Set Update Quizzes: A History
Ever since its inception in November of 2023, Judge Foundry and its members have appreciated and valued Set Update Quizzes. These quizzes have been routinely created and offered to JF members since the release of Lost Caverns of Ixalan in the Fall of 2023. Set Update Quizzes are crucial for judge learning, development, and maintenance. For example, last year during maintenance, L2+ judges had the opportunity to use their Set Update Quiz scores to “test out” of an Annual Rules and Policy Exam. Currently, Set Update Quizzes have two different variations: a General Set Update Quiz for Level 2 and Level 3 Judges and an Advanced Set Update Quiz for Level 4 and Level 5 Judges. This process is not perfect, and it is continuously being improved; however, it is awesome to see educational content being produced regularly with quality material.
Help Needed & Wanted
Ever since WOTC has decided to release a minimum of 6 sets a year, the Set Update Quiz Team, fearlessly led by Steven Zwanger, have felt increased pressure and workload to make these quizzes available to JF members in a timely manner. It is pivotal that Set Update Quizzes are made available as close to the release date of the corresponding set as possible because it allows judges to practice their knowledge/skills more, helps judges gauge and engage in the maintenance practice, and keeps the Set Update Quiz Team focused on the current set that players and judges will primarily be engaging with.
How We can Help: Question Writing
After chatting and reflecting with Zwanger, we agreed that it would be helpful and beneficial to publicize the question writing process. If you have a passion for writing quiz questions or want to try and develop and hone a new skill, you can follow the process below to write questions and send them to Steven Zwanger at szwanger@gmail.com or through Discord (szwanger). In addition, you could also join the Set Update Quiz Team to write questions with others. A message from Zwanger about the question writing process is below:
Hello everyone! I’m the exam manager for the update quizzes, and in order to keep our quizzes looking polished and professional, I’d like to get everyone on the same page about some aspects of formatting protocol. It will also save me a lot of time if I don’t need to fix these when editing questions. Thank you all!
1) Capitalization
Not capitalized: keywords ability words zone names steps and phases types and supertypes (with the exception of referring specifically to a full type line, e.g. “Gideon is a creature” and “Valakut is a legendary land” vs “Gideon is a Legendary Planeswalker Creature – Gideon Human Soldier”)
Capitalized: Infractions Penalties Subtypes Formats Example: In the beginning of combat step, all creatures with flying are put on the bottom of the library except for AP’s Hippo token.
2) Numbers should be written out unless they’re referring to life, damage, power, or toughness. E.g. six +1/+1 counters, gain 4 life.
3) Punctuation:
Full stops (periods) go immediately at the end of the sentence. Then exactly one space, then any citations. There is no period after citations. After citations (or after the previous period if there are no citations), there are two spaces before the next sentence.
4) Remember to always put all correct answers on top. That makes it a lot faster for reviewers and editors to quickly scan and interpret the question.
5) The first time you mention a card name, it should be put in double brackets, e.g. a [[cardname]]
Note that card names don’t have leading or trailing spaces, so [[ cardname ]] won’t work.
Split cards names have the first half, followed by a space, a double slash, another space, and the second half, e.g. [[Turn // Burn]]. Split card halves are always listed without brackets, and if the first reference is to just a half, you should mention the full card name, e.g. Insult, which is the top half of [[Insult // Injury]] .
After you submit a question, you should see all the cards you used displayed above the question. If any are missing, it means you didn’t format it correctly. If you see any Magic card backs, it means you put something in double brackets that isn’t a card name, e.g. [NAP]
6) Players should be designated as [AP] and [NAP].
Pronouns are similar, though the formatting always uses “he”, e.g. [AP he], [AP his], [NAP himself]. If AP or NAP is female, it will display correctly as she, her, herself, etc. Nonbinary pronouns aren’t currently supported but perhaps will be in the future. (Note: square brackets normally don’t display properly on Judgeapps, so there’s no need to use them when posting. Using NAP instead of [NAP] during discussions is totally fine.)
7) Avoid using “you”; instead use “a player” or “a judge”.
8) Infractions are always given the full name with a double dash and no spaces between the category and the infraction
e.g. Unsporting Conduct–-Cheating, Game Play Error-–Failure to Maintain Game State. Infraction names are never shortened.
9) Planeswalkers and legendary creatures should use the full card name for the first reference, including the square brackets; thereafter, you can refer to them with only the proper name
e.g. Jace, Hazoret, etc. Obviously the shorter names can’t be used if the question includes multiple cards with the same proper name, such as both sides of an Origins planeswalker.
10) Verbs are all present tense unless they take place before or after the timeline of the question.
E.g. a resolving spell “destroys” rather than “will destroy” but a reference to a future turn could use the future tense.
