I've said it before, I'll say it again. I'm bad about blogging. Between trying to write for novels and shot stories, working on the Loth arcs and working a normal forty to sixty hour work week as a programmer this gets put on the back burner for a while. I apologize for that. I'd like to post every Friday about something that's happening, making it relevant about the comic or comics in general or the internet. But honestly I'm not much of an internet person, I use the internet for research and information purposes. That said I'm always connected via Instant Messengers for chats with friends and fans, some of you take advantage of my screen name to chat with me, some of you don't. No matter how busy I am I always make a point to respond to any emails and private messages that come through my inbox in regards to this comic.

Some of them are positive, some are attacks, and some are critiques. I know the differences between attention gathers and trolls. This might dishearten some out there but The Chronicles of Loth will go on for awhile. We have a story to tell, we tell it for free, and if folks don't like it then thanks to the magic of the internet you can browse somewhere else. I've always appreciated and welcomed honest critics but critics are more than just your opinion stated in a negative connation. Creative people can't grow if they cloister themselves in a room and only get feedback from fans.

In the past we've made mistakes. I will freely admit when both the Artist and I came into this series we made several miscalculations. Like chess players we gambled on moves that were gambits. This was calculated and in some cases it's worked and in others it's made us hated. But we've got things in the works to improve. We can't go back and fix that which has come already. To do that would throw our schedule into disarray.

 The one thing we know about the internet is that if you miss a schedule you're screwed. Miss even one update and it starts the path to missed or slow updates. Since we only post once a week right now it's easy to maintain our schedule. In an effort to make things clearer for newer readers we're going back and addressing things so it doesn't seem so confusing.

To the Artist and I there is no confusion. We've got our eye on the big picture, but we have at times struggled with bringing the big picture into sharp focus for readers. I've never expected everyone to read the wiki, which asks a lot for the reader, but coming to the story where the characters don't know something or they know more than they talk about. It's like a shared consciousness in the story. People know about the stark reality of what happened in The Fields Of the Dead where plagues and famine were so wide spread that the whole world was about to collapse. The characters have this shared background and needn't explain it because it's part of them. Readers however expect a certain amount of explanation and addressing, which until recently I’ve been reluctant to do. Exposition for exposition sake is worthless, but in a fantasy world with no common basis to other worlds it was something I was too late to realize.

Never fear, we've heard and we're addressing this. In that vain I'm going to announce that this year we're not going to have a true Valentines Day special. I'll leave it as a surprise what you get in it's place, but if anyone wishes to do a valentines day special they are more than happy to submit it to mirlinthloth@gmail.com. We'll feature it on Feb 14th and will give credit where it is due.

Just bear with us while we try to improve. And I'll apologize again for making mistake in how the story started. But everyone's gotta start somewhere right? We could fold like so many other webcomics out there, and at times that seems the easier path. Just fold up and move on to our next project. But it seems wrong to just give up and contemplate fan fics for Sentai Squads or dinosaur movies or video games. Many web cartoonists fail before getting a hit. Some get lucky on their first try (Penny Arcade). Some like us have to work for our success. And we will be successful. Every step we take forward or backward will improve our skills and our comic.

To those of you who stick with us through thick and thin, thank you and know we're doing this for you.

Enjoy what is to come.

J.E. Flint