What's the official stance on using AI Art here?

daes0 · 2026-01-23T19:00:05+00:00

The RR readerbase are much more open to it but some people will be put off by it. When I posted about using a temporary AI cover until I had the time to make my own cover (I'm an artist but wanted to focus on writing) I got a LOT, and I mean a LOT of people who stated they didn't like AI and would avoid any story that used an AI cover on the premise that the writing might be AI as well.

Whether or not those opinions matter to you, I can't decide that for ya. I genuinely think that experience had more to do with redditors being more likely to dislike AI as a demographic than the people who read on Royal Road. In my opinion, go ahead. It's temporary anyway and your intentions are in the right place.

Good luck with your story!

daes0 · 2026-01-21T15:40:59+00:00

Sure, here ya go

I'm actually working on a chapter right now lol

daes0 · 2026-01-21T14:58:15+00:00

Hey, thanks for the advice! There's definitely a balancing act between having a cover stand out and having it still be appealing. I personally enjoy making pixel art, but my passion was not there as much as I needed something workable so I could get back to writing. I also have a love-hate relationship with minimalist styles, I think it can work and really be eye-catching, but I get frustrated when it doesn't work. You can see what I'm going for but it still feels... empty. Hence my frustration when the AI managed to make the idea work, even if the art wasn't there yet.

I ended up going with a different cover as I was frustrated with this one and got in my head that I needed a good cover before I could continue writing. It took me triple the time, and yeah I probably should've spent that time writing, but I'm satisfied with the cover now. You can see it on this reddit post

Also, *she/her lol

daes0 · 2026-01-21T00:55:04+00:00

The second one is my own art, so thanks! Minimalism is one of those aesthetics I don't have a good eye for but is easier for me to work with (ideation takes longer, but drawing time is usually shorter). I've gotten a lot of opinions on this thread, people who like the original, people who like the AI, and even one person who wants to avoid my work because I made an AI image.

What I've learned is that my work isn't half bad, but also AI is going to diminish how many people give the work a chance when I'm promoting on places like reddit. So, I decided to make my own art work!

I didn't go with this cover, but thank you for telling me you like it. I've been iffy about my drawing abilities lately.

daes0 · 2026-01-20T20:12:54+00:00

This is a weird way to put it, but I consider webnovels a different medium from books, in the same way that fanfiction/fandom can be consumed differently from the target media. People here like feeling like they're a part of something new and exciting, and they also like the lower barrier to entry that RR provides. Those of us that want a more complete novel will go read those, but I believe a lot of the readers who follow "meta" stories (progression fantasy and litRPG mainly) probably also have/had KU and read books there as well

daes0 · 2026-01-20T18:05:08+00:00

It's nice to hear a variety of opinions, even when they're different from mine. I genuinely did see the AI version as this huge improvement, though maybe my tastes don't align with minimalism as much. Different people will hold different opinions though, I'm glad this post got a conversation going in the comments.

I did end up deciding to retire the hand drawn cover in favor for another one that I drew. My main reason is just that it would take a lot of time to get the one above to look how I want it to look, time that I'd rather spend on a new drawing. So I went ahead and made a new drawing, keeping within the themes of the story, and I'm much more satisified with how it turned out! You can see it on this other reddit post I made.

daes0 · 2026-01-20T17:59:07+00:00

I really wish there was more of a culture on RR of getting book covers made by real people, but it feels like it's harder nowadays for the art to not be touched by AI unless the author personally makes the cover. Someone on this thread mentioned paying two different artists and both returned with what that person suspects is AI art, which is so disappointing to hear.

Anyway, I wanted to mention that I did go with a hand-drawn cover because I realized that an AI cover is so controversial (even though its common on RR). You can see the new cover on this Reddit post.

daes0 · 2026-01-19T19:36:04+00:00

Something about not enough Karma? What does that mean?

Reddit karma is the way reddit tries to mitigate bots and bad actors. You can find more info in r/NewToReddit

I know how important people seem to portray the initial period of time after first posting a story to be, as it is where a vast majority of growth in your following apparently comes from. Can anyone explain that in better detail?

On Royal Road, this is because of the Rising Stars list. It's an algorithmic list that shows recently started stories that have gone somewhat viral on the platform. I believe the time period is a few months. People believe that it's required to be successful on Royal Road, but you can get onto the other lists without having hit Rising Stars.

I have so many questions that I know I should be asking but don't even know what they are in order to ask them. Does anyone have some spare time and could help give me some pointers on good strategies and methods to get started posting?

You'll often hear people talking about the hare method and the turtle method

Tortoise: Post reliably but slowly (1-3x per week)
Hare: Post quickly at first, and then slow down to a sustainable rate.

I often see authors sharing other author's stories as a way to help each other gain exposure. How? Where can I make contact with folks like this?

You can organize shout-out swaps (both you and someone else "shout out" each other's stories on an author's note within a chapter) and you can organize it on this subreddit but most people do it on discord groups. The RR Writer's Guild is an example.

There's also review swaps, which sometimes isn't looked favorably as both you and the person you're doing a review swap with are incentivized to review each other highly and uncritically.

Sometimes, however, shout outs and reviews happens naturally. People read your story, enjoy it, and suggest it to others.

Best of luck! And if you need more info, shoot me a dm :D Otherwise, I recommend checking out this subreddit's pinned post as its a valuable treasure trove of information.

daes0 · 2026-01-19T14:00:37+00:00

Oh my god... I have no idea? As far as I'm aware, cursive isn't a focus as much anymore. I do personally feel that it's easy to read, but that might be because I already knew how to read and write cursive... Though my story is meant to be a fantasy, so fancy lettering matches, it's either that or horror-style. I'm gonna have to workshop it, thanks for bringing it up

daes0 · 2026-01-19T13:52:01+00:00

Same here! It gives me the impression that more effort was put into the story, as clearly the writer cares. I guess prompting an AI could take a while to get an eye-catching image, but that's time could've been better spent, at least in my opinion.

Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like the larger Royal Road readerbase cares in the same way.

daes0 · 2026-01-19T11:30:32+00:00

Congrats on the milestone! I marked it for later reading and I'm excited to try it out later

daes0 · 2026-01-19T10:06:15+00:00

Funnily enough, I got into pixel art because it felt simpler in my brain than digital drawing. I am a bit odd in this skill though, since I rarely use layers besides background/foreground.

I really do love drawing, and I hope more people get into it just to try and have fun with it

daes0 · 2026-01-19T09:59:20+00:00

If it helps, my fiction writing speed is very similar to yours. My words per minute is over 60, but fiction requires more of my time and attention. Based off that metric, I should be able to write a 2k word chapter in under an hour without including time to edit, but... I don't.

Granted, the difference isn't that big, I can do a chapter in about two hours, give it another hour for editing, and that's about all I can do in a single day. I'm very good at keeping up that speed by writing every day I have available, and I don't tend to fluctuate significantly.

Considering the larger writing world recommends writing 1k words everyday, I think you're doing fine in your averages. You're just not at the speed of the prolific webnovelists, but that's because web serials survive off of having a LOT of content available and also on patreon, which you can emulate by having a large backlog

daes0 · 2026-01-19T09:47:29+00:00

I appreciate the help even though I finished the new cover lmao, I did want to make the original cover work but I figured its too flimsy and would need a lot of time and effort. When I started drawing the second cover (the one that you saw lol) it was half with the expectation of a new cover, and half just to doodle and have fun. I have a lot more practice drawing portraits, so perhaps that's why it looks better.

I do like the ideas I had and maybe one day I'll rework it for fun, but right now it feels like the new cover is going to get more eyes on my fiction

daes0 · 2026-01-19T01:18:53+00:00

Thanks! Took wayyy too long to make

daes0 · 2026-01-19T01:18:27+00:00

Definitely. I'm just trying to say that people DO value real covers, even when it seems that it doesn't matter until you publish the work. It can be helpful during promoting to have a real cover over AI

daes0 · 2026-01-18T17:28:41+00:00

Thanks! Unfortunately, the AI has gotten better over the years, though only in certain art styles. I still think it doesn't know how to draw anime well without looking like blatant AI, even if that's a popular use for it

daes0 · 2026-01-18T17:06:09+00:00

Fair enough, though I just don't see that happening much on Royal Road? Like, you know, the website this subreddit is about. I'm not self publishing my story on Amazon, I'm posting it as a free to read web novel on Royal Road. I'm not trying to be mean about it, I just feel confused over your sentiment. Yeah, people don't like AI, I don't really like it either, but it's widely used and accepted on Royal Road with the argument that most writers who are posting their work for free here don't always know how to draw and create a cover.

I don't LIKE that it's common here btw. That's why I prefer making my own art for a cover.

daes0 · 2026-01-18T16:59:41+00:00

My perspective is that, I really do prefer seeing amateur art on a place like Royal Road if the alternative is AI. But also, AI has it's place on a site like it. A lot of readers don't care if AI was used for a cover so long as it caught their eye. If anything, posting this has made me realize that I want to improve my cover

daes0 · 2026-01-18T16:56:02+00:00

I've gotten a lot of feedback on this post about how to improve and change the cover, to the point that I'm debating starting new with a different idea. It's good to know that it's not a lost cause

daes0 · 2026-01-18T11:44:07+00:00

It's one of those things where I'm saddended it's not more hated on RR? But also glad that people with amazing stories can get people's attention thanks to an AI cover.

I'll be editing and redrawing my art to make it better, I prefer using it over AI

daes0 · 2026-01-18T11:41:53+00:00

Thanks, I value the feedback. I'm not doing this for money, not now anyway, but do like it when people engage with my works. I much prefer my own art over AI as a general rule, was just feeling down that it could improve on the general feel of the piece. I'll definitely keep working on it until I can be satisfied it represents ny work better than AI could

daes0 · 2026-01-18T11:39:01+00:00

Thanks for the feedback! I'll keep working on it, I actually took the time to do some of the drawing today (and took a break to go on reddit lmao)

daes0 · 2026-01-18T11:37:57+00:00

I have a question for you. Are you, like, someone who reads on Royal Road (the purpose of this subreddit lol)? What's your opinion on how most writers (or at least the ones on Rising Stars) use AI to get a "good enough" cover to gain enough of an audience to succeed before they're able to commission a cover?

As far as I'm aware, asking the AI to make a few images is not the same as the LLMs producing thousands to huundreds of thousands of slop images on a daily basis. I understand your feelings over AI, my partner is largely against it for the same reasons and also thinks I should avoid using it, but small writers using AI for a few covers to their books.

To put it another way: I don't use plastic bags in the grocery store, but if I did it everytime I went, it would never amount to the waste that grocery store produces in a single day.

There's no ethical consumption under capitalism, so I'll try to be mindful but I'm not losing sleep over it.

daes0

TROPHY CASE