I agree with the pre-order thinggy. Been an advocate about it from the start.
Im neutral about kickstarter though but if it could help NN financially then heck, why not. Frontwing is not a good model though, as they have been CONSISTENTLY going back against their words and promises in terms of delivery.
Physical release comes with a lot of commitment, added risk as well as financial costs so it makes sense to have some sort of funding. But instead of purely looking from financial perspective, you should consider the reputational and operational risk as well in the event the kickstarter runs into a bump.
If it's up to the extent that this added work (i.e. Kickstarter commotion) will affect the release/delay of other on-going projects, I'm gonna go against the release of Physical goods and would suggest to stick to Downloadable content only. Not worth the reputational risk for a small company like NN Imo.
You guys will have to run your own Risk Analysis on this.
TL;Dr I'm in with whatever NN decides but do hope you guys think thrice before venturing into crowdfunding, whether the benefits outweigh the risk.