Hail and well met, Guildies.

As it’s been evident, Guilded Age has been going under some external changes for some time now, and we’re chugging along at a slow pace but should have things wrapped up soon. A lot of the time you wait until the news is done before you say anything, but sometimes too much time elapses and enough’s enough. What we’ve got to tell you is too exciting to wait any longer, including MORE UPDATES PER WEEK.

So without further ado, here’s the State of the Guild…

1) We are going to begin updating five times a week.

Yes, you read that correctly.

Starting in the new year with Chapter 20, we’ll be updating this comic FIVE TIMES A WEEK. How is this possible? Our friends at Hiveworks are helping us expand our art team to John Waltrip and his twin brother of equal awesome, Jason Waltrip! That’s right, the Wonder Waltrips are activating their powers in the forms of Pencil-Inker and Colorist! That means twice the production speed so nearly twice the updates per week (gotta get our buffer back somehow).

There will be no changes to the story except for new possibilities. We intend on running Guilded Age for another four years, and so there’s going to be a LOT more comics than we originally planned. If all goes well, this will give us the chance to flesh out the universe and the people that live in it, as well as tell more random one-off episodic stories that we want to do just for the fun of it. So, speaking of which…

2) More Bonus Comics

We’ll be putting more bonus comics in Guilded Age Plus, starting with our next one coming from none other than Joe Hunter of Ghost Bucket!

As you see from today’s update, we’re going to be doing a little something special for the holidays this year. An Axemas Special is something I’ve always wanted to do, but could never afford to put in the main comic do to our previously constricted updating pace. BUT NOT ANYMORE. So sit back and strap in for our first foray into a new kind of Guilded Age story!

3) Hiveworks

We have, indeed, joined with Hiveworks. What does this mean, you ask?

It could be the start of something big. They’re going to start taking over aspects of our business-iness so we can focus more on creating the comic and new merch. They’ll be handling our ads, which means their optimization is starting from scratch. As some of you have seen that occasionally means ads with sound. Let me be clear:

We hate them, too.

If you see one, say something. Tell us what the ad was for. E-Mail us at glitchphil@gmail.com. Tweet us at @GuildedAge. Put it in the comments section, we don’t care! The fact is that WE CANNOT DISCONTINUE THE AD UNLESS WE KNOW WHAT IT WAS FOR. So report the ones you see and we’ll have them eliminated. With extreme prejudice.

4) The Kickstarter

Yes, we’re still doing one. There have been way, way more ducks to get in a row than we initially predicted but said ducks are nearly lined up, namely, putting a shit ton of effort into the pitch video to the degree where it might be more entertaining than Volume 2 itself.

We expect to launch the KS in January, and we hope you guys are going to love the legitimately one-of-a-kind rewards we have to offer.

The Volume 2 cover does look phenomenal, though. You’ll get to see it soon.

5) The Site

We have a new site design that’ll be more conducive to our new comic/ad layout, being put together by the Random Assembler, Samantha Kyle! She’s also going to be doing other spots of graphic design for us as we go on, including merch design because, lemme tell ya: I know a lot of designers out there on the Internets and my buddy Sam is the best damn one there is.

Some of you may have wondered why we changed our comic/ad layout. Some of you have immediately drawn the conclusion, “Because it makes more money.”

Well, you’re right. We’ve been freakin’ doing it wrong since we started! Hard lessons learned in the value of above/beneath the fold ad spots. We resisted at first, but the increase in revenue could let us do some crazy stuff for you guys in the future.

So that’s where we stand, y’all. Big plans, big dreams… big delays. It is my sincere hope that when it pays off, we shall all collectively shit bricks.

Because we’re going to need to build a warehouse at some point, too.

Thank you all, as always, for your patience and loyalty as our Guildies. We’re doing everything we can to prove right the ones of you who say, “Best Damn Webcomic Out There.”

Please enjoy the 2012 Axemas Special, Chapter 20 begins in 2013! Don’t miss it!