March 2026 Update - Production Continues, Pledge Manager and more!
4 days ago
– Sat, Mar 28, 2026 at 08:19:27 PM
Howdy folks, we're back again with another project update for you all!
March was an incredibly busy month for us as we attended three different conventions. First, we had a booth at GAMA Expo in Louisville, KY to show off our retail product line for game store owners from across the US and Canada. It was wonderful to meet so many new companies and get them signed up for our wholesale direct program. Both this year and last year we've made large strides towards expanding our business into retail stores and getting the word out about NLM! If you have a favorite local game store you'd like to see carry our products, shoot us an email at [email protected] with their details and we'll reach out to them.
Next up we were at GaryCon the other week in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin (kind of between Chicago and Milwaukee) where we had two booths selling minis to attendees. It was our first time at GaryCon and it won't be our last!
And currently part of the team is at Adepticon in Milwaukee to meet with clients we cast for, pursue new opportunities to work with publishers and game makers, and also having a bit of gaming fun (hey, we gotta get some fun time in!).
Our own personal March Madness will be over after this weekend and then it's back to our usual work full-time again! If we saw you at one of the recent events, it was awesome to meet you and as a heads up we'll be at Origins in June (Columbus, OH) and GenCon in August (Indianapolis). Hopefully we'll see you there!
As you can see, sprues of DC2 minis are rolling out and piling up, ready to be QC'd and clipped. It may not look like a lot in the images, but most of these sprues have 12-16 minis each, so what might look like a tiny pile could actually be a few hundred minis!
Not much to say on this front other than we're still cranking out the minis!
Speaking of cranking out minis, we've got two new releases at our Web Shop for the Acolyte and Town Priest. As always they're available for a special introductory price for about the next month, but if you'd instead like to add them to your existing pledge, you can do so over at the Pledge Manager/Pre-order Store!
As for the Pledge Manager, previously we had said we were going to leave it open until the end of April and for now we're sticking with that plan. So our current plan is to close it up in roughly a month from now. If you haven't completed your pledge survey yet, please have that on your radar. If you haven't received your pledge survey, email us at [email protected] so we can assist you.
We may extend the Pledge Manager as we get closer to the end of April, but for now we are going with our original timeline. But if anything changes we'll let you all know.
Anyway, that's it for this one. As always, thanks for reading and keeping up to date with the project. We'll be back again in April with another one.
Take care and have fun out there!
February 2026 Project Update + News!
about 2 months ago
– Thu, Feb 12, 2026 at 07:41:02 PM
Hello backers and Happy New Year!
Well, it's not quite so 'new' as we're already in February (where does the time go!?). But we're belatedly back with another project update to cover everything Dragon's Cache Vol. 2 and other goings on for Next Level Miniatures. Let's dive in!
We unfortunately started off the year with our production manager slicing one of his fingers quite badly which resulted in needing surgery to repair some nerve damage. Ouch! The good news is he's happily back to full-handedness (is that a word?) after being in a hand cast for a good bit of time.
But we do have a few pictures to share of some production models. First up, we've got a duo of minor demons - the Dretch and one of our Mane variants! These little guys will be quite the nuisance to your adventurers.
Next up we've got the Shadow Demon,which we're experimenting with a new production method for our translucent models that should result in reduced air bubbles and color consistency. We've very excited and pleased with the results so far!
We've had a few questions about the pledge manager and how long it will be open until. Currently our plan is for it to be open through the end of April. As we get closer to that time we may revise the closing date, but we'll be sure to keep you all informed with plenty of lead time before it ends.
Over at our webshop (www.nextlevelminiatures.com) we just released two new models for February - the Constable and Jailer. This pair may or may not be enforcing the law in the most objective or fair manner, so you may want your heroes to steer clear of their path. They're available for a special introductory price, so make sure to snag them while the deal lasts! And don't forget to add some Town Guards or Guard Dogs if you need to beef up the local posse.
Alternatively, if you'd don't need them right away, you can add them to your existing pledge to receive them with the rest of your DC2 haul. Head on over to the pledge manager to do so!
That's going to wrap it up for today. Sorry for the longer than usual gap between updates. We'll be back with another update in early March. Until then, thanks for reading and stay safe!
Dragon's Cache Vol. 2 December Update
3 months ago
– Fri, Dec 19, 2025 at 03:16:53 PM
Hello backers!
Hopefully this update finds you all in jolly spirits this holiday season. We wanted to give a quick update on how things are going with the project.
First topic on the agenda is to let everyone who backed for digital rewards know that you should have received an email from us via MyMiniFactory with a download code link to your rewards. If you haven't received that yet please let us know at [email protected].
If you backed for physical rewards, but decide to back for a digital reward post-today while the pledge manager is still open, just send us an email and we will get you your download code sent over so you don't have to wait until the physical rewards to be done to get that.
Speaking of physical rewards, we're hard at work getting everything mastered, molded and produced (although the massive Black Friday sale we ran crushed us for a few weeks with orders, but we're finally out of the thicket). But for today we wanted to show you all the process of molding/vulcanizing a mini for production!
First we start building the mold with silicone inside our vulcanizing frame. It is vitally important to arrange the masters in the mold as balanced as possible to avoid any production issues down the line caused by plastic flowing unevenly in the mold during injection. We also add in "lock nuts" which help keep the two halves of the mold lined up during injection.
Then, once we have the models laid out we put the top piece of silicone on and seal up the vulcanizing frame and pop it in the vulcanizing press. We set the cook time based on the thickness of the mold and set the temperature (~320F) and start baking!
After it's done, we take the frame out of the press and let it cool off as it is still crazy hot (we've got the burn scars on our forearms to prove it!), but once it is cool enough, we unscrew the frame and pop the mold out. Then we'll separate the two halves of the mold, remove the masters and sprue parts, and cut in a main vacuum channel along with vents to each cavity so that during injection air can be sucked out by the SioCast machine to eliminate air bubbles forming.
Once we've got the mold "cut" (as we call the prior step) and prepped for production, we test run the mold in the SioCast to dial in the production settings for a whole slew of things like injection time, cooling time, pump speed, compaction time, and how hard the machine squeezes the mold during injection and compaction. Once we're done tweaking the settings and getting consistent quality results, we can get the mold into our production schedule.
And lastly, we just added a couple new models to our webshop - Adult and Young Earth Elementals! Grab them now for a special price this month.
Or if you'd rather receive them as part of your pledge rewards, we've added them to the Pledge Manager along with last month's Guard Dogs (Attacking & Standing variants), Giant Eagle and regular ol' Eagle.
Well, that's all for this update. We'll be back in January with more DC2 production news and NLM goings on.
Until then, stay safe, stay warm and have fun. Cheers!
Pledge Manager Open & Backer Surveys Sent!
5 months ago
– Sun, Nov 02, 2025 at 06:33:32 PM
Howdy everyone! We just wanted to pop in with a quick update to let you all know we've just sent out all of the remaining backer surveys. So please check your inboxes so you can get those taken care of.
A note for those who pledged for digital rewards, those will be fulfilled via MyMiniFactory in the coming weeks. However, we still ask that you go ahead and fill out your backer survey in Backerkit.
If anyone has any questions, please let us know at [email protected] and we'll be happy to help with whatever issues there may be.
Thanks again to everyone for your support and we'll be back soon with another update and info on the digital rewards fulfillment.
Pledge Manager & Surveys Coming Soon!
5 months ago
– Wed, Oct 29, 2025 at 07:49:49 PM
Hello hello! We hope this update finds all of you in good spirits (and maybe spooky spirits as well). The pledge manager is about to open and backer surveys are coming to your inbox soon!
We've got the Pledge Manager built out and we've got the green light from Backerkit to send out a "Smoke Test" to ~5% of backers to test and ensure everything is set up correctly before we send out the rest of the surveys. So please keep and eye on your inbox as we're sending those surveys to those randomly selected for the smoke test now.
Assuming there are no issues, and if there are we get them resolved quickly, we'll then be sending the remaining surveys out to everyone in about 48 hours from now.
As a heads up, we've added some of our recent webshop direct minis releases (Baker, Blacksmith, Tortle and Steel Defender) to the pledge manager in case anyone wants to add them to their pledge.
We appreciate your patience while we got all this taken care of. As always, if you have any issues with your backer survey, or anything else, please let us know at [email protected].
Thanks again and we'll be back with another update soon when we fully open the pledge manager and send the full backer survey queue out!
