12-16-2010, 01:43 AM
There were a couple of problems with the "staff decides when someone gets a power-up" method. The first, and most blatant, or which was simply that it was the staff deciding, not the member themselves. While it usually wasn't an issue, I specifically remember someone (no idea who; this was way back when) getting upset because their getting a power-up during a saga wrecked the personal storyline they had been halfway through when the broke out for the saga. It sounds like a stupid complaint, and that's definitely the most extreme example of it, but it gets to the core issue of why we decided to let people buy Power-Ups: we wanted them to have as much freedom with their character's evolution as possible.
Yes, there are some who just went straight for the power-up without much care for when and why their character got it, and that was a foreseen consequence of our decision, but there were also people who worked the power-up into their storyline, purchasing it when it made the most sense for the character (as opposed to the member). Did this cheapen what it meant to have a power-up? Yes, it did, but the payout was allowing people to create more intricate and engrossing storylines by combining Out-of-Character achievements with their writing.
While that was the primary reason for purchasable Power-Ups, the secondary reason was simply that we're not going to be able to read everyone's writing, outside of a situation where its necessary to keep up with all the active members (a saga, for example). Even if we did do that, history has shown that members would start looking at who got power-ups for what and attempting to quantify what a Power-Up was worth and writing towards what they saw as the "goal." It ended up feeling like a situation where, if people were going to be doing it anyway, we might as well standardize it.
That, for now. It's understood that a blanket power-up > non-power-up might not be the best way to go, but that's where we stand at the moment.
Yes, there are some who just went straight for the power-up without much care for when and why their character got it, and that was a foreseen consequence of our decision, but there were also people who worked the power-up into their storyline, purchasing it when it made the most sense for the character (as opposed to the member). Did this cheapen what it meant to have a power-up? Yes, it did, but the payout was allowing people to create more intricate and engrossing storylines by combining Out-of-Character achievements with their writing.
While that was the primary reason for purchasable Power-Ups, the secondary reason was simply that we're not going to be able to read everyone's writing, outside of a situation where its necessary to keep up with all the active members (a saga, for example). Even if we did do that, history has shown that members would start looking at who got power-ups for what and attempting to quantify what a Power-Up was worth and writing towards what they saw as the "goal." It ended up feeling like a situation where, if people were going to be doing it anyway, we might as well standardize it.
Quote:they're outmatched on the purely stat level
That, for now. It's understood that a blanket power-up > non-power-up might not be the best way to go, but that's where we stand at the moment.
![[Image: Kaden2.jpg]](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v403/Nezumi16/Sigs/Kaden2.jpg)
"It's on my brain, driving me insane. It's on my mind, all of
the time, and if it left... I would be fine."