Hey guys. It's that time! The OOTS 2017 Monster Calendar is on pre-sale, like, right now. Wanna see the cover? Sure you do.



And here's a page. The first page, in fact:



As usual, the calendar is an Ookoodook exclusive, for all sorts of logistical reasons that lI won't go into here. But you can pre-order it here, now.

I will do my best to answer questions in the thread, but here's an FAQ composed of mainly the same questions people ask me every year on this thread:

Q: Where can I order this calendar?
A: Here, at this link: Order of the Stick 2017 Monster Calendar

Q: If this is a pre-sale, when do you expect the calendars to ship?
A: We are aiming for all pre-orders to shipped by December 9th. This is the same timeframe we target every year—and miss every year. So we're getting started a few weeks earlier without moving up the expected in-stock date, in the hopes that we can actually meet our intended goal. However, we cannot promise that the calendar will ship before December 9th, and we certainly cannot formally guarantee that everyone will receive their calendar in time for the winter gift-giving holiday of their preference. That's our planned schedule, but if we miss those dates please don't come here and yell at me that I swore a blood oath to deliver them on time.

Q: Will there be a charity donation with this year's calendar?
A: Yes! We'll be donating $2 per calendar pre-ordered to one or more no-kill animal shelters. I haven't nailed down which ones—I have few personal favorites—but they'll be local to here in Philadelphia, or Houston, where the Ookoodook warehouse is located. Last year we were able to donate $1536.00 to MercyCorps, and I'd love to exceed that this year.

Q: Are those monsters on the cover representative of the monsters that are featured in the calendar?
A: Nope! A few are, but mostly I just drew a bunch of random monsters for the cover.

Q: Hey, I don't see the holiday ornament, does this mean there's not one this year?
A: No, there will definitely be a holiday ornament this year, along with at least a few t-shirts. But I haven't finished the art for them yet, and we have issues every year with the calendar getting printed and shipped. I made a decision to try to sell the calendar earlier this year to maximize the number of people who will get their calendars on time. The holiday ornament will be available probably around November 21st or so. The holiday ornaments are here! Scroll down to the end of the post to see a picture, or head on over to the CafePress shop to get them.

Q: Should I wait until you put the holiday ornament on sale before ordering the calendar?
A: You certainly can, but there's no real benefit to doing so. The ornament will be sold by CafePress, not Ookoodook, and we can't plausibly combine shipping for items from the two different vendors. You won't save any money on shipping by waiting.

Q: Why are the overseas shipping costs from Ookoodook so high?
A: Because Ookoodook is a very small company that is bringing these to the post office, and that's what the US Postal Service charges for an international package that can be tracked these days. Yes, Amazon charges less for shipping. Ookoodook is not Amazon.

Q: I hate that you waste your comic-drawing time on this stuff and wish you'd spend all of your waking hours producing the next comic and/or Kickstarter story.
A: OK, well, here's the thing: The calendar and CafePress stuff takes me maybe around three weeks of drawing time, total, and generates enough income to let me pay my bills for a few months. During that time, I am free to work on the regular comic or the long-overdue Kickstarter material without having to worry about paying my rent. In fact, this stuff is incredibly efficient in regard to how long they take me to finish versus how much time they give me before I need to figure out where the money for next month's bills are coming from. So even if you don't want the calendar or the ornament, understand that putting them out is what allows me to keep working on the free comic.

Q: OK, but...where's the next comic?
A: There will be a new one up later this morning, after I get all this promo stuff in place.

If there are any other questions about the calendar, feel free to ask them below.

EDITED TO ADD:

The 2016 Holiday Ornaments are now on sale. Here's a look:



You can get those from the CafePress shop as usual. In addition, the 12 previous designs in the "snowfall" series are also on sale, so if you missed out on any of those, you can pick them up now. Thanks!