New Ability

Happy holidays everyone regardless of which holidays you celebrate. The staff team has completed developing a new ability that has been wanted for some time by the player base -- Wandmaker. The ability to pick and change your wand. This has a statistical benefit only for players with this ability.



Link to the Abilities Page.

Broom Racing Captains

Tests have been sent out to applicants for Captain. If you have not gotten a test but sent in your application, please reach out to me. As one house has very few (no) applicants and the other houses have had limited applicants we have re-opened Broom Racing to allow for those in other sports (they won't be getting points for both sports and preference would still be with those not in another sport and those who have applied have preference also) and the applications will remain open until those roles are filled. In your Bulletin Board for your house you will see an announcement regarding this.

New Pets have been added to the Magical Menagerie and are now available for purchase. We do not have the Beast Master abilities that correlate with these pets out as of yet but they will be released soon. You can purchase these pets as you would any other pet.

There was a bug discovered last evening (already fixed by Zach) that involved the advent calendar and knocking people off of the validation queue. The bug has since been fixed and the players that were knocked off have all been contacted as part of their validation (we believe) but if anyone has a friend that has been stuck in the queue for the past week, please contact the administration since everyone in the queue has been messaged by a member of the team of validated by us.

I have graded every Broom Racing Test that has been submitted to date. For those that have not submitted the test, this is the final call regarding the test. I am going to pick the captains based on the tests that have been submitted as of 0900 EST tomorrow. It is present 0926 EST, so this is just under 24 hours warning. There is a distinct possibility that all of the house captain roles will not be filled, meaning that the position will remain open and for those who have submitted the application your application can still be considered for that house, but I can state that most of the houses have at least 2 viable candidates, with the exception of 1. Those who have not submitted the test portion of the application, I can state that your house is not the house lacking in applicants so if you are interested please finish the test portion of your application so you can be considered.

We have now added a Broom Racing Captain Team that you can see on the staff page. We are very excited to work with this group of new (in most cases) moderators. Over the next several days they will be endeavoring to create the facets that make Broom Racing unique as well as prepare for their first race (likely shortly after the new year).

Please extend a welcome and a congrats to our Slytherin Captain Opeila Winters, a first time site mod that scored very well on the exam and has had experience in moderating privately run threads such as dorm battles. The co-Captain for house Slytherin is Starlee Kennedy, again another first-time moderator that has been with us for some time participating in adventures. She demonstrated impressive knowledge of the systems we use even when the system is brand new.

In House Hufflepuff we have a pair of familiar faces: Avery Gallows our newest Hufflepuff Racing Captain. A broom racer herself, she was formerly known as Aspen Summers, a tenured user that has evaded death thus far. Her co-Captain is Ami [workaholic] Procoppio who also co-Captains for the Hufflepuff Quidditch Team. She will be serving in a dual role as co-captain on both teams. Ami is know also for her work as a Newspaper writer so she will be among the mot busy of her peers this coming year so please give her your support and accolades.

In House Ravenclaw we have a pair of new faces to moderation: Aurora Ranvier, the new Captain of the Ravenclaw Broom Racing Team and Ari Gwild the new co-Captain for the team. Aurora is well known on the site and to the discord community for her large population of cats, her art skill and now her position as Captain. She scored exceedingly well on the assessment exam, confounding me. In addition, she is well known on the site as a member of the Newspaper Team. Ari Gwild is a member that is new to moderation as well as teams. They are a broom racer themselves and they impressed the team with their scores on this new system. They appeared to be able to grasp something that they had limited exposure to very quickly. We are very hopeful to see what this co-captain has to bring the the community and team.

Finally house Gryffindor Broom Racing Team has a new Captain as well as an interim captain. Nicholas Mccowan has been named Captain of the Gryffindor Team. New to moderation, besides their work at the ball alongside one of the other recently named Captains, he has shown awesome promise as a Captain. His test scores were incredible and he appears to have a strong grasp of the fundamentals of the system as well as ideas to improve future moderation. His co-captain is serving in an interim role, meaning the position for captain remains open until we find a suitable replacement. For the time being Hugh Lowe will be serving as the co-Captain for this team. Hugh has no intention of remaining in this role long-term but will remain until a replacement is found. He has successfully moderated a test game during the public, live tests and has shown his capacity to moderate these games.

The answers to some questions the players might have:

1. When is the first game?

Likely in a few weeks, the team will be deciding on a date shortly now that they have been collected.

2. When will the official Broom racing Teams be created?

Likely in a few days, we are awaiting to hear back from the new Captains for an agree-upon size.

3. I have noticed that some of the Captains play for other teams. Does that mean that they will be earning a stat point for both teams if they win?

No, the Captains that are not broom racers themselves (because they are duellists or quidditch players) are not eligible for house points for victory. Some have stated it is their intention to transition over to Broom Racing at the year end (they cannot swap mid-year), other plan on remaining on a different team with their student than the sport they Captain.

4. How will it be roleplayed for those that are Captains or co-captains but they are in other sports so they themselves cannot race?

They will be more like coaches or in character bosses for the team in character strategizing, assisting with training, boosting morale and watching the whole game play out.

5. I have noticed that some of the Captains and co-Captains have NPCs that are broom racers. That was not supposed to be allowed!

Yes, you are correct, it is not allowed and we have reached out to those members. They have agreed and intend to change the sport that their NPC is playing in because they are aware of the potential conflict of interest that having an NPC from another school in the same sport would pose.

6. Are Broom Racing applications (to race, not to captain) open?

Yes. If you are not already in another sport for this year, feel free to apply. The positions will be first come, first serve. We will be updating the rosters for activity as well, Members that have not posted in over 30 days will be removed from the rosters. expect official starting rosters to be made public shortly.

We now have the house teams for Broom Racing posted and the members added to the appropriate user groups. Please contact a Head of House if you are lacking in your accesses. Presently each house is limited to 5 members for their racing team, the positions being given out first-come, first serve. The moderators (captains) will be doing periodic activity checks and updating the roster. Members that fail to post 2 rounds in a row in a race, choose to step down from the team or are site-wide inactive (have not posted anywhere on site in the past 30+ days) will be removed from the roster. Even posting in OC chats and forum games count, so for those that are interested in racing but only minimally active, there are ways to stay on the team.

Slytherin _____________________________ Captain: Opeila Winters Co-Captain: Starlee Kennedy Racers: Percival Gray Thomas Lestrange Scarlet Salvatore Violet Carrington Vale Ashwood	Hufflepuff _____________________________ Captain: Avery Gallows Co-Captain: Ami Procoppio Racers Jack Warren Serena Towers Simon Kincaid Winter Wolfhartz Avery Gallows
Ravenclaw _____________________________ Captain: Aurora Ranvier Co-Captain: Ari Gwild Racers: Ari Gwild Eliphas Dune Lin Evanvleck ________ ________ . . .	Gryffindor _____________________________ Captain: Nicholas McCowan Co-Captain: Hugh Lowe Racers: Xailah Alptraum Nicholas McCowan Hugh Lowe Shanelle Meza Levi Drakos Wait List Della Barfield

There are plans to expand the size of the team once the moderators and racers become accustomed to this game so feel free to join the wait list if you are interested. Furthermore, there are some first string positions open in Ravenclaw for those that wish to earn some glory as well as some stat points so feel free to join. The only restrictions we have are the players must have an approved trunk; players must be active on site (posting at least once every 30 days);players must not be in any other sport. If your NPC is in broom racing, we will be asking you to change your student's sport due to conflicts of interest. In addition, Gryffindor is looking for a co-Captain. Hugh Lowe is serving as interim co-captain for the time being but plans to step down once a replacement has been found. If you are interested, please apply.

If anyone has any questions, please feel free to reach out to myself, any of the Captains, co-Captains or a member of the Head of House Team.

House Cups

House Cups are considered to be in-character. The reason for this announcement is the fact that we have three firmly held beliefs regarding the House Cup and celebrations regarding the House Cup. Both logical and coming from a good place.

1. Canon adherence -- in the canon the house cup is an annual celebration.

• This is correct, the canon has a yearly celebration. We do so monthly for mechanical reasons -- it is very hard to engage people over a reward that is only once per year. Does this mean that there is no annual celebration? Not necessarily, but these celebrations are not staff-driven. At the end of the year we are at our busiest setting up the summer camp, winding down the blossom ball, moving users up a year (which involves activity checks, updating the rosters and the manual moving of every active member) and often the management of NPCs. If your house wins for the year, I do encourage you to reach out to your Head of House and House Prefects however because they may be interested in doing something fun to celebrate.

2. The house cups we have on our splash page are entirely out of character.

• This would be for the sake of canon adherence but also to reconcile the fact that during the summer months sometimes the top earners are not in attendance at the camp so it is unknown how they would logically earn anything. Also when it comes to the top three earners, there is nothing in the hour glasses to designates that the majority of the house colored sand was contributed by this user. So casually knowing who the top earners are is illogical.

3. The site is a gamification of the canon. In addition, it has been many years since the canon material was in the setting.

• In the course of 2 decades a lot can change. We should seek to find ways to have this make as much sense as possible so that players can celebrate their victories in character also.

The staff took a vote regarding this and to be honest it was a close vote but #3 won out. As such house cup winners are IC recognized every month. A month winner does not necessarily mean that a house is in the lead for the annual cup but rather they earned the most points over the course of a month. It is in-character explained that people would look at these hour glasses and know last month the houses were at these numbers and this month they have gained this much more. This one house in particular earned more than the other three houses. As for top earners in a given month, it would be generally known who they are because people would be hearing the Professors and staff praise them, see them getting awarded points for various reasons and therefore be generally aware of the name. This does not mean that other players would recognize someone by their face but they know [blank] student earned the most points this past month. This would apply to the top three.

The prizes however are out of character. if you got a broom or a pet, it is still up to you to in character explain where it came from. Your parents, you saved up, etc.

Link

Welcome our New Professor of Flight

Miriam Stube (account to be created) will be our new Professor of Flying. The former Professor of Flying River Jemari is hanging up his broom. Please thank River for his service, he was instrumental in the development of Quidditch.

The student behind this account is our own Lavinia Cloven, a tenured user that has been a dedicated quidditch player since its earliest days. She has demonstrated skill and understanding of both Quidditch as well as the recently released Broom Racing. It is our hope that she will impart a portion of this understanding the the community in her lessons. We are all very excited to work with her.

Non-Binary

You are going to be noticing some major updates over the next few days. I am at work so please do not panic, I am old and need sleep. We are going to be implementing a third gender option in addition to Male/Female. The third option is meant to encompass the non-binary identities that some of our members have. This is a step towards inclusivity. We realize that there are a lot of genders and this is in no way an attempt to shoe-horn anyone into a large group but rather the third gender option is intended to represent the non-binary population. Zach will also be creating a means for users to change their gender identity for those that undergo a 'change' or have a fluid gender identity. Due to the coding complexity this will mean that there are changes to the bathrooms as well as dorms in terms of access. We understand that gender is a complicated subject and that there are some members that may feel uncomfortable for personal, social or even religious reasons with bunking with the opposing gender. The staff will be working on a means to accommodate everyone.

I am saying this before the changes have happened because dorms will be changing drastically and accesses will look very different. A lot of questions are going to be springing up over the next couple days and because it is so different from what we presently have we wont be able to anticipate everything -- however we are going to be accounting for many of these questions over the next few days. The permissions shift will happen before a lot of the dorm details are written publicly.

The answers I can give:
- you will not be losing your threads, they will be moved
- it is likely that there will be some changes to how dorms are set up (your house will be following up regarding this soon but not for a few days because we have a HOH getting married and we have the major winter holidays the next week and a half)
- please watch for announcements by Zach on the details (as he has to code this) of how to pick genders and change them.