Hi and welcome! Hope you enjoy GH though it has been pretty slow these days compare to its hey days. I wonder where is everyone? Discord??

Hmmmm, recently I rebuilt my fjell with mx blacks and alu plate to switch up my plateless build with nk creams that I had been running for a long time (it was the initial build for the board) and it's weird cause I don't think I'm typing on it that hard (or at least typing the same hardness) but it definitely feels harder overall cause of how much stiffer the alu plate is compared without a plate. However, I feel like the blacks makes less of an impact when I type as well, which is weird. This is 100% because the creams are long pole and the blacks are not but still important to note.

Also I think the plateless build was why I thought the hhkb plate was metal and not the abs it is because typing on this compared to the hhkb it's very apparent that it's a plastic plate and the mounting is what makes it a lot harder when I type compared to like a PC board.

Have you guys seen MTNU Rascals IC?

While I understand that minimizing risk makes sense for new product development, investing in molds for a layout that represents under 10% of the customer base may not be the best start. If it goes poorly the total loss would be within an order of magnitude of a full base kit.

You should have analytics on hand to see the the actual target market for 40% buyers - consider a fully developed full size base kit if you're serious about the project (I think its great)

just my dos pesos