Upcoming 2 Year Anniversary! - Tier Changes, Competition and Plans (Patreon)

Hi Everyone!

I have a number of updates for you all so I am going to get it all out here and then will have a few other more focused posts as well coming soon.

Firstly, everything is going great with my new family. Our son is (luckily) super chilled out and (relatively) easy to manage, so starting this month (July) I will be aiming to get back to my regular schedule of 4 main releases per month. That will be 3 map sets from me and 1 Contributor Creation. This also means I will be back to charging your pledge up to 4x per month (never more).

Next month will be my 2 year anniversary on Patreon and like last year I am going to do a little freshening up and also run a custom map competition to say thanks to all of you! There will be more information on all of this soon, but I want to give you all a heads up in advance.

Updated Patreon Tiers and Price Changes

Most importantly, these new prices WILL NOT affect existing Patrons. All existing patrons will remain on 'legacy' tiers and continue to get the same rewards as before. The legacy tiers will just be unpublished, but remain active in the background.

The new prices will only apply to new or returning patrons. Also, they will not go live until August, so you have a full month to get in on the 'legacy' pricing if you are not already.

Please note tier prices are in USD as that is the default currency for my Patreon. They may show differently for you depending on your location. These prices are not inclusive of VAT, which also differs based on your location. Patreon (and international tax laws) like to make these things confusing for us.

There will be more detailed information when the updated tiers go live, but an overview for now:

Traveller Tier - $1:
This will be unchanged, as I want to always have a $1 tier to make my content as accessible as possible. The only difference is that seasonal and biome variants (like desert, snow etc) will no longer be available at this tier for new map releases.
Into the Wilds series maps and contributor creations will be accessible as normal.

Adventurer Tier - $3:
The price for this tier will also remain the same, but I am getting rid of the Builder tier and combining it with the Adventurer tier. This tier will now be for all additional content beyond the standard maps including extra map variants, unfurnished 'clean' variants, asset packs, DungeonDraft packs, adventures and other bonus content.

I will also be switching from weekly asset packs of 30+ assets to monthly asset packs of 100+ assets. Up until now I have mostly been releasing the assets I make for each new map along with that map set, but as my library grows (over 7000 now!) I often don't need to create as many new ones. Instead I will do a larger themed pack each month, which I think will allow me to create more diverse, interesting and useful packs as I won't be so tied down to what I need and instead can create what you need.

Forgemaster - $5:
I am increasing the price for this tier from $4 to $5 as the amount of work to create each Foundry Module pack increases as more features are added to FVTT. This will also allow me to support more third party software like Moulinette Cloud to make your lives easier.

Creator - $10:
This will be a new tier with better commercial licensing options for using my content. The existing licensing options will remain for use of my assets and free maps (with some minor changes), but this tier will also allow use of my premium maps and creature tokens for those of you who create your own TTRPG content to sell.

Emperor - $20:
This tier is for the incredibly generous among you who have chosen to give me extra support with no additional rewards in return, for which I am eternally thankful. The tier will remain unchanged.

As mentioned above, I am combining the Builder and Adventurer tiers.  I am also getting rid of the Warrior and Curator commission tiers, at least for now. I always really enjoy working on these, but unfortunately they take up too much of my time at the moment, and time is something I am very short on.

I am primarily making these changes in order to simplify and streamline things. The Patreon UI is based around having 3 main tiers, where I previously had 4, and while the commission tiers were a lot of fun, they meant I was focussed on only a handful of higher paying patrons for too much of my time. This will allow me to make more, better content for all of you.

Custom Map Competition

Like last year, I will be running a competition to commission a custom map set from me to celebrate my anniversary on Patreon. These map sets will be released to all Patrons in August. As mentioned above I am discontinuing the Curator commission tier, so this may be the last chance for a while. Last years winners are still some of my favourite maps I have produced, so I am looking forward to seeing what you come up with.

All patrons will be able to enter, but entries are weighted based on how long you have been a patron (not which tier you are at). For each month you have been my patron you will get one additional entry to win. 

A post with more information on how to enter will go live following this, and will be available HERE 

Plans for Year 3

• A New Map Maker - I have so many ideas for more content and projects that I want to get to, but as mentioned above I am time poor, so one of my priorities will be to bring on another artist. I already hire a number of people to help me out with the technical stuff (Alex for writing, Dagonzo for Foundry packs, Moulk for Dungeondraft etc) and commission some very talented artists for the contributor creations, but I would like to have another mapmaker involved full time who can help me create more of the core content you all come for. 
• Discord - Based on the feedback from the poll, I will be creating a new Discord server. This will allow us to create a proper community, and also allow you to be able to contact me and my team much easier and have more direct engagement and input into my content.
• Tom Cartos Website - As most of you are aware, the Patreon UI is....not the best. I am planning to build a new, separate website that will allow you to more easily view and browse my content, which will then link back to the relevant Patreon post for downloads. 
• Quality of Life Improvements - Further to the website, I have other plans to make accessing my content easier. This will include putting together more bundles of both maps and assets to make bulk downloading and file management much simpler.
• Video tutorials - I have wanted to make a video tutorial series on map making and design for a while now and am making it more of a priority for this coming year.

If you have any questions about any of the above information, or if there is anything else you would like to see from me in the coming months, leave a comment below.