The Quizbowl Resource Center

This is the formal announcement for Fake Intercollegiate Championship Tournament Experiment 2, to be held at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond on Sunday, March 22. See also the announcements for Fake TRASHionals and The Experiment II, which are occurring at VCU on Saturday, March 21.

The tournament is currently being written by myself (everything except science) and Andrew Alexander (science). FICHTE is a tournament intended to mimic the difficulty, distribution, rules, and question lengths of the actual Division I NAQT ICT as closely as possible. In other words, it will be noticeably difficult as compared to the normal collegiate quizbowl tournament. It will also differ by being timed, having more trash/geography/current events, and otherwise using NAQT rules. Please be aware of these factors in advance. You can see last year's FICHTE packets at http://collegiate.quizbowlpackets.com/archive/fichte/ ; this year's will be quite similar, though they will conform to the newly stated NAQT collegiate length guidelines for tossups, rather than the older guidelines used to construct the 2008 packets.

FEES:
Base fee $120 per team
Buzzers: -$10 each (no limit)
Clocks: -$5 each (no limit)
Staffers: -$20 each (no limit)
Minimum fee: $0

To get a discount, buzzers must actually work for the purpose of a normal quizbowl game; that is, they must have eight working activators, a working control box, and either a working power cord or a fresh battery, as applicable. Don't waste everyone's time bringing broken buzzers to the tournament. That's actually worse than bringing no buzzers at all! Similarly, if clocks are battery-powered, they must contain a fresh battery to qualify for the discount. Don't bring broken staffers either.

ELIGIBILITY: In order to give teams preparing for the ICT the best possible competition, this is an entirely open tournament. Any team whatsoever of 1 to 4 people may play, regardless of whether the people involved go to the same school (or any school). It is possible that a Division II title (by NAQT criteria) will be awarded if enough such teams are in attendance, but it is quite unlikely that an entirely separate Division II field will be run; you can expect all teams to play in the same field, and any subsidiary titles to be awarded to the highest-finishing eligible team within the tournament.

REGISTRATION: To register, post in this thread or mail me at [email protected] with the number of teams, buzzers, clocks, and staffers you want to bring, and an email address where you can be contacted with details.

LOCATION/DIRECTIONS: The tournament will take place in Harris Hall on our Monroe Park campus (aka "Academic Campus"). The nominal address of the building is "1015 Floyd Ave" if you need to put something into your map software of choice, but you may have an easier time finding the side of the building that faces the intersection of Main Street & Harrison Street, just west of the University Student Commons.

PARKING: On weekends, parking on the street is free and available in most places around the campus; the best place to park for access to Harris is directly adjacent to the building on Main Street or Floyd Avenue. If parking on the street appears unavailable, there are pay lots a block to the west on Main Street that you can park in all day for $3.

TIMES: Registration will run from 8:30 to 8:45 AM, with the goal of starting Round 1 as soon as possible after 8:45. Please be in room 2110 of Harris by 8:45 or risk forfeiting your first game.

FORMAT: Games will use the NAQT rules (http://naqt.com/rules.html). There will be 18 packets produced for this tournament, and the tournament format will give teams as many games as possible, given the field size and our cognizance of the fact that people don't want to stay too late on a Sunday.

PAYMENT: Financial arrangements will be handled by Quizbowl at VCU president Andrew Alexander. All teams must pay on Sunday morning, in one of two forms: cash, or a personal or institutional check made out to Andrew Alexander. Do not bring checks made out to Matt Weiner, to VCU, to "quizbowl," or so forth. We can't do anything with them. Unless you have made a specific arrangement with me or Andrew, you must pay your full registration fee at or before the tournament. If you need an invoice ahead of time so that your sponsor can cut a check, let me know. Otherwise, all teams will receive invoices at the tournament.

MIRRORS: This tournament is scheduled to be mirrored at Illinois and Tulsa. If you want to mirror it somewhere else, just let me know and we'll discuss the arrangements.

--Matt Weiner, tournament director, Fake ICT 2
[email protected]

Field:

Maryland (2)
Chicago (1)
UVa (1)
Putting the Fun in Frederick Funston [local HSers and others] (1)
House (1)
UNC (1)

We just ordered 20 timers, and so we can supply the Illinois site with all the timers it would need. Just let us know how many to bring.

alkrav112 wrote:We just ordered 20 timers, and so we can supply the Illinois site with all the timers it would need. Just let us know how many to bring.

That's cool. We also have a large number of timers, so we probably won't need any more, but I'm sure someone will let you know.

MaS

Chicago (1)

The Spring Break David Seal/Shantanu special?


Also is there any more of a field update?

DumbJaques wrote:The Spring Break David Seal/Shantanu special?

Yes.

Also is there any more of a field update?

No. I'll send some e-mails while I'm holed up in the WOQ control room, but I imagine a lot of people are on break now so decisions won't be made until next week.

The field has been updated at viewtopic.php?p=118243#p118243 in accordance with some recent verbal commitments.

Matt Weiner wrote:The field has been updated at viewtopic.php?p=118243#p118243 in accordance with some recent verbal commitments.

Just so you know, it's highly unlikely Penn is going to be able to make this.

So what's the deal with the Experiment still being on Saturday, etc.? Is there really a reason we can't do it the same day (the rounds are timed, the TD is as competent as they come, etc.)?

DumbJaques wrote:So what's the deal with the Experiment still being on Saturday, etc.? Is there really a reason we can't do it the same day (the rounds are timed, the TD is as competent as they come, etc.)?

I am writing 18 FICHTE packets, so I want them to be played; between that and the fact that it's a Sunday and people won't want to stay until the middle of the night, I think doing something Saturday night will be the way to go. Additional reasons include that some people who are involved in staffing or playing the high school tournament at Cosby want to play The Experiment and haven't indicated that they are staying for Sunday, so this seemed like the best plan.

I definitely understand that - and we want to play FICHTE packets, certainly, so I agree that main tournaments are more important. But if I recall, last year at Maryland we finished the tournament and then played through all remaining FICHTE packets (with breaks and team drafting/swapping) and were done way before late at night. I actually can't remember on which occasion we played Africa challenge, but it's possible we might have done that as well. Assuming we hold to the plan of just doing Experiment tossups, I don't see why things would necessarily run too late, particularly if we were able to decide who was playing by lunch or something and draw up a schedule then. We're running very tight on funds so I don't think we'll be able to make Saturday, but I understand if the schedule won't allow it.

Also it seems like most of the teams in attendance are so local that staying a bit late Sunday wouldn't be too much of a problem - it isn't for us, and we have the farthest to go of any non-Penn teams, at least. I'm not sure who you meant about the tournament people for Saturday - are they not mostly Richmond people in any event?

Penn regrettably won't be able to make this one.

DumbJaques wrote:I definitely understand that - and we want to play FICHTE packets, certainly, so I agree that main tournaments are more important. But if I recall, last year at Maryland we finished the tournament and then played through all remaining FICHTE packets (with breaks and team drafting/swapping) and were done way before late at night. I actually can't remember on which occasion we played Africa challenge, but it's possible we might have done that as well. Assuming we hold to the plan of just doing Experiment tossups, I don't see why things would necessarily run too late, particularly if we were able to decide who was playing by lunch or something and draw up a schedule then. We're running very tight on funds so I don't think we'll be able to make Saturday, but I understand if the schedule won't allow it.

Yes, it was last year's FICHTE when we played the Africa Challenge, then a three-packet "everyone grab a buzzer" round and still finished by 8 or 9pm.

The Experiment has only tossups, no bonuses, 10 packets worth just like last year...and if I recall correctly, it took about four hours to play last year, so I'd guess it'll be about the same this time. Use this info to plan however y'all see fit.

I'd like to toss my name out there as a free agent for this.

Lapego1 wrote:Penn regrettably won't be able to make this one.

We're keeping your buzzers until the next time we see you at a tournament, you know.

Hey, just wanted to know what's going on with some possible entrants to this tournament before I sent out the team update e-mail...I know Henry Gorman is coming and I see Dan Puma posted above; some other high schoolers who are frequently seen at collegiate events are going to be in town for the Cosby tournament on Saturday, but I don't know if they are staying/what teams they are playing on for this event, if I need to plan for an additional team comprised of them, etc.

I should make it known that, if we have to run/staff four rooms for this event, that means the VCU house team will probably consist solely of Evan and Brennan for the time being, so some people can play with them if you want to come but don't have a spot on a roster yet.

Actually, it turns out that I'm not going to be making it down with David and Shantanu, so you don't have to worry about me.

Hey, we're going to do The Experiment on Sunday after FICHTE after all. Sorry for all the jerking around on that. I'll update the other thread in a little bit.

Sorry for the late notice, but it turns out I can't make it.

So Maryland A (without Jeremy Eaton) defeated Shantanu, david Seal, and Doug Yetman in a one game final, after a 6 team double round robin.

Frater Taciturnus wrote:So Maryland A (without Jeremy Eaton) defeated Shantanu, david Seal, and Doug Yetman in a one game final, after a 6 team double round robin.

Indeed. Stats for RR: http://www.hsquizbowl.org/vcufichte/10_standings.html

Finals will be added to the stats eventually.