I'm not a big fan of fur but this is ok. What I dislike is that dense smooth fluffy fur like on the pink one; makes the wearer look like a poodle.

8 minutes ago, Beani said:

edit: when I attach photos here lately the quality looks pretty mangled. Are they showing blurry for others too? 😕

Yes. In the pic above I can see aliasing on the hands and a kind of overall graininess. Comparing to your pictures on flickr, something seems to be clobbering the sharpness here.

29 minutes ago, Beani said:

edit: when I attach photos here lately the quality looks pretty mangled. Are they showing blurry for others too?

I've had the same issue. Photos that look fine on Flickr end up blurry here. I suspect it's how the forum resizes the image to fit.

3 hours ago, BeyondTime said:

I suspect it's how the forum resizes the image to fit.

That and/or it recompresses everything. Because I'm anal about everything I've redone most of my avatars several times to try to make them look better. Even if I make them the 170x170 pixel size, by default the upload editor thing wants to crop them which I drag the corners around to avoid, but they are still resized and cropped somehow, or maybe the circle frame just cuts all sides anyway. The little Ranko pic with the speech bubble I made because I was happy about the lottery also looks blurrier/muddier here than my original of it.

If there have been any changes in the behavior (I can't tell) it's certainly possible that updates to the forum software have fiddled with how this is done.

Edited February 24, 2020 by cfx

On 2/23/2020 at 2:50 PM, Monty said:

On 2/23/2020 at 8:02 AM, cfx said:

So if there is a DD besides Sakura, and if we are going to get any kind of teaser this month, it will have to be soon now.

Volks twitter usually has the pre-announcement for Volks News about a week ahead of time as well, so if VN87 is going to be March 2 that should be soon too; otherwise I guess the magazine will be later in the month.

Obviously there will be Dolpa 43 coverage. I was thinking that since there isn't a March Dolpa like there usually has been, would there possibly still be a March outfit collection this year, besides the April Dolpa one?

The way it usually goes is the twitter announcement for ‘next volks news!’ with Komame (The Disconcerting Volks Cat) happens some time during the Wednesday before the Monday it releases, and teasers for new dolls will go up the Friday before that Monday (usually late afternoon or early evening). Note there have been times where this differs and that’s usually because of the license-holder wanting to do reveal things their own way through their own channels. 

Basically if we see the Next News Koname on Wednesday it’s likely we’ll see a new doll on Friday, whether SD or DD (or both - SD doesn’t seem to always get the teaser treatment though)

It's late Wednesday, already Thursday in Japan now, and this didn't happen so I guess it won't be out this coming Monday.

I didn't post for just that non-information though, what I also noticed is the volks_doll twitter is talking a lot about SDs, specifically SD13 and SDGr. It's because the 21st anniversary of SD is apparently 02/28, but they're also specifically linking to the voting page for SD13 and SDGr. I wonder if they are hinting that there will be SD rereleases in that category in the upcoming magazine?

I voted daily for Jun Tachibana in both the SD13 & SDGr categories. 

I probably shouldn't have voted in that category since I wouldn't be buying no matter what is rereleased so should've left it to actual potential buyers, since I also didn't know what was rare or wanted by others. I just voted for ones I thought were pretty based on the pictures on the voting page. I may have not always voted for the same ones, but I remember primarily voting for SD13 Cristal, SDGr Creamy Mami, and SD16 Johanna.

I didn't vote in any of the SD categories after that first one.

Edited February 27, 2020 by cfx
typo as usual

Creamy Mami would be a good candidate for a re-release.  

I did vote for her because she's an anime character so if I was buying an SD it'd be something like that, and I had noticed her price being high on Mandarake. Looking now, they have a couple for 140K but they're not in the best condition even at that price.

I think I also voted for Belldandy some of the time, and Suigintou. Had I known what Suigintou sells for now and how wanted she is I'd have voted for her all the time.

21 minutes ago, cfx said:

Had I known what Suigintou sells for now and how wanted she is I'd have voted for her all the time.

She’s a unique sculpt for sure 

Volks USA lottery results are out.  I  Ranko won both the white and black pom-pom skirts which was all  I  she entered for. Ranko is happy.

To definitively answer my question from earlier, in case someone else is curious about it, indeed I was able to order non-lottery items together with the lottery items in my order. Whatever I remembered about that not being the case was either just outright wrong, or has been changed.

Suigintou is arguably the highest potential SD13 to be re-release on the list, but most likely won't be because... too much work for Volks. 😭

Won the yellow furisode, the white jacket, and the test tube belt. Would have liked the other furisode for Miku, but overall it was a good haul. 

I won both items I entered for -- the white skirt and the fishtail jacket! Those are the only items I wanted from the clickwar that I didn't get. This event continues to take its toll on my wallet... I guess it's a good thing I didn't go for anything in the February collection.

Congrats to all who won their items!

I only entered for the blue furisode and the zori. Sadly I only won the zori. I really liked the blue furisode, but I knew my chances were lower since it was associated with Miku. I do like the yellow furisode as well, but didn't enter in case of the slim chance of winning both. That would have been too much money for me right now.

I've got the mini herbalist outfit and test tube belt on the way.  Looking forward to dressing Louise up in this set.  

In case anyone didn't notice, the banner on the site now states the leftovers from this lottery will go on sale on March 2nd at 11AM. There's at least a possibility for items anyone didn't win to show up if someone didn't pay for their win.

So at least two of us won the white pom-pom skirt; I figured that would be hard to get since it has now sold out quickly, twice, in the Japan clickwars.

8 minutes ago, Galvatim said:

I've got the mini herbalist outfit and test tube belt on the way.  Looking forward to dressing Louise up in this set.  

Glad to see people are winning the test tubes; I know it sold out very quickly in the Volks Japan clickwar.

1 hour ago, Jezrah said:

I do like the yellow furisode as well, but didn't enter in case of the slim chance of winning both.

I don't know how this could be implemented where it would be fair and also not a big hassle to Volks, but I've had that thought before that I wish there was some way to have a couple of options like "enter for this secondary item only if I don't win my first choice" along with "enter for this secondary item only if I win this other item"; the latter for a case like there's a pair of shoes that you only want to use with an outfit you're also entering for.

They could do it by not requiring you to actually buy what you win, but that of course opens up a big mess for Volks to deal with.

Edited February 29, 2020 by cfx

I won all three lotteries I went for (white jacket, fish tail coat, and the shorts turtleneck) but I don't think those were the super popular sell out items anyway. The herbalist outfits looked interesting, especially the test tubes, but I decided not to go for them.

12 hours ago, cfx said:

I don't know how this could be implemented where it would be fair and also not a big hassle to Volks, but I've had that thought before that I wish there was some way to have a couple of options like "enter for this secondary item only if I don't win my first choice" along with "enter for this secondary item only if I win this other item"; the latter for a case like there's a pair of shoes that you only want to use with an outfit you're also entering for.

Volks has two principals that the line lotteries at the in person events are based on. (Two that I know of, the company president talked about it at the LA Dolpa.)

1) They want everyone in line to have a chance no matter what their initial place in line is. Essentially someone who camps out all night has no better odds than someone who arrives right as the shop opens.

For those who aren't familiar with the Dolpa lines, everyone in line gets a number based on their place in line. Volks draws a number and the person with that number, and everyone behind them moves to the front of the line. E.g if there are 300 people in line, and they draw number 92, then #92 - #300 move to the front and #1 - #91 move behind #300.

2) They limit people to one of each item, and if they want a second one they have to go to the back of the line and wait till everyone else gets a turn.

I think we see the second one implemented in their web cart system. You can buy one of an item, and you can't buy a second of that item until after your order has shipped. That way other people have a good chance to get that item before you can buy two.

I would suspect that the principal behind the first guides how they do the web lotteries. My hypothesis - really more conjecture given how little we know about how they run their lotteries - is that we are all getting a number in the order of our lottery entry, and then they draw a number to see who is first in line for the available items. E.g. if they have 100 dolls and they draw number 92 then lottery entry numbers 92 to 191 get a doll. The main reason I think they might do it this way is because it mirrors the Dolpa line method, and that strikes me as pretty fair for everyone trying for a doll in person or online.

I really want to stress that this is a guess on my part. I have no special knowledge of how Volks does their lotteries. They could just use a random number generator that spits out defined quantity of unique numbers within a specified range, and the people whose entry number matches one of those numbers get a doll.

Edited February 29, 2020 by BeyondTime

If they do it that way, that would explain what that number is in front of the item name in the user groups thing.

36 minutes ago, lardroom said:

I won all three lotteries I went for (white jacket, fish tail coat, and the shorts turtleneck) but I don't think those were the super popular sell out items anyway.

The white riders jacket and fish tail jacket are two of the items that are sold out on the Volks Japan website, so they are pretty popular.

15 hours ago, cfx said:

To definitively answer my question from earlier, in case someone else is curious about it, indeed I was able to order non-lottery items together with the lottery items in my order. Whatever I remembered about that not being the case was either just outright wrong, or has been changed.

Sorry.  I didn't notice the question from earlier, or else I could have given you a definite answer.  I've often tossed normal items in stock along with my lottery winnings.  It's been true for as long as I've been doing the USA lotteries, so 4 1/2 years.

In fact, this time I forgot to grab an item I had been intending to get when I was checking out with my lottery winnings.

All I entered for were the white jacket, tulle socks, and SB-SD16G-084, and managed to draw all.  Of course, I thought the only one that I might whiff on was the jacket.  It wasn't a terribly exciting collection for me, and neither is the February collection. 

30 minutes ago, Gabriel said:

Sorry.  I didn't notice the question from earlier, or else I could have given you a definite answer.  I've often tossed normal items in stock along with my lottery winnings.  It's been true for as long as I've been doing the USA lotteries, so 4 1/2 years.

Thanks. So whatever I remember is just wrong. It might just be about the doll lotteries that I think state that, if not here maybe it was when Japan was still doing lotteries. I don't know, I remember all kinds of little things that aren't too important but then things I don't remember--old age sucks lol.

I was hoping I could do it because the shipping cost shown for the two pom-pom skirts was $12.50 which irritated me (not Volks' fault I know) but I was able to add two outfits, leather pants, socks and a pair of tweezers and still just have $16.75 shipping.

32 minutes ago, Gabriel said:

All I entered for were the white jacket, tulle socks, and SB-SD16G-084, and managed to draw all.  Of course, I thought the only one that I might whiff on was the jacket.  It wasn't a terribly exciting collection for me, and neither is the February collection. 

This event wasn't too exciting for me overall, but Ranko really needs those pom-pom skirts. February was exciting for that business suit and two pair of shoes I really liked, as well as shirts that seem generally hard to come by.

In another week or two we will hopefully have Volks News and see what the next Dolpa outfit collection is.

2 hours ago, cfx said:

If they do it that way, that would explain what that number is in front of the item name in the user groups thing.

Possible, but the numbers for the Pom Pom skirts you won were sequential, and the numbers on the items I won all seemed pretty low 16, 24, 35. 16 was the yellow furisode, I’d be curious what numbers were on the blue & pink ones. If it’s 15 or 17 then my guess is those numbers are some type of sequence Volks uses in their system. A comparison of the alchemist items would likely show a sequence in that case. 
 

2 hours ago, Gabriel said:

It wasn't a terribly exciting collection for me, and neither is the February collection. 

I’m liking a lot of the stuff lately, but that’s because so much of it is normal clothing rather than costumes. I like stuff I can mix and match to create styles for the girls. 

Edited February 29, 2020 by BeyondTime

So I wasn't after anything this time around but a friend of mine in Canada wanted that alchemists tube belt set thingie.  I went after it and then never got an email about it.  SO I went to the site and checked under the Groups tab and saw where it says:

 

24-Mini Bags   Active

 

So what does that mean?  Did I win them or no?  If so, how do I add them to my cart and pay for them?  I hate this new system setup, it's so friggin confusing.  😛

 

 

Billy

18 minutes ago, baldylox said:

24-Mini Bags   Active

You won them. Have you checked your junk mail folder?

Try logging into the system and searching for: Herbalist Mini Bags

That should pull up the item and let you add it to your cart. If for some reason that doesn't work I can PM you the link from my email, and you can try that.

 

6 hours ago, cfx said:

It might just be about the doll lotteries that I think state that

I think not mixing dolls with other items makes sense, because dolls usually have a 4 - 6 week gap between payment and shipment.

Edited March 1, 2020 by BeyondTime