I feel this is an important matter to discuss, not because cosmetic addons are important in itself but because it can be used to motivate and bring a lot of good things to our group.
Builders and meshers, as we all know, are the responsable of bringing new items, ideas and concepts to be used in IC, which clearly serve no purpose other than pimping our gear out. This consumes time and money (as things need to be uploaded, several times in many cases) and its not guaranteed to be aproved by the Council. If it gets approved, the Council will determine which rank will be granted the use of that item. This is the way things work right now, and i feel it doesnt work for anyone. With this way of thinking things out, our builders and meshers cannot wear their creations (limited to rank only), lower ranks have no means or ways of pimping their own gear and highier ranks not only have the authority, experience and elitism to be taking the decisions (both IC and OOC) but also get to wear in IC what others invested time and money on.
This is, to me, clearly unfair, and why ill write down some suggestions that will hopefully motivate our members, regardless of their rank, to do more in order to gain more.
The idea is simple, whatever addon that is created (and approved) and serves no real improvement in IC should be considered a cosmetic addon (Ex: kama, rangefinder, pauldrons, etc. should remain rank given...straps, decals, scout like upper visor, should be comestic only). Cosmetic addons could be used by anyone who does certain things.
· The builder/mesher who created the object is allowed to wear it.
· Other members would be able to get this item by buying it (could even be used in gotchas, group only of course), and the money raised could be used to pay for rentals in allied sims (or even saved to get our own sim), or to pay builders/meshers a certain ammount each time an item is approved (so it doesnt cost that much money for them).
· Members who cant build and cant pay for this items would still be able to earn them by IC actions (giving a certain ammount of reports in a given time, doing certain ammount of patrols in a given time, and so on).
This mentioned before, as i understand it, will push our community foward, giving the builders freedom and recognition for their work, funds for our community to expand in other sims, active lower ranks with more than one goal to achieve, better looking gear to the eyes of the swrp community.
Unlike special groups designed to act as a kickass version of troopers, unlike special armors designed to give members an edge, unlike ranked addons designed to point out certain ranks...comsetic addons will serve no purpose other than pimping us out, and with that, pushing the group foward into achieving more and more things.
Would love to hear what you all think about it, specially the Council and elder members, as i belive this is not entirely a new concept. Hopefully, we can all work it out together, keeping in mind moving foward.
Excuse my grammar and spelling mistakes, english is not my mother language.