Hello all, we’re in the middle of the staff meeting and in passing reviewing Custom Kits, it came up that we maybe don’t have a clear view of what “Non-Arg” and “Arg” Custom Kits mean anymore. The concept was kind of lost in the various changes we applied to the system without really sitting down and thinking about our policies on these kinds of Custom Kits, so we’re applying a few ideological changes to how we review Custom Kits.

Firstly, we are doing a 3-minute “Can we actually come up with an Argumentation for this Arg Custom Kit that we just rejected?” This is a courtesy for players who maybe feel stuck getting routinely rejected for bad argumentations, but won’t really be a saving grace. If we can’t come up with an Argument for you, we will try to tell you why this is, which may or may not be helpful creating a better foundation to future argumentation formulation.

Secondly, we want to clarify what Argumentation and non-Argumentation really means.

Argumentation Custom Kits

Argumentation Custom Kits are based on the idea that you will be empowered, for providing good rp/activity to others, and giving others a reason to log on and roleplay. This means your Character faces greater opposition (usually) or does something special that needs more empowerment to deal with the inevitable grind of being the tool used by other players to have more activity. Obviously driving activity on the server should be fun, but it can sometimes be a slog, so us giving you more special powers should off-balance the community contribution.

Non-Argumentation Custom Kits

Non-Argumenation Custom Kits are based on the idea that our abilities are very broad, and cannot fulfill certain niche functions players may want. For example, I am playing X Character invested in Firearms, but I want Firearms to be more like Ana from Overwatch, far less damage, more utility. Firearms Point Buy simply does not allow this, so I am applying for a non-Argumentation Custom Kit so that Abilities that I would normally already Point Buy can instead be custom written for the niche I want.

So basically. If you need to be more powerful, you apply for an Argumentation Custom Kit with an Argumentation. If you need things you already do, to do something slightly different (but not distinctly more powerful) then Non-Argumentation Custom Kit is for you. When we review Argumentation Custom Kits, we consider the Argumentation foremostly, if we review a Non-Argumentation Custom Kit, we just review if the thing the player is asking for cannot already be done some other way, and whether we want to see that particular niche in the current rotation.

We have already applied this “courtesy” 3 minute review to all current outstanding Applications, and also reviewed them all as if they were Argumentation because we had a bunch of functionally Argumentation applications without an Argumentation attached.

It should be noted that being rejected for Argumentation means not you are by default a bad roleplayer. It just means that what you are proposing isn’t actually as cool for other people as you think it is, not all types of forced antag/bully rp for example are good/rewarding unless you understand/are able to live out the very specific habits that a lot of players just aren’t suitable for.