Multiple linkshells suggestion.

[Enfarious]

You're not locked on anything. You just press a given linkshell's key whenever you want to send a message to that linkshell. it's a lot faster than typing a multi-character slash command.

*ls hotkey1*
hey, lets hang out tonight
Oh? What time?
Okay, see you then
*ls hotkey 2*
I can't do that tonight, I'm meeting someone else
Sorry!
*ls hotkey 1*
OK, everything's all settled now
I'll be ready!

versus

/ls1 hey, lets hang out tonight
/ls1 Oh? What time?
/ls1 Okay, see you then
/ls2 I can't do that tonight, I'm meeting someone else
/ls2 Sorry!
/ls1 OK, everything's all settled now
/ls1 I'll be ready!

One is much less work than the other. Guess which one?
Top, person had to press three buttons between sending 7 messages.
Bottom, person had to press 28 buttons (4 characters in each slash command x7) in sending 7 messages.

There's nothing "permanent" about the switch. Just press the hotkey for the original shell and switch back.

Think perhaps you misunderstood my meaning of "locked", so as an example.
/1 (w/o text this is the equiv of hitting [ls1] so now my active ls is 1 and cm is /l)
blah blah blah
/4 Hey anyone wanna grind (I don't actually want this to be my active shell, just want to send the one line)
/p (w/o text this is the equiv of /cm p, I don't want to be in linkshell chat default at all right now)
/3 Got 2 xp slots open anyone want in?
/2 Come fill this xp pt for me.
So I asked on a couple shells to try to rep these last couple slots.
(time passes pt dies)
/1 (again w/o anything following the "/1" it switches my chatmode to /cm l and active shell to 1)
Well that parties done.
Anyone doing anything fun or interesting?

I've switched chatmodes less times, pressed less keys, and saved ~8 keystrokes over mashing [ctrl]+[shell n] everytime I want to say something to a shell and then [ctrl+p] to talk to my party again.

All I meant by permanent/locked is that your active shell changes, or your chatmode changes, for instance in a pt more often than not I don't want to change chatmode from /p since more often than not I'm talking to party members. That makes:
[ls1 keys]
Oh as soon as I get 50 (~50k) I'll come do that.
[ctrl+p]
Hang on I need MP!

More keys than:
/1 Oh as soon as I get 50 (~50k) I'll come do that.
Hang on I need MP!

every time no matter how you wanna try to argue it^^