Reinbach

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I feel like a lot of this page speaks for itself so I'm struggling with what to say in this space here. The idea that Switch's economics class quickly devolved into an apocalyptic survival course comes from my own strange fascination with wilderness living. I say strange because I'm not outdoorsy in the least myself. But if you put a Youtube video about a guy building a hut out of sticks and clay in front of me, brother I will watch that shit for two hours. 

Hope you guys like the page. More of Switch, Casey, and Millie's Nurse hunt on the way in this chapter before they hit the beach!

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I implied earlier in the scene that Switch had approached Isaac prior to her class debut. I had a bit planned where she had tried to do the same with Casey. But since Casey had shaken up her routine due to the events of the previous night, Switch hadn't been able to find her in time. I couldn't fit that explanation in but I think this works alright. I like the idea that Switch would really enjoy surprising the hell out of her human friends and the looks on their faces when she just shows up out of nowhere in a human body.

TRW Strips #126

You know, I don't think I ever had a character actually get their hands on a magic potion in any DnD game I ever played. The most difficult challenge our adventuring party ever encountered was just getting everyone together in one place consistently enough to keep a campaign going. I think the highest level I ever got was four or maybe five, tops. There would inevitably be a weekend where one guy couldn't make it, so we'd all roll new characters and start a new game to play without them. You can see where this is going. We eventually had so many games going at once that I never got any one character high level high enough to discover any loot more magical than a bat with a nail in it.

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As supporters I'm going to let you in on the fact that this is a mild fake out. There's no way Casey's just going to keep walking here without noticing Switch. I don't often do misdirection like this for a couple of reasons but in this case I was prompted to get out of my comfort zone. By what? By me realizing I was about to end another page in this chapter with a panel of somebody with a look on their face like that scene in Jurassic Park where they see the dinosaurs for the first time and I had to think of something else.

I would have loved to do two pages this week, as I'm dying to get to the next one over here. But I hope you like the set up and Millie's increasingly frazzled state. Next week is the big reunion! :)

TRW Strips #125

Our game master here is having to run things along way faster than a real one normally would for the sake of this being a strip series that needs to keep things snappy. By that I mean I don't imagine a lot of real-life adventures that would just punt a new player upon the group without everyone getting a chance to role-play a bit of ceremonial distrust to the newcomer first. If you've never played DnD, one common character trait that EVERY player has is that their character is suspicious of everyone and everything. Understandable enough in a setting where absolutely anything can be a trap that kills you. It can be pretty maddening when players take this a little too far though. For example, if Morgan was a real player, she'd be the type whose character would refuse to accept a new party member because that meant sharing treasure with more people than they initially agreed to.

Meanwhile on to the spooky town! I'm having fun with this here, I have to say. It's not often I get a chance to sketch out a little Castlevania village. I'm not resetting the strip schedule by the way. Since this one was a week late, I'll just do the next one next Monday and be back on track. See you next week to find out how they deal with a succubus!

Casey and the Gang

This commission for Mr. Bug continues the what-if series of pin ups featuring Casey and the twins. Though this also marks the first sexual appearance of Goth Abbey! :D

Tried something different with the lighting here: hard light and shadows. Normally I blend colors on skin with a soft airbrush tool. But in this case I wanted to make the light above them look really bright, and I think it works here. In any case I loved the chance to draw this group together and I hope you all like it too!

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Spanning across three different students, Switch's mental projection has been attending classes in Castlewood for years now. She knows the teachers here don't really "teach" so much as lecture their opinions to a captive audience. She'll fit right in just fine.

Story structure has always been a challenge for me. I personally think that what writing strength I have lies in slice of life, minute to minute-style pocket stories. It's when I have to plan proper plot outlines in the long term, like "this happens so this can happen so that can happen," that's where I have to really work extra hard to keep the wheels from flying off.

Case in point, when the Nurse showcased her super strength and ripped off the car door, that was the last of the reveals I really had for her to show until Switch showed up, and that was nearly three years ago. Since then she's been pretty much frozen in the story up until this point, which is not ideal. Better late than never to unfreeze, I guess! XD

I'm on the Mend and TRW will Post Tomorrow

I'm pleased to announce that I was able to get the eye drops I needed and am now feeling a thousand times better. I hate for TRW to run late a day, especially because my travel visa is up this month and I'm getting booted back to America on the 29th. I was hoping to save THAT week for a possible late post. But I'll just try to get ahead of schedule before I make the trip.

That's all the important stuff but I'll share some details about my ordeal if you're interested. I had to spend the day in a British Emergency room. I have no health insurance in this country. (My traveler's insurance had just expired at the end of June, LOLZ.) I ended up having to to see a nurse practitioner and two specialists during my visit and when all was said and done, the whole thing didn't cost a dime. I paid ten pounds for eye drops at the pharmacy and that was it. As an American that just blows my mind. I feel like the natural order of the world as I understand won't be restored until somebody sends me a bill for at least ten thousand dollars, damn it!

Anyhow what I had is called Iritis and it basically means your iris has decided that it's sick of your shit for a couple of agonizing weeks if not properly treated. Not caused by eyestrain, much to my surprise. I had naturally assumed that my penchant for staring at screens during my every waking moment was a factor but nope, I'm just an unlucky son of a bitch and this can happen to anyone. But now I've got drops that clear it right up, so with any luck this will be the last time I miss work over this particular curse.

That's all for now! Thanks for waiting and I'll see you tomorrow with the next page of the comic!

Posting Schedule for The Week

So straight to the point: my eye problems from last year are back, and I can't easily get the medication I need for it in England. If you weren't around last time, what I'm dealing with is extreme light sensitivity. Basically staring at any backlit screen currently hurts like knives and there's little I can do but lie down with a blindfold and listen to podcasts to pass the time. I'm not a podcast guy, this is boring as shit and I feel like I'm in purgatory over here.

As of now, the Monday strip has been bumped to next Monday, and unless I wake up miraculously better in the morning, TRW is probably going to run late as well. I'll update you all on Thursday either way. Sorry for the delay and I'll be back to work as soon as I'm able to.

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I put a lot of thought into Human Switch's design. Visually, she just didn't look like Switch without the shark teeth. Besides, she's a cross-dimensional hell monster disguised in a human body. It just makes sense that she'd have a few design quirks like teeth and claws to imply her otherworldly nature.

At first I thought maybe I'd just go by anime rules as to explaining why nobody freaks out at the little details on her. By that I mean in shows like Ah My Goddess, for example, nobody ever comments on the little goddess markings the girls have on their faces and it's never explained as far as I recall. Anime logic seems to imply that "hot girl" is the primary visual characteristic that overshadows other trivial details like prehensile tails or bunny ears. If you're conventionally sexy enough, who cares if you also have freaky little bat wings amirite?

But TRW is not an anime and I do have a lore reason as to why no one's standing up and yelling "That bitch has demon eyes!" It will come up later.  In the meantime I hope you're half as jazzed as me to have Switch join the cast in the corporeal plane. It feels like I've been waiting to get here forever. 

FF14 Girls

This commission for Sgt Artyom is a timely one! As of this writing, the much-anticipated latest expansion for Final Fantasy 14 dropped today. And this job features their Warrior of Light paired up with Y'shtola and a bustier, 18+ version of Alisae from the game.

Anyone else playing the game today? If you don't know, FF14 is one of my personal favorite games of all time. But every time I come back to it after a long break it's always a real challenge for me to remember how to not be a total load in combat. It takes me awhile to get back in, but once I am it tends to take over my life for a couple of months until its hold loosens and I can actually play other games again for awhile.

In any case hope you guys like the pic. I always have fun drawing FF14 characters.   

Nikki's Reaction

I found myself without a Discord Poll for the month of June. The easy poll has always been who to draw for the Monday pin up. But since those are on pause until I finish the current strip story and I didn't have anything in the comic itself to vote on either, I had to come up with something at the last minute.

The vote was to see a TRW character doing a fourth wall break in reaction to the new smaller, more realistic money shots in the comic. It was a fairly close one, but Nikki came out on top! It was supposed to be a quick flat color sketch but I got carried away.

Fun fact, she brings up a real issue here. Since giant ejaculations have always been part of my comics, I've never been able to present sneaky sex all that believably. You know, that classic scenario where a couple is going at it one minute but manages to JUST get their clothes zipped back up and compose themselves before someone walks in on them? It's a classic erotic scenario, and it's pretty much impossible if a guy is leaving behind giant puddles of jizz that would take forever to clean up afterwards.

That's all for now. Back to work on the next page of the comic for me!

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I was kicking myself at first for having two very similar cliffhanger pages over such a short span of time in the comic. By that I mean where the last panel is somebody looking shocked. In the end I had to just live with it because anything else doesn't fit here.

Half the work on this page was that group shot. Some of it was just about figuring out who should and shouldn't be present. Characters like Bria, Abbey, and Elianna have too much going on themselves to be around for a scene that isn't about them at the moment, for example. Though I couldn't fit the whole class in the shot without shrinking them down to ants, so I left myself some wiggle room to add more characters here if I change viewing angles.

That's all I have to ramble about here. Thanks as always for supporting and I personally can't wait to get to next week's page!

TRW Strips #124

For the record I do know that elves have the ability to see in the dark in Dungeons and Dragons. But I really wanted that torch-lit shot up top, so let's just say he's carrying the torch to boost the light for his human companions.

I very rarely use jet black for shading. But I am jealous of those who can pull it off so i thought it would be fun to try and practice here. Also Millie's here as an homage for any of us who've had to put up with someone in the house who's not playing and knowingly or not, is being disruptive. Though to be honest crunching chips loudly is a pretty minor offense. Got any worse ones? Let me know!

Kinzie

This commission for Dapper Basilisk features Kinzie from Saint's Row! I never got going on the series myself, and I'm not exactly sure why. Tonally it looks right up my alley. What probably happened was that the series didn't evolve into my kind of thing until part two or maybe even three. And I have an irrational inability to come in on a franchise from anywhere but the beginning. It's like I have an extreme fear of missing references and Easter eggs. I've missed out on the entire Witcher series for this reason too.

My troubling psychological hangups aside, hope you like the pin up!

Sticker Sale, Commissions, and the Future of Porn in my Work

First off, I'd like to announce that all of our stickers in the merch shop are currently half-price for the next thirty days! This includes our newest one here featuring Madelyne Pryor. Enter the code Summer2024 during checkout to apply your discount if you're interested.

Secondly, you might have already noticed that I've re-listed commission waiting list access as a $10 reward here. The list is currently open again for supporters on that tier. If you're new here, the reason I've always set it at that level is that it keeps the list from getting too big for me to handle. And even then it doesn't always work. It took me two years to finish the last list I opened in 2022.

I usually try to discourage supporters from upping their pledges only for the sake of commission access, though. Some warnings: with a few notable exceptions I normally choose names with a randomizer tool, it could be literally years before I get to your name, and my prices start at $125 for one character and $65 for each additional one. That said, I try to manage at least two commissions per month to keep the list moving at a decent clip, you don't have to stay pledged at $10 to remain on the list after your initial buy in, and to my knowledge I've never left a client unhappy with the work. If you do decide to join that tier, send me a PM on the Discord server and I'll get you on the list while it's still open.

Lastly, the porn. It's been two months since my personal troubles came crashing down. And while I'm not back to a hundred percent by a long shot, I feel more stable now. With a clearer head, I'm wondering if going 100% R-rated was a bit of an over-correction to my issues at the time. 

I was hesitant to bring this up at first. I feel kind of stupid, making such a bold declaration of a change in direction only to waffle on it barely two months later. But it's clear to me now that the difference between being hardcore porn artist or a softcore porn artist really isn't going to make much of a tangible difference in the grand scheme of the problems that arose for me. As far as my social standing is concerned, I'm still drawing smutty cartoons at the end of the day, and whether they're R-rated or X-rated really won't move the needle much as to how my content is perceived by those around me. So it's either quit the whole comic or continue and rethink things. I choose to continue.

The recent Morgan and Warren scene was the first one to test my new direction, so I'll break down what I liked and didn't like. I liked that it was snappier, more quickly paced. Not slowed down with gratuitous penetration close ups and focused more on the relationship dynamics between the two partners involved. I also don't miss the page taking a couple extra hours to make while I arduously paint gallons of semen that I have to place correctly depending on where it landed on the woman in every single panel. (In that last one with Casey and Fontaine, it took me a whole extra day.)

That said, having no money shot at all just felt wrong. I can't shake the feeling that without them, TRW is giving up too much of its identity. It also hit me in this scene that with this new direction, male nudity is out the window and that will be very limiting to me in the future. Softcore scenes allow for man-ass-shots only and you can guess how I appealing I find those by how I almost never fucking do them.

So what's the play here, then? I'm leaning towards a middle ground of sorts. Shorter scenes without close up penetration panels bogging things down, more panels featuring angles that leave something to the imagination, but not censoring/omitting all penetration entirely. And still present semen/ejaculations but in smaller, more realistic volume rather than the bucket loads I've been showing in the past.

I'm no longer all that enthused about drawing high school characters having explicit sex. But maybe instead of trying to rush the end of the comic to start something new, I should instead try to focus on just expediting the Castlewood class to graduation day, and continue their stories from there.

It's a lot to consider. If it's one thing that this year has taught me it's that your whole life can change in the blink of an eye. What feels right today may feel wrong tomorrow. I no longer think I should make big declarations about the future of my work, and I'm just going to keep making comics every week for as long as I'm able to, featuring whatever content feels natural to me as I go. In the meantime your feedback would be very valuable if you have it.

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I don't know about you, but this page made me wish I had a Halver following ME at around to immediately coach me through what would otherwise be tense or upsetting social situations in real time.

Bit of a throwback to the visual novel as well here. I think there was a line in there about how Chloe, when angered, is prone to announcing silent treatment but is too feisty to actually keep her mouth shut when she's upset at someone.

I'm trying to put more effort into clothes lately. Trying to get it through my head that not EVERY outfit has to have a plunging neckline. (Though many of them still do.) Which opens up Chloe's wardrobe of 60's get ups quite a bit. (Not a lot of low-cut dresses in that era. At least not that I can find in a Google search.) Personally I like the contrast here of her flashy outfit next to Millie, who's probably wearing the same clothes she slept in. XD

That's all for now. Thank you as always for supporting the comic!

This Romantic World Page 361 (Plus Messy Version)

I appreciated the suggestions you all gave last week on how to end a sex scene without an explicit money shot. I do like the "close up of the woman's O-face" idea and will likely use it in the future. But as you might have guessed from the page, Morgan wasn't quite able to get there in this case. So I went with "smash cut to aftermath."

The move to softcore content still feels strange for me, if I'm being honest. But it does have the upside of making the sex scenes a lot snappier, meaning I can possibly fit more of them in as I go. Which would be nice. I have a few characters I thought would be fun to pair up but haven't because I didn't want to spend a month and a half drawing a scene between them when I still have so much story I want to get to.

As for the page itself: The idea here is that Morgan and Warren are coming to realize that just because they're best friends that doesn't exactly translate to the best sexual compatibility. And after what feels like a hundred years I finally get to address what exactly happened between Switch and Vincent.

That's all for now. Hope you like the page and thanks for supporting!

TRW Strips #123

This page is inspired by a true story. Ages ago, some friends and I were playing in a modern sci-fi-themed setting called Alternity. (Is Alternity still a thing? Is any role-playing system but Dungeons and Dragons still a thing? Let me know if so, no time to Google it.)

Anyhow I played as a heavy machine gunner and my brother was basically playing as discount James Bond. Alternity players had points you could spend to get yourself out of a jam. Last resort points, I think they were called. Meant to be saved for life or death situations to turn a bad roll into a good one. My brother's character attempted to steal a wine bottle from a resort bar, but he failed his roll. Arguing that a super-suave super-spy wouldn't find himself being chewed out by a bus boy for failing to steal a bottle of wine just for the lolz. He spent his one and only last resort point to avoid being seen and nab the bottle. At the time, we all thought he was fucking nuts. But in hindsight, I respect the hustle when it came to playing the character.

Got any similar stories of your own? If so feel free to share them here!

Unexpected Reunion

This joint commission for Raj Tallahand and Kaldonis features their characters, (Amber and Kal respectively,) getting it on outdoors! This one is canonical with the comic and takes place during Chapter Nine of TRW. Attached is a PDF with a full story to go along with it written by Kaldonis.

I liked working on this one. Amber has a very unique look and I think the warmer colors do a good job of conveying that it's a hot sunny day. Now I'm wishing the last few pages of the comic looked more like this, just in time for the outdoor part to be over. XD

In any case I hope you guys like how it turned out!

This Romantic World Page 359 and 360

I try to make every individual page of the comic stand on its own merits if I can, ideally so that new readers might come in and get hooked without having to have read everything that came before. Part of that process for me demands that the last panel should have something punchy in it. What that means to me exactly is hard to articulate but what I want to avoid is for a page to feel like I just ran out of room and had to stop there. Page 359 felt like a ran out of room page when I finished it, so I added an extra half page for the week and now it feels complete for reasons I cannot explain. XD

It feels nice to give Elianna in a shiny happy moment for a change, as her scenes usually revolve around her getting angry in one way or another. Not so much for Casey. Between finding out Bria was pregnant the night before and waking up to Abbey's transformation, she's not having the best morning so far.

Meanwhile Morgan and Warren are running late for school. In this page it really doesn't feel like the R-rated sex scenes are all that different from how I made the X-rated ones. All that's really different in this instance is that I've omitted the penetration close-up panels that would normally be there. I'm more concerned about how to handle next week's page. I may legit have to watch some softcore porn for research purposes because I currently have no idea how to end a sex scene without a money shot.

 That's all for now! Hope you like this week's update. I've got some stuff coming up real soon here in the comic that I've been waiting to get to forever. In the meantime thank you for your support!

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Why the twins are scared of Elianna was first referenced in a studio strip I did awhile back. I try to keep those separate from the canon and it will be properly mentioned in the main comic at some point, but for now I can summarize it pretty easily:

Mary: "That bitch knows kung fu."

If Elianna had been present she'd be quick to correct Mary that it's not Kung Fu, it's Karate. Back before Abbey got ahold of them, Trish and Mary were rather stereotypical schoolyard bullies. Meanwhile Elianna was a bossy rich girl who at one point or another the twins decided could really use an ass kicking.

I don't imagine Elianna really hurting them during the scuffle. I picture it going down as one of those anime fights where she would just subtly dodge and shift her balance, letting the twins crash into shit on their own. Even so, Trish and Mary left the encounter thinking Elianna was John Wick.

I tried to go big with Jane's cheerleader uniform. I regret that I already showed her arms on a previous page because I really wanted tassels in the final design. Maybe I'll work them in with a revision in the future.

That's all for now! Hope you like the page and thanks as always for supporting the comic!

TRW Strips Studio Archive PDF

Bundled here is the first 107 TRW Strips bundled into one PDF for offline viewing. It's the complete "Studio Era" that was focused on the cast answering fourth wall-breaking questions before I moved on to a more story-driven format. Not to say I'll never come back to the studio. In fact I most certainly will at some point. It's just a convenient framing device for this particular bundle is all. XD

Get the bundle right here.

TRW Strips 122

I haven't decided whether or not Jane is aware that Douglas has a character inspired by her. Probably not, as Douglas doesn't want anyone to know about his love of fantasy gaming and he would know that Jane is the last person on Earth you should trust with a secret like that. But if she did know, she'd probably ask why her dragon-breasts weren't bigger. Hope you guys are liking the story so far. I've resolved to plow ahead until it's complete before I switch back to pin ups for a bit. Let me know what you think of Dragon Jane's design if you would!

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In most cases whenever Elianna shows up in fun police mode, her targets have more or less rolled over for her. Even someone as standoffish as Casey put up little resistance when Ellie busted in on her and Morgan in the showers way back at the start of the comic. I'm pretty sure this is the first time she's had any real pushback.  This could get messy! :O

Rogue Remake

Last night I was attempting to get an animation to look right for the game. My choice of the word "attempting" should be plenty telling as to how that particular session went. I needed a break but nothing was grabbing me, ( I got shamefully stuck within the first 45 minutes of playing Crow Country.) So I picked an old drawing to paint over to pass the time.

Went with Rogue because X-Men 97 wrapped this week and I still have that show on my brain. By now I should know better than to get attached to an animated show that's anchored to a streaming service. They're expensive to produce and thus first on the chopping block a lot of the time. But man I couldn't help getting invested here. This first season was such a banger I honestly don't see it being topped by whatever might come next. Doubly so because the show runner was recently fired for apparently being a nightmare to work with and it's unknown how much of his writing will be carried over into season two.

But honestly if this season was all we got I'd have been happy with it. Meanwhile I hope you're all having a good weekend. See you this Thursday with more TRW!

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I don't have a lot to elaborate on in this space about the page itself this time, as I'd just like to hear what you guys think of it without me rambling about it first. I will say that while I was drawing it, it felt like Casey taking a kick in the ass without falling over on her face might be the most unrealistic thing in the whole comic. Being so top-heavy has got to be hell on your balance.

Hope you're interested to see how Casey navigates this particular day and thanks as always for supporting the comic!

TRW Chapter 9 PDF

Here's the biggest chapter yet, complete for offline viewing in high resolution! :)

TRW Strips #121

Critical fail wins the Discord poll this month! It was a close vote but slightly more members wanted to see Morgan humiliated, it would seem. XD

I'm sure that in real DnD it's likely a rare thing indeed that rolling a one would actually get your party safely out of a combat encounter. (Has that ever happened to anyone? Let me know if you have a story.) But I figure that TRW role-playing would be so seduction heavy that having the female NPCs nope out entirely and now no one gets to try to bang them would be a harsh punishment indeed.

Also is this the kinkiest thing I've ever drawn? It sort of feels like it is. In any case I hope you like Pixie Mandi and let me know if you have suggestions for what TRW characters might turn up as what kind of monsters in the pages to come.

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Congrats to everyone for making it through the cliffhanger! Also that's Chapter Nine finished at long last! :D