Overall, the spirit stone system and having paid early releases is fine and a fair idea. However, the current method is poorly executed. Because free chapters don't keep up with current releases, a huge gap/paywall builds up for novels that release several chapters a day. The more that gap builds, the more expensive -and thus discouraging- it is to catch up. Moreover, it punishes those who do pay to catch up to current, because they then have no choice but to keep paying or wait weeks to months for the free chapters to catch up to the last place they were, effectively nullifying their original purchase. The free daily stones do alleviate the problem a little, but not nearly enough; being able to maintain a novel, maybe 2, at a chapter a day so long as your diligent about checking in and voting.
Some ideas to improve the system to be a bit more fair:
-Instead of a free chapter a day, have chapters unlock after a week or 2 or a month or whatever arbitrary amount of time. This guarantees that free chapters keep up with the premium releases, and those who paid to catch up aren't severely punished for being unable to maintain the expenditure and can resume reading again after a period of waiting instead of waiting months only to catch up and go to a chapter day. This can be implemented after a series builds up a certain amount premium chapters ahead of free chapters (20-50 or so) so series that don't have such an exaggerated gap between the 2 will stay at a release a day.
- have new chapters be unlockable with an ad watch for a reasonable period of time (a few days to week) or at the very least, have the newest release always unlockable with an ad watch. This would again provide a safety net for the Premium users who paid to catch up but can no longer afford to do so so long as they're diligent about checking for new chapters.
-Have a bulk price to permanently unlock all future chapters for a novel. Or have a subscription to each novel or the site overall.
-Include more ways to gain free Spirit Stones, such as watching ads or doing surveys or whatever. Or reduce the cost of each chapter.
-Replace or Supplement the free daily check in Spirit Stones with "Unlock" tokens that can unlock a chapter regardless of cost. They would essentially be something like the Power Stone and Energy Crystal where they have a daily recharge and a maximum storage amount. Perhaps tying them to level, gaining 1 per level for 1 to 5 a day or odd levels or whatever. Perhaps have a price to permanently unlock more per day.
Overall the problem I have with the current system is not that I have to pay to read the most current chapters, but that if I'm ever put into a situation where I can no longer do so, I basically have no choice but to drop the series do to the time gap it would take to convert to a free reader; wasting all of the time and money I put into up to that point. Knowing that, I'm hesitant to maintain more than 1 or 2 novels; especially since the price is a bit high compared to buying a finished product instead.
