"Flattened"

JGray

If today's page looks a little strange to you that's because, as he was doing what we in the industry call the flats (the basic colors of the page without the shading), Keith discovered he was running a fever. Obviously caring for himself overshadowed the need to get the page done tonight. We'll update with the finished, shaded page as soon as possible.

In the meanwhile, I am curious. I've been wary of actually sharing the origin story of the arcana with you guys. Not because you don't deserve to know it, of course, or because I think it is a bad story. Rather, I was worried with the slow pace of a webcomic (two pages a week) taking such a long break our familiar main characters might be a turn-off for readers. Even without the year-long hiatus we took in the middle, the Telling ran somewhere around 15 weeks. That's a long time to go without the main characters in a comic that is primarily about their relationships.

So, please tell me. What did you think of the Telling? Our origin story of the Arcana and the Keys? Please answer as honestly as you like.

See you Monday!

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the leaking pen
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Guest post by "the leaking pen"
I liked it, but I caught almost all of it in bulk on a backlog binge. I think it might have been something to try and do in a larger chunk, or a seperate item, if possible.

Submitted February 27, 2014 at 1:05AM

TC
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Guest post by "TC"
I thought something felt dark (as if the bonfire had gone out completely).

I liked the telling for what it was, personally.

In cases of back story elements, I've seen some webcomic writers treat it as a separate entity. For example, Yamino (Sister Claire) had recently been doing additional "Journal Entries" written by the main heroine, Claire. In addition to those journals, she's even been posting some "missing moment" back stories, mostly written by her wife and drawn by her.

I've seen a couple people post one back story as a HUGE vertical spread that could be broken down for the sake of publishing.

In all honesty, it's what you're comfortable doing. Doing it this way (hiatus not included) made seeing our girls more refreshing than it otherwise would have been.

Submitted February 27, 2014 at 1:06AM

David E.
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Guest post by "David E."
I was pretty bored by the telling.

It is the kind of thing that might be welcome in a published work, or if the update pace was quicker. I wouldn't have minded, say, 2 weeks of updates on it. (As many comics as you like, but let's not stay off the story for longer than a couple weeks).

It's also the sort of thing that you could make as a for-purchase side story.

If you feel that the Telling is an important element of the script, I wouldn't have minded reading some text on the website, or some comics that are mostly text with just a few images (or hey, even no images at all, to get through it.) The Telling in particular is a part of the story that could be effectively told without the aid of pictures. Then if you wanted to go back later and fill it in, either for dead tree publication or for-purchase pdf, that could be great.

Submitted February 27, 2014 at 1:13AM

David
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Guest post by "David"
I liked it. Sometimes you have to step back from the main story in order to progress it, and I think you did that well.

It was a bit of a slower pace, yeah (hiatus notwithstanding)... but you used the imagery well to tell the story.

Submitted February 27, 2014 at 4:57AM

Fairportfan
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Guest post by "Fairportfan"
Okay - with the next update being four days away, that last panel is just sadistic.

Submitted February 27, 2014 at 6:53AM

Adamas
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Guest post by "Adamas"
Tell Kieth to get better soon, he can't leave us dangling like this!! Tsktsk
I enjoyed it as a break from the whole "Sneezing on Horrors, getting kidnapped, and running from homicidal machines" thing Wink

Submitted February 27, 2014 at 9:28AM

JGray

Leaking Pen, In chapter 2 we had a set of pages we did five per week instead of two per week for that very reason.

TC, that's what I did with Kludge's Notes (which you can find in the extra section)! Glad to meet another fan of Sister Claire. Yamino is awesome.

David, I am sorry the story didn't agree with you. Unfortunately, as I pay for the art, doing it as a side story would have been very expensive. However, I promise next chapter will be fast paced and full of action!

Fairportfan, I promise you'll see what that look on Chrys's face means come Monday!

Adamas, I'm glad you enjoyed it. My hope is understanding the Arcana multiverse will further enrich the joy of reading MotA.

Submitted February 28, 2014 at 7:05PM

Musical_life
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Guest post by "Musical_life"
I rather liked it, I do think the panels after the telling itself are coming off a bit awkward though.

Submitted February 28, 2014 at 10:47PM

Gunsolo
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Guest post by "Gunsolo"
I really liked the Telling, it's always nice to see some good worldbuilding (or multiverse-building in this case).
It answered a lot of questions about MotA but left us with some new ones as well (just who won the battle royale of the gods???).
The long break from the main characters didn't really bother me since the Telling was so interesting, though it's probably not something you should do too frequently.
You could have done without the hiatus too. Smile

And with only the flat colors on this page, it did look like the fire had gone out.

Submitted March 1, 2014 at 9:39AM

Adamas
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Guest post by "Adamas"
Yeah, knowing more of the world is always a good thing.

Submitted March 1, 2014 at 12:38PM

12 comments. Showing 1 to 10. Goto page 1, 2 Next

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