The evaluators are given a briefing to let them know what the Academy Airport layout is and what the students are expected to know, in case you get an evaluator from an airport like ORD that expects you to be flawless with as "slow" a problem as you have there.
At the same time, some instructors are more lenient than others about what can fail you or not. One biggie is whether or not the actions taken by the sim planes would happen in real life or not. For instance, at the end of my local PV, I had DAL802* holding short of 28R with ASA731* rolling out on 28R after having just landed. I was about to give the relief briefing when I keyed up and said, "Delta 733, turn right at [taxiway] Echo; contact ground when off." Alaska had already turned off, and then the Delta jet pulled out on the runway and started his slow taxi toward taxiway Echo to turn off, as instructed. During the briefing, I told the instructor everything as I knew it to be. The instructor then asked me what the Delta jet was doing, which is when I first noticed him moving onto the runway. The instructor laughed and said he wouldn't fail me on that because the jet wouldn't have done that in the real world anyway.
On the ground PV, I had a Southwest jet and United heavy coming out of the terminal taxiing to 28R while Air France was taxiing back to the terminal via B-C-I. When Air France got close to the terminal, I held the position on SWA416 and UAL492(H) to give Air France a chance to pass, which the instructor liked. The problem came when I told the two jets to continue taxiing -- but in Academy land, you are supposed to tell them where to taxi so they respond. With just enough time for responses from the two pilots, I said, "SWA416, continue taxiing to runway 28R." He responded. Then, "United 492 Heavy, continue taxiing to runway 28L." I have no idea why I said "left", but by God, he read that back and did just that. As soon as a Citation was put in position on 28R, the big ass United jet went right behind the Citation and chugged right over to 28L. My local controller looked at me like "WTF?! Why did you just taxi him over to 28L??" while I looked at him like "WTF? Why did you send the heavy jet to the left runway??" The instructor told me that in real life, the pilot would have asked for clarification instead of just moving right on over, especially since I didn't give him runway crossing instructions.
These are the only things the instructors said I did wrong. We had a few people that couldn't even get out a single departure and had six jets stacked up at 28R ready for takeoff, along with three on 28L and three on 16. They got so worked up with the pattern trying to keep it straight that they didn't even launch anyone else. THAT kind of stuff will put you in the student services office getting your termination paperwork processed.
There are quirks in the simulator system that can cause problems if you say the wrong thing because it can't discern between what is legal to do and what isn't. It processes what you tell it to do, and it does it. Your instructor is your last line of defense, and you do have a little bit of a chance to explain yourself if you do something like what I did.
*I don't remember the specific callsigns, so those are guesses used for retelling the story.
