Study Schedule

Are You Ready for Combat Training?

You should aim for a Boot Camp score of at least 7/10 before starting your Combat Training. (If you're not quite there, it might be an idea to spend a few more days reviewing. It will be time well spent.)

If you do have at least 7.0 then CONGRATULATIONS! You are hereby promoted to Combat Training!

Note on Scoring

You may have noticed on the Battle Plan page that your Combat Training score is > 0 even if you haven't done any of the Combat Training quizzes. This is because the Boot Camp quizzes are a subset of the Battle Training quizzes. When you work through your Battle Training, you'll see that you've already done some of the BattleCards. (In the same way, the Combat Training quizzes are a subset of the Custom Battle quizzes.)

Suggested Study Schedule

Intro

Combat Training is the main part of the BattleActs system. You should expect to spend at least 3 months here, depending on how many hours a day you study. You can use the table in the BattleBriefings page to map out a study schedule. (There is also a link to the BattleBriefings page in the left sidebar near the top.)

1. On the BattleBriefings page, you'll see that the top 6 readings account for 35% of the exam (about 1/3) on average. So if you plan to study for 3 months, it makes sense to spend about 1 month on these top 6 readings. That averages out to about 5 days each, but Odomirok.16-17-SAO and COPLFR.SAO will definitely require longer since they are ranked #1 & 2. Note that you can basically just skip ASOP.36.
2. You can use the same reasoning for the readings ranked 7-12. Since the top 12 readings account for about 25% of the exam, you should spend about another 25% x 13 weeks = 3.25 weeks on readings 7-12 (roughly 4 days each)
3. Apply the same principle readings 13-18 and 19-24. I'm sure you've caught on to the idea! The pattern is laid out explicitly in the table below.
4. It's interesting that all the remaining readings account for only 15% of the points on the exam. That means 15% x 13 weeks = ~14 days. That doesn't seem like enough time for over 40 readings. But there are virtually no calculation problems here, and the amount you have to memorize is far less. It consists mainly of memorizing answers to past exam problems, if any.

Let's Add Precision!

Since we're actuaries, let's generalize this study schedule to the case where you plan to study n days. So for 3 months, n = 90 days.

papers	percentage of exam *	# of days	if n = 90 (3 months)	if n = 120 (4 months)	if n = 150 (5 months)
#1-6	35%	n x 35%	31-32 days total OR 5-6 days per paper	42 days total OR 7 days per paper	52-53 days total OR 8-9 days per paper
#7-12	25%	n x 25%	22-23 days total OR 3-4 days per paper	30 days total OR 5 days per paper	37-38 days total OR 6-7 days per paper
#13-18	15%	n x 15%	13-14 days total OR 2-3 days per paper	18 days total OR 3 days per paper	22-23 days total OR 3-4 days per paper
#19-24	10%	n x 10%	9 days total OR 1-2 days per paper	12 days total OR 2 days per paper	15 days total OR 2-3 days per paper
#25-63	15%	n x 15%	13-14 days total OR 3 papers per day	18 days total OR 2.2 papers per day	22-23 days total OR 1.7 papers per day

An Obvious Observation!

• The earlier you start, the more time you have per paper! The CAS rule of thumb is that you should plan for 400 hours of studying, but our past users have told us that using BattleActs greatly reduced this. Your study hours will also be more efficient because we tell you exactly what to study, and the order to study it in. Also, the built-in scoring system provides continuous feedback on how well you're learning. (More on this below) Still, you will need to devote significant time to learning the material reliably. By exam time, it should feel like second nature. If it doesn't, you will have trouble finishing in the allotted time.

The BattleActs Scoring System

On your first day of study, you'll mainly be learning new material. But each day after that, part of your study should be devoted to review. And the portion devoted to review will gradually increase as you work your way through the material. Ideally, the final couple of weeks will almost entirely be for review and for working the most recent exam.

Question: how does the BattleActs scoring system help direct your study

The table in Combat Training provides two critical pieces of information for each paper:

• score out of 10
  • (Note that your score tends to drop for each day you don't attempt a BattleCard. This is to simulate the fading of memory over time)
• average # of days since you last attempted each BattleCard

Here is how you can use the scores & days-lapse information

• After covering a new paper, get your score up to at least 7/10 before moving to the next paper (For papers ranked #25-63, you can do 2 or 3 papers at once since you have to get through them pretty quickly)
• You can't review every paper every day because there is just too much material. You should decide what to review based on your quiz scores and the average days lapse. (If you've successfully reviewed a paper several times already, the scoring algorithm recognizes this and your score will not fade as quickly. In this case, the average days lapse can be higher. You will have to judge for yourself how comfortable you are not looking at a paper for a certain number of days.)
• By BattleDay (exam day) you should aim for a score of 8 out of 10 for all of the high-ranked papers in the Combat Training table, and at least 6 for the lower-ranked papers. (This statistic will become more credible as more people use the system.)

Level 3: Custom Battles

Good News! You can very likely pass the exam without ever going to Level 3 - Custom Battles

Ok, then why the heck is Custom Battles included???!!! Well, there are a couple of things, but these are for advanced BattleActs recruits only!

• You can filter the BattleCards in a more custom way using the optional settings. I think this is self-explanatory - just play around with it - but let me draw your attention to two things in particular:
  • You may have noticed that when you're doing a BattleQuiz, you can color-flag particular BattleCards with 5 different colours: orange, aqua, light green, yellow, or light red by clicking a specific number of times in the leftmost column. You can then filter on these color-flagged BattleCards using the Custom Battles screen.
  • Level 3 also gives you access to the lower-probability BattleCards. These are facts from the papers that I felt had only a low probability of appearing on the exam.

There is actually some advice on using Level 3: Custom Batles in the Memorization section of the article BattleActs Analystics - Memorization So, I hope all that is helpful to you. Go to Combat Training and slay the beast!!!