Usually types refers to the amount of separate figures/ individual boxes, so I'm leaning towards yes, though I'll probably be waiting for confirmation from the blog.

With So-Do, most figures are two boxes, so 12 types probably only means 6 figures, not 12, though it's possible it's more if some of them are troop builders that only take up one box

https://i.imgur.com/nN4ipsP.jpg
I've had this tiny magic trick box since I was a kid. I've kept it all these years because I figured it would make a good prop one day. Well today is that day.

https://i.imgur.com/21nzhnh.jpg
They're Kiramai Stones now.

But that's not all! I made a handle to make the Yellow Stone Hammer to.
https://i.imgur.com/e9NB2Bw.jpg

And... and that last one works well for Silver when he comes out, too!

How did this work out so perfectly for you?! o:

Hoarding mostly.

Blade Raider you genius. :rock:

The real magic trick was the repurpose all along.

There's a video out showing the stickering process for So-Do Ultimate Kuuga. The arms look fairly easy to sticker, but the legs look pretty rough. Figure looks wonderful overall though!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=075mF6gLlvw&t

Big thanks to Deepsea for doing the SODO group buy.

I was able to secure the Kiramager set and I just finished building and painting them up. It took a lot longer than I anticipated because of all the details they have.

https://i.imgur.com/Nogciid.jpg

I'll post soon on my painting thread about how I detailed them. Compared to the LuPat Yu-Do, these figures are so much better. Good articulation, especially with the wrists.

https://i.imgur.com/r9Yu2jT.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/BhZN5k5.jpg

Sparkling!

Got my box from Deepsea as well today, thanks a ton! Coincidentally, my So-Do backlog package arrived today too. Wow that's a lot of boxes!
https://64.media.tumblr.com/cb01aef8...58c1f922b0.jpg
https://64.media.tumblr.com/152b181a...391b73fe97.jpg

I got a few figures stickered up tonight. First was Thouser and Metal Cluster Hopper, since those are the current newest suits at the point I'm at in catching up with Zero-One. They both do an interesting thing with the old armor going on the body thing, where the armor doesn't fully wrap around the torso but just adds additional armor to it. Both were pretty easy to sticker, went by fast.
https://64.media.tumblr.com/e040ae5c...aa8e6122f6.jpg

Next was the winter movie duo, ZeroZero-One and Ichi-Gata. They were a bit rough. A lot of small of thin stickers requiring very careful placement. The figures both look fantastic once they're done, but it wasn't the most enjoyable process.
https://64.media.tumblr.com/d2af8d9e...75b0dd3cbe.jpg

Lastly, because I was curious what the figure was like, was Breaking Mammoth. It's pretty cool! More articulated than I expected, and with a lot of paint! There's no way to have a Zero-One inside it like last year's Time Mazine, but it's better because of that. Less gappy looking. Nice to have all of Aruto's base forms complete now.
https://64.media.tumblr.com/a3ee06df...9504ce136a.jpg

Next up is the three Trilobite Magia, the Humagear and Ikazuchi. Oh, and I should probably to the bike as well, even if it never gets used in this series. Burning Falcon and Rampage Gatling I'll do once I get to their debuts in the show, and the non Zero-One stuff I'll figure out later!

Those figures look beautiful, I love what you've done!

This figure should have come with a shovel. Because it's ground breaking!

Yes! It must be me, Aruto!

https://i.imgur.com/TKKyTwB.jpg

Also for people wondering about the scale difference of SODO and YUDO

https://i.imgur.com/YfvPNpH.jpg

Got some more figures stickered a couple days ago. The two MBJR bird boys, and the troop builders!
https://64.media.tumblr.com/b5e79198...a2802adfde.jpg
Ikazuchi was pretty sticker intensive, lots of finicky little lines of detail, while Burning Jin was very fun easy to assemble, other than a confusing moment of where exactly the stickers on his head go, which I was able to resolve by looking at a video of someone putting the stickers on. The Humagear and Trilobite Magia were in the middle, a bit finicky at times, but overall not too bad. I'm very glad I was able to get a couple extra Magia from Deepsea's order split, because I messed up a few stickers on the first Magia I did. Not too noticeable, but enough that it would bother me if it was all I had.

I should be getting to the debut of the last Zero-One figure tonight, Rampage Gatling, and after that, I'll have to decide whether to do OOO next, which I'm more interested in, or the Zi-O stuff, since otherwise I'd put it last but I'm not sure I want to end on a low point.

I just realized I have all the necessary riders to do this:


https://i.imgur.com/UDjOSb6.png

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...stake_1_25.jpg

So mistakes were made with Build Genius, so I might just buy a 2nd one to have someone paint, what do you all think of this SODO, should I go through and get a 2nd one?

The Build Genius SO-DO is a punishment from Bandai for liking Kamen Rider Build. Within the restrictions of that cruelty, I think you did a good job!

That said, the stickers are never going to look as good as markers or paint, assuming the painter has every shade that Genius uses. If so, yeah, you may feel better about having one painted up. In the meantime, though, the one you've got is nothing for you to feel bad about.

It's for Bandai to feel bad about.

Okay. I might just roll with this one then

https://order.mandarake.co.jp/order/...d=SODO&lang=en

Also if anyone wants Zi-o Wave 8 featuring Cross-Z Evolt now's your chance

What's wrong with Build Genius? He looks good considering how insane the actual suit is. I'm surprised he has a black neck.

He's just a really finnicky design that requires a lot of very small stickers in very arbitrary places. I'm happy with how my version turned out, but I'm sure I must have lined everything something up a little wrong just from sheer luck of numbers.

Meanwhile, is anyone else having the issue where the boards are just refusing to load an image from Discord? I thought it was just a Deepsea thing, but it happened to day with someone else, and it's getting odd that it's just that one site.

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...08_14_2020.jpg

It is done




I haven't been but that might be because they're my images.

Well I picked up the old Ride Shooter from Kamen Rider Dragon Knight (known as the Advent Cycle there) because I read everywhere that it was scaled for 4" inch figures, which SODO are.

How wrong I was. Scale and size are two very different things! No way a SODO figure is gonna sit in this. Even the smaller SHODO figures have too long of legs.

Oh well at least it kinda looks okay if they stand next to it?

https://i.imgur.com/aRvDrVE.jpg

Congrats! How many boxes and figures was that total? I'm still working though my huge shipment, finished everything Zero-One and got started on Zi-O. Should hopefully be able to finish it soon!

You guys! It is okay to pace yourselves!

I am completely on the other end of the spectrum, where not only have I not even inventoried what I got in from the Deepsea SO-DO Split Of 2020, but I got a shipping notification from Bluefin that my Golden Kuuga guys should be in Tuesday. And I got at least one set of SO-DO sitting at AmiAmi! Maybe 2! And it should be three by the end of this month! And the Accel/Trial/Skull 3-pack is supposed to show up at BBTS this month! I AM DROWNING OVER HERE.

In fact, you know what? Let me go the other way from Deepsea's post and show off the shit I haven't opened yet, to try and generate enough shame (internally or externally) to start actually opening and enjoying these tiny plastic mans.

https://challengerscomics.com/images...o/IMG_2812.jpg

I am exhausted just thinking about trying to type out what's in that photo. If I finish this pile by January I'm going to feel pretty goddamn proud.

I am horrifically jealous of all of you.

I'd love to get a complete series set someday but for now I have neither the money nor the space.

I think it was about 93? My math may be off though. Good luck on your latest stickering binge too!

Edit: Wait I forgot the ride plus sets and AI 5.5 so it's actually closer to 105.


You see Die, the thing is I have had nothing but free time since the whole shelter in place thing, so this was mostly me just filling time.

You on the other hand are a very busy person, so try not to worry too much about stickering up tiny men.

I hope you can find yourself in a space where collecting these becomes more viable!

I mean, it's a little that, but it's also a bigger problem with me?

When I get into collecting something, I tend to go crazy with acquiring, to a degree that I end up having more than I can enjoy. When I was first getting into plastic robot toys, I'd spent a few months getting new figures without opening any, leading to a gigantic pile of boxed figures that completely stressed me out. I ended up returning a bunch to Target, just to stop seeing them at home. Since then, I try to make sure that I open stuff shortly after getting it, so I don't get that anxiety-inducing backlog.

...which is exactly what I've got right now with SO-DO, for almost the exact same reasons. I was so excited to buy stuff, to tick things off a checklist, but now they're just multiplying in a closet somewhere instead of being enjoyed. It's turned something that should be fun into something approaching an obligation.

Like, I need to start opening these things to reduce the pile. But, like, now it feels like a chore. It's not a fun new figure I've just put together, it's a tiny dent in a giant plastic mountain.

I don't know. It's a problem I've always had, and this is just the newest, most recent expression of it. The good news is, I think I'm taking steps to correct it? Talking about it helps. I've decided to not preorder any Saber stuff, so that'll stem the tide a bit. I'm going to try to open at least one box a night, right before bed, and see if that can slowly whittle away at the pile, while still being enjoyable.

I got problems, you guys. Scheduling is one of them, but it ain't the only one.

Hey, don't underestimate how huge it is just to even have that kind of self-awareness! I'm even breaking my proud tradition of merely lurking the merch threads just to tell you this, it's so important. There's actually a bit from that chunk of your Kuuga thread that turned into a Collectors Anonymous meeting that I still think about pretty frequently:

Something about this has really stuck with me as someone only (relatively) casually into amassing pieces of plastic representing IP's I like. Especially where it comes to tokusatsu, which has the unique combination of the hassles of importing meaning I basically don't bother at all, and yet also the fact that years of watching Japanese toy reviewers on YouTube has legitimately played a massive part in learning as much as I have of the language.

I have a passion for toys the same as anything else, but a lot of the way I engage with that is from a distance. SO-DO is pretty much the perfect example. Watching this whole saga of craziness as Bandai effectively doubled the price/quality of the usual candy toy figures for Ex-Aid, decided they would make everything when it turned out to be a success, and then kept adding joints and detail over the years to the point those early Ex-Aid figures compared the newest Chronicle stuff look almost like the Ghost figures compared to those early Ex-Aid figures? Completely fascinating to me! And yet I don't feel compelled to pick any of it up.

Like, and I really hope this doesn't come off like I'm calling you a cautionary tale, which is not at all my intent(!), but seeing some of these conversations, and especially that particular quote from you, has really got me thinking how grateful I kind of am to be in the position I am. Like I can just admire tiny plastic mans from a distance, and that's fun and satisfying and valid in its own way.

Maybe the point is that there's levels? It's okay to not have anything, and it can be just as okay to have ALL the things, if that's feasible enough, but no matter what, it's probably most important to just be honest with yourself and what you really want. Or something. I kind of feel a little bad that the first time I'm engaging with this chunk of the forum immediately turned into a wordy lecture (What do you know? I got problems too!), so hopefully what I'm saying at least makes sense!

I'm okay being a cautionary tale! I hope any of this weird public confession is helpful to someone!

The thing that makes this behavior so endlessly repeatable for me, the New Interest > Buy One > Buy More > Buy Too Many > Reckoning, is that it's fun to buy them. That's the part of my brain that gets me into trouble. Always has, probably always will. I catch it sooner now, and it's never really been anything greater than something that stresses me out (I do not have financial problems because of these behaviors), but it's still something I can't totally compensate for. Like, finding that elusive SO-DO for a good price? Or finding enough stuff for a big Mandarake shipment? That releases chemicals in my brain on the same level as actually having a thing.

Still, eventually it all becomes too much, and then the high wears off or whatever. Getting new things becomes a burden, a frustration. The pendulum swings back, and I can start to get things under control. Like, I still buy plenty of plastic robot toys, but I buy a reasonable ("reasonable") amount, and I make it a point to open them quicker.

Having things... honestly, I don't know if I'd be happier having nothing? Maybe. I see the value of it, the admiring from a distance of it all. I'm that way with Figuarts. I've got strict rules about what I get, and the rest of it is just looking at galleries or hearing what people are excited about. That's plenty for me and that part of the fandom.

I think... I don't know. I think that I'm, overall, doing okay. I don't want these posts to make it sound like SO-DO is ruining my life or anything. I got a backlog, it's a bummer, but it's not the end of the world. It's not a permanent state. I got behaviors that have been with me since I was a kid, and they make collecting... problematic, but it can still be fun if I know my limitations. I don't always, or even often, but it's something I can work on.

I'm sorry if I made this thread uncomfortable! I like these tiny plastic mans! I like all of you! It's okay for you to like tiny plastic mans if that's something that makes you happy! Wheeeeee!

I kinda feel like a broken record saying this again, but whenever this topic comes up I always do feel the need to bring up how important it was for me to question why I want to buy things and how much fun I'll really have with them.

Like, so, for instance. I've got a friend who's super into collecting, and the other day I was talking to him about the few human figures SHF has done like Takeshi Hongou and Ankh. I was thinking about getting one of the Kurotos as it seems INSANELY fun even though it breaks what I'm usually collecting, and he said to me "sometimes it's good to get something completely off the wall like that to break out of the monotony of collecting."

And, the thing is I just didn't get that too much, because I... don't... really feel a monotony?

Now admittedly what I'm about to say does partly come from me not being in the financial situation to just throw money at a toy whenever I feel like it without planning things ahead of time, but just looking at my remaining pre-ordered toys for this year that I've got coming up? SHF Seihou Tajador; FRS Amazing Mighty; SHF Seihou Momotaros; SHF Cross-ZBuild; SHF Geed; SHF Z. All of which were in some way very important characters for me and ones I wanted to focus on above all else -- it's not like I'm picking up SHF Horobi or Ginga Strium on a whim just because I'm capable of it. The way I collect means that every figure is an event for me, because:-

A) They're so far apart anyway; the most I get in a month excluding very exception circumstances is like, maybe 3 figures and those would be cheaper ones like FRSes
B) All of them mean something to me and are ones I've considered over time and know that they're something I really really want

A smaller collection like this also means a smaller shelf display. With a huge collection of figures it's easy for them to blur into each other, but right now my main display area consists of about 9-12 figures which are the main characters of W/OOO/Fourze/Build; then FRS Den-O off to his own at the side; then Ohma Zi-O off to the side again because I'm still so chuffed I won him and he looks goddamn awesome.

Everyone is different and I'm not saying this to say that everyone should follow my example or anything, but if you are feeling that sort of fatigue, I think it is good to step back and consider if this might be good for you.


That said it is of course a very different tale for So-Dos, in large part because they are so cheap and take up so little space! At that point it's really not as bad to pick up a lot of them and lower your standards a bit if you know you'd have fun with them. And to a degree? That's kinda what I want to do! I've been considering my wants when it comes to them, and it comes down to...

- Zi-O's armours of my favourite Riders (OOO, Build, Kuuga, Den-O, Fourze)
- The Another Riders of OOO, Build, Den-O, W and Fourze
- Build SameBike
- Kuuga Mighty
- Trychaser

Some of that is for bigger reasons, some of it is for smaller ones. I want the last two because Kuuga's bike (either of them) is so much more important to the character I feel than most bikes and it'd just be wrong for me to not have a Kuuga on a bike -- aaaand the SHF bikes are ridiculously expensive, so this is my next best bet. After that? I like the idea of having Zi-Os representing my favourites in a nice simple way, and it helps that those are also some of my favourite armours. Similar thing for the Another Riders, who have amazing designs! ... and then SameBike because it's just awesome.

Expanding out from that, I think I'd be happy at some point to pick up other SoDos if I just like them enough! But I would never want it to get to the point of a display that demands a lot of space, y'know? It needs to be tight and compact, otherwise it loses the point of me getting them to begin with -- why did I get Another W in the first place if he's just gonna be in the background, barely visible behind a bunch of Saber dudes? Or the opposite -- if I decide that I don't care for the Saber dudes I picked up on a whim that much and just put them behind some other SoDos, then why did I press add to cart?


And that all comes back to the thing I said before -- that I don't feel a monotony in collecting. I think if you are doing it, each figure you get has to be something that you are excited for on some level. Not necessarily jump-off-your-seat-over-the-moon excited -- it's not even like all the figures I'm getting are incredibly overly important to me! Geed's my favourite Ultra so far and Cross-ZBuild is so important to everything I loved about Build, but then also I'm getting Momotaros because I think he'll be a VERY funny figure even though I already have a Den-O Sword Form, and I'm keeping Ohma Zi-O because I really like looking at him! In a similar vein, I eventually want to pick up Lightning Collection Lord Zedd because he's an awesome design even though he hardly means anything significant to me beyond having a blast with him in a fighting game. But my point is that there has to be something more there than "I've completed Zero-One's collection of forms even though I don't care about most of them", y'know? Because otherwise it's going to start feeling less like a joy and more like a chore.

TBH One of the big reason I collect SO-DO is because I find apply the stickers calming, so I just end up buying a lot to pass the time and focus on something unstressful.

It's worth repeating! That quote from Die is basically just the tl;dr version of everything you said back then that also really resonated with me anyway. I've always been vehemently against the idea of my hobbies becoming a checklist, but there's like a part of me now that I'm not sure was there before that considers that question of "why?" even ignoring ideas like space and cash.

Speaking both purely hypothetically, and entirely personally, I don't think I'd get a lot of satisfaction over having a complete set of every SO-DO figure from one show, for example. Not just for the sake of it. Even shows I utterly adore. If they did Chronicle sets for Ghost, I wouldn't particularly care to have every Rider suit ever from it. But a little display of just Ghost in his forms from the show, I could see myself being genuinely happy to one day have -and for more than five seconds- because I've got a particular passion for that character and those designs, and like how they look together enough that it used to be my sig image.

I really do think making sure every purchase means something to you, even if it only means a little, is just darn good advice. If you read that last bit and go "Fish, what are you talking about I would literally kill someone to have a wall of all 128 OOO forms or whatever", I'm not knocking that kind of passion, either. I just think it's important that you feel like that's what it is. Something exciting, or that relaxes you, or whatever else. A hobby should be a positive thing.

Man I'm having flashbacks to when this topic was brought up in the "How Are You Today?" thread.

Something I wanna add to it now that I didn't think to add back then, since it came up recently with a friend of mine that I was talking about the hobby with: It's okay to cancel pre-orders.

Yes, basically having to pre-order in order to get certain figures certainly sucks, but the upside is that, as time passes, if you end up feeling less passion for a particular release, or you end up not having the money, or you look at your spare space and go "You know another figure would be better off here." Then yeah, cancel it. And then if your passion for the figure/character/whatever is reignited, track it down again at a later date. I've done it before and it's saved me alot of headaches.

Yeah, I feel like, with Build, I felt like I could go all in, and I really liked the forms, but some of them I felt like I grabbed just because "Well, I have the rest, so I need Hedgehog and Firehose mans". Sure, it's resulted in me getting new favourites - SmarphoWolf is very very cool! - but sometimes I do regret it a little, in terms of space. Buyers remorse is a strange thing. I've avoided it since then, like - the only Zi-O stuff I have is the main Riders, a few legend armours of favourite Riders, and the Quartzers, because those designs are cool.

Meanwhile, tonight's blog doesn't have any big reveals, other than a teaser for Saber and his books. Just have this image of Ark-One in exchange!

https://cdn-ak.f.st-hatena.com/image...0812200704.jpg

I'll definitely agree with all this. It's the reason I skipped collecting So-Do during Zi-O, even though I was impressed with the increases in quality of the figures, I didn't want to collect something out of obligation rather than desire. It's also why I decided to stop collecting Lightning Collection other than MMPR, it stopped being fun and ended up feeling like a chore.

Ending on a more positive note, candy toy blog says Saber reveal is next week, and leaves us with a teaser!
https://cdn-ak.f.st-hatena.com/image...0812184642.png

https://challengerscomics.com/images...o/IMG_2815.jpg

Be the Slightly Less-Stressful Amount Of SO-DO you want to see in the world. One box down, a closet left to go.

Special thanks to Bandai for making sure that my first box in a while, chosen at random, was an almost completely joyless chore. Four tiny stickers on both ends of the staff, and six thin strips of stickers for the body of the staff. Unbelievable.

Hmm, there's a slight rounded cut off over Saber's belt which might mean they're adapting the waist swivel from chronicle gaim.

To almost completely counter my last post, I'm suddenly wondering how far Gaim So-Do will go because there is a LOT of stuff in that series that just never got any figure representation. Jam, Idunn, Tyrant, Saver, Black Baron, Yami Gaim, Fifteen, Decade Arms, 1 Arms, Sengoku Duke, the Proto Riders, Fresh Orange Arms...

A lot of that is extremely minor, of course, but So-Do is that sort of toyline, y'know? I could see a lot of people being happy about Fifteen and Sengoku Duke.

Maybe they'll finally be the ones to give us Zangetsu Jimber Melon arms, the most rare of Gaim Arms.

Actually, a couple of those had figures released in the candy toy Arms Action Gaim line back in the day (I even quickly dug up some old photoblog reviews of the sets that included Gaim Yami and 1 Arms to prove it!) , though I don't think anything from a V-Cinema ever got one, since that was before candy toy figures were so successful Bandai would keep releasing Zi-O figures at retail like a full year after Zi-O ended. Things have changed, is the point! Gaim is a popular show! It wouldn't be surprising to see them go crazy given the chance. Especially for Fifteen. That is a design in desperate need of some love.

Using tweezers to apply stickers and then clear coat nail polish to seal them makes these figures feel absolutely incredible. I don't feel like I'm handling cheap toys at all. After coating them, the stickers literally feel and look like details that were painted on.

It takes a little bit of time and steady hands, but it is absolutely worth it. I love this line. If anyone here hasn't done this yet, I absolutely could not recommend it enough.