@KoinosTheGoat Let me put my grain of sand to clarify these concepts: A koinos node is a set of microservices (different pieces of software). Most of them are OPTIONAL. And most of them can be upgraded without hardforks. As long as all nodes create blocks with the same format and protocol there is no problem of changing its logic or adding features to them, this can happen without hardforks. From this set, the most important microservice is the CHAIN Microservice. This microservice contains the VM, the smart contracts, and the state of these smart contracts. This is the unique microservice that run smart contracts, no other. And this set of contracts contains a subset of contracts called "system smart contracts", which contains the logic of consensus, mana, governance, koin, etc. Then, coming back to TPS. There is a system contract that determines "how much MANA is charged to each user". If the blockchain receives a high amount of transactions per second this contract will increase the price of the MANA to infinity and no one will be able to pay for it. As a conclusion, the TPS is reduced because the mana does not allow this high TPS. How to increase the TPS? by changing the contract that determines "how much MANA is charged to each user". This contract is also known as the "Resource Contract". And to change that contract you need consensus from governance. However, it's not as simple as changing this contract, because the hardware of the nodes must be able to support this high performance. So, you can see the MANA as a protection for the nodes to operate in a reasonable conditions for their hardware. So first, it's necessary to improve the hardware (better cpu, bandwidth, etc) in all nodes and then make a call to the governance system to soften the parameters that govern the mana. There is a tradeoff... some nodes will not be able to improve their hardware and will stop, so, it reduces the decentralization.