Participation points (PP) are points that are earned through completing various tasks, missions and events on the site, sometimes even given out raw for winning "OTM" bonuses. They are solely used to determine a characters rank, nothing more. Participation Points represent as a whole the experiences and story a character has had on the site, while their currency form Adventure Points (AP) are used to purchasing specific character power increases and other specific character enhancements. If you want an easy to think of example. Participation points are the home you purchased when you created your character, they summarize your net worth, while Adventure Points are any updates you make to the home, using the home as equity.
The easiest, but perhaps most difficult way to rank up, would be to grind out missions. The second would be, be involved and participate in events/site plot. The third would be exams, participation in them, forth being from PvP.
Investment
Newly created characters begin with the first degree unlocked in the following categories:
Ninjutsu || Taijutsu || Genjutsu || Chakra Capacity || Dexterity || Strength || Agility || Stamina || Perception || Intelligence
When starting a new character, that is a member of a clan, or Jinchuuriki along with a few other special abilities, they begin with One Degree in the Ability Virtue - to show there natural affinities towards that aspect. Those without such starting, begin the game with an additional 25 Adventure Points (AP), to spend during initial creation.
In order to "upgrade" your character's Virtues and Vices, you need to use the funds you acquire through roleplaying (as well as the points you start out with) to spec into the various trees available.
Player vs Player combat is bound to happen, literally the majority of Naruto was about fighting or training for fights, and how many fodder were killed by a stray shuriken. It is important to note that Player vs Player is the only type of interaction to gain PP this way, Player vs Staff Controlled NPC is part of the mission total, and this section does not come into play. Player vs Site Event NPC/Boss (bijuu etcetc) do count, however the lower ranged amount of PP will be used.
Bounties or hunting missions also carry a bonus PP, however that is discussed in the respective organization topics. We use a very generous PP earning system.
- If the Player who has the higher rank wins the fight, they earn 40% of the losers total PP value.
- If the Player who has the lower rank wins the fight, they earn 80% of the losers total PP value.
- If the Players are of the same rank, whoever wins the fight earns 20% of the losers total PP value.
If the target is killed/captured (and subsequently killed), the PP total earned decreases by 30% of what was supposed to be gained. Same rank, Player A won, killed player B (200 PP), they would have earned (200 * 20% = 40 * 30% = 12)
sidenote Losers will still earn PP depending on how their topic went, getting 1 shoted results in no earnings, however a decent fight will be graded and PP earned accordingly.
As you grow and gain Participation Points, so too can your character achieve growth and development. Participation Points are never lost or "spent", they are OOC point metrics used to judge your rank. As you can see below, when you earn enough Participation Points, you can advance to the next rank, why do you ask if this is important, well simply put, the higher your rank, the higher ranked moves you can utilize.
- E Rank: 0 - 39 PP
- D Rank: 40 - 89 PP
- C Rank: 90 - 179 PP
- B Rank: 180 - 349 PP
- A Rank: 350 PP - 679 PP
- S Rank: 680 PP and above
There are certain special markers that your character can earn, that will give them PP, each of these can only be done once.
- Join an organization - + 20 PP
- Become Head of the Village or an Organization - + 30 PP
- Rank up twice in the span of 2 months - +20 PP
- Earn a title - + 7 PP
- Defeat an Event Boss (Bijuu, Masked Beasts etc) - + 50 PP
- Achieve a OTM Title - + 10 PP
- Create a Character in the first month - + 10 PP
- Achieve a Perfect Score on your character application - + 5 PP
- Complete your first Team Mission - + 3 PP
- Successfully Rescue someone in mortal danger - +15 PP
- Train someone in a jutsu - +5 PP
As said, these can only be done once, so choose carefully. This also means that if you say, get OTM for a topic you were in, you cannot ever earn that again, same for title, even if you earn 4 different titles you can only claim it once.