The Marshmallow Ranch Gazette (Patreon)

Volume 3, Issue 8 - Tuesday, May 15th, 2018

Howdy, patrons!

It looks like I'll have some significant time off between jobs -- my last day at the day job was last Thursday, but I won't start at the new position until June 11th! This gives me so much more time for activities, and I'll be making hay while the sun shines!

Over the next two weeks, I'll be posting four "first episodes" for various serials: 

• Dungeon Monsters: Four friends have landed their first dungeon, hoping to raid it and rid the ruins of evil while gaining all kinds of sweet loot! The treasures they find there, however, might have their own agenda and the adventurers may find themselves in over their heads -- and the lands they mean to protect underfoot.
• Big Sky: In the small town of Big Sky, college football is literally the only thing to get excited about. When the university's star athletes begin demanding more power for themselves -- figuratively AND literally -- Jay Sherman (the university's English professor and life-long town resident) decides enough is enough and someone must stand up for the little guy. But in order to do that, he'll need to become the biggest bear on campus.
• Aftershocks: It's been two years since a wave of biological terror attacks changed the world forever, killing tens and thousands and turning the few survivors into giants. Now that several cities have been rebuilt for "integrated populations", the victims of Agent Kaiju must find their place in a world that has become a lot smaller than they remember. 
• Crushing The Competition: Ever since cold fusion had been cracked and the world of quantum manipulation unlocked, the power for corporate bigwigs to become literally too big to fail has remained in the hands of a select few. One lowly salaryman is drawn into the life-and-death world of corporate espionage, where he must remain constantly on guard. After all, anyone's next step could be his last…

The plan is to release these episodes on Wednesday and Thursday over the next two weeks, and have you lovely folks vote on which one you like best! Once the numbers are tallied, I'll continue with the most popular serial for a month or two. I'm hoping to get at least ten votes for these serials by the time I come back to the US from Confuzzled and subsequent European vacation; in the event of a tie or not quite enough votes to indicate a preference among the patrons, I'll release the episodes on SoFurry and open the vote to the general public.

What I'd love to do is ultimately have two serials up: one a relatively light/fun story that gets updated every week, with a more polished one (like Boundaries) updated at least once a month for patrons donating at the upper levels. However, I think the first Boundaries story will be made available to all patrons when it's done, just because you folks have been so incredibly patient and supportive. 

I'm sure I've said this already, but I'll be at Confuzzled 2018 in just a week and a half! I'm incredibly excited to hang out with the British and EU furs AND help celebrate the guest of honorship for my husband, Ryan Campbell! I've already signed up to play in one or more tabletop RPGs through the convention, and I'll also be on a panel or two (like Zen Meditation), so feel free to say hi and everything! :D

That's it for this week -- I want to make sure that I'm as far ahead as possible on various projects, and there's no rest for the wicked. 

Until next time, partners!

-Jakebe