Forum:A Note on Challenge Points (CPs)

I've noticed that some people liked to provide more precise information on the changes to a player's challenge points (e.g. the actual amount of change in attributes in game like Watchful, Shadowy) when editing the results of an action. I've nothing against that--in fact, I'd prefer more precise info too and have provided my two cents whenever it was possible to be more precise.

However, it's also clear that the game doesn't really make it easy for you to see the exact changes of your challenge points. Which is probably why the templates don't have a standard on inputting such info. Furthermore, I suspect not enough people actually know what the "CP" actually stand for, or how much they actually represent. I think most people, myself included initially, simply assumes when they see "x CP" listed in some results that "CP" is the same thing as the level of an attribute. In other words, they think if a person currently has Watchful 5, it means their total CP in Watchful is 5, and thus if Watchful increases from 5 to 6, then the change is 1 CP. Unfortunately, this is  wrong.

Challenge points for each level of an attribute actually equal the precise number of that level. In other words, one level of level 1 Watchful = 1 CP, and one of level 2 Watchful = 2 CP, but because the 2nd level of Watchful is worth 2CP and the 1st level worth 1 CP, the total CP for a person with an attribute of Watchful 2 is 3 CP. Thus going back to the example in the previous paragraph, a person with Watchful 5 has a total of 1+2+3+4+5 = 15 CP in Watchful, and a change from Watchful 5 to Watchful 6 actually means a change of 6 CP (because the level 6 itself is worth 6 CP). Of course all this is assuming that we are starting and ending at the exact amounts of each level, though in reality we often start with 5 point something Watchful and on completing the action end up with 6 point something Watchful. Which is why it's so hard to be precise on the exact amount of changes for CP. The best I could come up with if I ever added CP info in my edits, was when I see at least a change of 1 level in the attribute, and if it was not too far from a whole level, such as if it looked like from 5.5 to 6.7, then say it was "about 6 CP". This gets hard to do at higher levels as one action rarely raises an entire level or more at once.

So besides to provide clear-up info for people who were in the dark like I was about the definition of CP, the point of my post is to suggest a more regulated standard for entering CP amounts to be incorporated into the results (success/rare success/failure) templates. I don't have any set ideas for the exact format yet, which is why the input and collective wisdom of all wiki editors are welcomed and needed here. Please feel free to express your thoughts.

(P.S. I only found out about CP when I was reading something the developers wrote somewhere, either in a tweet or from the EB forum (of sorts), though I can't remember the exact location and I'm not sure it's possible to find it again. So if anyone can help to provide a more definitive source for proof, I'll be much obliged.)