I’m at level 43 after 18 months, with an average of 10 days per level, and wkstats accuracy totals around 89%-95% the whole way. I was keeping up with lessons and reviews (getting to 0/0 at the end of most days), not cheating, and not abusing scripts. Around the 30s levels, though, I started getting bogged down: the apprentice count rose into the 200s and then the 300s, with >300 reviews a day, and accuracy percentages dropping.
I tried various things: outside reading (I studied Japanese before), using the self-study script to review levels and leeches, and setting vacation mode and taking a break. I tried moving quickly through review sessions to let SRS do its work (which led to low accuracy levels, and more reviews to do); and I also tried moving more slowly through review sessions to try to study the failures on the spot better for next time (leading to fatigue and errors because of long review sessions.) I also tried going more slowly on lessons and getting apprentices below 100, but I couldn’t get that number to stay there. Things just kept getting worse overall.
Now I’m trapped at level 43, with over 300 apprentices and 600 gurus, 300 lessons and 1000 reviews, with 370 reviews expected daily. I don’t even try to do lessons anymore. I tried turning on vacation mode for a week or two a couple of times recently, just to get some time to figure out how to recover, but now, coming back to reviewing, I don’t see how to get out of this hole. I’m currently trying just to get through the reviews, using the self-study script to go over the failures right afterwards, but this method takes so long that all the piles just keep getting bigger. Accuracy is typically in the 0%-50% range, which adds to the number of reviews and apprentice items. (Also, unless I can get through the entire pile of reviews every day, then I don’t see how the SRS can work, because the time period between reviews gets extended.)
Several levels ago, I starting seeing items that had been pushed above Guru coming back to me for review without my being able to remember them at all. I’d recognize having learned them sometime in the past, but that’s about it. It’s like the SRS time period between reviews is just too long for my brain. Another part of the problem is that the changeover to the new mnemonics took place when I was in the low 20s levels, and since some of the new mnemonics worked better for me I went with the new ones–but stuck with a lot of the old ones. Mixing and matching this way turned out to be a disaster. Now I’m also trying to remember which mnemonics I used for the radicals in a particular kanji (is it fingers or nailbat this time?–the whole story changes), which then adds to the memory load and failure rate.
I see some advice for others in this position (but at lower levels) to just keep pressing forward, but at this high a level, and with this many reviews and lessons piled on, is that even possible? Would resetting be better? I’m not even sure what level to reset to–or if I’d just have the same problems the next time around, and maybe WaniKani just won’t work for me. Also, I’d hate to give up the (flawed) progress I’ve made up to this point. Has anyone else been in a situation like mine? Sorry for the long post. Thanks–