So I saw a graph a while back showing how workload scales in WaniKani and it lied to me! It showed workload peaking at the early twenties when you first start burning items, but man was I not prepared for how much worse it gets in the late twenties…
I think maybe that graph assumed perfect review accuracy but even then it wouldn’t make so much difference as I’ve always been at around 97%. Thing is, not only do the burns start low and increase in frequency and amount as you burn higher levels of items, but if, like me, your burn pass rate is lower than the others tiers, you’re going to start getting more and more Guru items.
My Guru items actually passed the number of Master items the other day and at this rate I can see that becoming the norm. This is especially the case due to how much my Guru/Master pass rate has deteriorated due to the increased workload in general.
It got so much last level that I’ve taken a week off from lessons to recharge a little. Somewhat dis-heartening but felt really necessary and I’m going to get right back on it after this week. I can handle the workload just about but it’s definitely tough with how much time I need to put in. I’ve always been very… slow to get things done. I’m not slow like stupid slow, but it takes a me longer than most people to get stuff done. So it’s likely I’m spending a lot longer on reviews than most people, which doesn’t help…
Anyway, two things in summary.
PSA: If you’re holding a steady 7-9 day pace like I was and you’re coming up on your first burn, be prepared. It gets worse. You may have to take a hit to your pace unless you do reviews very fast and/or have a high burn pass rate.
Some questions: How do other people handle this increase in workload? I assume it’s fairly normal to have a higher burn fail rate? And most importantly, when the hell does it ease up for people similar to my speed / pass rate up to now?
yep. That graph assumes a 100% accuracy. So your workload will somewhat look like it if you never fail an item that is on Master or Enlightenment progress, and you get those item there in a decent time.
Every item you fail obviously does not decrease your wokload. And if you keep piling up new items while not decreasing the stack, well then you are where you are now.
So far I am keeping up my 7-9 days. Lets see hwo that continues.
@ctmf you have been summoned to do battle with your nemesis - the unrepresentative workload chart!
@Yossa sounds like taking some time to get things under control is the right call at the moment. As someone that can have a middling pass rate on Burns, I feel your pain. But it’s all worth it as reading and listening becomes ever easier and more fun! Keep it up!
It also assumes a particular rate of completing lessons, as far as I remember.
People like to throw that graph around to show others that “look, it gets really intense later on!”, but it’s not particularly helpful at showing any one individual what their workload will look like.
I would say don’t ever worry about taking breaks to keep things under control. Doing breaks where you only do reviews is a great way to keep things manageable.
I wasn’t prepared. I woke up with 100+ reviews despite maintaining 3x a day of review without fail (and an average of 7-8 day per level), and I totally became miserable eating breakfast with 150 stack of reviews or so. I can only handle less than 50 at a time. Thus, my accuracy suffered a lot; I averaged 90% on every reviews before, but now its pretty normal for me to get below 85%
I still cannot answer for the last question, but I did handle the increase in workload by becoming miserable by slowing down on lessons. I usually do all lessons in one day, but as kanji becomes more complicated and burns come around, I’d have to be WK all day to put up with all of it. I’d also like to hear what others have done to manage their increase workload because I can say mine’s not a really solid plan.
As for burn rate, I don’t know if I have a high burn fail rate, but maybe I fail 1 out of 7 burn items (in my very best estimate).
I’m actually taking a break on lessons this week due to IRL reasons and I also want to have some respite. My motivation is down right now with all the SRS I do plus my real life situations getting really harder.
