#(i took a hiatus from irl play for a bit but now that the thing causing my break is over c:)

[bunnyboy-juice]

i wish i could bring all my kinky online pals together to my area to go to a play party i am part of cause i just know so many of them would LOVEEE it and I'd love the chance to regularly play with my pals also but alas. distance.

[darkkitty1208]

The past few weeks before I finally returned from my unofficial hiatus, I've lost a lot of my motivation to write and anything to do with being part of the fandom as a whole. I contemplated quitting and never returning again, deleting all my works and socials and any other trace of me anyone could find, but I know that it's just the anxiety talking and my brain playing tricks with me due to IRL stress and that logically, I *do* have a place here in the fandom space. So I held back.

Now that I'm here again -- and have been welcomed very warmly by dear friends -- the urge to create has finally come around again and I want to get back into writing. It's just that, god, I feel very rusty. It's been quite a while and I feel like the words have run away from me after not using them for so long. I look into my mostly-abandoned WIPs and I can't find the right way to continue them.

But despite that, I decided to do a bit of the good ol' self-projecting and started a WIP (instead of finishing my old ones, lol). It's not much, but it's something. I felt compelled to share in hopes it would motivate me to write some more. This is all I've got so far, and it is admittedly very rough, but it's getting there.

~

Here’s the thing: healing isn't linear.

These are words repeated over and over again by those who you wouldn't think ever even had to heal. They're the kind of words that would lose its meaning the more they're said, and have you start wondering if to some people, they ever had any sort of meaning to begin with.

You can never really tell where it starts or where it finishes, or how it happened or if it ever did happen, the same way the flawed five stages of grief could never explain the true act of mourning and the same way your every emotion defies anything your logic could ever tell you.

Sometimes, Stephen finds, some things are just unexplainable like that.

Sometimes, Stephen doesn't think he's capable of healing. Sometimes, especially in nights where every bit of his sanity starts to fall apart and each choking breath would sting as it enters his damned lungs, he thinks he's too far gone to be capable of it at all.

(Sometimes he would sit silently and stare into nothing, thinking about the way nobody would understand that at some point in his life, he wasn't the man he used to be anymore. Sometimes he could feel it, the thing that consumed him, that took away who he was, and the way it would take up every space in his ribcage and burn his insides like acid, the way it would rip apart the space in his chest where his heart used to be. Sometimes he would think about it, and the way that it makes him nothing but an empty shell of a man. Every day that thing would grow inside of him and one day, it might ruin him; as if he isn't already far too broken to begin with.)

But it's here, in the roof of a sentient building he's grown to call his home where various pots are neatly arranged in small shelves, with his trembling fingers digging into rich soil and dirt sticking underneath his fingernails, that he starts to find proof that maybe, he had the capability after all.

It's here that he understands why humans would pick up a trowel and spend so much time getting on their hands and knees to dirty themselves with grimes of dirt.

There's something about the green of the Earth and the smell of her moist dirt in the early mornings, damp from the moon's tears, that soothes a part of him that he couldn't quite identify. There's something comforting about the mindless action of digging and burying and placing and watering. There's something comforting about knowing that his damaged fingers could sprout life even if it all depended on time.

But that's the thing, isn't it? Everything is just a matter of time.

(Sometimes he wishes healing isn't linear, the way he wishes time doesn't march on an ascending line.)

He remembers the same damp smell of moss and the same smudges of dirt on the knees of his trousers back then, the first time he was taught about gardening and farming and sprouting life from seeds.

He had still been a small boy in Nebraska, back then. He had been young, and he had never understood patience the way he does now. He didn't understand that what he planted was something that, if anything, was considered a miracle, and that miracles took time, and that miracles don't last forever. He didn't understand that life and decay is just a matter of time, and that everything including himself would eventually be nothing but rotting flesh and cracked bones, becoming one with the earth and consumed by the maggots and mushrooms.

Because that's the thing: everything is just a matter of time.

The experience had meant nothing to him then, and had taught him nothing much of anything at all, but it means something to him now.

[blairsanne]

Writing Questions Tag Game:

Thanks for tagging me @residentdormouse ♥

What is your absolute all-time favorite idea you’ve ever had?

Um, so the two favourite ideas of mine are not things I can link you to because the first one, which is a faerie story about (among other characters) the fae prince of Winter, is a story I'm writing (I guess it's on hiatus) with my irl bff and it's not finished or available to the public. I don't know how much I should share tbh, but I love all the characters and the world we've built so much.

The other is just my special daydream OC character whose story I will never actually write because it's a mashup of various fandom lores and very complicated and while fun to daydream doesn't sound fun to write. She's a priestess who gets murdered on the altar of her world's gods by her bff and they revive her to kill him (he was a priest who took the power of the gods and then proceeded to basically demolish the world around him). She does so, but is essentially left alone in her world and becomes a guardian of sorts. Her role is to link herself to one person (anchor) in every one of the worlds/dimensions/realities that the collection of souls her gods watch over reincarnate into. She can call on power from the other realities to protect them from outside threats (basically, if the gods were creator beings, there are destroyer beings who want to devour the souls/realities). She ends up being kind of a tragic character though, since she's stuck between a bunch of "lives" so to speak and beholden to different people in different worlds but never able to settle down and be done. She keeps getting revived by the gods when she dies (with all her memories, instead of reincarnating), and she struggles with grief. Why is this my favourite idea? IDK but I keep thinking about it.

Is there a question you’ve been asked in the past that really stands out to you and you still think about sometimes?

Well one time someone on anon complained that I wrote a self-indulgent mary sue oc into my fanfic and asked "who asked for [that]". To which I replied that I did. Because, you know, I write shit for myself first. As a fun hobby. I'm in no way saying that I write anything great, and if you think my writing is cringe, like, okay, you're right? Die mad about it, I guess? Get a life? Idk. I'm just having fun playing pretend with these fictional worlds.

What is your favorite part of being a writer?

Re-reading finished things because I write the type of stories I like to read, so it's really satisfying to get to reread them later. Close second is when someone else likes what I've written, that's pretty cool. ♥

What parts could you take or leave?

The agony of the time between posting something online and that first bit of feedback on it. Now that I actually have people looking at my stuff there's a little bit of like "well I hope at least one person does end up reading and enjoying this" and like... if not then it feels like why bother posting it online? (Honestly I started posting my BWOC fic in 2013 just so my irl bff could read it. I started posting my newer fics on tumblr in 2021 just so I'd move on and finish the missing parts of the story I had been writing... which hasn't worked, in case anyone wondered haha.)

What is your greatest motivation to write/create?

I am constantly coming up with stories in my head. There's something about writing them down and crafting them into something I can read again later that lets me put them down, if that makes sense. Like a brain dump. I don't need to remember just how that scene went or why that was happening in this plot, because it's written down now. I can revisit it later if I like. Or never.

Second-biggest motivation is when I'm writing a fic with someone else in mind, like a request or gift, or for an event, or just something I know that one person in particular will like. In the hopes I contribute something good to their day. (Even if it's smut.)

What do you wish you knew when you were first starting out writing?

I've honestly been writing since I was a child, so I wish I could tell you. XD

What I would say to someone new to writing is this: You get better at every skill by doing it. So, if you want to write, you're better off writing a ton of stories, badly at first and reworking, refining, revising, etc. than to wait until you're "good enough" to write the story you want to write. You can always write a version two or twenty-five, months or years later. Done is better than perfect, and shitty-first-drafts are better than forgotten ideas.

What is your favorite story you’ve written TO COMPLETION? Link it if you’d like and can!

Probably Homecoming, a smut-fic for Bofur in the Durin's Garage AU. Mostly because I haven't written most of my stories to completion, but also I love that fic.

What is your favorite out-of-the-box quote?

"If anyone can do it, so can you."

Which of your characters would you say has the most controversial mindset? Why do you say so and how do you personally feel about their ideals?

In one of my original fiction stories, one of the characters is an emperor who is basically taking over the world bit by bit, and has zero remorse about it. He believes that nobody can love him (for good reason unrelated to his status/warring) and has decided not to love anyone or anything either. At one point, frustrated with how passive his stolen fiancee is, he orders his brother to strangle her to death in front of him and then gets mad at her when she doesn't fight back (he orders the brother to stop, it was just like... a test?). He's very aggressive and believes that everyone only looks out for themselves, etc. so he does the same. (So her passivity sort of challenges him in a way. It's complicated.) It think it's a very toxic but easy-to-fall into worldview when someone thinks that the world is cruel to them, to decide to be cruel back. That's probably the most controversial mindset of my OCs, but that's sort of the point. Obviously I think he's wrong, and eventually things happen to change him.

If you, when you first started writing, met you now, what would younger you think?

She'd probably be confused why we stopped doing forum-RPing and be completely amazed that a single stranger anywhere in the world had read and enjoyed something we wrote all on our own. Honestly I think little me would think I was pretty cool and living the dream. Maybe I should remind myself that more often.

I really value the community in fandom spaces, which I think is why fanfiction is so appealing. We all get to play with the same dolls in different ways and go "ah yes, that's a cool way you played" and learn from each other and grow, and it's all around a shared love of stories. Storytelling is how humans make sense of the world, and community is what makes life feel like it has meaning to me. So this is a pretty cool place to be.

No pressure tags: @laurfilijames @i-did-not-mean-to @i-am-still-bb @silvermoon-scrolls @sotwk @middleearthpixie @sketch-and-write-lover @enchantzz @lordoftherazzles and OPEN TAG to anyone who wants to do it. :)

[umbravirtus]

Hello and Welcome! I’m Alex (he/him), a 35+ writer who’s been on the RP scene since 2013. English isn’t my first language, so you might see the occasional typo or a sprinkle of Spanish in my posts. I also use AI tools for grammar and syntax, so if that’s not your thing, I completely understand if you decide not to follow or interact.

This is a sideblog. Follows/Likes from: @umbravorago.

Canon divergent and heavily headcanon/fanon based:

🔹 Hans Westergaard (Frozen Franchise) That one prince who tried to speedrun royalty through villainy and is now stuck on the "redemption arc" DLC. umbravirtus – Virtue in the Shadows. (Or at least, he's trying.)

A study in:

The youngest son of thirteen, raised in a house of lions where the only law was survival. Strength was currency, weakness was exile, and love—if it existed—was conditional, fleeting, or cruel. The Westergaard name was a cage built on the backs of its own, a legacy where sons were pitted against each other like beasts in an arena. "Westergaards are lions, not mice." A lesson carved into his bones long before he could ever fight back.

But what happens to the cub no one bets on? The one deemed too meek, too small, too insignificant to matter? Some fall in line. Some break. And some—desperate, cunning, furious—decide to rewrite the rules of the game.

Hans took destiny into his own hands and got it wrong. Terribly, unforgivably wrong. He played the villain because the world had never let him be anything else. But even the coldest snow melts, and the weight of past sins lingers heavier than a crown ever could.

A story of cycles: of abuse, of ambition, of the desperate need to matter. The prince who stole his future, lost everything, and now has to decide if redemption is a battle worth fighting—or just another throne too far out of reach.

Rules, Thread Tracker, About me, etc. under the cut.

About me

Proudly Mexican, Trans, AuDHD, and LPA. Living outside the U.S. I’m here strictly for RP and positive vibes—no politics, drama, just good times. I won’t tolerate any anon hate, negativity, or toxicity—this is a safe space where I’m here to have fun and create stories with like-minded people. If that’s your vibe, we’ll get along great!

RP Preferences I like to start with small, spontaneous interactions to test out character chemistry. If things click, I’m all in and love longer, more involved threads.

Dash Shenanigans & Crack: Encouraged! Bring on the banter and ridiculousness.

Content Warnings Dark themes may appear and will be tagged as tw trigger. This blog is DDDNE—if it’s tagged, it’s there for a reason.

Contact & Private RP Discord is available upon request after a bit of OOC bonding.

Thread & Following Management I cap my active threads at 50 to keep things fun and manageable. If a thread hasn’t seen a reply in a month, I will archive it, or untrack if interests shift. This isn’t personal—everyone has their own pace and priorities. If you’re on hiatus or want to replot or revive something, just let me know!

To help me plan, a heads-up on availability is always appreciated. I soft-block mutuals I haven’t interacted with for a while just to keep my dash fresh. If we’ve drifted but you’d like to reconnect, you’re welcome anytime! Also needless to say I am NOT MUTUALS ONLY everyone is welcome to interact.

Rules

Please like this post to confirm you’ve read it.

I enjoy mature and dark content; this blog is DDDNE.

I am sex-positive, if that content bothers you, Block me.

Mun and muses are of age. MINORS DNI

Mun ≠ Muse, Don't god-mod, Don't Meta-game. Etc.

I've got no triggers and I tag everything as tw trigger

Based on past IRL unfortunate experiences, I avoid pregnancy or children-based roleplay. Exceptions are made on a case by case scenario and upon talking it with the respective mun.

Likewise, based on IRL unfortunate experience I no longer feel comfortable RPING SMUT, so you won't be seeing much of that in this blog. I am open to it on more private settings like discord. If you're uncomfortable with discord we can simply fade to black if the plot goes in that direction.

I ship chemistry. We can plot but if the chemistry isn't there, sorry.

Each interaction exists in a unique verse unless all parties agree otherwise. Special partners will be referenced in my muses’ story arcs. I've had partners in the past insert muses on verses without consent so this is an automatic hard block for me.

Purity police, you're not welcome here.

Virtue signaling doesn't fly with me and will likely get you blocked.

We won't get along if you feel like people are nasty for enjoying fictional, legal, and not-real content.

I am proud to be Proship. Helsa was the problematic ship in my fandom way back then, and I stood by it when people cared. I will stand by the right of people to ship what they ship, as long as it's legal and fictional.

[cisthehuman]

Cis Rambles: 10--The Future of Streaming~

It's not a goodbye! It's a 'See You When I See You' type of deal.

Trigger Warnings: Family Tragedy, Self Harm, Suicidal Thoughts (while I don't go into great detail about these thing, they are mentioned)

To explain myself and how I've been feeling, we should talk about why I started streaming in the first place.

I've said it a few times on stream, and possibly on here in a post, but I started streaming a few months after my dad suddenly passed. At that time, I was thinking 'Oh shit, we really don't have long to live. I need to do stuff I've been wanting to do before I kick the bucket too!'. At the same time, I've withdrawn from my friends a bit at the time, and I wanted streaming to be a thing to show them I'm okay and hanging in there.

And not everyone will understand the pain and energy it takes to grieve. It's been three years now and it still sucks ass, but it was even worse during those first few months when the wounds were very fresh. I don't even remember those months now as it's blocked it out of my memory. On top of navigating this new normal without my father, I went to graduate school which required even more energy and time. And to make matters even more confusing I was beginning to experience my first symptoms of PCOS which made my mental and physical health even worse.

I'm unfortunately not a stranger to poor mental health. I've considered cutting my time on this planet short enough times to know that I have to take extreme care of myself to be strong enough to fight off these thoughts. The stress of taking up some of my father's responsibilities, dealing with loss, school (which then turned into work stress when I got employed), and the ups and downs of chronic illness made me very weak to find happiness and enjoy my hobbies.

Now, don't get me wrong--streaming positively affected me during this time. I was able to do some streams with my irl friends, meet new people, and experience new stories/games that I never considered playing. The highlights was playing Our Life. The small group that amassed during that time was very fun. It made me feel lighter and brighter! And in the future when the sequel comes out, you bet your bottom dollar I'll be streaming it!

Tangent aside, while streaming was fun and did give me something new to do, I became a bit too ambitious with it. That is all on me. I started trying to make this into my third job and the two that I have take up a lot of my time. I started to bite off a bit too much than I could chew. I wanted to make a big overarching story for my streams and make all of these cool things for it...and with my limited energy I usually missed my self imposed deadlines which would make me very upset and feel even worse for myself. On top of that my lovely (but fairly cheap) set up would sometimes make streaming impossible, which added unnecessary pressure. I would think the small viewership I had would forget me, I could never get this to take off, all of this was for nothing.

That was when I realized I lost sight of what I was doing with streaming. I forgot that my original goal was just to sit around and have fun, whether no one or several people showed up. It was something I wanted to do to just relax. Instead I turned it into something I avoided.

I needed to take a step back. I took a small vacation from my job and truly sat around and did nothing. It was the first time in the last three years that I just enjoyed being alive. It was a sobering experience for me as I realized that I also haven't fully processed all of my grief and traumas. Resting also helped me get more energy to feel more present with people I care about and be more mindful of what I was doing healthwise.

This brings us to now! Streaming is going on an indefinite hiatus. There may be times where I randomly have one, but I won't stick to a particular schedule. I need more time to myself to get to a place where I'm mentally and physically able to bring streaming in as a bigger piece of my life. I've been in this place mentally before, and instead of giving myself time, I ruined things for myself and wasn't the best person to other people. That's a scar I'll keep, but I'd like to be better this time around!

So yeah! If you made it through this half planned/half stream of consciousness, thank you! Like I said, it's not a I'm completely gone type of thing. I just need to rest properly. I like putting my whole self into things, and I just don't have enough 'me' to put into this sadly. But don't worry! I'll still pop up with things! I'll still make posts on here as well!

One day, CisLunar will be back and ready to roll!

[brckensocietyarch]

pinned post (last update 28.12.23) 

hello my beautiful lovelies! i’m zoe (she/they, 26) the writer of brckensociety!

this post is for quick links for mobile users along with updates relating to me and what’s going on irl and on the blog! hope you’re having a great day and i look forward to any interactions we may have! note: please read rules before interacting or messaging me. i do not rp anywhere but tumblr. I DO NOT RP ON DISCORD. also, i primarily use the beta editor primarily now, sadly tumblr has cut me off from using legacy even just for reblogs and not posting.

quick links

muses (mobile version) | rules | wanted opposites | open starters

scream muses!

just wanted to add a note here for all to see, my scream ocs and headcanon muses have been added and for obvious reasons i’ve aged them up, so everything goes down in college instead of high school. note: in threads these muses can die, etc, but nothing is permanent for them xx.

f/f threads:

atm my muse for f/f threads is a little rough. like i have about 5-10% of muse for them. so those replies will be slow. all m/f threads will likely get quicker responses (with both my male and female muses). if we have f/f threads and m/f threads i will reply to both at the same times or one after the one if they are queued. so yeah, replies will take longer, sorry y'all. on top of this please read this post along with my rules if you want to interact with this blog.

life/blog updates

currently this blog is on a fluctuating semi-hiatus due to my mental and physical health being very up and down (and super unpredictable). i will be getting on as often as i feel capable, some days will be better than others but i may take longer to reply than normal and may disappear for multiple days at a time! if you want to drop a thread because of waiting or whatever just let me know. also, if i haven’t replied for 2+ weeks and i’ve been active feel free to check up with me on if i saw the thread with tumblr hiding replies and all, but firstly, check my rules, specifically the 2 week hold rule as that could be the reason i haven’t responded to specific friends. update 28.8.23: my brain disorder is playing up again and making my brain fog worse, so activity will be all over the place and it’s likely i may prioritise threads that i have higher muse for when my brain is feeling up to replying and all. please, be patient and if you want to drop threads just tell me. it sucks when i push myself to reply and never get a response because mine took too long. just tell me so i don’t waste my time. for a detailed update of the situation go to this post here. (don’t feel obligated to, but fi you want to understand to some deeper extent what kind of shit show is going on, read the post). update 28.12.23: this blog with remain on somewhat semi-hiatus for the next little while, the new year starts off with a lot of things happening socially for me, including my birthday and on top of that my pain is still flaring and i’ve started a new drug that is going to make things a little hard for a bit. hopefully when things start to settle and i see my pain specialist i’ll be able to be more active regularly again.

[cheeseburgerbuan]

wanted to make a little blog post documenting some real life going ons and things i've been playing/watching! :o

Truthfully not much going on IRL for me as it is too cold to do anything 🥴 I keep saying the moment it gets hot here I'll be up early and take advantage of good weather like I'm not going to run back inside to an AC-chilled room the moment I start sweating too much LOL Also took a brief hiatus from the gym just to focus on some life/hobby stuff after work, still been going good with my dieting so it's not a big issue. So besides that, really not much going on. Been slacking on making art lately but trying to work on something atm. In regards to stuff I've been indulging in lately: Games:

FFXIV: 6.1 dropped so I've been having fun with the game again after a brief break. I've been enjoying the PVP revamp to an extent, sadly not enough to grind for the Garo mounts sorry LOL Sailers also did some Endsinger EX and that was a lot of fun! Current goal is to get a clear from that and go back to leveling crafters.

NEO: The World Ends With You: I started this one about... a month ago now, I wanna say? I've absolutely been loving everything about this game so far and am always listening to the OST on my way to work everyday LOL Probably about more than halfway done with the game and if postgame stuff isn't too annoying to go through maybe I'll do it right after... or just save it for an NG+ run in the future. But I'm having a blast for sure right now.

Twisted Wonderland: I'm only mentioning this because lately I fall off of gachas really quickly. The moment leveling units starts to feel like work the uninstall is inevitable. However, since the game is really more a card collector visual novel where stats don't matter, I don't feel nearly as stressed to do shit. It's nice. My plans after NTWEWY are to either pick up Kirby or start DQXI which has been on the backburner for a while but it'll most likely be Kirby. I need a bit of a JRPG break after this lol Shows/Channels I've been watching:

The Ultimatum: What can I fucking say about this honestly?? You are not immune to watching straight people be messy as shit on one of these trash tv shows. I fucking love it.

Rilakkuma and Kaoru: Already seen this one when it came out, but gave it a light re-watch as background noise while doing some drawing last night. I'm still mad they'll never make more of this, it still warms my heart as much as the first time I watched it.

I Will Always Travel For Food: If you are familiar with TabiEats (foodie vlog channel run by two Japanese dudes named Shinichi and Satoshi), you'll also probably know this one? It's a side channel run by Shinichi where he doesn't talk and just quietly shows stuff and adds commentary through subtitles. I watch his other two channels where he tends to talk (not that I have an issue with that LMAO) it's just that I tend to prefer the ASMR on it and reading the subs. If you like Japanese food and restaurants (and are also possibly trying to fill the niche of not being able to go to Japan rn), I recommend this! The Ultimatum is giving me a 90 day Fiance itch again so that feels like something that I'll be watching sometime soon LOL And that's pretty much what I've been into as of late 😤

[risrielthron]

Who We Were

This took a good long while because there was a retcon in November of 2015 that kinda forced Risri into hiatus. When I brought her back for the paper in 2016, some details changed but still this was an eye-opening exercise of how I’ve grown as both an RPer and a writer. Anything that does not have brackets is the same.

Take a trip down memory lane, pull up the oldest ‘about’ post you can find for your character, and annotate what has changed and what has stayed the same in {Curly brackets}. 

(I borrowed this from @alyssa-ward​​ because what a cool exercise)

Originally posted October 4, 2015

Character’s full name: Risri Elthron Reason or meaning of name:  combination of Mother's best friend's name (still alive) and her mother's sister who died - Rislana (best friend) and Kiari (sister). The Elthron family have mostly played a back seat in the history of the Kaldorei. {Both of these origins have kind of changed. Risri’s name became a place that her parents named her after, something that was important to her father’s family in an RP with her aunt. The last name Elthron was chosen by Risri during her exile her original family name is Kal’serrar.} Character’s nickname:  Ris Reason for nickname: just a short form of Risri

Physical appearance

Age: 403 {she has aged 1 rl year each year since 2015 she is currently 408 years old} How old does he/she appear: to a human about 20ish {I actually think now she probably seems a little older to people) Weight: We don't ask ladies this! Though she looks healthy and toned. {I figure she’s whatever the average weight is for female elves} Height: Average for a Kaldorei {This has changed a bit. I have her just a tad shorter than Dragaur in human form so she’s 6’2” which apparently is short for an elf} Body build: She's not a body builder but her activities keep her in shape. Shape of face: Typical Kaldorei {She did not have a face claim at the time nor did she have art.  Her face looks like this art the most.}

Eye color: White {I list it as silver now} Glasses or contacts: none Skin tone: light purplish Distinguishing marks: Claw tattoo (gained during her Druid initiation ceremony) Hair color: Purple Type of hair: Long Hairstyle: up in a ponytail or straight down her back {when I first made Risri I had her in the pigtail hair style. I quickly didnt like how it looks and changed it to the long style she sports now. It has not changed since} Voice: typically soft {I imagine her voice and accent a bit like Gal Gadot’s natural voice} Overall attractiveness: again not really caught up in her appearance so someone may need to tell her and even then she will more than likely blush and stammer a thank you. {This has changed so so much from when I first created her.  She knows she is lovely and she will probably think you want something from her if you flatter her appearance.} Physical disabilities: none Usual fashion of dress: For events: dresses...she has discovered she likes pretty pretty dresses.  For class: simple black pants and a simple shirt  {So this too has changed from when I first created her.  She aims for comfort and style. She most often will be found in one of these} Favorite outfit: Dresses, she found a lovely gold and white dress that has become her favorite {I dont even know what dress this was but Im sure it was something from my early days on wra-I would say her favorite outfit is probably one of the ones above} Jewelry or accessories: She wears a button on a string around her neck. She fondles it every so often. {The button on a string has actually moved to her bag, she now sports a ruby necklace from Dragaur, her bracelet with several charms on it, and always has her camera}

Personality

Alignment: Good {I think I would classify Risri now as more neutral these days} Good personality traits: Loves animals, children, books, meeting new people (even though she can be shy, she enjoys it), giving, loyal  {This is all true except for the shyness, I don’t actually rp Risri as shy. She may be standoffish but thats cause IRL I am shy but Risri most definitely has no fear of talking to people} Bad personality traits: shyness can sometimes stop her from joining in, when she is caught up in research she may ignore others not to be hurtful she just gets caught up  {I think this one goes with the other, as for bad traits today, I usually say she can be stuck in her ways at times and can be over protective} Mood character is most often in: happy {I would say this is still true but she’s had her share of pain} Sense of humor:  silly things make her laugh {Not so much silly things but she definitely has a more snarky is funny sense of humor} Character’s greatest joy in life: running in the forest as a cat {Taking pictures and being a druid are equal} Character’s greatest fear: the death of her mother {This has actually come out in RP as a fear of mind control.  She would fear the death of her mother but mind control tops it.} Why?  Her mother and her are very close (unusual for Kaldorei, as they grow up communally typically), travelling with her mother in her formative years they relied upon each other What single event would most throw this character’s life into complete turmoil? Ris would be devastated if something happened to her mother  {I think the death of Latilda, and then when she thought Dragaur was dead, and subsequently the death of Suzi in the office are three of the most profound things that made Risri change some. Her fel contamination would come a close fourth Currently, if something was to really happen to Dragaur, Sky, or Selise it would mess up Risri for a while} Character is most at ease when: Researching {Funnily enough this might still be true, but I would say taking pictures is probably more} Most ill at ease when: at war {This is true, but as she found out both at Darkshore and recently when there are forsaken involved she has no hesitation in killing.} Enraged when: witnessing senseless destruction of sacred places or artifacts {I completely forgot that I chose that, but I would say it has not changed. She also does not stand for people she cares about being hurt, this one is tricky though and I often have to tame it down because of interactions with others.} Depressed or sad when:  she is a pretty positive individual, depression and sadness are fleeting if they happen at all. {This has matured over time. She gets very introspective at times and definitely will seek alone time when she is sad.} Priorities: Learn about as many cultures as she can, current focus is Treants. {So long ago… Her priorities currently are her studio, Dragaur, and helping the Kaldorei still homeless.} Life philosophy: Learn, Learn, Learn then share it all!  {This was definitely written back in my Stormwind University days. Her philosophy “Be kind. It’s worthwhile to make an effort to learn about other people and figure out what you might have in common with them.”} Character’s soft spot: her Sprite Darter "Flutter" {Also a certain worgen} Is this soft spot obvious to others? Sometimes {while I dont play it up too much she is very attached to Flutter. As for the worgen, yes when they are together it is clear she has a soft spot for the gruff one} Greatest strength: Passion for learning {This is probably still true but I would say she also is a pretty good photographer and a loyal friend.} Greatest vulnerability or weakness:  Naivety of how the world really works even though she has travelled the two main continents extensively she has been sheltered by her mother. {This was one of the things I retconned out of her when I brought her back for the paper. Risri may be unknowing of some human interactions but she is far from naive in most cases.} Biggest regret: That one time at band camp...seriously she is young so right now she doesn't have one but this may play into her development and story later. {HUGE change here... in fleshing her out in RP the biggest regret is and always will be the incident that forced her out of the Sentinels but not the results because it let her become a druid so its a double edged regret} Minor regret: she forgot to tell her mom about the time she ...oh that might not be appropriate for here {Again a change that came about from RP, that she threatened Dragaur with turning him in. She would never do that and she said it in a moment of frustration with him during a fight. It hurt them both too much.} Biggest accomplishment: coming soon  {Running the paper. Opening her studio. either} Minor accomplishment: joining the University! {so many things, her writings, some of her photographs, saving people at Teldrassil, helping the Kaldorei in Stormwind.} Past failures he/she would be embarrassed to have people know about: she was almost not able to become a druid...story for another time {This also changed with the retcon, but I would say the time she spent before coming to Stormwind would be something she would not want others to know about and will probably not talk about to anyone.} Why?  She loves being a druid so not being one… {I have thoughts about what she was doing but its not fleshed out. Maybe someday and I can revisit this.} Character’s darkest secret: She is a pretty open book. Maybe later she will have a "dark" secret.  {So this dark secret is the fact that she killed 10 Sentinels. That also came with the revamp.} Does anyone else know?  {Several people.}

Goals

Drives and motivations: Curiosity unusual for a Kaldorei and need to have answers to questions  { I would say this is somewhat still there and aided her when she was a reporter, but her drives and motivations are deeper now and the result of RP. She wants to make amends and sees her work with the Kaldorei refugees as part of that.} Immediate goals: Make friends with the treant she met at the Grove of Ancients {Keep her business running, aid the Kaldorei} Long term goals: Become an expert in as many cultures as she can {Live} How the character plans to accomplish these goals: Locate writings and interviewing others, spending time with treants ((her contact will be sending her around Azeroth and Draenor to meet with others)) {So her plan for her immediate goals are tied together. She takes a good portion of her profits from the studio and the two books she’s published to fund her relief efforts} How other characters will be affected: may be pestered for any little detail they have about treants  {Most of the people she interacts with in RP would not be impacted.}

Past

Hometown: Darnassus  {God I was such a noob.  Feralas is her home.} Type of childhood: travelled both continents with her mother {so noob. She spent her youth in Feralas, Ashenvale, and Darkshore.} Pets: Sprite Darter named Flutter and a curious little white kitten {I retconned the kitten. Its only Flutter} First memory: Leaves above her (could be why she is fascinated with the treants...) {I think I’ll leave this one.} Most important childhood memory: Her and her mother on a ship talking into the night {This can stay too} Why?  The closeness she felt to her mother {Because of this reason}

Present

Current location: Elwynn Forest, Jazimina Amberstill's "Ranch" {Stormwind City, either Dragaur’s apartment or her studio} Currently living with: Jazimina Amberstill and Ritti {Dragaur} Pets: Sprite Darter "Flutter" Religion: Follower of Elune {no change, add wild gods} Occupation: Researcher {Photographer} Finances: moderate {no change though she has more wealth than she lets on}

Family

Mother:  Kahrysta Elthron  {Oh wow I totally changed her mother’s name.. Its Alistra Kal’serrar } Relationship with her: good {excellent} Father: Brezlin Elthron Relationship with him: vague memories, he died when she was still a child Siblings: none Relationship with them: Spouse: none Relationship with him/her: Children: none {though she briefly adopted Ritti before they found the gnome’s family} Relationship with them: Other important family members: Mother's best friend Rislana is like an aunt  {her aunt Tara, cousins, and another aunt I dont have a name for.}

Favorites

Color: Green and Purple {blues could be added} Least favorite color: Orange {sorry Drag, but I dont think its true anymore} Music: any Food: Chocolate Cookies {See answer here} Literature: Any Form of entertainment: stories {plays, dances could be added} Expressions: "Indeed!" {Its not often I get to use it but I do like it} Mode of transportation: Winterspring Frostsaber, given to her by her mother when she hit adulthood (about 50 years ago) or flight form  {Flight form.  The frostsaber went away in the retcon} Most prized possession: her journal {Camera}

Habits

Hobbies: Dabbles in alchemy {more than dabbles now} Plays a musical instrument? No Plays a sport: no How he/she would spend a rainy day: reading a book, any book {taking pictures} Spending habits: thrifty {for herself this is probably true, for others she can be extravagant} Smokes: no  Drinks: not normally  {no change, but she will drink} Other drugs: no What does he/she do too much of? Read  {Take pictures} What does he/she do too little of?  Socialize just for fun {This is probably more true now since giving up the paper} Extremely skilled at:  Keeping a team alive when faced with challenges when exploring  {Photography, writing could be added} Extremely unskilled at:  a lot of things but she does hate cooking {LIES...I retconned this. She loves to cook. I don’t know...but I am sure there is something. It would probably be something she doesn’t do and has no desire to do.} Nervous tics: not sure someone may need to point that out to her  {She plays with the bracelet on her wrist when she’s nervous. } Usual body posture: relaxed and happy Mannerisms: polite {extremely so} Peculiarities: …  {hmm, I am sure there are some that have manifested over the five years I’ve been RPing her. Perhaps how she will always address a human as their full name unless she has been asked not to and will still use Ms. Mrs. Miss. Mr. with that name unless she feels close to you.}

Traits

Optimist or pessimist: Optimist Introvert or extrovert: Introvert until she gets to know you then she might not be quiet {I would say shes more mixed now.} Daredevil or cautious?: A little of both Logical or emotional: Emotional  {probably more mixed now though she can be emotional she just normally doesn’t let it show unless she is very comfortable with you} Disorderly and messy or methodical and neat: somewhere in between, depends on how wrapped up she is in her research but she does have a habit of cleaning up if there is a mess  { I would say she is very neat. Sky drives her crazy.} Prefers working or relaxing:  working {definitely would say this is still true} Confident or unsure of himself/herself: unsure internally, others probably see her as confident  {a little of this still lingers but unless you are close to her you wont see it} Animal lover: indeed

Self-Perception

How he/she feels about himself/herself: an introvert who is more bookish than social  {This is still kinda true.} One word the character would use to describe self: shy  {Quiet} One paragraph description of how the character would describe self: A passionate learner and studier of peoples, loves animals, enjoys outdoors, and exploring is exciting.  {A memory keeper, lover of animals and the outdoors, her passion for photography as a way to preserve memories is high.} What does the character consider his/her best personality trait? her passion for learning  {her compassion for others} What does the character consider his/her worst personality trait? her shyness ((its all in her head too, she really can be quite un-shy when meeting new races or investigating something though in social entertainment type situations she is at a loss)) {so retconned, she would say her possessiveness when it comes to the people she cares about.} What does the character consider his/her best physical characteristic? She is unaware of her appearance most of the time  {She likes her hair.} What does the character consider his/her worst physical characteristic? She hates her feet...not really  {I’ll keep this if only cause I dont know} How does the character think others perceive him/her: She sometimes thinks too much about this and sometimes it doesn't bother her at all  {She is very conscious of being a Kaldorei business woman in a human society. She strives to show that her people are trustworthy and kind.} What would the character most like to change about himself/herself: her shyness  {Since I retconned the shyness...I don’t know...Risri believes she can be a better person but its something that you work on each day.} 

Relationships with others

Opinion of other people in general: opportunity to learn  {She is still curious about others and likes people watching. She thinks most people are good at heart.} Does the character hide his/her true opinions and emotions from others: hmm, I think this will depend upon the relationship and situation  {Oh most definitely, this was honed during her time as a reporter where she hid a lot of her thoughts about things.} Person character most hates: no one (yet)  {Elyza Morrowbranch} Best friend(s): her mother / Jazi  {Sky Stoneseat} Love interest(s): none (yet)  {Dragaur} Person character goes to for advice: her mother / Dean Crowelley  { Dragaur, Sky, Selise} Person character feels responsible for or takes care of: Ritti  {Dragaur, Sky } Person character feels shy or awkward around: cute boys...oh ok anyone in an entertainment social situation, when she is meeting others for what she calls "research" she emulates her mother's ambassador ways as much as possible  {So such a noob.  She really doesn’t except older Kaldorei...she worries what they know of her past.} Person character openly admires: her mother and Rislana Silverwind  {Who is Rislana Silverwind omg I totally forgot this was a thing. Will have to think of someone else as Rislana is a Draenei now.  As for who she admires?  Her mother, Selise, Sky, Eilithe, Feyawen, Anegorn, and a few others.} Person character secretly admires: Dean Crowelley {I don’t think there is anyone she secretly admires, if she likes you, you know.} Most important person in character’s life before story starts: her mother  After story starts:  Ritti, Jazi, and the university faculty  {Dragaur, Sky, Selise}

If you made it here thanks for looking at the changes of Risri over the course of the last five years.  Its been a long, strange, crazy trip but I wouldn’t change much about it. If you want to do this, I encourage you to! And tag me cause I wanna read!

[beyondtheborderridiculous]

Why I love A3! and am content being stuck in actor hell

In this essay I will

No seriously. I really love this game and I have no otaku/weeb friends irl that would ever play this with me. And I just want to fangirl and have no other outlet than writing a massive post just spilling out my love for this game. Read at your own risk, lol.

For me, what makes me fall in love with a game, more than their game play, is their story. I play games for their stories because I am a story lover. I love stories so much, that I majored in literature, lol. So for me, I only really play games that are story-centric. But even though I’ve been playing video games for as long as I can remember, I suck at them. My coordination is always so bad, and I’m so bad at grinding, that sometimes, when a game is too hard, I stop playing halfway through and never end up finishing the story out of frustration. There’s a lot of games on my switch and other apps that I’ve played that are on hiatus due to this reason.

But A3! is really simple to play. Took a while for me to get the game mechanics of it, and I was a bit confused at first, but unlocking the next chapter is a pretty simple feat. (The fact that I downloaded this game during the period where all the main story acts were accessible also helped.) So I got to read all of Main Story 1 and I FELL IN LOVE.

I fall in love with stories if I fall in love with the characters. And as a story consumer I am so impressed by the amount of thought the game developers had for each and every character.

My first impression of how the story would unfold was that Sakuya would be the main focus of this game and that other than Masumi, the other characters would fall to the way side. Sakuya was your typical shounen hero character, the optimistic, untalented but hard working guy (the Naruto in the early arcs of that series). He’s not my favorite type, but I understand that he’s a necessary and in my first impression, the most important character of the story. Then there’s Masumi, the kuudere/tsundere talented bishounen who’s the rival (i.e. the Sasuke). The fact that he falls in love at first sight with the player (or Izumi) was a hilarious surprise, and he became an instant fave. I know that some don’t like his obsessive yandere tendencies, but I find them hilarious and am quite fond of them (but I would never condone it irl). Honestly, during Harugumi’s act, I honestly thought that the focus would solely be on them. But it wasn’t.

Tsuzuru got the chance to pursue his dream of becoming a playwright and he dwells into some regrets of not pursuing his dream earlier. (The fact that he straight up dies after each script is written cracks me up every time. Seeing it in the anime adaptation killed me.) Citron is the comic relief. He’s necessary to gel a team of strangers together. But during this act, his past and background is hinted and it doesn’t seem to be all sunshine and rainbows (To be honest, and spoilers for the EN server here, but before I read Main Story 2, I straight up thought that Citron came from a different planet, lololol). And then Itaru. Chigasaki Itaru my man, my all time fave. To be honest, when I first saw him I didn’t have a favorable impression. The prince-like bishounen is the type I dislike the most. But he’s an otaku? A closet gamer? But to be honest, even when that was revealed, I didn’t think much of it. I initially thought, ‘Oh, they made a gap mode character, cute.’ And again, I thought that he would be put into the backdrop. BUT THEN HE WANTED TO QUIT AND HARUGUMI PERFORMED A STREET ACT TO CONVINCE HIM TO STAY AND I DIED (Omg, Citron in the anime adaptation killed me). I thought that only Sakuya and Masumi would be the focus, but I was very very pleasantly surprised to find that all characters had their own major screen time (Maybe save for Citron. His was kind of the smallest, but that’s for a reason. At this point, I’m tempted to make a first impressions vs. current thoughts post of every single character. Would anyone be interested in me doing that?). 

By the end of Act 1, I fell in love with Harugumi. And to be honest, I was apprehensive of reading Act 2. I became so invested in Harugumi, and now I have to start a new journey with a new set of characters? I just wanted to read more about Harugumi and I was disappointed because I thought that I wouldn’t see those characters again. But again, I was pleasantly surprised to see that that wasn’t the case. Act 2 is Natsugumi’s story, but Harugumi characters were sprinkled here and there. And I thought that it was cute that Temna, a really prideful actor, looked up to Sakuya and asked him for advice. And then you have Sakuya saying that he didn’t really do anything as a leader, LOL. Save for sleeping on the stage together. And then Temna proceeds to follow this advice by going to Izumi and saying that after much research, the answer to a better team was sleeping together. LMAO TEMNA YOU IDIOT (I love you)! Natsugumi’s story was adorable, and I adored it.

Main Story 1 is the introduction and formation of every troupe. By Act 3, I was expecting it to become repetitive. What was impressive to me was that it wasn’t. Every single character is so vastly different from one another. They have their own personalities and fully fleshed out backstories. In Main Story 1 alone, that’s twenty characters. That’s highly impressive, especially like I mentioned beforehand with Act 1, everyone got their own screen time and character development. And for those that didn’t it’s because there’s a reveal/plot twist later down the line that’s at least hinted. You don’t always see that in t.v. shows/anime/manga with an ensemble cast (Voltron Legendary Defender, I’m staring at you. But that’s just one example, there’s others too). 

But the game developers didn’t stop there. For each of those twenty characters, the writers developed not only their personalities and backstories, but also their own personalized relationship dynamics with other members of the company.

Each troupe is very unique in their dynamics. I have a very hard time picking a favorite troupe because I am just so fond of them all. The relationships that the members have with each other in each troupe is so different, so special. I think the reason why I love anime/manga so much is because found family or nakamaship is usually a prevalent theme in them and I am a sucker for these. One of my favorite genres is slice-of-life just because I love reading relationships, whether they be platonic or romantic. And each troupe has these in spades.

BUT IT DOESN’T END THERE.

By Act 3, I thought that I figured out the pattern. Harugumi supported Natsugumi during Act 2, so in Act 3, Natsugumi would do the same for Akigumi. And then Harugumi will fall to the wayside. But I was pleasantly surprised again (do you see the pattern here?) to find that wasn’t the case. Fucking Itaru became the outside support/advice giver for Banri LOL. What made me fall in love with the game even harder, and what made me impressed with the game developers even more, was that not only did they write relationships within the troupe, but they also created and personalized intertroupe relations for ALL TWENTY CHARACTERS. Like how?! That’s so much work and so much to juggle with! As an avid story reader, that was just so crazy impressive to me. 

So that’s just me geeking about the narrative and character and relational development. Let’s talk about the gaming side of things, shall we?

I’m pretty familiar with app gatcha games as I’ve played my fair share of them. A3! strangely focuses more on the story aspect than the game aspect, which I am totally okay with. But what impressed me from the gaming perspective was how A3! handles events. Most gatcha games I’ve played, the event story line had nothing to do with the main story (SWD Obey Me and FE Heroes being prime examples here). Events were used as fanservice in order to get money from the consumers. And my first event was the Summer Beach Episode, so I initially thought that that was the same case for A3!. But it wasn’t.

When Main Story 1 ended, I was satisfied and at the same time I wasn’t. The story was good, and it ended well, but I wanted more. The game seemed to hint at more, so would I ever get more? And then I find out that all of the events (or most of them anyway) is the continuation of Main Story 1. That’s crazy!!! As a gamer, and as someone who has a family member that works in the gaming industry, I was crazy impressed because I haven’t seen this done before. I thought that that was immensely smart on the game developer’s part. Honestly, I know that not everyone plays the events in app games. But by making the events canon, and not au, gamers will be more inclined to play the event games. And I also know that it’s crazy easy to get bored of games, especially if the main story ended or the gameplay/story line isn’t that interesting. But the beauty of app games is that they could constantly be updated; their stories could continue to be added to. And with A3!, the event story line dwells deeper in these character’s backstories. Remember what I said about me initially thinking that the story will only revolve around protagonist and rival character? With each troupe play event, the lead and support actor constantly change. Everyone straight up gets their time to shine and their character development continues. Along with their relationships with others within the company. As someone who’s already invested in these characters, there’s no way that I would miss these events! I’m determined to play all of them! And that’s why I really think that the game developers came up with a smart strategy to get their gamers hooked. 

My biggest regret is that I downloaded this game recently, so I missed the prior events. PLEASE, LIBER AND CYBRID, I WOULD PAY MONEY TO HAVE ACCESS TO THE PREVIOUS EVENT STORIES. I don’t need the gatcha cards pertaining to these events, I just really really want to read the previous event story lines. I am forever grateful to yaycupcake that I was able to read what I missed (and the future events), but it’s not the same as experiencing it myself. 

What’s also smart, is that you have to read the event story lines, or else you won’t be able to completely understand Main Story 2. There’s aspects of things in the event that Main Story 2 will touch  upon. So as a consumer, you really do want to participate in all the events. 

Let’s talk about Main Story 2. I somehow discovered that in Main Story 2, each troupe is going to get an additional member (the BRBrookies). And I didn’t know how I felt about that. I liked the dynamic that each troupe has now. Wouldn’t an additional member ruin that? And could I really get myself to like these four new characters? The joke’s on me because I severely underestimated the game writers. You would’ve thought that I would have more faith in them since they impressed me so much. But I was a fool. Main Story 2 is great, and it didn’t seem like anything was pulled out of nowhere because it was all hinted at either in Main Story 1 or during the event stories. And each rookie is a perfect fit for their troupe and each troupes’ bonds continue to grow stronger and I cry every time. I can’t wait for it to come to the EN server. 

Now I’m a talk about the music.

For a while, I was aware that in the otaku/weeb community, that there was an idol craze. But I never understood it’s appeal. This game is starting to make me understand, lol.

I may not have understood the idol craze, but I do like vocaloid. When I first listened to vocaloid, I thought that it was weird that I was listening to a computer program sing. But what really attracted me was the stories told in the songs (again, story lover here). As an example, I’m going to talk about Evillious Chronicles. The Evillious Chronicles told a story in each song that was all a part of a story, and it was also my introduction to vocaloid. Storytelling through songs was just genius to me, and I fell in love with it. Granted, I know that it’s not new to vocaloid, and that not every vocaloid song is part of a series or tell a story, but it was what drew me in.

So vocaloid may seem like a tangent here, but to me, the A3! music was kind of like vocaloid. I accidentally stumbled on it when I was actually searching for someone doing a gameplay video of the Alex in Wonderland event. I couldn’t find any, but instead I discovered Alice in Wonderland Go Go. I gave it a listen, and fell in love with the melody. The music fit the theme of Alice in Wonderland so well. And then I listened to Susume Pirates next. It fucking slapped. These two songs became my gateway to A3! songs. 

I’m a go on a bit of a tangent here, but I’m a talk about the voice actors for a bit. As someone who’s also pursuing voice acting, I always appreciate when voice actors go the extra mile for their fans. Despite the vastly polar opinions of Voltron Legendary Defender, I adore the voice actors for their contribution to the fandom. Especially Josh Keaton (Shiro’s VA). So imagine my surprise, that I discover that not only is the Main Story completely voiced in A3! (which is very impressive and high production for a f2p app game), but the voice actors sing too in these songs too!

The A3ders sing the theme song. But each troupe has their own song, and each song is so vastly different from each other because these songs reflect the dynamics of their specific troupe, and I love that. But not only are there troupe songs, each character has their own song! And once you read the main story of each character, their song just becomes so much deeper! I give mad props to the song writers for tailoring each song to fit the character. I’m not going to lie, I bawled while reading the Manju Fist event, and then when I listened to Taichi’s character song afterwards? My mom thought that someone died since I was crying so hard. And did it end there? No! There’s a song that’s fucking tailored after every play! And they’re all bops!

The amount of times that A3! has impressed me is just way too much to count. It’s a fucking amazing game, story wise and music wise. And the love that the developers have for A3! is just so evident, and I love that. It definitely deserves its five star rating, and deserves an even bigger fandom here in the west.

So there, that about wraps up my massive essay on my love for A3!. If you read this far, I tip off my hat to you. If you also want to talk about A3! hit me up! I need someone to fangirl with, lololol. 

[365daysofsasuhina]

     [ Hey lovelies! I know it’s been a long silence, and I apologize. I’ve been rather busy and also caught up in other projects. But, I have a bit of an announcement to make. 

     tl;dr: due to...a lot of things, I probably won’t be doing SH month this year. Keep reading if you care at all about details, but that’s...really the long and the short of it, I’m afraid.

     As I’m sure many of you know, SasuHina month seems like it’s going to be moved to next month, May 2020. And I’m afraid that - for a few reasons I’ll summarize in a moment - that’s probably going to mean I won’t be participating despite doing so the past two years.

     For one, I’m honestly still very burnt out from this blog’s project: both in terms of writing, and of the ship itself. It took a LOT of creative juices to get this thing done, and I just...don’t have much built back up for this ship yet. If the event was in August, I’d like to think I’d be ready by then, but...well, the coordinators have other plans, WHICH of course is 110% fine - I’m not in any way criticizing. It just won’t work for me, personally.

     In another avenue, I have a LOT going on irl right now. I know for most that isn’t the case, given...recent world events. But I’m actually getting busier as time goes on due to several things lining up at once and overlapping irl. So I just won’t have as much time to dedicate to the ship month. That and things are very...tense and stressful in my household, and have been for several months. Which only makes being creative all the harder, I’m afraid.

     And lastly, I have other projects I’m giving priority. Some of you might know I have a longstanding RP hobby here on Tumblr, and that’s where a lot of my free time goes. I also write fics based on ships developed through said RP blog, and I admittedly had very little time to work on them as much as I wanted due to this blog taking up so much time last year, so I’m still playing catch-up with those fic projects. I’m also hosting my own ship week the first of June, and I don’t want a ship month right before that encroaching on my work to both run and participate in it (and further burn myself out).

     I might (and this is a big might) pop in on interesting prompt days and try to do some. But honestly I don’t like doing things halfway, so I doubt I’d do that. I’m an all or nothing sort of person. There’s a slim chance I might try to participate despite all this - maybe just write much shorter entries or something. But again, I have a lot working against me. So I’m afraid at this point I can’t make any promises.

     I know a lot of you are still waiting for more content from this blog, and it will come eventually. But as stated above, I have...obstacles. And yet this silly blog has passed 700 followers while I was gone, and has been slowly but steadily climbing despite my hiatus, and that’s awesome (even if some, maybe even most, are likely spam blogs I don’t have the time to vet). Thank you all so much! I still love this ship, and I want to create more for it. Now just...isn’t the time. If I do decide to skip SH month this year, I hope you all can forgive me - maybe come August I’ll just...do the prompts late or something. I’m largely winging this given how abruptly the schedule change has come up (and how busy I’ve been, thus addressing it a little late). Either way, thanks to everyone who gives this a read, and I’ll see you all soon! ]

[animecat33]

I’m in a mood, so here’s some an extremely long post with shit conflict that happened on deviantart when i was younger that i’m still petty about and i wanna vent about it because if i wasn’t so young i woldn’t have let people step on me like that

No one should read this, tbh, it’s a fucking horror show out here 

oc: Shinju

When i made her it was the first time one of my ocs had like effort put into it, i designed her, make her backstory, put her in kirigakure, and i spent a long time researching names for her, looking up japanese words that i think would fit her, Ren Takeo

One person commented saying that they had an with the same name, from the same village, though they didn’t mean any harm by saying that, and even said it was fine

Here’s where it gets tricky.

I then got comments and private messages from OTHER PEOPLE telling me to change the name

So, like the weak bitch i was, i changed her name 

Oc: Roxy

I’ve talked about this one before, but i have this sonic oc named Roxy, i loved her, she was a bit edgy but like, queen, 10 years ago we were ALL edgy

I really wanted Roxy to be a lesbian, but i didn’t like, put that in the info, at the time gay ocs we’re really taken very well by the community, plus a few of my art friends were very iffy anytime i implied that some of my ocs might not be 100% straight.

now, i WANTED Roxy to be a lesbian but i was guilt tripped by some dude to roleplay with him, no matter now many time i said i didn’t roleplay, he wouldn’t take no for an answer and I was very easily guilt tripped into eventually saying yes

A roleplay starts with Roxy and his Male wolf characer, John, when we started he assured that they were gonna be friends but one thing lead to another and he pressured me into role playing a sex scene, i was 14, i didn’t want to, didn’t even know how to write that. At that age i hadn’t really even seen porn before, but a few days of mowing down my boundries and he guilt trips me into saying yes.

At that point, he essencially took Roxy and did whatever the hell he wanted with her. Next thing i know, Roxy was married to this male character and they had a baby? I even ended up making some art of them because he kept saying how he was tired of making all the artwork himself.

Thank god, eventually he forgot about me and Roxy for a lot time. The last time i talked to him was on a pm where he warned me he was gonna delete all his ocs, including Roxy and Johns child, i think he wanted me to convince him not to do it but by that time i was older and just said “alright man, see ya”

Thank fuck, that problem solved itself, but i’d be better off not going through it in the first place

The cosplay hellhole

When i first started cosplaying, i posted my pictures to DA too, since there was a cosplay community there, didn’t think anything would happen

When i got my first Harley wig and makeup i was so excited i posted them on deviantart, and they did quite well, tbh. Some people asked for fansigns, and i didn’t even know who those were but, once it was explained to me, i did some for people who requested them, from there it was also fine, but stay tuned, cause it’s gonna bite me in the ass later down the line

I start getting wierd dms, very sexual in nature, which grossed me out, since i was already 20 it wasn’t like, illegal or anything, but there was a pattern of people asking for sexual content followed by “it’s okay if you say no, though” and when i said no, they would be pissed at me, calling me a whore, saying if i didn’t want attention, i wouldn’t cosplay Harley.... keep in mind, all of my photos where from the shoulder up at this point, i muscle through this time, i’ve been harrassed enough to have a lil bit thicker skin.

But over time, the pile up of messages from diferent accounts were getting to me, and i was starting to delete photos.

AND THEN

He said he was embarrassed of having to send me these things but if i wanted the photo taken down i’d have to report it myself, thankfully he also found the direct link to the report page so i didn’t have to dig through the website. Thankfully the report worked and the photo was taken down

I receive a pm from a friend that scared the shit out of me. He was going through this porn website called Xhamster, he recognises someone using one of my fansigns as a photo, now he KNOWS this isn’t me, because i’ve been vocal about not wanting to be sexualized while in cosplay. Someone took one of the fansigns, edited out the words, flipped the image, and photoshopped their own signature on to the sign in hopes of like... getting verified or something?. In short this person was using my photo as if it was a photo of them.

That mixed in with the still incoming pms from creeps made me delete every cosplay photo i’ve ever posted on deviantart.

Years later i did post new cosplay stuff again, now giving a warning right at the top of the description and being very okay with using the block button to my leisure.

I’m taking a long as fuck hiatus from posting on deviantart, it’s been over a year now, but i still go on a block spree when someone breaks the rules i’ve set 

The whole “Luís” saga

Sit down for this one, it’s the weirdest one

I had a friend named Luís, we weren’t super close, in fact he was mean to me a lot, making fun of my english, even though neither of us were native speakers, refering to my home country as “Spain’s bitch”. Sending me cartoon porn when i was underaged was a big red flag that i didn’t even think was a big deal until i was older and thought back on it, like that was fucked up.

One day, i had critiques open, Luís sends a super spammy message and then blocks me. I was like “okay, whatever, i’m tired anyway” and i blocked him back.

THAT is when shit hit the fan

He tries to unblock me and talk to me, when that doesn’t work he makes a secondary account and starts sending me very aggressive pms. I’m was tired of how he acted with me, plus something about him being so desperate to be unblocked didn’t sit right, so i just blocked the new accounts

He made 15 separate accounts, getting more and more angry with each one, i block all 15.

Suddenly i’m getting pms in english and spanish from people i’ve never interacted with, but aparently Luís had told them i was being some sort of monster, some of them backed off after seeing the full picture, the others got blocked

Luís girlfriend was friends with me.

He then threatned to leave her if she didn’t block me.... she left HIM, and now I’M being blamed for that

Someone shared some uuuuhhhh fanart he drew of her after that, it was super sus, it was a comic about him seducing her with a kiss in order to make her hate someone, girl you’re better off without him, jesus christ

Now shit starts moving off of deviantart

He finds my personal facebook, which was NOT disclosed to the public, and starts messaging me, from there he found my twitter, youtube, skype, starts messaging my irl friends, quite a lot of them did not even know english at the time.

In the few messages before i blocked him, i warned him to stop, i warned him he was stalking me online and that shit isn’t okay. THIS DUDE 

this dude replied with “it’s not stalking because i’m younger than you”

BOI

this happened over the course of a year, and it was the first time i ever reported someone, hell it’s the first time i’ve seen a report be successful, because i contact deviantart with a list of everything he’s done, screenshots to prove it, links to his separate accounts where all the comments are ONLY about me

a week later they DELETE THIS MAN’S WHOLE ACCOUNT

I have not heard from him in almost a decade

This is like, the ONE TIME i feel like i won

Aaand well, done, those are the most serious one, there’s some minor shit that’s not worth talking about, but looking back, wow, i used to get a lot of sexual harassment on deviantart huh?

[brynnmck]

Hi friends! I have been in a bit of an anxiety pit for the past couple of weeks but I'm hoping to be more present on here going forward. @ajoblotofjunk and @dame-lazarus both tagged me for this, thank you! ❤️ (Also, ajoblotofjunk, I’m SO glad we have the opportunity to get to know each other better via this meme 😂❤️)

Rules: Answer 21 questions and tag 21 people you would like to get to know better!

Nicknames? The vast majority of my fannish friends call me Brynn, including IRL; I answer as happily to that as I do to my wallet name. My husband calls me many ridiculous nonsensical things, such as “lady yam” and “baby puncher” (NOT, I should clarify, because I have ever even considered punching a baby, but because he thinks the combination of words sounds funny).

Real name? I am old school enough to want to keep my wallet name separate from my fannish name, at least publicly on the internets! Lol

Zodiac sign? Gemini (which, man, internet zodiac stuff NEVER seems to really understand/like Gemini). Taurus moon, Leo rising. ENFP, too, while we’re at it. 😂

Favorite musician or group? The Headstones and My Chemical Romance have been my top two of the past several years. Other artists who show up on most of my playlists include Springsteen, Bon Jovi, the Kris Delmhorst/Jeffrey Foucault/Peter Mulvey triumvirate, The Local Strangers, Lake Street Dive, and The White Stripes.

Favorite sports team? The Seattle Mariners (fairly unfortunately for me, though there have been some pretty fun times in there too). My dad loved baseball and I eventually fell in love with it too, in my early 20s, and it was the biggest point of connection we had. And baseball takes up enough of my time and emotional energy that I am so far pretty monogamous about it and have not gotten super invested in any other sports. But I never say never!

Other blogs? My first blog was an LJ, and I still have a Dreamwidth account that I haven’t updated in years. I’m @rockedfaces on Twitter (a lot of my baseball fandom lives there, as well as the ongoing clusterfuck that is the USA, and RTs of cute animals, and some media fandom stuff too). Mostly I can only manage one social media platform at a time so while I totally get the concept of having different accounts for different interests on the same platform, I cannot imagine maintaining that!

Do I get asks? Mostly only when I do ask memes. I always appreciate them though!

Blogs I follow? 185. Though I just came back to Tumblr a few months ago after a years-long hiatus, because I wanted to Get Involved in J/B fandom, so some of those blogs are now defunct and I know there are lots of great ones I don’t follow yet, too. 

Tumblr crushes? Obviously!

Lucky number? 7 I guess?

What am I wearing? Black yoga pants, a brewery t-shirt that I got for free as a pub trivia prize, and a sweatshirt for the western martial arts convention that my husband co-runs. 

Dream vacation? Right now? The alternate universe where there’s no global pandemic. Failing that, I’d like to go to New Zealand someday, and go back to the UK and Ireland, too. More basically, I just want to walk around interesting cities and eat good food and drink tasty alcohol with people I like. Pretty hikes are good too.

Dream car? I’m not really a car person. But an electric car with a super-long range would be pretty sweet.

Favorite food? I love very many foods! As you might be able to tell by the fact that I wrote a whole long fic about it! 😂 Tough to beat cheese and bread, as a general concept. I’m also extremely into good summer fruit when it’s in season, especially strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, nectarines, plums. Ooh and mango. And a really good peach is transcendent, though they’re rare here. We get amazing cherries though. SO MANY GOOD CHERRIES. Is it time for summer fruit yet????

Drink of choice? I do drink quite a bit of water, and I’m super into fizzy water right now. Alcohol-wise, bourbon or rye (perfect Manhattans are my go-to in the absence of a cocktail list), or a good Last Word in the summer. Also sparkling wine. And beer, especially at the ballpark (IPAs are my standby, as basic as that makes me, though I don’t like the super bitter ones).

Instruments? I played piano through high school and took voice lessons in high school and college (I was a theater kid). I can still play piano veeeery sloooowly if I’m learning something new, though some of the songs I played a lot as a teenager are still in my fingers somehow!  

Languages? English and what remains of my high school French. I really want to learn Spanish--if for no other reason than to be able to read baseball players’ Instagram posts--but so far I have gotten as far as downloading Duolingo. IT’S A JOURNEY.

Celebrity crush? Sooooo many. Nikolaj and Gwen are the two brightest stars in my little fannish sky at the moment, obviously. Various handsome baseball players. Ben Browder and Claudia Black. Chadwick Boseman and Nicole Beharie. Anna Kendrick. Frank Iero and Ray Toro. Lindsey Way. David Cook. Adam Brody. Gillian Anderson. I could go on!

Random facts? Let’s do three to make this 21 questions for real! 1) Ummm. I am bad at random facts about myself! I have one sibling, a brother who’s about a year older, and we were super close up through college (we still get along fine, he’s just been on the other side of the country for years now so our paths have diverged more); 2) We stayed a weekend in one of the treehouses at Treehouse Point in Falls City, WA just before Treehouse Masters really exploded and it was one of the most magical experiences of my life; 3) I never knew I was a dog person until we got a dog, and even though we are dogless now (though I would love to get another one at some point!), I am still very much a dog person, and I always want to see pictures of your dog, FYI.

I feel like with everybody tagging several people and me being way behind in responding, surely most of y’all have done this already? But if not, please consider yourself tagged! And @ me! And/or link me to your posts in the replies; I’d love to see what I missed while I wasn’t around.

[yeonchi]

Kisekae Insights #4: Series Overview (Next Gen and Moushouden Series)

I decided to split this into two instalments otherwise it would have been too long for me. From this point on, I started to have full control over my stories in the series – I would end up writing whole series instead of a few episodes, which eventually started to have a detrimental effect and became one of the reasons why I wanted to end my personal project as soon as possible.

The rationale behind making these two series originated from the latter half of my high school years; many people, including my teachers and parents, were saying how those final years would be important to my future, which meant that I would have to put my writing on hiatus for the time being. However, had I known better, I would have just kept on going.

The Next Gen Series

Originally, the plan was that Block 9 of the 50th Anniversary Series would have been my last series. However, towards the end of 2013, I got ideas for more stories and also realised that I would have played the Fifth Doctor for only two years whereas those actors who played the Doctor on the BBC series did around three or four years. I created this series (under the name “Project Next Gen”) with the intent of playing the Doctor for another year before finishing my final year after the hiatus. All episodes were broadcast in 2014.

I wanted to make this a “budget series” with the tagline “A New Doctor Who For A New Era”, but things happened and I ended up making it bigger than I originally wanted it to be.

2013-14 Specials: While the Next Gen Series officially started in 2014, The Day of the Doctor and A Christmas Carol (the actual 2013 Christmas Special) are also considered part of these series. Along with a five-episode miniseries broadcast around the New Year period, three specials were broadcast during Chinese New Year, with one of them being an adaptation of Princess Twilight Sparkle and another being an original pony adventure featuring Storm Dasher. All three specials featured Hiroki and Akari as companions.

Series 8: A light-hearted series that turned sour. Basically, some stuff happened IRL and Akari had to go back to being a villain with Girl Power and her cousins, who become the main villains of the Next Gen Series. Angelina Mouseling replaced Akari as companion from the sixth episode. I also adapted three BBC Fifth Doctor stories for this, namely The King’s Demons, Warriors of the Deep and Frontios respectively. The Awakening was another idea that came to mind, but I decided against it. The series finale started with some scenes from Resurrection of the Daleks, then I adapted some scenes from both ends of the 2013 TVB drama Brother’s Keeper (巨輪). It involves Hiroki kidnapping Akari and the son of a man who owned a Chinese restaurant in my local area. This is the bit where Hiroki’s sanity starts to slip as a result of his wife’s betrayal. (tbh I could have also adapted a rape scene if I wanted to but then it wouldn’t be a family series anymore) The subsequent Christmas in July Special followed on from the Series 8 finale and featured the Master as a villain alongside Girl Power and the Daleks in an invasion of Equestria. To finish off the drama adaptation, Hiroki fights the Master and is about to shoot him when he gets shot by Shining Armor. The Master is captured and dispersed throughout time and space (ala Arc of Infinity). Megan Williams makes her debut and three new companions join the Doctor, Hiroki and Angelina from this episode, namely Satoyuki Saitō, Storm Dasher and Rainbow Dash.

Series 9: If you were to read the stories of this series, you’d think I was a creep or misogynist of some sort. This series is now entirely focused on Hiroki’s fight against Girl Power and his worsening mental health that somehow barely gets mentioned. It starts off with Hiroki rejecting his old name, the name he was originally given at birth, then ends with him beating his wife and destroying the world. The Ice King is the subject of the series opener and Twilight’s Kingdom is also adapted, but with Storm Dasher and a seventh Element of Harmony, namely time. All the stories are connected with four double-parters throughout. The prototype to the Superhero Project begins here as in the second half of the series, the Doctor and his companions fight Girl Power as the Samurai Rangers. The series finale is mostly set in Hiroki’s point of view, but it does feature a pared-down adaption of The Time of the Doctor, which involves Trenzalore being an area on Earth and him only being there for like a few days or weeks or something. The Earth gets destroyed, then everything is suddenly back to normal.

The Final Specials: Three specials were made for this block. The first two are collectively known as the “5115 Specials” because they celebrate the 51st anniversary of BBC Doctor Who and the 15th anniversary of this Doctor Who. Following the format of 24, the two specials follow on from the Series 9 finale and features the Earth being raptured, then restored after the Doctor and Hiroki fix a time distortion in Heaven. Following that, they go back to Earth and fight Girl Power and their allies. Their army is so strong that it took the second coming of Jesus in order to defeat it. Hiroki and Akari reconcile after this. The final episode, the 2014 Christmas Special, features a remnant of Hiroki’s first incarnation attempting to take over his current self until Akari and her friends prevent this.

Jee Gun’s Spinoff: Magical Tachibana

The Tachibana Mysteries is a series of crime dramas centred around detectives who are part of the legendary Tachibana family, whose ancestors have worked in the police force. Magical Tachibana is one of those series; a detective from the Tokyo Metropolitan Police, Yūki Tachibana, is transferred to Minato-Sugaru Island, home of the Equestria Girls. It’s basically Equestria Girls meets Death in Paradise. In addition to this, I decided to reintroduce Jee Gun’s character, with his real self ending up on Minato-Sugaru Island following his regeneration into Storm Dasher.

I wrote two pilots for the series and nothing more. The first pilot isn’t remotely connected to this series and it probably makes even less sense as you read it. Basically, it’s an adaptation of the first Equestria Girls movie where Jee Gun is sent to the human world to help Twilight, but he forgets what he is supposed to do and things just go wrong. The second pilot is the actual pilot of the series, which adapts Deep Breath and is kind of an alternate or side story to Rainbow Rocks. Basically, the Dazzlings find a time ship that crashed years earlier and they attempt to harvest organs to repair it. It ends with what looks like Adagio being impaled on top of a tower, but it’s not what it looks like.

I think only one or two series were made before it got cancelled. I’ll talk more about Jee Gun when we get to his instalment.

Director’s cuts

During the two-year hiatus, I did do some rewrites, or rather, “director’s cuts” of some episodes, which mostly involved removing or rewriting some storylines that I didn’t like. For the most part, the director’s cuts take precedence in canon over the original episodes, with the exception of the first set, the Series 9 Shinkenger arc, as it is an alternative retelling altogether.

Here are the episodes that were made into director’s cuts:

Series 9 Shinkenger arc (most of the second half and the 5115 Specials)

Block 9 (with an edited cut of The Time of the Doctor from the Series 9 finale as the de facto 2015 Christmas Special)

Series 4 Kikuchi arc (from the two dramas)

Series 7 Part 1 (the Salacian Time War specials)

Blocks 2 and 4 (the highlights of the 50th Anniversary Series before Block 6)

Series 5 finale (as the de facto 2016 Christmas Special, also includes the episode before it)

The Moushouden Series

The full name of the series is Doctor Who Xtreme Legends Moushouden (named after the Koei Warriors spinoff games), but in recent years, I’ve started to call it the Moushouden Series or Project for short. I started making plans for this towards the end of the Next Gen Series in 2014 and they have been continually changing. If I told myself in 2014 what the Moushouden Series would look like by the end, I probably wouldn’t believe myself.

The Moushouden Series started in 2017 and was meant to end at the end of 2020, but the coronavirus lockdown has forced me to push it back by another year to 2021. The Fifth Doctor would undergo a big character change to be more similar to the BBC Twelfth Doctor for the adapted episodes and Gokaiger’s Captain Marvelous for everything else. The objective of this project was to “retell the past and forge the future”. I also tried my best to answer any questions and loose ends left over from previous series. There are also numerous spinoffs that are heavily linked, so they will be listed under this section as well.

Doctor Who: This is the main component of this series that eventually got overshadowed by the other spinoffs. Because each of the original series was 12 episodes long, I decided to write an additional episode for each series to make them 13 episodes long.

Series 10: Broadcast April-June 2017 and based on BBC Series 8. I also rewrote the series opener along with the original episode. The original episodes of this and the next series are broadcast as part of the preludes to the Superhero Project and Kamen Rider Project. Some of Deep Breath was also used in the series opener, including the Paternoster Gang, the Clockwork Droids and the Half-Face Man. Clara Oswald returned as companion for this series and the next. Last Christmas acted as the Christmas in July Special.

Series 11: Broadcast September-November 2017 and based on BBC Series 9. Some modifications were made to this series to fit my project’s canon. In the opening two-parter, Davros was replaced with Antoni and in The Girl Who Died, the circumstances as to how the Doctor got his face are slightly modified. Clara Oswald departed in the series finale. My interpretation of the Hybrid is different than whatever Steven Moffat meant it to be, which I will explain when I get to it. The 2017 Christmas Special marked the debut of the Gokaigers, with the Doctor being the leader of that team as well.

Series 12: Broadcast September-December 2018 and based on BBC Series 10. In a throwback to Series 1 and 2, there are 16 episodes in this series, including the original episode, The Husbands of River Song, The Return of Doctor Mysterio and Twice Upon a Time, which featured the First Doctor’s first actor. This series is also nicknamed “the Nardole saga”. Bill Potts is also a companion in this series. Like Series 11, modifications were made to this series, such as the Monks not affecting Australia due to the influence of the Power Rangers, Kamen Riders, Ultramen and Space Sheriffs. Due to some circumstances that happened in Gokaiger, the Doctor regenerates into himself at the end and appears in the 2018 Christmas Special.

Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger/Kamen Rider Decade: Broadcast back-to-back January-June 2018 with an additional movie trilogy released July-September 2018. This is the culmination of the Superhero Project and Kamen Rider Project. There are 13 episodes in this series along with a crossover special, TV movie and extended episodes for the series premiere and finale. The amount of episodes equated to 28 half-hour episodes that could be adapted from their respective counterparts. I will be making separate instalments on this in the future.

Gokaiger: Aside from adapting episodes from Gokaiger, some storylines from Boukenger, Ninninger and Zyuohger were adapted as well. I remember using ideas from the 199 Hero Great Battle movie in four episodes for some reason. Not all Sentai teams were adapted into the Superhero Project – I only adapted Zyuranger, Kakuranger, Ohranger, Hurricanger, then Dekaranger to Zyuohger. In the movie, I also adapted Goranger, JAKQ and Dairanger as the “ancient Rangers”, mostly because they were also used in the finale and I already had a limited pool of powers as it was. The movie trilogy, titled Space Squad, involves the Gokaigers fighting alongside Ultramen Ginga, Victory and X along with Space Sheriffs Gavan, Sharivan and Shaider under the banner of the Shadow Proclamation.

Decade: Consider this my attempt at making a better version of Decade than the one we eventually got under Shoji Yonemura. This version focuses on Hiroki redeeming himself for his past sins as he is sent back a month in the past in order to gain the cooperation of the Riders and save the world from destruction. Like the original, there are two arcs in this series, namely the Nine Riders Arc and the New Riders Arc. The Nine Riders Arc features a counterpart of Narutaki as the main villain, while the New Riders Arc features a quartet of villains working under Foundation X to resurrect Dai-Shocker, the villain group of the TV movie. Originally, I wanted to feature original Riders, but in the end, I only kept three (later two) original Riders as I adapted every Rider from Kuuga to Drive. The “Nine Riders” are different in this series than the original. The movie trilogy, titled Age of Riders, is derived from the Heisei Generations movies. Kamen Rider Ghost was also adapted for this as well.

Three Kingdoms: A four-series drama recounting the backstories of Hiroki’s past self and Parker. The series is inspired from the Dynasty Warriors-esque battle dramas, but with schools and armies of children fighting each other. It covers the events of the Last Great Time War on Earth from 2003 to 2011, which is kind of related to the Hybrid. Other events after that are covered in other parts of the project. This is a weeknightly drama with 60 episodes in each series. Some specials were also broadcast between Series 3 and 4. In addition to this, a side spinoff Three Corners was made, with 26 episodes broadcast weekly in the second half of 2017.

Series 1: Broadcast January-March 2017 and covers events from 2003 to 2007. Highlights include their time at kindergarten and the first years of primary school.

Series 2: Broadcast April-June 2017 and covers events from 2007 to 2010. Highlights include Hiroki and Parker’s rise to power and their rivalry with a group of young strategists.

Series 3: Broadcast October-December 2017 and covers events from 2010 to 2011. Highlights include the Salacian Rebellion and their chaotic transition to secondary school.

Series 4: Broadcast January-April 2020 and covers events from 2011 to 2012. Highlights include Parker’s death and resurrection and Hiroki’s departure to become a ronin, bridging into his Doctor Who appearances.

Soulbound: A four-series drama focused on the adventures of Shinbu Serizawa, Mogoro Kuwabara and their friends in another universe. I got the idea to make this series from my memories of playing a Doctor Who-based adventure with my friends in primary school. The TV series Parallax and other works played large roles in influencing the series lore. The first two series was contained in its universe while the last two series crossed into the main universe, where the other works are set (though with a ten year time difference). Like Three Kingdoms, this is a weeknightly drama with 60 episodes in each series. A Doctor Who 20th Anniversary Special (celebrating the anniversary for this version of Doctor Who) was broadcast as an extra episode in Series 3.

Series 1: Broadcast April-June 2019 and features adaptions of the Ape Escape games and Sonichu fancomic. The final arc of this series revolves around the Dimensional Merge, where Soulbound’s universe is merged with the main universe, explaining the appearance of anime and cartoon characters throughout the project.

Series 2: Broadcast July-September 2019 and features an adaptation of Kingdom of Paradise. The Third, Fourth and Fifth Doctors are featured in dedicated two-parters near the end of the series. The final arc involves the construction of a dimensional bridge connecting the two dimensions, allowing travel between them, and the characters becoming part of their universe’s Shadow Proclamation.

Series 3: Broadcast September-December 2019. The entire series is an Ultraman-based arc centred around Ultraman Ginga and his nemesis, Ultraman Venokatto. It’s a really long story. The Kamen Riders are also featured, but out of the Rangers, only the Gokaigers are featured (with the exception of some Samurai Rangers during a two-parter). But between you and me, it’s also a big finger to the writers of the MLP:FiM finale. More on that when I get to it.

Series 4: To be broadcast October-December 2020. Work for this series is in progress.

The Equestria Chronicles: A two-pronged series focused on Doctor Who and Ultraman respectively. The Doctor Who portion is a clip show broadcast in the second half of 2019 and it features Storm Dasher as a guest teacher at the School of Friendship telling the students about his adventures in Doctor Who. The Ultraman portion is a six-arc drama broadcast in the second half of 2020 and it features the backstories of Ginga, Victory and X, adapted from their respective Japanese series.

The Zhuge Family Chronicles: Another clip show with different members of the Zhuge family to be featured in each episode. To be broadcast in the first half of 2021.

The Final Kamen Rider Chronicle: In lieu of a fifth series for Three Kingdoms and Soulbound, it was decided that adaptations of Ex-Aid, Build and Zi-O would be made instead. The entire series will premiere in the second half of 2021 and I will be writing the Zi-O portion of it. What I can tell you now is that my version of Zi-O will take place in an alternate 2018-19 of the project, but the Legend Riders will come from the end of their respective stories, that is, their histories will not be changed.

So that’s my personal project in a nutshell. From the next instalment, I’ll be going into the specifics of certain aspects in the project.

[nolan-sims]

>>> Computer Help, Requests, General Q’s, Top 3 Packs, etc. 

Anon: Do you know if sims users who use a MacBook experience lagging issues? Is it a good computer for a lag free sims 4 experience?

Hey there! I’m a PC user so I can’t really speak on behalf of Mac players, but from what I've heard, if you’re planning on mostly playing games it may be better to go with a PC over a Mac. 

Anon: Hey! I’m saving for a gaming PC. And I wanted to know what pc you have? Or where to get good PCs. It doesn’t have to specifically be a gaming one, just a good enough one to play The Sims 4 on higher settings. My pc isn’t bad but it can’t handle sims on higher settings ( which I like )! I probably sound so selfish because I want a gaming PC to have sims have good settings without lag but I do lol my game lags on lower settings too, So I guess I ain’t too selfish :P I hope you help, thank you ❤️❤️

Hey, there’s nothing wrong with wanting a nice piece of equipment! Especially one that’s as useful as a computer. They’re a necessity, really-- it doesn’t make you selfish in the slightest. As for my computer, this is what I use. It’s a few years old now but it’s been fantastic & never has a problem running almost every game I’ve played on it on Ultra (i.e. Skyrim, Subnautica, Dragon Age: Inquisition, etc.)! MSI makes some pretty solid machines 👍

Anon: Hey! I was wondering if you could make a longer version of your new dress? It’s so beautiful but I only put long dresses on my sims since I’m modest IRL and I like my sims to be too. It’s not a request or anything. I hope I don’t come across as rude, I do love the dress. 😍😍

Anon: hi nolan!! super sorry to bother you but i was just curious if you had any interest in making a version of reticulates' daydreamin eyes for mermaids? or if you've seen anyone make some around!! thank you 

Anon: hi honey, would you try to make a mermaids reticulates default eyes?

Hey there~ To answer both questions, I don’t actually take requests. As for the mermaids eyes, because they aren’t my CC to edit or post, I probably won’t. When I made the edits for pets, I got permission to do so. But because reticulates has been gone for quite some time, it’d be a bit rude of me if I did without asking first. I hope you’ll understand-- Sorry!

Anon: hi there! do you have a psd for the pinafore your thoughts dress? tysm!

I don’t have it uploaded at the moment, but i’ll add it to the folder sometime this weekend! In the meantime, feel free to check out all of the other ones I currently have >>> PSD Folder.

Anon: hi hi! i was wondering how you got the short version of the yuletide hair to shorten so smoothly? like there are no jagged parts? thank u in advance

There, unfortunately, isn’t much I can say besides I really took my time & was super careful about making things stay proportionate/smooth throughout the entirety of editing. 

Anon: What are the worst expansion packs in your opinion?

I’ve actually enjoyed all of them so far! But if I really had to choose, probably Get To Work. It’s mainly due to the fact that I can’t be bothered to actually follow my Sims to their jobs 😂 (I’m just too lazy for all of that).

Anon: Hi! How do you clean the background of your Cas for your full body pictures?

Hello! My editing process is on my FAQ & Resources page 😊

Anon: I'm fairly new to sims, i was wondering why some CC items require certain expansions? I'm not complaining, just curious

Most CC creators do this if the CC they made is only a minor edit or recolor of an item from a pack, that way, it won’t just be a direct port-- therefore making a paid item free (which is a no-no).

Anon: hey, do you take sim reqs? even if not a soft-faced ya female named Noelle would be adorable in your game i think. just a suggestion, no need to follow up!

I don’t take requests, but I have a Sim that sort of fits that description!

Anon: Do you know of any good Sims 4 teen mods that’ll allow them to quit high school without affecting the responsibility manner gauge?

I wanna say MCCC does this, but I don’t use any mods so I honestly have no idea 😅 If anyone knows, let me know in the replies!

Anon: Is there anyway for sims to buy multiple housing properties in Sulani like the sims in the Sims 3? I know you can make property “generic”, but I want it to be a house that my sims can own while having other houses if that makes sense lol

No, unfortunately. That’d be really cool though! I think the only/closest way a Sim can do this is if they own a retail store?

Anon: i wish i could donate to your patreon but i'm a broke student sadly, i really do appreciate you not using paywalls for your cc as i have had some problems with it before. thank you and have a nice day :)

Hey there! That’s really sweet of you to say, but don’t feel bad! I’m honestly just glad to be making CC in general 😊💕 +I hope you’ll have a nice day as well!

Anon: Do you know what ever happened to femmeonamission? She just disappeared one day I feel like. Is she taking a hiatus?

She’s out living her best life 😭💖 (probably)

Anon: i absolutely love you and your cc! i think my first ever cc i downloaded was from you

Thank you so much for the sweet message~ 💖

Anon: Hi I love your stuff btw! But I was wondering if you could tell me what your top 3 game packs and stuff packs are. I’m just trying to see which ones I should buy.

Hmm, that’s a tough one (seeing as I don’t get a whole lot of free time to actually play my game 😅), but here goes: +I’m throwing in my favorites EPs because why not!

Top 3 Expansions Packs

Seasons

Island Living

Get Together

Top 3 Game Packs:

Vampires

StrangerVille

Jungle Adventure

Top 3 Stuff Packs:

Laundry Day

Movie Hangout

Romantic Garden

[homenum-revelio-hq]

Welcome (again) to the Order of the Phoenix, Gracie!

You have been accepted for the role of ALICE LONGBOTTOM! We really enjoyed your application for Alice! We loved the personality section and the discussion of Alice’s worldview weaved throughout. Definitely looking forward to see how her black-and-white thinking will play out in the Order! 

Please take a look at the new member checklist and send in your account within 24 hours! Thank you for joining the fight against Voldemort!

OUT OF CHARACTER:

NAME: Gracie

AGE: 21

TIMEZONE: EST

ACTIVITY LEVEL: I’m in my fourth year of college, and I’ve managed to be a part of tumblr rpgs my entire college career, so I’m quite good at balancing my IRL responsibilities with managing replies and all the fun stuff. If I had to put it on a scale of 1-10, probably like a 7, 7.5. I usually know well enough in advance when I’m going to have some tough schedules so I can work around it or ask for a brief hiatus.

ANYTHING ELSE: No triggers or squicks to note, but I’ll let you know if that changes.

CHARACTER DETAILS:

NAME: Alice Aurelia Longbottom (née Edgecombe)

AGE: 33

GENDER, PRONOUNS, and SEXUALITY: Female, She/Her, heterosexual

BLOOD STATUS: Pureblood

HOUSE ALUMNI: Slytherin

ANY CHANGES: Nope! Love everything! <3

CHARACTER BACKGROUND:

PERSONALITY:

There’s something interesting about being caught in the middle. It forces a person to think, rather than to just pass by.

That’s where the Edgecombe family had always been. Not quite so lofty as to be a part of the Sacred 28, but still, a perfectly respectable pureblooded family. They never really stood out. That was, until Alice.

         Unlike her older brother Frederick (or Freddie to his friends), Alice was always quick to question something. Why was the sky blue? Why was her name Alice? Why could they perform such amazing acts of magic, while muggles lived their whole lives without it? She could always be found digging through her father’s study for the answers or climbing to the tallest tree or digging up the garden to see if she could figure out some of the answers for herself.  

         In school, she had a bit of a reputation as a know-it-all. But not your typical know-it-all. She never insisted on interjecting into every class, every conversation; No, no Alice wasn’t at all like that. It wasn’t that she talked very much. Alice would only speak when she had something to say. She was very quick to correct you if she thought you were wrong and could verbally cite all the reasons why. Needless to say, this didn’t help her make any friends. If someone asked her a question, she almost always had the answer and then some. If she didn’t have the answer for you, you could rest assured that after an evening in the library, she’d basically be an expert on it and could tell you just about anything you’d want to know. The thirst for knowledge was relentless. She wanted so desperately to understand everything, and whatever Alice wanted, Alice would get.

Alice is a perfect balance of soft and tough. She’s like the soft beauty of fresh snowfall mixed with the sharp bite that whips in the winter wind. Being raised as the proper daughter of a pureblood family, she could play the part of the polite, soft spoken, and quite witch. However, she never bothered to hide the wit and charm that crackled in everything she did and said. She’s poised, and at times quite cunning, but never, never cruel or harsh. She’s quite captivating, though she never wants to be the center of attention. At her core, she’s kind, and she’s sturdy. She’s also stubborn as anything. As such, it’s very difficult getting through to her when she believes something.

Her world view is one of black and white. There aren’t any shades of grey. There is only right and wrong. In Alice’s mind, the laws are there to protect everyone- to keep everything and everyone in the right. By breaking the laws- even bending it, could spell out something disastrous. Her world view is why becoming an auror seemed like such a natural fit for her. She could make things right, and she could solve problems. She could see something wrong, look for the pieces of the puzzle and reassemble them to find the answer.

Alice is kind of like a pointillism picture. From up close, there’s nothing that seems to stand out. Just another dot on a canvas- one in a million. But upon further inspection, and a different perspective, she’s remarkable. She could be the center of attention, if she didn’t prefer to hide in plain sight. She liked being considered average. It drew less attention to her, and it made it even more satisfying to surprise people when their assumptions proved to be wrong.

But pictures aren’t always pretty.

The clever, calculated nature of the way her mind works means that some people tend to consider her cold, or unfeeling. The know-it-all wound up separating herself from pleasantries and conversation, as people never seemed to like to talk with her. Alice is incredibly blunt and doesn’t sugar coat things. Facts are facts, and there’s no point in making things seem like they aren’t all that bad when they are exactly as bad as they look. In this way, Alice is her own worst enemy. No matter how hard she tries to make friends, to get people close enough to her so that they might begin to understand her, she says something harsh, or doesn’t let emotions influence her response. Then it’s just one more person who finds her completely intolerable.

There’s also the fact that she was in Slytherin. While being in Slytherin doesn’t automatically stain you with certain irredeemable qualities and brand you forever as a dark wizard, it does sometimes create situations where you’re surrounded by people who tend to agree with the sentiments of dark wizards. Being surrounded by these ideas for seven years of her life, hearing the whispers in the halls and the common room conversations, she learned to think like them. Part of these experiences are what helped her to the top of her field. The other part allowed her to work as they do- to be manipulative, to toy with people. These are aspects of herself that Alice hates the most and would love to see disappear. However, they are a part of who she is, and she will still slip into old habits from time to time when these undesirable qualities are called for in whatever task is at hand. And sometimes, even when they aren’t called for. Sometimes it’s just a subtle comment on something, but this controlling aspect of her will rear its ugly head from time to time.  

Alice is a force to be reckoned with. She knows what it is she wants, and she will get it. She knew she wanted to make her family proud. So, she did as she was told, sat straight, acted the proper lady. She still bites her tongue around them rather than tell them how she really feels. Once she knew she wanted to become an auror, to protect those who couldn’t protect themselves, she worked hard and got it. She wanted Frank, and she got him too… But now she’s not so sure he wants her too. He’s grown so distant.

BRIEF OVERVIEW OF FAMILY: 

Alice’s family isn’t exactly easy. Her mother, Cordelia, is the definition of a mother hen. Constantly fluffing and preening and just ever-so-slightly overbearing. It took years, and a muggle book from a Hogwarts friend, to realize that her mother is Mrs. Bennet from Pride and Prejudice- to a T. While she would probably never utter it allowed, Alice’s mother wanted desperately for her daughter to marry up in pureblood society. She was positively thrilled when Alice brought Frank home for dinner. But that’s not to say the woman doesn’t care about Alice. She’s incredibly proud of her daughter and her accomplishments. In polite society, she gushes endlessly about her Alice, the auror, who managed to snag THE Frank Longbottom.

         Alice is more like her father, Atticus, than anything. The man is quiet. While he doesn’t say much, his mind is always working, always playing some elaborate game of chess with the world, a game that he will inevitably win. He taught Alice to think before she speaks. To always have a plan, all the way from A to Z- just in case something was to go wrong. Alice was always much closer to him than to her father. He just seemed to understand her better than her mother. The clucking and fussing and frills were nice, but Alice needed time away from all that noise to function. She’d much rather be hiding in her father’s study, in silence but never alone. That’s not to say it was always quiet. The battles of wits between these two were legendary- it’s better to never bring up politics around them unless you’re willing to listen to a very well mannered, but absolutely scathing debate.

         Freddie had been her best friend and confidant growing up. She’d constantly pester her big brother for the answers to her innumerable questions that swirled around her head. He was always more of a “mama’s boy” though. Always looking to stay in the woman’s good graces and do as he was told.

         Now, it’s quite difficult. Cordelia and Atticus are both inclined to stay in the graces of pureblood society. Instead of speaking up, they bow their heads, turn a blind eye. To agree that perhaps Lord Voldemort isn’t all that bad and that everyone’s just blowing it out of proportion. Freddie, never one to question his parents, is following blindly along with them.  Alice is forced to watch silently as her family slowly aligns with something she views as truly, and irredeemably wrong.

OCCUPATION 

Alice is an auror. Alice is bright. She knows the spells to use, she knows the laws, the protocols to follow. But it’s not just that that makes her such an excellent fit for the job. The ability to think quickly, to solve the problem in front of her efficiently and effectively, was the key to her success. She had a clear mind in the face of danger, which helped to make her one of the best duelists in the business. She and Frank had been nearly unbeatable. But something is off with them, and it’s throwing off their dueling, and it’s throwing Alice off her whole work game.

ROLE WITHIN THE ORDER/THOUGHTS ABOUT THE ORDER:

         Alice is in the inner-circle of the Order. She was there to provide a level head and a ministry insight into what was going on politically. She’s there to try to keep everyone safe and protected. At first, the work she was doing with the Order was right. They were protecting the innocent and defenseless. But when things began to fall more and more into a legally grey area, Alice wasn’t so certain anymore.

She’s known who she is and what she stood for her whole life. To be questioning something now is ground shaking. Watching as the younger Order members are more inclined to cause chaos that increases the panic within the community rather than focus on quickly, quietly, and legally helping the others and slowly dismantling the forces that He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is assembling is painful for her. She’s trying so desperately to show them that there’s a better way of doing things. A safer way, for everyone involved. But they don’t seem to want to listen.

Watching as Frank takes on more dangerous and legally questionable jobs from the Order has been causing a pit to form in her stomach. Not just because she adores him and would be inconsolable if anything were to ever happen to him, but also because the one thing she cares about most above all is beginning to exist on the fringe of the black area in her mind. In her world without a grey area, she’s not sure what she can do. She knows she won’t turn on him or expose him, but then, what is she supposed to do here?

SURVIVAL:

         The British “Stiff Upper Lip” defines how Alice gets by. Living in the Longbottom family house is a step up from the tiny Edgecombe household, and a very welcome change to the tiny London flat she’d holed up in after Hogwarts as she was getting her start at the Ministry. Having copious amounts of floo-powder in the house always makes the commute to work a breeze.

More eyes are on her now than when she was younger. Marrying up meant that people paid marginally more attention to her, even more so as a respected auror. She’s forced herself to be very careful. She never talks of the Order in public. At work, if the group is mentioned, she’s always the first to volunteer to investigate them. Better her than any of the other aurors. If it were anyone else, it was likely all their faces would be on the front page of the Daily Prophet, holding numbers across their chests and looking incredibly grim. Worse the end of her career, if she was discovered to be associated with the Order, it would almost definitely be certain death, now that so many of Lord Voldemort’s followers are also working in the Ministry. She can never be too careful with who she trusts.

RELATIONSHIPS:

         While it may not seem like it from the surface, Alice is holding on for dear life with Frank. They’d always been a team in her mind. The two of them against the world. But now he won’t talk to her. He’s been distant, and she barely recognizes him some days. The man she’d married isn’t who’s sleeping beside her anymore, and she isn’t sure where he went, or what she must do in order to bring him back. It’s not as though she can talk to her family or work friends about the problem without exposing the Longbottom’s dirty little (illegal) secret to the entire wizarding world. She can’t talk to anyone about it. She can’t talk to Frank about it. Her parents cannot know that she’s part of the Order, or else they could be in serious trouble. Not that she’d even like to imagine it, but she knows there’s a chance that they could turn on her and turn her in or inform someone in Voldemort’s ranks of just what the Longbottom’s are up to. She can’t talk about it at work or risk exposing herself as a member of the Order. Alice is a cauldron of stress that is at risk of bubbling over. She needs a shoulder to cry on, or at least someone to vent to. Otherwise, Alice is going to explode.

         Caradoc Dearborn is clever. He’s got a good head on his shoulders. He knows how to think, and not just blindly stumble into things firing spells left and right. He’s one of the reasons that she still has faith in the Order and what it’s doing, and why she hasn’t withdrawn. She hopes he can help direct to Order into doing what’s best for the entire wizarding community, without making a muck of every law and statute the wizarding world lives by. She can’t imagine what it’s like to lose a parent, and she’s sort of taken him under her wing as a younger sibling of sorts.

         Mary MacDonald stresses Alice out more than anything. The girl’s completely all over the map. She flickers back and forth between what’s right and what’s wrong in Alice’s view like a light bulb on the fritz. It doesn’t make sense to her that one person can change her opinion on something a million times in a minute. In Alice’s mind, maybe the girl changes her mind so much because she isn’t sure what she believes. Or worse yet, she knows what she believes, and she’s trying to take the whole Order down from the inside and take everyone along with it. She doesn’t trust her as far as she can throw her.

OOC EXPLORATION:

SHIPS/ANTI-SHIPS: Alice x Frank, Alice x Chemistry

WHAT PRIVILEGES AND BIASES DOES YOUR CHARACTER HAVE? 

         Alice is very privileged. A pureblood witch who married into another pureblood family? A respectable Ministry job? That’s as good as it gets, as far as some in their community are concerned. But she’s never been one to judge. In school, she enjoyed seeing the other half of the world. She’d trade books and music with muggle-born students, read as much as she could about everything- vampires, werewolves, shape shifters- everything. The unquenchable thirst to know all that there was out there provided her with the facts. But the facts, she’s beginning to find, are often different than the reality.

The underlying prejudice with her still exists, as much as she tries to fight it. She listens to her family and questions whether they always thought that way. Whether or not she used to agree with them. She can’t recall, and she hopes it wasn’t so. But sometimes, watching as these youths who think they’re changing the world by tearing it apart… She wonders just where they learned to think this way. Are they muggle ideas? I want her to try and better understand the struggles that others who aren’t nearly as privileged as her face daily. To try and understand why some are, in her mind, so intent on blowing things up and starting again. To understand their struggle, so that maybe Alice can learn to think beyond what’s black and white in the eyes of the law, and instead see what’s morally and ethically the right thing to do. Perhaps this ability to better understand may help her to realize where her loyalties should truly lie in this war.

WHAT ARE YOU MOST LOOKING FORWARD TO?

Literally, everything. Alice Longbottom has always been my favorite of the Marauders era characters, as I feel like she can be interpreted a plethora of different ways, and I think that this interpretation of her may just be my favorite yet.

PLOT DROP IDEAS: Maybe an inspection of ministry workers, or something that could poke at whether they’re involved in anything suspicious? Or a raid on Diagon Alley.

ANYTHING ELSE? Nope! <3 Mischief Managed!

[comicteaparty]

November 9th-November 15th, 2019 Creator Babble Archive

The archive for the Creator Babble chat that occurred from November 9th, 2019 to November 15th, 2019.  The chat focused on the following question:

How do you deal with a lack of engagement from your audience, both emotionally and physically?

IzzyNinjaMaster

Oooo now that's a good question. If my online audience doesn't respond, I personally always show any new page updates to my family and friends and get feedback and comments from them. Really great for support. But sometimes their not available or I don't have anything new to show them. When this happens, I just look to myself for support. I know that doesn't really make sense or sounds kinda cheesy but it's what I do. I get myself pumped up and excited for what I can do next in the story and how awesome it will look all drawn out. And I go from there, I'll start drawing out ideas or writing out new chapters. So just be your own hype man, not just with your comics either but with everything. Great for self esteem.

Sorry went on kind of a rant right there

carcarchu

I prepare myself emotionally to not have any expectations. If you expect nothing and receive something you'll always be happy!

IzzyNinjaMaster

Lol true very true XD

Deo101

I'm not completely sure what this question means by physically, but I just kind of keep making art to move past it. Something that has helped me a TON is to make art that's just for me (like, that I don't post anywhere). I think that if everything is made to be shared, then we get a little too used to trying to find validation with engagement. With comics, specifically, I try to make none of my goals relate to engagement. I only have goals for myself and what i'm producing. If I'm hitting all of my goals, then I feel good about what I'm doing! No one engaging with it is just kind of like "okay!" Another smaller thing that helps me is getting my work done well before I upload it! for some reason just getting a bit of time distance between when something is done and when I post it I dont feel so bad if people don't engage.

Cronaj

I'm fairly lucky that I have a small following on one of the sites I post on, so while some weeks might be slow with feedback or engagement, I'm usually not completely devoid. I also have some very supportive family members who read my comic and often comment or text me after I update. As for what I do personally when I don't have a lot of engagement? I do a lot of self-reflecting, which is probably not the healthiest of practices. I question what I'm doing, trying to figure out what I'm doing wrong and how I could improve. I also try to understand other external factors at play, such as my readers' personal lives, jobs, school, holidays, that might have delayed them from engaging with my work. For example, I know that during November, as we get closer to Thanksgiving, there is going to be a huge drop in readership, because a lot of my younger readers will be preparing for school finals and visiting with family. By knowing this, it helps me cope a lot better. And if all else fails, I vent to my fiance or my little sister. It really does help to have someone to whine at for a bit

khkddn

If I were to get completely zero engagement on something I'd do what I'd always do, message people I know irl like "validate meeeeeeee"

In general I just take a step back from what I've posted and focus on something else. That way I remember webcomics isn't everything, and by the time I check up on things again there might be some sort of audience response.

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

I kept my work hidden for the first few years I was working on it (wanted to iron out any wrinkles before I was comfortable sharing) so in comparison, any engagement afterward - even a tiny amount - is pretty great! And even now, some updates get more traffic than others, for a lot of different reasons. Luck, timing, quality, etc. I always keep in mind that this project is - at its heart - for me and my own enjoyment/fulfillment. And if I’m pleased with where it’s going, that’s a win.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Oof, that question really hit me where it hurts. Over the years I’ve lowered my expectations, because while I used to have an active audience in the ‘00s, I’ve rarely gotten any engagement on my comics in the ‘10s. It’s definitely made me feel depressed and like a ‘failure’ to put heart and soul into my comics and art and get 0 reaction online. I honestly don’t have any way I ‘deal’ with it. I make something, hoping to get some comments > I get no comments > I get depressed about it and feel like my work is garbage. Rinse and repeat several hundred times. I keep going because I just love to create, but it’s like an actor trying to put on a performance and no one shows up to the play. It has gotten better lately and I’ve started getting some engagement for the first time in many years, but I honestly don’t have a good answer for how I handle that emotional reaction to reader silence.

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

Also good to keep in mind that lots of people may read without commenting, and still enjoy it! I did a poll wondering who would be interested in doing guest art, and way more people responded than I expected. It opened my eyes! Sometimes you just can’t tell until you outright ask for feedback

keii4ii

There's definitely a risk to that, though. You ask and still get nothing. Or worse, you ask and get negativity. Asking is a worthy gamble, but it takes courage! Sometimes when we don't have enough courage, we gotta find it elsewhere first, before we can try that gamble...

I lost that gamble one too many times and need more Courage Fund before I can try again, lol

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

True true! It was a gamble I had no real expectations/assumptions about, so I didn’t have much room for disappointment. Even getting one person who says “This is cool!” is enough to fuel me for days. But I know that’s not how it is for everyone. Once you’ve been disappointed once, it can take a while to get the urge to try again. I can’t imagine getting negativity, though... I think THAT would wreck me.

keii4ii

Sometimes I don't even ask and someone just randomly drops negativity off at my doorstep... I need to remember that I have also had wonderfully positive responses, that it wasn't all negative. But it can be hard to remember that on bad days.

Deo101

Yeah, negative comments always seem to be the loudest ones... They can drown out dozens of good ones if they hit you right.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I did develop a pretty thick skin for negativity in art school, which was really fortunate because my comics garnered a lot of negative attention at first. Though thinking back on it, I was making very androgynous and gender non-conforming characters (even though I never stated anywhere that they were queer) in a time when the public attitude towards such things was far less kind than it is today. At the time it was draining to get so many trolls, but unless I was already having emotional difficulties in other areas of my life, I was able to let it roll off.(edited)

keii4ii

The weirdest thing with my negativity is 99% of them come from actual readers who mean well. So I have a hard time dismissing them like 'oh they're just haters.' It's not necessarily harder than dealing with blatant trolls, but it is an entirely different beast.

Deo101

Sometimes I go and reread positive comments when I'm down about things

Yeah I'm not sure that I've had any trolls tbh... Its all readers saying what they think

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Avid readers who give backhanded compliments and ‘well-meaning’ but very subjective critique can definitely be detrimental.

keii4ii

In Korea, I dunno if they're still a thing, but 1-2 decades ago there was this type of theft called slash theft. It's a type of pickpocketing, done on the street while walking by. They bump into you, briefly and lightly, but you don't think much of it because Seoul is a crowded city and you brush against other people all the time. But during that brief bump, they manage to slash open your purse and take all the contents. It's an amazing ninja level skill for sure. I know people who had their stuff stolen that way. Back to the Courage Fund analogy, sometimes a negative comment isn't just a normal theft of your Fund. The comment slashes your purse open, and now your bag can't contain Fund even if you put more and more into it.

It can take a long time and lots of support to sew your purse back.

Deo101

Idk if other places to slash theft, im sure they do, but im pretty sure historically its been a big thing. The term "cutpurse" comes to mind

keii4ii

(:o I didn't know that was a term! The more you know)

Deo101

(some book i read (wasn't great but you know) used the term a lot and i was like "ok wtf is this")

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

That’s a very good analogy for it, and I definitely understand what you mean. I had to take a three year hiatus from one of my comics once after a IRL ‘friend’ ripped the comic apart and called me a terrible writer in less-than-kind words. I had already been going through some very bad things with my health and family and it hurt me far more than it should. It took some encouragement from some very dedicated readers to convince me to pick up the comic again.

Deo101

(so i associate it with pirates now)

That's really terrible lee... Om glad you picked it back uo though!!!

keii4ii

I can super relate to harsh comments hurting way more than they should, when you're already in a bad state. >_<

Deo101

And also it is a really good analogy keiiii

Yeah things just kinda get harder to deal with in general when you're more tired/upset in other areas

keii4ii

The most devastating feedback I've got would have done far less damage if I weren't in a fragile state at the time.

Deo101

Like you can't go be safe elsewhere if everything is a source of stress...

keii4ii

(For all we know those slashers in Korea could be pirates )

Deo101

:o

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Does Korea have pirates? If so, I’m moving to Korea.

(Sorry, we’ve probably gone way off topic for the discussion)

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

I got antsy when someone made a small critique of my lettering (rightfully so, though - lettering is hard and I’m still learning) so a proper heart-stabbing, bad-faith critique might sideline me for a while. Gotta be prepared for that someday

Deo101

Its weird, it really seems to be mostly about how I'm doing elsewhere in life now that im thinking about it. Also being further along in the comic helps cause I've got years of support and "just keep chuggin" under my belt

Like the other day someone critiqued me randomly and called my characters stupid and i was like "dam ok, your comment getting deleted then" but a year or so ago a comment like "I'm sorry im a little confused..." Made me second guess everything for weeks

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

Ohhh Maybe the obviously mean/troll comments are easier to deal with, than feeling you let down a reader who was genuinely trying to understand the story. I would definitely react similarly.

Deo101

Iunno, the big old critique was a normal reader who has left other comments he jusy kinda randomly did it. But yeah I think it can be easier to shrug off things that are CLEARLY antagonistic versus someone being harmlessly confused

Because confusion can mean I'm not being clear enough and need to change things and whatever. Its vague in a way that hits your anxiety

keii4ii

Yeah, when someone is obviously being a jerk, you know it's on them

omg... reader confusion has been the bane of my existence

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I dunno, man, art school just toughened me up to most negative comments. If one person out of five is confused, I don’t take it personally and just explain it to them to clear up confusion. If everyone’s confused I think ‘Hmm, maybe I should retcon in some dialogue to make it more clear’. I guess art school really teaches you to distance yourself from your work and be very objective about it. BUT as I said, I’m not immune when other bad things are going on and it becomes the straw that broke the camel’s back.

Deo101

Though THEN you kinda get like "why am I being a target???" And its very frustrating, at the very least, and it does definitely still hurt... (Wrt trolls)

keii4ii

It's hard to tell who's confused and who isn't sometimes

Deo101

Yeah Lee im in art school right now, but for me its different when I make something to be critiqued versus a passion long term project

If I am asking for critique too, im braced for it in a way I'm mentally prepared for. Im not always braced to have someone be like "its pretty good buuut..."

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Ahh, I can understand that. I guess I’m able to view my passion projects the same way I did my school projects. It took time, that’s for sure. It’s a process of desensitisation, and was something I had to build up over years.

keii4ii

I'm disproportionately sensitive about reader misinterpretations/confusion. I'm 95% sure it's because one bad experience. Someone thought my main story was garbage, but they liked parts of it, so they told me to basically make a different story using those parts. After that, every time a reader didn't recognize the main story (I got a very prominent B plot, so it's kinda understandable that some people mistake it as the A), I got vivid flashbacks of that one bad experience. Every time someone said they liked [this character that The Other Person liked], I got flashbacks. Took me good 2-3 years to get over it.

Deo101

Its also a lil different when it's like.. i wont be changing these pages so unless it's a critique for moving forward its kinda pointless and i cant really apply it

Damn keiiii that's really rough

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Yeah, that sucks.

keii4ii

Yeah, it's hard to be motivated when the underlying message is "your first 100 pages are hot garbage, but you can still improve........ even if readers will give up long before they get to the decent 101st page!"

Deo101

RIGHT...

I don't want to have to preface "check out my comic!" Wirh "i promise it gets better..."

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

COUGH That’s exactly why I’m reduxing Eryl’s hot garbage beginning right now COUGH

Also because I’m a masochist and perfectionist.....

keii4ii

I think "it gets better" is fine when it's a reader reccing it. (I remember some of my friends reccing multi-season anime series to each other, going, "it gets better after season 1") But yeah, as the author we can't be the ones saying it.

Deo101

Mhm.

And I'm still hapoy with my old pages. I know I could do them better now but they're perfectly fine and they get the job done so... Idk its just hard when someone is like "wow two years ago you made a mistake, :/"

Like. Yeah, duh... I've spent like a thousand hours on pages theres gonna be some mistakes

keii4ii

It took me a long time to realize that Flaws =/= Problems

Deo101

I'm learning and getting better youre gonna have to bare with me here

Nutty (Court of Roses)

are you kidding i still get crit on stuff i made TEN years ago

Deo101

Mhm

keii4ii

omg

Deo101

Well its not a competition

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Same, Nutty

Nutty (Court of Roses)

True sorry ;;

Deo101

Ur name just changed colors keiiii

You: flaws =/= problems Your name: im ascending

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I think...learning how to like not be bothered by negativity that much is a skill. Super freaked out one time when someone said they didn't know what's going on when reading HotV whoops

(turned out they just had to re-read a bit and it was just webcomics being webcomics)

Deo101

I had a group of readers say they were co fused and one person asked me to explain the last 2 chapters and i was like "holy shit am i being this unclear????"

Its stressful for sure

Nothjng wrong with being concerned with ut

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Keiiii has reached a new plane of existence. The blue is unrefutable proof

Deo101

Its something you're passionate about and you want to be as good as it can be

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Yeah...

Deo101

So any critique, regardless of validity will be something you WANT to consider

Which is fine and theres nothing wronf with taking things to heart like that

But also if youre Happy with it that's all that matters

You gotta be your #1 fan kinda thing

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I'm personally super uh...yeah I am having a hard time dismissing criticism

even if it's in bad faith, haha.

keii4ii

The #1 fan thing sometimes reminds me of that scene from Lilo & Stitch

The scene of Lilo's rag doll. It's been years since I watched it, so memory's a bit fuzzy, but I think all the kids were showing off their dolls, and Lilo wanted to show off hers too

but the other kids didn't like her homemade-looking doll, and it made her sad, almost not like her doll for a moment

but she picks up the doll again afterward

There are days where I relate to that. I never not-love my story and my characters, but sometimes I feel like everyone else has a low opinion of it, you know?

and I'm like lonely Lilo hugging her rag doll in the sad corner

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Yeah I totally get that and...loving what you do first and foremost is really important. I don't think in a medium like webcomics you would be able to keep going

keii4ii

I'll always love my Doll but I do wish this little corner weren't so lonely, kinda thing

Deo101

I feel that keiiii

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Hmm

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

When the ‘critique’ is detrimental it does become a problem. Like that ‘friend’ I was talking about earlier who bashed Eryl to bits. He told me to ‘read some Stephen King’ to learn how to write. I was making a high fantasy story, not a horror story. The writing of a horror author is simply not applicable to building a good fantasy adventure story. That’s when I knew he was full of shit. But the damage had been done, and I lost all motivation for the project for years.

keii4ii

uuugh, I'm so sorry that it happened to you D:

Deo101

Also this story is one that i have dropped and picked up SO many times, and its wildly changed over and over, and so i worry a lot im not making it in its final form, i suppose. I worry i started it too young, and so critique of the older parts hits that anxiety

Wow lee that's terrible...

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Gosh...

Deo101

Also you can't really compare Novel writing to comics imo. The structure can be compared but...

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I think HotV is like a project I've worked on since...2008? And it changed with me and I feel pretty confident that it's in its final stage.

keii4ii

and not every story needs to be a Stephen King story

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

But yeah, you can really not compare writing for novels to writing for comics wth

nah

tbh it's weird (I like King personally) but his stories and also his writing do have flaws too so

what

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I actually do use novels as a source to study how to construct my comics. But! Studying the right genre is important. I’ve the feeling the only books that guy read were Stephen King, so that’s the only kind of story he was familiar with.

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

God when I was still developing a picture I did got featured somewhere and someone criticised the way I did knees and linked to the picture of another artist going: Hey draw knees like that

Deo101

Every story will have flaws, its impossible to make one that is perfect. Well. Its impossible to make a story thats perfect for everyone. So alk you can do is try to make a story thats perfect for you!

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Agreed, Deo

keii4ii

^ THAT REMINDS ME

Deo101

Omg

keii4ii

(going back to the original question) With no response, or negative response, one thing that helps me is hearing other people gush about their beloved unpopular stories!

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Hmmm

Deo101

!!!!!! Me too!!!!!!!!!

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I am having this problem and went to ask on twitter what ppl loved about their projects

and that's really uplifting somehow

Deo101

I LOVE reading other comics and just seeing how much passion is in them its like a light

keii4ii

I need to remember that just because someone, or even a lot of someones, thinks a story is trash, doesn't make it the universal truth

Deo101

^^^

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I WILL GUSH ALL DAY BOUT MY BELOVED UNPOPULAR STORIES and once you open that damn I am unstoppable. You will regret it, trust me.

keii4ii

And people gushing about their unpopular favorites is an excellent way of reminding myself

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

hehe

Deo101

I have been very lucky and have had a few incredibly kind people who i can remember fondly when i worry my story isnt reaching people. I Know it has touched a few lives, and if it makes even ONE person happier (even if thay person is me) then im doing my job and its worth all the time and effort.

That was kind of off topic i swear it connected in mt mind

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Absolutely

I feel it's connected

Deo101

Phew

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

bc hmm it's a way to deal with times when there is not much engagement?

Deo101

Aha! There we go yes :)

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I do generally write very off-beat, unpredictable stories because I like reading / watching those kinds of things. A lot of my favourite movies bombed at the box office because they weren’t formulaic, which was what I loved about them.(edited)

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Remind yourself that there is people who enjoy what you do and who are happier bc of it C:

Deo101

Mhm ^^

Also i have my characters on a shirt so i can just wear that and be like "fuck yeah. I have a shirt. It cant be a bad comic if I've got merch babeyyyy"

Which admittedly is a very odd way of dealing with anxiety

But like.... You should get your Characters on a shirt.

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

dfhwioufheuf Deo that's cool tho

I made so many like...background designs and posters for HotV and some of those I WANT ON A SHIRT

Oh I think what also helps me is to find a friend and just talk about the comic?

Deo101

The place i use lets you get up to 6 items a month as a sample order and it's severely discounted my shirt was like $15

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I should do that. I have designed some T-shirts but that wasn’t for personal stuff.

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

omg

keii4ii

I'm actually in the (long) process of re-learning how to talk about my comic

Deo101

And yeah for sure having people i csn talk with/joke with about my comic helps soooo much

Like the fact that i know these 5 people will get my jokes like this

THAT helps a TON

These people actually are the reason I was confident enough to be able to start after having a bad friend drive me to almost drop the story for good

So having their support is probably one of the biggest things thst helps if no one else engages.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Okay, so on the original subject of ‘How to deal with no feedback’ I do talk about my stories a lot with my two best friends. They are my biggest fans and my sounding boards. They let me go on and on about plot threads in my comics and it’s one of the main reasons I keep going. Even when I get 0 reaction online, I still have two people who I know are reading the comic and think I should keep going.

Deo101

Or like, when my family is being homophobic about my work kinda thing. Friends are good for that...

Yessss lee having people you can talk with about it is SO good

keii4ii

ngl, I'm jelly of those of you who have go-to support friends who are genuinely into your story! That's something I hope to have some day, myself

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I don’t know whether to give a sad react for homophobic family or a happy react for supportive friends

Deo101

Happy react ^^

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Still sorry about your homophobic family tho, but your friends sound awesome

Deo101

Yeah but :> I know I'm doing good work. Again those few people who i know my story has touched.. i know I'm doin good work.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

@keii4ii Just know I’ve been an acid fan of your comics for over 10 years and honestly think they’re some of the best comics I’ve ever read

AVID

NOT ACID(edited)

keii4ii

Hey acid is important too

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

GOD MY PHONE

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

hiodcnioefwe acid

love this

I have one friend who has supported me since 2007 and I can always count on her freaking out about my comics Y_Y

so when I feel especially bad I turn to her

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

My phone is old and the keyboard lags and autocorrects like AAAAARGH(edited)

Deo101

Its okay same here lee

Typo club babeyyyy

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I have to edit almost every comment I make THANKS A LOT PHONE

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

shakes fist at ur phone to be more kind

I can't type on phone at all so...

keii4ii

Yeah, swipe-typing is high level sorcery to me

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

As someone who’s normally a grammar freak it causes me great pain that my texting is a syntactical disaster.

Deo101

I've been doing swipe a bit lately so it doesn't hurt my hands to text (I Tex too much)

keii4ii

This actually makes me wonder

What are some good, safe(ish) ways to reach out to people who may be 1000% willing to become that Support Pillar for your comic?

Deo101

I just straight up start doing it

keii4ii

For all I know they exist. But.. Schrödinger's pillar

Deo101

And gague the reaction

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

As an antisocial gremlin who hides under a rock, I have no idea.

Pakky

never hurts to ask

keii4ii

@Pakky You would be surprised

Deo101

Start sharing art, see if theyre curious, get deeper if they're good with it, kinda thinf

I've got friends who like to see my art but don't really care about my comic, and you kinda just gotta take it case by case

Pakky

mm fair enough, i always try to be supportive of content creators mostly because i would hope for the same in return. theres a lot of bluntness in my industry so if you do well you get praise but if you do poorly, you very well know it :/

keii4ii

Me: "Thank you for supporting my humble comic!" (this wasn't even asking, just thanking) Reader: "Well, your comic isn't that good." Me: "?????????"

Deo101

Wh

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I’ll be honest, on the rare occasion a reader starts trying to get really close to me, my dumb brain freaks out and I put some distance in because I have Issues for days.

Pakky

thats just rude on their part

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

what

holy fuck

keii4ii

I've Been Burned

omg, that question mark react is so appropriate

Deo101

I've chatted with some readers here or there but I don't know if id wanna use them as a support pillar

I kind of have trained myself to think readers as fickle.

If they get sick of my story, theyre allowed to leave

They dont owe me their time or energy and them being here is a gift

So I'll chat and stuff and answer questions but unless someone is my friend i will not lean on them for support.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Honestly it’s happened that I’ve gad readers try to get really close or be my sounding board, and I think they were just trying to be enthusiastic and supportive but my stupid broken brain always panics and goes WARNING STALKER ALERT WARNING ABORT ABORT.

Deo101

Hey better safe than sorry

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

juppp

Deo101

I'll chat but i wont give personal information and im not gonna like, get all into spoiling everything im planning lmao.

If someone asks me a question thats a spoiler ill answer it in private

But bringing raw ideas up for help... I need very specific people for thst.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

The thing is they weren’t even being creepy or trying to get really personal. They were just very friendly and I apparently can’t handle that. ><

Deo101

The friend group i get writing helo on are all writers, and they all understand my vision. They don't write stories like mine, i dont write stories like theirs, and we all fully understand our suggestions may go unfollowed.(edited)

Also whoever put the eye emoji yeah if u have a question straight up dm me and I'll answer.

keii4ii

It's okay, your comfort is important. If you want to be more open, you can work on that. But not everyone has the same comfort level and that's okay too

Deo101

Yes! Its all about what you're comfortable with

But I've personally got a small curated group of writers/artists who all circulate our work between eachother

Which i know is very rare.

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Same, Deo...helped me a lot and I also know who to turn to when I'm down about engagement

Deo101

Mhm ^^

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

(also they are all perceived better than me so I believe them if they say sth nice)

Deo101

Omg

That group of people have done SO much for me honestly. Im thinking about them. I love my friends.

Also dont worry its nit all about me they also talk about and we help their work too i wanna be sure thats clesr

keii4ii

I figured it was all mutual! but now that you've said it's not all about you I'm suddenly imagining The Cult of Deo

That is 10000000% wonderful though

Deo101

I walk in and I'm like "y'all check out this new millennium lore" and they all take their hoods off and start scouring it for plotholes

keii4ii

Whilst sitting in a circle (a magic circle to be exact)

Deo101

Of course of course

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Damn, that’s awesome! I only see my friends every few months so I dump a lot of plot on them all at once, and it’s harder for them to give really detailed critique. XD

Deo101

Oh, I do this all online

Irl I sit down with my sister and we talk for 4 hours and Lose our voices LMAO

Cronaj

Good convos literally ALWAYS happen while I'm at work

keii4ii

I'm still here

Cronaj

Good, because it made me sad when you said you didn't have a support pillar

And that readers are fickle (which can be true)

But I don't think you know how much I love your comic

keii4ii

I'm seriously honored! I still fear that maybe people are not seeing the story I'm trying to tell, and are following the comic for some other reasons (which is valid, just not what I'm trying to achieve). But hey, I'll never find out if I don't keep going, right?

kayotics

keiiii, i love your comic and i think it's beautiful in many ways, not just the art

but also, on the topic of lack of engagement... I'm pretty fortunate in that my spouse is always really supportive of my comic, so when I need a little pep talk I can always ask them

sssfrs

I’m trying to collect as much negative feedback as I can so that I’ll know my comics strengths and weaknesses and I’ll be prepared to take criticism as it comes in the future. It is pretty frustrating having no response or fanbase right now but I started my comic pretty recently and theres still time for growth

Glowbat (Aloe)

when you're collecting feedback be mindful that there's a difference between constructive criticism and people being unhelpful and simply telling you they don't like your work

the latter wont do anything but bruise your self confidence(edited)

keii4ii

Yeah, and sometimes even well-meaning critiques can miss the point too, like if it comes from someone who thinks your work should be X, when it is intended to be Y. Easy example: My previous comic was a depressing drama centering around a terminally ill young woman and her doctor, and once someone told me I "needed more fight scenes." It wasn't even an action comic! In that case, the lack of fight scenes was not a weakness. It simply meant the comic wasn't for that person.

DanitheCarutor

On the topic of lack of engagement. My answer is really boring, but I just keep working on my comic regardless of how much/little engagement it gets. I never intended or expected to have an audience to begin with since my comic has sooo many problematic elements in it, whenever I get feedback it's super nice! Always a surprise, like seeing the machine light up when winning $500 on the penny slots! (In a way, getting engagement is kinda like gambling. You post a page and you may or may not win some comments in return... Not equating real people to items to win, of course!) Admittedly, if there is a page I feel would cause reaction but I get nothing, it is a little sad. It's not the end of the world, though! I got a story to tell, and as long as I can still draw I'm content.

kayotics

i relate to that a lot, Dani. I also never intended to make the comic for anyone but me, so the fact that anyone reads it is really exciting to me.

Cronaj

@keii4ii (Potentially off-topic, but is there somewhere to read your other comic(s)? Or are they all in Korean?)

DanitheCarutor

@kayotics Every so often I look at my reader base and think "Man, there are people into this kind of stuff??" It's an almost surreal feeling.

kayotics

Yeah I get it! I wouldn’t say mines too out there but there’s so many other fantasy dnd inspired comics out there that they could read that I’m surprised they even glance at mine.

AntiBunny

How do I deal with it? Usually experience a series of emotions such as "how hard is it to leave one little comment you losers?" Then "Who am I kidding, no one is reading this, I'm creating into a void," and finally pry a few comments from people who know me personally, reassure myself that I create out of a compulsion to tell my stories even if no one's reading, and start the process all over for next week. Not exactly a healthy method I admit.

keii4ii

@kayotics There is only one Toivo out there

@Cronaj aaaa the previous one was in English. But I would not recommend it It's unfinished (though it does have more than 600 pages IIRC) and honestly really rough.

kayotics

@keii4ii true....... one weird wizard boy

Cronaj

Dang... I LOVE medical stories. I'm seriously addicted to them. @keii4ii

keii4ii

I enjoy them too and I appreciate your interest!

Cronaj

scours the internet for the lost records

keii4ii

The site layout is also broken so yeah...

I guess another thing I do is try to comment more on other people's comics, to rec them publicly, etc. Being the change I want. I don't do this as often as I want, but I think/hope even the little bit I do counts.

mathtans

Heh, I'm basically with Cap'n Lee in terms of a cycle. I think part of my issue is I won a fanfic competition in 2004, and it's kind of been downhill since. I've posted regularly to a serial site for over 4 years, accumulating 300 posts, and last month it had 100 total views... there's been 2 comments since March.

On the actual comic side though (not serial) I've relaunched it more than once, and tried to flag the more recent index as a starting point. And yeah, just hold on to the few good comments, like the guy who applauds me for continuing to post even though I only have 10 people following on Tapas.

These days, of course, I'm too darn BUSY to really think much about the lack of engagement. So one solution might be to get married and have a kid. Then you're just happy when you manage to get content out, never mind if anyone remarks on it.(edited)

Mharz

Popping here just to answer the question becos it's interesting. The lack of engagement was a bane in my existence and honestly one of the factors why I had to see a psychiatrist. My doctor told me I have self-esteem issues which leads me to seek validation from strangers. This is the first thing I work on. I have to be confident enough to not break even if nobody likes my stuffs. Which means I have to love myself first. (People prolly see me as vain at this point) Second thing I do is keep a mentality of "nobody has to care. They have things going on as well" which helps me appreciate the small percentage of people who actually took the time to engage, talk, and be friends with me. I also try to put a positive spin on it. "Nobody cares therefore I can make as much noise on my social media as I want and no one will bother criticizing becos nobody cares." If people unfollow, it's on them. It just means they're not really a fan of my work and I shouldn't waste my time. And if my mental illness is too much, then I will disconnect from the online world a bit. Treat myself. Do something fun like gaming and baking and hang out with friends IRL if possible.

Mharz

I sometimes think it's karma on my end becos I'm so vain, I rarely get interested in anything so I'm not really a fan of many stuffs so that is something I accepted as well.

AntiBunny

Perhaps being a webcomic author sort of goes hand in hand with needing validation.

MJ Massey

OH BOY ARE WE TALKING ABOUT A LACK OF ENGAGEMENT?!

over the past week, I got 24 users. Granted, I didn't update, so that's probably why

So this is a four month overview of my website traffic. I hit a high of 184 unique users in August, and after that it plummeted to just barely over 100. And I hadn't really done anything different

I have never really gained a lot of traction with my comics. I'll admit that Black Ball definitely has more appeal than my last comic, so I have slowly been building an audience with it, but it's still been very slow. Sometimes it feels like I have to adhere to some extra set of rules while others can just throw up their comic on Tapas and have instant success. Of course, that's not the case at all

the key is to remember "why am I doing this? isn't it because I love making comics?!"

and to keep on pushing, keep up that hustle, and enjoy the ride. Make great content and it will be rewarding in and of itself

carcarchu

I'm not really sure it's as simple as simply throwing something up on tapas and getting instant success. there's a lot of work that goes behind every comic even if you don't perceive it

MJ Massey

well yes of course, I'm just saying sometimes it SEEMS like that

I'm a marketing professional, so I know there's a lot of stuff that goes on behind the scenes

Glowbat (Aloe)

theres, i think, a lot of factors in certain comics gaining traction faster than others that are mostly out of a creator's control. on mirror sites like webtoons or tapas you have to factor that more attention is given to certain genres and art styles over other because of what that crowd likes. if they're into slice of life romances in anime-esque styles then someone who writes fantasy mysteries in a more western influenced style may not get as much love as they deserve

its tough out there

ive been fairly fortunate to gain a steady bit of followers on tapas but on webtoons my reader engagement and subs are significantly lower

Glowbat (Aloe)

i chalk it up to the type of crowd

MJ Massey

I've been analyzing my audience and my work and have a hypothesis that my work just works better in bulk format. I think 2020 will be a year of transitioning into bulk distro instead of the page at a time format

and see if that helps. As well as some new marketing techniques and getting back into the con circuit

Kabocha

A lack of engagement... This is definitely... a topic. I feel like, sure, one's general marketability in any given platform will definitely make it easier or harder to attract an audience, but on the other hand? It's also worth making sure you kinda figure out what you want out of webcomics. Some people have been working on their projects (or existing within a fandom) for years - decades, even at this point, which can be a big boost to initial readership on a new project! Other people just have the advantage of being able to sit down and advertise, or having someone do that for them. Personally, though. I went in not expecting to get an audience, and for a long time, actively avoided even having a comment section on my site. I just enjoy making comics and creating things - and if it happens to make someone happy, that's awesome. But comics and art aren't the only thing I do in my life that make me happy, and I've found engaging other people directly about things like comic craft and resources to be about 100x more fulfilling than posting comics themselves. (And it is fun, sometimes, to gush about my OCs and how dumb they can be.) But how do I cope with it? Eh, it's honestly not a big deal to me. It feels less stressful in some regards, because the dayjob can get hella hectic, and trying to balance "OH GOD COMICS" with "OH GOD THE SERVERS NEED PATCHED ALL NIGHT TONIGHT" can be.... interesting.

(But oh god, I will admit, having someone come up to me and say, "I read your thing or used your photoshop/csp brushes" can be incredibly motivating. But other days, I have to be my own motivation, so...)

kayotics

Sometimes it’s helpful to keep a list of really nice comments or to write down memories of when someone told you they like your work. This can take a while to gather but if someone says something nice about your work, keeping it somewhere safe for a day you’re feeling bad can help boost that morale

It also helps me sometimes to think about how there’s a TON of people who never comment on things, but they’re probably regularly reading.

MJ Massey

Totally! I was building a landing page for my email subscription, and I was able to go back and find old reviews from my last comic, and it really got me pumped

Kabocha

Yeah! When I worked in a call center, the metrics on calls in -> surveys was something like... At best, you get 10% of your callers leaving surveys. And it's usually because you left an impression (good or bad). Usually the reality was at best, you'd hear back from about 2% of your userbase unless you gave them an incentive them to say something.

Mharz

re tapas and other platforms: I have to agree that certain genres really are more appealing there. I have two comics with different genres that I regularly update and the numbers are literally like night and day. It's a sad truth.

Mharz

I also love getting notifs on tapas when a person is binging my comics and liking every update. It means I got them hooked. :'3(edited)

nice reminder that there ARE people who like my comics.

Kabocha

Well yeah - even in traditional publishing, some genres generally get larger readerships than others (and higher advances) because they're more easily marketed. There's a reason why some publishers will categorize what's basically a fantasy story with romance subplots as a "romance" overall for a relatively unknown author (it's because they're more likely to attract more readers because romance is HUGE)

MJ Massey

true that

and you have to find where you audience lives as well

Kabocha

Yeah... I have some readers who only engage when they come back to catch up, which can be every 6weeks or more. Some only read when a chapter is done being posted, which is about every six months.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Re: Tapas. Yeah, Tapas especially has very particular styles and genres it likes (anime style + romance, especially BL). I posted Children of Shadow there for six months and had 20 total subs before taking it down. A while later I tried posting it on Webtoons and got 60 subs in one week. That level of engagement slowed down considerably almost immediately though, because the prologue episode is in colour and the main series is greyscale - and I discovered the hard way that the majority of Webtoons’ users do not like greyscale (I even got rating-bombed over it). My second comic is doing much better on Webtoons since it’s in digital colour rather than pencil like Children of Shadow. Each platform has its specific interests and it can be a struggle to get noticed if you’re not making something that falls into its normal styles and genres.

Glowbat (Aloe)

both tapas and webtoons really dont push their scifi comics hardly at all. Tapas' top scifi section is littered with discontinued stories (at least theyve abandoned tapas at any rate idk if theyre for sure no longer continued) which means that because i update weekly and sorta fall into a semi-anime inspired style i get some decent traffic from the small demographic who go hunting for a scifi comic

RebelVampire

That's not that surprising, tbh. Even in the realm of novels sci-fi is more of a hunt for where the audience is sometimes.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Scifi is an under-appreciated genre, imo. Unless you’re Star Wars, Star Trek or a Marvel comic, it seems like people don’t talk much about scifi.

It might help boost views if you rework your genre labels on places like Webtoons. Like, have Adventure or Drama as your main genre tag and Scifi as your secondary genre.

Glowbat (Aloe)

actually ever since avas demon went on webtoons ive been getting about 10-15 subs a week there

for a while i had listed aloe as drama first but the results werent fantastic as i think that genre has been flooded over there

keii4ii

I think sci-fi has some very prominent associations with the genre that don't apply to every sci-fi story -- e.g. the first thing a lot of people immediately think of is spaceship explody battles. So if someone sees sci-fi and they're not into spaceship explody battles, they won't read.

Glowbat (Aloe)

i may try adventure though if scifi doesnt pan out

keii4ii

Alternatively, if someone sees sci-fi and they ARE into that... and only that... they will leave once they find out the comic is not about that

Glowbat (Aloe)

thats also a good point

keii4ii

I've had similar difficulties even though fantasy is more widely accepted these days as a more varied mega-genre

People expect X, comic contains only a sprinkling of X and is about Y instead.

Glowbat (Aloe)

in my personal case, i've alienated potential readers i feel sometimes simply by having the cast be primarily lgtbq with an agender lead. but i dont regret that and im happy to have it deter people who arent down for that

RebelVampire

That is definitely true about sci-fi. Film has really biased people as to what fits sci-fi, where in reality sci-fi is a really wide genre. So a lot of stuff never gets a chance cause it confuses people.

Nutty (Court of Roses)

Yooooo i feel that, glowbat. On one hand, I want ppl to know that my comic is a safe read for LGBT, but at the same time I know that announcing it as such will deter others on principle.

The Q - working on WAYFINDERS

I feel the same way. The whole cast of Wayfinders is some form of lgbt+, but we don't actually adress it much, because it's an adventure story moreso than a romance. So it's like.... how do we tell the readers it ain't straight

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Fantasy does seem to get drowned by numbers. Eryl gets about 5 new subs per update and Children of Shadow only gets 1-2, and I think they’re just getting lost in the crowd.

Nutty (Court of Roses)

Two of my characters jokingly told each other their identity through bard puns, plus I keep pushing for gay ships within the story, so I'm pretty overt with my readers about it ahaha.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

@The Q - working on WAYFINDERS I’m having some difficulty with that dilemma, too. Both my comics feature large LGBTQ+ casts but romance isn’t the focus of either. It often feels like there’s no good way to bring it up naturally until the romance threads surface very far into the story, and I’m always worried about homophobes lashing out when they eventually discover the comic is G A Y

Glowbat (Aloe)

in my descriptions i describe the comic as a lgbtq+ themed scifi flat out

keii4ii

Early in HoK, one character embarks on a journey for a personal reason, and the MC tags along. I've semi-recently heard from an American friend that she didn't really get the character's reason. He wanted to take a younger family member away from a bad living situation, but to the friend, the situation didn't seem so bad. After some talking, we realized it was a cultural thing. The situation was very obviously bad to Koreans, but it didn't/doesn't seem like a far departure from the range of normal life in the US, for cultural/societal reasons. I suspect that was a big part of the reason why people kept pegging my comic as a "fun adventure romp" despite the lack of fun adventures (it has elements of adventure, but is not that as a whole). The reason for the journey seemed superficial, like the author (me) just needed an excuse to start the Fun Adventure-Filled Journey. Whereas Korean readers, back when I was publishing it in Korean, immediately understood it was an intensely personal, difficult task that the shy boy decided to accept for the sake of love.

And yeah, LGBTQ+ as a tag/ part of the description seems like a good option to me too!

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

But then I’m also anxious that LGBT folks will think that’s false advertising because the characters’ labels aren’t mentioned until really far into the story (and it’s no where near that point yet). Aaaagh maybe I just overthink everything.

Glowbat (Aloe)

its really interesting to hear the difference in reception HoK gets

keii4ii

Yeah and the setting itself apparently feels different, too! To Koreans, it evokes secondhand nostalgia. But some non-Koreans have told me it feels fantastical and Ripe For Adventures

Glowbat (Aloe)

I feel you Lee- almost none of my chars have mentioned or done anything to illustrate their identities yet

keii4ii

(I also feel the need to mention, there have been non-Korean readers who got what HoK was about. Those readers mean so much to me! But I don't know if they understood that particular detail about Danbi's motivation for the journey early on.)

The Q - working on WAYFINDERS

(I'm gonna put so much lbgt+ love in the background of the story everytime they get to a new city ahahahaha >:) )

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

To me, @keii4ii HoK is very reminiscent of Studio Ghibli films because I get similar whimsical vibes. But Studio Ghibli has always been more about emotional journeys so after a couple chapters I was like ‘Ah, yes, I think this comic is about the characters’ emotional growth’(edited)

Holmeaa - working on WAYFINDERS

(muhahhaa, also just let Sallly flirt with all the ladies in the BG)

Glowbat (Aloe)

yesss flirt with ladies

MJ Massey

I'm worried that my comic is not "gay enough" to warrant the LGBT+ label. The character's sexualities have very little to do with the actual story, and one character is actively hiding their identity

The Q - working on WAYFINDERS

SAME

keii4ii

I'm aro/ace/agender and I don't really feel "LGBTQ+ enough" so I can't really use the LGBTQ+ label for my own comic, even though I know the label isn't exclusively for ownvoices stories.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I admit I’m not sure I ‘got’ Danbi’s motivations on a cultural level, but I felt like the tone being presented in that scene made it pretty clear she was in a bad situation?(edited)

Holmeaa - working on WAYFINDERS

but... we have calculated a total of 1 straight character in our whole comic.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

‘She’ as in the niece, not Danbi. XD(edited)

MJ Massey

that's what it seemed like to me too, or at least that by leaving their village they were going to a better situation

Glowbat (Aloe)

first of all- high fives keii because agender solidarity and second of all if you have chars who identify as either not straight or not cis or both rolled into one then its gay enough to have the lgbtq label

to heck with gate keepers

there are plenty of queer peeps who just want to read stories that casually include people like themselves

but if you dont feel its needed you dont have to either

MJ Massey

I guess there is a certain expectation when you say "I make an LGBTQ+ comic" of how that comic will be, and I don't want to disappoint people or set them up to expect something different

I just figure that all kinds of people exist in the world, so I should include as many different kinds of people as I can in my work

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I probs should just put LGBTQ+ labels in the descriptions and be like ‘this is genre fiction but almost everyone’s queer even though you can’t tell yet’. XD

Nutty (Court of Roses)

I use the term "LGBT-friendly" to indicate that they're present, but might not be the full focus

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I write genre stories because I’m not that into romance-centric stories myself. I want queer heroes in the kinds of stories I like to read without the entire focus being on their sordid love-lives. I just want to read about the hero who slayed a dragon to rescue his prince instead of his princess, lol.

Glowbat (Aloe)

lol im in a similar position where i'd rather see the hero befriend the dragon

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I have plenty of that in my comics, too!

There’s some nice dragons and some very-not-nice ones. XD

Glowbat (Aloe)

(im insufferable in d&d i was a bard who tried to be friends with everything)

eryl is on my lisssst <3

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

This is why I love bards

Glowbat (Aloe)

hehe

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I'm always happy when people mark their stuff as LGBTQ+ if characters are present tbh Y_Y

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Also agreed with everything said above

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

All right, now Imma definitely have to add the LGBTQ+ labels to my comics next time I do website maintenance.

Glowbat (Aloe)

yay!

Nutty (Court of Roses)

Aw ye aw ye

Join the brigade

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

yiss

I feel a bit bad bc I rarely read sth that's not clearly marked as LGBTQ+ or where I know the authors are part of the community whoops

But it's mostly the fact that I consumed hetero-focused media my whole life and now I can...choose.....

the dream

Glowbat (Aloe)

heck yes

im way more drawn to stories that are marked lgbtq+

keii4ii

Don't feel bad, because seriously, even if you exclusively read LGBTQ+ marked stories? There ain't enough time in this life to read every good story that fits that bill.

There are too many good stories out there and we do need to choose.

Glowbat (Aloe)

its just nicer because then i can enjoy the story without having to worry that in the middle of it im going to get a rude wake up call from an off colour joke or somethin at my expense

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

yeah that's true

keii4ii

Sometimes we miss out on stuff that we may have fallen in love with, but that's the name of the game, the game of not having enough time

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Webcomics feel a lot safer than other media in that regard atm

Jupp especially if you're also working on your own stories

Glowbat (Aloe)

it sucks thinking theres a bunch of stories out there that im sure id love if only i had the time or mental fortitude to sift through a bunch of others.

keii4ii

(OTL that reminds me... there is one instance of trope use in an early chapter of HoK that falls into that 'off color joke' category. I don't have any excuses for it, just 'I just thoughtlessly parroted a trope that I saw elsewhere.' I regret it and hope to figure out an elegant way to rewrite that one scene.)

Glowbat (Aloe)

i dont have the energy to be burned so often by stories that seem good and then hit me with random transphobic bs or using slurs as jokes

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Yeah, as someone who grew up in a time when no one positively portrayed queer folks in mainstream stories (and there was no internet and living out in the boonies made it impossible to discover underground cultures) I love that now I can seek out tonnes of LGBTQ stories and drown myself in the gay every day.

Glowbat (Aloe)

yesss

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

jupp ;;

Glowbat (Aloe)

man if i could give ten year old me printed copy of paranatural and turn to the pages with rj's identity being explained? that kid would have grown up way happier

living in small towns aint great for queer peeps

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Nope it’s not. I was badly repressed until honestly only 3 years ago when I suddenly asked myself why I loved reading about and writing so many gay characters. And then suddenly my whole life made sense.

Glowbat (Aloe)

im so happy for you<3

Glowbat (Aloe)

its a heck of a thing thinking back on things and realizing why you do certain things

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Honestly there were giant clues from when I was still a little kid and I can’t believe it took me so long. XD But I’m digressing from the comic talk, lol.

Glowbat (Aloe)

haha i understand what you mean

i think its why its so important for comics to be inclusive

spare some poor kids the heart ache and confusion

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Yes! The internet has created such a boom for indie comics and that huge variety of voices has been so so important.

Glowbat (Aloe)

as much as comics are an art, they're extremely powerful as a vehicle for teaching and generally conveying ideas

FeatherNotes

Can i just say how happy i am that y'all are making LGBTQ+ comics that aren't just romance tho? I'm pretty indifferent and on the ace spectrum for sure, so its so refreshing that we can have a queer cast just being cool and not hurt by identities. I wish i had that as a kid

Also no shade on romance but there's def a lot and lgbtq+ isn't just for that genre

So yes yall are 'gay enough' lol

Glowbat (Aloe)

i agree! queer peeps shouldn't be squared off in romance, which unfortunately i think is a result of people's gross misconceptions

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Admittedly, I use my comics as a vehicle to work through my own issues, so there are scenes planned where the characters have to deal with transphobia or homophobia. But I will always counterbalance that with other scenes that validate the characters’ identities.

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Hmhm my story also deals with transphobia and dysphoria bc I'm working through own issues. I don't think that's a bad thing though

generally I think it's pretty ok if the story is not a constant misery train

(even those can be written well, but they are usually not my cup of tea)

Glowbat (Aloe)

i think its perfectly acceptable to use comics as a vehicle for that lee

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

yeahh tbh

MJ Massey

there's no wrong reason to make comics/create a thing

Glowbat (Aloe)

youre a queer creator and you're working with what you know so why not

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I know focusing on queer suffering has been criticised a lot but I feel there's more nuance to it. Especially if it's a LGBTQ+ person writing about it

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Yeah. I’m a miserable emo and I write miserable emo stories, but I try to inject some hope into it, because I think that the majority of humans are good and/or want to be good.

Glowbat (Aloe)

theres this comic called dropout that does a wonderful job exploring the grittier truths of being queer

its a fairly short read but its super good

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Hmmm, I may look that up

Glowbat (Aloe)

i can dm you the link! no pressure to read it tho

twothirty

gosh, i just want to chime in because i really relate to earlier comments around labelling comics. I'm bi, but i don't wear it on my sleeve, and my own comic has like...1 straight character. I feel like there is an expectation for comics labelled as lgbtq+ and i don't want to disappoint people who are really looking for that content to be directly addressed.

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Tbh I feel many people are just happy, if there's queer characters doing cool stuff (at least that's how it's for me).

Glowbat (Aloe)

i label my own comic as lgbtq+ and the plot hardly hinges on that being the central theme

just a bunch a gay scientists and robots in space

...i swear its way more interesting that that lol

man i wish i could get more of my comic out faster so i didnt have to worry about spoiling basic things geeze

twothirty

haha im into it! Ahh, well probably a big part of it is my own insecurities, but what are webcomics for if not... for figuring out your own crap (edited)

keii4ii

I feel that X'D

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

juppp...I get the anxiety tho

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Mess of anxiety solidarity.

Glowbat (Aloe)

oof yeah

also hey while we're at it with the queer biz in here:

aro/ace/bi peeps are all gay enough full stop

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

YES

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

jupp

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

As a demi-bi dude I fully endorse that all labels are valid.

And that gatekeeping sucks and helps no one

Glowbat (Aloe)

yeah anyone who makes you feel like you dont belong under the lgbtq+ umbrella isnt doin right by you

and your comics should be allowed to be considered as queer as you want them to be

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Also all gender identities are valid and don’t hinge on having a physical transition. You’re valid as trans whether you change your body or not.

Glowbat (Aloe)

^^^

YES

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

YESS

Glowbat (Aloe)

all our experiences are valid and the comics we make because of those experience are beautiful

Deo101

Oh man I missed a huge convo, but I love y'all and it's wonderful seeing so many kinds of comics out there and seeing people make their own content

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Yo, nothing "gross" about romance, and the reason people flock to it is because romance with same-gender couples and/or trans people has been treated as "deviant disorder that needs to be cured and cleaned up, or at least kept far away from polite society" for so long (and still is, in many places)

All queer stories are valid, queer characters don't need to be in a romantic storyline to count, but please let's discuss that without echoing homophobic rhetoric about queer romance being "gross", yeah?(edited)

MJ Massey

I don't think it was meant gross as in queer romance itself being gross, but more in the finding a general distaste for romance tropes and romance as a genre

but I agree, that we should be careful about implying those sorts of things with our work

keii4ii

Romance as a genre is valid too; the consensus was just that there's a lot of it, and other genres are valid too. That every genre is valid

MJ Massey

true, but people might just feel strong distaste for certain genres from a personal point of preference

it's part of what makes the fabric of human existence so fascinating, we all have different opinions, likes, dislikes, viewpoints...

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

tbh I love romance stories but the thing that disheartens me is that the queer stories people take most serious are romances

keii4ii

The pigeonholing

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Can you elaborate on that Keiiii?

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Those are the stories that get repressed and erased the most, is the thing, so it takes more effort to get them produced and shared, and that makes people extra-happy

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I don’t think anyone said romance stories were gross?

Just that it’s not necessarily our jam.

keii4ii

Oh, I meant that's what people are doing when people start exclusively associating a very diverse experience/ group of people with ONE thing, to a point where the people in that group are not allowed to be anything other than That One Thing

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I was reacting to "queer peeps shouldn't be squared off in romance, which unfortunately i think is a result of people's gross misconceptions"

keii4ii

and it's a really unfair, inaccurate restriction

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Ahhhh

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

OH okay, thank you for elaborating, Keiiii. I couldn't really associate anything with the term at first!

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Misconceptions are the reason queer people have been excluded from most romance for so long

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I think in that case it was more about people's misconception of queer identities being inherintly sexual and/or romantic though?

and not about queer romance being gross

DanitheCarutor

Huh, I thought 'gross' in that context was more akin to 'outlandish' or 'exaggerated', but I could be misunderstanding.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I think it means more that a lot of people fetishise queer relationships when there’s only representation in romance.

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Associating "queer people being sexual and/or romantic" with "gross" is still hella dicey

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

the misconception is what's gross, not the queer people or their romance?

Glowbat (Aloe)

re: gross misconceptions :Oh! i think i said that Erin- i don't think i did a great job of explaining my thoughts on that. on sites like tapas and webtoons its fairly common for gay couples to be exploited for an audience thats less interested in representation than fetishization(edited)

MJ Massey

yes I think there was some lamenting that it could be difficult to show queer characters without an element of romance to make their identities apparent?

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I don’t think they meant gross as in disgusting but gross as in ‘far off the mark’

MJ Massey

because some people wanted to have queer characters but not focus on a romantic plot

@Glowbat (Aloe) I know what you are talking about I think

Deo101

Yeah, though I'd like to add on as someone who is writing LGBT romance, I get lumped in with fetishization content a lot and that is very frustrating for me, too

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

And it does take a lot of digging to find respectful representation in romance instead of stories made by and for straight people that use bad stereotypes to fetishise queer relationships.

Not that all romance by and for straight people does this.

But it’s a problem in the genre

Deo101

I work very hard to portray healthy loving relationships and people lump me in to their hatred of romance in general or categorize my work as bl or discount it for having that. It gets fetishized or dismissed an awful lot and that's very frustrating for me to see happening

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

If you want to talk specifically about something you feel is stereotypical or fetishizing, I wouldn't object to that, it's the broad swipes at all romance that become a problem

Glowbat (Aloe)

agreed

queer romance is very important to represent

i dont think anyone here would imply otherwise

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

And, hey, sometimes queer writers/readers also enjoy a romance that's unrealistic or trashy or silly or melodramatic, I don't want to dismiss "all romance that wouldn't represent a healthy and respectful relationship IRL" either

Glowbat (Aloe)

very true

Deo101

Yeah, not what I was trying to say.

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Idk if anyone was saying that tbh

Glowbat (Aloe)

i think our initial conversation though boiled down to that we were happy to see stories with queer people being allowed to just be people doing things that didnt focus on romance

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I'm personally very glad that we are getting a wider variety of queer romance now

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

What we were discussing earlier is more that it’s important to portray queer protagonists in all kinds of genres, instead of only romance. Which doesn’t mean romance isn’t also a valid genre.

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Sure, and part of my discomfort is that queer characters have already been "allowed" to do non-romantic things in mainstream media for a long time -- it's being "allowed" to have an explicit romance that's new and different

keii4ii

^ I don't know about that. It probably depends on where you are, both IRL and part of the internet?

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I never saw a queer character that wasn’t either tragic, a deviant, or the butt of a joke in media until the late ‘O0s(edited)

MJ Massey

both views are valid--it's good to both want explicit queer romance and to also just want to see queer people doing a wide range of things

DanitheCarutor

@Glowbat (Aloe) Yeah, to parrot what you said. I just chalked the convo up to seeing queer characters expand into different genres, and being happy that queer fiction is starting to be known for more than just romance.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

There was no positive representation in any genre in the media I had access to for most of my life(edited)

Deo101

It helps with the normalization of stories like that, but I also think it makes homophobes be "more comfortable" with gay stories sometimes in a way that bothers me

I have had someone say that my story is the only bl they can stand so I'm sensitive about this subject though

Cause there's a lot to unpack there

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

The "if there has to be a queer romance, at least make it awful and tragic" trope was absolutely true in my area too

yikes, I can see being sensitive about that

Deo101

Like me writing something that primarily isn't romance and just has a romance b plot is making homophobes and fetishizing people read my work and that's frustrating for me in a way I can't articulate. I'm very happy within the LGBT+ community to have these works be made but among the straight people I know it's uncomfortable when they start saying things like "oh yay finally some gay stuff that isn't romance" kind of thing

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

yeah that makes sense

Deo101

From other gay people I get it, it makes sense and I'm the same way! Especially with the oversaturation of bl

DanitheCarutor

@Deo101 Gah I got a comment like that before, it was a weird situation because not only was it unnecessary but... TGtaHR isn't even a romance...

Thinking about it, that's actually kinda worrying.

Deo101

But it's important to remember that the LGBT+ community is a bubble and though it's safe to explore all sorts of stories here, it's not safe outside of our bubble

Or, not necessarily safe

Like a homophobe reading a gay story with an unhealthy dynamic could just bolster their bad opinions about gay people even if it's exploring it in a healthy way

I have a hard time explaining what I'm thinking and I really hope this all makes sense

keii4ii

I get you

Glowbat (Aloe)

(i get what youre saying deo <3 )

Deo101

And its not something we can really change but I think it's important to remember with regards to society at large and how our stories are percieved outside the community

Phew lol

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I get what you're saying, although in that case, the homophobe was probably going to think that no matter what, and if it wasn't the story they'd find some other "evidence"

Deo101

Yeah absolutely

And I think it's important to remember that when talking about exploring stories that have unhealthy Dynamics and things other than romance and whatnot. I don't want those things to become safe for cishets to exploit basically

Like "oh great now I don't need to write them kissing so I can access BOTH the LGBT and everyone else!"

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Ah, you mean like "the author says they're gay, so that counts as representation and LGBT people should buy this, even though there's never anything explicitly gay in the story"

right?

Deo101

Yeah

Deo101

Which again within the community I get and it's important to explore things like that for sure

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I think the important difference is, writers within the community are going to do something to indicate the queer identity, even when it's not "having an on-screen romance"

And that's something that, say, your average JKR doesn't bother doing

Deo101

Again I have a hard time explaining myself and I might be tripping over my words a bit here

Yeah that's true as well

I trust LGBT people to be navigating stories with an inherent nuance

For the most part

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

That, or (I think people were talking about this upthread) we don't advertise a story as "look at all this representation!" while the characters' identities haven't come up in the comic yet

Deo101

Yeah I know I didn't say my story was LGBT til I had the married couple kiss cause I was worried people would think I was gaybaiting

I know I'm not but it feels wrong to me like I'm trying to rally up readers kinda thing...

But also if you know you're planning to do it I feel like you can say it'll be there

I just have anxiety LOL

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

No, I get you. Even if it's definitely going to happen in the future of the comic, it'll disappoint readers if you rally them up for something that isn't there yet

That would happen with anything, not just queer identities

Deo101

Yeah I also don't tag my pages or whatever for disability if a character isn't disabled on the page

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Like if it was "read my comic for cool space battles!" when you had only posted the 5 pages of setup with characters having a chill talk in a field

sssfrs

I think what bothers me about lbgtq focused romance stories is that they’re often centered on how ~scandalous~ the relationship is and how the characters have to overcome personal biases or homophobia/transphobia as the central struggle

Deo101

I don't want the wrong audience. I mean I also could probably slap bl on my cover and I feel like I'd get a lot more readers but they're not the readers I want

sssfrs

Or at least I dont enjoy reading stories like that

Deo101

Yeah that frustrates me too, personally

But some people like seeing that overcoming idk

sssfrs

My comic has at least 2 visible prominent gay relationships but its not about romance at all

I guess thats personal preference(edited)

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I think a lot of the time you also know what intentions the person behind telling a story like that has? I have a straight aquaintaince writing BL and it's totally clear that she thinks the whole ordeal is kinda cute and endearing when it's pretty...harsh for actual queer people

Deo101

Mines got 5 and it is about romance cause I absolutely love romance and I love love, but I am overly frustrated with romance as a genre. Which is why I write my own

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I think that goes back to the "talk about a specific trope that bothers you, don't treat it like the whole genre" thing I was saying

Deo101

Yeah I think there's a lot of nuance to it that cishet people largely don't have

sssfrs

I feel like it makes the romance into a statement about how society is bad and its not interesting or groundbreaking to represent that bigotry in your media without adding something new

Deo101

I'm frustrated with the often unhealthy Dynamics and the frequency with which homophobia and transphobia are shown.

I live in a homophobic household I don't want it in my romance cause it hurts to see

But, I don't think it's bad to tackle those issues it's just hard for me personally

sssfrs

I like pairing up side characters but only 2 pairs are going to have an Arc. so far....

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I...feel for many cishet authors it's also a good excuse to not have the characters get together right away without actually thinking about why they would not for other reasons (like personality based). So there's a lot of "I'm not gay!!!" type of thing

Also totally understandable Deo :C

Deo101

Yeah absolutely.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

It’s also valid, as a queer author, though, to show characters that do have to overcome their ‘gay panic’ when they first realise they’re gay. It’s something a lot of us have gone through, but it’s important to show the comfort you finally feel in yourself when you come out the other end if it.

sssfrs

Why should fiction include all the shitty parts of real life

Deo101

I think straight people see LGBT authors tackle these issues and go "oh so I can too!!!"

And yeah this is why I'm largely drawn to sci-fi and fantasy, I get to entirely remove all the things that hurt me about reality. Dude can just use a cane and everyone is like dope

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Because sometimes fiction helps us process all the shitty parts of real life. Both happy stories that take away shit and gritty stories that acknowledge shit are valid and important

Deo101

Ppl can just be trans and it's fine

I agree they're all important

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

(I think I'm just super bitter bc here I've seen cis and straight women get awards for their queer romance stories which just hmm)

Deo101

^

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I agree it's a super nuanced topic

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

...I feel like you've also gotta make some allowance for bad writing. Like, maybe someone's not getting a lot of nuance in their story because their skills aren't sharp enough to handle it yet.

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Agreed, Erin!

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

And one of the ways they'll get good enough to write better stories is by working out issues through writing the worse stories.

sssfrs

My main character is a butch lesbian gnc completely androgynous person and no one is ever going to say anything nasty to her about it

Deo101

I feel you sssfrs lol(edited)

Deo101

I thirst for gentle, nice LGBT stories. I just crave them

Nutty (Court of Roses)

I feel that. As I build Prismal and decided to include lgbt folks in it, my first thought about it was "would there be any reason for them to be hated in this society? No? Then why would I include that theme?"

Deo101

And yes it's important to delve into the harsher realities and I think it's good to use fiction to explore and work through those themes, definitely, but personally no thx

sssfrs

I like where ppl are just all expected to be pan or bisexual by default

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

heh, I literally have 2 comics and one of them is "real world where characters struggle with realistic prejudices" while the other is "fantasy world with 0% homophobia/transphobia."

Something for everyone!

sssfrs

Nice

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I’m too goddamn miserable to write such nice stories, lol. But writing gritty stories where my characters go through hell helps me process the stuff I go through in my life. But I love reading those nice stories where we can forget racism and queerphobia exist.(edited)

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

hehe...I've decided to go into some queerphobia in my next comic only bc I want to...explore historical queer spaces and the kind of space does not make sense in a world that's 100% accepting

Deo101

Yeah it's just all about that nuance babeyy

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

yeahhh

Deo101

I think that's also why we see so much more LGBT content of all kinds in indie media

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Absolutely

Less gatekeeping, less opportunity for homophobes to shut it down

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

No big boss complaining it’s not ‘marketable’ to be inclusive

Deo101

And I worry that mainstream stuff will be like "ohoho, so that means I can do it too" *stumbles and sets gay people back 10 years in the eyes of the general public *

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

YEEEEEEAH there’s that

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I think the mainstream is going slow enough that that's far from my biggest worry

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

But change never happens smoothly

Sometimes it goes up and down before society evolves into a better mindset

Deo101

Well yeah ofc, but even on a smaller scale of bad people reading good works it is kinda happening I feel like

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

So there’s gonna be periods of shit before being queer is faithfully represented in the mainstream

Deo101

Yeah for sure

It helps normalize things but it also can do it in an unhealthy way and it's frustrating

As in people going "yes let's include gay romance *it's just bl tropes *"

And things like that

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I think the best way to counter that is by producing & supporting more stories of all kinds -- the more complex and multifaceted a view people get, the better

Deo101

Yeah

From people who are handling those stories well, too ^^^

Which is subjective of course I know that

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Also, something nobody's mentioned that I think should come up...a lot of times you don't know who's straight/cis and who's not. Like, if it's Famous Mainstream Author JKR, you can be pretty sure, but with small-scale indie creators, how much can you tell the difference between "straight/cis artist who thinks BL tropes are how all real gay relationships work" versus "gay/bi/trans/etc artist who understands IRL fine, but it's fun and self-indulgent for them to write those tropes"?

Especially since the artist could be actively in the closet. Or could still be on their own journey of self-discovery and not know they aren't straight and/or cis yet. All the more so since indie creators are more likely to be younger than well-established mainstream standards.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I don’t know about you guys, but it’s always BLATANTLY obvious to me by how they’re writing.

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

How did you confirm it? Did you ask them?

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Call it intuition

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I don't think it's always confirmable tho :C

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Granted, sometimes a person writes with enough nuance that I can tell they're queer, but how do you tell a straight writer from an awkward/inexperienced/clunky queer writer?

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I know a lot of authors thinking they were cishet and later on realizing they were not

and some of them wrote a lot of "yikes"

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

There’s writing patterns and use of tropes that signal whether the person is actually respectful if the queer community or not

Deo101

Also just cause you're working through things doesn't mean it's a healthy exploration that is good for the community at large

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Even if they’re queer and self-indulging, there’s a lot of tells both in the comics and in their commentary

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

tbh I think some tropes are fair to criticise no matter if the author is queer or not but there are also queer authors writing disrespectful tropes

it's not sth that I see a lot, but I've seen it

Deo101

^ yeah this

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

All questions of their writing aside, there are definitely queer people who don't respect the community IRL, either...

Deo101

Like it's not good to write glorifying rape fic of pedophilia no matter who you are or how it's helping you work through things. I mean you can write it but then to share it is something else entirely

Not saying those are common things but they're pretty very much "bad" things

And actually glorifying rape is something I do see much more than I would have expected

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

And that’s problematic, too. When you’re part of a community but not respectful of it, that’s just as bad as a straight person being homophobic. Sometimes the worst homophobia cones from within the community, but that doesn’t make it okay or healthy.

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

If you share a dark story behind accurate warnings and labels, then it can reach other people who are working through something by reading it, and be avoided by people who don't.

Deo101

Yeah there's a lot of lateral agression within the community

Okay but glorification of it isn't a healthy way to work through those things it's not a dark story

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I'm not saying homophobia from within the community is okay or healthy, I'm just saying it doesn't have to indicate that the person is straight/cis.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I have a lot of dark themes in my comics. There is rape, but it is never shown on panel and never never glorified. I think it’s a subject that’s important to talk about, but I find it extremely disturbing how much it’s romanticised in fiction.

Deo101

^^^

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

yeah...

DanitheCarutor

Huh, this convo reminds me of an article a friend sent me from someone's Patreon. https://www.patreon.com/posts/25994657 It talks about creation policing, and problematic fiction. You all proooobably won't agree with it given the direction of discussion (which all points of view are totally valid), but this whole subject is super interesting.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

All right, true, you can’t always know if an author is queer or not. I should have been more specific in whether an author has a healthy view of the LGBTQ community or not.

Deo101

So you might not be able to tell if someone is gay by their writing, but there are certain trends that gay people do not generally fall into that MOSTLY indicate someone is straight, though there's no way to know for sure.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

THAT is always obvious to me.

Deo101

And like def there are bi women who fetishize gay men, and there is transphobia and biohobia and everything within the community

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

If they’re being homophobic or just don’t ‘understand’ the queer community, I mean

Deo101

Etc etc, so even if you can't tell whether a harmful representation is written by someone who is LGBT it's a harmful representation regardless

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

^^^^This

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Yeah. I'm always very hesistant on how to address things like this

Deo101

Me too esp since I have such a hard time saying what I mean

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I'm not saying it's impossible to write harmful representation, but "this is harmful!" gets used as a cudgel against any representation, so often that I'm wary of talking about it as a vaguely-defined blanket category.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

It’s hard to articulate things clearly when in fast-paced chats like this

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

yeah, haha

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

At least it's good for leveling people up, huh?

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

eifhiuef pfft

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Lol. ‘You levelled up talking about homophobia!’

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

(I feel we're all respectful and try to explain ourselves and give others the chance to do so too)

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

At least it's good for something??

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

(so that's good haha)

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Yes. Talks like this are super important to help see each others views on tricky subjects

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Yeah, I feel like we're making good-faith attempts to understand each other, which...is not something you always get in internet discussions

To put it very very mildly

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

We all have our own stories and unique perspectives, and that’s important to share both in the fiction we write and in discussions with each other

DanitheCarutor

@Phin (Heirs of the Veil) The subject is pretty sticky. On one hand artists should be allowed to create whatever they like, on the other if that work can perpetuate harm for a certain community should it be allowed? There is a lot of this going around right now where people want sanitization in media, and what works of art are and are not allowed to exist. Not saying it's bad, but it is fascinating. I'm not fully getting into the convo because I'm honestly super neutral.

kayotics

I’m definitely watching the convo play out, it’s interesting to see a chat like this develop

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

yeah I'm taking notes this is not my area of expertise, and it's all good stuff to keep in mind

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I'm okay discussing & criticizing specific examples (which is probably why I keep bringing up Dumbledore...), but I don't like being critical of broad categories, because they can be so ambiguous & easily misused.

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

@DanitheCarutor I think it is very hard to differentiate between people who want difficult subjects to be explored (which is valid) and people who don't want to be called out for certain kinks for example and a lot of the times stuff like "purity policing" gets used to shut legit criticism up. On the other hand there are a lot of examples of callout culture gone wild and honestly ??? Idk anymore.

Deo101

Its very frustrating

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

But I'm also at a point where I'm getting super tired of constant discourse so

Deo101

Yeah I've literally had to block words like "ace" cause it's just so often discourse from either side and I'm just so tired of it

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Plus there’s always going to be stories that help one person work through things but that are very toxic and upsetting to someone else. Just like there’s people who are toxic to one person and important to someone else.(edited)

Deo101

I've also blocked LGBT and "feminism" kinda things

I JUST see cats and memes now thank you

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Lee: absolutely, which is why accurate labels are important

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Eyyyy, it's my turn!

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Yes

kayotics

I think it’s important to curate your online experience, and sometimes NOT curating your experience leads to purity policing

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

HMM

kayotics

But yes tagging is really important!!!

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I think there is the creation of a lot of anxiety in what and what you can't tell in stories

Deo101

Tags are super important but also when someone doesn't think or realize they're doing something harmful they might not tag it

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Warning labels all around are always a good idea

Deo101

Like if someone is being a homophobe just cause etheyre homophobic they're not gonna tag that

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

True

Deo101

Why tag it's glorifying abuse if they think it's hot or reality and don't realize that's bad

Etc etc

kayotics

There’s definitely a lot of creator anxiety lately, I’ve had a lot of friends come to me with anxieties about not wanting to start a project they love because they’re afraid of who might attack them online

Deo101

^^^ I've been scared about this

kayotics

Me too, honestly

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Same honestly

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

There’s always the issue if ‘should harmful ideas be given a platform’ vs ‘stifling voices you just don’t want to hear’ it’s a fine line.

Deo101

I once got all in a tizzy cause I was like "oh my god my planet of women is asking a man for help"

Yeah cause some free speech silences other's

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

Same

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

And sometimes you get people thinking "if I label this with a warning that it contains Bad Content, the internet police will come after me," so they don't use warnings for that reason, and then it's just bad times all around

Deo101

Yeah.

And also there are things no one thinks to warn about, like some very specific triggers

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

yeah...

Deo101

Its just all around a very difficult to navigate space

DanitheCarutor

@Phin (Heirs of the Veil) Right? People do that with anything, if it's not the "purity police" excuse it's "my style", or "I'm friends with -insert minority here-!" I don't bother with the arguments anymore since I've been pushed into them enough, I'm more into seeing opinion on general art policing, or what is and isn't allowed to exist in art. Sorry, I'm being slow at typing again.

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Heck, if we're talking about actual psychological triggers, most of them are going to be super-specific

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I have a trigger for fungal growth on bodies now bc I have 3 people who either have probs with plants growiing on bodies OR funghi lol

Deo101

Ya I have a "someone watching someone else sleep" trigger which people use a surprising amount

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

...wait, Phin, now you have a trigger, or now you use a warning for it?

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

@DanitheCarutor srsly don't worry about it, haha. It's a nuanced topic and I think generalizing is pretty bad when it comes to what you can and can't portray

I use a warning for it, sorry Erin, wasn't clear

I had multiple people approach me so I warn in update posts and should probs also do it on the website

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

no worries, just wanted to be sure

kayotics

I do have an extreme phobia of needles and you’d be surprised how many news sites use active needle shots for vaccination stories

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

GOD I KNOW

I am not afraid of them but like once they are near skin

I don't wanna see...these shots

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I have a deathly phobia of vomiting and there are NEVER warning labels for it.

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

yeah I think most people don't regard it and sometimes it's hard to get everything...

a friend of mine, Eli, creates a very gory comic and they put all their warnings on their update post images

and I kinda wanna try to be similarly mindful?

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

(I’m okay if it’s in a comic and off-panel or the gross part is not shown but the sound and sight are crippling for me and shows and movies just SHOW it all the time)

kayotics

That’s true. Not a vomit fan.

DanitheCarutor

Ah I've thought about using page by page TWs, and I tried it out with one page, but with the amount of triggering thing in my comic I decided on a general warning. (since almost every page would get a warning) A few of my readers also said they preferred not to see them due to possible spoilers.

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Hmm...I have a list of possible triggers in my about section

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I probably should start doing that bc my comics get very bloody

kayotics

I know I’ll have a scene eventually that I’ll want to have a warning on, but I’m not sure how to warn for it without spoiling?

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I installed a spoilertext plugin on one of my comics for that! Now I can put specific warnings at the front of a storyline, and readers who don't have triggers & don't want spoilers can leave them hidden.

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

OHH that's a cool idea

DanitheCarutor

Yeah, mine is like a general pop-up that you have to click on to proceed to the comic.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I’m going to have to look at that plugin. Potential spoilers are the only reason I don’t have really detailed warnings on my comics

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Here's the one I use: https://wordpress.org/plugins/inline-spoilers/

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Yeah I'll look into it too. It seems super useful.

Heck thanks Erin!

DanitheCarutor

I don't know how you could make a warning without spoilers, @kayotics! I mean, you might have to if you want to do a page specific one.(edited)

Sorry, my cat sent the message for me.

kayotics

I was thinking a page specific one for the upcoming scene.

So I’m glad that doesn’t seem weird

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I'd say super-general warnings are mostly not spoilers. A movie will say "contains graphic violence", and that doesn't tell you who's being violent, or why, or how it's resolved.

DanitheCarutor

^^^

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

yeah, I think that's not a spoiler, especially if the comic was already violent

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Yeah. I have warnings for things like ‘graphic violence, blood and gore, nudity, etc. But some chapters or pages probably warrant more detailed TWs.

Deo101

Yeah I'm gonna put in my a/n for a few updates before like "hey there are some spooky scenes comin' up!'

kayotics

I wouldn’t say my comic is already violent, so it’s more applicable for this one scene

Deo101

And yeah things like "watching someone sleep" is gonna be at least somewhat of a spoiler...

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

hmhm

DanitheCarutor

@kayotics I think it really just depends on the person too. Some readers like page by page TWs, and don't see them as spoilers, others are the opposite. Your readers might appreciate a warning more than mine since your comic isn't overall super graphic.(edited)

Gah I can not type today!

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I put "this will get bloody" before some of the vampire storylines, not spoiler-cut -- because it's not a given, but shouldn't exactly be a surprise, either.

Deo101

I also do not mind spoilers whatsoever and I WILL spoil to anyone who asks as I've said many times, but I know not everyone is like me and spoilers are a big deal to many people

"i don't mind spoilers" i love them and they make me enjoy things more for many reasons

DanitheCarutor

Ah same! I'd love to just spill everything!

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

(Deo high five bc same)

Deo101

My people

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

tbh spoilers got me interested in many comics and I actively spoil myself

like getting into new comics and reading the updates before jumping to the beginning haha

kayotics

I’m very much the opposite

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I don't want to spoil anything, I want to keep people guessing! But sometimes you gotta.

Deo101

Yes. I get incredibly stressed about whether or not things will work out and spoilers relieve that. Even if it doesn't work out like at least I know

I get so so sooo stressed about it

kayotics

Whenever people tell me spoilers I actively like content less

DanitheCarutor

I don't mind them myself. My mom absolutely hates them, and used to make me spoil every movie if I saw it before her, so I'm pretty alright with it.

Deo101

Yeah ik many people are that way

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

yeah I also think that's fair

DanitheCarutor

Also spoilers don't affect me either since it's not the content that means anything, but how it's used. Imo

kayotics

Usually for me it’s like. “Ok you spoiled a major character death/reveal, that’s not fun for me anymore”

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

OH yeah Kay! Tbh

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

If there's a big twist, I want to be unspoiled the first time I watch/read/etc the thing. If it's handled well, I can always rewatch it again with the knowledge.

kayotics

Because then I don’t get to experience that anymore

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

that's sth that can also ruin a story for me

kinda didn't get into the current season of CritRoll bc of such a spoiler

with comics it's kinda like...I see them on twitter, read along a few updates and then jump to the beginning so there I don't mind spoilers at all

it's more scoping out if the story's for me

Deo101

Oh man I sometimes only get into things because of spoilers LOL I know I'm weird with this but genuinely I love spoilers so much they make me comfortable with what I'm watching. I love rewatching things cause I know how it goes down and I'm not stressed by it

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I sometimes have troubles to deal with...raw emotions towards media so spoilers help me with that too

like preparing myself for it to hurt

(not always tho)

Deo101

Right yeah for sure

Even if I know it won't work out I KNOW and I don't put energy into getting my hopes up

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I hate spoilers, personally. I love going into stories completely blind or with just the bare-bones ‘genre, overall theme’ because I LOVE being shocked and surprised and have plot-twists thrown at me, so that’s what I do with my own comics(edited)

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

yeah that's also fair. Right now my brain's not in the mood for that so I gotta play it save hehe

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I still don't like saying "here's what the Beings are" in ads or sales pitches for BICP, even though the page where it was revealed is several years old by now

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

But everyone likes different things so there’s nothing wrong with giving spoilers for your own stories if people want them(edited)

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

yeah it depends honestly and that's pretty okay.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Everyone’s different and everyone’s valid

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I don't spoil my own story, except with artworks and mostly it's without context or cryptic enough that it's not...a real spoiler

yeah!

in that regard, it's just a huge matter of taste

twothirty

i also jump into webcomics, read them backgrounds for a bit then realized im actually into it and read it properly haha

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

hahaha yes

If I get invested without context I know it's good lol

Deo101

I don't spoil on public platforms cause I know people don't wanna necessarily see that (unless it's in an ama but I try to avoid spoilers still) but in private? I'll spill whatever tf u want like

I have and I will again!!!! Lmao

I know no one is gonna write it like me and also it's p linear so the only spoilers people really ask are Character things not plot things, anyways

So I'm not worried about theft im not doing anything super wild or original lol

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

all my favorite panels I've done are all the most spoilery ones, so... whether I share them or not, I lose

Deo101

Aw man

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

SAME

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

nooo

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

but it makes sense! I put all my effort into those moments where the story twists and turns

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Some of my fave panels or pages are when big reveals or plot twists happened

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

and it shows

so meh, I'll live

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

So I can’t share them to people who haven’t read my comic yet XD

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

luckily they don't make a ton of sense out of context, but... as soon as people start reading they might be like OHHH I know what's coming now

but it got them reading so shrug

I guess all mileage varies

Deo101

I feel like even the way I talk about my comic spoils it LMAO whoops

I'm made out of spoilers I can t hold them all in very clumsy

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

haha

I feel the same a lot

(But I also just wanna scream 24/7 about my stories whoopsie)

Deo101

I once had readers asking me to sum up a chapter caus ethey were confused and I just waited til someone else did it cause I was worried I'd spoil Something in trying to sun it up

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Linear stories are good too, though! Just reading a satisfying, well-written story is great; there doesn’t really NEED to be twist and turns for it to be food.

Deo101

Who doesn't wanna scream all the time and their stories hahahahha

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

GOOD

NOT FOOD

GAH

Deo101

Millennium is yummy yummy yum

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

...for the in-universe version of spoilers, I just had a moment of "hang on, this scene could've been way more dramatic if this one character hadn't already been given a certain reveal last chapter"

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

good food, agreed

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Normally I get away with not having a long buffer prepped ahead of time, but for once I wish I could still change this

Nutty (Court of Roses)

i spoil a lot about my characters more than i do the plot lol

i mean except their backstories sometimes

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Oh :C sometimes it's like this, Erin. Reasons buffers are good, but when do you have the time....

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I've tried putting this one on hiatus to prep a buffer, but it turns out I need the deadlines and the regular feedback to push me through making the pages...

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

oh I see. Understandable though...the only time I create real buffer is when I finish a book for print and have a deadline there.

(I wanna try to actually...get better though, since I wanna start a second comic project)

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I mean, sometimes if there's a process that works for you, you gotta just go with it and not waste energy fighting it. Even if it's not the Best or Most Professional way.

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

yeah that's true. It's just frustrating when you compare the work you get done in these phases vs. every other time.

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Clearly the solution is to split it up into smaller books, so you have more print deadlines!

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

haha, that might be!

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I need buffers or I get super stressed. Unfortunately I also find them difficult to keep up.

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Buffers are very hard to keep up. I'm running out of mine next week, whoops

But I've already started working on new pages

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

I have...a half-finished, past-deadline page open in another window right now, lol

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I haven’t been able to draw for about a month, so one comic’s buffer is getting low and the other’s going to either miss this week or be late.

And I’m stressing about it. -_-

sssfrs

I’m so excited for my story to progress. I’m tempted to talk about it but when I am I think that nothing I say casually will be as impactful as just letting the story actually play out

Desnik

I deal with lack of engagement by throwing my ideas (or myself) at people. I learned that keeping secret twists as spoilers was inhibiting my growth as a writer, so instead I talk through my plots with my writing group and I often walk away with much better ideas to write

We're a kidlit/MG/YA group and I'm writing in a similar fashion, so we usually don't have to warn each other about anything we're writing, which is its own kind of freedom

if I can get the content to be good enough, and land in front of someone who'll help me take it further, then the engagement will follow

keii4ii

(This the right place?)

Deo101

Speaking of a lack of engagement, i feel like my engagement rates are incredibly low. I get a good bit, i get comments on every page and im very happy with that, but it's odd that i dont get more given my amount of readers and I wonder if some comics just aren't the kind of story people feel a need to say anything about, or what?

I think so?

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

My engagement rates are... almost nonexistent.

keii4ii

I TOTALLY GET THAT DOUBT

When my anxiety is bad, it gets... really bad. "Maybe my story isn't worth commenting/ there is nothing to talk about it." I know that's just anxiety, so I try my best to not listen to that voice.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Although I think my audience is just not there? My page-views are pretty low, too, so maybe I just don’t have enough readers to comment (outside of you awesome SF perps)

PEEPS NOT PERPS

MY GOD THIS PHONE

keii4ii

Yeah, my views are fairly low too, considering the sub count I have on platforms

Come on, phone. We're not criminals. (Probably. )

Deo101

Yeah, its just weird when i have like. 1000 readers on tapas and get 0 comments i guess? I do kinda feel like my comic is very.... Its very linear its character driven and people can onky say "aw cute ^^" so much so idk what they would say

Like its legit .1%

keii4ii

hides the bloody knife

Deo101

ITS IN THE FLOWER POT!!!

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I was getting about 1k daily views right after I joined SF but now it’s back down to about 100 a day, so shrugs

keii4ii

Views though, it's natural they spike like that even if you retain 100% of the people who checked out your comic!

because typically, people only go through the old pages once

so they give you more views upon first visit

Deo101

^^^

keii4ii

But I 100% understand the worry of "why do people check out my comic and decide not to read it... is there something wrong with my work"

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

On webtoons I think I have relatively good engagement for Eryl considering my low sub number. I have about 350-some subs and get an average of 1-2 unique comments per page, though that number goes up when a character dies. (edited)

That’s true! They do get kinda ‘falsely’ inflated when people binge-read archives

Deo101

Most comments i ever got is when I said "tell me your pet names"

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Lmao, I should try that

Deo101

And then outside of that when luzio and sage do something cute is the most I get like, organically just frim my content

Amas are second most comments which are again, me starting the discussion

Maybe alk my authors comments should be like "tell me about your fave color" that'll inflate my stats

keii4ii

One person told me they don't comment because everything seems so obvious, and they don't wanna be captain obvious. Which I can respect. But I don't think everything is that obvious if the most common comment I get is "I'm lost"

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Hmmmm

Deo101

Hahahahhahahahah

Like "NO PLEASE SHARE THESE THINGS"

keii4ii

IKR

Deo101

Help everyone else out!!!

keii4ii

There is a term in Korean comment section culture

"Konan" (from Detective Konan)

It's a term for commenters who explain obtuse stuff for other readers

Sometimes you'll even see comments like "Hurry up, Konans! I'm too tired to think! Spoonfeed me what happened in this update!"

Deo101

Me reading every comic ever

keii4ii

I NEED A KONAN IN MY COMMENT SECTION

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Honestly I wish western readers did that, but they either get attacked for being ‘Captain Obvious’ or people scream SPOILER!!!! at them

Deo101

I really wish people woukd expkain for me too because then i know some people get it, but ALSO i dont want to explain things i didn't show, accidentally.

snuffysam

one thing i've found that helps with engagement is making sure to include something on the page for people to talk about, no matter how relevant it is. like a while back i had a (in my opinion) fairly boring scene where it's basically "where do we gotta go" "i'm not telling" "please" "ok you gotta go here" so to give readers something to talk about i had one of the characters take a hotdog out of a pokeball and eat it.

keii4ii

There was also this incredibly, incredibly obtuse comic. It had a fascinating hook but then became almost impossible to follow. You'd see comments like "so this is the Forbidden Realm that even Konans cannot enter."

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Hahaha

Deo101

I try to make every page have something, i usually have 3 goals i want a page to accomplish but it's not very... Fun i guess? Its just kibda like "yes this happened"

keii4ii

It's also kinda sad when you DO put something important to you, and nobody says anything (or worse, says "so when is it gonna get interesting???")

Deo101

Yeah...

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

So once I spun this theory on a comic by picking it up from context clues. And I was like ‘Hey guys, what if X character is the dragon???’ and everyone was like ‘WELL DUH IT’S IN THE HOVER TEXT.’ I read comics on mobile where hover text doesn’t always work, and after getting sneered at for something ‘everyone knew already’ I was put off of ever being a Konan type again.

Deo101

:(

I never read the hover text unless its by accident I just dont think t

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Yeah. And it wasn’t obvious from reading without the hover text so I was really proud of myself for figuring it out. But it just goes to show how rude commenters can scare away well-intentioned ones.(edited)

keii4ii

aaaugh D:

snuffysam

tbh i'm not sure why an author would put something important in the hover text where mobile readers can't see it. or tbh in blogs, side stories, etc. if it's important to understanding the main story, it should be in the comic.

Deo101

Yeah that's what im thinking... Hover text should be for puns

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

It was revealed later that chapter in the main comic, but apparently it wasn’t a ‘secret’ like I thought it was.

keii4ii

Bleeeh, sorry that happened to you. >_< This is why we can't have nice things

Where is the nearest Konans R Us, I want to order one for each of our comics.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Yeah... I’m very socially anxious / awkward so I’ve been scared away from quite a few comment sections. I still read the comics and buy them if they go to print, but a negative commenting experience usually discourages me from ever participating in the discussion.

keii4ii

100% understandable

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Which is why I feel it’s super important for the creators to moderate their comments (or hire a good moderator if they don’t have the time). A lot of comment sections get toxic if the author is lax about fostering a positive discussion environment.

Deo101

That makes me feel much better about the times ive asked people to cut Something out or deleted comments.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I appreciate that effort very much.

Deo101

I worry that its "disengenuous" or something and if someone has a negative opinion I don't want to be like "nope you're ONLY allowed to be nice to me!!!" But it's not good, i don't think, to let people feel safe being mean In my comments.

keii4ii

Yeah, there is being critical, and there is being mean

Deo101

So I rarely do it but I have and I don't feel any guilt over the times i have

Right

keii4ii

Sometimes a comment can tread the fine line between the two and it's really annoying that it's not Obviously, Blatantly Mean

Deo101

Yeah hahahahahhaha

keii4ii

But I try to remember that I too have walked that line unintentionally and obliviously, back when I was younger

Deo101

Right. I have too

I was like "oh man I am so smart and im about ti IMPART MY KNOWLEDGE ON YOU!!!" *Is a jerk *

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

That one comic I was talking about earlier: the author had a hard time keeping up with moderating and eventually took comments off the main site. It was 100% not her fault and she was herself getting emotionally distressed from the amount of negativity in the comments. Especially since the comic itself is really thoughtful and has a lot of messages of acceptance.

Deo101

:(

keii4ii

>_<

Deo101

Uhh but yeah! Does .1% feel like about what y'all get as far as comments:readers goes?

.1-.2

I feel like i have no actual gague for this lol

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

It varies from comic to comic (for no quantifiable reason, usually) but that is about right. 99% of readers are lurkers.

Deo101

Dope, I was worried I had like super low numbers when talking with some people and it got me worried about my content

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Plus subs don’t necessarily translate to active readers. A lot of people just never clean out their library after they stop reading something / subbed it to read later and never got around to it or left the site entirely.

Deo101

But I've also just got a lot of anxiety about what im producing and how it's percieved in general

Yeah ik

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I can see people binging my archives from my stats but maybe 1 in 100 or less leaves any comments.

snuffysam

on average, each subscriber to my comic has posted about 45 comments total (which is like 0.07 comments per subscriber per page) if someone clicks on a page (subscriber or not), there is a 0.5% chance of that person leaving a comment.

Deo101

See for me its like. 1 in 1000 leaves a comment...

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

(It’s okay I get anxiety over it, too)

Deo101

Yeah i was gonna say uhhh whats it called

Shoot i lost mt train of thought.

Right. I feel like the longer a comic goes on tbe less frequently people engage

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Yeah, I’ve noticed that in my comics, too.

Deo101

Like less readers will have made it to the end, more will be inactive, etc

snuffysam

i've found that my active commenters take a jump in early march (i.e. right after the comic's anniversary), and any time a book ends (since, i guess people like seeing how all the stuff that's happened in the book culminates)

Deo101

Oh that's an interesting note

snuffysam

i suppose that's some other advice on increasing engagement - give a reason for even caught-up readers to leave comments. one thing i've been doing is redrawing old pages and releasing the redraws on anniversaries, which gives reason for people to re-read.

and for end of book stuff, i suppose people are more willing to predict how something is going to end when it's close to ending

Deo101

Hmmmm

I'm taking notes

twothirty

seeking validation through comments is my downfall, because i just dont seem to write a comic that has the type of readership who is into that. What helped was just looking at google analytics and being like "oh right, of course people read this, its clearly here in this data" haha.

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

twothirty, same. It's kinda hard to get out of that mindset.

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Raises hand I need constant reader validation and get depressed easily when there isn’t. It’s not healthy, but it’s really hard to break out of that mindset.

Deo101

Im not seeking validation through comments, but when i have thousands of readers and get only like 5 it does make me look twice and start wondering if there's something I'm doing wrong.

And yeah it's hard to break out of the mindset

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Me constantly atm haha

Deo101

Especially if you've bee. Hurt in the past and you feel like people secretly hate your work because... In the oast they have

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

I wonder if it's actually...a change in how people interact with media nowadays?

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Oh yeah, definitely, Deo. I got so much negative feedback when I first started posting webcomics and it still sticks with me today.

Deo101

Yeah I've been lucky where people have been mostly nice to me or otherwise just indifferent which makes it so I don't have a super negative experience that my anxieties latch onto

And its STILL hard

Because words of affirmation is my love language lol

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Partly I think it was because I was creating a lot of gender-nonconforming characters in an era when that wasn’t well-accepted in Western comics (reminder that I was surrounded by a veeeery conservative environment at the time), and partly because my skills were just not what they are now. There were a lot of nasty comments from both strangers and people I knew, and it was really tough to work through. I think if I hadn’t had the Tomgeeks forum to hang out in, I probably would have given up.

(For you young’uns, Tomgeeks was a webcomic list site and we had a really tight group in the forums. A lot of that old crowd are now in Spider Forest).

Kabocha

(Sorry, saw the tomgeeks mention! I remember aspiring to be in that group one day, but I was a lil' too much of a noob back in the day.) A lot of media is kind of... Sometimes you need to put a call to action to be like, "HEY LEAVE A COMMENT!" or something - else, they forget in a lot of cases, but ofc that's no guarantee.

keii4ii

Re: people being less willing to engage the longer a comic has been going on, that is definitely a thing

I think it's called archive burn or something

and I feel it too sometimes, as a reader. I feel like I'm not "allowed" to start reading a comic unless I can find a big enough chunk of free time to finish the archive in one session

It's 100% irrational but... it is a thing

I've found that I don't experience it IRL, with physical books. The end of each volume is a really good stopping place

snuffysam

then i suppose a problem is that webcomics don't really have stopping points you can physically see like physical books like when you're reading a book series, you know where one book ends, but when you read a comic you don't really unless you check how many pages each chapter has

and even then it's hard to keep that in mind when it isn't physical

mariah (rainy day dreams)

I definitely understand that feel. It's kept me from doing a lot of the book club comics because I'm like "I got ten pages in, but that's not enough to comment" T_T

snuffysam

maybe someone could program a widget for comic sites that works similarly to the page indicators in ebooks. like "you're 40% of the way through the chapter, and at your current reading speed you have 10 minutes left"

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Comic Rocket!

mariah (rainy day dreams)

Does Archive Binge also have a feature like that?

I feel like they might... I don't use those kind of readers so I'm not super familiar with them.

snuffysam

archive binge lists what page you're on and how many pages the comic has, but there's no reading speed thing no

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I don't know. I'm technically on Archive binge, but didn't get any subs there so I didn't look into it past creating my listing. I don't use those services myself because I like a nice long archive to work through, but I know that comic Rocket shows you how much of an archive you've read.

snuffysam

also, the thing i'm talking about would be for chapters as well as the whole comic. because if there is a big archive, people like to know how long they have before a good stopping point

mariah (rainy day dreams)

I'm on Archive Binge. I don't think I have any subs either but definitely get traffic regularly as if I did. How even does internet work ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

snuffysam

i guess recently updated?

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I usually check out the archive page of a comic to get a good idea of chapter length, myself. So I know if I'm in for 10 pages chapters or 100 page chapters. Plus, idk, I have no problem stopping anywhere and picking it up again later, but I may be a pretty atypical reader.

Lmao, I have no idea how the internet works. I was one of the first people to list on Archive Binge and I have never gotten a single click from it. I get a steady number from Comic Rocket, though.

keii4ii

I wonder if it'd be worth experimenting with chapter numbers? Like, re-number existing chapters like "Season 2, chapter 2 of 15" instead of "chapter 20" ?

Deo101

^ thats a good idea

seeing "chapter 20" makes me as a reader go like, oh god, theres so many,,

snuffysam

^ that's one of the major reasons i label things "book X chapter Y" instead of just counting up chapters forever though adding "out of" is an interesting addition...

keii4ii

I'm nearing the end of season/ book/ whatever 2. I should give this a try

Cronaj

Lol, my books are going to be 3 chapters long each, so I don't think it would make much sense for me XD

keii4ii

Yeah, my chapters are short but numerous, so this might have a different effect than comics with longer but fewer chapters

Deo101

I'd be afraid of saying "out of" cause... well, i dont know how many heheh...

it all gets wacky when it comes time to actually make the thing

snuffysam

i mean, could add 'em retroactively as each "season" finishes

Deo101

oh thats true!

keii4ii

I would probably do "Chapter x out of [REDACTED]" (not that but something similar) when I start posting book 3

Cronaj

Yeah, my chapters are around 35-50 pages, so they're pretty long'

snuffysam

listing how many chapters are in book 3 would kinda spoil a twist lol, so i'll probably only do it retroactively

same lol

and some are 80 pages

book 3's going to have one 120 page chapter which is wild

Cronaj

I was thinking about printing 4-5 chapter books, make it more like a manga-length

keii4ii

You know, some comics (Korean comics do this a lot) do like... Chapter 10: Happy Day, followed by Chapter 11: Happy Day (2), followed by Chapter 12: Happy Day (3)

Cronaj

but full color printing is expensive

keii4ii

Dividing what might have been a single chapter into digestible chunks

snuffysam

i've split "arcs" into multiple chapters before, but unfortunately there aren't really any solid split areas in the chapter in question

Cronaj

and I doubt anybody wants to shell out $25+ on a 200 page comic

This is of course, a consideration for the future, as I don't even have the first chapter finished yet, but ya know

Come next year, I'll have some big decisions to make

@keii4ii Is that a webtoon thing? I've noticed that webtoons have shortish chapters

snuffysam

webtoons an entire chapter is posted at once

keii4ii

It's a Korean thing, which means Webtoons gets some of it

Cronaj

I mean, technically I post my comic in scrolling format, so I consider it a webtoon, but it's definitely drawn for print

@snuffysam, I mean the length of the chapters. The chapters (or episodes) are usually somewhere between 50-100 panels long, which is anywhere between 10-20 pages of a traditional comic

keii4ii

(Tangent, but as a Korean speaker I'm very weirded out by the word "webtoon" in English contexts. Over there every webcomic regardless of format is called a webtoon; I guess it's like anime/manga in Japanese? That in Japan, every animated show is anime, and every cartoon thingie is manga?)

Cronaj

Yeah, that makes sense

In the english speaking world, originally there were comics and webcomics, with little difference between except that one was posted online

but when Korean webtoons entered the English-speaking market, the naming conventions changed

The major difference being the prevalence of scrolling-format webtoons, which made people think that the difference between webtoons and webcomics is the format

but really, it's just a naming thing

You can call a comic a manga, and people expect a black and white comic in a specific style, but really, it's just a comic in Japanese

keii4ii

Yeah

Deo101

I usually just say "scroll style comic" or "page format comic" because im putting pages up on webtoons so it feels... weird to me

keii4ii

That too

IT'S A PICTURE STORY THINGIE WITH SPEECH BALLOONS

Deo101

hahahaha

Cronaj

In the end we are all just children XD

kayotics

this is really late, but i've been getting a lot more comments on my main site lately and I have no idea what I did to encourage that.

Deo101

people caught on

kayotics

That's probably all it is, but it's really surprising that my main site is the one getting more comments, since I wouldn't say it's necessarily a well built comment system? It's the native CMS comment system, and I require the first comment to be moderated

keii4ii

Does this mean I can claim I started reading Ingress before it got famous 8)

kayotics

yes

BUT, I'd say that the estimation of 1% of readers (or whatever the number was) is still accurate.

Deo101

.1% ish

kayotics

I have the most eyes on my comic over on Tapas, and while I do get a handful of comments there, it still equates to less than 1% of the total people subscribed. I'm sure there's a lot of reasons for that (like subscribers who aren't regular readers, people who quit the app, etc), but even the ratio of views to comments is pretty low.

Deo101

yeah I've been noticing that too

I have the most eyes on webtoons but I still have like. a good chunk on tapas and I think those are just more... casual sites

kayotics

yeah absolutely

Deo101

like on comicFury I have way higher engagement rates and i think that's pretty typical cause most of that audience there is also creators

kayotics

I'm sure there's some people who are pretty dedicated on Tapas, but I'd guess that there's more dedicated readers on my self-hosted site, just because they have to specifically seek out the content.

Deo101

^that makes a lot of sense to me

I know a lot of people who follow me on tapas are following 100+ other comics

and i know for SURE I wouldnt be able to take the time/effort to comment on like 10+ comics a day, assuming theyre even keeping up with all thsoe

wow yeah I just checked my list this person has over 6,000 comics theyre subscribed to, and a few have over 500

just on the first page of my readers(edited)

sooooo yeah it makes sense why engagement would be low if people are regularly reading that mant...

keii4ii

I actually rambled about this on twitter recently!

Deo101

and also makes me feel a little bit less bad when people are confused hahahahaha

keii4ii

How I thought I'd get a very small readership who are into what I'm making, but I ended up getting that very small readership PLUS a huge number of people who are just casually reading it

That first expectation was mostly based on my experience with my previous webcomic, but things were different back then. Big platforms weren't a thing, so casual readers were less common.

Deo101

yeah that's really neat

since I've only been making millennium for like... a little over 2 years and it's my first comic, I kinda just started with like 5 mirrors and was like "alright well, lets see how this goes I guess"

I had only ever read one webcomic before i literally have no idea how or why i got so convinced into making a comic

but since I was like 12 years old I was like "hm... I am going to make a comic i think." I just never did any research or tried til recently

or read any. I dont know how this happened

keii4ii

Casual readers vastly outnumbering the dedicated ones used to make me feel like I was doing something wrong, but I think that's just how the times are.

Deo101

Yeah :/ it's hard NOT to notice and feel like you're doing something wrong though.

when its like "okay i have 7,000 subs and got 5 comments" it's like ??? what am i doing WRONG

even though... its nothing wrong

it just be that way

hard to match those two ideas up though

almost went to continue this thought in an entirely different channel.

I think there is also something to be said for people not wanting to repeat a comment

like "oh someone already said what I thought so I'll just give it a thumbs up"

keii4ii

That's what upvoting is for!!!

Deo101

yup!

keii4ii

though, tfw highest voted comments are like "I have no idea wtf is going on lol"

Deo101

YEAH.

also do you ever comment on your own pages?

like not replying to people

keii4ii

I think I did once or twice, back when I actualy had relevant info and didn't have enough room in author's notes or something

Deo101

I've done it a few times, but it's usually kind of to ask questions where I can get replies

keii4ii

I have also seen a pro Korean creator post "first" on their own comic because they were tired of seeing so many of those

Deo101

I did that once LMAO

it's funny when people comment on my comic "FIRST!!!" cause i'm like. dude i get like 10 comments it's not that special to be first

but i'm happy theyre there and theyre excited its kinda cute i guess

keii4ii

Yeah, it's harmless

Deo101

and it's also nice to have people think that they have to race to be first

even though they don't

so it's kind of a nice comment to get even if it's not commenting on my work at all

keii4ii

It's kinda like hitting the like/heart button, just with more HURRY POINTS

Deo101

yeah hehe

oh i do 100% like all my own pages though

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I actually get the most commenters on Webtoons but I’m (fairly?) sure I have more readers on my website.

Deo101

on webtoons, I don't do it on tapas cause you can see i did it LOL

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I think I only ever got one First! comment and that was the only comment on that page.

keii4ii

Hey no shame in being your own #1 fan

Deo101

the one time I said "first!" was cause it had no comments on it for like a year and a hal

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Oh no, I don’t like my own pages. For some weird reason I feel like it’s cheating.

Deo101

and hell YEAH! I'm my number one fan so much that i'm making a dang comic for how much I like these characters ;D

keii4ii

I don't feel bad about liking my own pages, but I rarely do it because I wait a bit before even looking at the post

Deo101

inflate your own stats its cool. all the cool kids are doing it

keii4ii

And by the time I look at it, I forget about liking

Deo101

I only do it on webtoons cause I have to manually post there anyways

so i post and its like "heres the page!" and im like :) good job me :)

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I might start doing it. XD I get an average of 5-10 likes per page so why not.(edited)

Deo101

I also rate myself 10* or whatever the max is wherever I can

keii4ii

Yeah, and TBH one like isn't gonna give you an unfair advantage anyway

Deo101

^

keii4ii

If you're making a dozen alt accounts to give yourself more likes, now that's a bit questionable

Deo101

yeah that would be not so good

but you're a real account who likes your work so why not!

keii4ii

Yeah!

Deo101

I also honestly kinda like to sub to my own stuff and like my pages partially to make sure it's all working right

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I should probably rate myself 10* bc both my comics got ratings-bombed at one point for really dumb reasons.

Deo101

like to see when the page goes up and everything

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

The ratings have slowly crawled back up a ways, but it’s always disheartening when people attack my comics for stupid things.

keii4ii

Oh, to go back to an earlier point about asking questions to readers to encourage commenting, I might straight up ask next week if my comic is making any sense.

Deo101

ohhhhh man i dont like swingin at that hive lol

keii4ii

I'll have to word it well because I do not want it to be a pity party

Deo101

but i mean it might encourage the people who do get it to go "yup!"

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I do straight up ask every now and then. Sometimes I’ll get a pity comment when I do and sometimes it’s still crickets.

Deo101

also I feel really lucky that I havent had anyone be like, mean to my about my work.

I feel like trolls have really gone down in popularity

keii4ii

like even right now I feel like nobody's getting it (except maybe <10 people) so..... I don't think the answers could make me feel worse

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I meant I straight up ask for comments, ugh, I misread Keiiii’s post.

I GET IT, KEIIII

I LOVE UR BABIES

Deo101

oh man, I could never just ask for comments. if I'm feeling really down I usually send it to my friends like "can i have smth nice please" I just get really anxious asking people for things

not that asking is necessarily bad I just, as a person could never do that

also keiiii I havent read it yet but it's on my list cause the way you talk about your work and what I do know of it... seems like it would really jive right with me

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I usually do it along the lines of: ‘If you enjoy this comic, don’t forget to leave a comment! Getting feedback motivates me to keep drawing!’

Deo101

oh okay thats not so bad

oh my god how are the eyes moving

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

I’m shameless, you can say it

Deo101

I have too much shame probably

keii4ii

It is my anxiety moving the eyeballs

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

Give me sone of your shame, it’ll even us out

Deo101

please take it

keii4ii

(anxiety with Nitro powers)

Deo101

NOOO dont be anxious im gonna love it

god that eyes shaking emoji is so great

keii4ii

ikr!

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

So fun fact- my real face eyes do that

keii4ii

I think Tatsumaki wants to see you do it

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

It’s called nystagmus and it’s super trippy if you’ve never seen it before!

keii4ii

OH, I knew someone with that condition!

I never noticed anything about their eyes (only heard about them having the condition from talking), because I never met them while wearing my glasses X'D;;

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

My eyes just RANDOMLY do it a lot and it really freaks people out XD

Desnik

I've found that comments don't matter too much, but getting a boost from someone with a big following does

and the only comments I take seriously are from people I trust, although I get it: chasing the internet numbers is fun

snuffysam

what do you mean by "comments don't matter" you mean, like, in terms of garnering popularity?

Desnik

yeah, and as validation they can be a bit fluffy too

my perspective changed when I started printing out my work as zines and got people to buy them irl, it was very eye-opening

very few people commented on them online but in person I've found out they're not bad? And one of them got me a lettering job

keii4ii

Eh, I think it's okay to have different goals. To some people, good comments mean the world, and that's totally valid to want that.

Desnik

I know, just stating my pov

keii4ii

I mean that to some people, a good comment is not just an "internet number."

Desnik

fair enough

I believe I allowed for 'good comments' as being from someone I trust

keii4ii

Me, I treasure insightful comments from anyone who's invested in my story. To each their own

FeatherNotes

I have a book that I write them down to give me a lil boost to morale when I need it! i def appreciate the time it took for someone to write something thoughtful

keii4ii

Yeah!

Capitania do Azar

Oh comments are like.. What I like the most! (not all comments are the same tho). The reason I put my story out there is so I can share it and discuss it with people and the fact that a few take some time off their day to actively tell me what they think it's what keeps me moving

eli [a winged tale]

I really enjoy comments too. I always respond to my Instagram ones but not the comic ones mostly because of platform difficulties

Glowbat (Aloe)

I love reading through all the comments- they really motivate me when I'm having a low point and need a pick me up to get goin on pages. I just wish I was better at knowing how to respond instead of just liking the comment and hoping they recieve my telepathic brainwaves of gratitude

Phin (Heirs of the Veil)

Replying to comments is very hard and I always have the anxiety of "ruining" it haha ;; whatever it is (the person's enjoyment of my work?? who knows)

Glowbat (Aloe)

I feel that- part of me is always nervous I'm gonna say somethin to off put them or smthn.

Though I do try my best to curate comment sections if things are looking like they're gonna get rowdy

keii4ii

YEAH, and/or sometimes you're like "this comment is Awesome and deserves an Equally Awesome reply... HOW DO I DO THAT" and get stuck in a loop

Glowbat (Aloe)

yesss exactly that

I'm not that clever and I require lots of time to come up with anything I'm confident in lol

and by the time I have something cool to say back its been like a week

keii4ii

I made a Discord icon to express my internal response in a visual form to such Awesome comments, but I can only use those on Discord

This one:

Glowbat (Aloe)

Hehe

cuteee

and also a mood

keii4ii

Sparkling tears of happiness

Capitania do Azar

I believe them

Cronaj

Man... I will admit, I barely respond to comments

And that probably sounds terrible

But I honestly don't have time to respond to every comment

As well as the anxiety of not know what to say

It does depend on platform tho

keii4ii

I mean, as a reader I don't expect a reply if my comment is like "ooo nice!"

Cronaj

Generally, I respond more readily to comments on Tapas than on Webtoons, because I only have like 2 commenters at most on Tapas

And usually it's readers who ALWAYS comment, so I almost feel like they deserve a response, even if it's just a smiley face or a "thank you"

keii4ii

But if I've written a long ass essay comment, it would be nice to have some kind of engagement with that. Don't get me wrong, the creator doesn't owe me a reply but it's like... should I ever do this again with this comic. Or is my reply-writing time better spent on another comic

Cronaj

True

keii4ii

I def respect that not every creator has time to read all of the comments, regardless of how many comments they typically get

Cronaj

On Webtoons, I have way more engagement, but most of it is thirst for my characters or talking about the art style

keii4ii

and that not every creator may even aim to get comments

Cronaj

So I don't usually know how to respond to stuff like that

keii4ii

But if that is the case........ I would rather know before committing myself to multiple essay-length comments

Yeah, that is understandable!

Cronaj

I read every comment, but I don't want to respond to all of them

keii4ii

I'm 100% cool with "thicc" comments on my MC's butt or on my tiger dude's legs, but I can't necessarily think of productive replies to those

Cronaj

The only comments I respond to on Webtoons are either a) incredibly funny, b) meaningful and noticing more than the art, or c) a genuine question

Like if someone asks about my update schedule

Or if someone wants to know which programs I use

I had one comment about how good my grammar in the dialogue/thoughts is, and I felt so honored that someone else noticed

Usually I get comments about the art (which is also nice), but I prefer comments about the story or subtleties

keii4ii

It's the best thing when people notice the things that you put a lot of thought and love into

Cronaj

For several years in high school, I played around with the idea of getting a writing degree, so grammar and literary language have a special place in my heart

sssfrs

I respond to every single comment... I get one comment a month pretty much though

When friends or readers say nice things about my comic on any platform I save a screenshot and read them if I start to feel like nobody likes what I’m making

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

I do the exact same

FeatherNotes

Its a good practice when things are kind of slow! Or just for that lip morale boost too