In the past, I have purchased a few commissions and YCH's from artists that never completed the work and I have had friends or friends of friends experience this same problem. In many cases, there seems to be no recourse for buyers, especially if you use PayPal. Why? Most transactions are done as personal transfers, and PayPal offers no financial protection for the sender in this situation. I have had a few artists specifically ask for personal transfers and it is usually of that pool that I have had the most issues in the past.

You will notice I am not naming any names, and that is due to FA's policies because they would count it as name shaming. A policy I understand but find ridiculous that they allow for commission and the organization of purchase but offer little in review for the provider of a product. Which is what we are dealing with, those that purchase art are buying a product from those that supply and create our artwork for us. In this case, names are not required. Many who read this will have experienced the same as I and others, and for those that have not personally experienced it, you will know someone who has. You as a buyer have the right to financial protection for your purchase, but it is up to you to ensure you take the necessary steps to provide such protection for yourself. I will share what has worked for me in the past.

1. Do not use PayPal.me links - unless you have purchased from the artist before, and have never experienced issues in all your time with them, do not use PayPal.me links provided to you. These are counted as personal transactions, and not covered by PayPal's dispute methods.

2. Do not send money as a personal gift, use the buying Goods or Services option - Some artists will not be happy with this, they price their work at a specific amount, and when you buy a good or service via Paypal the fee is deducted from the seller, not the buyer. So if you are paying for a commission that is $40 the seller may only get 39.05 or whatever is left after PayPal takes its fee.

3. Carefully read the artists policies - One artist I dealt with would not return any money unless he/she hadn't returned even a sketch of your commission in five months. You may recognize this as well beyond the timeframe most financial institutions will handle disputes on a transaction. With artists that require payment upfront, it is important to make sure what their turn around time is. Intentional or not taking months to get back to you puts you at risk of never seeing your money again unless they decide to give it back. Avoid artists with refund terms that extend MONTHS out, this is for your protection. YOU are the buyer, YOU are paying for something, and YOUR rights should also matter.

4.Look at the artist's Activity - If you notice an artist doing tons of YCH's while also accepting tons of commissions without finishing previous ones consider this a big flashing red alert. Granted there are many artists that work in a backlog constantly and communicate with their customers but be wary because many will take months and may even decide months down the road not to finish or do your piece at all.

5.Read comments on posts, journals or even shouts on the user page - this can be difficult in some cases, an artist I had commissioned had taken 6 months to complete my piece, it was a YCH and I had noticed newer YCH's were being completed over mine. I did see comments from other customers that complained about waiting 7 months to a year and still having nothing. The problem with this was my comments and the comments of others got deleted minutes after they were posted. So it is possible but difficult.

Those are five things I take into consideration any time a purchase a new commission or YCH. Commissioning is a commercial activity, there is a transaction between two or more people of financial nature in return for a completed product. Yes, commissions can take time, and this is something every buyer should consider, but there is a reasonable turnaround and then there is not doing right by the customer. Artists have the right to go about their lives and use their talents and skills to earn an income and work within their method. However, you as the buyer also have the right to receive what you pay for, receive in a reasonable amount of time depending on the medium being used and beforehand discussions with the artist, and have financial security in your purchase. You MUST provide your own security by purchasing things the right way. If an artist asks you to use an alternate payment platform check and make sure that the platform provides YOU with a method of disputing payment if things get out of hand on your purchase. Yes, there are artists that get screwed over, which is just as bad as buyers getting screwed over. Sadly I have nothing to say to help artists, all the practices I take now are from me buying art and never getting it and seeing my money fly away forever.

Would be nice if FA just allowed us to review artists. Same for artists reviewing buyers.

So I have only written a few on this site so far, however, I did want to clarify a couple of questions I have received both via notes and via SL Ims. I am still working to build the general universe that surrounds my main sona and that of my partners, so a lot of things I can't answer yet because simply I don't know. Not all of the questions though relate to the content of the stories themselves so I would like to share those too.

Do I plan to write more?

Yes, when the mood strikes me. I cannot force myself to generate a new story, I have to be in the mood and the mindset to do so, otherwise, my creative juices just don't flow properly and the story comes out wrong.

Do I plan to continue adventures with a god?

Yes, I am actually working on the next chapter. However, as with the first question I have to be in the mindset for it. I had a hard time with the third chapter because I just wasn't feeling that story at the time.

Is my character always a god?

Yes and no, confusing I know. The world I built in which my stories take place is a multiverse structure. In some stories, the character may show no divinity what so ever, however, the divine variant of the character is present in all universes in one form or another, and does have a connection to the physical manifestation. The way I write my character, which is also my fursona, is as a very chaotic being prone to bouts of boredom and experimentation. Simply put some stories in which he does not show signs of divinity are ascribed to an experiment to exploring the many facets of mortality.

Do I plan to do commissions?

I honestly do not know, there doesn't seem to be much of a market for commissioned stories and I wouldn't know how to do pricing. That and I do not think I am well versed enough, or well known enough to share my stories. If this is something people want just let me know.

Are people able to draw things from what I write?
Absolutely! The only thing I ask is that you credit the source material, and let me know.

Why did I choose Alex Moon?

Okay so I don't actually remember when I started going by Alex, for years I went by Loralai and for many people that is still my name. The full name of my fursona is Alex Loralai Moon. Moon was a surname chosen based on a family I have in SL with the surname Moonwall. I shortened it to Moon when I started writing smaller stories among friends. Moon, however, wasn't chosen due to the association of wolves with the moon, har har, it was because in many cultures the moon is a source of omens. It was actually a perfect combination with my partners Icajunihy Usevoruna, and while I am not sure why she chose her name the way she did, storywise I have it as associated with the stability and formation of the universe.

Am I anything like my character?

Aside from the godly powers and immortality yes. Though I am not 7 feet tall XD close enough though at 6'8". The personality of my character is derived from my own both good and bad. On second life or other virtual worlds I am always In-character playing my role, and many of the roleplays I participate in give me inspiration for the stories I write.

Why gods?

They are interesting, more so than what people give them credit for. A lot of people do not like divinities because the people who play or write them will go too far. Things get boring when a character can do absolutely anything and be unchallenged. My character is a primal god yes, omnipotent, and omniscient as long as he chooses to access 'divine knowledge'. But omnipotence is only there in his true form. The form most seen in my stories is a physical manifestation that is bound by very strict rules and rituals. This is done for two reasons in the story; First, His influence as chaos would cause the boundaries between reality and imagination to degrade to the point that reality and thought were no different. Chaos's influence is what gives rise to the changing seasons, evolution, the slow and steady constant change in the universe. Without his seals, his influence would be magnified and the flow of change would accelerate to an unsustainable rate. Second, these seals help hide him from groups that would want to utilize his power for their own ends. Icas character Order also has similar seals and for similar reasons. Orders influence is what gives stability to everything, without her seals the universe would stagnate and be forced into still perfection.

Outside of the story, it is a plot point that allows me to add limiters to my character and allow for growth and struggle. I am sure that was obvious though.

Why do I refer to chaos and order as primal gods?

So this question was brought up by a few friends in one of my Discord servers. In my world, there are two major categories for gods. There are Primal Gods, aka Alex and Ica, and there are gods which come with their own subcategories. Primal gods are gods that emerged from the void and gained sentience without being formed from it by an outside force. They made the entire cosmos and gave birth to the other gods. However, primal gods did not create mortal life. This was done by the other gods through the reasons why have yet to be released yet and are part of a future chapter in "adventures with a god" So you will just have to read that to find out. As for the other gods these are classified as Creator Gods, Major Gods, Minor Gods. So you could view the primal gods as similar to the Titans in Greek mythology.

What types of limiters are in place?

So like I said before, one reason why a lot of people don't like roleplaying or reading things about divinities is that the players or writers go the whole hog on the all-powerful aspect of a god. There is no struggle, no growth, no risk. So the story is boring and stagnant. As you may have read in the first chapter of 'Adventures with a god' my character is able to be beaten in a simple game. He can make mistakes, be injured, lose, be captured, or even have his physical body damaged beyond his ability to regenerate. Yes, it is difficult but it is possible. How does that last one work though? Yeah, I was asked that lol. So how it works is Alex or Ica have to manifest in a physical form, this form is flesh and blood but it is a construct of divine power so it is also more durable. However, if their physical body takes too much damage they are forced back into the celestial plane by their seals, the reason being is it would require too much of their godly power to repair the body and it would cause their seals to break. They can manifest again but it could take months or years to do so without substantial sacrifice from the mortal plane to summon them.

Another limiter in place is the time limit. They can only remain on the mortal plane for a specified period. Alex as the primal influence of Chaos is only able to stay on the mortal plane for a year, his power constantly degrades the seals keeping his influence in check and those seals will have to be renewed. As long as his body is not severely damaged before renewal he can leave and return to the mortal plane in a matter of days. Orders power is different. Order is bound by chaotic seals where Alex has Order based seals. Order is able to remain in the mortal plane for a little over a century before having to return to the celestial plane.

Are there demigods running about?

Yes :P

Are Alex and Ica able to influence the world from the celestial plane

Yes. In their true forms, they have full access to their divine power, and they are able to mold the cosmos to their will. However, they do not. Once the universe as it is in the story was put into motion they decided to let it go its own course. There are times in which they may interfere, such as resurrections and other miracles or even disasters, but these events are rare.

What powers do they have?

So I took this question in the context of their physical forms. Both Alex and Ica are able to manipulate reality to a point. A good example would be changing someone from one species/gender to another, manipulate the weather and other elements of nature, and various other powers you would find in fantasy novels. They can tear holes into other dimensions and planes of existence, and practically teleport anywhere they wish. They have superior strength and speed as well as heightened senses. Their blood and other fluids, yes even the sexy ones, contain portions of their power and can be used for healing and various other magical shenanigans. Ica is better at healing, a skill which with her is often painless, whereas Alex forces an accelerated healing which can be painful to some degree. There may be other powers but I have yet to come up with them if you would like to suggest some feel free!

What kind of weaknesses do they have?

Again I took this in the context of their physical forms. They aren't like Superman where they have a specific kryptonite that has to be used to weaken them. Spells using their opposing element would work well enough and blessed weapons as well. You can bind their powers, and even trick them. Alex can be arrogant and overly cocky, causing him to lose focus. Ica can be irritated to the point she loses sight of other things around her other than what is pissing her off.

Can you use our characters in your own work?

I can only answer for mine. If you want to use my character in something please ask me first, I will want to know what you will want to use him/me for, and I would like it to remain somewhat in-character for him. For Ica you will just have to ask her.


Those were the major questions I got. If you have other questions feel free to note me or place them in the comments. I would prefer comments though as it lets others see as well that way I dont have to answer the same question twice :D. You can also give me suggestions or ideas, things you think I can do better on to make my stories more enjoyable. For those of you looking for more NSFW stuff it is on the way. Once I stop using it as fap material >.>