Application Grading Rubric Discussion

Here's the break down for each section.

SHINIGAMI
Physical Description ~ 000/200
Usually not a lot to say here,a s most of the things people are concerned with are covered in the personality section. Aside from knowing someone's hair color and body build, this section is almost always skimmed in comparison to the personality which shows more of the character's demeanor and habits. Furthermore, for Shinigami in particular, this section typically barren as people tend to focus on outfits way more than they need to and Shinigami all wear the same thing.

Personality ~ 000/500
This is always important because we're on a site dedicated to character growth and progression. This is your foundation and, for at the very least your first Milestone, this is how staff can see how far you've come. Not only that, but it lets people know pretty quickly how each other's characters will interact. It's an invaluable tool. The logic behind this scoring is the same in every section.

Power & Race-Specific Details ~ 000/500
For Shinigami, this is the core of your character. Your spirit and Inner World are massive storytelling tools for your character and are very obvious sections for the reader to understand how well the player knows their character. Like all race sections, we generally don't care too much about the power itself, rather we focus on the spirit and how that plays with the main character. Even more so than the personality, this is the main section that staff reference to see how far a character has come.

History ~ 000/300
Most Shinigami have a very similar story. There's very few exceptions. For this reason, there's not a lot of room for diversity, so we take that sort of consideration in stride. Instead, we focus more on the player's ability to identify core storytelling elements and show that they know how actions can change a character's personality. This is more of a ribbon that ties the character together, rather than the paper itself.

==========================================
QUINCY
Physical Description ~ 000/300
Quincy typically have more pressure on their appearance than other races. Since BG itself doesn't really have a norm, this is more based off what we currently have and a bit from canon traits. Typically, Quincy like to look very good and have some form of uniform. For this reason, there's a bit more room for showing that level of depth.

Power & Race-Specific Details ~ 000/200
Quincy powers and weapons almost always have no real tie into their character concept. While it does sometimes happen, it's not expected of them and we don't see a reason to really put that much weight on something that could really just be tagged into the app and not make a huge difference. Most of the scoring here comes from writing ability and some buffer room for people who do make the attempt to tie everything together.

History ~ 000/500
Similar logic to Humans/Variants, there's no real structure or set path for Quincy. There's a lot of room for creative freedom and we'd like to encourage human-based characters to really think about how and why they fit in the setting. This gives them the means, as well as the nice reward, of really taking the time to make the character work in the setting. For Quincy, this is especially encouraged due to the lack of innovation we have in the race. There's not a lot of people doing a lot of stuff. We've only just recently had an official organization.

========================================
ARRANCAR
Physical Description ~ 000/200
Admittedly, I was up in the air about this score. The main focus in this part is the hollow mask and hollow hole. The reason it's only 200 is because I don't want people to think they need crazy elaborate masks and features in order to get a solid amount of points. While that sort of creativity is what we look for mostly in this section, I don't want people to think it's any more important than any of the other races.

Power & Race-Specific Details ~ 000/400
Similar to the Shinigami, an Arrancar's AoD (Aspect of Death) is their main story telling tool. Even more obviously than the Shinigami, this reflects where the character needs to grow and shows a very clear, fundamental understanding of the character the player has. This is really important and should be treated as such. A lot of the points here are more "tie-in" points. You'll see Arrancar race section scoring highly if their AoD is present all throughout the app, rather than only just mentioned here.

History ~ 000/400
Much like Shinigami, the path to becoming an Arrancar is pretty straightforward, however they have the hard part of the vast majority of their lives being a mindless beast. However, this is a very good section to show how their AoD has corrupted them and really taken hold of their actions. Especially the decision to become an Arrancar, there's a lot of really big leaps that happen in the Arrancar's past, so there should be more wiggle room for people who identify those key areas and really hone in on them.

=======================================
HUMAN
Physical Description ~ 000/200
Basically everything I've said above.

Power & Race-Specific Details ~ 000/300
With a Human or Variant, it's really hard to judge just how important this section is. We'd rather not force people into thinking they need to have something super in depth like a Shinigami's spirit, but we want to leave wiggle room for things like that. As such, you'll notice there's an option for this section to be raised to get additional points based on the what's provided. Those points would be taken from history, naturally. That sort of situation absolutely must go through Tony or I, however, and I don't foresee it being common place.

History ~ 000/500
This is based of mostly the same reasoning as the Quincy, though even more so. Humans are difficult to really fit into the setting and with nothing really helping them out the gate, we'd really like to see people who think through the character and clearly show they know what they're doing with this character. The history isn't so much as a place to just talk about what's happened to the person, but rather show how those events shaped who they are today. That's why the history has been broken down to get rid of that pointless fluff in the middle. For humans, their should be a lot of wiggle room because there's many different ways to approach this, each with varying levels of success.