Backstory War! Matilda Vs Mab!

[Mischa]

I think the big limitation isn't so much money, as it is time.  If someone threw a big enough wad of cash at her to draw both comics -- say, $1 million -- then she'd probably be happy to do it.  But I imagine that while she probably has the time to spare to do one extra comic on top of regular DMFA updates, trying to do two comics and the current update cycle would probably be too much.

Still, if one assumes the comic will take at least 6 months to complete (20 pages or so, at one page per week), and one wants to pay Amber a fair salary for her time, then I suppose $15,000 to $20,000 might be enough to make doing two comics financially feasible.  On the other hand, the odds of turning up that much money in the next two weeks seems slim. 

I'm still not entirely sure how much I'll be able to toss into the fray... my budget is looking good, but between paying for my flight to Anthrocon and wanting to help out some of my friends that are having tough times, I'm still not sure what I'll have to spare.

[Mao]

I know I'd probably get a little steamed if she tried to do three comics (one with updates two a week). 

[Jasae Bushae]

hmm....Point...Then what if it was one comic at a time and the one with the higher donation amount could go first? I mean, abels story was over 200 pages and (hopefully) neither of these would come anywhere close to that so...

Also ill confess im one of the people on the matilda side of this XD Im curious to find out how she ended up going from exile to living in a large town running a shoppe in the mall surrounded by water birds XD Might offer a look into the life of a person in this universe who isnt a cubi or an adventurer

[KV1NN4]

hmm....Point...Then what if it was one comic at a time and the one with the higher donation amount could go first? I mean, abels story was over 200 pages and (hopefully) neither of these would come anywhere close to that so...

Also ill confess im one of the people on the matilda side of this XD Im curious to find out how she ended up going from exile to living in a large town running a shoppe in the mall surrounded by water birds XD Might offer a look into the life of a person in this universe who isnt a cubi or an adventurer

I say she'd still need to raise well over $5000 before doing such... Even if she's not doing everything at once, she'd still need to be compensated for the TIME she'd put into it,and 5k doesn't last very long unless you're very very very good at budgeting/bargaining or perhaps living at home and not paying rent or have no other bills..?

ANYWAY; I'll be impressed if Mab manages to catch up.: U
Dig deep Mab-fans; after all, you don't need BOTH kidneys.
~K. *: )

[tikitori]

As soon as my new job is confirmed, I think I'll donate out of celebration.

I've been reading the comics since I was 16 (I'm now 23), and now I finally can donate!

[ChaosMageX]

My God, either there are many many readers who want Matilda to win, a few very rich ones.  At this point it seems safe to call Matilda the winner, unless someone VERY rich and on Mab's side comes along in the next 13 days to even things out.  Just keep buying those lottery tickets, Alondro.  You're not the only one.

Either way, at least I'm happy knowing even my meager drop in the bucket is going towards the worthy cause of helping Amber and Mason get out of dental debt.  Mason isn't the only one in that boat, especially between my brother's wisdom teeth and my snaggled teeth and underbite.

All that aside, even I have to admit that Side-Story War chibi Matilda is being super cute right now.  Can her species really scale walls like geckos?  If so, a controllable (possibly van der Waals based) stickiness like that certainly makes up for the lack of opposed digits.  Hopefully we'll learn more about this possible ability in her upcoming background story, since at this point it seems inevitable.

[Jasae Bushae]

Just a few rich ones? XD at this rate matilda will surpass the last side story war all on her own. @_@ wait...*rechecks* she already did! XD
Now im sorta wondering if that insane prediction of 10,000 being donated is that crazy now....XD

and wow. if the bonus comics going to feature perspectivee shots of matildas people scaling around like that i can only imagine the nightmare they will be to draw XD (on the plus side, abel will seem like a drop in the bucket by the end ^^ )

hmm...i wonder if i could fill a pillow with money if i used $1's...a money laden pillow fight does sound fun...

[icarus]

since no one else has brought harry belafonte into the mix...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=160rGid_TFw

[Prroul]

I just hope the disparity doesn't discourage people from donating further. Regardless of which 'side' wins, we've got bonus comics! And Amber is an awesome artist who deserves a bit of compensation for all the hard work she's put into this project.

[Plotting]

How to these story wars work? And how do you contribute money to them?

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

since no one else has brought harry belafonte into the mix...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=160rGid_TFw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-WCFUGCOLLU ?

How to these story wars work? And how do you contribute money to them?

Everyone donates to Mab, as per standard, except you add in the comment as to which way you want your donation to go.

Simples!

[Tuyu]

I just hope the disparity doesn't discourage people from donating further. Regardless of which 'side' wins, we've got bonus comics! And Amber is an awesome artist who deserves a bit of compensation for all the hard work she's put into this project.

And it's only $230 to go to an even $4K.

[Plotting]

Everyone donates to Mab, as per standard, except you add in the comment as to which way you want your donation to go.

Simples!

Thanks! Money sent to starving artist who creates lots of funky Mytho species!

[Jesk Levethix]

hummm..

One that  both comics idea there is a way that doesn't overtax the amazing.

make each Bi-weekly instead of weekly.

like  a  Week A (this one)  , week B ( other one),  next week back to A.

That might even stop the dreaded claw-hand

Thou.. looking at the scores this seems a completely nu-nessacery suggestion now. Ah well.

have to admit Matilda making a break for it is massively cute.   wonder how that will be put in the archives for this bonus mini-comic thing..

[icarus]

hummm..

One that  both comics idea there is a way that doesn't overtax the amazing.

make each Bi-weekly instead of weekly.

like  a  Week A (this one)  , week B ( other one),  next week back to A.

That might even stop the dreaded claw-hand

Thou.. looking at the scores this seems a completely nu-nessacery suggestion now. Ah well.

have to admit Matilda making a break for it is massively cute.   wonder how that will be put in the archives for this bonus mini-comic thing..

as someone who does comics too, this isn't really gonna be less of a problem. making a comic requires a lot of planning, and the planning takes time as well. she'd be juggling three comic concepts, plots, scripts and sketches... it can still get overwhelming very quickly. art is only one factor of the comic making process.

[ChaosMageX]

hummm..

One that  both comics idea there is a way that doesn't overtax the amazing.

make each Bi-weekly instead of weekly.

like  a  Week A (this one)  , week B ( other one),  next week back to A.

That might even stop the dreaded claw-hand

Thou.. looking at the scores this seems a completely nu-nessacery suggestion now. Ah well.

have to admit Matilda making a break for it is massively cute.   wonder how that will be put in the archives for this bonus mini-comic thing..

as someone who does comics too, this isn't really gonna be less of a problem. making a comic requires a lot of planning, and the planning takes time as well. she'd be juggling three comic concepts, plots, scripts and sketches... it can still get overwhelming very quickly. art is only one factor of the comic making process.

That may be, but what if, like Tapewolf, Amber were to at least eliminate art as a factor by bringing in a third party artist, perhaps to draw the losing side-story?

Like what Tapewolf did with The Dark Angel, she could take it as far as storyboarding, with blank cells with positioned speech bubbles, and then pass it off to third party artist, who'd then draw, sketch, ink, and color it, checking with Amber at various stages, and then reintegrate the speech bubbles and give her the finished image files to publish on missmab.com.

It doesn't seem too unreasonable for Amber to bring in another artist she knows well and trusts to do this, especially considering that KV1NN4 has been helping Amber to ink some of the recent pages in the main comic.  On the other hand, Amber might not trust anyone else with drawing one of her comics for her own reasons, but I'm not going to try to grasp at straws at what those reasons are because I don't know Amber that well.  It's only a suggestion on how to lighten possibly lighten the workload of doing three comics at once if she does choose to publish both side-stories.

I also agree that alternating the comics between weeks for fortnightly updates would be a good idea as well, regardless of whether or not Amber draws both side-stories.  It would mix it up and make it more exciting for the readers by giving them something to wait for, on top of possibly allowing buffers to be built up for both side-stories.

[icarus]

It doesn't seem too unreasonable for Amber to bring in another artist she knows well and trusts to do this, especially considering that KV1NN4 has been helping Amber to ink some of the recent pages in the main comic. 

i believe KV1NN4 was just inking amber's sketches. the bulk of the work still fell to amber.

[KV1NN4]

i believe KV1NN4 was just inking amber's sketches. the bulk of the work still fell to amber.

Yeah,she does do the lion's share of work. Also,i'm trying to get my own webcomic going this year...just need to  build up a buffer before it goes live.

Aaaaand telling both side stories would take time in the long run that the money she's making from this war, will again, not result in it being fair financial compensation (unless it does break in at least 5 figures) for the time/work she put in, even if she was alternating the schedule...

But i don't really know how to explain the time/money/update schedule thing properly. I guess... jsut because you're going slower and taking your time doing something doens't mean its... um... less work... or.. worth more money?

..I need to get back to packing.

~K. *: )

[Wanderer]

SWEET JUMPING JEHOSHAPHAT! Ok, I swear I've been checking this page every day, and just yesterday it still told me Matilda only had about $900. Where in the billions of billious barbecued blue blistering barnacles did $2800 come from?!

[Mao]

That image updated (for me) on friday (and again today, from the looks of it).  Maybe you had a cached version?

[Wanderer]

That image updated (for me) on friday.  Maybe you had a cached version?

I shouldn't have, but I have visited enough pages since then, and I visited this one just long enough to see "nope the image hasn't changed" that I cannot guarantee by this point that I did a forced refresh of the page. I probably did, because I always do when there's something I want to check and see if it updated, but I cannot clearly remember.

Matilda was running away from the war, climbing the image, but her number was still only about 900.

[ChaosMageX]

That image updated (for me) on friday.  Maybe you had a cached version?

I shouldn't have, but I have visited enough pages since then, and I visited this one just long enough to see "nope the image hasn't changed" that I cannot guarantee by this point that I did a forced refresh of the page. I probably did, because I always do when there's something I want to check and see if it updated, but I cannot clearly remember.

Matilda was running away from the war, climbing the image, but her number was still only about 900.

Yeah, I have that problem too, and I usually have to reload the page a few times, even after directly loading the image.

What amazes me is the fact that even though the total is nearly a whopping $4000, it will still only put a dent in the dental bill.

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

What amazes me is the fact that even though the total is nearly a whopping $4000, it will still only put a dent in the dental bill.

Teeth are expensive. If nothing else, consider that the dentist needs a whole lot of specialised tools, long training, a well-trained assistant, a hopefully-clean place to work... and that's not counting the materials you walk away from him or her carrying in your mouth. Gold or gold-plated, titanium... not cheap metals, and one of the reasons they're not cheap is that they're useful for putting inside people when you don't want their body to try to take the darn things apart.

Frankly, if the dental bill is for four or five hours of their time, I'd not think two grand unexceptional. In GBP, no less.

[Mischa]

Bweeeeh... I remember the one time I had to get actual dental surgery done (full anaesthesia and all) for something with my wisdom teeth, and the bill was around $800.  I do remember inquiring at the time about various other options at the times (caps and bridges and so on), but they were at least double the price of my operation (which I think was simply pulling out the offending teeth), so yeah... I can sort of imagine a highly expensive dental operation.

It also sounds like the money is going towards helping out with other debts as well, though, so it may be that simply a portion of the accumulated donations is going towards paying for a portion of the operation.

[FairWage22]

I have exceptionally good insurance from work (though this might get screwed up with upcoming law changes and I may not be able to afford it any longer...) and having an emergency extraction of a tooth (and subsequent x-rays and examination, etc) ran into the thousands of dollars of which I had to pay about a quarter (25%) of. 

Seeing Matilda's exodus along the frame of the comic makes me wonder, though... is there any way to see these 'underlay' in an archive or the like?  Because this isn't the first time one of the contests has gotten decidedly yet understandably odd.

[Amber Williams]

Yeah. Woefully dental is not a thing covered by the the gov as its considered a cosmetic surgery...so most of the time it's up to the person to handle dental. My husband's work has some insurance but it usually only covers a percent with a 1k cap limit per year.  When his teeth decided to make a break for it, getting that sucker fixed took about 1.5k alone. 

I cannot deny that another factor that caused the debt was simply the interest and a few times it was pay rent versus pay debt...with rent winning out so the interest then snuck up another notch.  Because even with a debt, groceries and bills and life necessities still need to be paid for.

If folks want what the debt's total is more close to, it's thankfully not in the 5 digit mark.  But it is a little more than double the amount raised so far.  As I mentioned, it was never my goal to try to raise the full amount because I don't know if I could make a side-story that impressive and I fear that what with happened with Abel's Story in how the pages ran away past my expected amount, offering both may end up with me biting off far more than I could chew in terms of workload.  Still, if the full amount had gotten raised, I would probably have to do something. Because I'm a prideful creature who wouldn't feel comfortable otherwise.

[Mischa]

Woefully dental is not a thing covered by the the gov as its considered a cosmetic surgery...so most of the time it's up to the person to handle dental.

Yeah, that's one of the things about the Canadian system that tripped me up when I finally got old enough to no longer be eligible for my parents' coverage.  As near as I can tell, most physical health issues are covered, as I've gone into clinics to get rashes and the like examined with no significant charges.  But dental treatment?  You're basically footing the entire bill yourself, even if it's excruciating amounts of pain. 

Still, it could be far, far worse. <.<

I do want to respond to your lengthy rant about getting onto a more regular art schedule at some point, as I can sympathize with a lot of what you're going through with it.  I'm just not sure if this thread or the other is the better venue for it...

[ChaosMageX]

Woefully dental is not a thing covered by the the gov as its considered a cosmetic surgery...so most of the time it's up to the person to handle dental.

Yeah, that's one of the things about the Canadian system that tripped me up when I finally got old enough to no longer be eligible for my parents' coverage.  As near as I can tell, most physical health issues are covered, as I've gone into clinics to get rashes and the like examined with no significant charges.  But dental treatment?  You're basically footing the entire bill yourself, even if it's excruciating amounts of pain.

Ah, cosmetic surgery, that explains it.  Still, wow, I didn't realize that teeth were so expensive since aside from a retainer I wore as a kid, I haven't had to have any major dental work done so far.  Given those facts, I might just choose to live with my crooked teeth and jaw rather than get them corrected, especially since I'm not one for braces or retainers.
Couple that with the fact that dental careers have one of the highest suicide rates among professions and teeth become very serious business for all parties involved.

Since there are still 10 days left, I'm still hoping that the total of the donations reaches at least $4000, even though I don't have anymore extra cash I can afford to give to it.  I'm still curious as to whether it was a bunch of people or just a few rich ones that gave to Matilda's side.

Either way, I wish Amber luck dealing with the claw hand she'll get from drawing so many taurs.  And I also hope she and Mason manage to get through and pay off all their massive dental debt within the year, hopefully before AnthroCon.

But I still wish we could have some consolation for Mab's side that didn't involve much art, like a written explanation, or as someone else suggested, a Powerpoint presentation.  I'd personally be happy with something similar to those clan leader letters, as a few of them offered great insight into the world mechanics.  Perhaps it could be a letter/dissertation written by Mab, so to speak.

[Amber Williams]

Between this fundraiser, taxes coming back (we usually get about 1k back) and my husband planning to overtime it in February, we should be able to take a severe chunk out of it.  May not be able to fully defeat it, but the payments will become far more manageable and we can then just chip away at it for the rest of the year.  Mason and I tend to live pretty modest.  Other than rent, phone/internet, food, bus tickets for travel, and a rabbit...that's about all our expenses.   We've been cutting out a lot of frivolous spending like any eating out (Even those random stops into Starbucks/MCdonalds add up!) or impulse buying (going to a convenience store to buy a soda usually results in buying a couple other things, which add up as well! If we want soda, we can pick up some along with groceries and if we run out, then we gotta wait the week). 

Granted who knows what the year holds and there is always the risk of getting blindsided by some event that will make things quite uneasy, but if that happens it happens and I'm not gonna fuss about a future event I have no control over.

I'd be surprised if anymore donations come in. I was surprised at how many came in in the first place.  That said, I don't intend to leave the mab side fans high and dry.  Because, I should have mentioned this, the universe rules are not only the ones that apply to DMFA, but to all my comic canons. And there are a couple stories I do have planned that don't even take place in DMFA that I intend to release into the future when I no longer am being a giant chicken-heart.  So even if it doesn't get mentioned right away in this side story, it will get mentioned because it's pretty much intertwined in all of my projects in some way or another. XD

[ChaosMageX]

Between this fundraiser, taxes coming back (we usually get about 1k back) and my husband planning to overtime it in February, we should be able to take a severe chunk out of it.  May not be able to fully defeat it, but the payments will become far more manageable and we can then just chip away at it for the rest of the year. 

That's great to hear.  I hope that everything works out, particularly when it comes you guys going to AnthroCon and Condition (Wasteland) and having a great time at both.

Mason and I tend to live pretty modest.  Other than rent, phone/internet, food, bus tickets for travel, and a rabbit...that's about all our expenses.   We've been cutting out a lot of frivolous spending like any eating out (Even those random stops into Starbucks/MCdonalds add up!) or impulse buying (going to a convenience store to buy a soda usually results in buying a couple other things, which add up as well! If we want soda, we can pick up some along with groceries and if we run out, then we gotta wait the week). 

It's the Mountain Dew that always gets me, especially when it's on sale for $1.00 per 2 liter bottle, and because I drink it instead of coffee.

I'd be surprised if anymore donations come in. I was surprised at how many came in in the first place.  That said, I don't intend to leave the mab side fans high and dry.  Because, I should have mentioned this, the universe rules are not only the ones that apply to DMFA, but to all my comic canons. And there are a couple stories I do have planned that don't even take place in DMFA that I intend to release into the future when I no longer am being a giant chicken-heart.  So even if it doesn't get mentioned right away in this side story, it will get mentioned because it's pretty much intertwined in all of my projects in some way or another. XD

Do any of these stories involve Mikelo and/or some of the other characters we've seen on your Fur Affinity account?