The Rubric.

[Saxon]

I think the rubric should be open for restructuring if this doesn't work out well.

I still don't see the necessity of the wildcard since the entire rubric is meant to give the Judge an area of discretion by design. If a judge likes something that I wrote, he can mention it and apply the appropriate amount of points in the area it pertains to at his discretion. There is no need for an area of the rubric to allocate bonus points that aren't bonus points at all considering they are weighted by the overall score anyway. But hey, if giving 10 points to a judge makes them feel empowered or some shit that they can tack on a plus 10 making my score jump from an 80 to a 90 regardless of what their reasoning for it is, go for it. I suppose in the end, I win either way.

I think action and dialogue were pivotal points to the rubric we used, and removing them or dare I say.. relabeling them under new definitions in an effort to strengthen the fight in The War On Bunnying, was a very bad mistake. Honestly, how often do we deal with powergaming on this site? Really. It seems like it would be common sense to those who have been on this site long enough that blatant bunnying or powergaming would be detrimental to one's score, so doing so would be against one's interests and avoiding the matter entirely in favor of better scores, experience and favorable judgments is incentive enough.

It just seems to be an application of blatant paranoia over circumstances that are fairly uncommon in most threads, and only really relevant in tournaments or battles. In which case, it is a substantial argument to make that there should be two rubrics instead of just one. One for quests which focuses on the story elements and how well the member achieved in those different areas, and another as a battle rubric that could be used to regulate and manage powergaming/bunnying while also focusing on scoring in a way that is favorable to competition over development.

Right now, I think the rubric as it stands is a combination of both and will do either job poorly. Considering battles and quests are two seperate mediums, some thought should be put into this idea of two seperate rubrics instead of trying to shoehorn all the elements of both of them into one rubric and try to make it one-size-fits-all.

[Tainted Bushido]

I think the rubric should be open for restructuring if this doesn't work out well.

I still don't see the necessity of the wildcard since the entire rubric is meant to give the Judge an area of discretion by design. If a judge likes something that I wrote, he can mention it and apply the appropriate amount of points in the area it pertains to at his discretion. There is no need for an area of the rubric to allocate bonus points that aren't bonus points at all considering they are weighted by the overall score anyway. But hey, if giving 10 points to a judge makes them feel empowered or some shit that they can tack on a plus 10 making my score jump from an 80 to a 90 regardless of what their reasoning for it is, go for it. I suppose in the end, I win either way.

Mehtinks you missed the point of wildcard. There should be no discretion, there should be no bias in the judging, that is entirely what wildcard is for. If I don't like a character and abhor him, then they still get points in character, because the character brought about an emotional reaction from me the reader.

I think too many judges forget they aren't supposed to let their views get in the way of honestly critiquing the works, creating a situation of "I didn't like it so I'm going to slam it in the judgement"

My Eudaemonians are planeshifting technocrats from an alternate future of Earth. Does that jive well with Althanas? Not really, but I've been using them so long that several people acknowledge them. So does that count for Continuity? Is it just "do people buy it"? Does it help that I portray them as outsiders with significant problems?

Pretty much nailed it. That would get you points in continuity, because you aren't forcing a merging of the two. You are ackonowledging althanian canon by making your character have to overcome the differences in culture. That is why you would score higher in continuity than some rip off character that magically knows the language.

[Christoph]

I think too many judges forget they aren't supposed to let their views get in the way of honestly critiquing the works, creating a situation of "I didn't like it so I'm going to slam it in the judgement"

On one hand, I agree entirely with what you just said. On the other hand, the new rubric for 3.0 adds a second category that, if not actively encourages judges to "let their views get in the way", definitely makes it far easier for that to happen. Judging will always be subjective, but that doesn't mean we should exacerbate the situation. That's why I'm not fond of Creativity.

Beyond that, aside from some of the category names not making a lot of sense, I'm generally okay with the changes.