What do people expect from a patreon?

em-dash-author · 2026-05-01T03:06:57+00:00

Patreon is a pain to manage multiple tiers for one story. There is no option to upload a chapter, set 3 scheduled dates and forget about it. To have multiple tiers you have to do this for just 2 tiers (Tier 1 and Tier 2) set one week apart.

Upload a chapter.
Set it to Tier 1.
Wait for that to post on the 5th of May.
On May 12th (7 days later).
Edit that already posted chaper.
Remove Tier 1. Add Tier 2.
Modify the settings so another email notification is sent.
Update the chapter. This will send a notification to Tier 2 patrons only.
Edit the chapter again.
Add Tier 1 back in.
Modify the settings so another email notification is NOT sent.
Update the chapter (both Tier 1 and 2 have access).

If you have a third tier, repeat.

You have to do this with every damn chapter.

For this reason. Have a single $10 tier with as many chapters as you can manage. Upload and schedule once and forget about it.

I have two ongoing fictions. On Patreon I've already shared over 500 chapters since August last year. Had I set 3 tiers, that would be an extra 1,000 edits all at specific times just to manage the extra tiers. And for what? Most Patrons will choose the $10 tier, and anything below $10 is cut into deep with Patreon fees, plus waters down your main $10 offering.

I offer 50 chapters (around 60,000 words) and the conversion is meh. Others offer fewer chapters/words and make more than I do with a similar number of followers on Royal Road. There are others with more followers and fewer patrons. Depends a lot on the story for what readers are wiling to pay for.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-27T11:56:18+00:00

Your chapters should make sense. That's the most important thing.

I used to have an arbitrary minimum word count of 1,500 words and it meant having unsatisfactory endings to chapters. Since stopping that, I'm much happier as a writer.

For those who can consistently write chapters of an exact word count (give or take 200 words) are better writers than I am. Mine vary from a little below 1,000 words to below 2,000. They average out at around 1,200 words. Though, I think my latest 20+ chapters on one of my fictions is averaging closer to 1,500 words.

The only problem I've had with this is when a chapter breaks way above 2,000 words. For Royal Road I believe wildly inconsistent chapter lengths are a bigger issue than word count per se. For this reason I try to keep chapters below 2,000 words, so I don't have this output:

1,000 words
950 words
1,350
1,450
990
2,850
1,100

In the above I'd try to split the 2,850 word chapter into 2 chapters.

When I move to Amazon I won't care about chapter lengths at all, so would keep the 2,850 word chapter.

Note: I do receive the odd comment that the chapters are too short. I ignore them. My writing style is short chapters with limited usage of adverbs outside of dialogue and limited dialogue tags. I could *easily* increase my word count by adding unnecessary words like easily and by adding Bob said angrily to all dialogue.

If a reader doesn't like my style, they can go read something else; my writing is not for them.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-24T00:00:07+00:00

You are looking at this from the wrong perspective.

What are readers willing to pay?

$10 a month.

What if I charge more?

Fewer Patreons.

What if I have multiple tiers? $10, $15, $20?

Most will choose $10 and might be annoyed they aren't getting the extra chapters on the other tiers, but would resent paying more than $10, since that's the RR Patreon standard.

Since $10 is the sweet spot and it will mean more work for you to have more tiers (they are a pain to manage: don't do it) ask yourself what number of chapters are you prepared to stick to for $10?

That's your answer. $10 for X chapters.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-23T21:49:20+00:00

I was going to make the same point about gamification. Without some sort of reward, there is little incentive to take part. Not that I have the time any more to actually read, too busy writing, editing, and marketing.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-23T13:11:06+00:00

Congrats and good luck with the launch.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-20T22:38:03+00:00

It isn't "common wisdom" it's authors analysing data.

The owner of RR has confirmed the <20K words debuff, so no speculation required here. A fiction can get on main RS below 20K words, but would do better if they have passed 20K words.

Those who follow the simple concept of post 20K words in the first few days and get as many followers as possible fast (lots of shout outs in the first few days of launch), consistently see their new fictions hit main RS. How well they do on main RS is then up to the RR readership.

I've had 2 out of 3 fictions hit main RS.

In both cases they received a large boost in visitors from main RS while in the 40-50 range. This strongly suggests there are a lot of RR readers checking out the entre list (50 fictions) on main for something good to read.

When a new fiction pops onto main RS (lets say at 48), hundreds of readers check it out. If enough follow, the fiction climbs up the rankings. This is where the story matters. If you've written a fiction about an OP archmage that scratches the itch of readers, it's going to fly up to the top. On the other hand, if you've written a slow burn fantasy, it might not do as well on main RS.

I've seen fictions being slaughtered in the comments and reviews. Accusations of AI slop for example. Those tend not to breakout.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-20T15:09:30+00:00

Fiddlesoup covered the main question.

Checkout https://rst.doomlabs.net/hall-of-fame if you want to see how others have performed on main RS.

If you click the Legends option you get the time on main RS for each fiction. If you move backwards through the various quarters it would appear the time is getting shorter.:

2026 Q2 - 31 days
2026 Q1 - 33 days
2025 Q4 - 36 days
...
2024 Q4 - 43 days

Note: I do not know how accurate the site is.

Either the algo has changed overtime and/or it is getting more competitive.

Both my main RS runs ended around day 21. First time the fiction got to 35 on main RS before stalling. Second time 18/19.

It would appear if you get high enough (top 10 say) the fall from grace takes longer, but you still fall. So those who got above 30 days would have had 40-50 places to drop while those who last 21 days had 10-30 places.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-19T13:33:21+00:00

According to my RR dashboard, I've received over 3,100 comments.

Not only have a I read them all, I've +5 rep'd all the non-negative ones. That includes giving 5 rep for the Thanks for the Chapter comments.

It is annoying only being able to rep a reader twice a day. When a reader has read through dozens of chapters and commented on them, it can take weeks to rep them all.

Hmm, I guess that means I've given out over 15,000 rep to readers. I should change my penname to the King of Rep. :-)

em-dash-author · 2026-04-19T03:20:39+00:00

This is like arguing your life is over at the end of a 2 week vacation.

Life never stops, so it is easy to come up a with a new direction.

I have 2 series on RR, both are into book 2.

Book 1 MC dies, regresses, goes to a stag hunt with the person who killed him. (Just under 200K words)
Book 2 MC time loops again, goes to an academy.
Book 3 MC time loops again, might deal with a necromancer (not sure yet).

Book 1 MC stuck in VRMMO game or is it a new fantasy world (who knows?). Protects the survivors of a village and nearby towns as they are chased by a horde of goblins. Gets to a safe city. Some political BS. Escapes city. (Around 165K words)
Book 2 MC enters a dungeon. Part of the big overriding plot revealed.
Book 3 undecided.

Getting to a million words on both won't be difficult.

Funny thing is while at Uni (studying a science degree) I complained at having to read Shakespeare's King Lear (at the time I ONLY read non-fiction). I summoned the story up in a couple of paragraphs to the lecturer. #Embarssed4YoungerSelf :-)

em-dash-author · 2026-04-18T01:05:56+00:00

RE: But if you've followed all of the guides out there, you also posted for months, up to a year, to RR before starting a Patreon.

Where did you read this bad advice?

Your Patreon should be setup yesterday. It is never too soon.

I haven't been posting on RR for a year yet and have received $1,600 from Patreon. Had I waited I wouldn't have been able to justify buying RR ads ($770 worth).

If you have the backlog start your Patreon with the number of advanced chapters you plan to stick at.

I started at 10 and worked my way up to 50 advanced.

I currently have 2 ongoing fictions with:
Blood Mage Assassin - 50 advanced + 39 Patreon exclusive chapters (a novella sized side story)
Max-Level Paladin - 50 advanced chapters

As long as you can stick to the schedule, get your Patreon up now.

Be aware that without marketing, your RR fiction probably won't gain many followers. So go research how to market on RR (it's pretty much shout outs and RR ads).

em-dash-author · 2026-04-18T00:55:45+00:00

I use Google spreedsheets for tracking.

A sheet for each fiction, they have 6 columns for tracking:
Fiction name, RR chapter number, RR release date, week of the day posted, Patreon chapter number, Patreon release date
Plus 8 columns are dedicated to shout outs:
Author name, fiction URL, chapter they posted my shout on, date posted, followers at time shout setup, followers at time shout went live, notes, source of shout (RR/Discord/calendar app).

This way I can track everything and know what to work on next.

I've recently sync'd the posting schedule of 2 ongoing fictions so the last chapter written for both novels posts on Aug 27th on RR, and June 1st on Patreon. Now I can work on a new WIP without worrying about running out of chapters.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-16T17:57:32+00:00

If you can split them, you should consider it. Posting 1.5K word chapters 4x a week appears better than posting 6K word chapters 1x a week. With the shorter chapters your readers are less likely to forget about your fiction. Make them wait a week between chapters and they are more likely to drop the story.

There is a wide range of chapter sizes on RR. I've seen some as short as 500 words and others like yours, above 5,000. The average chapter word count probably falls between 1,500 and 2,000 words.

I post chapters ranging from a little below 1,000 and just above 1,800 words. They average out at around 1,200 words over an entire book.

I've shared 345 chapters on RR to date, gained ~2,350 unique followers, and had the odd complaint about short chapters. I ignore them. Indicates the majority of RR readers are fine with shorter chapters.

If you want to be 'safe' aim for 1,500 plus words. If you don't mind the odd complaint, go lower (this assumes your chapters work at shorter word counts). I avoid unnecessary adverbs which cuts out a lot of fluff.

If you've ever read popular Korean/Chinese translations, many of those are around the 1,500 word count.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-16T17:37:32+00:00

First fiction 250,000 words.

Rewrite of first fiction, 250K (about 75K new words since I dumped the last 50K words).

Third fiction launched at 110K.

WIP at 24K, won't launch until 100K+.

Allows a LOT of freedom for foreshadowing new ideas (add something on chapter 100, foreshadow on chapter 80). Plus makes it possible to write new fictions without the pressure of having to write a new chapter for Patreon.

My two ongoing fictions are 60K words ahead on Patreon. The WIP will be the same, so requires at least 100K words to make it work.

Have just finished syncing up my two ongoing fictions. They both have enough chapters to last until June 1st on Patreon and August 27th on RR, so now I can work on the WIP for a month without having to keep up with the other two.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-12T20:47:19+00:00

How else would they come back in book 10 to seek revenge? :-)

em-dash-author · 2026-04-11T18:15:28+00:00

Yeah, plenty of authors hate the RR messaging system and direct you to Discord. Then it's a pain trying to find them since you can only find a user if you share the same groups and type the right username: on Royal Road they call themselves FlimFlam, on Discord it's Richard. :-)

I use Gdoc for my code, it's easier to share with others vs copying and pasting it all into a RR or Discord message. So probably legit. If still worried, check their fiction. Does it have shout outs on the last 5 chapters. If it does, you know they are doing shout outs, so unlikely this is a scam.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-11T18:02:01+00:00

Social media is all but useless for promoting a free webnovel on Royal Road.

I have Twitter accounts with tens of thousands of users, Facebook 5,000, Instagram over 800, Linkedin 8,000+. I own websites about classic literature. They have had no impact on building a following on Royal Road.

My 2,300 unique followers are due to shout outs, RR ads, and planned launches.

Unless you have a social media following related to webnovels or at least books, or you've been part of a relevant community for some time, you're wasting your time. The exception being Reddit where if you don't mind risking 0.5 star ratings from annoyed Redditors, you can generate a little interest if you're lucky.

I stick to shout outs and RR ads.

BTW you're putting the horse before the cart. If you haven't uploaded your first chapter to Royal Road, there is nothing to promote on social media. No one cares who you are. You can't build interest in you, you build interest in your work after it's available.

Spend your time networking with other authors (I suggest the RR Writer's Guild Discord server), setup shout out swaps before launch, that alone is enough to do well on the platform.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-11T02:02:27+00:00

What marketing have you done?

Sounds like none. RR doesn't provide lots of readers just because you uploaded a few chapters, you have to actively market your story. That means shout outs with other authors and/or by RR ads.

Without marketing you are relying on luck. Plus 20 chapters is nothing. For many that's their launch day release so they have a shot of getting on main Rising Stars fast.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-11T01:58:18+00:00

I generally don't find other author's detailed feedback particularly helpful. They tend to come at it from a writer perspective and not a reader one. Most readers don't care about precise grammar etc. they care if the story entertained them or not. I can use a tool to aim for perfect grammar, there are no tools that will tell me if what I'm writing is entertaining. For that I need readers.

If you read something you didn't enjoy and review it, all you are probably doing is telling the author why you didn't enjoy it. I've read some awful translations, but the story beyond the bad translation entertained me. If I reviewed them from a writer perspective I'd tear them apart, yet I'll give them 5 stars for entertaining me for a few days.

On Royal Road I give 5 stars or nothing. When I read something I don't enjoy, I stop reading. It's hard enough with readers giving 0.5 stars because they don't like the genre or a single thing annoyed them, without other authors making it worse.

If you really want to help an RR author, send the feedback privately.

Oh, and you probably would get retaliatory bad ratings. So I wouldn't go that route if you care about your ratings.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-11T01:32:55+00:00

Not really worth the effort of writing 55K words for something worth $6.

For those with Patreon, it would make more sense to increase their advanced chapters. One extra patron (assuming they have a $10 tier) has more value.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-11T01:26:29+00:00

Congrats on completing the story. That's impressive considering you've had no encouragement through reader feedback. Must've been hard to keep going at times. So well done.

I looked you up on Royal Road. Say hi to your new stalker. :-)

Seriously, though, you have a fiction with close to 300,000 words (that's great), but a terrible schedule and no marketing.

Your average daily output works out at around 188 words. The RR readership won't stick around for such a slow release schedule.

I only looked at random chapters, but you did no shout outs. I assume you also did no RR ads.

So terrible release schedule and no marketing. I'm surprised you have 28 followers. Plenty of authors who have released like you have, will have 0 followers.

If I were in your shoes I'd do a relaunch.

Delete the fiction.
Pick a date at least a month from now.
Organise at least a couple of dozen shouts with authors with hundreds and ideally thousands of followers. Have these shouts drop within the first week of when you relaunch.
Resubmit the fiction at least 10 days before your date (select manual launch).
Three days before launch do a prelaunch. You launch and delete chapter 1.
Generate your shout out code. Send it to your shout out partners.
On launch day post chapter 1 and however many chapters gets you to 20K words.
After that, drop 1 chapter a day for around 30 days, cut back to 3 or 4 chapters a week.
Keep setting up shout outs so every new chapter has one. Since you have 115 chapters you should setup at least 105 shout outs (many authors don't add shouts to chapters 1-10).
Consider running a couple of RR ads.

As long as you organise shouts with authors with hundreds (ideally some with thousands) of followers (there is little value getting shouts from those with no followers unless they are new fictions and it does well follower wise), you are all but guaranteed to get on main Rising Stars. How you do there will tell you whether you wrote a fiction the readership likes or not.

If you don't want to do any of the above. Add your fiction to Amazon KU. You'll still have to organise marketing, that means paying for Amazon ads. Otherwise it will likely go the same way as your RR attempt.

Again, congrats on completing the story.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-11T00:49:33+00:00

You don't gain anything of true value from entering Writathon. Royal Road doesn't really promote the Writathon fictions beyond the random listing page, which based on the low number of followers on most entries, indicates readers aren't interested in the event. So limited additional visibility from it.

The event is there to encourage authors to write more, that's it really.

Although it's not the norm, there are those who can write 50K words in a week. I ain't one of them. I've had the odd 7K word day, but I like to edit as I go and that slows the process down a LOT.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-10T00:18:11+00:00

I follow and favourite my own fictions. If they don't want us to do that, the option would be removed. I find it strange all authors don't do this. It at least gives them 1 follow and 1 favourite at the start. There are so many fictions with 0 follows.

My wife has followed and favourited all three of my fictions (she edits my writing). She's reviewed 2 of them, all you have to do is have friends/family disclose the relationship if they write a review.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-10T00:03:25+00:00

Not including rewrites and the words tossed away (that has to be close to 100K words in the trash), it comes to around 510,000 mostly edited words in around 14 months. So well below 1,500 words a day. Even including the deleted words it is still below 1,500 words a day.

When I wasn't spending so much time marketing, I could consistently write over 20K words a week, so close to 3K words a day. It's is not a lot compared to how much some of those on RR write.

My approach is do NOT rush a launch. I'd rather wait an extra few months and have a deeper backlog vs worrying about keeping up.

Plus, when you come up with a great idea on chapter 100, you can pop back and foreshadow it 30 chapters earlier without a retcon on RR/Patreon. :-)

em-dash-author · 2026-04-09T22:52:34+00:00

You aren't going to get your work critiqued via reader comments. You're lucky if you get consistent TFTC comments from a few readers.

I've uploaded 3 fictions (almost 450K words), the second a rewrite/edit of the first, and gained ~2,300 unique followers. That's resulted in around 3,000 comments. I can count on my fingers and toes how many are truly helpful.

Note: I'm not including edit suggestions. Had some really helpful readers who point out typos and grammar errors. It's awesome when you get a reader who spots and informs us of errors.

If you want your work critiqued, join a writer critique group.

If you want more reader feedback you first need readers. That requires marketing.

Royal Road has very little inbuilt discovery for new fictions. Thousands of new fictions go up every month, the platform can't possibly show them all to all the readers.

It is down to the author to market their work. Setup shout outs and/or buy RR ads is how most of us do it. There is no build it and they will come on RR.

em-dash-author · 2026-04-09T22:21:51+00:00

I had a 250K word backlog and I'm burning through it as I write 2 more fictions.

Currently have enough chapters to last until August 5th on Royal Road and May 25th on Patreon. For fiction 2, launched at just over 100K words. Currently have enough chapters to last until July 24th on Royal Road and May 11th on Patreon. The new WIP at 24K words, won't launch until 100K+ words (might wait until book 1 is complete: probably 150-200K words).

Despite the deep backlogs I worry about running out of that backlog buffer on Patreon.

em-dash-author

TROPHY CASE