Written Exam: I think it'd be really cool if the written exam was a thread the included played characters and NPC's and not each person to a different room. I'd propose this idea as a means to test shinobi espionage. Cheating. I understand the present system works with this, but I assume either questions are re-used or staff is worried people will copy answers, if they're all written on one thread. However I think it'd be more sensible and logistically work, if the answers were given in a sense. My thought being a riddle or poem, something that's particular to each village.
So there'd be five riddles each one well known to a village, so a person of that village would get PM'ed the answer. Knowing this information a smart IC move would be to copy. Knowing who to copy off and finding ways to get answers without being caught should be the written challenge. This way everyone knows what they're trying to do and we're more giving points for creativity and those without the skill will go on with little points and need to thus greatly make up in the other fields.
I think there's a lot of avenues for fun this route and by limiting this thread to a two week span we might remove anyone who won't be active at the start.
Challenger Exam: Instead of a tournament style fight or along with a tournament style, we could potentially have a battle between multiple genin and one played or NPC'd character of the hosting village combating them. It'll force combatants to work as a team or fall one at a time, it opens a lot of avenues for creativity and tests shinobi on more than raw fighting potential per-situation. Instead of a shinobi this could also be a giant beast or some other fighting challenge greater than the genin, but manageable by the group. This idea was discussed to me and brought up by others, I won't take any claim to it, but I think it's a good one.
Puzzle Exam: What if we had a horror video game style system of clues to escape a mansion or other trap. Potentially a labyrinth where you'd uniquely have to map a maze and your ability to get through that maze in two weeks, is how you'd be scored in the event. It could be separate mazes or potentially one maze with multiple options, give people a chance to help each other or fight each other. Expand upon the potential, there could be a system of puzzles or simply one large one. However an event like this could be done with no necessary character counts. Same would go for the challenger exam, so I think these are fair ideas.
Tournament Exam: I think in order to do a fair tournament it's best we have more than one fight, a fight very much could be terms of a circumstantial situation. I personally enjoy tournament style, so I'd not say axing it entirely is necessary. However I think if we're short members NPC's should be added like what happened in BfVS. IF no one wants to play these roles I'd gladly head that front. Though options like puzzle and challenger could be implemented instead. As tournaments can be long though, I'd recommend all parts of the exam only consume two weeks. I think the grand total of an exam should be around six weeks, meaning there should be either three rounds of any one of these exams. If ever we've got eight genin, I'd say full tournament.
Race Exam: Similar to labyrinth this would be an event in which there's a hard to reach point, a point which all the genin must race too. The obstacles would be the same for everyone, but the way you'd be rated would be upon the manner you tackled them. Good ideas rewarded, bad ideas blown off and failed ideas... well it's a race hopefully our obstacle course is still manageable. Aside from the how's one gets through an obstacle course and where they end up if they don't finish, we can also rate or award points based on their arrival to the point.
Overall Exam Suggestions; I've only seen tournament style really and written. I think more options would help spice up the exams. I also think having a list of options with rules we're working out could really help sites growth down the line. I would also say it'd be really cool if Kages maybe got to choose the exam types they hosted. Even if they can't NPC for them, there's people like me who'd gladly take that role. I also think it'd be cool if Kage's got to write up the tournament fields if they choose they wanted too. It seems like a choice they'd make in characterly.
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