Hey, finally got around to making a proper post. Maybe there will be more platforms one day, but for now, Chub and Janitor will always be the foundation (or until their untimely demise).

I'm doing this for you, my favorite creators, but also for my players. As a character creator, I sincerely want my players to get the most enjoyment out of the best models.

Crushon and Yodayo fall into the category of platforms that provide their own AI models. They are responsible for keeping the AI running, they set the prices, and they impose the limitations. And because these sites act as the providers themselves, the limitations are as follows:

Crushon - For free, you get a MEAGER 8k token context (more than half of which will be eaten up by the character card and instructions), and the AI's responses are cut down to a couple of paragraphs, capped at 200 tokens. AT THE HIGHEST PRICE TIER, the context memory is still ridiculously tiny: 24k tokens. And that's for $200 a month. Oh, and no unlimited models for chatting, they delete your old chats, and a bunch of other crap.

Yodayo - You get 16k context for free, which is undeniably better. There's also a completely free model that most people use. Responses are only 300 tokens, but overall, 16k context and 300-token responses don't allow for complex and rich roleplay, and the free model is very dumb. For the top subscription price, you can get 64k context—which is a decent and comfortable size for complex scenarios—for just €42 a month.

On both of these sites, they are the sole providers of the models; you can't connect your own from an external source.

Chub and Janitor are different in this regard. On both of them, you can use your own APIs directly from the AI provider, like Gemini from Google. The setup process differs on each, but generally, since the site itself only processes the chat and doesn't pay for the AI, they don't impose such limitations. By connecting a proxy, you can increase the context to 128k tokens!!! This allows for not only complex character cards but also maintaining memory of a rich plot and handling detailed instructions. Of course, context size doesn't solve issues with the quality of the model from the provider itself. But compare that to 24k context for $200.

Unfortunately, Chub is limited in which proxies you can connect. Chub is also completely transparent, giving you full access to a character's definition (description, scenario). Janitor might seem more closed-off, but in reality, even if you disable proxies and force players to use the dumb, slow, 8k context model just so no one can read what you wrote inside, it's actually easier to rip your character from Janitor than from Yodayo. I'll share that lifehack some other time.

But honestly, it's BETTER for your players if they know what's inside the character definition. Because both sites function more like character archives anyway.

SillyTavern itself is a user interface that saves your chats LOCALLY and connects via external APIs (or internal ones, but is your rig powerful enough for that?). To save a character in SillyTavern, you obviously have to access its internal data. It's literally a document on the user's hard drive, even if it was saved from a link.

What makes SillyTavern great is that it offers the most flexible settings. You can configure:

* Context over 128k (not recommended, but might make sense for huge models like Gemini and Grok. It's your money or your methods for using it for free).

* Responses of any length.

* Set up auto-hiding 'thinking' text at the start of a response, where you can force the model to process context and character information. It really helps with logical consistency.

* Configure summarization in the most optimal way.

* Fine-tuned and flexible prompt settings.

* Scripts. Info blocks. Image generation via your APIs. HTML, and much, much more.

Honestly, it's complicated. You have to read guides, look for presets... You could just stick with the simpler sites that let you connect YOUR OWN API. There are providers that give free or dirt-cheap access to great models that others sell for a high price. Claude excluded, but oh well.

In any case... don't roleplay on Crushon. And to my other favorite creators...

Can I get copies of your characters on Chub? Please?