Training Tutorial 6: Difference between revisions

; Training Tutorials
	Training Tutorial 1 Where do I go from here?; ; Training Tutorial 2 Writing cooperatively; ; Training Tutorial 3 Your character; ; Training Tutorial 4 Advancing the story through our character’s eyes; ; Training Tutorial 5 Writers vs. characters; ; Training Tutorial 6 Military time, stardates, and how to address officers; ; Training Tutorial 7 How often to sim; ;
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Latest revision as of 20:17, 28 January 2024

			Cadet Orientation

Chat on Discord • Website Tour • Introduce Yourself • Prepare Your Character • Training Tutorials • FAQ • Intro to Star Trek

Tutorial 6: Military time, stardates, and how to address officers

MILITARY TIME

Our group uses military time. It's a simple concept, but one that can take a little getting used to. Here's a quick example: 6:23am is written 0623 hours. For AM times, just add a “0” at the beginning.

Instead of the clock resetting at 1pm, it continues to count up. 1pm becomes 1300, 2pm becomes 1400, and so on. An easy way to calculate this is to take any PM time and add 12 to the number. So, 6pm would be 6+12=1800 hours. At midnight, the clock starts over at Zero-hour: 0000 hours.

STARDATES

The Star Trek universe uses a special dating system, due to the fact that everyone is moving around the galaxy at different times of the night and day. Our calendar is based on the Earth moving around the sun, but not everyone in Starfleet comes from Earth. So we use a system called "stardates."

On the show, stardates were usually selected arbitrarily as a series "start value" and an "end value," so they didn't really mean anything. For our purposes, though, we need a way to keep track of everything that's happening In Character. You will be glad to hear that the In Character Stardate system is very simple. The format of our stardates is as follows:

yyyymm.dd

Where:

yyyy = The current In Character year
mm = The current REAL month
dd = The current REAL date

Meaning...:

The current REAL date is simply the current date. For example, if today is the 18th day of the month, the number you'd put in for "dd" would be 18. Note that the date portion is always two digits, so the 4th of the month would be 04.
The current REAL month is a two digit number representing the real month. If it is January, the number is 01, in February is 02, and so on.
The current In Character year is figured by adding 377 to the actual current year. So, in the year 2000, we added 377 to create a In Character year of 2377. In 2014, we added 377 to create an In Character year of 2391.

When you add all these parts together, you have a stardate. Let's try one: June 15th, 2004 would become 238106.15. And the time, if it's 6:30 p.m.: 238106.15 – 1830h.

To make it easy for you, today's stardate – 240111.12 – can always be found on the main page of the wiki: https://wiki.starbase118.net/wiki/

FORMS OF ADDRESS AND RANKS

The appropriate formal forms of address are as follows:

At all times, use of an officer's rank combined with their last or only name is appropriate, as is their rank alone. For example:

Commander Marlet
Commander

It's fine to abbreviate ranks in our narrative, and it often makes things easier to read. For example, you might want to write "Lt. (JG) Bloggs", instead of "Lieutenant Junior Grade Joe Bloggs". You can see below for a list of ranks and their common abbreviations.

The exception to this rule is when we're writing dialogue. We're transcribing character speech, so abbreviations should not be used. "FltAdml. Wolf" would be "Admiral Wolf" when spoken.

When speaking to an officer of lower rank, you can use their rank combined with their last or only name, OR their last name alone, OR their rank alone, OR "mister" (yes, you can call a female officer "mister"). For example:

Ensign Kyle
Kyle
Ensign
Mister Kyle

When speaking to a doctor, you can address them by their rank, or call them "Doctor," followed by their last or only name. For example:

Commander McReedy
Doctor McReedy
Doctor

StarFleet officers generally only call others by their first names while off duty, or when they're alone together and regulations aren't important. Be careful if you're speaking to an officer of higher rank, at any time!

RANKS

There are many ranks one can ascend through in our group. Here's a list of them, with their abbreviations:

Ensign (Ens.)
Lieutenant Junior Grade (Lt. JG / LtJG / LtJg.)
Lieutenant (Lt.)
Lieutenant Commander (Lt. Cmdr. / LtCmdr.)
Commander (Cmdr.)
Captain (Capt.)
Fleet Captain (FltCapt.)
Commodore (Cmdre.)
Rear Admiral (RAdml.)
Vice Admiral (VAdml.)
Admiral (Adml.)
Fleet Admiral (FltAdml.)

More detailed information about ranks, including Marine Corps ranks and their Starfleet equivalents, see the Starfleet Rank Index.

PROMOTIONS

Once you have completed training and are posted to a ship, you are automatically promoted to the rank of Ensign. At the discretion of your commanding officer, you can rise in rank to Lieutenant Commander. To become a Commander or Captain, you must take both a written and a practical exam, which is administered by a friendly member of the community staff. You must also receive a recommendation that you are prepared for promotion.

All ranks above Lieutenant Commander are presented at the discretion of the Captains and Executive Councils.

For more information on promotion criteria, check out the Promotions area.

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-{{LCARS-bar|Cadet Orientation|COLOR=#6699cc}}__NOTOC__
+{{Cadet Orientation Header}}__NOTOC__
-<br />
+__NOEDITSECTION__
-{{Start-85%}}__NOEDITSECTION__
 {{Tutorials}}
-{{Heading|Tutorial 6: The world through the eyes of your character|#6699cc}}
+===Tutorial 6: Military time, stardates, and how to address officers===
-By now you have a feel for how the game is played: other characters move things forward and leave tags for your character to add in dialogue. On the most basic level you can get along by just filling in the blanks, deciding what your character will say and responding to whatever the other writers on your ship send in your direction.
-Sims from other writers will include descriptions of events that they can see and their character’s reaction to those events. When you come to write a sim for your *own* character, you will need to mention the actions that everyone can see happening, but you need to remove all internal reactions from other characters. It doesn’t make sense, for example, for you to have a passage in your sim that describes how another cadet is feeling and why, because there’s no reason for you to pick up on that! (Unless you’re an empath of course, in which case you might find yourself with some idea!)
+===MILITARY TIME===
+Our group uses military time. It's a simple concept, but one that can take a little getting used to. Here's a quick example: 6:23am is written 0623 hours. For AM times, just add a “0” at the beginning.
-Let’s take a look at an example. Cadet Doe reads the following sim from Cadet Bloggs:
+Instead of the clock resetting at 1pm, it continues to count up. 1pm becomes 1300, 2pm becomes 1400, and so on. An easy way to calculate this is to take any PM time and add 12 to the number. So, 6pm would be 6+12=1800 hours.  At midnight, the clock starts over at Zero-hour: 0000 hours.
-  ((Example: Cliff Edge))
+===STARDATES===
+The Star Trek universe uses a special dating system, due to the fact that everyone is moving around the galaxy at different times of the night and day. Our calendar is based on the Earth moving around the sun, but not everyone in Starfleet comes from Earth. So we use a system called "stardates."
-  Bloggs felt his heart rise into his mouth as he stared over the edge of the cliff. He had always been afraid of heights. He watched the first officer, Commander Rollins, throw a cheeky wave at both him and Cadet Doe. He was sure that command officers were supposed to be a little more responsible.
-  Bloggs: We have to go all the way down there? oO I’ll never make it! Oo
-  Doe: Response
-  Bloggs gestured for Doe to go first.
-  Bloggs: After you? Maybe you can show me how it’s done?
-  Doe: Response
-When Cadet Doe comes to answer his tags and send in his reply, it would be a little strange for the thought that Bloggs has about not making it, unless Doe happens to be a telepath! It would also be strange to be reading narrative about Bloggs feeling his heart in his mouth and being afraid of heights because unless Doe knows him already he isn’t going to know! Anything that isn’t immediately relevant to Doe needs to go but things that he can see and hear get to stay:
+On the show, stardates were usually selected arbitrarily as a series "start value" and an "end value," so they didn't really mean anything. For our purposes, though, we need a way to keep track of everything that's happening In Character. You will be glad to hear that the In Character Stardate system is very simple. The format of our stardates is as follows:
-  ((Example: Cliff Edge))
+'''yyyymm.dd'''
-  Doe stood at the cliff edge filled with eager anticipation. If someone had told him that the exam he would be taking at the end of years of hard work at the academy would include rappelling down a rock face then he would have asked whether or not it was by virtue of his good grades that he had earned that privilege! The first officer, Commander Rollins, threw a cheeky wave at both him and Cadet Doe as he started his descent.
-  Bloggs: We have to go all the way down there?
-  Doe: All the way? Buddy, you could jump to the bottom and barely even feel the impact when you landed. oO Don’t tell me this guy is going to wuss out on us! Oo
-  Bloggs gestured for Doe to go first.
-  Bloggs: After you? Maybe you can show me how it’s done?
-  Doe offered his colleague a confident grin.
-  Doe: No maybe about it! Watch and learn, Bloggs!
-When you’re thinking about what to add between those double colons, you have a huge amount of things to consider. The best advice? Put yourself in your character’s shoes and think about all five senses as well as internal thoughts. Throw the doors open and let everyone take a look at what’s going on inside your character. This is your chance to tell their story and make a mark on the sim!
+Where:
+* yyyy = The current In Character year
+* mm = The current REAL month
+* dd = The current REAL date
+Meaning...:
+* The current REAL date is simply the current date. For example, if today is the 18th day of the month, the number you'd put in for "dd" would be 18. Note that the date portion is always two digits, so the 4th of the month would be 04.
+* The current REAL month is a two digit number representing the real month. If it is January, the number is 01, in February is 02, and so on.
+* The current In Character year is figured by adding 377 to the actual current year. So, in the year 2000, we added 377 to create a In Character year of 2377. In 2014, we added 377 to create an In Character year of 2391.
+When you add all these parts together, you have a stardate. Let's try one: June 15th, 2004 would become 238106.15. And the time, if it's 6:30 p.m.: 238106.15 – 1830h.
+To make it easy for you, today's stardate – {{stardate}} – can always be found on the main page of the wiki: https://wiki.starbase118.net/wiki/
+===FORMS OF ADDRESS AND RANKS===
+The appropriate formal forms of address are as follows:
+At all times, use of an officer's rank combined with their last or only name is appropriate, as is their rank alone. For example:
+* Commander Marlet
+* Commander
+It's fine to abbreviate ranks in our narrative, and it often makes things easier to read. For example, you might want to write "Lt. (JG) Bloggs", instead of "Lieutenant Junior Grade Joe Bloggs". You can see below for a list of ranks and their common abbreviations.
+The exception to this rule is when we're writing dialogue. We're transcribing character speech, so abbreviations should not be used. "FltAdml. Wolf" would be "Admiral Wolf" when spoken.
+When speaking to an officer of lower rank, you can use their rank combined with their last or only name, OR their last name alone, OR their rank alone, OR "mister" (yes, you can call a female officer "mister"). For example:
+* Ensign Kyle
+* Kyle
+* Ensign
+* Mister Kyle
+When speaking to a doctor, you can address them by their rank, or call them "Doctor," followed by their last or only name. For example:
+* Commander McReedy
+* Doctor McReedy
+* Doctor
+StarFleet officers generally only call others by their first names while off duty, or when they're alone together and regulations aren't important. Be careful if you're speaking to an officer of higher rank, at any time!
+===RANKS===
+There are many ranks one can ascend through in our group. Here's a list of them, with their abbreviations:
+* Ensign (Ens.)
+* Lieutenant Junior Grade (Lt. JG / LtJG / LtJg.)
+* Lieutenant (Lt.)
+* Lieutenant Commander (Lt. Cmdr. / LtCmdr.)
+* Commander (Cmdr.)
+* Captain (Capt.)
+* Fleet Captain (FltCapt.)
+* Commodore (Cmdre.)
+* Rear Admiral (RAdml.)
+* Vice Admiral (VAdml.)
+* Admiral (Adml.)
+* Fleet Admiral (FltAdml.)
+More detailed information about ranks, including Marine Corps ranks and their Starfleet equivalents, see the [[Starfleet Rank Index]].
+===PROMOTIONS===
+Once you have completed training and are posted to a ship, you are automatically promoted to the rank of Ensign. At the discretion of your commanding officer, you can rise in rank to Lieutenant Commander. To become a Commander or Captain, you must take both a written and a practical exam, which is administered by a friendly member of the community staff. You must also receive a recommendation that you are prepared for promotion.
+All ranks above Lieutenant Commander are presented at the discretion of the Captains and Executive Councils.
+For more information on promotion criteria, check out the [[Promotions]] area.
 ===SEE ALSO===
-* Extra Credit! In your mission to master the art of simming, take a look at our tutorials on advanced simming in our tutorials library:
+* Extra Credit! If you want to develop your skills further, we suggest you check out the "Writer's Workshop" blog posts on our Community News: https://www.starbase118.net/category/column/writers-workshop/
-** http://sb118.net/taking_cues_from_lost
+* You can always find this tutorial on our website: https://wiki.starbase118.net/wiki/index.php/Training_Tutorial_6
-** http://sb118.net/creating_a_world
-** http://sb118.net/add_magic_story
-* You can always find this tutorial on our website: http://sb118.net/training_tutorial_6
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