Making Rewards More Guaranteed

So woot, arcade girl sequence finally done! Will be moving onto catching up on other stuffs! For right now though, I wanna get some ideas out there that I think you will find exciting or at least worth talking about!

Last week I made a big post going over my current workflow situation and how it's been more or less a bit of a car crash, and what steps I've planned to rectify it in the coming months. To summarize what I identified as my workflow problems, it's a combination of taking on too many large projects with different creative directions and obligations at the same time, and not enabling myself any time to pursue any of my personal interests, from original pet projects and ideas to just experimenting with my art. The big plan I was announcing from there would be that once this term of Creator Crownie comics is completed, I will be discontinuing the $45 reward and instead moving back to more traditional on-demand, case-by-case commission projects, so hopefully I won't feel the intense crunch for time.

In addition to that, however, I wanted to take the opportunity to also address possible problems within my current Patreon's structure, and in specific discussing the Character Crownie/monthly sketches reward. I've received concerns about the inherently built-in nature of having to fight for other peoples' ideas for the 4 sketch slots turns people off, and especially with the $15 entry fee.

(BELOW WILL BE PROPOSALS, AND NOT STRICTLY LOCKED IN AND MAY BE SUBJECT TO CHANGE. Feedback requested!)

After giving it further thought, and especially with consideration for this month's sketches I will be completing sometime soon, I noticed there's a scope problem as to what constitutes a "sketch" -- my original expectation was I'd be doing single-panel drawings of characters as pinups or the likes, but some folks have been double-dipping of suggesting a 2-page, before/after TG mini-comics. To be clear, I don't believe I ever said that that wasn't allowed, and honestly, I love those comics and absolutely would like to do them more! However, doing so takes me twice as long as necessary, and allocating that added time I likely may not have is something I don't want to have to regularly do as it puts me in a crunch and thus I can't give as much time and love into each work. Because I'm reopening commissions again soon, I will likely be placing before-after comics as an option there, and thus monthly sketches will strictly be of single-"panel" character art pinups; for those seeking those 2-panel before/after comics, that will be reserved for on-demand coms.

So that's the bad news, now here's the good news: I want to make those monthly character sketches guaranteed and make it so that if you wanna pay that much to request a character sketch, you WILL receive it. So here is the plan:

• Soon, I will be doing more than 4 sketches per month, and the 4-sketches-per-month limit will be abolished. Depending on what the response is, I may have a soft cap of 10 total per month (both of sketches and colored pieces, more on that just below), but let's just see how this goes.

• For $15, in addition to all the other benefits of tiers below (project suggestions, votes, previews, early FOAS pages, etc.), you will receive a MONOCHROME, single-panel character sketch. Will probably come with a minimal background, and in addition to each of the characters being their own individual images, they'll probably be able to fit on a general "doodle board"-like composite arrangement, sorta like what I do now.

• For $25, you will receive a COLORED single-panel character sketch. Again, with only minimal, simple-colored backgrounds, but this is the guaranteed option for if you want to see your OC/fanart/what have you in color. Consequently, I will be retiring the monthly poll for folks to determine which monochrome sketch will be colored, since again, this is guaranteed now so it won't be necessary.

• You will receive discounts for commissions based on your patron tier. This includes those who wish to upgrade their monthly sketches with more elaborate details (such as bigger-sized pinups with more complex backgrounds); you will be able to commission me for that at a discount proportionate to your monthly pledge!

• (still not sure what to do with the $45 tier, but I will leave that open as a valid option for commission discounts and such.

Simultaneously, I also want to be able to devote more time to pursue those personal projects I talked about, and right now I'm brainstorming this idea of "sponsorship" to pursue them. Right now it's early to say exactly how it'll work, but basically I'm thinking of posting an ever-updating list of personal concepts I wanna tackle urgently (specific TG comic ideas, OC concept art, multimedia projects like animation or music, etc.), and folks may be able to voice their opinions as to which of them sound like the most interesting that they'd like to see me pursue, possibly by broad vote of all tiers.

Perhaps actually commissioning me for any of those particular pursuits so I can prioritize them faster will get you a discount and some bonus goodies! Just spitballing that, I dunno how practical or interesting this will be for yall, but I'm all ears to hear your thoughts before locking in any numbers and stuff.

Once again, thank you for your time, patience, and support, it really means a lot, and I'm very excited to see how I can make a better experience for you and me alike! Lemme hear your thoughts, and as always, thank you, thank you, thank you.