100 percent agreed. This was fantastic.ThisIsMyUsername wrote: ↑Sun Feb 14, 2021 1:48 pm As expected, this tournament was an utter delight! Thanks to Mike for writing it and to Noah for running it.
Search found 537 matches
- Sun Feb 14, 2021 2:18 pm
- Forum: Trash
- Topic: Announcement: MIKE (Online, Asynchronous Audio Tournament)--February 8-13, 2021
- Replies: 14
- Views: 2815
Re: Announcement: MIKE (Online, Asynchronous Audio Tournament)--February 8-13, 2021
- Tue Dec 22, 2020 12:39 am
- Forum: Practices, Scrimmages, Online Packets, and Playtesting
- Topic: Miscellaneous Audio Packet (12/22 at 10 PM Eastern)
- Replies: 1
- Views: 313
Miscellaneous Audio Packet (12/22 at 10 PM Eastern)
I'm going to be reading my miscellaneous audio packet on the main quizbowl Discord on Tuesday, 12/21, at 10 PM Eastern. I already read it on Festivus, but some players who didn't get to hear it wanted a chance to play it as well. There is no distribution, but it includes trash (with a healthy amount...
- Sat May 02, 2020 12:50 pm
- Forum: Practices, Scrimmages, Online Packets, and Playtesting
- Topic: John Milton vanity packet
- Replies: 2
- Views: 948
Re: John Milton vanity packet
OK, I'm planning to read this packet on the Discord at 9:00 PM EST tonight. If you'd like to play this packet but would prefer a different time, please let me know.
- Tue Mar 24, 2020 9:57 pm
- Forum: Practices, Scrimmages, Online Packets, and Playtesting
- Topic: John Milton vanity packet
- Replies: 2
- Views: 948
John Milton vanity packet
I'm in the process of writing an extremely difficult vanity packet all about John Milton. There will be at least 20 tossups; hoping to have it ready by the first or second week of April.
- Tue Nov 05, 2019 7:15 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: Abolish packet submission for ACF Fall
- Replies: 29
- Views: 5189
Re: Abolish packet submission for ACF Fall
I'm only speaking for myself here, not ACF. I sympathize with people bringing up concerns about the current packet submission model for Fall, and I'm sure that ACF members are open to changes to ensure a better experience for writers and editors, much like the way ACF moved to half-packets from full...
- Mon Oct 21, 2019 10:03 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: No prizes is better than insulting prizes
- Replies: 22
- Views: 7774
Re: No prizes is better than insulting prizes
This post was prompted by my experience at Michigan's Penn Bowl mirror this past weekend, but my intent isn't so much to call them out as to raise this issue more broadly: that was far from the first time that I've seen a selection of books that frankly nobody wants handed out as "prizes."...
- Thu Aug 08, 2019 11:52 am
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: CO 2019 Discussion
- Replies: 48
- Views: 17217
Re: CO 2019 Discussion
The only criticism is that the lit bonuses seemed much more difficult than any other subject (to be fair we did not have a lit player, but even at this difficult level we all have pretty much a basic knowledge of author’s names or main characters). My teammates have commented on the music and my kn...
- Wed Aug 07, 2019 10:28 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: CO 2019 Discussion
- Replies: 48
- Views: 17217
Re: CO 2019 Discussion
If any teams are interested in receiving feedback on their CO literature questions, please shoot me an email at jonathan.magin AT gmail.com.
I'll try to respond as promptly as I can.
I'll try to respond as promptly as I can.
- Wed Aug 07, 2019 3:16 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: CO 2019 Discussion
- Replies: 48
- Views: 17217
Re: CO 2019 Discussion
I edited literature for CO, with the help of Wonyoung Jang (who wrote and edited the tossups on playing tennis, characters with the first name Mildred, Szymborska, Spring Awakening , Leonora Carrington, Medea , ghazals, Russia from eatly 20th century poetry, Laura Esquivel, British authors with the ...
- Mon Mar 18, 2019 5:38 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: Harder Questions in the Finals?
- Replies: 11
- Views: 5610
Re: Harder Questions in the Finals?
In theory, it's OK to increase difficulty in the finals because the teams are better. In practice, I think it's almost always a bad idea and encourages set editors to write sadistically hard questions. I've seen finals between good teams that turned into brutal endurance tests, and they didn't seem ...
- Wed May 16, 2018 12:18 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: I Love You, QB, So Please Get It The F*** Together
- Replies: 33
- Views: 18785
Re: I Love You, QB, So Please Get It The F*** Together
I'm much more skeptical that competitiveness is toxic, or that in-game passion is a symptom of an abuser, or that well-known players are more likely to offend than more anonymous players. Matt, I don't see anyone saying these things. I think Tamara is correct that we still tend to place far too muc...
- Tue May 15, 2018 9:12 pm
- Forum: Trash
- Topic: Chicago Open Trash 2018 (July 22, 2018)
- Replies: 62
- Views: 34150
Re: Chicago Open Trash 2018 (July 22, 2018)
I'm looking to play this tournament. I'm not bad at sports and good at frauding pop culture questions from academic knowledge.
- Wed Apr 25, 2018 3:38 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: Public discourse, on the forums and elsewhere
- Replies: 17
- Views: 7745
Re: Public discourse, on the forums and elsewhere
I am really unhappy with how some people in the collegiate/open community act towards each other, especially on the forums and sometimes on the Discord. After several instances of privately getting people to modulate their public behavior-–sometimes successfully–I’m finally pissed--off about it eno...
- Tue Apr 03, 2018 9:21 am
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: ACF and Powers
- Replies: 20
- Views: 7471
Re: ACF and Powers
I like powers as a player, but I think there are a few issues with powers from a set editing perspective that haven't been mentioned in this thread. Although all tossups in a set ideally gradate difficulty the same way, in practice, that doesn't happen most of the time. Powers exacerbate any issues ...
- Tue Mar 27, 2018 3:33 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: 2018 Carper Award: congratulations Mike Bentley!
- Replies: 6
- Views: 3855
Re: 2018 Carper Award: congratulations Mike Bentley!
Congrats, Mike. This award is incredibly well-deserved.
- Tue Mar 06, 2018 9:21 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: Your Favorite Question
- Replies: 45
- Views: 24932
Your Favorite Question
I think it would be interesting for writers to get a sense of the questions that quizbowl players enjoyed the most and why. So, what is your favorite question that you didn't write? I'm hoping that people don't just respond with questions that they got good buzzes on, but ones that were executed so ...
- Mon Jan 08, 2018 11:16 pm
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: Imaginary Landscape No. 4
- Replies: 23
- Views: 10177
Re: Imaginary Landscape No. 4
I'm extremely excited for this tournament and would pay a large sum of money to play it at Chicago Open this year.
- Mon Nov 20, 2017 10:55 am
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: Festivus (Dec 23rd, 2017)
- Replies: 48
- Views: 21263
Re: Festivus (Dec 23rd, 2017)
I'm planning on writing a hard packet of at least 20 tossups on weird, esoteric Americana.
Edit: My packet is now done.
Edit: My packet is now done.
- Wed Nov 08, 2017 10:10 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: Two Visions of ACF Fall
- Replies: 9
- Views: 5459
Re: Two Visions of ACF Fall
Jarret, that's fantastic to hear. I've talked to the other editors, and we're very pleased the field at your site seemed to enjoy the set so much. Thanks for letting us know! Also, Will, I understand your issues with past ACF Falls, but I think you're missing a bit of perspective here. If ACF Fall i...
- Tue Nov 07, 2017 4:47 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: ACF Fall Editor Feedback
- Replies: 1
- Views: 2184
ACF Fall Editor Feedback
The ACF Fall editors will be providing feedback for submitted packets upon request. If your team is interested, please email [email protected].com and let us know you'd like feedback on your packet. If we get many requests, it may take longer to provide feedback to everybody, but we will make sure we ...
- Tue Nov 07, 2017 9:46 am
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: Two Visions of ACF Fall
- Replies: 9
- Views: 5459
Re: Two Visions of ACF Fall
Thanks, Bruce. I'm honored and touched. I'm not exactly sure how to respond to Will's post, but I would like to clarify a few things. First, the editors attempted to keep difficulty down, but we still left in some tossups on harder material that we thought enough teams would know--Francis I, Ursula ...
- Mon Nov 06, 2017 9:58 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: ACF Fall 2017 Thanks and Discussion
- Replies: 31
- Views: 10576
Re: ACF Fall 2017 Thanks and Discussion
Here's some data for ACF Fall for your perusal:
ACF Fall Stats
Conversion Data for Maryland ACF Fall Site
ACF Fall Stats
Conversion Data for Maryland ACF Fall Site
- Mon Nov 06, 2017 2:54 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: ACF Fall 2017 Thanks and Discussion
- Replies: 31
- Views: 10576
Re: ACF Fall 2017 Thanks and Discussion
I'm sorry for the proofreading errors which were in the final set--as a former professional proofreader, I'm pretty annoyed that I didn't fix them before the set went out. They should all be fixed in the final set now, but that's still too late. I'd also like to talk more broadly about the goals the...
- Sun Nov 05, 2017 11:41 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: ACF Fall 2017 Thanks and Discussion
- Replies: 31
- Views: 10576
Re: ACF Fall 2017 Thanks and Discussion
I was happy to see some of Auburn's questions included on our first attempt at submitting. Thanks to the editors for putting this tournament together, even if it did have some flaws. Does ACF still do its writer feedback program? The editors will be providing feedback for submitted packets upon req...
- Sun Nov 05, 2017 9:33 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: ACF Fall 2017 Thanks and Discussion
- Replies: 31
- Views: 10576
ACF Fall 2017 Thanks and Discussion
Welcome to the discussion thread for ACF Fall 2017. I hope you all enjoyed playing the tournament; all the editors are looking forward to hearing everyone's thoughts and reactions. Our editors were: Ryan Rosenberg: American literature, European literature, world/genre/other literature, social scienc...
- Tue Aug 29, 2017 7:24 pm
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: ACF Fall - November 4th, 2017
- Replies: 35
- Views: 26762
Re: ACF Fall - November 4th, 2017
Here are some difficulty guidelines to help you write your ACF Fall half-packets: * Try to keep tossup answers accessible to new teams. If you want the Fall editors to use your questions, err on the side of easier answers that many players can get by the end. * Late clues and giveaways in tossups an...
- Sat Jul 29, 2017 12:06 am
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: How to not get overwhelmed by the college canon
- Replies: 8
- Views: 4339
Re: How to not get overwhelmed by the college canon
At harder college tournaments, even the best players will not know a vast majority of the clues and some of the answers. It's sort of like baseball: the best hitters still make outs around 60 percent of the time. We all spend most tournaments spending most of our time not knowing things and hearing ...
- Thu Jul 27, 2017 4:57 pm
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: 2017 It's Lit: Discussion
- Replies: 11
- Views: 3281
Re: Discussion
Yeah, this was a blast. My favorite questions by far were the tossups on well-known answers like Frost and Melville, which I greatly appreciated. Thanks to all the writers for producing a fun set!
- Tue Jun 27, 2017 7:25 pm
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: Jordaens Visual Arts
- Replies: 36
- Views: 19884
Re: Jordaens Visual Arts
I'm interested in signing up. Put me on the waitlist.
- Thu Jun 15, 2017 3:27 pm
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: CO 2017 Team Formation
- Replies: 23
- Views: 13514
Re: CO 2017 Team Formation
I just discovered that I can make CO this year, so if you want a humanities player and/or need someone to write a bunch of questions for your packet, shoot me an email.
- Thu Jun 15, 2017 3:08 pm
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: It's Lit
- Replies: 48
- Views: 24853
Re: It's Lit
I'd like to play. If you know world literature and/or modernist poetry, I'm interested in teaming up with you.
- Fri Apr 28, 2017 1:57 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: Difficulty Consistency in Finals Packets
- Replies: 19
- Views: 9003
Re: Difficulty Consistency in Finals Packets
In the late 20-aughts and into the start of this decade, it was orthodox, or at least common, to have challenging finals packets at nearly every tournament that specifically designated finals. Although I haven't done a scientific survey of this, my recollection is that these tournaments typically e...
- Thu Feb 23, 2017 3:53 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: περί μυθολογιῶν/De Mythologia
- Replies: 17
- Views: 7564
Re: περί μυθολογιῶν/De Mythologia
I don't know anything about mythology, but this thread is interesting to me. Although I don't have anything to contribute about the specifics of writing great myth questions, I have two more general points I think are germane here. 1) If you have some expertise in an area and want to see quizbowl qu...
- Sat Oct 15, 2016 8:09 pm
- Forum: Theory
- Topic: Improving as a Literature Writer
- Replies: 5
- Views: 4066
Re: Improving as a Literature Writer
Thanks Jon(and Jacob), that's some really useful advice. I definitely agree that good/playable questions are better than no questions, and that not every question has to be perfect or even close to it. Reading excerpts is definitely something I've utilized before and will definitely continue, espec...
- Fri Oct 14, 2016 12:17 am
- Forum: Theory
- Topic: Improving as a Literature Writer
- Replies: 5
- Views: 4066
Re: Improving as a Literature Writer
This is a really good thread. It's very hard to write a great question on a work of literature you haven't read, but it's much easier to write a good, non-awful question. And while there's nothing like playing a really great question, I think most literature players would be thrilled to play a tourn...
- Fri Aug 26, 2016 1:33 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: How To Avoid Running Out Of Question Ideas
- Replies: 9
- Views: 14488
Re: How To Avoid Running Out Of Question Ideas
Putting ideas down beforehand: When I'm working on tournaments, I usually list out my subdistributions well ahead of time and fill them in with ideas (elaborated upon with comments indicating clues I want to use) as they come to me, such that I'll often have some idea listed a couple months before ...
- Fri Aug 26, 2016 1:10 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: How To Avoid Running Out Of Question Ideas
- Replies: 9
- Views: 14488
Re: How To Avoid Running Out Of Question Ideas
Putting ideas down beforehand: When I'm working on tournaments, I usually list out my subdistributions well ahead of time and fill them in with ideas (elaborated upon with comments indicating clues I want to use) as they come to me, such that I'll often have some idea listed a couple months before ...
- Thu Jul 28, 2016 11:07 am
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: Bride of the Guerrilla Tournament (Film 2016)
- Replies: 26
- Views: 11101
Re: Bride of the Guerrilla Tournament (Film 2016)
I'm writing a packet also.
- Sun Jun 05, 2016 7:22 pm
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: Imaginary Landscape No. 3 Discussion
- Replies: 24
- Views: 7784
Re: Imaginary Landscape No. 3 Discussion
the miscellaneous tossups on Woody Guthrie. What all were the clues in this one? We were looking for the lyricist, right? That tossup had the room in knots. I was thinking Guthrie the whole time, but I finally risked the neg on This Land is Your Land because I was pretty sure he had a hand in writi...
- Sun Jun 05, 2016 5:01 pm
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: Imaginary Landscape No. 3 Discussion
- Replies: 24
- Views: 7784
Re: Imaginary Landscape No. 3 Discussion
I thought Eddie Kim did a great job as head editor for this set, and I think it's as good, if not better, than the first two Imaginary Landscapes. Eddie and Rebecca wrote almost all of the classical music/opera for this set, although I contributed the tossups on Borodin, Ives, Karl Jenkins, Lyric Pi...
- Mon May 30, 2016 4:14 pm
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: Imaginary Landscape No. 3 Discussion
- Replies: 24
- Views: 7784
Re: Imaginary Landscape No. 3 Discussion
Ben, Glad you liked the tournament. I wrote the Karl Jenkins tossup, I apologize for the Benedictus clue causing a huge buzzer race; I didn't think it was famous, and during playtesting, no one answered the tossup until the Palladio clues. Certainly would have put it later if I thought that might ha...
- Fri Aug 07, 2015 3:52 pm
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: VCU Open ‘15 @ VCU (8/8/15)
- Replies: 67
- Views: 29277
Re: VCU Open ‘15 @ VCU (8/8/15)
Cody, when have you scheduled the remaining CO packets? Also, do people want to just hear the tossups, or to split into teams and play the packets that way?
- Thu Jul 30, 2015 10:30 pm
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: VCU Open ‘15 @ VCU (8/8/15)
- Replies: 67
- Views: 29277
Re: VCU Open ‘15 @ VCU (8/8/15)
Is there any interest in playing the three remaining CO packets at this site, like what Jerry is running in Michigan? I just found out that I'll be able to come to VCU, and I'd like to read them, either in some sort of draft format or just to interested players.
- Mon Jul 20, 2015 9:42 pm
- Forum: Collegiate Discussion
- Topic: Could High-Level College Quizbowl Stand to be Easier?
- Replies: 25
- Views: 9602
Re: Could High-Level College Quizbowl Stand to be Easier?
I was going to post something about difficulty in the CO thread, but now that this one exists, I'll do it here. First of all, I've always strongly believed that editors should strongly control the difficulty of tournaments. Even at hard opens like CO, if you don't exercise strict discipline over you...
- Tue Apr 21, 2015 8:58 pm
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: ACF Nationals 2015 Discussion
- Replies: 227
- Views: 96874
Re: ACF Nationals 2015 Discussion
I think the "send in easier questions if you want easier questions" argument is a bit of a copout. Yes, in some sense the submissions guide how the tournament will look, and you want to reward teams for writing good questions by altering them as little as possible. But if you're an editor...
- Tue Apr 21, 2015 7:29 pm
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: ACF Nationals 2015 Discussion
- Replies: 227
- Views: 96874
Re: ACF Nationals 2015 Discussion
I think the "send in easier questions if you want easier questions" argument is a bit of a copout. Yes, in some sense the submissions guide how the tournament will look, and you want to reward teams for writing good questions by altering them as little as possible. But if you're an editor ...
- Tue Apr 14, 2015 10:35 pm
- Forum: Quizbowl History Forum
- Topic: Becoming Part of the Community
- Replies: 43
- Views: 34509
Becoming Part of the Community
In response to Mike's thread about people's lowest point, I thought it would be interesting for people to share how they became a part of the larger quizbowl community, what encouraged or discouraged them along the way, and anything that might have sped up or smoothed the process had it occurred. I ...
- Wed Feb 18, 2015 10:41 am
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: RILKE: Chicago Open Literature Singles 2015
- Replies: 95
- Views: 48480
Re: RILKE: Chicago Open Literature Singles 2015
I'd like to play this tournament.
- Sun Sep 07, 2014 10:28 pm
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: Imaginary Landscape no. 2 Discussion
- Replies: 5
- Views: 4677
Re: Imaginary Landscape no. 2 Discussion
I realized I forgot to post links to the packets, so here they are: Packet 1: https://app.box.com/s/9cjrh6f96um752scc4vk Packet 2: https://app.box.com/s/apg3kusvq0iiqfvcwfj9 Packet 3: https://app.box.com/s/l66tytwjmejq7pzi1ukj Packet 4: https://app.box.com/s/2w2ztx8ze9x6jvu5u67f Packet 5: https://ap...
- Mon Aug 11, 2014 9:14 pm
- Forum: College area archives
- Topic: Imaginary Landscape no. 2 Discussion
- Replies: 5
- Views: 4677
Imaginary Landscape no. 2 Discussion
Imaginary Landscape no. 2 is now clear for discussion. I'd especially like to thank my co-writers: Dave Letzler, Rebecca Maxfield, and Jacob Reed. They came up with many good ideas and provided great feedback on many questions, and really improved the tournament. The distribution was: 5 Composers 4 ...