2020 ACF Regionals: Specific Questions and Errata
Posted: Sun Jan 26, 2020 1:37 pm
This thread is for discussing specific questions and errata for 2020 ACF Regionals. General discussion of the set should go here.
Sponsored by the Partnership for Academic Competition Excellence (Twitter: @PACENSC)
https://www.hsquizbowl.org/forums/
SortesVirgilianae wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 1:53 pm Considerable confusion was caused at the British site by mentioning the "Canterbury Plain" as a clue on the Stonehenge bonus part. Stonehenge is located on the Salisbury Plain.
(On a sidenote, does anyone know when the packets will be available online?)
I remember reading this question, and it definitely said Salisbury plain.SortesVirgilianae wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 1:53 pm Considerable confusion was caused at the British site by mentioning the "Canterbury Plain" as a clue on the Stonehenge bonus part. Stonehenge is located on the Salisbury Plain.
(On a sidenote, does anyone know when the packets will be available online?)
The number 108 is considered sacred by the Dharmic Religions, such as Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism.ArnavS wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 2:21 pm
Edit: Also, I thought some of the quantitative questions were a bit weird. For ex., asking for a "magic angle" of 1.05 degrees, or the precise number of bandits in a Chinese gang (118? forget the exact question. but maybe that one is OK, if it's well-known.) There seemed to be a few questions which were inaccessible to those who hadn't read a specific Nature paper.
We had the same confusion - think this would be a good improvement as well.
Like most scientific discoveries, the importance of graphene's magic angle goes far far beyond the specific paper in which it was discovered in; because of the papers, there is now a significant amount of contemporary research dedicated to the phenomenon. The specific value of the magic angle itself is also quite memorable, the fact that it is really small is necessary for Moire patterns to emerge. With that being said, I think this bonus part, and most of the other bonus parts I wrote/edited tended to play somewhat harder than I'd have liked to, which I apologize for.ArnavS wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 2:21 pm Edit: Also, I thought some of the quantitative questions were a bit weird. For ex., asking for a "magic angle" of 1.05 degrees, or the precise number of bandits in a Chinese gang (118? forget the exact question. but maybe that one is OK, if it's well-known.) There seemed to be a few questions which were inaccessible to those who hadn't read a specific Nature paper.
This was my mistake, sorry about that.
I would very much like to second this request. I think one of the earlier clues mentioned 1 Corinthians 12, but the chapter is known for discussing a bunch of spiritual gifts. Trying to figure out which one is nigh impossible.
As someone whose seen talks on the research in question, I think the bonus was extremely difficulty-appropriate, and it was great to see this come up. In general, this tournament did a great job of cluing current research, which is often difficult to do well.Iamteehee wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 4:38 pmLike most scientific discoveries, the importance of graphene's magic angle goes far far beyond the specific paper in which it was discovered in; because of the papers, there is now a significant amount of contemporary research dedicated to the phenomenon. The specific value of the magic angle itself is also quite memorable, the fact that it is really small is necessary for Moire patterns to emerge. With that being said, I think this bonus part, and most of the other bonus parts I wrote/edited tended to play somewhat harder than I'd have liked to, which I apologize for.ArnavS wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 2:21 pm Edit: Also, I thought some of the quantitative questions were a bit weird. For ex., asking for a "magic angle" of 1.05 degrees, or the precise number of bandits in a Chinese gang (118? forget the exact question. but maybe that one is OK, if it's well-known.) There seemed to be a few questions which were inaccessible to those who hadn't read a specific Nature paper.
This tossup was definitely my most frustrating neg of the day, as it was incredibly annoying to buzz on a description of The Ecstasy of St. Theresa in a tossup on "this profession," say "saint," and not get points. I probably should have been able to get to nun with the prompt, but I sorta panicked when I got prompted.Periplus of the Erythraean Sea wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 2:09 pm [*] I'm really not sure why the tossup on nuns couldn't have outright taken saints, especially because a bunch of the people being clued were, in fact, saints (with the caveat that some of these Things Have Names i.e. "crowned nuns"). The directed prompt on "earthly vocation" was very welcome here, though, and props to the editors for in general using directed prompts extremely well, as this let us get to the answer.
I'll add to this (having not seen the question text back) with the note that my colleague uses the Pechini method in synthesis of perovskites, so that immediately caused some confusion. This was compounded by the clue claiming that "this ion is the most common anion in perovskites"; which on the face of it is true, but since perovskites are generally named in reference to the compound "titanate" anion this seemed like a suboptimal way of thinking about it.
I’m sorry if this caused you any confusion, but this is not standard practice and would be extremely hard to implement giving the number of similar, often overlapping, questions, and would result in a great number of questions being thrown out for little reason. Combining overlapping submissions often can’t be done for logistical reasons.Theodore wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 8:17 pm There were two questions I heard during my games that were very similar to questions I submitted. They were the tossup on Portuguese poetry in packet L, and the bonus that went Brian Mulroney/Quebec/Joe Turner in Packet J.
In general, I believe the customary (and best) practice in this situation is to remove both instances of the repeat questions. I'm not sure if the editors simply missed the two questions above, or deemed the questions to be insufficiently similar, but I'd just like to bring this to your attention.
I don't see the problem. "Saint" is not a profession, so it was very generous of the editors to even give that prompt in the first place.100% Clean Comedian Dan Nainan wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 5:17 pmThis tossup was definitely my most frustrating neg of the day, as it was incredibly annoying to buzz on a description of The Ecstasy of St. Theresa in a tossup on "this profession," say "saint," and not get points. I probably should have been able to get to nun with the prompt, but I sorta panicked when I got prompted.
Why not just ask for "magic angle?"A Very Long Math Tossup wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 5:06 pmAs someone whose seen talks on the research in question, I think the bonus was extremely difficulty-appropriate, and it was great to see this come up. In general, this tournament did a great job of cluing current research, which is often difficult to do well.Iamteehee wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 4:38 pmLike most scientific discoveries, the importance of graphene's magic angle goes far far beyond the specific paper in which it was discovered in; because of the papers, there is now a significant amount of contemporary research dedicated to the phenomenon. The specific value of the magic angle itself is also quite memorable, the fact that it is really small is necessary for Moire patterns to emerge. With that being said, I think this bonus part, and most of the other bonus parts I wrote/edited tended to play somewhat harder than I'd have liked to, which I apologize for.ArnavS wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 2:21 pm Edit: Also, I thought some of the quantitative questions were a bit weird. For ex., asking for a "magic angle" of 1.05 degrees, or the precise number of bandits in a Chinese gang (118? forget the exact question. but maybe that one is OK, if it's well-known.) There seemed to be a few questions which were inaccessible to those who hadn't read a specific Nature paper.
Vikshar from Washington (who also submitted their packet late) said on Discord that he had a similar concern about, I think, the Octavio Paz literature bonus, although in that case, unlike with Michigan's bonus, not all three parts were the same. Given that this has already happened once with a late-submitting team having one question added to fill a hole and not having their names added to the packet, it'd be good for the editors to check whether there was another instance of this.
Again, I truly apologize for what happened; this was 100% my error. For context, Michigan's packet was added to a different packet to fill out a distributional gap. There is only one other packet where this occurred, and I have already confirmed that their name is included in their packet. Thanks for bringing the original issue to my attention.CPiGuy wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 9:17 pmVikshar from Washington (who also submitted their packet late) said on Discord that he had a similar concern about, I think, the Octavio Paz literature bonus, although in that case, unlike with Michigan's bonus, not all three parts were the same. Given that this has already happened once with a late-submitting team having one question added to fill a hole and not having their names added to the packet, it'd be good for the editors to check whether there was another instance of this.
I brought this directly to the attention of the editors last night as soon as I realized what happened with our submission; a bonus I wrote was used in a packet that did not have our name on it, and we played this packet. The other team received the bonus and I wasn't paying enough attention to it to realize at the time that it was my submission, which thankfully meant it didn't affect gameplay, since that was the only question used and none of us noticed (if we had, we would have of course immediately alerted the tournament director).
It is, however, deeply concerning to me that ACF was not able to fulfill what seems to be to be the most basic possible responsibility for the editors of a packet-submission tournament -- correctly labeling each packet with the teams who wrote the questions contained in it. It should be easy to see how this error has the capacity to cause extremely substantial and potentially catastrophic impacts on the integrity of the tournament, not to mention the scheduling. At the very least, I think the editors ought to do a careful check of the questions to make sure that Michigan's submission had the only uncredited used question -- and rectify any other issues that might be found. I think ACF should also make sure to explicitly review this *before* sending out the packets to hosts in the future, and not trust themselves to have gotten it right when assembling the packets, because they clearly did not this time.
I want to be clear that I'm not commenting on this further to try to, like, shame ACF/the editors or rub their faces in it or anything. They clearly worked very hard on this set and produced what was otherwise a very good set which I enjoyed playing! I just think it's a Serious Problem that warrants serious consideration about how to avoid its happening again, plus I want to make sure there weren't other instances of it that get written off by the submitters as coincidences.
My site complained that “profession” is an inaccurate term for this question, among others asking about a _non-paid_ occupation (seeing as nuns traditionally take vows of poverty, of course barring some technicalities about some modern nuns donating their whole “salary” to the church). This inexactitude likely caused similar confusion; “job,” “post,” and “occupation,” among others, would have avoided this problem.Cody wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 8:31 pmI don't see the problem. "Saint" is not a profession, so it was very generous of the editors to even give that prompt in the first place.100% Clean Comedian Dan Nainan wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 5:17 pmThis tossup was definitely my most frustrating neg of the day, as it was incredibly annoying to buzz on a description of The Ecstasy of St. Theresa in a tossup on "this profession," say "saint," and not get points. I probably should have been able to get to nun with the prompt, but I sorta panicked when I got prompted.
I agree that the question was phrased poorly - I was buzzing in with B minor, heard B minor mentioned, and thankfully managed to come with E minor as the obvious key for a cello concerto common-link. I'm not sure I'd agree with regards to key tossups - lots of pieces are very closely associated with a certain key, particularly concertos, and I don't think it's any less obviously meaningful than a lot of other common links people can and do come up with (first names, etc.). I didn't mind the note string clues since most of them were fairly notable melodies, although I don't think that type of cluing works as well for a piece like Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra as, say, Rachmaninoff's third piano concerto.csa2125 wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 10:47 pm Someone in the General Discussion thread brought up an example of “bait,” which was disappointingly more widespread than one question. Off the top of my head, the E minor question had a sentence along the lines of, if I recall correctly, “Victor Herbert’s second cello concerto in this key inspired Dvorak’s concerto in B minor”—less than ideal not only for baiting one into saying the key of Dvorak’s concerto (maybe you could say that’s early, but it’s best just not to bait at all), but for the confusing construction “second cello concerto in this key,” which can confusingly refer to “the second of 2+ cello concertos in this key by Victor Herbert” or “the second numbered cello concerto by Herbert, which is in this key.” The “bait” is more a problem, I think, but both of these lead to gameplay problems: I would have preferred something like “Victor Herbert’s second cello concerto, which is in this key, inspired the B minor cello concerto by Dvorak,” or even “Dvorak’s B minor cello concerto was inspired by a concerto in this other key, namely the second by Victor Herbert.”
I also generally question the wisdom of key questions, in particular as tossups: unless a piece is known by its key (Mass in B minor, Prelude in C# minor), or is a key that “really means something” in context (C minor in Beethoven, Elgar’s first symphony being in the rare key of Ab major, the emotional associations of a key and the piece [possibly the “dark” Bb minor of Chopin’s funeral march), it seems to “artificially” limit the number of people who can buzz on a given clue, esp. given how “non-musicians” rarely tend to know the key of most pieces excepting the above reasons (same idea as limiting the amount of “score clues”/note strings [and very much so when given without a tempo]). What would have been lost if this question asked for “cello concerto” or even “cello” with the same clues?
That was a bad addition on my part -- I added it in because I needed another middle clue, but at game speed it's hard to make the logical jumps necessary to go from Ricardian equivalence = tax cuts now mean tax hikes later to "tax rates will even out over time because government spending stays the same." I should also have made clearer that tax cuts were not what was being asked about -- I emphasized quantity because I don't consider tax rates to be a quantity, but I should have fleshed it out further.cwasims wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 11:07 pm I'd have to see the tossup to comment more fully, but I was annoyed to neg government spending with "taxes", especially since Ricardian Equivalence is a result much more strongly associated with taxes than government spending in my experience. I'm sure the clue did point to government spending, but it's difficult to parse those kinds of nuances at game speed.
csa2125 wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 10:47 pm Someone in the General Discussion thread brought up an example of “bait,” which was disappointingly more widespread than one question. Off the top of my head, the E minor question had a sentence along the lines of, if I recall correctly, “Victor Herbert’s second cello concerto in this key inspired Dvorak’s concerto in B minor”—less than ideal not only for baiting one into saying the key of Dvorak’s concerto (maybe you could say that’s early, but it’s best just not to bait at all), but for the confusing construction “second cello concerto in this key,” which can confusingly refer to “the second of 2+ cello concertos in this key by Victor Herbert” or “the second numbered cello concerto by Herbert, which is in this key.” The “bait” is more a problem, I think, but both of these lead to gameplay problems: I would have preferred something like “Victor Herbert’s second cello concerto, which is in this key, inspired the B minor cello concerto by Dvorak,” or even “Dvorak’s B minor cello concerto was inspired by a concerto in this other key, namely the second by Victor Herbert.”
I also generally question the wisdom of key questions, in particular as tossups: unless a piece is known by its key (Mass in B minor, Prelude in C# minor), or is a key that “really means something” in context (C minor in Beethoven, Elgar’s first symphony being in the rare key of Ab major, the emotional associations of a key and the piece [possibly the “dark” Bb minor of Chopin’s funeral march), it seems to “artificially” limit the number of people who can buzz on a given clue, esp. given how “non-musicians” rarely tend to know the key of most pieces excepting the above reasons (same idea as limiting the amount of “score clues”/note strings [and very much so when given without a tempo]). What would have been lost if this question asked for “cello concerto” or even “cello” with the same clues?
My apologies for the unfortunate wording in this tossup -- it's definitely something I should've been more cognizant of. That being said, I agree with Chris that key tossups can be treated similarly to other common links and that, if there is a meaningful connection between the clues, I don't see why common linking keys is any less valid, especially at this difficulty. The key of a piece is important information for music players to know and I'm inclined to reward players with a more robust understanding of that than players who lack it.cwasims wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 11:07 pm I agree that the question was phrased poorly - I was buzzing in with B minor, heard B minor mentioned, and thankfully managed to come with E minor as the obvious key for a cello concerto common-link. I'm not sure I'd agree with regards to key tossups - lots of pieces are very closely associated with a certain key, particularly concertos, and I don't think it's any less obviously meaningful than a lot of other common links people can and do come up with (first names, etc.).
To clarify, I believe Elgar’s Cello Concerto in E minor is a piece “known by its key”; I wouldn’t extend the same with the same certainty to Prokofiev’s Symphony-Concerto, and definitely not to the barely-known Herbert Second Cello Concerto (I found a peak of 11K listens to this on Spotify, and around 15K and 18K for the top two YouTube results [to be clear, the problem is more having a middle-ish clue on _the key_ of such a relatively unpopular piece than on asking about an influential (at least to Dvorak) concerto by a less-known composer]. If I must confess, I was frustrated by being able to identify the composer, dedicatee, title, etc. of the Symphony-Concerto but not its key because I didn’t quizbowlify every single aspect of the piece. However, it doesn’t seem in the spirit of quiz bowl to get a question because it’s “the obvious key for a cello concerto common-link,” as it isn’t to get a common link on contemporary British novelists named Smith because “it’s the obvious surname for a modern British novelist common-link.” I’m still not seeing “what is added” by asking the key instead of the genre in this instance, aside from unjustified difficulty—not teaching players these concerti are in E minor in a way that can’t be done by asking “cello concerto” or “cello”; nor have I yet found anything suggesting that one “doesn’t know” the Prokofiev or Herbert concerti if they don’t know their keys, in the way that one “doesn’t know” Elgar’s concerto if they don’t know it’s in E minor, or the same of one who forgets the key of the Rachmaninoff Prelude or Mass in B minor.cwasims wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 11:07 pmI agree that the question was phrased poorly - I was buzzing in with B minor, heard B minor mentioned, and thankfully managed to come with E minor as the obvious key for a cello concerto common-link. I'm not sure I'd agree with regards to key tossups - lots of pieces are very closely associated with a certain key, particularly concertos, and I don't think it's any less obviously meaningful than a lot of other common links people can and do come up with (first names, etc.). I didn't mind the note string clues since most of them were fairly notable melodies, although I don't think that type of cluing works as well for a piece like Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra as, say, Rachmaninoff's third piano concerto.csa2125 wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 10:47 pm Someone in the General Discussion thread brought up an example of “bait,” which was disappointingly more widespread than one question. Off the top of my head, the E minor question had a sentence along the lines of, if I recall correctly, “Victor Herbert’s second cello concerto in this key inspired Dvorak’s concerto in B minor”—less than ideal not only for baiting one into saying the key of Dvorak’s concerto (maybe you could say that’s early, but it’s best just not to bait at all), but for the confusing construction “second cello concerto in this key,” which can confusingly refer to “the second of 2+ cello concertos in this key by Victor Herbert” or “the second numbered cello concerto by Herbert, which is in this key.” The “bait” is more a problem, I think, but both of these lead to gameplay problems: I would have preferred something like “Victor Herbert’s second cello concerto, which is in this key, inspired the B minor cello concerto by Dvorak,” or even “Dvorak’s B minor cello concerto was inspired by a concerto in this other key, namely the second by Victor Herbert.”
I also generally question the wisdom of key questions, in particular as tossups: unless a piece is known by its key (Mass in B minor, Prelude in C# minor), or is a key that “really means something” in context (C minor in Beethoven, Elgar’s first symphony being in the rare key of Ab major, the emotional associations of a key and the piece [possibly the “dark” Bb minor of Chopin’s funeral march), it seems to “artificially” limit the number of people who can buzz on a given clue, esp. given how “non-musicians” rarely tend to know the key of most pieces excepting the above reasons (same idea as limiting the amount of “score clues”/note strings [and very much so when given without a tempo]). What would have been lost if this question asked for “cello concerto” or even “cello” with the same clues?
Though some of the Econ in this set was very good, I concur this clue wasn’t my favorite; it’s obvious in retrospect that you want “the other side of taxation” when saying “it’s not taxation, but [Ricardian equivalence],” but that doesn’t fix that the clue was mystifying or illogical at game speed.I'd have to see the tossup to comment more fully, but I was annoyed to neg government spending with "taxes", especially since Ricardian Equivalence is a result much more strongly associated with taxes than government spending in my experience. I'm sure the clue did point to government spending, but it's difficult to parse those kinds of nuances at game speed.
To be more clear (I realize I wasn't before), I did think the first clue was referring to Prokofiev's Symphony-Concerto, which I also thought was in E minor, although I wasn't certain enough of either to buzz. But that, combined with assuming the later clues would be on Elgar, made me figure that E minor was the obvious guess at the point when I did buzz.csa2125 wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 11:55 pmTo clarify, I believe Elgar’s Cello Concerto in E minor is a piece “known by its key”; I wouldn’t extend the same with the same certainty to Prokofiev’s Symphony-Concerto, and definitely not to the barely-known Herbert Second Cello Concerto (I found a peak of 11K listens to this on Spotify, and around 15K and 18K for the top two YouTube results [to be clear, the problem is more having a middle-ish clue on _the key_ of such a relatively unpopular piece than on asking about an influential (at least to Dvorak) concerto by a less-known composer]. If I must confess, I was frustrated by being able to identify the composer, dedicatee, title, etc. of the Symphony-Concerto but not its key because I didn’t quizbowlify every single aspect of the piece. However, it doesn’t seem in the spirit of quiz bowl to get a question because it’s “the obvious key for a cello concerto common-link,” as it isn’t to get a common link on contemporary British novelists named Smith because “it’s the obvious surname for a modern British novelist common-link.” I’m still not seeing “what is added” by asking the key instead of the genre in this instance, aside from unjustified difficulty—not teaching players these concerti are in E minor in a way that can’t be done by asking “cello concerto” or “cello”; nor have I yet found anything suggesting that one “doesn’t know” the Prokofiev or Herbert concerti if they don’t know their keys, in the way that one “doesn’t know” Elgar’s concerto if they don’t know it’s in E minor, or the same of one who forgets the key of the Rachmaninoff Prelude or Mass in B minor.cwasims wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 11:07 pmI agree that the question was phrased poorly - I was buzzing in with B minor, heard B minor mentioned, and thankfully managed to come with E minor as the obvious key for a cello concerto common-link. I'm not sure I'd agree with regards to key tossups - lots of pieces are very closely associated with a certain key, particularly concertos, and I don't think it's any less obviously meaningful than a lot of other common links people can and do come up with (first names, etc.). I didn't mind the note string clues since most of them were fairly notable melodies, although I don't think that type of cluing works as well for a piece like Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra as, say, Rachmaninoff's third piano concerto.csa2125 wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 10:47 pm Someone in the General Discussion thread brought up an example of “bait,” which was disappointingly more widespread than one question. Off the top of my head, the E minor question had a sentence along the lines of, if I recall correctly, “Victor Herbert’s second cello concerto in this key inspired Dvorak’s concerto in B minor”—less than ideal not only for baiting one into saying the key of Dvorak’s concerto (maybe you could say that’s early, but it’s best just not to bait at all), but for the confusing construction “second cello concerto in this key,” which can confusingly refer to “the second of 2+ cello concertos in this key by Victor Herbert” or “the second numbered cello concerto by Herbert, which is in this key.” The “bait” is more a problem, I think, but both of these lead to gameplay problems: I would have preferred something like “Victor Herbert’s second cello concerto, which is in this key, inspired the B minor cello concerto by Dvorak,” or even “Dvorak’s B minor cello concerto was inspired by a concerto in this other key, namely the second by Victor Herbert.”
I also generally question the wisdom of key questions, in particular as tossups: unless a piece is known by its key (Mass in B minor, Prelude in C# minor), or is a key that “really means something” in context (C minor in Beethoven, Elgar’s first symphony being in the rare key of Ab major, the emotional associations of a key and the piece [possibly the “dark” Bb minor of Chopin’s funeral march), it seems to “artificially” limit the number of people who can buzz on a given clue, esp. given how “non-musicians” rarely tend to know the key of most pieces excepting the above reasons (same idea as limiting the amount of “score clues”/note strings [and very much so when given without a tempo]). What would have been lost if this question asked for “cello concerto” or even “cello” with the same clues?
I’m also not opposed to note strings that are _notable_ melodies or motifs, but to ones that are nigh unbuzzable without a tempo / other sufficient information (or, if read too quickly b/c there was no “read slowly” prompt) or by carding the note sequences that make up the X most common pieces’ melodies out of context, since the problem is what happens at game speed. It can lead to the same issue as quoting Nerval as quoted in “The Waste Land” in a question on the latter, among other problems (e.g., being unparseable or unbuzzable). Again, there are better times and better pieces to clue in this way than others.
Moreover, I think the “baiting” is a more general issue than asking for keys when maybe not the absolutely gold-standard way to write certain music TUs.
Sort of related to this: many of the religion questions directly tied together religious practices with related scripture, which I think is a great idea and mostly worked very well. There did seem to be more specific verse clues than there normally are, and some of them felt pretty deep. I wonder if providing more context about where the verses fall, rather than just the number, would be more useful. The tradition I'm most familiar with isn't as Bible-focused as other denominations, though, so I may be underestimating how well known these are. I'd be curious if others found them more helpful.
A minor thing along the same lines was the current events tossup on South Korea and Japan, which included a clue about the mnemonic song from Parasite that took the form (paraphrased, since I don't have the questions) "The Jessica, Illinois, Chicago song from Parasite... is based on a song about a dispute between these two countries." Because the relationship between North and South Korea is explicitly an element of the film (albeit one that has nothing to do with the clued scene), I vulched (after a neg on the same clue) with that before getting to the referent in the question. Reworking the sentence so that it starts with "A territory disputed between these two countries" would likely make the question play just slightly better.Milhouse wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 2:43 pm This seems like a not insubstantial hose for dawn or sunrise (which are totally phenomena) if you buzzed anticipating that the sentence would be 'Homer used the phrase 'rosy-fingered' to describe this phenomenon,' that could be solved by saying that you're talking about Roman equivalent before giving the clue about Eos.
Bro sometimes when you play the game you gotta play by the rules. If you reflex buzz on the first word the 2nd sentence and give the wrong answer that's your onus for buzzing before hearing the whole clue and not the editor's. (Presumably the answerline was just proteins/peptides for conversion purposes although there was some pretty awkward wording as a result). It's pretty unreasonable to prompt on proteases just because they can be the target of other proteases because that would justify prompting on literally any protein family or superfamily that is known to be enzymatically degraded.celsius273 wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 11:05 pm The science in this set was my favorite of the regionals I've played ('18, '19, '20). To add to the discussion about bait, my one gripe is with the "protein" question in packet E (Central Florida A et. al.) I buzzed and answered "protease" when I heard "MEROPS" (I did not get a chance to hear the back half of the clue specifying that the question wanted the substrate of proteases) and was extremely miffed to hear that "protease" was explicitly unpromptable. What was the rationale for theme-ing the question about proteases (clues I can recall: MEROPS, oxyanion hole, papain) instead of making the answer protease? One of my teammates pointed out afterwards that technically, proteases themselves can be the target of other proteases (e.g. TEV protease loses activity over time because it gets cleaved by neighboring proteases) making the "do not accept or prompt" incorrect.
While I tend to agree with Andrew that prompting on proteases probably isn't the right thing to do with the way this tossup is currently written, I also want to say how much I did not like the pronoun for this tossup being "these molecules". Maybe this isn't the case for everyone, but this pronoun just made this question incredibly confusing to play for me, and in my opinion just making this a tossup on proteases would have been the far better decision (and still a difficulty appropriate one).Banned Tiny Toon Adventures Episode wrote: ↑Mon Jan 27, 2020 2:06 amBro sometimes when you play the game you gotta play by the rules. If you reflex buzz on the first word the 2nd sentence and give the wrong answer that's your onus for buzzing before hearing the whole clue and not the editor's. (Presumably the answerline was just proteins/peptides for conversion purposes although there was some pretty awkward wording as a result). It's pretty unreasonable to prompt on proteases just because they can be the target of other proteases because that would justify prompting on literally any protein family or superfamily that is known to be enzymatically degraded.celsius273 wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 11:05 pm The science in this set was my favorite of the regionals I've played ('18, '19, '20). To add to the discussion about bait, my one gripe is with the "protein" question in packet E (Central Florida A et. al.) I buzzed and answered "protease" when I heard "MEROPS" (I did not get a chance to hear the back half of the clue specifying that the question wanted the substrate of proteases) and was extremely miffed to hear that "protease" was explicitly unpromptable. What was the rationale for theme-ing the question about proteases (clues I can recall: MEROPS, oxyanion hole, papain) instead of making the answer protease? One of my teammates pointed out afterwards that technically, proteases themselves can be the target of other proteases (e.g. TEV protease loses activity over time because it gets cleaved by neighboring proteases) making the "do not accept or prompt" incorrect.
Jason, I'm very sorry about that clue, and I'm glad you knew enough to avoid negging on that sentence. I first read about Ibn al-Rawandi in an article that called him "the first Persian atheist" or something similar, so I wrote a note in my spreadsheet of question ideas like "Ibn al-Rawandi- Zumurrud- Persian proto-atheist." Then, when I was researching this question, I actually saw that Encyclopedia Iranica article and assumed it was referring to Iran's Khorasan Province, since I already thought of him as Persian (especially since it said 'he "secretly returned to Persia" after living in Baghdad). I should have been more careful given that Greater Khorasan extended past Iran's current boundaries.jasongg17 wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 6:01 pm A rather major error (ok, maybe I'm being a tad cartoonishly over-invested in my niche interests here in calling it "major) I noticed was in the religion question on Iran (I think it was a religion question). While I was over the freaking moon to hear a clue on Ibn al-Rawandi/Book of the Emerald come up, to describe Ibn al-Rawandi as being from Iran ("this modern day country") is simply inaccurate. There isn't total consensus over where he was born, but modern Iran is not a candidate, with the main actual candidates being Afghanistan or Iraq. He was also based in modern Iraq for his entire recorded career as far as I can find.
http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/ebn-ravandi
I'm sorry. I don't think this question worked as well as I thought it would. I wanted to write a question focused on contemporary spiritualism and new religious movements. When I wrote this question initially, the leadin was entirely about Edzard Ernst, a prominent scholar and critic of alternative medicine. I added the 1 Corinthians clue to try to help people place it, but I can see how it could be confusing. The original pronoun for this question was "ritual," but I changed it to "kind of practice" to try to make it clearer and show that it was a type of ritual rather than a specific ritual. However, that does not seem to have helped. Many people understandably negged with "love" on the Williamson clues, and perhaps "ritual" would have prevented that. But I also should have used a clue that was harder to mix up with The Politics of Love, such as Healing the Soul of America: Reclaiming Our Voices as Spiritual Citizens.8. Edzard Ernst traced this kind of practice to First Corinthians 12:9 (“chapter 12, verse 9”) and evaluated if it’s “hype or harm.” Choa Kok Sui and Mokichi Okada taught the “pranic” and Johrei forms of this kind of practice, which Amaterasu guides in Kurozumikyō. “The holy relationship” is “context” for this kind of practice, whose “political” form “flows from spiritual experience,” according to Marianne Williamson. The “palm” method transfers “currents” in a practice used for this purpose that manipulates “fields” with “touch.” Therapists focus “energy vibrations” with rocks for this purpose, which chakras often guide. To promote this goal, Deepak Chopra created a “quantum” ritual. Pentecostals perform this kind of practice with the “laying on of hands.” For 10 points, crystals and Reiki are believed to provide what benefit in alternative medicine?
ANSWER: spiritual healing [accept specific types like quantum/crystal/faith healing or therapeutic touch or Reiki; accept word forms like health; prompt on therapy or treatment or homeopathy or complementary and alternative medicine or similar by asking “what medical effect is supposed to result from these rituals?”; prompt on touching or laying on of hands by asking “what is the spiritual goal of the touch?”]
<Religion>
floorsweeper wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 5:15 pm Would it be possible to see the bonus on Classic of Mountains and Seas? I heard it describing the monster Xingtian as using his navel as his eye, but his navel is actually his mouth.
I'm sorry. This was my fault for mixing up the words "nipple" and "navel."17. Guō Pú published many commentaries on this text, which describes gods like Dìjiāng (“dee-jyong”), a flying yellow sack, and Xíngtiān (“sheeng-t’yen”), who uses his navel as an eye because Huángdì beheaded him. For 10 points each:
[10] Name this Chinese classic, a fantastical geography of ancient China completed during the Hàn dynasty. This text describes implausible foreign peoples like the asexual and regenerating Wúqǐ (“woo-chee”), and the beaked and winged Huāntóu (“hwahn-toh”).
ANSWER: Shān Hǎi Jīng [or Classic of Mountains and Seas; accept Guideways Through Mountains and Seas; accept the old translation Classic of Mountains and Rivers; accept Saan Hoi Ging]
[10] The Shān Hǎi Jīng features many of these animals, like the doubled Féiyí (“fay-yee”) and the elephant-eating Bā. In a folktale, a white animal of this kind becomes a woman to marry Xǔ Xiān (“shoo sh’yen”). Nǚwā (“n’yoo-wah”) and her brother Fúxī (“foo-shee”) are often depicted with the bodies of these animals.
ANSWER: snakes [or serpents; or shé; accept ji or se; accept Legend of the White Snake or Báishé Chuán; prompt on reptiles or other generic answers; do not accept or prompt on “dragons” or “lóng”]
[10] In folktales like the Marquis of Suí’s (“sway’s”) pearl, snakes commonly appear in the “grateful animals” motif. That motif is also a staple of the Panchatantra, which was written in this language, like the Mahābhārata and Rāmāyaṇa.
ANSWER: Sanskrit [or saṃskṛtam]
<Mythology>
Kasper Kaijanen wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 5:47 pm Can I see the tossup on slavery from the Bible? I buzzed on the clue about the Sabbath year with something about forgiving debts
Although Jeremiah 34 is specifically about freeing slaves in the sabbatical year, debt forgiveness is a reasonable answer to give if you are familiar with the shmita (which is why I included the "farming" exclusionary clue). However, there is a complication, because the released slaves are held in debt bondage (an acceptable answer). Therefore, it would be wrong to say "It's not debt," but the practice of general debt forgiveness is somewhat different. I probably should have included a directed prompt on "debt" alone. I'm sorry that it hurt you.13. The Mekhilta (“meh-kheel-TAH”) of Rabbi Ishmael glosses this practice’s different rules for women and men by citing possible damage to the 24 chief external organs. It’s not farming, but in Jeremiah 34, King Zedekiah changes his mind about ending this practice in accordance with the shmita (“shmee-TAH”), or sabbatical year. Genesis 37:28 (“chapter 37, verse 28”) describes Midianites and Ishmaelites engaging in this practice, whose law code in Exodus 21 marks its permanent form with ear piercing. Statistics about this practice were manipulated to push antisemitism in the pamphlet The Secret Relationship by the Nation of Islam. The Haggadah (“ha-ga-DAH”) uses the “bread of affliction” and the bitter herb maror (“ma-ROAR”) to remind Seder (“SAY-der”) guests of Jews suffering this practice in Egypt. For 10 points, the Curse of Ham was cited to justify what atrocity in the antebellum South?
ANSWER: slavery [accept the slave trade or similar; prompt on commerce or trade, etc.; prompt on labor or work, etc.; prompt on kidnapping by asking “kidnapping someone in order to do what to them?”; accept indentured servants or servitude or debt bondage or bonded labor]
<Religion>
I'm sorry about this phrasing. I did write the clue that way initially, but changed it in an attempt to make the syntax less awkward. I'm sorry if it caused anyone to neg and then fail to answer the directed prompt on "dawn" ("Who is the Roman goddess of dawn?").Milhouse wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 2:43 pm The tossup on auroras (which generally described them as "this phenomenon") had a sentence that I remember saying something to the effect of "Homer used the phrase 'rosy-fingered' to describe a god whose Roman equivalent names these phenomena." This seems like a not insubstantial hose for dawn or sunrise (which are totally phenomena) if you buzzed anticipating that the sentence would be 'Homer used the phrase 'rosy-fingered' to describe this phenomenon,' that could be solved by saying that you're talking about Roman equivalent before giving the clue about Eos.
I'm sorry if this confused anyone else. I tried to write that question very carefully to be avoid transparency, and thought that doing so required that the answerspace include such groups of objects.Auroni wrote: ↑Mon Jan 27, 2020 1:00 am I wasn't a fan of the referent "these objects" to refer to "the sun and the moon" in the myth tossup in one of the Finals packets, since as it's generally used in myth questions, "these objects" refer to a general class of items rather than a limited set of specific objects. Though I do understand that there aren't a lot of options here that wouldn't make the tossup immediately obvious.
This is almost certainly a moderator error, as this was the answerline:ansonberns wrote: ↑Mon Jan 27, 2020 3:58 am I didn't get points for saying "the prologue to Hopscotch" for the bonus part on the Table of Instructions. Was this a moderator error (possibly because of a long or complicated answerline) or was this a genuine omission by the packet? If the latter, I think the answer line should be expanded to include such answers.
As you can see, "prologue" was not explicitly mentioned in the answerline precisely because I did not want to make it longer than it already was (and, quite frankly, it's not that long as it stands), and I instead elected to include the phrase "descriptions such as" and allow the moderator to exercise some common sense (while making explicitly clear that the only reasonable description they cannot accept was about it being a first chapter). If the moderator did read this answerline correctly, they apparently didn't think that "prologue" was descriptively similar enough to the three other examples I gave (I'm thus inclined to believe the moderator just read the answerline wrong, as this, at least in my view, is a silly call to make). I apologize for not explicitly including "prologue" in the answerline, but I also would like to use this as an example of why there are often long answerlines -- the more discretion you give the moderator, the more room for error there is in game when it comes to making these judgment calls.ANSWER: “Table of Instructions” [accept “Tablero de dirección”; accept descriptions such as the introduction or beginning or author’s note of Hopscotch or Rayuela; do not accept any answers indicating that this section is a first chapter]
While there were issues with this particular question, I want to push slightly against Jacob Reed (and thus balance out my agreement with him in the other thread) on the content. It's pretty standard to include clues on new religious movements in religion questions with country answer lines, and folks like Chopra and Williamson are "in the air" enough that one can make an answerable, pyramidal question with clues about them. The propensity of the work to induce eye rolling shouldn't be disqualifying. (Obviously this shouldn't be at the expense of, you know, Islam, or Buddhism. But there's still room for stuff like it.)Chimango Caracara wrote: ↑Mon Jan 27, 2020 4:34 am I'm sorry. I don't think this question worked as well as I thought it would. I wanted to write a question focused on contemporary spiritualism and new religious movements. When I wrote this question initially, the leadin was entirely about Edzard Ernst, a prominent scholar and critic of alternative medicine. I added the 1 Corinthians clue to try to help people place it, but I can see how it could be confusing. The original pronoun for this question was "ritual," but I changed it to "kind of practice" to try to make it clearer and show that it was a type of ritual rather than a specific ritual. However, that does not seem to have helped. Many people understandably negged with "love" on the Williamson clues, and perhaps "ritual" would have prevented that. But I also should have used a clue that was harder to mix up with The Politics of Love, such as Healing the Soul of America: Reclaiming Our Voices as Spiritual Citizens.
I definitely agree that "prologue to Hopscotch" should be acceptable, and in fact that's the answer that was offered and accepted in my room. However, you seem to suggest that the balance of responsibility for this situation falls on the moderator, and I disagree with that. Certainly the moderator could make the judgment call that "prologue" should be acceptable, but if the editor wants that to be the case, they bear the greater responsibility to say so. What about an answer of the preface or the foreword to Hopscotch? As far as I know, such terms are close to but not exactly synonymous with introduction, and when presented with a judgment call about a notably atypical book one has never read I think the moderator can expect a little more assistance. The finals sequence of the 2018 ACF Nationals featured a contentious protest concerning the difference between a frontispiece and a cover, so I don't think it's at all unreasonable that people could be uncertain when asked to make this sort of distinction.Thiccasso's Guernthicca wrote: ↑Mon Jan 27, 2020 12:24 pmThis is almost certainly a moderator error, as this was the answerline:ansonberns wrote: ↑Mon Jan 27, 2020 3:58 am I didn't get points for saying "the prologue to Hopscotch" for the bonus part on the Table of Instructions. Was this a moderator error (possibly because of a long or complicated answerline) or was this a genuine omission by the packet? If the latter, I think the answer line should be expanded to include such answers.
As you can see, "prologue" was not explicitly mentioned in the answerline precisely because I did not want to make it longer than it already was (and, quite frankly, it's not that long as it stands), and I instead elected to include the phrase "descriptions such as" and allow the moderator to exercise some common sense (while making explicitly clear that the only reasonable description they cannot accept was about it being a first chapter). If the moderator did read this answerline correctly, they apparently didn't think that "prologue" was descriptively similar enough to the three other examples I gave (I'm thus inclined to believe the moderator just read the answerline wrong, as this, at least in my view, is a silly call to make). I apologize for not explicitly including "prologue" in the answerline, but I also would like to use this as an example of why there are often long answerlines -- the more discretion you give the moderator, the more room for error there is in game when it comes to making these judgment calls.ANSWER: “Table of Instructions” [accept “Tablero de dirección”; accept descriptions such as the introduction or beginning or author’s note of Hopscotch or Rayuela; do not accept any answers indicating that this section is a first chapter]