Dakimakuras anyone?

Strange, guess they're just really busy. D:
If I had the money (or the limit, even) I'd probably put in an order for a second one. The sample is probably one of my favorites in recent memory, and I figure if I buy two that would lower my average price to a more reasonable level. :P Can never tell how things are going to go in this hobby. I could have waited to see if they sold out, and ended up paying even more than what I did. Even with that comforting thought, it still sucks to overpay.

How much did your one cost you again?

I bought it out for 20k. Wouldn't have been a terrible price had the cover been a bit harder to come by, but I just didn't want to risk it. It's not like I could have gotten what I wanted had I passed up the Fatalpulse cover; the other "big ticket" item I was eyeing to spend my limit on ended up selling for 67k. >_>

Edit: The Ricotta weborder started.

Yeah always hard to know how popular things will be, I was expecting the Fatalpulse cover to be much more popular than it was too.. and the Oshiki Hitoshi one to be slightly less than it was. Essentia was about where I expected, didn't really follow any other ones than those 3.

Yeah, the ones that I'm most familiar with are probably Anko, Marks, and Udon-ya for their goods.

Anko and Marks were really strange this year. Anko didn't even have any Kimi at the event, but from what I understand, did what was essentially a preorder for the cover which is supposed to ship sometime next week. The going price right now seems to be in the 15-20k range, which is a bit low for Anko's work. I think this is explained by no one having the cover on hand; I honestly think that if the current auctions had an actual product to ship out immediately, people would be more willing to buy it at a higher price. I guess we'll see when they ship the cover out if it increases the going price. Anko also did a tapestry, which is the first time they've done so. They apparently underestimated the interest in it, and thus only had a few at the event. As a result of that, they sold them off by lottery. Three factors combined (Anko's work, Miku, lottery) and the first three sold for 38k (buyout), and 67k (dutch auction with two available - both sold for that.) It will be interesting to see if they decide to do a mail order for either item. On their website they have a bit where it says it hasn't been decided yet. It's definitely better than a flat out no, but Anko doesn't do web orders often.

The Marks covers sold for what you might expect of their work, but it got weird because I've seen a total of 6 auctions for their C82 covers, and only 2 of those had the actual product on hand (the other 4 were from one seller and were removed/bought out before the event started.) So I don't know what the deal was there. Maybe they didn't have enough time to print many, or the covers actually went to people who weren't looking to make a quick buck for once.

Udon-ya is about what I expected. Their tapestry at C81 was selling for 20-30k alone, with a full goods set going for 30-50k. Pretty much the same deal here, I've seen the tapestry alone fetch about 20-30k.

I normally follow Argyle's stuff and have picked up something from their last two events (Miku and Luka), but I haven't seen a single one of their C82 items pop up (Miku and Kan'u.) So no idea what's going on there either.

Maidoll's Saeko finally popped up, with 2 (dutch auction) currently going for 22kish last I checked. With 12 hours left, I wouldn't be surprised if they hit 30k.

Edit: Did you end up getting a Oshiki Hitoshi, btw? If not, there's one on Mandarake for 30k... >_>

Yeah I got one, for 21k auction, not bad at all given the prices they all ended up going for.. which I really wasn't expecting. Was expecting over 15k for sure not not 24k+

I've not heard the term "dutch auction" before, you mean when it's a single auction with multiple copies of the item available I take it? I noticed those function slightly oddly on YJA.

There was an auction with 2 items with bidder A and bidder B both winning 1 at 26k. Then someone came along and bid 26.5k for 2 of them. This made bidder A's price rise to 27k, while bidder B's stayed at 26k as that was the maximum he had bid. Bidder B was still listed as a winner though. Then another bidder came and bid 27.5k, which pushed bidder A to 28k and bidder B remained a winner at 26k still. If you wanted to place a bid on the auction even for a single item the minimum bid was 28.5k though, even though a bid of 26.5k would of beaten bidder B's maximum bid.

Yeah, that's what I mean. And I only started using the term because it's what SMJ calls them. The Marks cover that Zengar won was one of them, and he didn't realize he had won until they sent him the winning email. :p SMJ's system is kinda broken right now when it comes to them, too. Previously it was exclusively manual bids, but I guess they've updated the system so that it's automated. But while it's now automated, it screws any other SMJ bidders that want to bid on an item that another SMJ user already has a bid on. I tried to place a bid on the Marks cover, and it told me that "user is only allowed to bid on one of the items listed", I guess meaning that a bidder was only able to win one of the two listings. I don't know if that's the case for all dutch auctions or it's just a specific feature that a seller can choose, but I wasn't able to bid even though my maximum bid was higher than what Zengar said he put.

I think it's that once you make a bid on it you can't alter the amount of items you're bidding on (unless you get outbid - I guess), and SMJ just stops other people from trying to too because it's simpler than working out some complicated logic for the behaviour with respect to their clients in that situation. I did get the option to select how many items I wanted to bid for on a "fresh" auction through the SMJ UI.

A small amount of covers from SMJ and Mandarake.




I have to say the Oshiki cover has to be the most expensive I ever buy.
I got one for 29k with the doujins and another with the full set including tapestry for 42k.


Oh, and any of you here want to try your luck with this rare Hazuki clochette cover?
http://page5.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/e129502741

You know, as long as you are satisfied with your cover and your pictures, then that is all that really matters. ;)

Hopefully Yokatta responds quickly. In the mean time I'm creating an SMJ account, although that'll take 24hr to confirm the deposit so either way I'm stuck waiting. The clock is ticking. :(

For anyone interested in Urushihara's work his latest at C82 is on Mandarake (JP, unfortunately) for a really good price. The cover and a few other items for 4k yen. I'm pretty sure it retailed for 8-10k at C82, so it's really a steal. The cover can be seen on image 2. The only downside is his work is often censored, but you're not going to beat 4k yen.

http://ekizo.mandarake.co.jp/shop/ja/item_s-989963.html

Weird, isn't the cover A and J's 2WT?
Seems weird to have the book and the cover for only 4k.

Yeah, it's definitely a lot cheaper than I'd expect it to sell for. Pretty sure it retailed for more than that, and I've seen it in the 8-12k range on YJA. So it's definitely a steal either way you look at it, but I have no idea why it's so cheap.

From Oshiki Hitoshi's blog (with googletranslate):
"I resell the pillow! ! Maybe! !

I have not decided yet or how to sell or quantity
That at a later date, please be detailed."

Ah, nice. Would definitely pick it up if I could get it at a reasonable price. Similarly, there was a message on Anko's site the other day (that has since been changed) that said they hadn't decided if they would resell their Kimi and Miku tapestry. Given Anko's history, I'd say it's pretty unlikely, but it wasn't a flat out "I don't have any plans for a web order at this time", which they have posted in the past.

There's also another message on their site now that has me wondering what it means:

†»ã¾ãŸå±‹å¤–・野外でのご使用はお控えください。

Translates to something like "Outdoor use in the field. Please refrain from."

My best guess is that they're referring to the recent C82 picture of the dude hugging the Nanoha pillow outside. I'd imagine that circles are able to get away without censoring their work because they're fairly small entities and have a fairly limited audience (which is also probably the reason that companies can't be more explicit.) So instead of the fairly limited audience the case may normally see, thousands of spectators at the event probably got a glance at it and then everyone who saw the picture online. I'd imagine it's that kind of exposure that smaller circles would want to avoid, since they're technically breaking the law by creating uncensored works. But that's just speculation on my part based off a shitty translation that could have a different meaning entirely.

Just a question is the nanoha in question explicit?

Very much so, its an Anko work, after all. :P

http://www.sankakucomplex.com/2012/08/10/shameless-otaku-lies-with-girlfriend-in-public/

Figures, cover is sold out and still no response. At lest I should have my SMJ account up and running soon and I can give them a real try. I didn't realize they required a deposit or else I would of set it up sooner.

Has anyone had any success with the "vote" button on toranoana? I gave it a click for the fun of it, not sure if they usually are successful in getting re-prints or not.

That sucks. Did you send the money to Yokatta, or had you not even gotten to that point yet? If you hadn't paid yet, there's obviously no chance of them having picked it up, but if you had paid already maybe there's a chance... but from the sound of it, you didn't. D: Yeah, SMJ is actually pretty speedy on special orders, even. They say they don't process them on the weekends, but I usually don't have much trouble getting one in as long as I have 24 hours to do so. As an American, they're a great service overall, but for some reason I want to say you're in Canada so I'm not sure how cost effective they'll be that way. I just know that they're probably the best service for auction orders in the US. They're fairly expensive for special orders, but seeing as I don't have to pay until the order comes in (probably limited to US customers, but might apply to Canadians too) and the fact that they're very easy to deal with, it's worth the extra cost to me.

For the Toranoana thing, I haven't seen it work personally. It probably has a lot to do with the circle; Toranoana probably lets them know when the requests reach a certain number, and then they can decide from there if they want to resell. I went ahead and clicked it myself since I wouldn't mind a backup and I'd like everyone that wants one to get a copy.