Frequently asked questions

Getting started

What is Aether Observer?

A story that keeps growing, at your pace. You create a story, add what happens next (or let the story invent it), and chapters tell what happened — building up a real, continuous history the story remembers as it goes.

How are the chapters written? Is this AI?

Yes. Chapters are written by AI (a large language model) from what you add: the events you describe, or the session notes you type or photograph into a TTRPG Log. Behind the scenes, the story keeps a separate, permanent record of what actually happened, and every chapter is written from that record, so it stays consistent with everything before it. Before a chapter is saved, it's checked against that history. Comic panels and portraits are AI-generated images, and chapter narration uses an AI-generated voice. What you type yourself is kept exactly as you wrote it. More on how we use AI.

I added an event — why isn't there a new chapter yet?

Events and chapters are two separate, deliberate steps. Adding an event just gets it interpreted and folded into the story's state; nothing is narrated until a chapter actually gets written. Look for the “Write the next chapter” button right below the event form on your story's page.

Does a chapter ever get written automatically?

No. Your story only moves on when you add something and press “Write the next chapter”, so taking a night (or a month) off never costs you anything. The showcase stories on the homepage are the one exception: they write a chapter each day on their own, as demos.

What does the Autonomy slider do?

It controls how often new events get added on top of yours — consequences of what you introduced, and background events you never asked for — and how far they get taken. Low keeps a story quiet and mostly user-driven; high means more frequent, higher-stakes developments happening on their own.

What's “Narrative focus”?

Character-driven story tells one continuous personal narrative. Story / civilization simulation spreads chapters across concurrent regions, factions, or storylines instead of a single throughline — better suited to a story that's more about a whole society than one protagonist. TTRPG session log is built for feeding in your real tabletop session notes and letting the table's own history write itself, nothing invented.

What's “Language suited for age”?

It adjusts how simple the language stays for new events and chapters — useful for a children's story. “15+ (mature romance)” is the one exception to that: it opts a story into on-page romantic/intimate content (tasteful, never graphic), and reading it — not just writing to it — requires being signed in. “Automatic” leaves it unchanged.

Characters, places & comics

What's the Characters page? (Lore in a TTRPG Log)

Everyone and everywhere a story has come to know, in one browsable place — characters, places, and storylines, each with their own page. It fills in on its own as your events and chapters mention people and places; you can also add a relationship between two characters, or a note, directly from their page.

What are tokens?

The currency behind the extras: a character or place portrait, a comic-strip panel, rewriting a chapter, narrating a chapter, or editing a TTRPG session's notes past the free edits. Plans with a + come with a set number of pictures each month, refilled on the 1st and used first; whatever's left doesn't carry over. Tokens are separate and never expire: free accounts get a one-time gift when they sign up, everyone earns a bonus token for every 7-day streak, you get more for inviting friends, and you can buy token packs from the Tokens page. See Pricing for the exact numbers per plan.

Can I turn a chapter into a comic strip?

Yes — from a published chapter's own page. It costs one token per picture, and you choose how many pictures (up to 10, or 20 on the ++ plans). In a story's Settings you can set its usual comic size, or have a comic made for every new chapter. Characters your story already knows keep the same look picture to picture.

Privacy & sharing

Is my story private?

Yes, by default — visible only to you. It only becomes visible to anyone else if you take one of three deliberate, opt-in actions: share it directly with another account, list it on Discover, or share one specific chapter via its own public link. Nothing is ever made public automatically. It is also hidden from the site's admin screens: staff see it only as “Private story”, and every time an admin action reaches a particular story it is written to a log.

Can search engines or the AI see my private story?

Search engines can't: private stories need you to sign in, and they are marked so Google and others don't list them. To write your story, its text is sent to the AI provider we use. It is sent privately through the provider's paid developer service, which doesn't use it to train its AI models. It may be kept briefly for safety checks, and it is never shown to anyone else.

What's the difference between Showcase, Discover, and my own story?

Showcase stories are public demos I (the site owner) run myself. Discover is real users' own stories that they've chosen to list publicly. Everything else — the overwhelming majority of stories — is private by default and visible only to you.

I shared one chapter's link — what can someone see with it?

Just that one chapter's text — nothing else about your story (no other chapters, no settings, no way to find or identify the story it came from). You can revoke a share link at any time from that chapter's own page, which also lets you generate a fresh one.

If I list a story on Discover, does it show my real username?

No — never. You can set a separate display name just for Discover from the “Discover” tab in your account menu, or leave it blank to stay anonymous.

Accounts & limits

What are the free-tier limits?

2 active stories at once (finished stories don't count), 5 events a day, 30 chapters a month (up to 3 a day) shared across all your stories, and a lifetime cap of 75 published chapters per story. A story's first chapter doesn't count. Daily limits reset every day and monthly ones on the 1st; the lifetime cap doesn't end a story, it just pauses it — upgrading picks it up again exactly where it left off, nothing is lost. See Pricing for the full comparison, including tokens and how much of a story's own history each tier remembers.

What are story details?

Everything the AI keeps in mind about your story: the facts it picks up from each chapter, plus every character and place. Each plan has a limit on the total (see Pricing). In a story that has gone past it, characters and places always stay, but the AI remembers fewer of the older facts when it writes, so old plot points can start to slip. Nothing is ever deleted, and upgrading gives it the room back. You'll see a warning on the story before it gets there.

What happens if I delete a story?

It's permanent and immediate — every event, chapter, and piece of story state goes with it. There's no undo, so make sure before you confirm.

How do paid plans work?

Real, self-serve subscriptions from Pricing — pick a plan and subscribe there directly, no waiting on anyone. Prices are in US dollars. Manage or cancel from the same page, or your account's Subscription tab.

Is there a minimum age to use Aether Observer?

Yes — you must be at least 13. If you're under 15, we recommend using it with a parent or guardian's supervision. This applies regardless of which visual theme you pick for a story, including the “Kids” theme (that's a cosmetic colour/font choice for the reading experience, not an age setting).

Guides

Short guides to getting the most out of it, starting with turning tabletop session notes into a campaign story (with pages for D&D, Pathfinder and Call of Cthulhu). All guides →

What's not built yet

Can I export my story as a book or PDF?

Not yet — it's a planned feature, not something you can do today.

Is there a podcast feature?

Not as a podcast yet, but any chapter can now be narrated aloud in a natural voice from its page (1 token; replays are free).