Now, onto a proper HM report!

I’m going to talk about some course and degree changes, so here’s a quick reminder on how those work. I do the course changes, such as making things accessible or inaccessible, so those went into effect a minute or so before I posted this. However, degrees are awarded through Prometheus and updating that requires James to deploy new code to the site. So that’s something that will go into effect Soon™ based on when he’s available and how much else he has to do. If your shiny new degrees don’t pop immediately, just relax and give it a day or so.

If you're in a situation where you need to retake an exam to qualify for a degree but you can't retake it, reach out to me. For example, over the weekend we had a member who was stuck at 83% on a course but couldn't resit the exam because the questions he'd missed on a previous attempt weren't active anymore. He couldn't raise his score because the site wouldn't let him retake the exam, but he couldn't retake his exam because he'd gotten all the existing questions correct. This is an easy problem for James and I to solve but you'll need to poke me about it.

New Course: Writing Dialogue

Ta da!. Thanks to Zentru’la for developing this one and Zuza for editing together the supplementary video. Dialogue is a hard thing for new writers to get comfortable with, and I hope Zen's advice helps ease that learning curve a bit.

Video for SA courses has been in discussion since at least 2012, when my secret HM archive starts with Solari’s notes. This course, which uses a few clips from Star Wars media to illustrate a principle from the course notes, is obviously only scratching the surface. If nothing else, it’s a proof of concept and we now have the infrastructure in place for future videos. I don’t anticipate major changes or for video to kill the text star anytime soon, but this is an area I’m going to continue to explore with my staff and our newfangled Emissary office going forward.

New Degrees: Writing

I mentioned last month that if Grammar and Style wasn’t close to finished when Writing Dialogue launched, I’d go ahead and deploy the new degrees without it so we can clean up most of the department’s deprecated courses. So pour one out for Poetry Studies, Grammar Studies, and Run-On Studies and the Writing and Philosophy Savant. Say hello to either three or four new degrees, depending on whether you count this first one.

Maven - Writing
This is the same Maven we used to have, though the requirements have almost entirely changed. If you already had this degree, you still have it regardless of your coursework.

• Introduction to Fiction Writing
• Story Structure
• Descriptive Writing
• Writing Dialogue
• Fiction Studies

Fiction Studies will be retired and replaced with Grammar and Style whenever other stuff stops happening long enough for me to finish writing it.

Maven - Character Development
This is a new degree using old courses, so a lot of folks are going to get a surprise diploma whenever James deploys the updated Prometheus script. The CS 10X courses and Wiki Basics are going to get overhauled in 2024, but for the time being this should be pretty stable.

• Character Sheets 101: Introduction
• Character Sheets 102: Possessions & Loadouts
• Wiki Basics: Character Creation
• Character Development

Before we get into our next two degrees, it’s probably worth reminding everyone how the Test of Wisdom works, because it’s unusual. Essentially, you take it twice. You submit a fiction–any DB fic works, it can be an old comp submission or something new–and Zen grades it according to the Voice rubric and converts that to a 100-point score. Then he’ll give you some specific feedback on how to improve that story. You work on addressing the feedback and then “retake the exam” by submitting your second draft, and you’ll get scored based on your level of improvement.

We chose to make the Test of Wisdom the central course for the upper writing degrees because this feedback and revision process is to some degree unavoidable if you want to improve as a writer. Don’t take my word for it. If you read Stephen King’s On Writing, he talks about how important his wife, Tabitha, has been as a test reader for him. Brandon Sanderson’s writing course at BYU, which is available for free on YouTube, talks at length about writing circles and how he and his writer friends get together regularly to give honest feedback on each other’s drafts. Tamsyn Muir had the Clarion Workshop. C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien had the Inklings. And literally every writer who gets through traditional publishing thanks their editor for a reason.

My understanding is that the old Writing Sage, now renamed “Advanced Writing Seminar,” involved a lot of writing to specific prompts and working through feedback from the teacher. At any rate, it was too resource intensive to be realistic for the SA. The ToW is my compromise and I’m curious to see what people think. Hopefully it's useful and encourages you to build these test reader/editor relationships with other writers across the club.

Savant - Writing
Normally, SA degrees require you to score 85% or higher on each course. This one is an exception.

• Test of Wisdom, 70% or higher
• Inquisitorius Rank V or higher
• Maven - Character Development
• Maven - Writing

Sage - Writing

• Test of Wisdom, 100%
• Inquisitorius Rank X or higher
• Savant - Writing

As mentioned above, the old Writing and Philosophy Savant is no longer available. However, the Tactics degrees still are. Hopefully, in 2024 we’ll be developing more content for what I call “collaborative storytelling,” which includes not only the ACC, but run-ons, small group fiction, and roleplaying. The Tactics degrees will get fleshed out into a full degree path focused on that, with more options on how you can unlock them for members who don’t like the ACC specifically. More on that in the spring.

New Feature: Wrong Answer Hints

So last month, Arshus suggested that it would be helpful to have some level of feedback for wrong answers in autograded exams. Just getting 0/1 in the results email doesn’t give you much to work from. So I talked it over with James and I have good news and bad news on that front.

The good news is we can do that now. For each question, we can define prewritten hints that will be included in the exam results email.

The bad news is that we have to do that, the hints don’t just appear on their own. So it’s going to take us a while to work through the existing exams and add those hints.

Status Report

Some odds and ends to report, mostly on the Galactic Studies/Technology front.

Eleceos delivered the first draft for Droids to me last week, so I can get to editing that. I’ve talked to a few people directly about artwork, but if you have any good pieces of your droids that you’d like to see featured in the course notes, hit me up.

The Fist staff also provided me with a draft of a previously unannounced course that I haven’t had a chance to review yet.

As promised, I finally trimmed down some exams to make certain courses less painful. Starfighter Studies, Capital Starship Studies, and Freighters/Transports Studies have fewer essays, although they’re not radically different from before.

Lightsabers has been updated with some cool new blade effects that Rian and Noobi worked out to reflect the crystal options available through the Eos Exotic Kyber Bazaar.

And, finally, I added a blurb to Comms 102: Discord on account security features. If anyone has specific questions on that front, feel free to ask me, since that’s what I do for a living.

Closing Remarks

I've spoken to, gee, at least six people who are or are considering applying for Emissary and I've heard about a few others. If you think you have anything to contribute, I think you should submit an application. That job's going to be tough, but if the folks I've spoken to are all contributing to the effort, I think we're going to be in an excellent place going forward.

As always, if anyone sees any errors in the course notes or exam questions, please submit them through the form. Scrolls of Foundation are a nutritious part of a healthy XP diet.

And, of course, I am always available at [Log in to view e-mail addresses] or Archenksov#2230.

Academy Changelog

DB FUNDAMENTALS
Comms 101: Website Navigation
- Removed outdated information about orders and the roster view (Malik)
Comms 102: Discord
- Added a section on multifactor authentication and account security

COMBAT & WARFARE
Capital Starship Studies
- Cut five questions from the exam to make it less of a time sink for members
Freighters/Transports Studies
- Cut four questions from the exam to make it less of a time sink for members
Lightsabers
- Fixed a Markdown issue in the course notes (Wally and Qormus)
- Fixed a Markdown issue in the exam (Qormus and TuQ)
- Updated to reflect new blade effects per the Herald (Noobi)
Starfighter Studies
- Cut three questions from the exam to make it less of a time sink for members

LEADERSHIP, LAW & COMMUNICATION
Leadership Management
- Updated course to remove outdated communications channels (Zuza)

WRITING
Character Development
- Exam questions now provide enough room to answer the questions (Work't)
Grammar Studies
- Course retired
Poetry Studies
- Course retired
Run-On Studies
- Course retired
Writing Dialogue
- New course by Zentru'la, with video editing by Zuza

SA DEGREES
Advanced Writing Seminar
- Renamed from "Sage - Writing" to preserve unique accomplishment for members who completed the old Writing Sage
Maven - Writing
- Removed Grammar Studies, Poetry Studies, and Run-On Studies from the requirements
- Added Story Structure, Descriptive Writing, and Writing Dialogue to requirements
Maven - Character Development
- New degree
Savant - Writing
- New degree
Savant - Writing and Philosophy
- Degree retired
Sage - Writing
- New degree