DX Chogokin VF-171EX Alto - Revival ver. WWM Release

[Mommar]

Interchangeable wings was the least of my worries...

[Lolicon]

This may have been posted before. It looks great with the matte finish. Looks like there's a few markings and paint apps added. Minor stuff. 

Wings look like the same crap swapping mechanism, even if it doesn't come with extra wings. 

[PointBlankSniper]

bandai pls matte teal 😭

[twich]

I am getting this as a pre-order for a Christmas present from my wife, I have never owned a DX VF-171, but I love the design.  This picture of the matte finish, looks fantastic.

Twich

[PointBlankSniper]

In the midst of the YF-21 preorder madness, I noticed amiami had these readily available for preorder, and under msrp at that.

Then I got seduced by this footage:

At the thought of bandai never completing product lines, which means waiting for teal CF being a bad gamble, I buckled.

RIP wallet. 😭 Wasn't planning on stomaching the USD markups for the 21 anyway. Will just have to go on the hunt again near release, or on mandarake afterward. Still have an affordable 19 to hunt for too...

[26662]

3 hours ago, PointBlankSniper said:

In the midst of the YF-21 preorder madness, I noticed amiami had these readily available for preorder, and under msrp at that.

Then I got seduced by this footage:

At the thought of bandai never completing product lines, which means waiting for teal CF being a bad gamble, I buckled.

RIP wallet. 😭 Wasn't planning on stomaching the USD markups for the 21 anyway. Will just have to go on the hunt again near release, or on mandarake afterward. Still have an affordable 19 to hunt for too...

A sexy beast below MSRP?  Don't blame you a bit.

[Angesdad]

HLJ preorder back up again for you to entertain;

VF-171EX Armored Nightmare Plus EX (Alto Saotome Machine) Revival Ver. | HLJ.com

28,000 yen.

Edited January 17 by Angesdad

[Robin-11]

Just got my item in stock notification from Anime Export. I know DHL raised its prices a bit lately...hoperfully shipping won't be so painful... Anyway i hope i will have it in my hands by the end of next week...

[Anasazi37]

3 hours ago, Robin-11 said:

Just got my item in stock notification from Anime Export. I know DHL raised its prices a bit lately...hoperfully shipping won't be so painful... Anyway i hope i will have it in my hands by the end of next week...

Same for me with HLJ. I'm waiting on a few more items to come in stock before I ship, but hopefully within 7-10 days it will be on its way here.

[Lolicon]

Shipped mine by itself since I'm eager to check this bad boy out. DHL was only $36 on top of the unit price of $190, so the whole thing cost me $226. That's pretty comparable to what you can find domestically if you shop around, give or take a few dollars. Really the only real upside from ordering WWM items from Japan is getting it 3 months earlier. (Or you live somewhere without easy access to a good WWM dealer.)

[Sanity is Optional]

Anime Export charged $31.50 for air small packet to California.

DHL was a bit over $40

[MKT]

Some Fighter-only very preliminary comparison pics from William Wong of FB.

He mentions that the joints feel tighter, the triangles look exactly the same design, it doesn’t come with non-hardpoint wings & there are more tampo markings.

From his pics I’m noticing:

1. New ‘no step’ markings on the wings.

2. Both sides wings are now flush against the LERX (hope I’m using the right term), with no varying degrees of gap that plaque the old versions. This issue was a very pet peeve of mine.

3. Is the gun bigger now? Can’t tell if it is or it’s just due to the camera.

Edited January 19 by MKT

[jenius]

Damn, still has the stupid wings. If it just came with the hard point wings attached I would never need to swap them.

[PointBlankSniper]

Anyone know or have a guess at whether surface parcel or air small packet would be cheaper for this box, plus small stuff that amount to approximately 1 hg kit in size and weight?

To my understanding, air small packeet should be cheaper, until it nears the limit and suddenly leapfrogs surface parcel's starting rate, but I can't judge which side of things my order would fall on...

I have ordred with surface right now, Not sure if I should to change to air sp.

[Test_Pilot_2]

$33 bucks for me on air small parcel, just paid it.

[PointBlankSniper]

I think that sounds to be around the range of size tiers where the rates near the end of trading places with surface parcel lol. Not sure if the other stuff in the order will tip things into the upper end rates for air sp.

Maybe I'll wait for invoice and hope amiami lets me change if it does end up cheaper, or at least for same price but faster shipping

[Test_Pilot_2]

To be sure, odds are not in our favor regarding asploding triangles?

[jenius]

Nothing is certain but that was mostly only a problem for the cannon fodder variant.  I'm not expecting it to be an issue.

[kajnrig]

Got a payment request from Amiami. Cheapest shipping was 3160 yen for boat mail, or ~$230 total. I went with air mail for 4860, which cuts down on shipping time by hopefully 2+ months and is only $10 or so more thanks to the exchange rate.

That's $20-50 cheaper than stores stateside (+ tax), which isn't anything to sneeze at.

[MKT]

13 hours ago, jenius said:

Damn, still has the stupid wings. If it just came with the hard point wings attached I would never need to swap them.

I think it comes only with one set of hardpoint wings as default installed.

 

11 hours ago, PointBlankSniper said:

I think that sounds to be around the range of size tiers where the rates near the end of trading places with surface parcel lol. Not sure if the other stuff in the order will tip things into the upper end rates for air sp.

Maybe I'll wait for invoice and hope amiami lets me change if it does end up cheaper, or at least for same price but faster shipping

Amiami does let you change shipping method when they invoice you as the item comes into stock, so you'll be able to judge which shipping is better for you. 
 

Edited January 20 by MKT

[PointBlankSniper]

1 hour ago, kajnrig said:

Got a payment request from Amiami. Cheapest shipping was 3160 yen for boat mail, or ~$230 total. I went with air mail for 4860, which cuts down on shipping time by hopefully 2+ months and is only $10 or so more thanks to the exchange rate.

That's $20-50 cheaper than stores stateside (+ tax), which isn't anything to sneeze at.

If that's the difference, with my other items present, sounds like surface might be the way to go.

1 minute ago, MKT said:

Amiami does let you change shipping method when they invoice you as the item comes into stock, so you'll be able to judge which shipping is better for you. 
 

I realize that now, after what kajnrig said. I keep forgetting which stores let you change these things because they all have different policies and invoicing proceedures. 🤪

[Slave IV]

59 minutes ago, PointBlankSniper said:

If that's the difference, with my other items present, sounds like surface might be the way to go.

I realize that now, after what kajnrig said. I keep forgetting which stores let you change these things because they all have different policies and invoicing proceedures. 🤪

Surface is almost always the way to go. The only time it isn’t is for very small items that cost less to ship small packet so you get it faster and cheaper that way. Saving $10 or more per shipment adds up quick!

[26662]

4 hours ago, kajnrig said:

Got a payment request from Amiami. Cheapest shipping was 3160 yen for boat mail, or ~$230 total. I went with air mail for 4860, which cuts down on shipping time by hopefully 2+ months and is only $10 or so more thanks to the exchange rate.

That's $20-50 cheaper than stores stateside (+ tax), which isn't anything to sneeze at.

Got the same notification, but I only knew to look for it because of your post.  Many thanks!  I went with DHL just to be done with it. 

With shipping rates being what they are, I think 2024 will be my year to shop for sale/clearance items rather than pre-ordering.  I might even try to cancel one or two pre-orders.  [I've had a Gigapower Dinobot pre-ordered since 2022.  TFSource says the figure should be released around March.  We'll see.]

[PointBlankSniper]

7 hours ago, Slave IV said:

Surface is almost always the way to go. The only time it isn’t is for very small items that cost less to ship small packet so you get it faster and cheaper that way. Saving $10 or more per shipment adds up quick!

The thing is, hobby search sent my Max's Durandal as a small packet for just 1800 yen last year. So a "very small" box is apparently enough to stuff a whole valk with super parts in, if retailers actually wanted to be good to other customers, as opposed to treating the couriers. I guess the true cost is paid for by suffering the wait for their PO lottery results though lol

[Angesdad]

14 minutes ago, PointBlankSniper said:

The thing is, hobby search sent my Max's Durandal as a small packet for just 1800 yen last year. So a "very small" box is apparently enough to stuff a whole valk with super parts in,

Clearly someone over at 1999.co.jp made a mistake because no retailers I've dealt with will ship a Max 29 for 1,800 yen jammed in a small packet. I'm all penny pinching when it comes down to shipping charges but there is such thing as having enough room/protection for your expensive toy in an ample size box, and you pay for that.

[Anasazi37]

7 hours ago, Slave IV said:

Surface is almost always the way to go. The only time it isn’t is for very small items that cost less to ship small packet so you get it faster and cheaper that way. Saving $10 or more per shipment adds up quick!

You also have to hope that the store packs your item well enough to survive the long trip, or at least be okay with some item box damage in exchange for the lower shipping cost. The more time your item is in transit, the higher the probability that something will happen to it. DHL nearly destroyed my VF-25 Alto Full Set Pack, so even express couriers have problems (especially DHL), but my experience with Surface hasn't been great. If your item ends up in a bad position in the shipping container, with many heavier packages on top of it, and stays that way for 2-3 months, it might get crushed unless it's packed well. The few times I've used Surface, as an experiment, the shipping boxes arrived in bad shape, and there was some inner box damage. I know that you've had consistently good luck with Surface, and I tried using it based on your good luck and recommendation, but it hasn't worked out for me.

Reputable stores like HLJ, AmiAmi, and AE do pack well, which gives your item a good shot at arriving safely via Surface. Amazon Japan sucks for international shipping, or even just domestic shipping to a package forwarding service so you can use Surface instead of DHL (helpful for large and/or heavy items). There's always item box damage, bent pages on books, etc. because Amazon just tosses stuff in boxes or bags, loose. Little to no packing material. Speaking of package forwarding services, Tenso and Blackship pack well, but you generally have to pay extra for the service. It's worth the few extra dollars to make the box bomb-proof, though.

[MKT]

9 hours ago, PointBlankSniper said:

I realize that now, after what kajnrig said. I keep forgetting which stores let you change these things because they all have different policies and invoicing proceedures. 🤪

If Amiami hasn't invoiced you yet, then just for a quick exercise I looked up the size and weight of the new VF-171 box on HLJ. Surprisingly despite a more substantial Super Parts count, the VF-171 item package is the same size length & width wise, but 2cm thinner and sightly lighter than Max's YF-29. Max's box dimensions are at the size where Hobby Search would have used the biggest box allowable for Small Packet, so you could probably sort of estimate by size alone if the additional items in your current order at Amiami would be able to fit into Small Packet.

Additionally, Small Packets have a total weight limit of 2kg. The VF-171 published weight at HLJ is 1210g. The biggest carton box allowable for Small Packet, plus packing materials usually weights around 600g. So that puts the weight margin left for any additional items at <200g, so if they are more than this, Small Packet option would not be available.

[Lolicon]

IIRC there was only a difference of like 900 yen between surface and DHL for my 171 from HLJ.

For a difference of only $6 I'd rather have my item 2-3 months sooner and not battered over a long sea voyage. Plus I'm eager to fix up the 171. I never got around to working on the originals and now I have the improved matte finish version to fiddle with.

[Slave IV]

1 hour ago, Angesdad said:

Clearly someone over at 1999.co.jp made a mistake because no retailers I've dealt with will ship a Max 29 for 1,800 yen jammed in a small packet. I'm all penny pinching when it comes down to shipping charges but there is such thing as having enough room/protection for your expensive toy in an ample size box, and you pay for that.

I’ve had some cases where I think the shop messed up and charged a lot less than they should have and there are also times when they have promotions (especially HLJ) so I always go through the options and pick the cheapest. 

1 hour ago, Anasazi37 said:

You also have to hope that the store packs your item well enough to survive the long trip, or at least be okay with some item box damage in exchange for the lower shipping cost. The more time your item is in transit, the higher the probability that something will happen to it. DHL nearly destroyed my VF-25 Alto Full Set Pack, so even express couriers have problems (especially DHL), but my experience with Surface hasn't been great. If your item ends up in a bad position in the shipping container, with many heavier packages on top of it, and stays that way for 2-3 months, it might get crushed unless it's packed well. The few times I've used Surface, as an experiment, the shipping boxes arrived in bad shape, and there was some inner box damage. I know that you've had consistently good luck with Surface, and I tried using it based on your good luck and recommendation, but it hasn't worked out for me.

Reputable stores like HLJ, AmiAmi, and AE do pack well, which gives your item a good shot at arriving safely via Surface. Amazon Japan sucks for international shipping, or even just domestic shipping to a package forwarding service so you can use Surface instead of DHL (helpful for large and/or heavy items). There's always item box damage, bent pages on books, etc. because Amazon just tosses stuff in boxes or bags, loose. Little to no packing material. Speaking of package forwarding services, Tenso and Blackship pack well, but you generally have to pay extra for the service. It's worth the few extra dollars to make the box bomb-proof, though.

Yeah, I think this is a YMMV situation and depending on where you live and especially your local carriers, different options might not work out. Either way, I suspect most the damage is coming after the items arrives on shore because I happen to have pretty good local carriers and I have rarely received a damaged package. I probably use surface shipping more than anyone here so if the journey across the sea was the issue, I surely would have come across a lot more damaged packages. It makes sense to assume though because the longer it takes, the more chance of something going wrong but on the ship, we’re talking 2-3 months where it is safely tucked away with no one touching it. It’s when it gets into people’s hands again is when you need to worry. 

[Angesdad]

2 hours ago, Lolicon said:

IIRC there was only a difference of like 900 yen between surface and DHL for my 171 from HLJ.

For a difference of only $6 I'd rather have my item 2-3 months sooner and not battered over a long sea voyage. Plus I'm eager to fix up the 171. I never got around to working on the originals and now I have the improved matte finish version to fiddle with.

Quite excited to get a 171 for the first time and mine's in HLJ PW currently. The problem is I've ordered a HG YF-21 with it last September but my order isn't being processed as timely as I'd like...what the kit's now on backorder?! Has anyone managed to get one in your PW yet.

[Sanity is Optional]

5 hours ago, Lolicon said:

IIRC there was only a difference of like 900 yen between surface and DHL for my 171 from HLJ.

For a difference of only $6 I'd rather have my item 2-3 months sooner and not battered over a long sea voyage. Plus I'm eager to fix up the 171. I never got around to working on the originals and now I have the improved matte finish version to fiddle with.

Also worth mentioning there is an insurance upper limit for surface shipments.

[Mommar]

God, that matte white looks so much better.

[treatment]

Bandai really luvs bendy soft antenna again?

https://twitter.com/febrral/status/1748695800350437669

web-translated snap:

 

 

 

 

 

[treatment]

heppoko just tweeted lots pics from his page.

Sample:

https://twitter.com/simsim5479/status/1748939091679551758

web-translated snap:

[treatment]

No yt-reviews found, yet, and not sure if Hacchaka will bother, but here's Valkyrie-Hangar blog with his pictorial-review:

https://valkyrie-hanger.sakura.ne.jp/blog/detail/252

web-translated snapshot sample: