Discord (Patreon)

No, I don't mean MLP Discord. I mean Discord the chat thingy. I decided to try it out for a bit to see if it meets my needs so that means a change in the reward tiers. The tiers affected are Blog Access and Earlier Access. The Discord Access will replace Blog Access and the Earlier Access tier is going away. Why? Well, from the very beginning of the blog's conception, it has always been touch and go. The underlying turnkey solution to it was obviously WordPress which by itself didn't do what I needed it to do. I had to look for a plugin that can assign users access roles to certain content I post. Even with the plugin, I had to make my own edits which I regret because I didn't fully understood how the plugin worked. The feature I discovered later and needed wasn't that great either which made me jump through hoops to set content to certain role categories. All the content posted on the blog had to be duplicated if I had to reuse it for a new post requiring me to reupload the same picture wasting space.  Another reason for getting rid of it is because barely anyone took advantage of it even if they have access to it. 

Basically, the blog was put together with duct tape but it still worked. 

 So, what am I going to do with Discord? 

There's a separate channel on the new server I created which only patrons can access. I will post work in progress images, sketches, previews and anything relating to the rewards for the month before they are sent out. Finished rewards will also be a possibility depending on my mood. Past rewards are available upon request in this channel (minus PSD files).

Do you have to wait until you get charged to get access?

To be honest, I'm not sure. This is the first time I'm using Discord and the Discord/Patreon integration. I still don't have upfront charging enabled because I want to reserve the option to put rewards together in a nice package. If the Patreon bot does assign the patron role to you once you pledge to the Discord Access tier or above, then consider it a bonus.

Do you have to have a Discord account?

Yes, you do. Not only do you have to have one, you have to link it to your Patreon account for the integration to work its magic. I could manually assign you that role if you're paranoid about linking it to Patreon but not sure what the bot will do if I do that. If you don't have a Discord account, it literally took me a minute to sign up for one. With a Discord account, it can potentially be more beneficial to you because you can also use it to chat with others, join other servers you're interested in, etc. If you still don't want Discord, you are free to jump to a different tier that doesn't have it as a reward. You can even remain in that tier and nothing will happen because you haven't linked a Discord account.

I'm open to suggestions and feedback about anything so feel free to post them. The only ones affected are really the ones that were in the blog access and source files tier but  I'm posting this as a heads up to everyone so you can decide what to do if you need to.  

If you're interested in hanging out in the general chat, here's a link: https://discord.gg/wyGz8Fw