Town Hall Summary Post
—The time since the end of The Monarch Papers has been crazy for CJ, both on the business side of things and in his personal life. The focus here is business, though. TMP scheduling was very unique, and now that it’s over, he’s had to rearrange almost every part of the company’s schedule. There have also had to be changes in business style. Our big concern was how we were going to maintain the strengths of the community while also publishing 5 books in 2018 and 6 in 2019 (and beyond)? CJ has been monitoring the forums very closely, to figure out how to maintain the soul of TMP in the new era of AG (the soul being the connection between us and the readers). The solution falls into a number of categories:
—PRSFNE: Originally, PRSFNE has meant to be a free roam playground, so that everybody could still have fun in the Magiqverse while all the upcoming books were prepped for publication. Then, we realized that we had to provide a narrative for it to be a meaningful experience for you guys. This was why (with the immense help of Rev) the MAGIQbot was created. There are two PRSFNE campaigns coming up, the first in January and the second in February. The first is rp/creative writing-based, and the second is puzzle/action-oriented. However, we decided to leave it at these two eps for now, because we simply do not have the resources at the moment to create more narrative content and also focus on the other projects that our company needs to complete this year. This may change in the future, though.
This year is very different from last year for AG, not only because we’re entering the publishing world, but because The Book of Briars has to undergo some important changes in light of what you guys created in TMP. Despite the break in PRSFNE narrative after the first two episodes, we are going to be revamping the MAGIQbot, so you can build your own campaigns, with character stats, inventory, hit points, etc. We’ll be more clear about the details of this in the future, but we want to mention this now, as a reaffirmation of the importance of Neithernor in the future of AG. Neithernor has just been trademarked as the blanket title for all future AG roleplaying games.
—PATREON: Patreon has been a major lifeline for this company, thanks to you guys. You brought $11,000 to us through Patreon last year! CJ has funded AG out of pocket, but he wouldn’t have been able to hire an assistant (me, Devin!), make the finale video, etc. without all of this help. That being said, it’s incredibly hard and stressful to maintain the quality of Patreon content worthy of these contributions. The fact is that most Patreon creators have original, Patreon-only content for their contributors, and we could never hide narrative for this community behind a paywall. Instead, we’re going to try to make Patreon focused more on early access or behind the scenes content. You might notice that some of expectations of Patreon will change, but this doesn’t mean we don’t value your contributions. We will work harder than ever to be worthy of your support. We will let you know more about this, as soon as we finalize the specifics.
—THE ACKERLY GREEN SECRET SOCIETY: The pins are going out in the mail next week, and will be on sale through the end of January, or until we run out of them. Be sure to buy one before then if you plan to, and if you can’t afford it, remember to request one through the Ackerly Green Community Fellowship! The tentative plan is for the interactive parts of The Ackerly Green Secret Society to start in March (with maybe a couple of surprises in February). This should last 3-4 months, like a single phase of TMP. The events of The Ackerly Green Secret Society, along with some other content, will become an interstitial novella connecting The Monarch Papers and The Book of Briars! We can also reveal that the events of The Ackerly Green Secret Society will be a continuation of the MAGIQverse narrative. You can participate even if you don’t buy the pin, but if you do, it will add an entirely new component of the secret society which can’t be revealed yet. We can say, however, that we’re taking puzzles out of the virtual world and into the real world. This will work the same whether or not you live in the United States. This is our love letter to all of you, and we want you to know that we have heard and felt your concerns about how TMP community would continue. This is our solution. You can always be sure that when we’re quiet, it’s because we’re hard at work to bring you something great, not because we’ve forgotten the community.
—BOOK RELEASE DATES: Ackerly Green’s Guide to MAGIQ will begin shipping in February. (We’ve been considering selling a super-discounted bundle of MAGIQ guides, in case you want to leave them in public places). After that, here are the key dates:
• June 4th: The Monarch Papers Volume One: Flora & Fauna, The Monarch Papers Volume Two: Cosmos & Time, and the full length Fletcher Dawson’s Forest of Darkening Glass will ship. We’re also creating an Advanced Reader Copy (ARC) program, so you can get advanced copies, if you agree to leave reviews on Amazon when the books are released (of course, we want your reviews to be honest, but reviews in general will help us break out to the broader public).
• The Book of Briars beta begins on July 2nd. Through it, you will get two chapters per week, in an exclusive forum channel.
• The BoB will debut in full on September 3rd.
• The limited editions of the books and other limited merch will be in the store through January 31st.
• Make sure to buy the BoB in either digital or physical formats before July, and you’ll be in the beta.
• The dust jacket version won’t be available after January but you can still buy the ebook and the AG exclusive green/lock cover. The mass market version (sold on Amazon) will have a redesigned cover, which will make more sense to people who aren’t already familiar with the MAGIQverse.
• Also, in the winter, there will be a brand new novel which takes place in the MAGIQverse.
—LEADERSHIP: Community leadership is going to be very important this year. CJ is going to look at the roster and responsibilities over the next couple of weeks. The number of leaders will be narrowed down and CJ will be very clear about what he needs from them. Once AGSS starts, we could bring in new leaders, if anyone is interested.
—THE ACKERLY GREEN APP: It will be launching in February. It will have a built-in e-reader by June (called AG Reader), in time for the book releases, a built-in wiki, and more. The e-reader will automatically sync your purchases, you can buy from within the app, and CJ might occasionally drop short fiction there!
—INSTAGRAM: Ackerly Green’s official Instagram page launches February 1st. You will definitely want to follow it if you aren’t already. There might be some surprises there!