The Quizbowl Resource Center

I am pleased to announce that for 2021 Oxford University and Cambridge University Quiz Societies will be combining forces to produce a housewritten set: Cambridge and Oxford Open Tournament (COOT). The head editors for this set will be Joseph Krol and me.

The set, which will comprise 13 packets, will have the following distribution:

4/4 Science, subdistributed as follows:
1/1 Biology
1/1 Physics (inc. astrophysics)
2/2 Chemistry and Other Science, broken down over the set as:
12/12 Chemistry
8/8 Maths
3/3 Compsci
2/2 Earth Science
1/1 Miscellaneous

4/4 Literature, subdistributed
1/1 British
1/1 European
1/1 Anglophone (North America and Oceania)
1/1 World/Misc

4/4 History
1/1 Pre-1100
1/1 1100-1600
1/1 1600-1900
1/1 1900 onwards

3/3 Fine Art
1/1 VFA
1/1 AFA
1/1 OFA

3/3 Thought
1/1 Philosophy
1/1 Social Science
1/1 Belief

1/1 Geography and Current Affairs

1/1 Trash and Other Academic


Our aim with the difficulty is similar to this year's edition of OOT - note particularly that the we aim for the Science this year to be a notch harder than previous editions, and more in line with the rest of the set. Tossups will be around 7 lines long (in 10 point Times New Roman).
The initial mirror will take place in the UK at the end of January or in February. We would hope to host it as an in-person mirror in Oxford, but will await further developments before confirming this.
We would like to see the set widely mirrored outside of this country as well, and will be looking for hosts (in-person or online) in the future.

Mirrors: UK

Lake Winnipesaukee Mystery Stone wrote: ↑Mon Aug 10, 2020 12:23 pm 2/2 Chemistry and Other Science, broken down over the set as:
12/12 Chemistry
8/8 Maths
3/3 Compsci
2/2 Earth Science
1/1 Miscellaneous

Am I reading it correctly that there will be, at maximum, two pure astronomy questions in the set?

Santa Claus wrote: ↑Mon Aug 10, 2020 1:01 pm

Lake Winnipesaukee Mystery Stone wrote: ↑Mon Aug 10, 2020 12:23 pm 2/2 Chemistry and Other Science, broken down over the set as:
12/12 Chemistry
8/8 Maths
3/3 Compsci
2/2 Earth Science
1/1 Miscellaneous

Am I reading it correctly that there will be, at maximum, two pure astronomy questions in the set?

We intend to include a lot of what would ordinarily be classed as 'astro' in QB terms under physics, as well as including some under miscellaneous; on the whole we expect the amount of astro content to be similar to other sets of this level. (Also, the more applied maths questions are intended to integrate content from various disciplines, hopefully allowing representation of smaller fields in a more natural way.)

Will the set have powers?

AGoodMan wrote: ↑Tue Aug 18, 2020 12:54 pm Will the set have powers?

Yep.

Just a reminder that this set will be available for mirrors from February 13th - get in contact with us if you're interested in hosting one in your area.

krollo wrote: ↑Tue Dec 22, 2020 4:11 pm Just a reminder that this set will be available for mirrors from February 13th - get in contact with us if you're interested in hosting one in your area.

A reminder about this: we are looking for hosts for American/Canadian mirrors of COOT 2021 - if you or your team are interested, please email me at oliver dot clarke @ new dot ox dot ac dot uk.

Would love to see a North American mirror of this. Since it would presumably be a large staff commitment, I'm personally willing to pay a higher than usual entry fee to attract more freelance staff.

Mike Bentley wrote: ↑Mon Jan 25, 2021 5:56 pm Would love to see a North American mirror of this. Since it would presumably be a large staff commitment, I'm personally willing to pay a higher than usual entry fee to attract more freelance staff.

Ditto. I do think this set could perhaps even work on a more regional level, given the difficulty. Or at least something like more broad regions of West coast/Northeast + Upper Mid-Atlantic/Southeast + Lower Mid-Atlantic/Midwest.

If anyone is still interested in hosting a mirror of COOT 2021 please let me know either here or on Discord by Wednesday 1700 BST. If not, we'll post the packets then and people will be free to discuss/compliment/rant/insult as they wish.

The packets have been uploaded to the archive