My target customers are on Reddit and Discord. Both communities banned AI. How do you break through?

Hi IH,

I've been building OriCards (oricards.com) — an AI trading card generator where you type any prompt and get a fully designed card complete with artwork, rarity tiers, holographic effects, and stats.

The idea came from wanting to combine two things I genuinely love — AI art and trading cards.

And before anyone asks — yes, I know the "validate before you build" rule. I did go through Reddit before building and the demand is there. It's a minority, but indie developers and tabletop designers are always looking for affordable alternatives to commissioned art. Hiring an artist for card assets isn't cheap, and that's exactly the gap OriCards fills.

A few things I've learned the hard way:

→ The hardest part isn't building the product, it's getting the first users
→ TikTok's algorithm heavily favors your local audience — breaking out geographically is harder than anyone tells you
→ Most "free" AI directories aren't actually free — almost every one I tried had a paywall at the end ranging from $39 to $497
→ Visual products need video content — I ended up learning CapCut from scratch just to produce short form content, including figuring out commercial sound licensing to avoid copyright issues

The distribution challenge I didn't see coming is probably the most frustrating one. My target audience is indie developers, tabletop game designers, and TCG lovers. But most relevant Reddit communities and Discord servers have strict no-AI rules. So the exact spaces where my people hang out are the hardest places to show up authentically.

I'm currently working around it through TikTok and YouTube content series that started last week, building domain authority from scratch (DR is sitting at 0 right now), and trying to find communities that are actually open to AI tools. The product is live at oricards.com with a Japanese language version too. But it's slow going.

Would love honest feedback on:

• Would love any insights or out of the box thinking on breaking into communities that are skeptical of AI — or any other angle I might be missing entirely.
• Any experience targeting US audience from Southeast Asia?
• How do you navigate AI-skeptical communities when your product IS the AI?

Still figuring most of this out week by week. Any thoughts appreciated.