Techniques & Inventions

Creating techniques for your character on the CHAT channel to use during your roleplays is one of the most rewarding experiences that the Tier System can offer. It's a way of personalizing your character, creating a unique combat style, and augmenting the narrative of your stories with dramatic moments.
The DB:I staff is currently developing a way that techniques can be 'authorized' and viewed on the MUD similar to roleplay biographies, but in the meantime, the best way to have your techniques approved for play on the CHAT channel is to write a pnote (gboard 8) to the adminstrators overseeing the CHAT channel. This note should explain the technique you wish to use in as much detail as possible, and you must wait until you have received some type of confirmation before using the ability on CHAT.
While the DB:I staff encourages players to be thoughtful and creative when developing their techniques and abilities, there are also some general principles and guidelines which should be considered before making a final determination and requesting your ability to be authorized. Below is section dedicated to explaining what sorts of techniques are likely to be useful, and fun for not only yourself but everyone you encounter on CHAT, and what sorts of abilities are dangerous, or otherwise ill-advised to develop.

Techniques

At it's core roleplay on DB:I is a futuristic, martial arts setting whose source material emphasizes hand to hand combat and stylistic fighting. Almost any ability that was showcased in the Dragonball series is a safe bet on the CHAT channel because it is easy to understand and interpret, canonical, and suits the style of setting.
While some players tend to gravitate away from techniques like energy waves, blasts, and bombs, these sorts of techniques provide the most 'bang for your buck' than any other. Players on CHAT are very willing to allow these techniques to hit, deal damage and otherwise provide the explosive pay-off that they deserve because while they might not be as unique as some abilities on the channel, their effect is straightforward.
On the other hand, techniques such as energy swords, destructo disks and other 'one-hit kill' style abilities are usually very terrible on CHAT for a variety of reasons. Weapons and energy blades tend to create a literal arms race once they begin to proliferate on channel. If someone brings a sword to a battle, it seems foolish to not bring your own. In a setting based around martial arts -hand to hand- fighting, a ki-infused weapon breaks the agreed upon setting and turns the battle into a 'dodge or die' situation. While these techniques can be quite flavorful when slicing through a horde of enemies, they're often frustrating for both the user and the victim on channel when it's a contest between players because the player under attack from these types of abilities has only the ogre's choice of losing limbs, dodging, or dying.
Other techniques to be wary of creating are abilities that apply "DoT" effects, or that have lingering 'status effects' that need to be accounted for or tracked. The CHAT channel is not a formalized 'game' setting with statistics and values that can be easily identified. These types of techniques often lead to frustrating situations where the expectations and intepretation of the technique varies wildly from player to player, which often leads to arguments.
'Swiss Army Knife' techniques such as Telekinesis can be be very tempting for new players to develop because of the ability's versatility, but the more applications an ability has, the more often it comes across as seeming 'overpowered'. In general techniques that are 'narrow' in scope rather than broad tend to be the most accepted among the roleplay community.

A special note:
When developing a technique, a major red flag that you should move on to another idea is if you are having to incorporate a built in weakness, drawback, or disadvantage in order to use the technique. This is a clear sign to the adminstrators that you are attempting to 'bargain' for an ability that would otherwise be too powerful.

Ultimately, it is up to the admins whether your technique will be authorized. It is highly encouraged that you are as forthright about your techniques and abilities as possible. Do not attempt to hide, or otherwise mislead admins into believing a technique works in a certain way while not revealing any other special properties or effects you intend to roleplay it has possessing. Your abilities can -always- be unauthorized if they are misused or considered too powerful on the CHAT channel, and the Admins are the final arbiters.

Inventions

In addition to techniques some players may choose to spend their RPP to purchase what are known as "inventions."
Inventions in the RP universe are a great way to showcase your character's individuality by having items unique to them that are the only ones in the 'Verse of their kind. Starships, personalized 'bases', scouters, and even 'armies' are examples of inventions created in the past. They can have several unique properties to add fashion and flair to your character, but that is it. They cannot serve to boost any sort of 'combat stat' like increased speed shoes or special suits that allow greater defense.
An invention can take a myriad of different forms and usually if you're willing to spend enough RPP, you can purchase nearly anything you can dream of as long as you comply with the requests of the adminstrators.