Soo its no brainer that anime gacha pretty much just do collabs with popular animes no ? For example nikke adding makima from CSM, onmyoji adding Ichogo from bleach, etc etc
I think this game would benefit from adding characters like Naruto ( destruction, lightning) or Aang ( erudition, omnielement ), 2B from nier ( hunt, physical ), or maybe even non animes like harry potter ( nihility, imaginary )
And since we are doing multiversal trope they can just use some shennanigan like herta opening portal to other universe or Yang accidentaly merge universes
What do you think ?

PREAMBLE (the part you'll probably skip even though you shouldn't):
So. You, too, have been ensnared by the alluring scent of Anis' bakery and decided to start playing Nikke. Not the smartest decision you've ever made, but if you're reading this it's probably already too late for you anyway. That's why I'm here to ease your faceplant into the 160 wall as much as possible.
This is part one of what I plan to be a series of guides that, when complete, should comprehensively cover everything a new player needs to know to get started playing Nikke. Each part will focus on a different topic, though this first one will probably end up the longest and most detailed. For those who don't want to read the whole thing, I will provide a TL;DR at the bottom in the form of a bulleted list; you can go through that for the rundown, and then go back and read just the parts you don't understand or want more information on.
The focus here is on getting brand new players up to speed, allowing them to make well informed early- and mid-game choices and minimizing regretted decisions and wasted resources. To that end we will be covering some intermediate information and tactics, but the main goal here is increasing understanding of systems and mechanics. Things like "this is how boss fights tend to go" and "here are some things to to think about when building a team" rather than "Here's how to beat this boss and what team to use". No "just use Scarlet and Liter 4head" BS here. Documentation and explanation, not a step-by-step tutorial. The goal is to get new players to the point where they can understand such guides (or, ideally, forgoe them altogether in favor of their own strategies) as quickly and painlessly as possible.
Also, with the exception of the Synchro Device, I will not be covering in detail anything the game clearly teaches on it's own; combat basics, bursting, Simulation Room buffs, Recycling Room, etc. If you can read these guides, you can read the tutorials and explore around on your own. I will be giving tips on how best to make use of these things and what to focus on, and when, as well as perhaps a brief overview, but for the most part I'll expect readers to make use of the resources the game provides them. I may rethink this after I'm done if there's demand, or maybe I'll do a FAQ or something.
As I publish new parts, I'll edit the previous ones to link forward to the newer ones. So if you want to refer back to one of them, or if you want to find it again to share with someone else, you should be able to just search the sub for "Tiara's guide" and hit up the first part you find. Or, on the off chance it gets pinned to the sidebar, just find it there.
Finally, if you want to republish any of these somewhere else, please get my permission FIRST. I'll probably say yes, it's just... it's polite, you know? Don't be that guy. Anyway, let's get started!
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Tiara's "Everything You Need to Know to Get Started" Guide Part 1:

Team and Leveling Basics (aka "What's a Synchro Device?" aka "Here are my Nikkes what team should I use?")

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Preamble Table of Contents (You Are Here)
Secton 1: Leveling Section 1.1: INTRO TO LEVELING Section 1.2: HOW DO LEVELING AND DUPES WORK? Section 1.3: THE SYNCHRO DEVICE
Section 2: Team Building Section 2.1: INTRO TO TEAM BUILDING Section 2.2: BURSTS Section 2.3: STANDARD FORMATIONS Section 2.4: ROLES Section 2.5: OTHER CONSIDERATIONS (teambuilding faq)
Section 3: SR Teams Section 3.1: CHOSING YOUR SRs (Finally) Section 3.2: THE GIRLS Section 3.3: EXAMPLE TEAMS
Outro TL;DR
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Section 1.1: INTRO TO LEVELING
Alright. You've cleared the prologue and the first chapter. You beat Blacksmith, had a good cry, pulled an SSR, and now some sex machine in a military uniform is making you take the world's worst best some spy on another mission. Maybe you've done a few more pulls, or even unlocked the Outpost. Regardless, fights are starting to get more difficult and it's time to start thinking about leveling up some Nikkes, which also means it's time to start thinking about team compositions.
First let me say, if you're F2P, DO NOT PULL ANY MORE RIGHT NOW. Trust me, unless there's a Nikke on banner that you really want, save your gems and any Advanced Recruit Vouchers (the rainbow tickets) you might receive. Pulling strategies, yes there are strategies, will be covered in a future guide. Oh, but go ahead and spend your Recruit Vouchers (blue tickets) as you like. Or you can just whale, man, idk. Now, then.
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Section 1.2: HOW DO LEVELING AND DUPES WORK?
This is mostly explained in-game but Limit Breaking is important to understand, so I want to briefly clarify it here. Basically, all Nikkes have a level limit of 80. This limit can be extended by 40 every time you Limit Break a girl. Each Limit Break requires the Nikke to be pulled from the gacha an additional time (pulling a dupe), or for a dupe or spare body to be purchased from the Mileage shop. There are a couple other ways to get certain Nikkes under certain circumstances (read: events) but those are the basics.
This will all be explained in more detail in the pulling guide, but for now the main thing you need to understand is that dupes let you LB a Nikke, which gives bonus stats and raises her level cap. Max Limit Break (MLB) for SRs is two (so you need to pull her three times, once to get her and two dupes for the limit breaks) to a level limit of 160, and three for SSRs (four pulls total) to a maximum level of 200. Rs cannot be limit broken, and are capped at level 80.
One final very important thing to note is that units can have their levels reset for the cost of 10 gems (about 10-15 cents worth, one pull is 300 gems). This refunds ALL resources put into leveling her up (experience, credits, and core dust); the only thing you lose is the gems. However, it does NOT reset skill levels. I haven't had a good chance to say this yet, so I'll say it now: SAVE YOUR SKILL MANUALS. You'll need a lot of them, they're somewhat difficult to come by, and there's no way to refund spent manuals under normal circumstances. If you've already used some, it's no big deal, but for now save them until you're very sure which Nikkes you'll be using long-term and you have a better understanding which skills are best to upgrade. Or just dump them all into your Supreme Waifu, I'm not the boss of you.
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Section 1.3: THE SYNCHRO DEVICE
When it comes to leveling up your girls, the first and MOST IMPORTANT thing you need to understand is how the Synchro Device works. I'm going to explain it here, both because it's a little confusing for some people and also because its existance can impact decisions you make before you even unlock it.
The Synchro Device is unlocked after clearing Stage 3-9, and what it does is it syncs the levels of a number of designated Nikkes to that of your fifth highest level Nikke.
Wtf does that mean? Let me give you a scenario to illustrate.
The Synchro Device starts with five open slots, though you can unlock more through the academy (and can pay gems to unlock additonal slots beyond that). Let's say you have five Nikkes all at level 34. Now let's also say you put Rupee, who is level 1, into one of the open slots in the device (Nikkes must be level 1 to be put into the Synchro Device). Rupee will now will now be level 34 until you remove her from the device. As you increase the levels of your other Nikkes, Rupee's level will also increase. It's that simple. Mostly.
Remember, you're syncing to your fifth highest level unit. It's not an average, so if you level one, or even FOUR of your Nikkes to 100, Rupee will remain level 34 because your fifth highest level is still 34. Likewise, if you level a 6th, 7th, 8th, etc Nikke, that will also not have an effect on Rupee's level. Though if you level them past 34, they will automatically replace however many of the existing Nikkes as the highest level.
The other thing to be aware of is that this syncing ignores level limitations. If your current synced level is, for example, level 180, you can put in anyone from a two star SR, a zero star SSR, or even an R if you're feeling really frisky, and they'll all sync up to 180 no problem.
All of this means three things:
First, YOU NEVER NEED TO LEVEL MORE THAN 5 GIRLS AT A TIME. Anyone else you want to use should go into the Synchro Device.
Second, your five chosen girls should be leveled evenly.
Third, you should choose your five girls based on their LEVEL CAP first, and poweusefulness second.
Recall that in the previous section I mentioned that SR Nikkes have a level cap of 160, because you can limit break them twice? SR Nikkes are so common, and there are so few of them, that you are almost certain to two star all of your SRs before you two star even one SSR. This means that, at the beginning, you're probably going to want to pick five SRs to level unless you got VERY lucky with your rolls (or whaled on a banner). It's silly to spend resources leveling an SSR to 80 or 120, as doing so also caps all of your other girls to that level, when you could instead raise an SR to 160 and get everyone (including your SSR) to 160 along with her. However, you must understand that this also means TO GET PAST LEVEL 160 YOU NEED FIVE MLB SSRs. This is called the 160 Wall and breaking it as quickly and efficiently as possible will be the focus of the pulling guide. Anyway, does all of that make sense? I hope so because we're moving on to the next section.
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Section 2.1: INTRO TO TEAM BUILDING
Alright. So you need to level five girls. Cool. The obvious question at this point is... which girls? I will be giving you some recommendations, but in order to understand the hows and whys you need to understand the fundamentals of teambuilding. This will also allow you to modify the teams as you like, help you choose which SSRs to prioritize putting in the Synchro Device, and assist you in building teams to overcome difficult encounters. If you don't care about any of that and just want to know which SRs are good, you can skip it. I guess.
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Section 2.2: BURSTS
The absolute most basic and fundamental aspect of team building to consider is the Burst Rotation. The details of the burst rotation are one of those things that's complicated to explain but dead simple once you understand it, so buckle up cause this is gonna get a little weird. You (should) already know that there are three burst "stages" (or "levels" or "ranks" or whatever) and that they chain into each other; you always start with a level one burst, which allows you to use a level two burst, which allows a level three burst, which triggers "Full Burst Mode". If you don't have a burst two, you can't use burst three, and if you don't have a burst one, you can't use burst two (or, consequently, burst three). Also, all Nikkes have exactly one burst and there's no way to change what their burst does or what rank it is.
What you might NOT know is that ALL bursts, regardless of rank, have one of only two cooldown values: 20 seconds and 40 seconds. I will not be going into the exact mechanics of how the burst guage itself works, but it should not surprise you to learn that under normal circumstances, most teams will be able to burst about every 20 seconds.
So what does that tell us? What does it mean? Well, if we burst every 20 seconds, that means that 40s bursts can only proc once every other burst phase. With three stages to each burst phase, you would need 6 Nikkes to have a team consisting of only 40s bursts. However, there can only be five Nikkes in a squad, so we know that if we want to full burst every rotation at least one Nikke in each squad must have a 20s burst. Furthermore, Burst 3 units always have 40s bursts, so you always need two Burst 3's.
Also, higher burst level units tend to have higher DPS (burst 3s especially) while lower burst levels tend to be more support oriented. This isn't hard and fast, and I might go into more detail when I (eventually) get to the pulling/unit guide, but it's a good rule of thumb. It's not to say that lower burst units are worse, Liter and Pepper are two of the best in the game, but simply that a team of 5 Burst 1s probably isn't going to get you very far if only because you'll time out of every fight.
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Section 2.3: STANDARD FORMATIONS
When we put all of that together there are, generally speaking, three viable burst formations you typically want to stick to. They consist of the following:
2-1-2 1-2-2 1-1-3
Obviously the 1-1-3 formation requires a 20s burst in both the 1 and 2 slots, and one of the level 3 bursts will never be used (or may be situationally activated by the player). There are times where running only a single Burst 3, such as a 2-2-1 formation, is viable but these are more advanced edge cases in specific modes and we won't be covering those in this guide.
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Section 2.4: ROLES
Right, so what else is there to consider besides burst level and cooldown? First of all, roles. Notice I did not say "classes". There are three classes in this game: Attacker, Defender, and Supporter. However, the only mechanical impact they have is what gear a unit can equip (though each class' gear does confer different stats). You also TEND to see classes in particular burst slots; 14 of 20 Burst 1 SSRs are Supports, and a whopping 22 of 23 Burst 3 SSRs are Attackers (the only exceptions are Crow, a Defender, and iDoll Sun, an R support lol). Burst 2 is the most diverse, where only 9 of 21 SSRs are defenders, but it's also worth noting that as of this writing there are only 14 defenders in the game. But none of that actually matters very much, as in terms of practical capability these classes tend to be quite fuzzy; there are Defenders and even Burst 3 Attackers that feel more like supports, and supports that out-damage Attackers and out-tank Defenders.
So what's actually important about an individual Nikke, in terms of play mechanics, is her general role and (if applicable) what niche she fills. I won't get too much into niches and specific builds or other such deep meta in this guide, but in terms of roles I personally think there are five general "things to do" that I think about when categorizing Nikkes and building teams.
AoE Damage Single Target DPS Healing Tanking/Mitigation Support (Boosting party DPS)
Niche utility aside, in terms of practical use any unit that can't do at least one of these things exceptionally well almost isn't worth considering. The very best S tiers excel at two of these (Pepper, Emma) or are absolutely top of their class at one (Alice, Liter). "Niche utility" includes things like esoteric status effects (such as stuns and binds), burst generation, and bonus damage to interruption/parts. These things can make a girl invaluable in certain modes (especially PVP, looking at you Centi and Privaty) or for certain fights, but generally are not core considerations. Not until endgame at the very least. Thinking about those five core "roles" is typically what you want to be doing first.
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Section 2.5 OTHER CONSIDERATIONS (teambuilding faq)
It's all well and good to give a list of meta roles to fill, but what's a good balance between them? And how important are the various aspects of each role? ie HoTs vs burst heals, how important are Elements for DPS, etc. I won't go over every little detail here, but I would like to give some general tips and cover some of the common questions folks might have.
The most important thing to know is that, generally speaking, damage is king. As always there are niche exceptions, but generally speaking Nikke is very much a "the best defense is a good offense" kind of game; dead enemies can't hurt you, and overall you're much more likely to lose any given stage to timeout than actually getting killed.
Compounding this, the damage formula favors the attack stat. Point for point, Attack is the most important stat in the game. Not to the exclusion of all else, but one point of attack is worth more than one point of defense, and overall high attack builds are better than high crit builds. Crit isn't worthless, attack is simply better.
On the defensive side, healing is usually preferable to mitigation. This is tempered somewhat in late game when minibosses start spitting out OHKO lasers, but for the most part a big burst healer will carry you much farther than a tank or any amount of mitigation. One good healer backing up a solid DPS core is all you typically need for "defense".
Generally speaking, the stat spread is as follows: Attackers have a high attack but are the squishiest, Supporters have relatively balanced stats, and Defenders have more hp and defense but the lowest attack.
Following that, Defenders kinda suck. Or rather, it may be better to say Defenders aren't good at their job, but can be very good at other things. There are VERY good defenders, a number of the best and most sought-after units are Defenders, but they're all run for support buffs or utility rather than tanking/mitigation (fun fact: the best tanks are Supporters).
That isn't an indictment against Defenders so much as it is a point to reinforce that the usefulness of a Nikke lives and dies by her skills. There are a lot of factors that go into how "good" a Nikke is, and some Nikkes transcend a mediocre skillset, but generally speaking skills really are the primary concern.
Don't worry about weapon types for now. They matter somewhat more in endgame, but aside from range considerations the only thing you really need to worry about for now is that rockets do AoE damage and SMGs are kinda shit.
Don't worry about elements yet either. Nikkes deal 10% more damage against enemies weak to her element. This is nice, but not generally not enough to break an otherwise good team build for. Can be useful against later boss fights, but for now it's not worth fretting over.
One final, important note: TEAM ORDER MATTERS. When set to auto-burst, bursting occurs from left to right, by which I mean Nikkes on the left will always burst first if it's available. This means that if you have two 40s bursts of the same tier, the girl on the left will burst for the first rotation, and the girl on the right will burst for the second rotation. If you have THREE bursts of the same level, the girl on the far right will never* burst without manual intervention. Similarly, nobody to the right of a 20s of the same tier will ever* auto-burst. *(it can occasionally happen if the game has a hiccup or for your Rank 1s if you have a team that generates a lot of burst)
That's about it. You may end up with one "core team" that you use for clearing most stages, and not every team in every situation needs to have all of the five roles I listed covered. For example, as mentioned tanking and mitigation are only situationally useful, and obviously AoE damage is not a priority in many boss fights. But when you get stuck, adjusting your team based on the core role concepts to meet the specific demands of the problem fight is often key to clearing at a CP deficit much more than gimmicky builds or "just using Scarlet".
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Section 3.1: CHOSING YOUR SRs (finally)
Okay! FINALLY, we understand why we want to pick one specific team of five SRs and we have a good idea of what a decent team looks like (or at least what we might want in a decent team). Is there ANYTHING ELSE to consider? First, what SSRs you already have. Second, personal preference.
Your SSR roster doesn't matter as much as you might think for chosing SRs, simply because ALL of your SRs must be replaced eventually to break the 160 barrier, and very few of them have any practical use beyond that. Most of them will likely be outmoded long before you get even that far. Regardless, it's not something I can really help you with as I don't know which SSRs you have.
Personal preference really is the deciding factor here. I can talk about meta for as long as you like but at the end of the day we all know that waifus are the real meta and if you decide for whatever reason that Delta is the one you wanna pump your levels (or whatever else) into then I'm sure not gonna be the one to stop you. Godspeed, cummander.
We're in the home stretch now. At this point I'm just gonna give some bios on the girls and their strengths/weaknesses, then provide some example teams, and that'll be it!
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Section 3.2 THE GIRLS
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RAPI
Burst 3 (40s) Assault Rifle Attacker - Fire - Elysion
Rapi is the leader of Counters and features prominantly in the main story. Mechanically she's quite solid and is probably the DPS among the SRs, and as long as her stats keep up she can even go toe to toe with some of the weaker SSR DPS units. Unfortunately, as an SR she will, eventually, be outstripped by your SSRs and be outmoded. Additonally, as Attackers are the squishiest of the 3 classes the farther you get into the game and the stronger your enemies become the more her taunt turns from a nice way to proc her skill 1 into a liability. Especially with no extra defenses or healing in her kit. That said, her DPS self-buffs are quite good good and while I can't exactly recommend it, if you're a Rapi fanatic willing to invest into maxing her Attraction or even burn skill manuals you can keep her relevent for a surprisingly long time. And you wouldn't be the first one to do so, either. Her stoic demeanor, cool leadership under pressure, mysterious past, and occasional gap moe-inducing bouts of shyness combined with those fat thighs and child-bearing hips have deservedly earned her a spot as a fan favourite.
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ANIS
Burst 2 (20s) Rocket Launcher Defender - Iron - Tetra
The GOAT. The One True Queen of the SRs, Anis, besides being best girl is also the single SR to retain some manner of meta relevence beyond the 160 wall. Alongside a 20s burst and granting a moderate AoE def down, both things you're always on the lookout for, she also has damage sharing. I won't get into the specifics of damage sharing vs taunting here, but suffice to say it's a useful mitigation tool that very few Nikkes have. Furthermore, while being a defender is usually more of a detriment than a boon, in this case it means that she's thicc enough not to get instantly blown up at high levels like most other SRs do. Her single target damage is even worse than SSR defenders, but who cares? That's not her job. And as a RL user, in AoE situations she actually can put up enough damage to make a difference and is effective at all ranges. Finally, and MOST IMPORTANTLY, she's actually one of the top burst generators in the game. Damage sharing + Burst generation = she actually has a place in the PVP meta. She's not THE top pick for her niche and like Rapi you have to at least invest in boosting her affection to keep her relevent, but your dedication will be rewarded; especially if you don't have Centi or Jackal. Oh, and she's a member of Counters and one of the central characters in the story, and is very smart, funny, and cool, and SUPER HOT. So there's that too.
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NEON
Burst 1 (20s) Shotgun Supporter - Fire - Elysion
Neon, the last member of Counters who likewise features heavily in the main story, is kindof the oddball of the group in more ways than one. She's strange mechanically because, while she's not entirely useless, she's pretty inarguably the weakest member of Counters. Basically, she's a 20s burst 1 who gives a small buff to any shotgun users in the squad (herself included). Does that matter? Maybe! Shotgun teams ARE a thing! They're not exactly "meta" but they do have uses. If you happen to find yourself in a situation where you would like to run a shotgun team, and don't have Pepper, Mary, or a 20s Burst 1 with better buffs... well, my friend, Neon is always by your side. On the other hand, you could also just field N102 who is better in every way. But if you like goofy silly girls without room in their heads for a single thought on account of all the space in there being taken up by FIREPOWER, boy howdy have I got someone for you.
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ETHER
Burst 1 (40s) Shotgun Defender - Electric - Missilis
The first thing I'll say about Ether is don't sleep on her. Is she very good or strong compared to SSRs? No. Is she "meta" in any sort of way? Not at all. But what she IS is the only defensive SR likely to actually boost the survivability of your team. She doesn't heal, which is unfortunate, but she does have a nice, beefy shield on her burst. It's got a short duration compared to similar shields on SSRs so you'll have to time it manually to get much use out of it, and it only covers three members instead of the whole team, but you can totally use it to clear some tough early boss encounters. Her S1 also cuts the damage to one party member by a healthy percentage (with 1/3rd uptime, which is good for an SR), AND she gets a nice little def debuff on every full burst, to boot. Not bad for an SR, though you'll probably replace her the instant you get any SSR with a heal or shield. How is she as a character? Well... if you're into highly intelligent women motivated more by science than things like "ethics" and "morality" and who will absolutely lie, cheat, and steal to get what they want out of you, you're in for a treat. That said, for my money she's the hottest non-SSR Nikke after Neve (who you can't even get anymore).
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DELTA
Burst 2 (40s) Sniper Rifle Defender - Wind - Elysion
Delta straight up is probably the worst SR in the game. She's a Defender, so her stats are bad, she brings no utility to the party to speak of, and worst of all she has a global taunt so expect her to die a LOT. She doesn't even have a 20s burst. Now, I'll temper all of that by saying that because her taunt is on her burst, AND her burst creates a new decoy every time, there may be some manner of niche use in certain boss fights. I would be interested in seeing if someone can figure out a way to use her to cheese Special Alteisen. That would boost her from worst SR to arguably the best! But as it stands she sucks. As a unit, anyway. As a waifu, she's pretty simple; what you see is basically what you get. She's earnest, hardworking, a little shy, kinda dumb, and eats sleeps and breathes "being a soldier". You can probably tell just by looking at her if she's for you or not.
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BELORTA
Burst 2 (20s) Rawkit Lawnchair Attacker - Electric - Tetra
I like Belorta! I think she's underrated. She's got a cute face, a hot body, a niche she fills well enough, and she makes a funny sound when you click on her. She's even got a 20s cooldown! What's not to love? Alright she's kindof annoying so YMMV, but if you need an SR to do some AoE damage she's your best bet as she's the only Rocket Launcher SR who is also an attacker. Her burst also brings a tiny smidge of utility for RL/SR-centric teams, so she's got that going for her. You can basically replace her with any RL or AoE SSR though. As for personality, she loves pranks and food so if you're the type who likes the particular gap of childish girls with TnA for days, you'll be eating good right along with her. Also, if you're the "I like to watch" shipper type who'd rather imagine girls making out with each other than with you, she comes pre-equipped with a teetee partner in Mica.
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MICA
Burst 1 (20s) Rocket Launcher Supporter - Wind - Tetra
Belorta's gal pal, Mica is thoroughly meh. Also a RL user, her kit isn't actually the worst; it's servicable enough. The defensive buffs aren't worth much, but the + ammo is good for RL/SSG teams, and the def down isn't huge but it's nice to have. Mechanically her biggest problem is simply that N102 exists. That's actually kindof her problem as a character, as well. She's the shy, nervous, insecure moe type with a sad backstory. But if you want a girl to cry and fawn over... again, N102 is right there. To be fair, I actually prefer Mica in that regard; N102 is a little TOO depressing for my taste. On the other hand, I'm not not really into the "must protect" moe type to begin with. In the end, I do like Mica, and just because she isn't my thing doesn't mean she won't be yours. And of course she's got her whole thing going with Belorta, so that's nice!
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N102
Burst 1 (20s) Rocket Launcher Supporter - Water - Missilis
Co-star of one of the most popular events to date and the only SR yet to receive an SSR alter in Anne: Miracle Fairy, fan darling N102 almost doesn't need an introduction. Her constant memory loss character trope and innocent, childlike demeanor were engineered in a moe lab for the express purpose of creating simps. If you click on her, look at her face, and feel that inexorable urge to protect, it's too late. She's already got you. On top of that she is second only to Anis in terms of viability, and actually probably beats her outside of PVP, at least in earlier stages. The attack buff on her burst is hands down the best utility of any SR, and it lasts for 10 seconds on a 20s burst! That's not bad! A little bit of bonus crit and +3 ammo to, say, a high powered sniper or shotgun SSR and she can actually be worth keeping around long past you've put your other SRs to bed. Is she worth burning skill manuals on? ...no, even an Anne superfan would have to think twice on that one as you'll likely replace her as soon as you pull an SSR with DPS buffs. But hey, I'm not your mom.
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MIHARA
Burst 3 (40s) Assault Rifle Attacker - Water - Missilis
Everyone's favourite bondage kitten, Mihara has the unique honor of being the only SR aside from the three members of counters to feature in the main story. She doesn't feature as heavily as the main girls, of course, but the story surrounding her and her partner, Yuni (an SSR) is pretty good (and ongoing!) so look forward to that. Without getting into spoilers, her main traits are that she's a masochist with something of a motherly personality; Yuni is the domme, but Mihara is the boss. Another "What you see is what you get" kind of character, if her aesthetic and the fact that she's an M gets your motor running you won't be disappointed. As a unit, she's fine. She's fine! Her kit is more complicated than other SRs but the gist of it is that bursting once gives her a buff, and as long as she maintains that buff all of her subsequent bursts are enhanced. She's about as good as Rapi, so you can pick the one you like the most. Or use them both!
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NEVE, HIMENO, AND OTHERS
Occasionally, Shift Up releases additional SRs as free event units. These can be exceptionally strong, but as they are unavailable to new players who join after their debut event ends, they're useless for such players to break the 160 wall. And as I'm not about to update this guide every time a new one is released, you'll just have to judge for yourself whether they're worth spending the 10 gems to reset someone or not.
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Section 3.3: SUGGESTED TEAMS
Here are a few example teams you might want to consider based around common themes. Remember that you can swap any or all of these girls out for whoever you want based on personal preference and what SSRs you have, these are just examples that favor my own personal biases (I like boobs).
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Team Progression Meta (several of these girls have situational use even at mid/high levels, a good team if you only care about performance):
Burst 3: Rapi, Mihara Burst 2: Belorta Burst 1: N102, Ether
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Team Big Damage (transforms into Team FIREPOWER if you replace Mica with Neon):
Burst 3: Rapi, Mihara Burst 2: Belorta Burst 1: Mica, N102
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Team Lorehound Waifu (most of these girls play a role in the MSQ, a good team if you want an emotional attachment to your squad):
Burst 3: Rapi, Mihara Burst 2: Anis Burst 1: Neon, N102
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Team Fat Tits (self-explanatory):
Burst 3: Rapi, Mihara Burst 2: Anis, Belorta Burst 1: Mica
You can replace Belorta in that last one, based on who you find hotteless infuriating. Hell, you can replace anyone in any of these with anyone you like. Run five Rares if you want, for the last time I'm not the boss of you.
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Anyway, if you made it this far thank you for taking the time to read this beast. If you have any comments or constructive feedback, please let me know. This thing is just over 6,000 words and took almost a week to write, way more effort than I originally anticipated. Not feeling super motivated for the next parts if I'm honest, though if/when I get to them (does anyone even care? will anyone even use this? could I have been playing FFXIV or reading I'm in Love with the Villainess fanfic this whole time? lol) hopefully none of them are THIS long. I don't think they will be? But yeah, if you think it's useful, please point new players to it as needed and... idk upvote it? That's what I'm supposed to say here, right? Regardless, the most important thing is that newer players find it when they need it, and the best way to to make that happen is to share it around and make it visible. Thanks again for reading!
​
TL;DR
Section 1: Synchro Device

• -Free players save your gems and rainbow tickets, burn blue tickets
• -Nikke levels can be reset for 10 gems
• -Save skill manuals for now
• -Synchro device synchs Nikkes to your 5th highest level
• -You never need to level more than 5 Nikkes
• -Level girls evenly

Section 2: Team Building

• -Burst rotaion is key to team building
• -All bursts have 20s or 40s cooldown
• -Most teams burst every 20s
• -At least one Nikke in a squad must have a 20s burst
• -Classes are fluid, think in terms of role
• -The best defense is a good offense
• -The usefulness of a Nikke lives and dies by her skills
• -Tailor your team to the fight to clear problem stages
• -When set to auto-burst, burst priority is left to right

Section 3: SR Teams

• -Pick whoever you want, they'll all get swapped eventually
• -Thanks for reading, I hope this helped!

Really been having a great time with it. Would be a shame if it goes away.
Aside from the characters and gameplay:

• It’s 2D and way more battery efficient than a full 3D game
• Portrait mode
• Short play sessions, always something to do in a few minutes of free time
• Love the pixel art

I chew through tons of games looking for the ones that fit those first three criteria and they are hard to find. (At least ones that are not Generic Fantasy Trope DX 2023.)
Suggestions? :(
EDIT:
Thanks for all the awesome suggestions. In addition to the replies below, here’s what I’m currently checking out after chewing through both a ton of current releases, as well as my backlog of prior downloads just to see if I should take another deeper look at anything:

• Alice Fiction: Very colorful, fast paced combo of puzzle/rpg, it’s so far my fave out of all contenders; 2D as well ❤️❤️❤️
• Neural Cloud: The UI is amazing and super smooth; strategy gameplay, a bit slow, but hopefully I’ll unlock a speed control to make it a little faster (lots of “character-swings-sword-repeatedly” animations that get boring after enough times
• Dislyte: Super stylish, great audio design; total battery hog, definitely turn it down to HD at least haha
• NIKKE: Trying it again seeing as how I waited a long time for release; didn’t love it on first go ‘round but giving it another shot
• World Flipper: still cute, and like last time, still on the fence with it

Both of these are settings where you (the PC) are a commander of attractive women (and sometimes men, as in the case of some PGR Constructs) fighting for humanity in the aftermath of some apocalyptic event that involves an enemy that can somehow corrupt your Constructs, which is an important story plot.
Rather than make a jump for each individually, I was thinking of just making a Generic Battle Dolls jump because there are some tropes that they share. It'd be a blend of stuff similar to things you could get from Generic AI, Generic Military, and probably something like Generic Post-Apocalypse, which I haven't read recently enough to remember the perks but the theming would fit.
Given the strict hierarchy and boundaries drawn between what a Construct/Nikke/Battle Doll of some type can do and what a human Commander, Scientist, or Survivor can do, it'll have some origin specific perks with a mixture of general perks with a couple floating discounts to use in that section, I think. So my question is: Is there anything you can think of to include in a jump like this that I might not think of or are there any other settings (I know of Girls Frontline, don't worry) that are similar and worth looking at for perk/item inspiration?

So the game has 4 classes (lets call them classes for ease of understanding) which are Tetra, Elysion, Missilis the three main manufacturers and the Pilgrims with Pilgrim being the ultra rare class.
As someone who has played plenty of games in similar genre, a common trope I have seen has been three main and two opposite classes. (Eg. Fire, Water, Earth and Light, Dark).
And listen to me, this seems to be matching up here. Pilgrims are the light, the heroes and first nikkes. At the same time after Chapter 6 >! we know that their arc nemesis are the Heretics, the dark nikkes that joined the Raptures and use rapture parts as weapons. There is also an additional point that when Heretics Nikke drop, they cannot be classified as one of the three manufacturers or Pilgrims. !<
So do you think that a fifth class of nikkes is coming soon?
(The reason this idea came up was because I saw a leaked image of a >! heretic !< nikke
https://youtu.be/0ukXIICqRq0 At timestamp: 1 minute 40 seconds.)

Hello!
I've browsed some of the early guides from the CBT crew, but most of the info is synchronizing Bursts, which is appreciated. For example, I am trying out the 2-1-2 setup, and I guess its an improvement over the accidental 1-2-2 I was utilizing (really, I went with weapon variety the first time, and its only a 4 second hiccup waiting on Neon).
However, does placing a given Nikke from 1-5 position make a mechanical difference outside of how the game prioritizes burst order? I notice #3 exposed further forward, for example, and that's where I had the Shotgun positioned, the AMG on 2-4, and SRL on 1-5.
Is there a better place to position my Nikke labeled as Defender, for example? Is running more than one Defender silly? As in I should probably look at 3A, 1S, 1D (what you'd expect from MMO tropes) or a 2A, 2S, 1D setup?
I get Nikke is its own thing, but it's always good to figure out the minutia the numbers run around.
Thx, fellow CDRs!

I'm sure you all know by now that I like to complain about this game. A lot. So, let's get the bias out of the way immediately: I hate this game. It's not a bad game, but as a mainline it is an absolute fucking disgrace. If you play SMT for anything other than its gameplay and actually give a shit about making decisions to impact the story... hee ho-fuck, you've made a wrong turn, kid.
Apocalypse strives to do something a bit different in a half-hearted attempt to appeal to both newcomers fresh off the Generic RPG™ series as well as longtime fans (what with the return of YHVH, the Diamond Realm DLC, etc.). However, by trying to appeal to a larger audience it overly simplifies the series' trademark formula and boils down to an RPG that while on top of its contemporaries, is not in any way standout. Gone is the morally grey decision-making. You're either a total cunt, or the nicest person ever. This is a Megaten game where there is a clear-cut antagonist which you cannot side with — and it's not Persona. Though, if one were told it was Persona, they wouldn't question it in the slightest. That's because Apocalypse boasts the most shallow characters Megaten has ever seen.
These characters aren't just bad. They're fucking offensive. I am shocked by how bad they are. You'd think that the writers either had never seen an anime before in their entire life and thought they had a really original idea, or (to paraphrase a comment from TheBazBlue) they wrote Apocalypse as "a meta commentary on JRPG writing in general". Because this level of cookie-cutter character development should be nowhere near a story that depends on its cast, I often found myself laughing not necessarily because the writing was humorous, but because it was so fucking bad. Don't even get me started on the final confrontation with YHVH. It completely undermines IV's alignments and the characters who represent them. Suddenly all of the bad blood between Walter, Jonathan, Flynn and Isabeau is just completely gone. Even Jonathan is giving God the finger for some indescribable reason. It's like they're facing off against Izanami in Persona 4, as if they've tapped into some hidden truth about YHVH. It's so damn cheesy that it's hard to even watch with straight face. The fight kinda plays like a reverse-Izanami, too. As in, you literally take down record scratch's first form with the power of friendship before getting to the real fight.
Alignment reps aren't the only people being butchered here, though! Rest assured, Apocalypse brings out the absolute worst of the worst in terms of trope-y characters; we've got underdeveloped childhood friends, terrible mother-figures, unwarrantedly obnoxious teen demon anarchists, closet demons who never shut up about being demons, lolis who want your dick to an extremely uncomfortable degree, blank slates with hardly any personality, mascots and more!! Seriously, the only character with a halfway decent arc is Gaston... and even then, it's still not very good. Honestly, half of the reason Gaston is decent is just because he's the only person in the entire game who doesn't want Nanashi's cock buried down their throat.
Unfortunately, Gaston's differences from the rest of the cast end there. Everyone is essentially the same person. They may walk different paths in life, but all of their roads lead to the same direction eventually and they practically meld into one entity; just a big ball of neutral bias with nothing else to their characters beyond "I was this but then this happened and so I decided to rebel against the system to strive for this".
I know, though. Saying Apocalypse's characters are bad is like saying the grass is green or the sky is blue — I get it. But it's not something that can be excused here due to how dependent the game is on them for its narrative. It really wants you to care about them but it never shows you why... all it ever does is tell you why you should care. Because Apocalypse cares so little about its characters and world, that translates over to the player as well. I found myself skipping a lot of dialogue in Apocalypse, even in some important scenes... I just, stopped caring.
Here's some examples of a few scenes you should probably care about:

• The two mentor characters that were obviously designed to die, died. I hardly knew them, though. So who cares? I can't even fully recall their names. Nikk-something and Manabu, I think?
  
• Asahi's dad died. Nanashi may have a strong connection to Asahi's dad, but I certainly don't. So why should I care? Asahi hardly even cares herself!
  
• Asahi died. I still don't feel anything regarding her, so her death is pretty meaningless. Not to mention that it's undone almost immediately afterward, anyway.
  

Apocalypse fails so hard not only at making its characters interesting, but its world as well. That's because every NPC in Tokyo is virtually the same person. 9 times out of 10 they'll say something about Flynn. Nobody ever says anything helpful because it's never necessary. The closest thing to "valuable" information you ever hear is about the ring of Gaea members who sacrificed themselves for Maitreya or whatever. But again, why should anyone care? It's never brought up again and I wouldn't have even mentioned it here had someone not reminded me of it.
Consider what happens once you get to Tokyo in SMT IV. You have no idea where you are or where to go to complete your objective. You're in a foreign land and you need to rely on others to tell you where to go. This creates immersion, something that Apocalypse sorely lacks because all of its quests are incredibly specific and conveniently marked on your map. While that sounds good on paper, it completely ruins the whole element of exploration and makes traveling feel as if it's on rails. Apocalypse might as well have had Mikado's VN interface throughout the entire game just to spare the time tediously spent following Dagda's built-in GPS.
Another aspect of Apocalypse that makes it feel like an on-rails experience is the ability to revive yourself right after dying in combat. Random encounters are rendered trivial and benign because they no longer pose any threat. SMT IVA is a Megaten game where if you decide, "I lost a little too much MP during this fight", you can simply choose to kill yourself and restart from where you were just before said fight.
What's even more strange is that in the Cosmic Egg's dungeon, dying actually causes a game over... but in the Egg it's so inconvenient and flat-out pointless because you still have instant revival everywhere else. There's no reason to risk permanent death, so the logical thing to do is to use estoma in that dungeon and bypass every enemy to avoid losing any progress. It ruins the dungeon's encounters, but hey, at least you're safe!
Speaking of inconveniences that Maitreya causes unto you, I'll admit that I did kinda like the Mandala he put up about halfway through the game. On one hand, I find it incredibly annoying to be unable to use terminals. On another, I think Apocalypse has more satisfying combat when you can't use your partners Isabeau and do have to rely on yourself. Partners Isabeau makes everything ridiculously easy. The only enemies that stood a chance against me in the mid-late game were bosses. Everything else was a fucking joke (keep in mind I beat this game on the Apocalypse difficulty).
Which brings me to my next complaint... this one's a little more personal and probably isn't of any concern to most of you who played the game on Conflict or War; money problems. In Apocalypse mode, macca is ridiculously hard to come by. It's manageable for a while and it forces you to better manage your resources, rather than buying anything and everything you can afford. But not only is money hard to come by — all prices (except for the compendium) are multiplied. Eventually, you're probably gonna be forced to buy the shitty macca DLC because you're incapable of lowering the difficulty, and you don't feel like waiting 12 hours to grind relics so you can buy the improved samurai outfit which you will die without from the black card shop... for the low price of 1,300,000 macca!
I'm sure the obvious response to that is, "Don't play on Apocalypse, you retard". But honestly, I think it's the best way to experience IVA. Because the odds of missing your attacks (until you get 100+agility) are so high, you become really dependent on ailments... and ailments haven't been useful since the SNES era! Needing to rely on bind skills not only for subduing your enemies but also for robbing them of their macca is an interesting dynamic that really makes you feel helpless early on. Makes the game a lot more engaging because you don't fly through random encounters. But, I digress.
While we're on a positive note, I'll bring up the combat itself: It kicks ass. It's easily the best battle system of the entire mainline series. Smirking has been improved and is no longer a shoehorned pat on the back or middle finger. It actually has a purpose and you can (and by the end of the game, need to) build your character and demons around it. Spices combat up and distances it a bit from the other games. Similar things can be said for the partner system, which is pretty good until you get Isabeau and autobattle so much that you wonder if you're playing P2 Innocent Sin. Partners are a blessing as well as a curse that serve to make Apocalypse more interesting, but go too far and eventually make it into a cakewalk.
Now, speaking of partners, let's play a guessing game: Who's the cause for the most annoying and gimmicky mechanic in the entire game?
If you guessed anything other than , you should be ashamed of yourself. The Jade Dagger is a fucking travesty. It's too simple to serve as a puzzle mechanic, it has an annoyingly short lifespan and its only purpose is to force you to backtrack constantly in dungeons. Don't get me wrong, backtracking to get rewards can and does work in games like DDS1, where finding certain items can unlock secret areas in previous dungeons; but Apocalypse doesn't do that at all with the Jade Dagger, because all of the backtracking is inside of a dungeon you're currently in. It forces you to run back and forth and it makes you feel as if you're running meaningless errands. It's just a forced gimmick to give Navarre some extra screen time and trick you into thinking he's not completely worthless to the story.
You know what else is pretty worthless? Simple Fusion. This is an issue I had with SMT IV as well and it returns in Apocalypse. They're both really adamant about making you use the demon searching mechanics. That wouldn't bother me so much if the original fusion methods were still optional. But instead, they've been replaced by a shitty system where you can only see the results of two demons at a time. How did this get fucked up so badly?
Regardless, speaking of demons and fusion, one thing I need to give Apocalypse props for is what I can describe best as "demon specialization". SMT IV's improved but admittedly flawed skill transferring mechanics have been perfected by IVA, as demons vary in which skills they should and shouldn't use. It's no longer logical to let a Pyro Jack use bufu skills, and it's more difficult to make ridiculously overpowered demons than it ever was in IV. Big improvement.
I'm running out of positives, but I can think of a few more: The voice acting is pretty good, with few exceptions (Aigis Nozomi). Also, I really like the concept of the Divine Powers. It's just a shame that they couldn't be, well, an alignment. I wanted to side with Krishna's alliance the entire time, but the fact that Apocalypse forces you to see them as clear-cut antagonists no matter the side you choose is fucking bullshit; it completely throws alignments out of the window. Apocalypse's ending choices are like Nocturne's... if Atlus forgot to write in any of the Reasons.
I can't even compliment this game without backhanding it immediately afterward. The art direction is bland and generic (I swear, Doi is getting worse as an artist. IV was pretty damn good... but what the fuck is this? Or even worse... this?!). The music is forgettable at best (save for a few tracks) and downright annoying at worst, often it clashes strangely with the unchanged tracks because Apocalypse has such a different music style than IVanilla. Almost every dungeon is bland and/or annoying. All of the boss rushing is ridiculous for a handheld game and doesn't make the game any harder because it's already so damn easy (watch out! It's a swarm of Metatrons!!). There's too many futile battles which tend to make you waste your items for no good reason. The game has barely any alignment representation and with a few changes to the script could easily be adapted to a Persona spinoff. Nearly all of the cutscenes are so damn lazy, and are often really distracting because they look like absolute shit. The writing is so heavily biased towards the bonds route. The list just goes on, and on, and on. Fuck this game.
Overall, SMT IV Apocalypse will be forgotten when the next mainline is released. The few who remember it will view it as a dated, generic story of friendship and bonds with a battle system that almost made enduring it worthwhile. But as it stands, Apocalypse is not a mainline game. It may play like one, but everything except its battle system boils down to a forgettable, cookie cutter JRPG that you can already find in the bargain bin. Underdeveloped characters cannot work in a character-focused story, and this game is proof of that. There's some good, but it's far outweighed by the bad.
Overall rating: 7.5/10.
My rating: 5/10.

Submitted by SROTDroid

/theredpill

149,432 unplugged users for 3 years!
A few weeks ago a nomination came in for /theredpill. The response was not great. There's a perception that /theredpill is misogynistic, or worse, a hate sub. I decided to see for myself. I read their sidebar and some of the subreddit's content, top posts and comments. I had some question about "red pill theory" in general after I was done. So, I contacted the mod who originally nominated the sub, bsutansalt, who was happy to answer them.
This feature is written as an interview between /theredpill moderator bsutansalt and myself (ZadocPaet). The design is to find out what exactly red pill theory is through conversation, and then to leave any conclusions to you, the readers.

On the outside, TheRedPill (hereinafter referred to as "TRP") seems to be a subreddit for two goals; (1) to help men lead productive lives mentally, emotionally, and financially, and (2) to promote sexual strategies. The subreddit comes under a lot of fire for the latter. Do you see the two things as one, or do you see TRP as one subreddit for men where the reader can get out of it what they are looking for?

Virtually everything we do as human beings is an expression of our biological imperatives and predispositions whether we realize it or not. This is especially apparent in our choice of career, at least for men. For example, why do so many men want to get a lucrative job? It's not because they enjoy working 80 hours a week, that's for sure. No, it's because somewhere deep down they know having a great high prestige job with a six figure income is going to enhance their sexual success with women. It's so ingrained into us that we don't even realize it, and to do so is politically incorrect. This is one example of raising one's sexual market value (SMV) without even realizing it (or publicly acknowledging it).
Another example is fitness. Not only are you enhancing your quality of life, longevity, and all that, you're also making yourself more physically attractive, and I think it's a fair generalization that most people would like to look good naked. People don't generally go through the hassle of dieting and the pain of working out because it's fun. While it can be, that's usually not the unconscious motivations at play. Often, like the example above, people realize being physically fit raises their SMV.

You mention that men want a higher paying job for sex. I know that I want a higher paying job because I like things. I like driving a nice car. I like living in a nice safe place. I like my grown up toys, like video games...

This is a good question and I suspect the answer is that it'll vary from person to person. Remember, I was simply using that as an example of how our biological drives and predispositions can influence our behavior, which you yourself acknowledged can be be a motivator.

Isn't it possible that increased sexual attraction is a side effect of success and not always the motivator? Sure, I'll concede that it can be a motivator, in part, for some people. But I only think it's part of the picture and not the big picture. When you're talking about sex as it relates to fitness, and in my opinion not just fitness, but things like oral hygiene, I agree. Health and sex go hand in hand.

I think if you look at human behavior and development through the lens of evolution, then you might ask yourself, "what drives us to be great or successful?" Greater sexual success/attraction may not be an obvious answer to that, especially when one can be successful without necessarily becoming more sexual. However, when you view it in the context of evolution, it would make sense that we, as a species, are more driven to behave in ways that are more likely to result in sexual success, even if it's not a conscious or deliberate strategy.

Do you feel that in western culture that it's more difficult to be a man, or is that perception more of an internet thing? For example, I often see the term "cis white male" used as a pejorative online, but I don't think I know a single person in real life who even knows the term "cis."

Masculinity is most definitely under attack in western society. The media denigrates men left and right and often we don't even realize it. An example is the TV trope of the "doofus dad" in commercials and TV shows.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BumblingDad
This sort culturation permeates western society to the point that just having natural healthy expressions of masculinity can get you kicked out of school and a lynch mob set upon you. I personally think this is in large party why Trump has such widespread appeal: he doesn't shy from his critics and doubles down on his antics and is a lightning rod for those who miss old school masculinity in our culture. This article goes into great depth on the masculinity vacuum we have today:
http://www.singularity2050.com/2010/01/the-misandry-bubble.html

Can you give me an example of masculinity getting someone kicked out of school? Are we talking about gun shaped Pop Tarts? Or something deeper than that?

The pop tart thing was just the tip of the iceberg as this issue goes much deeper. Just look at how it's open season on men in college, in large part due to the Dear Colleague letter. Another example is the notion of "teach men not to rape". If that's an accepted notion, then why not "teach women not to falsely accuse" or "teach blacks not to steal"? If the latter are misogynistic or racist, then logic demands the anti-male version be misandrist/sexist.

I am a guy. When I am with my guy friends our bar or fishing banter is a lot of the time in line with "Red Pill Theory," in particular when it comes to a financial and fitness perspective; the idea that self-esteem or self-worth comes from self-improvement. What are the core areas that TRP thinks a man should look to to improve upon himself?

From my perspective the most important areas of self improvement are (in no particular order):

• Fitness -- If you're fat, slim down. If you're skinny, bulk up. In my personal experience the male body type with the most widespread appeal to women isn't the big bodybuilder, but rather someone who's cut and has at least above average muscularity. The key component is a low body fat. An example of what I'm talking about is the Olympic swimmer or gymnast. An example of this taken to the extreme are the CrossFit pros like Matt Fraser and Rich Froning.
  
• Taking women off the pedestal -- This is clutch because women respond well to men with a backbone. Who knew! This manifests as being able to say no and check them when they test you. Stuff like understanding "shit tests" fall under this.
  
• Balanced investment -- This piggybacks on the above. If you're walking on eggshells, then things are seriously unbalanced in your relationship, which is actually really unhealthy and can lead to emotional terrorism in the relationship in some cases.
  

What I personally teach is that investment levels should be balanced, if not slightly in the man's favor (especially if they're new to the community and are those guys walking on eggshells). This is important because having things a bit in your favor plays a big part in women respecting the man's role as leader. This is going to ruffle some feathers, but I'm a big fan of the captain/first officer model pioneered by Athol Kay. And when it comes right down to it it works! It may not be PC, but I take results over comfort of strangers on the internet anyday, and the women in /redpillwomen will probably agree with me here.
A ton of women simply don't want to be the one calling the shots, planning dates, and so on, and actually want the guy to take the lead on stuff like that. However, if she doesn't respect you or is minimally invested, she's likely to be unresponsive to your attempts at taking on that leadership role. And not being in that role and letting her be in charge of the relationship can really turn a lot of women off sexually. If you look at the relationship dynamics of those in the dead bedrooms subreddit this comes up quite often. Once the guys hit the gym and stop being so available and attentive (rebalancing the investment levels) suddenly they find their gf and wives initiating and/or being responsive to their attempts to initiate sex again.
How can anyone reasonably expect those in a relationship to be open and honest about boundaries if one person is afraid the other will dump them at a moment's notice? Having standards and not being afraid to hold women accountable by them is really important for men. No, "important" is the wrong word. What this really is is empowering. I think that scares a lot of people, which is ironic because women appreciate a strong man who knows when to take the lead and often will resent a man who can't or won't.
Bottom line, if your relationship is so fragile you can't have healthy boundaries, you really need to reevaluate things.

You mention that a ton of women don't like to be the ones who call the shots, they like the man to be in the driver's seat. But what about women who do like to make decisions? Perhaps not even all decisions, but who are maybe more skilled at finance and are in charge of the bills in a relationship. Is there room for egalitarianism in TRP?

Life operates on a bell curve. Some women who are "alpha" females (eg dominant type-A personalities) are going to be in the minority on the far end of the curve. A huge reason for TRP's existence is the pursuit of male sexual strategy, therefore we focus on what gives men the best bang for their buck. In this case we focus on the meat of the bell curve rather than it's fringes. This is in essense why we say all women are like that. We aren't really saying ALL women, just those in the 80-90% of the bell curve's middle. We understand exceptison will always exist, even if we don't always say as much. I think once you've been around for a bit you'll start to see where things are implied.

In regards to, "Life operates on a bell curve..." Do you have any stats on that?

It's self evident. Type A personalities are the minority of both genders actually, but they're more common in men.
This is also pretty telling...
http://www.slayerment.com/mbti-gender
Look at how inverted the personality types are:
ISTP ("the virtuoso") is men's most common and women's least common personality type. Conversely, ISFJ ("the defender") is women's most common and men's least common personality type.

You also mentioned that investment levels should be balanced, so in the above scenario I described, if the wife is in charge of the bills, and the man is in charge of other aspects of the relationship, enough so that there is a balance of responsibilities, would that be okay?

Something like would be ideal in my opinion, where you share the load with each person being able to leverage their natural strengths. At the macro level this might translate to the man bringing home the bacon and women doing the lion's share of the child rearing. Again, this matches up with women's collective predisposition to "nurturing". There's a reason why teaching and nursing are female dominated careers. This again goes right back to the bell curve with women in general not working high wage jobs as often as men do. A cursory look at degree breakdowns bears this out: 9 of the top 10 most lucrative fields of study are male dominated. Conversely, 9 of the top 10 least lucrative fields of study are female dominated. That doesn't happen in a vacuum. I'll refer you to the documentary posted at the link below which delves into this phenomenon at length. The findings were so provocative it caused the closure of the NIKK Nordic Gender Institute.
/TheRedPill/comments/1vuho8/the_documentary_that_made_scandinavians_cut_all/

Speaking of bar banter, just like with most guys the topic of sex and "sex strategies" comes up a lot. In my circle of friends a lot of us come from different perspectives. We've all also gone through different phases in our lives; times of commitment, times of celibacy, and times of promiscuity. Some of us are married. Some date a lot of women serially, or at once. The primary criticism of TRP is that it's used to game or manipulate women into sex. How do you respond to that criticism, and is there room in TRP for married men, or men seeking long term relationships, or who are more egalitarian in their approach to women?

First off, yes there's room for TRP for married men! As I stated before, many men in relationships have found our community and seen their relationships return to how they used to be with their wives being interested in sex again and nagging less. Usually the men just learned to become playful again and figured out how to address shit tests and comfort tests, thereby resulting in everyone being happier. A lot of it goes back to that subtle testing women tend to do, sometimes on purpose, but often times unconsciously. So far as I can tell having dated up and down the age spectrum, that testing never stops.
The criticism largely has no merit and is largely born out of two things: butthurt SJWs and tone arguments. TRP is an online locker room for guys to speak plainly and with sweeping generalizations. Realize we're not gong to reign in people's speech for the most part. So long as they stay on point with our mission, have at it. Granted sometimes some really wild stuff gets shared, but that's going to be true of any community with our level of openness (which is rare in this day and age).
Everyone is welcome to come over, read the sidebar, kick the tires, and judge for themselves. All I ask is they have an open mind. I also made a guided version to the sidebar to help those who are unfamiliar with the community's lingo and philosophies so the ideas build upon one another, and so new readers can see where we're coming from:
/TheRedPill/comments/3de5aa/the_red_pill_primer_a_sidebar_made_simple/

Disclaimer from bsutansalt: The above are just my personal thoughts on what you asked, although I'm sure others will have their own two cents to add once the SROTD thread goes up.
Note from ZadocPaet: I fully encourage our readers to ask question in the comments and for mods and users from /theredpill to answer them. My only request is that the conversation be kept civil.