'Not A Villain' Webcomic - Side Story about Annie, blob #48

Charactership Side Story – 10

New Readers: We're finishing a side story that involved reader interaction. See here for details. The main story will resume Tues, March 13th.

And Annie reveals her L.i.F.e. appearance, wearing the generic female outfit. She'll get the color/outfit she wears in page 2 a little later.

I'm not sure exactly when/how to do Annie's side stories. She'll pop up as a background character in the main story but most of her interactions will be in side stories that run parallel to the main story. I could include them as bonus side stories found only in the dead-tree book versions or perhaps offer them as incentives for something (assuming I have enough time, of course). Anyone else have ideas?

Anyway, this wraps up the blob story as well as the daily updates. Book 2, which I'm super excited for, will start Tuesday and follow the normal Tues/Fri schedule. See you then!

And for the vote incentive, Annie discovers a consequence that comes with being a real character 😀

Oh! And you can find all the polls' results here.

16 Comments

Well, this whole arc with us voting on what would happen with her was so that you could take a break from the main story right? Maybe you could do side stories with Annie after future major events while you plan the course of the main story.

Yay Annie is now a real character

I really like her smile. I guess that’s what happens when you first feel what life – or, in this case, L.I.F.E.- means xD

You could just keep Annie’s side story stuff as vote incentives. That way people who are strapped for cash, but like your comic, can still get a chance to read them and you don’t have to go crazy trying to do once or twice weekly updates on them.

Just wait until she discovers another consequence of becoming a character: Rule 34.

Congratulations on your first official RetCon!

Yay for Annie!

I like it as a vote incentive, but maybe do one panel re-draw and one Annie per week? There are a number of us who are broke but love your comic! Maybe put like one extra Annie story in the bundled comics, as a “Thank you!” for buying, but not just there please 🙁

I also like Dusk’s idea – do them as a break from Kleya’s story. (But also having Annie pop up occasionally in the background would be awesome!)

Yay Annie! \o/

So, wait- the computer asked her if she wanted to join? Like, a popup ad? That sounds… disturbing. Just how bad is the internet, really? And how bad is reality, that it’s still an improvement? (I really want to se reality now…)

Fiddling with character ideas… I know you probably already have this planned out, but:
I think it would be cool if Annie were the (only) one in the story to poke at/be aware of/break the ‘fourth wall’, a la z2’s idea. Naturaly this would be side- story- only, and only in fun.

Having Annie’s story provide ‘filler pages’ between chapters of the main story sounds like a good idea, particularly since (if I remember correctly) the consensus was for Annie to illustrate a bit more about the world than we would otherwise see. I’m not sure about the idea of having her able to lean on the ‘fourth wall’, but perhaps she still remembers her days as Blob 48 and therefore is much more aware of the other Blobs’ actions and motivations than the generally oblivious main characters?

Playing more with this and other ideas…
What about having annie mostly show up in the incentives, and limit any/all fourth-wall breaking to those? That could also pull in (some of) the existing incentive comics, since that appears to have been the trend with the blobs in them…

Oh, oh! Schedule the incentive dumps for –when– after Annie’s main-area appearances! (that would require a combination of several ideas… Not gonna happen, I know)

But yeah, go with whatever.

i think “filler pages” is also better, it can be a choose ur own adventure thing like how we did with the voting buttons. I thought it was freaking ingenuis lol but i know its kinda difficult lol

i think it will be funny if Annie doesnt remember her blob days, but has a feeling of them. Like a past life kinda thing lol

wow she looks pretty—- OHG**SHE’SMISSINGANARM!!!

I’d prefer either intermissions (like this) or vote incentives. though for the first chunk vote incentives more. Don’t want to wait a whole book to find out how any got a splash of blue.

I’m also for the filler thing. You could use her as an agent of exploration concerning extra background information for the world of LiFe.

I really like the idea of having two comics, taking place n the same world, running parallel to each other via the vote incentives… You come here and see the story, you vote and see Annie’s story. Two comics in one, taking place in the same world. It would of course require a LOT of extra work, and Annie would probably update less often, But it sounds awesome.

Another good idea, I’m going to take from another webcomic I read called ‘Flipside’ where every few chapters, there’s an ‘Intermission’. During these ‘Intermissions’ between chapters, the artist draws them in chibi form, (practically blobs with faces) rather than trying to be realistic. He also breaks the fourth wall, and takes time to explain anything that might be relevent to the story, from the workings of magic, to how to play poker! Well that, and he throws in some cheap gags. I’m not trying to advertise, just offering another way to do things.

Whatever you try to do, I’m sure it’ll be great to read.
First time commenting, and despite your drawing, you have a fun, appealing story that stays interesting. H***, even seeing the progression of your art is interesting, so there’s an upside to that too.
Keep it up! one of my favorite webcomics now.

I’d like to request that any dead-tree versions also have ebook versions. I have severe space shortages at my house, and I’m almost exclusively buying ebooks now. I’m happy to give you my money (I’ve bought PDFs of Girl Genius comics, for example), but I just can’t go with paper anymore.

As for where Annie stories appear, occasional intermissions are good, vote incentives are good… I like the idea of occasionally showing the main storyline from Annie’s point of view. She arrived fairly recently, so she may not be especially attached to Sasuke or Bandit, but that doesn’t mean she likes Kleya/Kat v.8. (Kleya may have just lost a bunch of her fans, actually.)

Not A Villain Webcomic

Webcomic of a semi- reformed hacker trying to redeem herself in a post- apocalyptic world she may have created.

Charactership Side Story – 10