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No room for objection

Crazy plan on not, we’re determined to go! At least more determined than me, after seeing that both the position on TWC and the support on Patreon is dwindling…!

Next page: https://www.patreon.com/posts/30166164 
Next next page: https://www.patreon.com/posts/30166164

How are you guys doing? I’m slightly depressed about Replay not doing so good lately. I have no idea what happened but it might just as well be that I’m bad at marketing. I’ve been doing this comic for… what, 4 years now? It’s almost 250 pages now! I’ll try posting it on Tapastic and Webtoons, maybe that’ll help a little… Your diligent artist is getting depressed about wasting so much time on a project that’s not going anywhere. But that only means I should suck it up and work on the marketing a bit, even if I hate it. If you work in marketing nad have a piece of advice please speak up haha! If you guys could vote or spread the word about Replay on Reddit or forums you frequent, retweet on Twitter or repost on Facebook, that’d be really great. Thanks a bunch <3 

Anyway, depressing thoughts aside, there’s one more page left and then we’ll have a couple of illustrations as an interlude. I’m recording the drawing process for them and, hopefully, that’ll be a little entertaining. And to make you more inclined to vote I’ll be posting sketches (maybe partial, if they’re too revealing lol) for the next page as a vote incentive! So please vote! Thanks!

And obviously the bullets vs swords discussion happens. For one, protecting yourself or hitting something with a sword is easier than doing so with a gun. Accidental friendly fire (or even not accidental, we’ve got limited resources here, it’s easy to turn on fellow men) is also much more likely to happen. Warding every single bullet is a ton of wasted time, a weapon that could be reused is a better choice.

But honestly, I disagree with Ada and Rob’s decision. Personally, I’m all for enchanted pitchforks.

ALSO! SPANISH REPLAY!!! https://www.faneo.es/comics/replay/pages/1

46 comments on “No room for objection”

  1. Leif Odin Eriksen Reply

    This quote fits the previous page better but “There’s a fine line between genius and insanity. I have erased this line.” -Oscar Levant. I didn’t know about the second part of this quote until I looked it up, not that I personally mind as I still find it fitting.

      • NotImportant Reply

        Haha can’t please everyone, that’s certain… 😀 I wonder if people would come back if Ada suddenly realized her true feelings and jumped Robert lol

  2. Crestlinger Reply

    Everyone has a realistic Chance, as long as they are Quiet about infiltration and have a massive distraction a town away that can draw every hungry creepy-crawler to It.

    Marketing ideas: check out hiveworks too. Voting wise Current at 93 with 1059 votes, but double that to 2118 and you’re 31st. Seeing the gaps present in the voting for that site maybe check out the top runners and see if there is anything being done on those that could be adopted here.

    • NotImportant Reply

      I was wondering about joining hiveworks… Maybe I should just apply there. I was hesitating because as far as I know you NEED TO be hosted by them. That means I’d lose the custom badges in comments, the awesome cast page, the spellbook… :C

      • EnterTheNameHere Camp dweller Reply

        Marketing is the most important. Unfortunately. For you it means not only you create the comic itself, but you need to tell everyone about it, on every place imaginable, not once but again and again – for example from different area: YouTube, if you say “like the video if you like it”, even if you feel it’s slimey, something sleazy and beneath your dignity, it means a difference of thousands of likes for video 150k+ views. Say “like the video” and you get 12k likes. Don’t say it and get 6k. For YouTube algorithm that can mean trending vs. nobody knows about it.

        I don’t know how much traffic TopWebComics or other lists brings you – that would be too much research for me – but from personal experience:
        – when I search for something to read, I go to site where I read comics – keenspot, smackjeeves, tumblr (not anymore), webtoons, but even other sites which rips manga because it’s not easily available, e-hentai, sites where people come for common themed content.
        – if you are not in search results on sites where I read comics, I won’t find you. I never looked up TopWebComics and similar lists, so if sites I read comics on don’t use it’s data…
        – for me, what I see – that one picture in search result which is usually banner for the comics – makes a difference between whether I choose to click on it or skip to next. Your art itself is awesome, so show it. If there is a text, the more interesting it is, the more likely is I choose to click it. Harry Harrison, my favourite sci-fi author, wrote that you have 3 lines on the first page of your submission to a publisher to interest the editor enough to turn to the second page or go to a next submission from another author.
        – the more places it’s possible to find you, the better. The more work, I know. But don’t prefer one site over other. Eg. I don’t use Facebook; I don’t watch comics on Twitter. I might find your main site and go read there. Someone else might prefer reading on Facebook, not finding your main page but rather read on their own favourite site, discuss with you there, while third person likes different site, fourth person might only use mobile readers …

        I don’t remember how I found you, but I know it was still the old pages which you have redone now. I’m on your main site, so that means it wasn’t some list or site with comics but rather I found you because someone somewhere wrote “read this comics”, probably when I searched “apocalypse”. Your art (so detailed!) and weekly update got me to support you on Patreon. Only just a week ago I found the side story about Ada returning umbrella there, even being your patron for a while… The print of Ada holding umbrella have much greater meaning now… I didn’t find what happened initially, I assume it is somewhere out there, if not as comic then as a text, but I didn’t find it yet. Patreon stopped loading posts so far in history for me.

        Maybe try asking other people how they found you, it might give you hints…

        • JW Reply

          I’m pretty sure I found the comic via topwebcomics, One look at a banner with a cute foxgirl and I was sold. What can i say, I’m easy.

      • NotImportant Reply

        TWC is my main source of traffic (other than people just jumping in directly) but I guess it’s time to consider other sources. The problem with webcomic aggregation sites is that most often you can only join one. And they’re not going to tell you how much traffic you’ll get. But it should all be better than nothing… Maybe I could send out some emails and see if anyone would like Replay to join their site.

        And yeah, I need to practice my begging but I think I got pretty good about the votes at least! XD

        Thank you, this is very useful!

      • Dragon Master Reply

        I found this Webcomic via advertisement on a different webcomic I read. It’s called Not a Villian, or NAV for short. It’s a webcomic about a semi-reformed hacker trying to redeem herself in a post-apocalyptic world she may or may not have created. The ad itself was the same strip as the one you use for the patreon link. It’s Ada face covered in blood while she’s in a trance during the demon raid on camp. The tagline was something like: “Magic, demons, catgirls and all the awesome” or something to that effect. It was mainly the art that got my attention but the tagline made me curious enough to try the link.

        • NotImportant Reply

          Thanks for the info! I know NAV, read it until the end and will probably go back to it when I accumulate some more updates haha.

  3. JW Reply

    But honestly, I disagree with Ada and Rob’s decision. Personally, I’m all for enchanted pitchforks.

    No, no. That’s for the Frankenstein monster apocalypse.

  4. T3hOgre Reply

    I hate commenting prefer lurking, always feel that what I say will be misinterpreted and will leave people feeling worse than before I left the comment. But you encourage us to do so, to gauge our interest, so I will (feel free to knock me upside the head or ban me – I can go back to lurking again 😉 This had no impact on me mind you, but the hiatus may have let some cats wander off (before I get clobbered by my fellow readers – I am not suggesting you not take hiatuses just pointing out a problematic issue that may have caused readership to decline [cats to wander off and so forth]) – I did not wander off – instead I hit F5 refresh every 5 minutes or so until the page changed.

    Also, I was a subscriber to Patreon for you and Tiny Paints (avasdemon) but could not afford to continue (lots of people I read in comments sections everywhere are in my same condition). So, nothing personal – just lost my money. I now only have votes to give. Just did so again before posting here and try to at least once or twice a week – and thank you for changing the vote incentive. I love nippley foxgirls as much as the next guy or gal – but was starting to look through my fingers to vote 🙂 The sketches idea you had there is a good one. Tom at Twokinds does a similar thing. He colorizes them with votes from the Patreon base – not saying you should do that since your time is limited – but of the artists I read regularly – you and he have awesome sketchy stuff – even when it is non-canon. Thank you also for making sword girl Sofia free on the gallery pages – I love that image.

    Biggest thing for me is – now that this chapter is over in a page – are we done with weepy Rob and Ada for a smidgen of time? (Covers head) I understand … plot and all – but can’t relate. And yes, we need high drama and the romantic tension – but my favorite relationship parts were where Ada hits Rob with sticks, Rob bounces dry bread off Ada, and the rest of the cast roles their eyes at it all. Can we blow up some demons for a few more pages? ‘Sploding is good for attention grabbing. Or maybe some ‘sploding in the romancey stuffs. Cats like ‘slpoding. I was on the edge of my seat for a couple of weeks to see if the Chicken was gonna get it. I kid, no need to make it a Marvel universe comic, but I could sure go for a couple of pages of spicy Sof, confused Rob, and headstrong leaping before looking Ada with a rope tied about her waist pulling the others along and Laura trying to run off the cliff with her only to have big brother snag her by the shirt. Weepy well has runneth dry.

    Please have a good week, and do your best (as they say over there). And again, sorry about dropping off Patreon. I am a large Ogre-ey type fellow who is willing to knock on doors and tell people to read your comic if it comes to that… 🙂 I think this is the most I have said in a comment section since that millennial dude wrote about putting avocado on toast.

    • Refugnic Reply

      If it’s any comfort to you: I did not feel offended or ‘put off’ by your commentary in the slightest.

      Furthermore, being a (hobby) writer myself, I know how important feedback is for artists of all kinds.
      Not only does it bolster the artists confidence (talking to an empty hall does have a bit of a detrimental effect on motivation), it also alerts them of ‘What people are thinking’.

      They can then use this information to tweak the story line to fill a plot hole they may have overlooked (yes, that happens), answer a question they didn’t think of or just to troll their audience a little (which can also be fun).

      None of this can happen if you stay quiet.
      And no artist worth the name will think less of you for whatever you have to say, as long as you obey the rules of common courtesy.

      I cannot speak for the so-called ‘fanboys’, but if they choose to get insulting and stuff, it’s them who will get the boot.
      Not you.

      At the very least, that is my opinion.

      • NotImportant Reply

        Agreed! I probably won’t change Replay because of the comments so nobody here should feel scared of voicing their opinion and accidentally modifying the story. But feedback helps me improve my next stories so bring it on! And if what I do here in this comic is boring just let me know and spare me all those hours of drawing… 😀 I can start a different story if you guys don’t like this one and keep Ada and Rob to myself~

        • Speedy Reply

          Hush yourself! Keep Rob and Ada to your lonesome? Them’s fightin’ words! >;)
          I suppose you’d like to take away my Calvin and Hobbes collection, while you’re at it. :O

          But, seriously. I just found Replay recently, but I would really miss Rob and Ada, if you took them away.

          Have you done many guest pages for other webcomics? That’s how I found a lot of the comics I read. Just be sure to use your art style – don’t try to copy theirs. Your backgrounds alone would be enough to get me to check out this comic.

          Do you read Wilde Life? Pascalle Lepas does beautiful art, also. Y’all could trade guest pages. I’d love to see Oscar, Sylvia, and (of course) Cliff with ears and a tail. (Or, maybe you already did, and that’s how I got here? I can’t remember)

          If you trade guest pages with other comics and they’re canon updates, instead of just pictures for a fan art page, then those pages will be read by every person who reads their archive. That’d be free advertising that would keep getting views for as long as people read their archives.

    • NotImportant Reply

      No offence taken and this is a very useful insight so thank you! Please don’t lurk! 😀

      Yeah, I know the hiatus was bad. I didn’t even rest (cause I was redrawing the earlier pages) but if somebody told me what the end result would be I’d probably decide against doing it. Oh well, can’t change the past, now I just need to figure out how to make it better again.
      I hope your financial situation improves (for your sake lol)! It’s good to hear that it’s not because you got bored of the comic 🙂 Votes are definitely good! Thank you for those and of course for your support thus far.
      I really like the idea of adding sketches and votes but there’s just no time… Maybe when I’m done with the Historia project. Juggling a full-time job, webcomic and visual novel project (on which I’m the only artist atm) is really hard…!

      Hahahaha thanks for the feedback about the romance stuff xD You’d be happy with the original story that had no romantic plots whatsoever! Also had no Sofia, no Stefen and no Nina so that’s a con… Anyway, don’t worry, it’s not going to be so sappy until the end of their days. I agree that they’re best as friends. Plus, as it was already said in the comic itself – we’re going to the city and city is full of demons so… magic, blood, slicing stuff, it’s all on the way~

      Thanks again for speaking up, it’s lovely to hear from you. I’ll be counting on those doors you mentions and I’m looking forward to reading more of your comments! 🙂 <3

      • JW Reply

        I really like the idea of adding sketches and votes but there’s just no time… Maybe when I’m done with the Historia project.

        As far as vote-incentives goes, just showing some in-progress sketches goes a long way. And they could be from Historia as well (if they don’t mind). As long as it’s something you’ve drawn most of us will be happy to see it.

  5. Refugnic Reply

    As for me, you’ve already done something about ‘your low vote count’: You changed the voting incentive.
    That means, that I can now, without worrying too much, vote again from my work place, which allows me to vote twice a day again (if I remember to do it, that is).

    I know that ‘one extra vote’ (more or less a day) doesn’t sound like much, but even though one little drop may not be much…given enough time (and maybe others who help), they can easily become an ocean. 🙂

    So yeah, while I cannot do all that much to help, you can at least count on me to have your back on this one, for whatever that’s worth.

    Regarding the page…yeah well, ‘such determination’…let’s see, certain doom because a lack of means to defend yourself (even enchanted blades could dull or even break)…or taking a ‘calculated risk’ in acquiring more ‘raw material’.
    Of course it would be safest to just create new swords, but I doubt they have any high quality swordsmith (or even just the materials to make new swords) in their camp, so ‘scavenging’ is really their best bet.

    People tend to become quite determined when it’s their very future/life on the line.
    Besides, with only two swords being available…well, it’s already been stated in the bullet argument: When there’s only a very limited supply of ‘the one thing that can protect you’, people tend to become quite…let’s say ‘determined’ to procure it for themselves.

    • T3hOgre Reply

      Agreed on vote incentive. 🙂 I never thought to vote from other devices with other IPs, though. Durn. Cancels plans to knock on doors. Ada gets a broadsword at some point – I’ve seen pictures – so they are just laying around somewhere. But sacrificial Chickens (now that they are guarded by Ada) will become harder to come by.

      • Refugnic Reply

        ‘What God, who has created all life, would demand man to take the life of another?’

        Agreed, this mostly talks about ‘killing other people’, but ‘animal sacrifices to please the Lord’ haven’t really been that big of a thing since Moses climbed that mountain.

        I’m not saying that it doesn’t still happen.
        But I cannot imagine, that a God, who also gave that chicken its life, would be all that pleased if you took it from the chicken and then leave it to rot ‘to incur his favor’.

        As long as you at least eat it after killing it, its death will at least have some sort of meaning.

        So yeah, I’m with Ada on this one: No pointlessly sacrificing that chicken! 😛

      • T3hOgre Reply

        #SplodeyChickens it’s marketing genius I tell you. Don’t have to have actual chickens splode. I’d totally click on #SplodeyChickens.

      • NotImportant Reply

        Thanks for the marketing advice! xD

        Very grateful for all the votes, it really does make a difference. Thank you so much guys 🙂

  6. Nohealforu Reply

    I vote every day. It’s a shame this comic isn’t getting more views, it’s really good. It was an ad that took me to your site both times. First time must have been closer to the beginning since the art didn’t hook me yet and there weren’t many pages yet either. The second time years later hooked me and I’ve been here since.

    As for what you can do to improve your marketing, I’m not sure myself. I think your artwork itself is good enough to stand on its own, so maybe posting some of your best art on sites like deviantart would help you draw in more people? Doing fanarts for larger works and getting retweeted would probably help out some. Maybe reach out to some other artists with similar styles that have grown their viewership and ask if they know where their new readers come from and what is effective?

    • NotImportant Reply

      Thank you for the votes and for the advice! Really good to hear how people discovered Replay and what pulled them in. Thanks!

      • Refugnic Reply

        If I remember correctly, I also came here from TWC, via the ‘voting challenge system’.
        You know, when you want to vote for a webcomic, you get presented with a character from another webcomic and need to pick out their name from three choices.

        I was all caught up with the ones I was reading at that time and figured I could check out a new one.
        And it was Replay, which happened to catch my eye.
        Been here ever since. And never regretted it.

  7. EnterTheNameHere Camp dweller Reply

    “For one, protecting yourself or hitting something with a sword is easier than doing so with a gun.”
    I’m sorry but I have to disagree. Are we talking about swords, you know, the warfare instrument for close 1v1 combat? That’s not knife. I don’t know if you have martial arts experience, then it might look easy, but wielding a real sword and even using it in defensive manner is everything but easy. If someone untrained was attacked, they would end up devoured, the sword would have no influence unless they would at the right moment pointed it the right way and demon would somehow impale itself on it and die immediately… UNLESS, the enchanted sword magically makes the demon a butter so you can easily slice through it.

    We saw Ada and Rob train with swords, so I’m sure for them swords are the prefered option for attack and defense. For someone untrained with swords, but trained with guns, gun might be useful for defense – at least against other people if not against demons. Learning to use gun is easier than to learn to use sword. Of course you don’t want someone untrained or reckless (majority of people) to have a gun either way…

    So the question is – are guns useful against demons? If not, then there is nothing to argue about. However if guns can be useful against demons, then I would argue it’s better to give guns to people who are not reckless and treat them with respect, for defense. They will be better with gun than with sword.

    • ERA Reply

      If they want to arm the group with hand weapons, I’d go with spears over swords OR guns. Spears don’t require huge amounts of training to use, nor the intensive amounts of time to ward all the individual bullets. Plus, a line of people with 6-foot or 8-foot spears would create a pretty formidable wall to keep any attacking demons at a distance.

      • JW Reply

        Crossbows might be good as well. The advantage over guns is that you can easily reuse the ammo. (And they’re more silent.)

  8. ERA Reply

    I posted this as a reply to someone else, but if it comes to arming the whole group spears would be more realistic than to give everyone swords. Spears require less training, keep an opponent at a greater distance, and allow people to more easily fight shoulder-to-shoulder in order to act as a living defensive wall. They also use way less metal/stone, and I shouldn’t be surprised if you find more spears at any given museum than you would swords. Plus if the spear is gonna break, it’ll break along the haft, so the tip remains usable and can just be re-attached to another haft which is far easier to source and craft than anything metal. Way less enchantment intensive than bullets, but also less skill intensive than swords.

    • NotImportant Reply

      Yes! Spears are great indeed! We’ll have some, no worries (it’s just easier for Ada and Rob in particular to focus on swords). We’ll also have a very nice illustration featyring spears in… two weeks? I think in two weeks. It’s already up on Patreon.

    • EnterTheNameHere Camp dweller Reply

      “and I shouldn’t be surprised if you find more spears at any given museum than you would swords”
      [thumbsup]

  9. replacement sparrow Reply

    There’s something to be said for being in the 90s on TopWebComics. I’m pretty sure I found Replay because it was at the /bottom/ of the front page listings, not lost in the middle.

    Can’t Patreon ’till my money situation improves, but I’ve been voting from every IP I visit (work, coffee shops, etc) as many times as I remember. XD I think the competition on TWC became way more fierce after ProjectWonderful closed.

    • NotImportant Reply

      Haha that’s some consolation! Thank you for all the votes, I really appreciate. And yes, I also felt like after the project wonderful has closed there was not much left to fill in the void and everyone doubled down on twc…

  10. Alex Reply

    I’m sorry to hear that Replay’s ranking and income keep declining. I remember the good old days a few years back when you and Aneeka (Not A Villain) dominated TWC, including all those sex-sells comics. Sadly these times have come to an end. Do you know whether the total amount of votes for the top ranking comics has changed significantly in the last couple of years?

    Unfortunately I don’t have any tips for marketing and stuff. There are SOOOO many artists (comics, fanfics, animators, streamers, musicians, Game devs etc.), even if I had a Basic Income Grant of 1000$ per month and used that to give 5$ to 200 artists I still wouldn’t be able to support everyone I want to support. But I *am* in support of the B.I.G., so that artists can just do whatever they want at their own pace. #YangGang
    The art market is just hell right now. Some years ago I thought that at least Project Wonderful had to be doing great, because their idea of ad-bidding was genius. Kinda reminded me of the webrings we had in the 90s. But no, everyone gravitated towards Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and whatever. That’s what capitalism does: Attention generates money generates attention.

    • NotImportant Reply

      Yeah, it sucks but porn still sells best. Luckily for you guys I don’t need to chase the art money and as long as there are people reading then I’m happy. No idea if the total number of votes changed, hm, that’s an interesting question. I only ever looked at the rank.

      I hate social media… But hey, there are now jobs growing around Facebook’s and Instagram’s ranking algorithms and people who managed to figure out what to do to be popular are now earning lots of money. Good for them, I guess! Same thing happened with Google and SEO became super trendy. Now it’s part of life and every web service. Maybe I’ll be bored enough to master social media one day too lol

      I feel really bad for all those artists who are trying to make a living out of art. I gave up, it’s too big of a struggle, I don’t think I’d want to live of Replay at this point… It’s just that easier to justify the time and money spent on this project when some of it is flowing back and when I see people enjoying it in the comments, voting, asking stuff, then it’s fun 🙂

      • Alex Reply

        That’s great to hear. When you took the “hiatus” to redraw the first pages I thought it was because of competition. Or did you simply not like your earlier works anymore? I understand the feeling of wanting to improve on old stuff when replaying video games. 😉
        Though it kinda reminded me of when Aneeka even hired a colorist for book 4, i.e. the art improved a lot, too, but came at the price of much slower story progress as well. That made me wonder whether people like me, who still prioritize a good story over high-quality pictures, are in such a small minority that we can get overlooked, even in a case like NAV, where the comic’s initial success was definitely owed to the story rather than the art.
        I believe that one gets the audience one caters to and that switching targets can be bumpy (as you probably realized when you switched from doing only tumblr art to starting this comic), but I don’t know how big the various target audiences actually are nowadays. If it were me you could go ahead and reveal the future plot with just inks and only the relevant parts of the background and update three times a week or more. 😀 I’m an avid Manga reader, I don’t need color all the time.
        Aaaaaaand I just realized I answered the question I’ve had for years myself: Since Mangas are still popular, I can’t be in a small minority.

        But all in all you gotta do what you like best, because free artists are the best artists. Your backgrounds are so amazing, they look like pictures from a museum, especially when there’s grass and trees and sunlight. Just don’t burn yourself out. 🙂

        • NotImportant Reply

          Thank you so much! <3 Yes, I redrew the first pages because they were so bad that I was afraid that people would give up reading just because of the art haha, also, it was kind of fun to revisit them and see how much I've improved over the years.
          I would probably get bored if I only did sketches for pages. If the project doesn't improve my skill then I don't see the reason to continue. That's why I try hard with the backgrounds, experiment with the coloring, try to make the panels more interesting and so on. But if I only could, I'd love to move faster with this. Without work I could easily make more updates in a week but ehhh gotta eat and pay my bills 😀 Living in Tokyo isn't cheap haha!

    • NotImportant Reply

      The problem is… What would I offer on it hmmm! I’m bad at those things because I want everyone to have access to everything I draw. I don’t like “only for patrons” things… sighhh But yeah, it’s a good suggestion, I need to come up with something.

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