I'm wondering how many words has to be on my application to have a chance. Mine has 1299 words so far. Is that enough? I failed the first one because it wasn't long enough. My second needs to be perfect.
The application form tells you the minimum number of words it should be. As long as you're at least at that number, you should be fine. In fact, they don't put it there and expect you to make it exactly that. Its there more to make sure you get at least the general amount of paragraphs needed to approximately fulfill that. They're not going to sit there and count each word up to 300 or whatever it is these days.
Also, as its been mentioned, what they care mostly about over anything is the quality of the application. Proper grammar is a huge thing as well as proper punctuation. Knowing canon and including enough in your application showing you know basic canon well enough is also a plus. Also, don't try to make such a cliche` story like, "John Doe's family was killed by rebels and ever since that day, he sought revenge and knew his destiny was to join the CCA to wipe out all rebels to avenge his family and seek justice." Those are a dime a dozen and what really catches the reader's eye is adding more of a unique story and twist.
Biggest thing though, make sure that punctuation and grammar and spelling is all exactly as it should be. They care far more about that than they do the actual content of the essay.