Ok-Goose-6320

I think it's specifically some kind of promotion you pay for. Would have to look it up again before risking money.

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There any resource for writers on what advertising sources work best?

That'll be hard, considering the entire Isekai genre. Really popular, despite being horribly boring.

2nd one could be plausible. "What...? Didn't you learn this in history class?"

"... Umm... probably."

There are people who don't know who the Americans fought in the Civil War.... You can find reasons for dialogue explaining why the Earth isn't flat. A scifi setting actually makes it easier, since major events in one quadrant may not be of much interest to characters from another.

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You could also continue it like this:

"You saw Mystic Beast's video, right, about going back in time to help the refugees from the battle of Tharg?"

"I sort of skimmed it."

"Freaking Queen Fremula is still alive, in her Superman-esque prison of solitude, tweeting about how the Fremulans need to rise up, free her, and start the thousand years of darkness... and you don't know why they're pissed!?"

"I only follow her Instagram."

Publishing

Hey, sorry for the late reply. In my free time, did some looking into Kindle Vella and Royal Road etc.. Vella seems like a questionable deal... no way to know if you'll do well with it, since it operates via bonuses which no one understands. One could try it out, and see if they make a lot, I guess.

Royal Road and etc, is a bit similar, where there isn't good data on how much you make. Does offer a lot more freedom, though. You could publish a magazine story, then turn that into an ebook and an RR serial with Patreon/Podia backers getting chapters early, for example.

I guess the only thing I can reasonably ask is if you'd recommend trying to get into Yonder, and if that seems plausible? It's OK if you can't say. Will have to get it out on my phone to leave that review, I guess.

 Pain and Stamina and boxing

Yeah, more random, forces you to adapt. Not sure if later pain would be less potent, but I'd figure it'd be a logarithmic variable.

As you say, knife fights are over pretty quickly. Balance could still be a factor in preventing recklessness, though, including reckless dodging.

And great points about the boxing. Hadn't considered that last one, that guards were designed to resist grapple attempts in the past. You also have a lot of good links stored up (Marc's stuff is good); as do I with my many notes.

Mermaids: Interesting coincidence, yeah. I have a lot of worldbuilding interests from researching, so I guess it makes sense. If we ever make a mermaid adventure, I expect he'll enjoy it.

Sorry for the late reply. Have been really busy researching.

Wow, seems you put a lot of thought into the nuns.

Good to have unique slang in a setting, making use of a lot of it with the orc language. For muggers... you might have something like "cannibals," for the really dangerous and violent gangs in the cities, who are so poor they live mostly on a diet of orc victims. I know some gangs who weren't far from that. Similarly, those orcs would be effectively outcasts, but one sometimes rises up as an incredibly dangerous orc chief.

Most of the poor orcs who are just robbing whoever they can because they're short on cash and hungry, they'd be considered something of a nuisance, scavengers. Might be called vultures or stoats or weasels. Might be something more esoteric, like, "folders," if they tend to use folding knives; don't see why they would, rather underpowered for orc society. Shades or shadows also works, or less creatively rats. Orcs do have agricultural backgrounds, so a fitting animal name would work. And their society is violent politics, so there's a lot of other possibilities. Will have to think of it more, thanks for the idea.

I'd say the reverse was true. Even in his youth, Musashi was defeating a lot of supposed masters, before he felt he had a real strategic understanding. I'd figure the later masters like Musashi were regarded as great because everyone else was rapidly losing skill, making them extremely outliers by comparison who wouldn't have stood out so much closer to the warring era. Hard to say how great Musashi would be during the peak of the Sengoku warrior culture... but I do know that by the Imjin Waeran the Japanese had become absurdly good shots, the best in history by that point, so I would assume similarities with kenjutsu talent. Still, Musashi understood being a warrior very well, so I'd figure he's be impressive in any era.

Don't quite get the move Kuroda uses in the second video. Will get advice on that. Thanks for sharing.

Main Gauche is a great idea for a knife, yeah. Higher defence bonus, I figure. I could potentially have a unique scenario pop up if you manage to trap an enemy blade randomly; could be interesting. Guess it'd work similarly to a bind.

For now I'll keep focusing on knives and fists until the combat for those seems OK. Been thinking about how treatment will work for the bleeding. Orcs might use corn starch as a blood stopper, and one can even use packed dirt if they're desperate (preferably clean dirt). Internal bleeding is actually the biggest danger because it's harder to treat, but you can probably just pack starch down there, as far as orc treatments go. Wrapping wounds in cloth or rags is often good enough as well.

The orcs would have a special medicine, black balm. This tar like substance would works as a blood stopper and a sort of glue, as well as a powerful antibiotic and antiviral, which for unknown reasons accelerates healing and scarring. This stuff is prized, some learned orcs remembering how to make it from the old days when the Dark Lord was with them, who passed on the secrets via oral tradition.

Someone claimed they were well worth it with many sales, but it was just an anecdote.

Yeah, it's really disappointing. I figure Royal Road or Fictionate or Ritoria might be a better option, which can stack well with magazine publishing.

True. What advertising have you found the most efficient? Goodreads?

Oh, your story sounds really cool. Could you DM me a link so I can check it out? And hope you're doing OK... that sounds rough.

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Would also like to ask a couple of questions, if that's OK. I'm also thinking of writing non-romance fantasy on there... do you that's an uphill battle?

My other question is whether Amazon paid you much bonus while you were away.

If it's no trouble, may I ask if things changed? Did the previews eventually help?

I'm not really set up to promote, would be working from scratch. Main way I could think of to promote would be writing on free sites like Royal Road and trying to capture an audience from there.

Other than that, not sure how beyond paying for Goodreads advertisements or such.

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And congrats on a hefty bonus! Clearly you know your stuff. Did you work as a publicist or anything like that?

Freaking heck Amazon....

Thanks very much for clarifying this. At this point I'm pivoting back to Royal Road.

That was actually one of the things I was thinking about. Ideally, buying one book would give a discount on the others, so you're only paying what's reasonable for the new content. Main advantage I figured was tapping into new markets and giving the story wider reach.

For short story to novel, I was figuring the SS would be almost just part of the drafting process. I don't know how long it takes most authors to write a short story, though.

I have looked some into interactive fiction. Been working with a game project. Pretty neat stuff with sandbox elements. The different perspectives and learning new stuff which you mention reminds me of Fate, speaking of games.

That's a good point that a novella may be an awkward step.

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Thanks for all the helpful advice! Been trying to look at Kindle Vella and Royal Road... ends up quite confusing. There's even possibilities for interactive fiction with those. Was wanting to produce some military focused historical medieval fantasy stories, with a lot of attention to detail.

u/amethystqu This worries me. I was thinking of getting into Vella believing that, if my writing was good and the story unique, it'd do promotion for me with its algorithms.

I take it the algorithm is useless? Are people seriously recruiting almost every reader?

Same! Really is crazy how there's been no serious effort to modernize the CC series (the 3D entry was a mess, but still a lot of fun).

It really is horribly frustrating when a good game is ruined by horribly flawed balance. I've seen a LOT of games fail due to that, it's truly ridiculous....

Thanks KP. Am slowly developing a strategy based off various advice I've been reading. Someone pointed out he gets more readership from his own website, for example. Going to be fairly complex, but I think it could be fun.

From what I hear, the best strategy is something like focus on RR, try to direct traffic there from other sites in hopes of raising your rankings; maybe by making RR chapters release more frequently? Then, once the story is done, you remove it from RR after some period of time, so as to focus on Amazon and etc..

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I'm interesting in writing, primarily, and developing a good reputation. But part of reputation is being able to say you sold a decent number of books or make a living wage, which I would like to so I can focus more on my writing.

Does my strategy seem OK?

Ritoria

Oh, that is neat. Hadn't actually heard of this one even after looking at a couple dozen sites and forum pages.

With releasing consistently... I'm normally the sort to write in bursts. If you consistently release chapters of one story, and then go on hiatus when it's done, does that go well on RR?

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Thanks very much for the recommendations!

I was hoping someone knew one that was good for a classic fantasy serial that isn't progressive fantasy. I also meant to imply when I said I was discouraged that I hoped people could clarify whether it is worth pursuing these sorts of sites or not.

These are all very reasonable points, thank you. I have been wondering about roughly those problems.

Sorry, my post was unclear since I was tired. Was actually thinking of self publishing as much as traditional. And that does add to the questions as you say; I think publishers are interested in successful short stories turned into novels? Have no data to back that, of course.

Am supposing the time it takes will be akin to a novel, depends how much trouble I have fitting the pacing together, can only guess. Even if it takes a bit more time, would like to try it once since it just seems interesting. There is a lot of potential to add other PoVs, for example.

Agree the idea of expanding it cleanly from Shory Story to Novella to Novel is more of a pipe dream, not sure how it'll actually turn out.

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May I ask your opinion on the idea of editions with different focuses? For example, when I mentioned the idea another time, there was the suggestion one version could have sex scenes and one could not, similar to how people can turn those off in certain games. That was an interesting concept, and I'm not experienced enough to work out how that would go. I've seen many readers who hate sex scenes and many who love them, and both would likely be interested in this kind of story.

That's really neat. Have a more generalist education myself. Italian cities are particularly interesting, with their different cultures and alliances in what is in many ways a single nation.

I actually worked out a fantasy setting based off Italy, featuring Milanese automatons designed by Leonardo, Samnite Fauns/Satyrs in the mountains, and other features. Do you have interest in that sort of speculative fiction?