And honestly I can personally attest to all of that. My writer doesn't pay me and I don't pay him. But we didn't meet on a forum promising each other royalties, contracts, fame or any kind of fortune. We were friends for a very long time prior (and know each other irl.) So with that there's a comfortable level of trust, accountability and reliability. We bring something to the table each other can't and because it's not actually a profit driven venture it's not even something we really think about let alone argue on. 50/50 is just /if it even happens/, and I can't honestly see how it'd be fair to argue one gets more. We both actively want to work on this project and pull equal weight contributing to it, and it's not like I think he contributes either. I know it for a fact because he sits next to me when we work.
I think the want here is the biggest factor for me. If I didn't have any personal stake in the story or didn't know the person as well, payment would be an absolute must. But in that case I would just default to my own personal short stories anyway, because what I want will always be the most efficient and stress free. There's definitely a lot of bonuses in team work but I think you have to be sort of person to even want that in the first place. This is really one of the very rare scenarios where working free can be beneficial, but there's so many variables it relies on to even be successful it's really difficult to find it in random idea-men who just pitch bare bones concepts and expect the world lol. Even if it was an amazing story, how do I know they will commit? How do I know they have good team work skills? How do I know they won't use underhanded tactics to steal profit and I won't know about it?
For a serious amateur writer who wants that sort of partnership, they need to look at not just gaining experience writing but a trust level with the artist by committing to very small projects first. Even just one page, especially if the artist has extremely little to no experience with comics. This way they can even feasibly determine if a full length project is something they would actually enjoy doing. Building relationships is far more critical really than producing the work. It's not like it can't be done, it's just always gone about in the absolute worst ways possible. At the same time though, nothing can really be built from a project that was born from purely profit driven motive because one side only loses.
This is so much a core key feature of the relationship I couldn't even stress it enough. If you're not going to pay, you have to share the story. You have to. Otherwise what's the point? You want to have your own story perfectly the way you want to be? Absolutely nothing wrong with that. You just need to pay an artist because you can't force them to care.
It definitely wasn't, that's why it was so insane haha. He really tried his best to guilt trip artists into drawing it but alas, he had no luck. If I could find it I would link it lol.
Edit: found
https://twitter.com/chemy_art/status/1028035743380381706