CANCELLED: Super Smart Brothers Brawl

[SoLegit12]

THIS IS CANCELLED. PLEASE IGNORE. SORRY FOR THE INCONVENIENCE. THIS WON'T HAPPEN WITH OUR OTHER TOURNAMENT.

duPont Manual is announcing the Super Smart Brothers Brawl, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Buzzer for next season's fall.

There will be at least two divisions: JV and Varsity, with a potential Middle School division, if interest warrants.

The questions used:
-Varsity will use a house-written set from the duPont Manual team. We will post a sample packet soon.
There will be powers and (if requested) superpowers in the following distribution.
4/4 Lit
4/4 Science
4/4 History
3/3 RMP
2/2 Social Science
2/2 Fine Arts
1/1 Geography
1/1 Trash or Current Events

-JV (and MS) will mirror the Fall Kickoff Tournament in Ohio.

We will send a sample packet to PACE soon and hopefully get affiliated or at perhaps certified.

The top 2 teams from any affiliated tournament of fewer than 20 teams, the top 4 teams from any affiliated tournament of 20 to 39 teams, and the top 8 teams from any affiliated tournament of 40 or more teams, receive automatic qualification to the 2010 PACE NSC. Automatic qualifying teams also receive $20 off their NSC registration fee. All automatic qualifiers may register for the NSC beginning on February 1, or as soon as they qualify after that date. If a team finishes in the qualification zone at more than one affiliated tournament, then they may register beginning January 15.

Beginning immediately, PACE will also recognize “gold-certified” and “platinum-certified” tournaments. These are tournaments of exceptional quality, which qualify more teams than usual and give their qualified teams the right to register earlier due to their higher likelihood of corresponding to the results of the NSC. For teams to be considered for either gold or platinum certification, they must provide statistics detailing, at the least, the performance of teams at the event. Statistics with information specific to individual performance as well is preferred but not required.

Gold-certified tournaments are affiliated tournaments which offer all teams at least seven games, use varsity-level questions deemed “good” by the PACE Certification Committee, and have at least two teams in attendance likely to finish in the top half of the NSC. Gold-certified tournaments will qualify 2 additional teams at each field size level in comparison to normal affiliated events–the top 4 for tournaments of fewer than 20 teams, the top 6 for tournaments of 20 to 39 teams, and the top 10 for tournaments of 40 or more teams. Teams who qualify through a gold-certified tournament receive $40 off their NSC registration fee and may register beginning January 1, or as soon as they qualify after that date.

We will use a straight, untimed 20/20 Tossup-Bonus format, 1-on-1 pyramidal question set. We will keep individual stats and post them, and guarantee at least 8 games in a round robin tournament format.

We are also looking for mirror sites. We will charge $8 per team (this is negotiable), less expensive than many tournaments for a high quality set.

This is looking to be in fall, with the exact date yet to be determined.

[Andrew from jc]

Sounds good, hopefully we will be able to come.

[Scott]

I'm not sure how having RMP distribution higher than fine arts will go over.
I wouldn't really mind, but I would rather them be the same.

[SoLegit12]

We're considering taking out trash to make it 3/3 FA. We wanted to see if people wanted this

[Scott]

I would like to see that happen.

but...

You could try out a new idea me and several others were thinking about.
Have a 1/1 culture distribution for the more academically relevant elements of pop culture.

[SoLegit12]

We might do that, but we are also interested in having a "pure" trash round in case we do this

[Scott]

That would be cool to do. You could have a little singles or team trash tournament on just tossups.
Maybe this could be around lunch time, or something.

[Huang]

We might do that, but we are also interested in having a "pure" trash round in case we do this

That's a bad idea. Invest more of your time to writing as good of a tournament as possible.

[at your pleasure]

We might do that, but we are also interested in having a "pure" trash round in case we do this

That's a bad idea. Invest more of your time to writing as good of a tournament as possible.

True, but A) a single trash packet should not be that much effort and B) they could always ask about mirroring Charter's trash packet or something.

[SoLegit12]

We might do that, but we are also interested in having a "pure" trash round in case we do this

That's a bad idea. Invest more of your time to writing as good of a tournament as possible.

It would be only in the event of not having any trash; which is not likely. It would take at most 2 days to write this in the summer with a multitude of days.

Any tips, Sandy, for the legitimate tourney?

[Huang]

Sorry, for the late response. I think the most important thing to do is to be able to discern whose advice is good and whose advice is bad when reading posts on this board. Listening carefully to those with good advice (such as the administrators and moderators of this forum) will produce a tournament you can be proud to have written (or at least be somewhat satisfied in the end). You should certainly listen to a user whose name is in green or red over someone like me (though there are also certainly plenty of regular users who give good advice).

[mkanu]

Hey everybody (I'd say y'all but I'm not that Kentucky yet),
Since I finally finished writing my questions, I can promise you a sample packet in the very near future. Probably before the end of the day, at most the end of the week.

[SoLegit12]

Hey everybody (I'd say y'all but I'm not that Kentucky yet),
Since I finally finished writing my questions, I can promise you a sample packet in the very near future. Probably before the end of the day, at most the end of the week.

First, we are going to playtest it, as we will do for EVERY packet

[Dan-Don]

Good luck coming up with 2/2 social science. You'll really be straining for answer space for the Varsity division, it will probably be impossible to do for JV, and....middle school?? I love soc sci, but give that 1/1 back to fine arts where it belongs.

[Charbroil]

Good luck coming up with 2/2 social science. You'll really be straining for answer space for the Varsity division, it will probably be impossible to do for JV, and....middle school?? I love soc sci, but give that 1/1 back to fine arts where it belongs.

-JV (and MS) will mirror the Fall Kickoff Tournament in Ohio.

[Dan-Don]

Good luck coming up with 2/2 social science. You'll really be straining for answer space for the Varsity division, it will probably be impossible to do for JV, and....middle school?? I love soc sci, but give that 1/1 back to fine arts where it belongs.

-JV (and MS) will mirror the Fall Kickoff Tournament in Ohio.

Oh good call. Well still...there is not enough Varsity soc sci to fill 2/2.

[Rococo A Go Go]

My suggestion would be to fold Geography into the 2/2 Social Science, and bump Fine Arts up to 3/3.

[Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN)]

Yeah, as someone who has written and helped edit many high school questions, 2/2 social science at this level will by definition be a disaster for you.

[SoLegit12]

We have decided to fold Current Events into Social Sciences.

[mkanu]

Hi everyone,
Here, is the sample packet. It's of pretty good difficulty. Please feel free to email or post your comments.
Thanks,
Meghamsh
duPont Manual A

[Faiyad]

I really like the Science questions; good job Meghamsh!

[Smuttynose Island]

While this packet is not going to be used, I'm pretty sure that the circle tossup has one clue that is the definition of an ellipse(Yes, Circle's are a special type of ellipse, but still). The specific line is this one:

"Apollonius of Perga defined one of these figures as any figure having a constant ratio of distances from two fixed foci."(EDIT: Ignore everything above this. I was wrong )

Also the lead-in to that tossup holds true for all of the other conic sections(I believe), but not for a circle. I figured that I might as well point this out. In other words, you may want to review any math questions and make sure that you have accurate and specific clues in them.

EDIT: EDIT: Heh this is a little embarrassing, but upon further thought and research, the above two "errors" are not errors(well you can't have a constant ratio of 1, but that's being picky) Nice packet.

[mkanu]

Thanks, Faiyad
now to write 12.5 packets worth more...

Daniel: The math ones are, in my opinion the hardest to write. From now on I'll try to make sure the clues are more succinct and precise.

[SoLegit12]

Hi everyone,
Here, is the sample packet. It's of pretty good difficulty. Please feel free to email or post your comments.
Thanks,
Meghamsh
duPont Manual A

They are playoff difficulty questions, actually

This is our first time writing a tournament, however, we are getting outside help for the actual packets.

[Mechanical Beasts]

The first clue to the magnetism question sure sounds like valence bond theory, not "magnetism," since Heitler and London together proposed some of the first elements of valence bond theory, though I don't really know what the "spin function" bit means. If you mean that magnetism is a consequence of the alignment of spins, well, that's true--but that's certainly not something only Heitler and London talked about.The Heisenberg model clue, then, is saying precisely that--so I'm a little confused.

A little lateral thinking makes "tossupable antisemitic composer" a pretty bland way to start a Wagner question.

The Mentality of Apes--as well as the three most famous Gestalt psychologists--can safely be moved later in the Gestalt tossup.

For the London dispersion tossup, second order perturbation theory can be used to describe anything approximately. It's a general method. "Proposed by the namesake" is chaff. I don't see why you're necessarily concerned with "monomers" here; I'd drop that. I don't think the next sentence is particularly helpful; it seems to be a lot of words surrounding induced, a word that implies "dipole," and forces.

For "Dover Beach," I don't see why the first part of "the word, which seems/ so various, so beautiful, so new" is two lines less famous than the second part.

I don't know what "discovery" showed that Shinto deities aren't distinguished between singular and plural, but given that Japanese lacks grammatical number (it uses measure words instead, basically), that makes the clue sort of silly-sounding (and totally a linguistic clue).

The chalcogens bonus seems pretty trivial; I'd suggest looking at the topics that a chem textbook covers.

All in all, this is a pretty good sample packet since you're a pretty inexperienced writing team. I'd really recommend that you ask around to see if someone with some editing experience could supervise your efforts; even little things could be a big help..

[mkanu]

Unless Nick has other plans I believe that we're welcome to any experienced editor helping us out. Actually we would love it. (that's a shout out to every experianced editor out there) you can contact me via email. It's m (dot) kanuparthy (at) gmail (dot) com [NO SPAM PLEASE]

[Huang]

Sample packet looks good. Make sure you guys write bonuses so that there are distinct easy/medium/hard parts. A few of the bonuses lack any real difference in difficulty.

1. For ten points each, name these works by a common author.
[10] The first chapter of this work is titled “The Stoker” and it describes the bizarre happenings of a seventeen year old emigrant named Karl Rossman in the titular locale.
ANSWER: Amerika
[10] This work is set in an unnamed location, speculated to be an island. This work features the use of an elaborate torture device that carves the sentence of a prisoner onto his kin. There are only four characters: the Officer, the Condemned, the Soldier, and the Explorer
ANSWER: In the Penal Colony
[10] In case you haven't figured out yet, all of these works are by Franz Kafka. For an additional ten points, this other work by Kafka tells of Joseph K, a bank clerk who is arrested and prosecuted by some authority who he doesn't know.
ANSWER: The Trial

I think most people who have read about The Trial probably have also read about Amerika. Maybe a The Trial/Kafka/In the Penal Colony bonus could work better.

2. Answer some questions about some Mozart operas, none of which are Don Giovanni for ten points each.
[10] This opera sees the Queen of the Night sing the famous aria “Die Holle Rache” about the anger in heart. It sees Tamino use the titular object to complete the trials of a temple unscathed.
ANSWER: The Magic Flute [accept Die Zauberflöte]
[10] This opera, taking place after the events of The Barber of Seville, sees Count Almaviva try to woo the fiancée of the titular character, Susanna. It ends with the Count and the Countess falling back in love.
ANSWER: The Marriage of Figaro [accept Le nozze di Figaro, ossia la folle giornata]
[10] This opera sees the rescuing of Konstanze from the titular palace by her fiancée, Belmonte. Set in the Ottoman Empire, it is said that after hearing this opera, Emperor Joseph II claimed that it had “too many notes”.
ANSWER: The Abduction from the Seraglio [accept Die Entfuhrung aus dem Serail]

Same here with The Magic Flute and The Marriage of Figaro. Throwing in Mozart as an easy part might make the difficulty distinctions more clear.

6. For ten points each, name these cities which all share the nickname, The River City, along with the honor of being the largest cities in their states.
[10] This largest city in Nebraska sits at the mouth of the Platte River. It is home to such companies as ConAgra and Berkshire Hathaway.
Answer: Omaha, Nebraska
[10] This largest city in Tennessee, sitting at the confluence of the Wolf and Mississippi River. It is named after a city of the same name on the Nile.
Answer: Memphis, Tennessee
[10] This largest city in Kentucky is the home of The Kentucky Derby and DuPont Manual High School. It lies along the Ohio River’s widest and deepest point.
Answer: Louisville, Kentucky

This bonus sort of lacks a real hard part, though it's never bad to err on the side of being a bit easy.

9. For ten points each, answer the following about Chinese history.
[10] This period of history saw the “purification” of China led by Red Guards and Jiang Qing, Mao’s wife played a large role in this event.
ANSWER: The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution
[10] Jiang Qing led this group which plotted to take over after Mao’s death. They were ultracommunist.
ANSWER: The Gang of Four
[10] This Chinese premier led Chinese reform after the Gang of Four’s downfall, introducing limited capitalism in China, and led China during its assumption of Hong Kong.
ANSWER: Deng Xiaoping [prompt on “Xiaoping”]

Maybe I'm blinded by my bias, but I don't think there's a distinct difficulty difference between the Cultural Revolution and the Gang of Four. Mao Zedong as an easy part would work perfectly.

12. Identify some “great” works of literature, for ten points each:
[10] This work by Charles Dickens was first published as All The Year Round. The protagonist Pip encounters such characters as Miss Havisham and Estella.
ANSWER: Great Expectations
[10] This most famous work of F. Scott Fitzgerald is narrated by Nick Carraway.
ANSWER: The Great Gatsby
[10] This collection of essays by Hunter S. Thompson was the first of the four volumes in his Gonzo Papers series.
ANSWER: The Great Shark Hunt

I'm guessing Great Expectations and The Great Gatsby are equally famous.

Only 5 of these bonuses seemed a bit odd, but all of them seem very fixable by just replacing a few bonus parts with more clear cut easy parts. Packet looks good, just make sure you guys pay close attention to the bonuses (and not make the same mistakes I made while writing DAFT).

[Auroni]

This is a pretty impressive packet, though I'm going to offer a few pointers on some of the questions that have not yet been discussed.

The Ash Can School tossup should not mention "American Realism" until the very end, because that is most identifiable thing about that school of art, so people with very cursory knowledge can buzz right there without needing any of the paintings or painters to help them figure the answer out.

You should never drop a title in any work without having described it first; to do so before offering any plot descriptions at all is an especially poor idea (ie Sean O'Casey)

The Pershing tossup could benefit from not mentioning the year 1919, which really draws attention to a small and specific answer space, and from elaborating on his opposition to French war policy, which is not a unique clue as written. In addition, the leadin is not specific and could be replaced, since it draws attention to that same time period right away.

Anarchy, State, and Utopia and the merging of Zanzibar with Tanganyika are clues that should be moved to the very end of their respective tossups.

The Soviet Union tossup is a little bit frustrating, since Soviet literature is often just viewed as a phase of Russian literature. Also, the Yakov Smirnov joke is not funny. It seems to be well written, though My Sister Life seems to be an outlier given the descending difficulty of the works you have mentioned.

In all of your bonuses, you should remember to really make the easy part easy. The Kafka, Mozart, and Lolita bonuses could just have mentioned their respective creators for an easy part. It may not be exciting and it may be too formulaic to write such bonuses, but they are a necessity given the ease of your tournament.

That's all the feedback I have to offer. Overall, a great first effort by a relatively inexperienced team. I would, however, like to know how hard you plan to make these, as some of your answer choices are things that high schoolers do not encounter until nationals.

[Ringil]

Small error: On the Savonarola tossup, it should be Charles VIII, not Charles VII because Charles VIII was the guy who invaded Italy.

[mkanu]

Hi,
I was wondering whether we could get some experienced editors to help edit questions that are string in the following subject areas:
- Science [we really need a science editor, more than any other subject]
- non-American History
- European and American Lit
- Philosophy
- Music
- Mythology
- Art

You can contact me m (dot) kanuparthy (at) gmail (dot) com . Thanks in advance for all your help.

[SoLegit12]

Small error: On the Savonarola tossup, it should be Charles VIII, not Charles VII because Charles VIII was the guy who invaded Italy.

Thank you, I mistyped.

This is a pretty impressive packet, though I'm going to offer a few pointers on some of the questions that have not yet been discussed.

The Ash Can School tossup should not mention "American Realism" until the very end, because that is most identifiable thing about that school of art, so people with very cursory knowledge can buzz right there without needing any of the paintings or painters to help them figure the answer out.

You should never drop a title in any work without having described it first; to do so before offering any plot descriptions at all is an especially poor idea (ie Sean O'Casey)

The Pershing tossup could benefit from not mentioning the year 1919, which really draws attention to a small and specific answer space, and from elaborating on his opposition to French war policy, which is not a unique clue as written. In addition, the leadin is not specific and could be replaced, since it draws attention to that same time period right away.

Anarchy, State, and Utopia and the merging of Zanzibar with Tanganyika are clues that should be moved to the very end of their respective tossups.

The Soviet Union tossup is a little bit frustrating, since Soviet literature is often just viewed as a phase of Russian literature. Also, the Yakov Smirnov joke is not funny. It seems to be well written, though My Sister Life seems to be an outlier given the descending difficulty of the works you have mentioned.

In all of your bonuses, you should remember to really make the easy part easy. The Kafka, Mozart, and Lolita bonuses could just have mentioned their respective creators for an easy part. It may not be exciting and it may be too formulaic to write such bonuses, but they are a necessity given the ease of your tournament.

That's all the feedback I have to offer. Overall, a great first effort by a relatively inexperienced team. I would, however, like to know how hard you plan to make these, as some of your answer choices are things that high schoolers do not encounter until nationals.

Thank you for your feedback. However, I though the Smirnoff joke was at least refreshing...

[FCPanther]

two quick questions:

1. Has a date been set for certain?

2. Have decisions been made regarding whether or not there will be JV and middle school competitions as well?

[SoLegit12]

two quick questions:

1. Has a date been set for certain?
It will decided shortly after the NSC this weekend

2. Have decisions been made regarding whether or not there will be JV and middle school competitions as well?
Definitely a JV component -- middle school is uncertain

[Irreligion in Bangladesh]

-JV (and MS) will mirror the Fall Kickoff Tournament in Ohio.

What set is this, exactly? I can't find a board post announcing this, but I might just be bad at looking for it.

[dxdtdemon]

-JV (and MS) will mirror the Fall Kickoff Tournament in Ohio.

What set is this, exactly? I can't find a board post announcing this, but I might just be bad at looking for it.

It's an mACF set that is being written by various people from the Ohio message board, some people from Manual, and the Boise State quizbowl team. I think it is intended to be played at six different sites in Ohio on October 2nd, and I'm not sure when the Idaho mirror is, or if it will still be happening.

[jonah]

-JV (and MS) will mirror the Fall Kickoff Tournament in Ohio.

What set is this, exactly? I can't find a board post announcing this, but I might just be bad at looking for it.

It's an mACF set that is being written by various people from the Ohio message board, some people from Manual, and the Boise State quizbowl team. I think it is intended to be played at six different sites in Ohio on October 2nd, and I'm not sure when the Idaho mirror is, or if it will still be happening.

Is it available for additional mirrors? If so, how late, and to what difficulty level is it being written?

[pblessman]

Slightly unrelated questions: Can somebody (else) create a database for all mirrorable tournaments listing level of difficulty as well as all mirror sites? This would be very helpful for people for looking sets to use at their tournaments AND for people looking for tournaments to attend. It just seems that right now all that data is dispersed... or I am unaware of where the central location is.

[SoLegit12]

Because of SAT/ACT dates (which we have already avoided) and other tournaments, the best dates are September 2nd, October 16th, or October 30th.

EDIT: Spelling

[SoLegit12]

Donald Taylor of Illinois will help us for this tournament, as well as Dallin Kelson from Chipola College.

However, we still (desperately) need a science editor. Please contact Meghamsh Kanuparthy at [email protected]

[Scott]

I'd say go for Oct. 30th, because of PSAT on the 16th.
I know that would reduce Grayson from three to one team because of losing six juniors (including me.)
The September date would be okay if the 30th, didn't work out.

[Rufous-capped Thornbill]

-JV (and MS) will mirror the Fall Kickoff Tournament in Ohio.

What set is this, exactly? I can't find a board post announcing this, but I might just be bad at looking for it.

It's an mACF set that is being written by various people from the Ohio message board, some people from Manual, and the Boise State quizbowl team. I think it is intended to be played at six different sites in Ohio on October 2nd, and I'm not sure when the Idaho mirror is, or if it will still be happening.

Is it available for additional mirrors? If so, how late, and to what difficulty level is it being written?

I cannot speak of additional mirrors, because I am not in charge of that, but it is being written at around a High School Novice/A-Set level, the last time I checked. Last year's version was much harder than it should have been and we are trying to strictly control difficulty this year.

[Steeve Ho You Fat]

September 2 might be a bit early; I don't know how it works in Kentucky but we start much earlier than most Ohio schools and we haven't even had tryouts by then.

While we probably couldn't make it on October 16, if this is on October 30 I will speak to our coach about crossing the river and venturing to Louisville for this from Cincinnati. In the likely event that we play the FKT in Ohio, we'd be ineligible for the JV, but I don't see why there would be a problem with playing the Varsity set that you're writing.

[Scott]

September 2 might be a bit early; I don't know how it works in Kentucky but we start much earlier than most Ohio schools and we haven't even had tryouts by then.

While we probably couldn't make it on October 16, if this is on October 30 I will speak to our coach about crossing the river and venturing to Louisville for this from Cincinnati. In the likely event that we play the FKT in Ohio, we'd be ineligible for the JV, but I don't see why there would be a problem with playing the Varsity set that you're writing.

Not sure about other Kentucky teams, but we normally start in early August.
But...
The first week in September still seems early.
It could be a much more well rounded field if you wait until October, not that larger is always better.

[SoLegit12]

Amit Bigli is no longer writing for this tournament. He has contacted me and told me he will be busy traveling and writing the Charity tournament. This has nothing to do with Amit's alleged crime.

[SoLegit12]

Jarret Greene has just volunteered to assist us in history

btw, due to new writing constraints

We have decided to downgrade social sciences to 1/1 and expand art to 3/3

[Scott]

Is this going to be Oct. 30 now that Danville and WKU are set?
Personally, I would like to see it in September, though.
It would be easier on teams to go to one in September and three in October, rather than four in October alone.

[SoLegit12]

I think September 25th would be a good date. Problems?

[Coach K]

I think September 25th would be a good date. Problems?

KAAC conference will draw a bunch of people away. :(

[Scott]

An early September date would be fine with us, if it works for other people.
It might be too early though...

[FCPanther]

Any news on a date or whether there will be a middle school division?