Score

What a Conduit is Looking For When Scoring a Player.

Love. That’s all we’re looking for.

That and some real signs of skill and commitment to the game from our players.

Grading is, in my eyes, the fourth most important part of Enclave (after missions, characters, and classes), and it does a WHOLE lot to sculpt the game. Why? Because grading causes there to be stakes when you are playing Enclave, and stakes make everything better! They drive you to constantly up your performance, they add a level of surprise and excitement, and they make sure no one can slack off without suffering the consequences.

But that being said, a lot of people have wanted to know in the past exactly how a Conduit grades. While I won’t go into as much detail here as I might during Conduit Training, this will be a player’s guide to grading, style in the following way:

If you were to get a 20/15/15 score on a mission (namely a dead average, meh-schmeh score), here’s what, on average, it would look like this (entries ordered by importance within their specific category)...

Realism:
 * You didn’t Piss Me Off even once (for a list of How to Piss Off a Conduit, see the bottom of this document)
 * I felt ALL FIVE of your Personality Traits manifest at least to a noticeable degree
 * You had believable interactions with other characters, even if you didn’t take them as far as you could
 * Even if it wasn’t particularly distinctive or interesting, I could tell the difference between your in-character voice/persona and your out-of-character voice; that is to say, when you asked questions or gave actions out of character I didn’t have to ask if it was you or your character who was saying it
 * You at least attempted to make reference to relevant canonized aspects of your character that have been established in flavor

Style:
 * You held my interest while you were performing actions, talking, etc.; you were entertaining enough to conduit for that I didn’t want to move on to someone else
 * You made use of most of your relevant abilities, enhancements, items, etc. to an effective degree at least once
 * You were relatively concise in your actions -- you didn’t spend a lot of time thinking or umm-ing while I was with you, didn’t pause the game too much to collect yourself
 * I felt like you did a pretty good job of communicating with me, the conduit: you asked good questions, delivered clear actions, and only clarified what needed clarifying

Completion:  And that about covers it: if you were to perfectly conform to the list above, you would get a 50 as a grade. How would you get a 100? Well, just extrapolate every item on this list to its logical extremes at the same time!
 * You did exactly what your employer asked you to, no more and no less
 * You contributed an average amount (compared to your teammates) to finishing the mission
 * You found zero secrets

Yeah. It ain’t easy.

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Pissing off the Conduit!

Before we go, there’s one last thing I want to cover: pissing off your Conduit. These are things that players do that annoy Conduits to NO end, and doing them will often cause your Realism grade to get utterly murdered. Here’s a brief list so that you can see what you SHOULDN’T be doing if you want good grades and don’t want your Conduit to hate Conduiting for you.

These are arranged in order of severity, but all of them are bad news: those lower on the list are sometimes enough to chop 2 or 3 points off your grade if you do them ONCE, and the higher ones sometimes penalizing for as much as 7 OR 8 POINTS. You have been warned!
 * Being a Bitch: Without a doubt, my least favorite thing that players do, herein defined as when you make disparaging remarks, say nasty things, or do other jerkish things OUT OF CHARACTER. I don’t even think I need to say why this is a shitty thing to do, whether it’s motivated by your dislike of another player or you’re just in a nasty mood: I don’t give a damn about your excuses. It’s never ok. It defies the first and most important rule of Enclave, the separation of player and character. So remember people, leave all your baggage with other people at the door: Enclave is NOT the place for that crap.
 * Ideologically Polarizing Statements: As one might imagine following the recent update and creation of the Anti-Ideology Policy, making such statements is not only going to get you a stern reminder from your Conduit, but it’ll also take a dump on your grade. Just another reason not to do it!
 * Overphysical Sims: Physical simulations aren’t too common in Enclave, and when we use them we tend to go very, very slow. Hell, players don’t even usually touch each other while interacting, but sometimes they do, and this is ok! BUT, if you physically simulate something in a way that someone else doesn’t like (even if they don’t admit it -- trust me, I can tell) and don’t even ASK THEM, you’re gonna get your ass penalized. This includes hitting, grabbing, groping, kissing, and anything else that the other person could feasibly be uncomfortable with. And if you aren’t sure, ASK (preferably out of character while I’m cutting to someone else). Even better, clarify it before the game begins! And don’t you dare put words into others’ mouths or try to pressure them to go along with it.
 * Contesting Calls: I don’t care if you think I’m wrong: what a conduit says goes, period. If you have a MAJOR issue with a call being made, you are encouraged to submit a Review (yes, you can even do this for Robby!) to another Conduit outlining exactly what your gripe is. But you can NEVER interrupt the flow of the game to dispute a call; if you feel like the conduit has forgotten something that may influence the call (like an enhancement, a precedent set by a previous conduit, your stats, etc.), you should remind them while they are making the call, not after.
 * Interrupting/Talking Over: When your Conduit cuts to another character, it is EXTREMELY frustrating when people try to jump in with their own actions. Even if you have something relevant to the other players actions (like a response or something), just politely raise two fingers to let your Conduit know, but know that they may not cut to you anyways if you have already done actions of your own and couldn’t feasibly respond to these actions contemporaneously taking place. You can’t be everywhere at once or doing everything at once!
 * References: Just like making copyright-infringing or lazy references in flavor or character design is not ok, it also isn’t ok on missions -- if you, while expected to be in character, make a blatant reference to the real world or a fictional world, it’ll be hard hit to your grade. I don’t care if you’re being funny, I don’t care if it was “just too perfect”: if you’re in-character and you say that shit, it’s a penalty to your grade. And if you say it out-of-character, just make sure it doesn’t fall under the category of Interrupting (see above).
 * Side-Conversations: HOLY CRAP, I hate this. When I am with someone, I should NOT have to tell other people to shut the hell up so I can focus on them. This is one of the most commonly-done things that Conduit hate, so you’ll need to careful with it. If you REALLY want to talk, either go outside and be ready to be called in (which is totally ok to do, by the way) or WHISPER! The only time there should ever be a side-conversation is if it’s in-character (in which case it is even encouraged so long as you keep your voices down). I should also add there that Side-Conversations INCLUDE noisy giggling, loud reactions to news you just got over the phone, exclamations over something funny you read over the internet, and more. Use your heads, people!
 * Psychotic Voices: The good ol’ classic! Psychotic Voices are when a person tries to give someone else out-of-character information or influence the way they play their character (“You should really use your ability Elemental Blast here”). This is one of the reasons why we made Premission, people, so you WOULDN’T feel like you have to blatantly cheat like this!
 * Bullshittery: It’s like reverse Psychotic Voices! Simply put, if you do something because you know it out of character and are trying to give your character a reason to go along with it, not only does it look REALLY forced and stupid, but it’s unfun and unfair! Don’t give me any of that “Well-I-come-to-the-logical-conclusion-that” crap! You’re compromising your character to go what you want! And that is CERTAINLY worth a knock to your Realism.
 * Not Declaring Negative Enhancements: If you have an Enhancement, Essence, or similar innate power that would be detrimental in a given situation (a classic example being the downside of a Curse) and you do not declare it, regardless of whether your Conduit reminds you or not, you will be penalized for Realism. This penalty can be either very small or as high as 5-6 points depending on how blatant/severe the mistake was
 * Not Paying Attention: If you should be in-character, but you are not paying attention, that’s a hit to Realism for sure. It breaks our flow as courteous and is the very least you can do as players. This includes when we are trying to cut to you and you too are focused on your computer, your whispered side-conversation, or the cute little bunny outside to notice us. Sure, it’s probably the most minor of infractions, but it’s still frustrating enough for us as Conduits to remove a point or two from your Realism.