About that limit

[Wycliff]

So upon reading that there is now a limit on how many characters a person has due to mods being overhelmed by the amount of apps being submited I have a few questions and comments on the whole thing. Do note I mean no disrespect in anything I write here and if it comes off that way then I am sorry that isn't my intention.

My first set of questions is in regards to unlocking new character slots. It was said that you are required 15000 ctp. First why this amount that is higher than a class one character for most races? The follow up is given that it says only ctp doesn't that just harm people who play TT characters as they have to gain so much more tp to not be stuck with only base stats and no techs at class one. Is there going to be some way to help calculate that to help balance that cost trade off give that unless someone is training for ctp all tp gained is simply raw and the only difference is where it goes to help grow your character in one of three directions, be it class, stat or technique wise.

My second set of questions comes from a system not used by most, by possible based off of the rulings could see a ton of use. How does this limit affect NPC characters. NPC's already have their own set of rules on how to create and how many you can have at any given time. Given that this whole thing is due to being overworked by all the apps being submited besides the cost and built in limit for NPC's what's stopping someone from just making a bunch of npc's and using them as proxy characters bypassing the limits? Would NPC count towards the limit of characters? If so then would costs of npc and useage of them go down given how restrictive they are now even more so. Would raising up ctp on NPC's count towards unlocking another character if they were counted as one of the six you're allowed to have?

Finally where did this come from? I don't mean any disrespect, but this seemed to come out of left field. I understand mod's can be busy but going based off of the who's who and the apps in grading/approved this seems more like a limit put into place directed at a few members/member rather than towards the community as a whole. I've been in voice with several mods over the past few months and not once have I heard them ever complain about the amount of apps in the mod que. (maybe about who the apps belonged to or the app it's self but never the amount.) There have been alot of times where mods have said either "there's nothing in the mod que or everything else has already been claimed." So I'm just left here wondering where did this come from? If mods have been vocal about the amount of things in the mod que at all I would understand, but for months hearing only those two things above or things hinting that there wasn't much in there brings up questions about this.

As far as my questions go that's all I have to ask below are some comments about the whole system being implmented.

I've been on other fourms before that have had limits like this in place, nothing this extereme in unlocking other slots btw, but almost every single one of those seemed to either lose members quickly or have the attention focused only one one race/subgroup/ type of character leaving the rest of the groups empty and feeling rather dead. Making a character on our site isn't easy, espcially compred to other sites. The time energy and effort alone keeps alot of people from being able to make an app or even wanting to start one. The major issue I see coming from adding a hard and soft cap for characters is that one race will see a massive influx of characters and the rest will suffer to gain any at all. Let's be honest shingami are and will be the most popular characters on site and I think with this limit they will be even more popular. People that would have put shinigami characters on the back seat and go for other races making one or two other characters will now feel more pressure to simply make a shingami. While this is good for shingami overall for the site it's a bad thing. The soft and hard limits force people to pick races that are more well known and popular races rather than lesser know ones. With fifteen races (eighteen if you count how different free quincy and vreich are vizards from hollow wraiths and feral to shingami bc) being only able to freely play a fifth or sixth depending on how you count the races and at max a third of all races alot of races will feel the pressure even more than they do already and unless mods implement a lock on more popular races only a select few races will continue to grow while the rest starve for members.

I understand that grading an app takes alot of work and it isn't an easy thing to do, but this feels like an overreaction to a few people dumping out app after app after app. If being overworked by so many apps of people with multiple characters why not put in an irl time restriction of half a year after people have three or more characters without a hard limit. It would mean that people after being on the site for a year could at max have five characters but for those who have been here longer and want to stay could have the option of having more if needed. With the hard cap gone the pressure of not being able to play a race you want is gone as well as making it so that maybe once every six months a member who already has characters throws up an app. Because right now as the rules are there is nothing stopping someone from using hollows to abuse the fuck out of this system by making a class 8 hollow app doing a solo training to consume enough to get to class one, mask break and do a quick fight to get the last 1000 needed ctp unlocking that fourth spot to make another hollow and do the same, rinse and repeat till all six slots are open then buy pills to delete the mask break arrancars have six slots unlocked and it only taking under a year if someone just puts in the effort.(which btw would be mods grading six apps to abuse the system 3 hollows and 3 mask break arrancar)

[Zeich Yajuu]

Alright, I'll address questions one at a time.

1) Why are we going for a 15,000 CTP requirement?

The reason we decided on a 15,000 CTP requirement is because that is generally the progress needed to hit Class 1, with exceptions being Quincy (17k) and Fullbringers/Beast-Clansmen (16k). The reason we aimed for this goal is because our intent is to have people actually develop, grow, and play their characters before moving on to the next one. This statement is not indicating that players currently aren't playing their characters to their fullest - many of our members with many characters play all of them to some extent, so this is not directed at anyone in general, but more the intent behind the decision.


2) Why only CTP? If I get TTP, why doesn't it count towards that 15,000 mark?

While technique learning and SP gains are part of a character's growth, they are mostly a mechanical gain. Yes, techniques and stats are used in combat, but at the same time, they're not what defines your character. How your character grows as they progress through Classes and thus ranks either within their organizations or as mercenaries will often define them more than the techniques they learn. Before the argument comes up that CTP is also a mechanical gain - a true statement, I won't deny - it unlocks far more progression possibilities than learning new techniques or growing in stats. We want to see the growth and development of characters, as our end goal.

Yes, that does mean that it can be harder for a TT character to unlock a new character slot, by virtue of feeling a need to gain techniques that you do not start with and needing to cap SP. But at the same time, the requirement for unlocking a new character slot, 15,000 CTP, has not changed. If you choose to take side routes along the way to advance SP and TTP, that is your decision, but logically, you have the same options as anyone else regardless of starting point to earn CTP. You can train, you can go on adventures, and you can have PVP. Are you at a disadvantage in these situations? Yes, I won't deny that statement. But you can pick and choose your battles and RP partners, as well, and focus on CTP growth if all you're interested in is a zerg to a new character slot. The work required to reach a character slot is the same for both PT and TT; it's just the paths you choose to take along the way that make the latter a longer trek.


3) How does this affect NPCs?

As you said in your statement, their natural costs and limitations on creation help balance them out, as well as the cost for implementing them in threads. Additionally, an NPC application tends to be far simpler than an RPC one, so the workload is strictly reduced. As of yet, we've seen maybe two or three NPCs, and if people choose to submit them, we will work with them as we need to and see where things go from there. Beyond that no, they do not count as taking up character slots. Additionally, your comment on them earning CTP is moot, as NPCs don't level by TP; they level by payment, as seen in Section 10.


4) Where did this come from?

While we may not have been outwardly vocal at the number of applications going on, we still have quite a few that come up. Currently, our queue has ten items in it, and five of them are apps, with two of them being large-scale power CIUs similar on par for the necessity of properly balancing them, so roughly 70% of our current workload is applications or similar. As a result of just how much workload tends to come in the form of new applications, to the point where we sometimes have difficulty actually posting and playing the game as opposed to doing work all the time, we decided that this was the best course of action.


From here, I'm going to be generally extrapolating points from your comments section.


5) Could this cause a negative effect because people flock to the more popular races, leaving a strict imbalance because people are limited to how many races they can play a character in?

Possibly. This will be a point of observation, and if it is deemed to have enough of a negative effect, we will take action. Currently, however, we do have a wide spread selection of races even with people who only have a few characters, so we do not feel that there will be such an impact just yet. Again, however, we will monitor the long-term results of this as we go.


6) What about a time-gated system?

I don't feel that it's an efficient way of handling things. We have a lot of members who may go AWOL for a month or more at a time, for example. If we added a system for activity, it would be unfair for those whose RL prevents them from constantly being around to have a harder time unlocking characters, yet at the same time, if we didn't, that means a person can get character slots with next to no effort at all. It'd be too difficult to balance as opposed to a static "earn this much progress.'


7) What about abuse using Mask Break Hollows?

In the event that abuse is evident, we will crack down as needed, and if possible, may have to invalidate progress depending on how blatant the abuse is. Hollows do have an easier time of growth with consumption, but they'd still have to put in a lot of work given our requirements for paragraphs of work to match consumption. In the end, I don't see this being a major issue, but we will be wary for abuse from members. Note that willingly abusing a loophole is considered a warnable offense, however.