People want to see jutsu *like those*, yeah, but it was always my impression that the Jutsu Creation thread was mostly there to give the developers extra ideas to work off of. The Jutsu themselves will combine to be OP regardless of whether or not you place restrictions on which ones can be learned with which...that's the nature of variety in a competitive environment -- and personally, I'd rather have a broad rainbow of potentially OP combinations to counter one another as opposed to forcing everyone into a simple few molds that are both harder to adjust and balance as a whole, and less fun and intuitive. Leaving everything on the table makes it easier to balance out metas when introducing new Jutsu as well, as far more possible combinations for counters can be discovered. By promoting excessive freedom of choice, you'll end up promoting balance through variety alongside of it.

          Additionally, this game aims for a fairly lengthy training system -- involving hours/days/weeks/MONTHS of training to *Truly* master individual jutsu (and thus become as effective as you can with them, accentuated by your Nature of course)...and that's not even counting in having to practice these jutsu in live firefights with enemy shinobi equally looking to strengthen themselves. Then you have the very nature of the villages themselves, how each will constantly be stealing the scrolls (I'm assuming the basic scrolls will usually be relatively safe, but the advanced techniques will become prime targets for agents to smuggle) from each other in order to prevent their enemies from even *beginning* to teach their shinobi specific jutsu. And then on top of that, some characters will end up actually, permanently dying in the wilderness trying to become those S-Ranked Shinobi...time waits for no ninja.

          We can't master everything, yes, because it would take too long. If you want to narrow down a few metas here and there, consider the amount of time each meta-player is going to have to sink into truly perfecting their styles. As Vreg said for combat speed: "I don't think it's fair for a player to be running XX fast before entering combat, just to arbitrarily lose all of that just because they got into a scrap." By extension of this, the only factors limiting how you want your shinobi to play should be their basic biology and the amount of time you're willing to sink into their training/combat.

          And again, should *all else fail* -- should a select few players actually manage the luck, skill and time to develop characters of immense power, even if they aren't KKG-capable to begin with...good on them. Good on them, so long as their characters live. Sooner or later, numbers will always add up, and old champions will meet their match against the odds of skill...or chance.

@mamita    Well, it seems a bit complicated, but the idea of keeping everything balanced (give or take a certain spectrum of error being allowed) at all times could be interesting -- especially if such a mode grants the user a great deal of power.

   However, I think they player should be given some sort of subtle cue as to when they're falling out of line...or, perhaps, even when they're balanced enough to access this chakra type; something simple, like dimmed flaring on the edges of the screen or a sound effect (a low whirring that gradually increases from a static position to a leveled hum, then a sort of cricket-level croaking once you begin to fall out of line) would be especially useful for a line so precariously easy to cross --particularly during combat-- without compromising the difficulty in comprehending its boundaries.

It may not be expert-level, but I looks to be a damned fine start; best of luck with those grades.

It probably wouldn't be a very good idea to have your health-bar increase concurrently with your prowess -- however, you make a fair point about its significance in combat. "Get-Stuck-In" types of fights in the current version are incredibly short --like a slightly more fantasized version of the time it takes for a fight to end in real life-- and I imagine the amount of powerful attack/deception/trapping jutsu available in later stages will be able to get to pretty vast quantities, making it so much easier to die.

          ...However, there's an argument that could be made that having a smaller/medium-sized health-bar for E V E R Y O N E would emphasize (Well, what do you know!) more stealthy, tactical game-play, for the exact reason you gave of people only having one life on a character. Additionally, characters will only die in the Perma-Death Border-Zones between each of the villages -- in all likelihood, it's quite possible that an entire invasion-force could slip through a border, attack another village, and lose *without* all of their characters specifically *dying* in that engagement.

          In an equal respect, of course, that entire invasion-force could be ambushed and slaughtered simply because...wait for it...one side made proper use of an Intelligence Force to gather information on the enemy before and during their entrance into the Border-Zones (stream-sniping might even be a viable option here, although I doubt anyone with a lot of investment in their character would be stupid/crazy enough to openly give away their army movements through a stream -- but it's still a possibility).

The majority of players *probably* won't go into the Perma-Death zones -- and given the nature of many PvPers, most of them will *probably* know to try and book it from an area in which they *know* people are dropping like flies or are likely to. People are survivalists...what else is there to say?

Well, I imagine training will become a bit more difficult -- if Sensei are going to give bonuses to the amount of experience earned when training attributes up, then there's that to consider. Purchasing items shouldn't be too bad, considering that there are going to be small, 'neutral' villages (if I remembered that correctly), but the main problem would most likely come from not having a permanent safe-zone. Sure, you can hide in a village, but that might only work for so long...that in itself makes me wonder whether or not there should be a time-mechanic for how long Rogues can stay within a village before getting a nice fat target painted on them, or otherwise how they will be able to be spotted.

I *believe* there are going to be a select few outposts that Rogue organizations will be able to take and hold for themselves -- perhaps even other villages might try to obtain these as safe-zones within the wilderness? Overall, becoming a Rogue will mostly allow you to kill/loot anyone at any time, although you'll face near-enough the exact same in consequence.

Perhaps Rogues should be allowed to temporarily occupy a weak enough village and --after a set amount of time holding it from it's original owners/other foreigners-- eventually become apart of it, with the leader of the organization becoming that village's new kage? Though that isn't to say there couldn't be the possibility of a coup to take back the seat of power for the previous owners -- maybe they'd find integration with the new-comers repulsive(much like the Mongols in...basically everywhere they invaded)?

Anyone else have more info on this?

Edit: Note, you won't have the luxury of a 'fixed'-income as a Rogue -- job offers will likely be far more sparse than when apart of a village, meaning you'll probably end up having to loot/kill more often in order to find items/coin to trade. Additionally, the likely-hood of death will probably be substantially higher in what contracts you do obtain, though these may be found more preferable to be served to Organizations, rather than singular Rogues.

From my understanding, Perma-Death Zones will be based in the Boundaries between each of the villages; So, I suppose that'd mean you'd have to form a treaty with one village in order to more easily attack another beyond it -- moving troops through their territory instead of traveling through the more dangerous Wilds *around* it.

Of course, this doesn't necessarily make the Wilds any safer just because you've brokered a treaty with another village -- likely, there'll be whole Mercenary Guilds staking out claims within these 'hard-core' zones; Additionally, I imagine it'll definitely be possible to monetarily persuade one or two of them --provided they're not occupied defending their turf from usurpers-- to harass general or specific targets moving through those areas.

I don't disagree with any particular point!! But how do you give the mentors the abuility to speed up training? Maybe just a local buff in the training arieas that only effect the squad your with?

Basically, yeah:

Shinobi of Jonin status are capable of forming Squads consisting of up to three other players beneath them -- this will be represented by some sort of side-bar UI only available to players of the Jonin status (Rogues will be out in the cold on this one, as they might be of Jonin *level*, but not *status*). While leading their Squad, they'll have a bar with a set number of Training Points that regenerate over time (most likely encouraging training for 2-3 hours per day).

Students within a small radius of the Mentor (50-100 meters? Or perhaps 30-50?) will gain a buff that draws upon this bar whenever the Mentor activates it, and will subsequently lose the buff whenever it runs out or the Mentor manually deactivates it; Said buff will decrease the practice sessions required to increase Skills, but not Jutsu.

In this way, Mentors will be able to assign when Students train and where, but Students will be able to practice whatever skills they need to under said Mentors.

But why are they able to learn the jutsu we have now? we currently have 4  nature's of jutsu in game. As well as basic kenjutsu.
Why are you able to learn these thing?
How do you advance in learning new natures that allows you to learn from the scrolls containing:
earth dome, earth wall, fire breath, wind bullet, and lightning fist(chidori)?
What sequence of events leads up to the ability to weld the katana in a way that lets you do damage to an opponent and not cut off your own head?

Simply saying you look at a scroll practice the hand signs and bingo you know a new nature and jutsu seams a little underwhelming to me.
There is No feeling of immersion this kind of learning system.

Jutsu require skills to use
focus
chakra control/ or stamina
Intelligence
ext.
these skills need to be developed before you attempt to learn a jutsu from a scroll.
now some you might be able to develpe throw practice and everyday play.
but some will have to be taught. simply for lore reasons and to immerse you in the game play.

this leads to the question what comes first the teachers or the students.
If not npc's then some story explanation as to why players have the abilities needed to be able to teach
other players the skills they need to know.
 

Obviously, there'll be a lore explanation as to how some of the world's populace have chakra, that much has already been established. As for the Scrolls, you *learn* of a new Jutsu (if you can even perform it in the first place, as I imagine there'll be a message saying something along the lines of "You don't have the appropriate Natures to learn this" if you *do* try to), but you must *master* it through practice in order to maximize your effectiveness with it, or your ability to convert it into a larger version of itself (if the particular Jutsu is capable of that, of course).

Skills would be trained through Training Grounds, I *believe*, such as practicing Stamina-conditioning by having your character perform Track&Field for a bit at a time. The Jutsu themselves are stored in scrolls in the Libraries, or at least, that's what I'm proposing. Basically, you don't need schools in order for Shinobi to create their respective playstyles, all you need is a Mentor, a Library and (yes) a Training Field of some sort. Or, if you just want to go solo, a Library and a Training Field.

You shouldn't need to explain why players are capable of teaching, because the Mentors will simply be advising their Students on how best to go about accomplishing their goals: "Oh, so you want to be the Taijutsu member of our team, hmm? Alright, spend some more time training your Stamina and Speed -- here, let me show you a great place/piece of equipment to help with that." The First Generation will be figuring out the systems and Jutsu available to them, which will allow them to train the Second Generation as they come into focus. If you already have all of the elements above, then why bother with a School anymore?