Paul Wang

September Content Update: Woe to the Tyrant

WOE TO THE TYRANT - A DENOUNCEMENT

Of the Crimes of the Citizen Frederico d'Ortensia:

Who has through high corruption and low cunning, has been acknowledged as DOGE of the SERENE REPUBLIC, though he has long since forfeited any claim to that title due his unpardonable offenses.

Who has committed crimes against the PEOPLE of the city, the integrity of the SERENE REPUBLIC, and the PEACE of all the world.

Who has inflicted, through his AVARICE, suffering upon the defencel...

September Content Update: Warlords of Calligia Pt 4

WARLORDS OF CALLIGIA PART 4

With a fundamental understanding of the disposition of the Calligian continent and the warlords which inhabit it now established, it becomes a mere matter of following these truths to their logical conclusion to understand the character of the Calligian lands and those men who would claim rulership over them: namely that it is naturally divided into interest groups based on matters of culture, history, and politickal identity. That the fact that multiple empi...

New Backer Tiers

As you may have noticed, I've redone the backer tiers to include two new tiers at the $20-a-month and $40-a-month contribution levels. This was done in consultation with $10-a-month backers, who generally expressed interest in having higher tiers even if they didn't include new benefits (which I'm not really in any position to offer).

When I started this Patreon, I honestly didn't expect anyone to want to donate $10 a month, let alone twice or four times that. Even having people wanting...

Wanted: Topics for September

Please choose one topic from each of the lists below, and reply with the respective letter and number of your two chosen topics in the comments below.

Voting will go until August 21st, 11:59 PM (Pacific Time).

Topics marked with the asterisk (*) have been chosen by backers at the $10-a-month tier. They will be available for voting this month only, unless they are suggested again for October.

August Content Update: The Heroic Antagonist

So far, we've talked quite a bit about conventional villains, as well as antagonists who pretend to be on the protagonists' side. Now, I'd like to tackle a rather different sort of antagonist: the one that is actually the good guy.

The Heroic Antagonist is, for the purposes of this discussion, an antagonist with the moral high ground over the protagonist by the standards of the audience. That last part is important, because ultimately the decision of who comes out as hero or villain is ...

August Content Update: Warlords of Calligia Pt 3

August Content Update: A Map of the Nizam-i Khazar

Wanted: Topics for August

Please choose one topic from each of the lists below, and reply with the respective letter and number of your two chosen topics in the comments below.

Voting will go until July 21st, 11:59 PM (Pacific Time).

Topics marked with the asterisk (*) have been chosen by backers at the $10-a-month tier. They will be available for voting this month only, unless they are suggested again for September.

July Content Update: Antagonists Who Aren't

Over the course of this series, I've mostly been talking about "open" villain-antagonists - which is to say characters which are introduced to the audience as antagonists, and which the protagonists are seen as being morally justified in opposing. In when talking about sympathetic antagonists, the basic assumption is that for all of that character's redeeming features, they are still introduced as an antagonist, and will eventually conclude their narrative arc with a thematically appropriate ...

July Content Update: A Land of Obscene Criminals (and also Bandits)

A Land of Obscene Criminals (And Also Bandits)

The Iron Marches! A land of opportunity! A lad of freedom! A land for the brave and the enterprising to make their own fortunes, or so they would tell you. Well, let me tell you something different. I have been to the iron Marches. I have travelled up and down the Iron Road, visited every little settlement and town, and I will say this: the statements are accurate, to a degree. The Iron Marches surely are a land of opportunity - to be robbe...

July Content Update: Warlords of Calligia (Pt 2)

Warlords of Calligia Pt 2.

Before one may begin to fully elaborate upon the particular interplays of the various noble houses of the Calligian continent, one must first come to understand the underlying fractures and divisions within the societies which populate that land. I take especial care in this account to describe such things in the multiple. For all that the continent may be under the supposed dominion of a single entity and a single government - a notion already defi...

Wanted: Topics for July

Please choose one topic from each of the lists below, and reply with the respective letter and number of your two chosen topics in the comments below. 

I've had a bit of a late start this month, so I'm going to delay the end of voting for a few days, until 11:59 PM, Pacific Time on June 25th.

Topics marked with the asterisk (*) have been chosen by backers at the $10-a-month tier. They will be...

June Content Update: Work-Ethic and Self-Care

I'm going to start off by making a statement which might be a bit controversial: namely that it is far easier and far less important to write well than it is to write consistently.

Ultimately writing is a craft which isn't all that difficult to learn. Reaching a level of competence where you can get across what you want to say to an audience doesn't take all that much in the way of learning and practise. That's why so much of what I've talked about so far in this column has less to do w...

June Content Update: Lost Colonies

Edit: Image Link 

From the Files of an Assessor of the Iron League

Settlement Name: Low Rapids (Case 45)

Location: Second cataract of the Rustflow Rush, approximately six days out from Montfort along the Iron Road.

Established: Approximately fourteen years ago, at the behest of Master Florian, of the Furrier's Guild of Arnault - ...

June Content Update: Warlords of Calligia (Pt 1)

EDIT: Image Link 

To His Excellency, Holder of the Onyx and Carnelian Seal

Excellency,

It has been made evident to me in recent days that the current mood of the Court has been placed in a state of some uproar as a result of the return of the formerly exiled Lord P____, and the circumstances of his return to the land of his birth in the company of the...

Just a Quick Heads-Up

Just a quick note for everyone. This week, I've taken possession of a new PC, which I've finally been able to afford partially due to the rush of sales revenue from Lords of Infinity's launch and partly through support from all of you. While this is definitely a much-needed upgrade (my old PC was over a decade old and physically falling apart), it does mean it's taking me some time to get all of my tools set up and re-establish my workflow (I've been having particular trouble with ge...

Wanted: Topics for June

Please choose one topic from each of the lists below, and reply with the respective letter and number of your two chosen topics in the comments below. Voting will end at 11:59 PM PST on May 21st.

Topics marked with the asterisk (*) have been chosen by backers at the $10-a-month tier. They will be available for voting this month only, unless they are suggested again for July.

Pleas...

May Content Update: Lords of Infinity - The Post-Mortem

LORDS OF INFINITY: A POST-MORTEM

Spoilers for Lords of Infinity, obviously.

1. Introduction

With the first month's sales figures now in, I'm happy to say that Lords of Infinity has had a pretty successful release, having sold more than eight thousand copies. That doesn't make me rich (or even able to afford to move out of the old one-bedroom apartment I live in), but it does mean that it, along with a bump in sales for Sabres of Infinity and Guns of Inf...