Frequently Asked Questions

Here's my massive FAQs page!!!! I'm dumping them all together!! I was sick and had low morale when I wrote them!! It's going to be great! If you have any questions not listed here, feel free to contact me.

Members FAQs

Do you have any active coupons for the VOD tier?

First-time subscribers can sign up for the VOD tier free, and I'd recommend signing up for the yearly tier even if you don't know if you'll still follow me a year later, then cancel your plan immediately. You need to wait for your plan to expire before using another coupon, and you don't want to get accidentally charged if you're not still interested a year later. There will be more free coupons until Fourthwall starts charging me transaction fees for free users.

Why have memberships with so few followers?

I have no plans to monetize twitch and I don't love YouTube, so I'd like to start building a catalogue of content now so if I do have folks who wanna support me down the road, there's a benefit to doing so. Still, I'm hoping to keep the majority of stuff free!

I am living in a different country and can't afford the membership rates with the current exchange, but I'd like to support you. What are my options?

Fourthwall added the option to change prices based on certain countries, so I've done my best to keep non-US/UK currencies consistent to CAD.

However, if it's still unmanageable please contact me with your country and I'll see what I can do! As a Canadian with a very low dollar, I am happy to try to accommodate you!

Please remember that the VOD tier does come with a free coupon too!

Why put VODs behind a paywall?

Fourthwall won't let me list the VODs for free to try to cover their own costs for hosting my content, and I greatly appreciate that they offer to host it for me. This is why I have the first-time subscriber coupon and then try to keep the yearly cost cheap. There will be free coupons until Fourthwall starts charging me transaction fees for free users.

I do also like having one hurdle to jump over to access my content. Sometimes I'm critical of the games I'm playing and I don't want randoms commenting on throwaway thoughts, and sometimes even VODs require some editing to put online, so it's one of of those things where they're more work than they seem to maintain and I don't want to deal with the BS that YouTube brings.

Why not use YouTube?

YouTube kept flagging the public domain music in video games as music in remixes so I wasn't allowed to use it and it was really frustrating!! I also got a lot of spam comments since it's just random content with little-to-no views. It's surprisingly time consuming to slap stuff up on YouTube and then dispute random music claims and remove spam comments constantly. It's also really discouraging! I also keep getting my account restricted, so YouTube is honestly a lot more work to maintain than its worth.

Are all VODs behind a paywall?

Unfortunately yes. After videos reach a certain length, Fourthwall needs it to be behind a paid tier so they're not losing money hosting me, which is totally reasonable! There is a free coupon for first-time subscribers, and there's one floating around after that as well.

What videos have captions?

There are auto-captions on some VODs and no captions on others. If you want auto-captions or need full captions, please just let me know! Please keep in mind the VODs are long so it may take a little while to have full edited captions, but I'll be slowly going through the backlog and adding auto-captions to them. The no-commentary real-time builds have no speaking or commentary. Any pre-records have auto-captions and I'll add edited captions if you need them!!

Why is certain content put under your "Supreme Loafer" tier?

A mix of reasons! Some stuff is personal and silly, so I'd rather it not get comments from random people. I assume if you're giving me money you're either a lurker who is interested in me or an active chatter, so I don't really mind if you look at bad drawings and have a little chuckle, or request a drawing you know is way out of my scope.

There's also more opinion-pieces I've made that I don't want people to comment on unless they are giving me money. I'm really not interested in debating randoms, and even if you give me money I'm not going to argue or engage with you if I disagree with you, but if I have to look at a comment I disagree with I might as well get paid to do it.

Streaming FAQs

Who did your PNGTuber model?

JacoTomo (NSFW)!! He's the best!!

What are you using for rigging?

PNGTuberPlus!

Do you plan on getting a vtuber model?

Not at this time! With the CAD as low as it is, it's unafforable for me right now, but I'm also not overly interested in having face-tracking on all the time. I'm rarely static in my seat (and I'm sure you can tell by how my volume changes when I lean away from the mic) and I'm not always streaming from the same room. Truthfully, I'm also sometimes in pain when I'm streaming, and I'd rather not have the model catch expression changes that are not stream-relevant, like grimacing during a romantic scene I'm actually enjoying, or something like that! I'm not saying I'll never consider it, but at this point I don't want to lay down the money if I'm not going to be able to use the face tracking.

What's your setup?

SO I'm still on the verge of making my set-up somewhat functional and I'm currently held together with sticks and gum. I'm far too lazy to constantly update as I upgrade. If this is something you'd actually want to know, please feel free to contact me and I'll make the effort to put together a list.

Who edits your videos?

Currently it's me!!!!! I take forever and I am still learning!! I can say if I ever make any money I am hiring an editor first.

What games are you planning to stream?

My discord server has an up-to-date list of stuff I'm hoping to eventually play!

I don't see "x" game on the list. Will you play it?

You can contact me if there's something you'd like to see me play! Please keep in mind I cannot play a lot of first-person games, especially ones with headbob.

A game you are planning to play, are playing, or has played in the past has a problematic creator/uses AI-generated art/has some other major issue.

If you notice it on-stream feel free to tell me, but if I keep playing close the stream (or watch someone else!) and contact me after if you're disappointed. The thing is, I might keep streaming it because I want to do my own reading about it after the stream, and I can assure you I'll edit the VOD and take it down from twitch and not post it to YouTube. If you notice it after (as a VOD or on YouTube) please contact me rather than commenting so I actually see it and don't think it's spam. If you have any research to go along with it, please send that as well.

Why don't you have chat on the screen?

I think I had chat on screen for three or four streams, and two of those times I had to blur out the chat for the VOD. It's a lot of work to remember when something happened, find that moment in a 3-6 hour VOD, blur it out, and then render that VOD again before uploading it. I am trying to get better at reading chat more clearly as it is on screen, but right now chat on screen is just not something I can manage.

I heard you say, "I'm not reading that." What did the person say?

This is usually a friend making a joke I don't want to read (generally a fart joke) or, since my mods and I know each other, sometimes they'll post a comment that I think gives away too much personal information about themselves. (They have never revealed too much about me!) Usually if someone actually says something offensive, I'll say something and/or just ban them rather than interacting. So usually if you hear me saying this, it's just a joke or me being overly internet safe rather than me ignoring something offensive!

Why are you working on x project instead of streaming?

Almost everything else I do I can juggle in with my job. I am extremely lucky to be able to do that. I also sometimes can't stream due to health reasons or burnout from my job, but I'll be fine to plug away at whatever else I have on the burner. (And sometimes I'm just laying down! I'm allowed to rest!) I also often leave the TV on while I'm working or when I'm trying to sleep, in case you want to judge my Letterboxd activity.

Why do some of your mods call you something other than Lava?

A few folks met me before the whole Lava thing and they use the internet handle they know me by! They've cleared it with me!

 

Collabs FAQs

When are you available for Collabs?

If you want me streaming live, I'm usually available between 5pm-10pm EST. I might be able to make earlier work, but currently 10pm is the cut-off for me. If you want it to be pre-recorded for YT, I might be able to make much earlier work, but I still can't work later than 10pm.

What won't you play?

Unfortunately a lot of collab games I either don't like or can't play! I don't enjoy Jackbox games, most PvP games, and most party games. I'm not interested in Roblox or any games where part of the gimmick is interacting with strangers.

If you want me to play a first-person game (like VR Chat or Lethal Company), I might only last an hour or two, and I can't do any jumping puzzles or stuff where I'm thrown around. I cannot play anything with headbob that cannot be disabled. I am physically unable to handle Minecraft (I can't even watch videos of it), it just sets off my motion sickness way too badly, which is really disappointing because I'd love to get sucked into something like that for weeks.

My health also makes me a little unreliable!! I'm honestly not a great person for collabs, but I'll do my best!!

Would you do a SWTOR collab if I haven't played before?

YEAH I would genuinely love to follow you around and help you learn the game/mechanics and stuff!! I think following BOTH of our toons' stories might be too much for viewers to follow, and it means you'll be trapped to my limited schedule, so I'd say we just focus on your story and hopefully I can get you to have enough of a grasp that you're comfortable playing solo from time to time! There's enough group content as well (flashpoints, story quests, etc), that we can always do those after your class story (or during once you're confident playing your class story solo). If you're interested we could always do something like I do with my characters, where we develop a canon for how they know each other outside of the game lore and stuff like that!! I probably won't openly roleplay my character though LMAO. I've gotten a FEW too many ERP requests for that.

What about something that's not actually multiplayer, like TinyGlade or The Sims?

Yeah! We can talk about what you'd be most interested in. We could always work from the same prompt, or we each make a base for the other to finish, or we each pick a shell to start with, or whatever! I'm fine with being on a call throughout the build or we build separately referencing the collab and then do a collab stream together where we check each other's stuff out!

How do I contact you for a collab?

You can just use my contact form or message me on bluesky! You can whisper me on twitch, but I think I have it as mutuals only and I don't always remember to check it! My contact form will be the fastest way to communicate with me!

 

Personal FAQs

Can I give you advice on what will help reduce your motion sickness?

Unless there is a specific setting in the game that I didn't see (eg. disable headbob, enable third-person mode, etc), I'd really, really rather you didn't. I've been dealing with this for at least six+ years and I do a lot of research on my own time. This isn't something I like dealing with!!!! Whenever I get advice on this, I feel like you're saying, "I don't believe you're trying hard enough" and I really have tried a hell of a lot. I'm really fucking tired of people giving me advice I've heard a thousand times before, especially when I'm either already doing it or it doesn't fucking work for me.

Can you disclose more about your health issues?

No. Anyone with hard-to-diagnose issues knows how many hoops you have to jump through to get any semblence of a diagnosis and how people feel free to give you really ignorant advice based on a random symptom you're having at the time. I have no interest in inviting that with internet strangers, and I find it extremely condescending to receive uninvited regardless of how well-meaning you're trying to be. I've had a diagnosis for one of my health issues for over twenty years, and people still feel like they know more than the specialist who's been successfully treating me for over two decades. I've even had conversations where I've said "I need to do x because that's what my specialist strongly recommends" and have had people argue with me after. Like you can just google it to see she's right, but even if you couldn't, I'm gonna follow the advice of the person who's kept me alive all this time rather than the person who's just making up bullshit so they can get what they want. So no. I might talk about bits of it on stream, but I won't be posting about it and I'll probably ignore uninvited questions about it.

I think health issues are important to talk about to remove stigmas around them. Don't you feel a responsbility to do that too?

No.

You don't talk a lot about real world issues on social media and sometimes avoid the topic on stream. Why?

So, I don't know if you've started a conversation on the internet with a random before, but a lot of people think everything is up for discussion. I have no interest in "debating" or trying to explain issues that directly harm me, my friends, or people like us to some asshole who has no interest in changing their mind.

"But what if you can change their mind?" you ask? One of my friends said something to me like, "What you think is an argument he thinks is a conversation," and it really stuck with me because I don't want to have a "conversation" that is debating whether or not my existence (or any marginalized community) has the right to exist. Sure, I believe people can change, but so much of my life is fighting to simply exist that I have no interest in expending anymore emotional energy on people who think the safety and well-being of myself and people I care about is a topic of conversation rather than an argument.

My doctor has strongly advised to avoid stress when possible, and, as you can imagine, I have a lot of normal life stresses that I don't want to add the constant reminder that the world is on fire, or listen to some asshole try to argue that my friends and I are not having their lives threatened on a daily basis when I see otherwise.

I am a trans and gay socialist. I volunteer when I can and donate to charities when I have the money to spare. I'm not going spend my time yelling into a void about issues that hurt to think about when I am just here to play some video games and relax with my friends.

Why is your discord ping-only?

I don't want to talk to people on discord.

Would you consider using Patreon instead of or in addition to Fourthwall memberships?

No. I've been burned by Patreon and I have friends who've been burned by Patreon and I'm shocked it's still being used considering how bad their practices are. I also don't like that they pretend to be pro-sex-work but blatantly aren't.

Would you consider using Ko-Fi for memberships or tips?

No. I don't want to directly offer my PayPal to anyone and I don't like that they're so anti-SW. I get that it's a Paypal thing, but if they're not even going to protect my identity, they're trying way too hard to cover their own asses when they're not even willing to stick their own out.

Why aren't you using Throne anymore?

They told me I had to celebrate Christmas to use their platform and if I didn't like it, I had to post a complaint to a public forum and maybe they'd consider implementing a change. They can go fuck themselves. Also half the time their platform didn't work (a pop-up telling me to update my wishlist couldn't be closed, preventing me from updating my wishlist?? IDK why they would even have a pop-up like that) and it took me over three weeks to receive gifts from fucking Amazon Canada. IDK I just had really, really bad experiences with Throne and forcing me to celebrate Christmas instead of my god damn birthday was really the last straw. Throne wishlist sucks.

Do you judge people who use platforms you have issues with?

Absolutely not! Sometimes I'll be disappointed I can't support them. (For example, my credit card company has Patreon blocked because they tried to charge my card over twenty times for the same monthly transaction.) Sometimes I'm surprised they're rolling the dice on a platform that doesn't support the content they create. But most of the time it's just not my business and I will still support when I can even though I don't like the processor! I am extremely privileged in that I can be choosy right now, and I totally understand that not everyone can afford to be!! That's totally fair!

Fourthwall doesn't support adult creators and you still use them.

Yes, but they also keep my information private. They also haven't lied about the type of content allowed on their platform, fired their entire security team in one go, or even tried using my credit card so many times in a row that they got blocked, all like Patreon. So I'm sticking with Fourthwall for now, but I'll move on if I need to. They're very clearly far from perfect and so far up elon and meta's ass that it feels like the writing is on the wall. I've had some pretty miserable experiences with them already, but I'm hoping they continue to be better rather than worse.

Can I contact you about what platforms you recommend or for advice on setting up a website or something along those lines?

Yes!! Please feel free to contact me!! I realize I'm just using Fourthwall and a goofy neocities website, but if you've been following me for a while you'll know I'm here because my original web host started messing up the back-end of my website and tried charging me for an upgrade I didn't request after I repeatedly fixed the back-end code. (I don't recommend Hostinger, folks!) My full-time job requires a lot of research for web hosts, domain providers, and the like. I have been creating various forms of content on the internet for over fifteen years (for a job, for personal profit, and for fun) so I have a lot of experience on different platforms and I am happy to admit when I'm ignorant in a different area (and would love to learn about it). I am also fairly budget-conscious and I'm fine being told that I'm out of touch if it turns out I'm not LMAO!

What was your side project before streaming?

I wrote pornography for the Kindle! Generative AI sucked the fun out of it and, while I hope it's temporary, I don't plan on stopping streaming in favour of it. Before you ask, I made VERY little money doing it!

Do you support GenAI?

No, and I will ban you in chat if you talk about it favourably with no explanation.

You're really critical of media sometimes and I don't think you're that good of a creator!

Cool, but, you know the saying, I don't need to be a chef to know when I'm being served shit.

Insert generic invasive personal question with identifying details.

Fuck you.

"Let me guess" generic invasive personal question with identifying details.

Fuck you also.