tl;dr, the conditions can be summarized with:
But in all seriousness, you (and a few others I won't name, you know who you are, guys and gals) are the very example of how a great creator (regardless of the creation) becomes even greater due to their interaction with the fanbase. I dare say that this is actually this proximity that makes peoples want to support you even more. I know you're on my list, had I the fund to support multiple devs... :/
Lol. Yeah, it's sad that it has to be said. But we've received some offers and after a quick search, seeing how they behave on the forums right here at F95 I've had to say, "No, sorry." I don't want to be a part of whatever bullshit you're up to.
I get it, I do. Devs want to make money so they can do this full time. I'm one of them. But like you said, you're a fan of ours but don't have the funds. But what if you hit the lottery tomorrow? There's no chance in hell I'll get any support then if I've been giving you shit for the last year in the forums.
Plus there are all kinds of other ways besides money to help devs out, and people do that for us all the time. Just talking about our game and letting other people know is a huge help. You might not be a financial supporter, but by being a social supporter you help financial supporters find us.
Talking about the game, putting banners in sigs. Those are all things that help us. Even posting in the forums at all is good for us because it gets us in the "latest replies" and people see us there.
And no joke, there have been several ideas proposed to us right here in this thread that we never thought of, but that were so great that immediately became story elements we wanted to explore (pregnancy for example). That kind of feedback is good and is going to make the game so much richer. Great suggestions come from everywhere, not just patreon.
On a more personal note, I also don't want to be a fucking hypocrite. I've pirated games, still pirate games, and pretty much every dev here has pirated a game or two. So who the hell am I to segregate people into paying vs non-paying players. And I am personally a patron of several developers on my private account, and our group account Ianvs Software, redirects some of our monthly Patreon intake to other devs we want to see succeed.
Anyway, I gotta climb off this soapbox before it gets too high.
But thank you for being one of our players and thank you for keeping up with us. And hopefully, one day you get that six figure job and can help support me in landing a five figure job that will let me do this kind of work all day long every day.
Cheers mate!