Standards and Accessability

Mishgul

So I just watched a pair of people rip into someone over an IG essay, which i decided to read. It was awful to see, and then watch them display a distinct lack of empathy in trying to tell him to not be offended.

The essay was awful. Like it was written by a 13 year old in fact. I was an awful writer when I was 13. I played Achaea back then too. If I had to do this requirement back then I would have failed it, and probably quit Achaea if someone told me it wasn't good enough.

Now I have no idea how old the person who wrote it is, nor should I have to care, but what constitutes as acceptable standards? This guy was really upset because he thought he did a really good job, and after reading it, I would probably give him 10/10 for effort. This is a game after all.

What kind of standard should we hold people accountable to though? Considering this is a game that someone who may not be proficient in english in might enjoy playing, at what point are we telling them they aren't good enough to take part and have fun? 

Conversely, to what standard should literature be held to in these circumstances?

Iocun

That's a very difficult question to answer. Personally, I make huge differences between different house ranks and stuff there. When someone wishes to advance to a prestigious, high position, I have relatively high standards, but for the ranks you'd expect every player to achieve after some time, I'm very tolerant.

It's possible in my house to fail early novice interviews, and many of my fellow novice aides also fail them if they don't really complete one requirement, and I used to do so myself. But nowadays, it's really almost impossible to fail an orientation/first novice interview with me.

I figure that at this point, we want to focus on making a newbie feel accepted. Once someone has been in a house for a while and formed an actual bond with it, you can easily get quite strict on them and they may even appreciate it, but at the very start, it often tends to just frustrate new players and possibly drive them away. So for those, I really try my best to get them to pass the interview in some way or another, by giving them hints to get them on the right track.

I feel many organisations make the mistake of having way too many early requirements, yet no actually super tough late requirements, which frustrates new players at the start, and bores experienced players at the end.

Taraus

I don't think there's a base-line standard you can apply across the board that someone ought to be held up to, mostly because people, and their writing ability, and their enjoyment OF writing, differs so radically.

I've never been overly fond of certain requirements anywhere that call for long pieces of written work, for the simple reason that this IS a game, and a lot of people find that so tedious - especially when you consider the amount of people that play who're in college - yea, I just spent two weeks writing this 50 page thesis, now lemme spend my 10 minutes of free time writing more!

I think, at some point, it has to be up to the -players- to decide what level others get held up to. You can [usually] get an idea of someone else's grasp on the language and word play by spending a little bit of time around them, and having a few conversations. How easily do they communicate, find the right words to say what they want? And in some cases, how well is their description written? 

That's ultimately how I feel about any requirement that involves writing - it's up to the players on the OTHER side - the ones who'd pass or fail - to determine what level is acceptable and passes muster. And it's up to everyone else (in the organisation) to make sure that whoever is on the other side is someone who's -reasonable-.

There is no standard you can set; this is one of those twitchy topics that ultimately boils down to - it's the -players- responsibility to handle this accordingly and appropriately. And it sounds like that's exactly what didn't happen, in Carm's story. Which means it's probably time to assess who's on the topside of the requirements, and are they dishing out more harm than good.

Jacen

I think it varies according to where you're at, character-wise. Meaning a good solid effort should suffice for up to HR5, and good solid effort does mean both length and relevance to the topic, but allows a lot of room for grammar and spelling errors. You could tighten up the standards here a bit if the writer is allowed to let people proofread his|her work, but overall I think you're really looking more for interest and loyalty in the org rather than the grammatical correctness of a written piece.

Beyond HR5 though, I think it needs to be judged more by its contribution to the game lore than by the requirements its written to fulfill, and that's where you can start holding it against more serious standards.

Eld

Taraus said:

I don't think there's a base-line standard you can apply across the board that someone ought to be held up to, mostly because people, and their writing ability, and their enjoyment OF writing, differs so radically.

I've never been overly fond of certain requirements anywhere that call for long pieces of written work, for the simple reason that this IS a game, and a lot of people find that so tedious - especially when you consider the amount of people that play who're in college - yea, I just spent two weeks writing this 50 page thesis, now lemme spend my 10 minutes of free time writing more!

I think, at some point, it has to be up to the -players- to decide what level others get held up to. You can [usually] get an idea of someone else's grasp on the language and word play by spending a little bit of time around them, and having a few conversations. How easily do they communicate, find the right words to say what they want? And in some cases, how well is their description written? 

That's ultimately how I feel about any requirement that involves writing - it's up to the players on the OTHER side - the ones who'd pass or fail - to determine what level is acceptable and passes muster. And it's up to everyone else (in the organisation) to make sure that whoever is on the other side is someone who's -reasonable-.

There is no standard you can set; this is one of those twitchy topics that ultimately boils down to - it's the -players- responsibility to handle this accordingly and appropriately. And it sounds like that's exactly what didn't happen, in Carm's story. Which means it's probably time to assess who's on the topside of the requirements, and are they dishing out more harm than good.

Well, some people DO enjoy that kind of thing, and having paths for advancement for those people that involves fairly extensive writing assignments, held to pretty high standards for content, and with some editing for grammar if it's going to become a lasting work, is useful and potentially rewarding. That sort of stuff should be reserved for a point where that's one option for progression, and those more interested in other avenues can go another, less writing-intensive route. 

For novice-level stuff, I'm usually just looking for them to have put a bit of effort into thinking about whatever topic, and would generally just as soon give the option of something written or an active discussion. Usually if I'm administering a test and someone turns in something written that I consider subpar, I'll just ask a few questions about whatever seems unclear and judge them on those responses.

In a game where one novice might be a 16-year-old non-native speaker and the next might have Ph.D. in English, there's not much you can do beyond finding a standard to hold each person to that's appropriately challenging for them.

Mathonwy

When I used to, you know, actually play the game and was active in House affairs, the first requirements were almost always just a baseline to see what the player/character was capable of accomplishing with minimal direction. The standards for each subsequent challenge would be set a bit higher, and each of them would be more focused on developing a side to that character so that when any given House member joined the House, there'd be some baseline, no matter how rudimentary, for roleplay development.

From what I recall, a number of Houses tend to have at least one path that's based basically more on perseverance and consistent roleplay than on doing a ponderous mountain of essay writing or speech-giving (although most have you try your hand at it at least once, just so you can see if it's something you like or not). It's often passed off as the administrative or educational side of the House and focuses a lot on helping newbies and things out, and what's absolutely wonderful about that and why every House should have a path like that is that it keeps new membership numbers up and, at its best, it keeps younger members actively engaged.

I think this is a good thing and to be encouraged; the best roleplay atmospheres I remember enjoying were the ones that had enough people involved in that facet of the House that people could get to know all of the newer players and help them define their goals in roleplaying that character, with its eventual culmination being some sort meaningful challenge to the horizons of the character for full admission into the House. It did, as previously discussed, a service to the character in question, but I'd like to think it also helped to make Achaea as a whole a much better atmosphere in which to roleplay.

Shirszae

I don't think something such as acceptable standards for ig literature can be discussed wholly ooc. At most, it should be a case per case basis. You can't just copy a scroll over, paraphrase it some, then call it done. Thats not even an issue of not being fluent in the language, thats just the writer being lazy and not wanting to actually write anything.

I feel that, at most, you could send whoever will read your essay a small note, telling that you really are not as fluent in english as you would wish to, and hope they'll take that into consideration. But that should not mean you don't have to put an effort into it. 

Blujixapug

If someone is making you WRITE AN ESSAY as a mandatory advancement task in this game, then they already have no judgment or sense, and expecting better of them is futile. Rote middle-school writing tasks are the dumbest shit in this game. Forcing someone, in a multiplayer game, to spend hours on a single-player task of writing something, when the results are probably never going to be seen or read by anyone else, is pointless, short-sighted, and bordering on domineering - layering criticism on top is just an extension of that short-sightedness. If you want them to spend time formulating an opinion of Evil, or the elements, or Chaos, there are many, many vastly better ways of doing that than writing a stupid essay.

If you have chosen to write something as an optional task, for example you're pursuing advancement in the scholar branch of your House, you're drafting a persuasive news post, you're helping to fill a library, you're creating a ritual/etc, then it's reasonable for people to freely criticise it, particularly if you've solicited criticism. I generally find it more effective to be kind with criticism, eg. explain why passive voice is bad, or why their sentence structure would benefit from shuffling, rather than just saying "change it". Because you're already telling someone that what they've done is bad, you may as well make it easy for them to accept what you're saying. Refraining from sugar-coating your criticism may save time, depending on the situation, if the recipient of your advice can accept it.

If you have chosen to write something that by nature should have extremely high standards, like a room description for a public area, or an item description for House wares, then that type of thing demands close scrutiny and ruthless editing. For something like that, I value the presentation (as an extension of the game's standards) over the feelings of the person writing it. Still, I find it hard to justify pointless cruelty, unless you are deliberately trying to discourage the player.

Zii

I'm an easy one to test with, cause I'll pass you if you get it wrong, after I show you whats right.  I would have passed him, and told him to work on his penmanship.

Some people seem to think they need to be a hard-ass about everything.  Criticize and they get upset.

Strata

As a novice aide, I rarely have to tell people which scrolls to read and what requirements they should be working on. When they ask me questions, no matter how trivial and boring it is to me, I go into as much detail about it as they need until they understand. And because of that, they ace their exams with flying colors. If they talk like a 13 year old, who cares? Check the news boards for posts from the early 2000's if you want to see some hilarious stuff. I mean... look at all these 13 year olds from Ashtan and Shallam talking shit to eachother! It's great. You shouldn't have to be a college english major to hold high office in this GAME. Get real, you pompous freaks.

Fitz

Blujixapug said:

If someone is making you WRITE AN ESSAY as a mandatory advancement task in this game, then they already have no judgment or sense, and expecting better of them is futile. Rote middle-school writing tasks are the dumbest shit in this game. Forcing someone, in a multiplayer game, to spend hours on a single-player task of writing something, when the results are probably never going to be seen or read by anyone else, is pointless, short-sighted, and bordering on domineering - layering criticism on top is just an extension of that short-sightedness. If you want them to spend time formulating an opinion of Evil, or the elements, or Chaos, there are many, many vastly better ways of doing that than writing a stupid essay.

If you have chosen to write something as an optional task, for example you're pursuing advancement in the scholar branch of your House, you're drafting a persuasive news post, you're helping to fill a library, you're creating a ritual/etc, then it's reasonable for people to freely criticise it, particularly if you've solicited criticism. I generally find it more effective to be kind with criticism, eg. explain why passive voice is bad, or why their sentence structure would benefit from shuffling, rather than just saying "change it". Because you're already telling someone that what they've done is bad, you may as well make it easy for them to accept what you're saying. Refraining from sugar-coating your criticism may save time, depending on the situation, if the recipient of your advice can accept it.

If you have chosen to write something that by nature should have extremely high standards, like a room description for a public area, or an item description for House wares, then that type of thing demands close scrutiny and ruthless editing. For something like that, I value the presentation (as an extension of the game's standards) over the feelings of the person writing it. Still, I find it hard to justify pointless cruelty, unless you are deliberately trying to discourage the player.

Actually on the one written assignment that I know about, it's posted for everyone to see, and then can be challenged, and discussed, and then the writer offers a rebuttal. It's to provide a chance to explore abstract concepts within the game reality that the player/character finds intriguing and actually wants to research, and then present to the collective group as a whole for discussion. Length is entirely up to the writer, and some of the essay's I've seen aren't even written in a structured way, but seem to ramble in the direction the writer was going within the paragraph.

Ultimately, I think it's a good thing, because it allows for discussions that may not happen due to peoples play times. Is it something for novices? No. But is it good for the House as a whole? I would say so.

Shirszae

Strata said:

As a novice aide, I rarely have to tell people which scrolls to read and what requirements they should be working on. When they ask me questions, no matter how trivial and boring it is to me, I go into as much detail about it as they need until they understand. And because of that, they ace their exams with flying colors. If they talk like a 13 year old, who cares? Check the news boards for posts from the early 2000's if you want to see some hilarious stuff. I mean... look at all these 13 year olds from Ashtan and Shallam talking shit to eachother! It's great. You shouldn't have to be a college english major to hold high office in this GAME. Get real, you pompous freaks.

This is probably something very subjective, but I HATE when people constantly talk with typos and lazy grammar. And I don't mean the kind of things you can ignore, but the ones that makes your eyes bleed. So I'd say no, you don't have to be an english major, but this is a text game, where the main mean of communication is text. So you better damn make an effort to write at least passably well.

And English is not even my mother tongue.

Synbios

Fortunately, my germination in an environment where English proficiency has degraded has made me numb to minor lapses in grammatical/spelling errors. What I would look for in their mash-up of a writing is if they understood the concept that I'm trying to teach them. I try to be analytical enough to discern the meaning of what they try to write, and may sometimes speak to them in person to get a better understanding of what they wrote about. If they did get it, then they pass, albeit with minor advice on penmanship. 

Would rather take in a novice who has sub-par writing skills, but understands why Good is best, rather than someone with excellent grammar, but is ferociously stubborn about being corrected that no, Good is not all flowers and kumbayah.

Eilona

I'm the leader of the scholar path within the Druids House. Writing an essay is never obligatory; you can always choose to hold a discussion, and that's actually preferred since it promotes more interaction within the House. If someone does choose to write an essay, I expect correct punctuation as a minimum. Whole paragraphs without a single full-stop make me despair a little. The point is for the character to show that they've learnt something new by interviewing other Druids and doing a little research. As long as I can read it without getting a headache, I'm not too bothered about it being perfect English. What does bother me is when someone has clearly just copied and pasted from somebody else's work.

Jovolo

I don't think I've ever been in a House where you didn't have to write at least one to two A4 pages of an essay (sometimes even three or more essays!) just to reach full member. Heck, in some places you had to do all that just to reach HR03. The Mojushai is probably one of the best at going about this, as they encourage interactive lessons (Attending, and giving) for you to reach Full Member, with a much smaller emphasis on scholarly essays until you want to specialize in a certain path after achieving Full Member. Mhaldor was the absolute worst for this and I know a bunch of people that quit over the nature of the essays and the pompous attitude of the people that read them, but they've been getting a lot better with it recently.

I agree that it depends entirely on what the essay represents within the House. Up until you reach Full Member, there should be no stupid emphasis on turning every single player into some scholarly genius, as I have said several times in the past this is just a game and most of us play for different reasons. I actually find the younger players endearing/nostalgic of earlier times in Achaea, and I also have no doubt whatsoever that a large, huge majority of those players are turned away from the game once they realise what advancement... actually entails. 

I see a lot of people agreeing with the OP (including myself), but even in positions of leadership there doesn't seem like there's any real effort to move away from this paradigm of essays for advancement or bust, and it's sad to see.

EDIT: Oh, additionally. I don't think it's any organisation in particular that is exceptionally at fault for the above issues, I think it depends on what fortune the player has when they pick their mentor or their interviewer. It's just that these issues are allowed to exist because of the framework of the requirements. If you alter that framework, then the bad apples wouldn't have room to throw their weight around regarding expertly written essays.

I think this is a really interesting discussion, because it's a problem SO very deeply rooted in Achaean history and it would take a real effort from almost everyone in leadership to approach it realistically and constructively. My points are a little verbose thanks to an all nighter attending an excellent led zeppelin tribute band +1 but I look forward to coming back to this thread after a little bit of sleep. Heh!

Aepas

After going to college, then spending too much time getting into apprenticeships for electrical engineering, I have not actually practiced my English language skills for quite some time. (especially since I joined the navy. Writing a service advisory in navy terms is vastly different than decent English terms.)

So, where has this caused me problems? Well misuse of words. I used the word propaganda once, referring to a way that we display ourselves to the world. However the true word of propoganda means a biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular political cause or point of view.

So, I was wrong in the way of the game. Mhaldor, as far as Mhaldor's RP goes, is never misleading or lying, it is only "Truth". So I was punished for my misuse of words. Granted, I have been around much longer than the rest, and I should know better when choosing my words.

However for people that I assume to be around 12-15 years old, I don't expect near such treatment to them. If anyone was ragging on a newbies true effort in an attempt at an essay, I'd be quick to interject. I remember the ebonfist had an "Essay" on lord sartan, but I passed with a simple paragraph when I was young. The idea is never to write something amazing, but simply show you have an understanding of the subject.

Too many forget that, and cause repeated problems because of it. I've experienced people that don't take such things into terms, and they are always problematic.

What we all have to learn from this is that the understanding of any specific subject will be heavily based on the amount of time they have had in game, what house they are in, and the content they wrote about. If we get caught up on diction and rhetoric, well we're all wrong.

Guess this was more of a rant than anything, but let's hope someone learned something from it.

Ruth

Mishgul said:

So I just watched a pair of people rip into someone over an IG essay, which i decided to read. It was awful to see, and then watch them display a distinct lack of empathy in trying to tell him to not be offended.

The essay was awful. Like it was written by a 13 year old in fact. I was an awful writer when I was 13. I played Achaea back then too. If I had to do this requirement back then I would have failed it, and probably quit Achaea if someone told me it wasn't good enough.

Now I have no idea how old the person who wrote it is, nor should I have to care, but what constitutes as acceptable standards? This guy was really upset because he thought he did a really good job, and after reading it, I would probably give him 10/10 for effort. This is a game after all.

What kind of standard should we hold people accountable to though? Considering this is a game that someone who may not be proficient in english in might enjoy playing, at what point are we telling them they aren't good enough to take part and have fun? 

Conversely, to what standard should literature be held to in these circumstances?

Personally, I feel that any essay as part of any requirements from HR1 to HR3 should not be criticized too badly. At these moments, the purpose of the essay is not to look for in-depth content, but rather, for the basic understanding the essay itself is supposed to demonstrate. To take an example:

[o] Write a short essay in a journal or letter, or set up a short
    discussion on one (1) of the following subjects:
      - Lord Sartan and the realm of Evil
      - Interpretation of one of the Seven Truths
      - Analysis of a chapter from the Apocrypha
      - A personal experience of an applied Truth

This is a HR2 requirement. I don't expect essays on this tier to be exceptionally good. All I require is one paragraph, from which I can deduce understanding from. If I cannot understand your paragraph, I will give out light criticisms and questions that are designed to promote further elaboration on the writer's side. I won't normally ask them to re-do it if I'm content with the discussion (should they choose to write an essay on it), because I know essays can be quite wearing to write, and some people aren't too good with written word as they can be in spoken tongue. I severely dislike people trying to be pompous and high-handed in passing/judging these essay requirements.

Daklore

Fortunately, in the Wardens, you don't start writing essays until you start working toward Knight. I don't know about the rest of the Knights, but I -believe- for the most part, grammar and eloquence is easily overlooked and the only real point of the essay is for the student to portray their fledgling and often-fumbling grasp on the Ethos of the House.

I think the only people who've "failed" their essays have been those who didn't offer any real substance. And most Knights follow up the essay with a discussion-slash-debate to fill in any perceived gaps and prod them in the right direction. If a Knight ripped into a student for having bad grammar... I think we'd set Czanthria on them.

Even with my irritating habit of picking at people's poor spelling and grammar(despite the fact that my own are at times rather atrocious), if I could get the point of the essay, I'd pass it. Essays Squires can choose(they actually -choose- to do them at that level, they aren't necessarily required) however, because they're optional, I'd definitely be a lot harsher on those... but that's a whole different barrel of monkeys.

Edit: me do grammar good

Kyrra

Daklore said:

Fortunately, in the Wardens, you don't start writing essays until you start working toward Knight. I don't know about the rest of the Knights, but I -believe- for the most part, grammar and eloquence is easily overlooked and the only real point of the essay is for the student to portray their fledgling and often-fumbling grasp on the Ethos of the House.

I think the only people who've "failed" their essays have been those who didn't offer any real substance. And most Knights follow up the essay with a discussion-slash-debate to fill in any perceived gaps and prod them in the right direction. If a Knight ripped into a student for having bad grammar... I think we'd set Czanthria on them.

Even with my irritating habit of picking at people's poor spelling and grammar(despite the fact that my own are at times rather atrocious), if I could get the point of the essay, I'd pass it. Essays Squires can choose(they actually -choose- to do them at that level, they aren't necessarily required) however, because they're optional, I'd definitely be a lot harsher on those... but that's a whole different barrel of monkeys.

Edit: me do grammar good

Wow that is so different to all the writing I had to do with the Runewardens.

Once you hit GR1 you had to start writing pages on the cornerstones of the Ethos and I think writing a formal background was GR2. I took about three weeks writing a small novel for mine that had to be so factually correct.

Iocun

edit: er, nevermind.

Strata

Shirszae said:

Strata said:

As a novice aide, I rarely have to tell people which scrolls to read and what requirements they should be working on. When they ask me questions, no matter how trivial and boring it is to me, I go into as much detail about it as they need until they understand. And because of that, they ace their exams with flying colors. If they talk like a 13 year old, who cares? Check the news boards for posts from the early 2000's if you want to see some hilarious stuff. I mean... look at all these 13 year olds from Ashtan and Shallam talking shit to eachother! It's great. You shouldn't have to be a college english major to hold high office in this GAME. Get real, you pompous freaks.

This is probably something very subjective, but I HATE when people constantly talk with typos and lazy grammar. And I don't mean the kind of things you can ignore, but the ones that makes your eyes bleed. So I'd say no, you don't have to be an english major, but this is a text game, where the main mean of communication is text. So you better damn make an effort to write at least passably well.

And English is not even my mother tongue.

You're absolutely right. I could have been more specific in defining what "talking like a 13 year old" means. What I meant is genuine "younger person" grammar where the reader can definitely sense that the writer is just that: younger.

I don't mind misuse of "your", "you're", "their", "they're" so much in Achaea even though IRL it is a huge peeve of mine. Text slang is completely unacceptable.

Also keep in mind that there are players with physical disabilities that inhibit them from typing properly or even typing at all. You just don't know who is on the other side of your screen.

Lastly, @Shirszae, did you notice the thread title? =D>

Anaidiana

Disclaimer: Read OP and first few posts, then skipped to post. If my 2 cents have already been contributed, consider them as a +1 to the person who originally said it.

If English isn't their native tongue and it's obvious: cut them some slack. Offer to help them by proofing their next assigned essay. 

If they're obviously younger IRL, also cut them some slack. While they may speak English natively, it's a fucking pain in the ass to learn all the phonetic nuances of this melting-pot language, when to add just an s or an es or i before e and all the other random rules. Offer to help them by proofing their next assigned essay. 

If it's hard to tell either about their language or their age, and you REALLY want to know, ask some leading questions about their history of writing. 

Another thing that might help is to create HHELP COMPOSITION or HHELP ESSAYS or somesuch. Find people in your house/org who are willing to help proof for new members. Throw some grammar hints in there about their/there/they're, to/too/two, and other easily mistaken spellings AND idioms (for all intents and purposes, not all intensive purposes, and so on). Throw in hints like, 'read it aloud. If you find you're hyperventilating as you read it, you have too many commas. Try rearranging your sentences to take some out and help the flow', 'don't start every sentence with 'I', even if it's your background/history essay', 'vary your word choices', and so on. 

Anai was asked to proof a LOT in the Sentaari and while some of the writers seemed to approach her at the most inopportune times, she gave them the help they needed because she wanted to see the output of the house at a high standard. 

edit: ugh. pregnancy brain. 

In addition, it's sort of the unspoken role of every person in a leadership position within an org to help grow that org. We shouldn't be scaring off new members (especially true noobs because that's how the game as a whole grows), but  instead finding ways to encourage them to stay. Each person has something to bring to the table, they just might need some help finding it.  IF you have people in leadership positions who are working against the good of the order, then maybe someone else needs to be there (or they need to have a chat about how they appear to newbies). Mhaldorian or not, I'm sure you want to keep your new meat. 

Jurixe

I can't speak for the other Houses, but it is entirely possible to get to full member within the Naga doing the absolute bare minimum of paperwork, especially now with a lot of flexibility in what you want to do to get there. That was something I actually really liked when I was a newbie in it - most of the requirements I did had practical consequences and actually had a point to them, so I felt like I was contributing and being useful instead of just doing requirements for the sake of doing requirements. I try to give my proteges the same thing.

Essays in and of themselves aren't inherently a bad requirement. I learned a lot doing some essay-type requirements that I would probably not have otherwise. However, it depends heavily on the requirements of the essay - does it require you to write a thesis-level paper, or is a basic demonstration of understanding on the subject enough, and can it lead to interesting discussion? Does it actually encourage interaction and spark interest in the student to learn more about Achaea? The second thing is the tester themselves - will the tester fill in any holes in your essay by talking to you and discussing it with you, and in the end as long as you understand your subject, ultimately pass you - or will they fail you on the spot for not having a comma in the right place?

To somewhat get back on topic, I do think that you should have at least some basic comprehension of grammar and structure - you can't really get away from the fact that it is a text game, after all. But people should be understanding of the fact that English is not the first language for some people, and for others while they can speak it fine, maybe they can't spell as well - but that doesn't mean that their comprehension of the subject is any less detailed, and if they can manage to convey it at an acceptable level then I think that should be fine. 

Katzchen

@Jovolo I have only had to write an 'a4' type length anything for order tasks, or individual ones/things I chose to do. Maldaathi you have to write out your history which can't be one paragraph, but certainly isn't judged highly. Then you have to submit your application to knighthood and say how awesome/ready you are/that you've finished all your reqs. That's all that I can think of. I've heard Naga who just got to hr5 by killing people... so I doubt it's them. I have no idea about the EF, but the Congregation is a scholarly house... if you join a scholarly house not wanting to write, you're going to have a problem.

Lianca

I have a slight problem with Katzchen's post, not for her reasoning, but in a city like Mhaldor, where every class has a specific House to belong to, and everyone has to be a part of a House, classing one as Scholarly and demanding higher standards of written work seems a bit daft. There aren't scholarly classes, but if you want to be apostate you suddenly find yourself held to a higher standard/amount of written work than a knight, serpent, or monk?

Seems like something needs to give there, either open class allowance and have the Houses tied on ethos, or standardise expectations across Houses and restrict by class.

Jovolo

Katzchen said:

@Jovolo I have only had to write an 'a4' type length anything for order tasks, or individual ones/things I chose to do. Maldaathi you have to write out your history which can't be one paragraph, but certainly isn't judged highly. Then you have to submit your application to knighthood and say how awesome/ready you are/that you've finished all your reqs. That's all that I can think of. I've heard Naga who just got to hr5 by killing people... so I doubt it's them. I have no idea about the EF, but the Congregation is a scholarly house... if you join a scholarly house not wanting to write, you're going to have a problem.

As I said, it has been getting better more recently, but before even you were Maldaathi I remember the requirements of various essays. The history of Mhaldor, the history of Sartan, Apollyon, and Shaitan (separate topics). Our opinions on Honourable Evil and its place in Evil, among various other additional topics. 

The above was pretty much a set of blanket requirements across all houses in Mhaldor, with slight changes to complement the specific Houses just to reach House Rank -three-, let alone Full Member. In a place where often you went straight from HR01 - HR03 with no HR02, that meant these requirements were necessary to embrace the class you chose, too. The Congregation used to be absurd with it and all.

As Lianca said, defining one House as more scholarly than any other is also unfair to the playerbase of the city. The Congregation takes a higher number of classes than any other House, picking any of those means you must be held to a higher standard of essay work and also be subject to more essays? That doesn't hold water with me, and it's exactly why the different paths exist in the Congregation past Full Member (Combat, and Scholar).

Katzchen

Lianca said:

I have a slight problem with Katzchen's post, not for her reasoning, but in a city like Mhaldor, where every class has a specific House to belong to, and everyone has to be a part of a House, classing one as Scholarly and demanding higher standards of written work seems a bit daft. There aren't scholarly classes, but if you want to be apostate you suddenly find yourself held to a higher standard/amount of written work than a knight, serpent, or monk?

Seems like something needs to give there, either open class allowance and have the Houses tied on ethos, or standardise expectations across Houses and restrict by class.

And then you lose those unique but really awesome houses like the Maldaathi and the Naga. I see things pointing to this being pushed across the board, and I really hate the idea. Maybe if we could have guilds back, and have some houses, some guilds per city... but if they just limit us to 2-3 houses per city and get rid of the Knight houses, it will be a very sad day.

Yes, it would be nice to have houses able to accept more than one class, but I'm not sure Mhaldor's houses would work with that, other than the congregation.

Kyrra

What is a Knight House?

Oh, right... the coin flip between the Wardens and the Maldaathi.

Strata

What if my intelligence is in the 10-12 range? Oh wait... Nobody actually considers things like that for RP.

Katzchen

Strata said:

What if my intelligence is in the 10-12 range? Oh wait... Nobody actually considers things like that for RP.

Who says 12 is low intelligence? That's average. 10 is still close... Personally I think it's a stupid thing for a stat... should be magic or something. Because this is a rp game, and very few people want to rp an idiot. Those who do, houses don't have to accept...

Adventurers are supposed to be the 'elite' inhabitants of Achaea, other than Gods and specific denizens. It wouldn't make sense for them to walk around acting like neanderthals.

Nakari

Katzchen said:

Lianca said:

I have a slight problem with Katzchen's post, not for her reasoning, but in a city like Mhaldor, where every class has a specific House to belong to, and everyone has to be a part of a House, classing one as Scholarly and demanding higher standards of written work seems a bit daft. There aren't scholarly classes, but if you want to be apostate you suddenly find yourself held to a higher standard/amount of written work than a knight, serpent, or monk?

Seems like something needs to give there, either open class allowance and have the Houses tied on ethos, or standardise expectations across Houses and restrict by class.

And then you lose those unique but really awesome houses like the Maldaathi and the Naga. I see things pointing to this being pushed across the board, and I really hate the idea. Maybe if we could have guilds back, and have some houses, some guilds per city... but if they just limit us to 2-3 houses per city and get rid of the Knight houses, it will be a very sad day.

Yes, it would be nice to have houses able to accept more than one class, but I'm not sure Mhaldor's houses would work with that, other than the congregation.

I think in my perfect world there would be houses with a specific focus and the more specifically class-based organizations could be carried on as high clans. I know that isn't particularly practical with how I usually see high clans these days, and that short of dragon-worming a city into the ocean it seems like it's pretty hard to change the way things are done. 

As far as the topic of the thread goes, I thin I'm more and more of the opinion that it's not essays that are inherently bad, but how they end up being viewed. If it is communicated that the point of an essay is to learn some things and then share that knowledge, free from worries of serious criticism on how that knowledge was presented, it seems like they probably wouldn't be all that bad. I guess the issue is that they're going to look intimidating ('essay' or 'paper' just sound difficult) and that often higher standards are going to emerge. I don't know, I certainly think that allowing the requirement to be fulfilled as a discussion is a good way to do it, though.