Final Update and Year In Review 2023

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

First off, I wanted to wish everyone a fabulous Christmas and a great New Year. No matter what you're doing to celebrate, I hope that you can find the time to relax during this period!

December/January Maps

The last release of the year was supposed to contain another two mansion maps, but this will be replaced with a large castle map, with the rest of the mansion maps to release in January. 

You might have suspected the reason behind this already. As much as I really enjoyed putting together the Roman Villa, it took a lot out of me as it was pretty intense, so I am going to enjoy my Christmas break spending time with family and not stressing too much about the next release. :)

Kickstarter Update

Earlier on today, I made an update post to backers - unfortunately the Kickstarter release is still on hold as we finish getting content completed. All of the maps and D100 tables are done, but NPC descriptions are still a WIP. However, I am hoping it to be completed in January, ready for release on Patreon (at least in part) early ish next year.

A Year In Review

I wanted to summarise this in a series of bullet points just to separate out the text a little:

• This year has gone pretty well. I began to have more confidence in my mapmaking abilities in Jan/Feb 2023, rebranded my entire Patreon over May/June, and started making oneshots in September. It's been a pretty good year for Snowy's Maps!
  
• Reflecting back upon this year, there have been some highs, such as publishing my oneshots. I definitely want to do this a lot more regularly, maybe with a 5e based Kickstarter next year.
  
• Some things really didn't work out - like the Dungeon23 project, and I burned out really quickly. However, I really like the idea of a mega project, so want to tackle this again next year - in a more manageable medium. This is looking to be a mage academy!
  
• I also suffered extreme burnout in October 2023, from a mix of taking on a new full-time position (a BioEngineering PhD), running Patreon, establishing collabs, commissions, and the second Kickstarter. Starting in 2024, I will be completing old projects first before I dare start anything new. This includes the Kickstarter, the mansions, and a couple of commissions I would like to wrap up. So expect these mansions first before I start putting out polls!

Fun Stats!

And finally, some little fun stats because why not! :)

• I started the year with a single paid Patron, a special thank you to Jan, and it looks like I will be ending the year with 28 of you. Thank you all so much for the support! <3
• We also started the year with 14 free members (followers) and now have 182!
• My most liked post of 2023 was the Twisted Shadows of Iliki oneshot, with 9 hearts!
• To date (23/12/23), my first oneshot has had 281 downloads and my second one has had 183 on the Pathfinder Infinite store.
• On average, I spend around 2 hours on a 25x25 map, and 4 hours on a 40x40. Assuming 3 maps per release, I spend about 8 hours on each release.

Thank you all so much for a fantastic year. I will be back with that final release on the 30th, but else, see you in the new year!

~Snowy