End of November Update and Thoughts..[IMPORTANT, PLEASE TAKE THE TIME TO READ]

 I want to preface this message and say thank you to everyone that has been supportive from the start, thank you to everyone that frequently comes to my streams,  and thank you to everyone that has given me words of encouragement, and just overall is supportive in any way they can be. It has honestly meant the world to me, and I'm always trying to think of ways to show my thanks and appreciation, but there will never be words that can fully capture my gratitude for the kindness and support I've been given.

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I know this is gonna be a lot to read, but I really ask for everyone here to take the time to really read through it.

So for those of you that have been following and keeping track of updates, you’ll know that November was a complete test month to see what sort of schedule I want to construct for the future, and the final verdict?
I’m not happy. 

I’m not happy where I was taking commissions, I’m not happy where I was taking Patreon.
I created Patreon to alleviate stress, and it ended up creating more, now that I can properly see it.

In the beginning when I launched Patreon, I launched it with the idea of wanting to focus less of doing commissions back to back to make ends meet, and instead, have a platform for people to support me doing what I love doing, improving my art, and illustrating my own characters and ideas, and drawing gift art/fanart of characters that I want to draw. 

One of the original benefits was first come first serve to commission slots, because I didn’t get very many commissions when I launched it over a year ago. Fast forward to now, it has mostly become “if you want commissions from me, you have to be a patron, and even still, it’s a gamble.”
And because of that, so many people have pledged with the expectation of receiving a commission from me, instead of wanting to support me as an artist.  And because the more people were pledging to get commissions, the chances of getting a commission dwindled for each patron, and the more people would feel cheated, and upset. 

And I started realizing this, so my initial thought was “well I don’t want people to feel like they’re being cheated, so I’ll try to do more commissions!” 

And thus, Patreon became the exact opposite of what it’s original purpose was. 

I tried making more promises to please more people, at my own expense.
If I was planning on doing commissions back to back, I didn’t need Patreon to do it. I could’ve done that through FA. I made Patreon to make myself happy, but instead it became me trying to make everyone else happy, and it burdened me with so much stress, and hardly any time for myself.

I still definitely plan to continue taking commissions, and I still definitely plan on utilizing the cooldown/bonus system for patrons so that they do have increased chances to get a slot.
But I’m going to be shifting the entire focus of my Patreon from “trying to get a commission slot from this artist” to “wanting to see and support the original ideas and artwork from this artist” and this way I can draw the spicy content that I want to draw, and that people want to see, and create merchandise that I can see online and at conventions as well.

I absolutely expect people to cancel their pledges, and that’s okay, no hard feelings. I completely understand. But I have to do this for me. For those that stay, and legitimately are pledged for the intent of just supporting me, I honestly thank you all.

Below I will summarize the primary changes you can expect moving forward starting next month & January

Patreon Restructuring

Overall Goal:

⦁  Transition to doing more personal artwork of my characters (and fan/gift art of characters that I have been wanting to draw) on a consistent basis and cut down substantially on stress/pressure of Patreon rewards and back to back commissions.

Patreon Restructuring:

⦁  Removing reference sheets, telegram stickers, high detail commissions from Patreon rewards. These commissions will be reserved for YCHs/rare slot openings moving forward

⦁  Titanium Tier is going away

⦁  *Commission slots will open up on a monthly basis, instead of weekly. This is to give me more flexibility with my schedule so that I fit in time to do personal art. It will be 5-10 slots and half of them will be for patrons only, and half will be public slots. Commissions for all patrons will be at a discounted price. 

⦁  *Utilize the raffle, hand pick, bonus entries, and cooldown systems previously discussed for commissions moving forward to help try to guarantee at least everyone will get a commission

⦁  *Monthly/bi-monthly YCH that will always feature Enro and/or any of my other characters

⦁  *Silver, Gold, Obsidian tiers will now get the ability to vote (1 vote, 2 votes, 3 votes respectively) on the monthly/bi-monthly YCH themes/ideas/concepts (Voting could be done at the end of the month to allow for conceptualization time before the auction is officially posted after the 1st of the month)

⦁  The Obsidian tier pledge will be for those that just want to support me and fund personal artwork of my characters, and provide suggestions/ideas for content and future merchandise. I no longer have anything extra to offer for this tier, so if you are only pledged to receive rewards or specific commission types, please cancel your pledge or reduce it to the previous tiers!  

*These changes are coming in January to give me time to catch up on owed work from this month.
Some progress on commissions will be slower since I do have work that I have to complete for ANE in February, and I have deadlines for this month and next month.

Thank you guys so much for reading, and if you have any questions regarding this, feel free to shoot me a message on here and I will reply to you as soon as I can. I also will GLADLY accept any suggestions and recommendations that you would like to see! 

This has been a huge growing and learning experience for me and I'm constantly trying to think of ways to improve it and myself, so any feedback is greatly appreciated!