David Niemitz
patreon
Reader Interest Poll
🕑 Added 2025-01-31 23:48:03 +0000 UTCI'm wrapping up my revisions on volume three of Faerie Knight, so that I can give the manuscript to Tantor and the last audiobook of the series can be recorded.
This is going to free up the time I've been spending on revising.
While the bulk of my time will continue to be spent on Guild Mage, I've been making notes on potential other stories.
I'm not saying any of these are going to start tomorrow - in fact, I'm saying they definitely won't - but when I need a brain break from Guild Mage, I'd like to get some feedback to help me decide what to focus on.
This won't be the sole piece of input that makes my decision, but I will take it into account.
Option 1: A Cyberpunk Progression story set in NYC. Progression element will be the characters working mercenary gigs for money and spending it on equipment (weapons, cyberware, programs). Corpo bad guys, gangs, and hopefully an emphasis on grass-roots community building in the face of dystopian oppression and corruption. Straight cyberpunk - no magic, no system, no aliens, etc
Option 2: Xianxia Cultivation fake marriage - The Matriarch of the Demon Sect is My Wife! (or something like that). An assault on the Dark Saintess of the Black Flame Temple ruins her cultivation and sends her fleeing. She's found by a farm boy who hides her and passes her off as his wife when soldiers come looking. Cultivation + Anime Rom Com tropes. Equal parts awkward + cute. Progression = Cultivation.
Option 3: Victorian very goth-y vampire story set in NYC (yes, I have an NYC story on my brain, either future or past. I live in CT, so for me its THE CITY. Sue me :) I'm thinking a rev war era vampire wakes up in the MET collection and goes on a revenge spree against the rivals who overthrow the old vampiric monarch of the city. Include a police detective in the victorian detective fiction fashion for good measure. Not much of an emphasis on cultivation, but the vampire would probably count as an OP MC.
Option 4: Superhero/Supervillain Enemies to Lovers. My wife challenged me to write smut. I'm not entirely sure how I would do this without going under a pen name, due to my day job, but I do have a niggling idea about a superhero team being betrayed and one member being captured by a supervillain. Would probably involve BDSM elements. Would either need Patreon exclusive chapters while the tame stuff is on RR, or some other solution. Would be an interesting challenge to write using romance beats, I've never done it before. Progression element would be the supervillain upgrading an iron man-esque suit.
Option 5: Collapse of an Empire in a massive fantasy world. I've had this one kicking around for a long time, but I'm not certain I'm good enough to write it yet. It would involve a LARGE number of viewpoint characters, across different portions of the empire. Two different magic systems, but the primary one is tattoo-based, so the progression elements would be centered on getting new ink.
Comments
Antony Claughton
Also, if certain training/conversion techniques were lost in the coup, plus certain hidden treasures lost, it would both mean neutral houses would be interested in the protagonist and give the protagonist some alternative goals. Even if the protagonist doesn’t know everything either.
Jacob Doppenberg
I voted for NYC cyberpunk but since Magic Empire Collapse is so popular, I now request that there is a viewpoint character in a fantasy equivalent NYC portion of the empire lol
Meowgrr
Honestly, it would be an excellent study in contrasts! Guild Mage being beautifully not-smut! :)
Takttiger
Tattoo magic sounds awesome and depending what incredible things you come up with you might start seeing readers with your ink at some point! The NYC real world focus is something I do not really resonate with very well. Might be a non-american thing, but specifically about that city it feels like there already exists much content around it and it gets alien-invaded in every second blockbuster. I would rather have an immersive fully fantasy or cyberpunk world with parallels to NYC instead of it being set in the actual thing.
FauxPraetor
Considering how your worldbuilding goes I do not doubt you could pull off Collapse of an Empire. The Xianxia premise sounds like it has the potential to be hilarious, but I am exceedingly curious as to what your Vampire lore/worldbuilding would look like considering what Faerie Knight and Guild Mage are like in terms of depth, so I just had to vote for the OP Vampire.
Dave N
Yeah I was thinking they were created by the previous monarch
Dave N
I'm glad it got at least one vote!
Andrew Jones
smuttt pleasee
Antony Claughton
I’d go the vampire, but not have it be the (previous) top dog who wakes. Say a loyal lieutenant or cousin of the monarch.
Guilherme Vasconcellos
xianxia is never a wrong choice
_Templar
The description was very vague, so anyone can project their desired story onto it. But I've enjoyed Guild Mage enough to try anything you write.
Dave N
Totally will!
Trevor Collins
Hey I am also a CT resident (and native) if you ever do a book signing let us know, I'll be there. Oh and I voted for the xianxia romcom, sounds fun.
Dave N
yeah it was very much like... 'I dare you to write smut and see if you can pull it off' lol
Rip Woodham
Agree about Guild Mage! I really look forward to its chapter every day now.
Rip Woodham
I voted for the vampire story but the empire story sounds good too. I'm just not sure it's what you need (since it seems like it would be both longest and toughest) and you said you aren't as confident in it yet. The smut one I'm not interested in at all but I lmao at your wife's challenge. I think the others sound fine but not as good as the vampire or empire.
Dave N
It's gonna be real interesting if the one I expect would be the most difficult to write gets the majority of votes lol
william wallace
Ive been looking for a well done vampire story ever since A Journey of Black and Red ended. Really think you could do fun things with the genre. Will at least try any of your stories that you choose to share but the romance story would probably be a hard sell for me.
_Templar
Wish I could choose two options since the Xianxia romcom and the collapse of an empire are both very interesting. The latter I feel has a lot more potential and I feel like you're a great writer, but you won't know until you try. I would love to try reading either one.
Michael Maor
I don't have any strong preference for any one of those descriptions, I do however have a strong DISLIKE for anything like the annoyance of errors option 2 sounds like (I know they're normally referred to as comedy, but mostly I don't find anything funny about them, just annoying). I voted for option 1, but really I'd be fine with any except option 2.
Dave N
Don't worry about that - I've got a long way to go on guild mage, its doing well, and I'm going to keep up a chapter a day. But sometimes I need to clear my head and fiddle with something else as a break, and having a clear choice would help me decide which future story to focus on prepping.
Daemon Ursus
Personally I would prefer "Collapse of an Empire" first, or if you truly don't feel you are up to it yet, the "Cyberpunk Progression" Good luck whichever way you choose to go. Though I do hope you wont even get started for quite a while as Guild Mage keeps getting better.
