FRENCH Open

[Shorts are comfy and easy to wear]

I look forward to seeing what people have to say and welcome any and all respectful constructive criticism. Much of why I wrote FRENCH was to learn how to improve my question writing, so I'd appreciate your feedback.

Before we begin, you should know that more than one version of the set has been distributed. After sending it to Oxford, many questions were edited for clarity, clue ordering, and prompt instructions, and I'm currently doing those things again after seeing it played at Michigan. The changes are small, but could impact the course of discussion.

[Emperor Pupienus]

Are there more mirrors of this set planned? If so, this discussion should occur in a private forum.

[Cheynem]

Agreed on the private thing.

In terms of general-ness, while I'm not a buff of the particular topics emphasized (even the American seemed really heavily military), I enjoyed playing the set. The things I did know, I felt featured good clues for the most part.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

This was the most fun I've ever had playing a quizbowl tournament, even though I played like an utter moron. It's also the first time since my freshman year of college that I got a higher percentage of buzzes from "real knowledge" than quizbowl-specific studying. I highly recommend playing.

EDIT: I also hope final stats are up soon! :)

[Lake Winnipesaukee Mystery Stone]

I'd say more in detail in a private discussion but:
1) for a 1 man tournament, this was exceptionally well thought out, with a few exceptions.
2) Perhaps my major criticism (which may well have been dealt with by further editing!) was that some answerlines, especially descriptive ones, quite often could have done with extra prompts or details - especially as (at least in the UK) most of the readers were kind non-history players giving up their time to indulge the historians, so might be less familiar with other acceptable answers given.
3) Thank you for writing a tournament geared almost precisely to things I know.

[Harpie's Feather Duster]

I had a blast playing this set. It had some of the polish problems listed above, but it also had a ton of questions on exciting material and felt more fun and fresh than the 2 CO History events I've played. Keep up the good work!

[TylerV]

I had a great time seeing this set evolve from a few questions Fregeau wrote and we played at UIUC practices to a final product. This was a great first writing effort and, based what I heard in the hallway, people had a blast playing it.

EDIT: I also hope final stats are up soon! :)

I've already talked to a few people privately but final stats for the Michigan site should hopefully be up in the next few days. There are a few issues with the existing stats stemming from the roster shakeup as people left and other things that popped up but these should be simple fixes when I have some time to sit down and look at them.

[Fado Alexandrino]

Are there more mirrors of this set planned? If so, this discussion should occur in a private forum.

Yes, Canada's doing a mirror on the weekend of 3/18-3/19

[grapesmoker]

Yeah, the subject matter of this set was far too ancient/medieval heavy for my taste, but all the questions were pretty solid, and it's not like I can say I wasn't warned in advance.

[theMoMA]

I've created a private discussion forum for FRENCH. You can join through the user control panel in the usual way.