This past Saturday I made the trip to Renton where the Mike and Key club run VE testing sessions.
It took about 4 months of study and the practice exams on QRZ to reach an average score of 80%. To pass you need a score of 74%, out of 50 questions you can get 13 wrong.
The good news is I passed!
I think the incentive based system here is a good way to manage access to HF bands, in addition to creating an incentive to further your skill and knowledge, regardless of how "irrelevant" some think the subject matter and questions are.