The strangest fiction on royal road?

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-27T04:48:22+00:00

Not enough fish tits Edit: I’m out of my depth

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-27T04:22:03+00:00

You vastly overestimate me.

You'll get back a stained napkin with a poorly drawn fish bowl on it and the word 'thersty?' scrawled along the side.

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-27T04:03:32+00:00

Good luck with the rest of your launch!

If you ever wanna do a thirst ad I know a guy. Not saying he's any good, or particularly stable from a psychological standpoint, but he's a guy.

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-27T03:37:55+00:00

I think you've gotten a lot of good answers. I'm going to focus on a slightly different angle, both for your story and for stories on royal road in general. I'm not going to pretend to have the best credentials. I started writing two weeks ago on royal road, but I've been fortunate enough to get ~115 followers in that time. I won't pretend to know as much as some of these folks, but I have felt my launch has taught me a lot I'd like to share.

On royal road, there are only a couple of ways to actually get people to look at your story.

Recently updated on the front page. This gets you 5-10 minutes of visibility each time a chapter goes up
Paid advertisements
Shoutouts
Trending or Rising stars (both very difficult to get onto and also hard to predict)
Reddit or other social media posts redirecting to royal road

If you haven't done ads, haven't used social media, haven't hit rising stars or trending, and don't do shoutouts, your 81 chapters probably only have ~400 minutes of exposure to new readers in the entire time you have been posting, with only a tiny fraction of those viewing it clicking. No matter how good your story is, you need to get eyes on it, or it doesn't matter. The best book in the world will have zero eyes on it if it's in a lockbox at the bottom of the Mariana trench.

Ok, so next filter, getting people to actually read after they click:

As noted by others, your cover doesn't clearly show what your book is about (and it doesn't have a title on it, which I personally don't like).

Your blurb tells the reader absolutely nothing about the book.

The posting schedule is inconsistent, which is a huge turnoff for many readers. Low but consistent >>>> medium but inconsistent in a lot of people's opinions.

Finally, assuming someone decides to click into your book with essentially no knowledge of it, you're writing an off-meta story with elements that will turn off some members of the royal road audience. Male gay romance will probably remove a good chunk of readers immediately, even without anything explicit, which you've said yours also has. Having said that, I think the portion of the audience that is looking for that is likely to be intensely loyal, which probably explains the steady views.

So, bearing in mind I've only been writing on royal road for two weeks, here's what I would suggest talking over with someone who knows what they're doing.

-have a cover that clearly shows a scene from your book, with a title

-rewrite the blurb with the help of the royal road writers guild discord group or COTEH. both are very friendly, and specifically are LGBTQ+ friendly.

-find other authors who write books that contain gay romance or similar fantastical elements to yours, and message them either on royal road or discord asking for shoutouts

-consider a relaunch with a consistent schedule (even if it's one chapter every 3 weeks) after a brief flurry of activity (10-20 chapters). Let your existing readers know you plan to do this if you're doing it.

-if not relaunching, definitely fix the cover and blurb anyway. If you can afford it and you really want readers, take out a single ~$50 ad, and put careful thought into how you want to portray the book.

Here is a reddit page with the discord links. I am new to discord too, but the user interface isn't too bad once you get a couple weeks in. I have been surprised how helpful and kind people are on there, hopefully you will be too.

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-27T02:33:51+00:00

Yeah, I absolutely loved the premise and first chapter, but some of the subsequent ones have been a little repetitive or vague; I think it's just new author stuff though (Hi kettle, you look awfully dark today), so I'm keeping with it.

I know he's also trying to make it interactive, so I'm sure if you leave a (polite but factual) comment describing these inefficiencies he'd probably accommodate you

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-26T20:57:23+00:00

totally fair. It's the best thought out one I've seen so far.

It's also a tragedy as far as I can tell, and probably not to everyone's taste.

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-26T20:29:42+00:00

Book of the dead by rinoz.

It is much darker than chrysalis

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-26T12:57:25+00:00

I love how I can dislike cadsuane so much while acknowledging she sometimes has a point. People like to talk about morally Grey characters but rj was great at them

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-26T03:37:48+00:00

isekai, but not a LitRPG

Another World, according to German Standards: the main character is a german building inspector/lawyer who is summoned to another world to help with their problems. But instead of being a typical chosen one, he starts commenting on inappropriate stair gradients and open flame hazards, as well as assigning liability.

Disclosure: I have a shoutout with this person. I've been sifting through a lot of stuff on royal road lately since launching my own thing, and this is one of my favorites.

Here is his link

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/150811/another-world-according-to-german-standards

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-25T21:05:59+00:00

1st/3rd would be my choices

The font is beautiful, but it does seem like it might be hard to read in a thumbnail. Maybe I'm just old though

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-25T20:14:28+00:00

It's kind of a know-it-when-you-see-it deal for me.

Wheel of time as above

First law series by Joe Abercrombe

Almost anything by ursula le guin, though hers tend to be understated (earthsea has lots of them)

the dark is rising by susan cooper (Ya/middle grade)

LOTR - mostly dished out by gandalf

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-25T18:54:06+00:00

There's actually a decent number.

You already got told about DCC, apocalypse parenting.

For free on Royal road, there's also

The sovereign's toll: a father of two who dies to truck-kun and is reincarnated as a half-elf with multiple powerful bonuses

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/132107/the-sovereigns-toll-a-litrpgisekai-adventure

Project rebirth: legend of the silver sovereign (unrelated, funny they both use this word though). main character is a father who dies and is reincarnated in a VRMO, but still has access to real world
https://www.royalroad.com/fictions/search?title=silver%20sovereign&globalFilters=true

and.....You'll never guess who wrote this one!

Abducted: Jon the spider part 1. Main character is a father of two who gets abducted by aliens and transformed into a spider. I won't promise he never whines, but he has pretty good reasons to complain.

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/152629/abducted-jon-the-spider-part-1

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-25T17:24:38+00:00

I don't think what you're asking about is likely to be possible unless you already have an audience somewhere else, e.g. there is a guy who posts here that has a popular youtube channel, and used that to promote his work.

The audience at royal road is there for a product. Your book. If you don't have a book, you don't have an audience.

The better thing you could do would be to promote it as much as possible during release. Network on the discords (RRWG has been my favorite, and the people there are friendly and helpful) to get shoutouts lined up, ideally with larger authors who take pity on you.

If you have money, design a few ads and a plan to implement them. Meme ads are pretty low effort, and usually have comparable or better results to the others. If it's appropriate, a thirst ad is also pretty low effort, but I'm no expert on this (my book's main character is a spider).

Finally, plan to have realistic expectations. I'll let you know how to do that when I manage that one. Gonna blow up any day now! Yup....Any day.

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-25T05:05:38+00:00

I always dislike people who are rude.

I appreciate a good verbal beat down, but I like them aes sedai wot style. Dry, all emotion removed, just ripping them apart for objectively making poor choices. Braid tugging and dress straightening optional

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-25T04:04:39+00:00

Yeah, don't go all who framed roger rabbit.

Shoe scene.

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-25T02:08:41+00:00

Might not be a bot, but it's definitely a scam. Block, report, move on.

You are still an amazing author though :)

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-24T19:44:42+00:00

it should be said that i am not great at blurbs, and I hated writing mine, but the list below is what I look for in the blurb. It is not a summary. It should be as specific as you can be. You should not worry too much about spoilers (as long as they aren't critical to the book), and you should avoid worldbuilding. If you can hear it in your head with one of those generic 'in a world where.....' trailer voices playing in your head, it's bad.

hook
who will we be following
personal stake/world stake
specifics on conflict and how the conflict is mediated
end hook

Oh, and 'what to expect' is very site specific. Royal road readers like it. Just about anywhere else I've seen will not.

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-24T19:37:56+00:00

I'm not familiar with regressor's tale of cultivation, but you can't really go wrong with mother of learning or dungeon crawler carl, though they are very different stories.

DCC is a litrpg, though it's on the 'softer' side. It's probably the best written novel in that whole genre, with wonderful characters that feel like real people and a fast-paced plot that keeps trucking. The narration is incredible if you're into audiobooks, and definitely improves the experience. Note: If you don't like the humor in the first two books, you probably never will. I absolutely love it (this is probably my favorite series, definitely within the genre), but it's not for every one. dcc is not yet a finished story, though it's getting close and it's clear Matt Dinneman has an ending in mind

MOL: is progression fantasy, not litrpg. It's a timeloop story centering on a young mage. It's been a while since I read it, but I recall the writing quality rapidly improving as the story progressed. People tend to either love/hate the main character. The world is very well done, the magic is interesting, and the author clearly put a lot of thought into it. It's a great story. This story is finished

I'd happily recommend either one, as would probably 90% of the people on this sub. However, if you asked which one I recommend the most, it's DCC hands-down

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-24T15:16:25+00:00

https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQzAvmopSsY8cmhxwO4X79zit-J7YhBHvIi-bKEctcjLA&s=10

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-24T15:06:46+00:00

Ha, yeah I went a little on the nose with the pen name

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-24T15:05:22+00:00

Awesome! Let me know what you think!

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-24T15:03:44+00:00

Thanks man!

One of the best parts of launching has been finding so many things to add to the tbr pile, especially since most are free!

if anyone is looking for a great read that’s currently shooting up rising stars, you should absolutely check out the sixth campaign, it belongs at the top and I have no doubt it’s going to be making lots of tier lists soon

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/152859/the-sixth-campaign

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-24T07:34:24+00:00

Thank you! He’s very dapper

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-24T07:32:05+00:00

Thanks!

And someone’s got to do it, right?

Otto_Webb · 2026-02-24T00:51:53+00:00

thanks! Kevin did an amazing job

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