Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

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Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

The eighth annual Harvard Fall Tournament will be held on November 9, 2013. Like it was last year, it is on Veteran's Day weekend to give teams who are traveling some extra time between schooldays. As in the past the set will be house-written and I (Stephen Liu) will be serving as head editor.

You can register for the tournament by sending an email to the Gmail account "harvardcollegebowl." (I've set this up so it's easier to find tournament-related emails, but the email account will be independent of any question content so there shouldn't be any security issues.) Please use "HFT Registration" as the subject header and indicate clearly how many teams you will be bringing. If you're not sure, give us a range and we'll make a note of it but "maybe" teams won't be guaranteed a spot in the field until you confirm a definite number.

The Set

We are planning to write 15 rounds, with the last two being special finals packets of slightly higher difficulty than the other 13. We will write another packet if it appears later on that a 16th is required. Each packet will include the following:

4/4 Literature
4/4 Science
4/4 History
3/3 RMP
3/3 Fine Arts
1/1 Social Science
0.5/0.5 Geography
0.5/0.5 Current Events

I will say outright that traditionally our question set has been intended to be more difficult than the average question set. The philosophy behind this is that, because our tournament attracts many higher-level teams and our tournament schedule is designed to maximize the number of games these teams play against each other, we want to minimize the number of buzzer races and bonus hard parts that provide little distinction between two teams with differing knowledge levels. Of course, this should not come at the cost of excessive numbers of dead tossups or bonus conversion that makes lower-level competition less meaningful. Our goal is to find the right balance between these two competing interests. It seemed to be the opinion of many teams at our site, the opinion of our staffers, and the indication of the stats from our mirrors that last year's questions may have erred on the "easy" side of our intended difficulty. The changes we made were focusing on more accessible tossup answer-lines and more controlled bonus difficulty. These things will be continued in this year's set. The complaints we received and our personal evaluations suggest that we can keep the set accessible while increasing the difficulty of early middle clues in tossups and the hard parts of bonuses. Neither of these will undergo drastic changes, but I'd like potential players or customers of our set to be aware of the direction we intend to take with our questions.

To put all of this simply, our questions will be slightly more difficult than last year's questions, but certainly not as difficult as HFT IV or V, for example. We will be expanding the difficulty in areas that should theoretically have minimal impact on lower-level teams, such as hard parts of bonuses and earlier clues in tossups. I hope that these changes will allow our set to better fill the niche that our questions are intended to fill for the high school circuit as a whole.

Mirrors

That said, we're ready to market our set to more regions in the country again. We held off on this a bit last year to demonstrate that we are capable of taking into account public opinion regarding our questions, and now that we have done so I feel comfortable saying that this set is probably appropriate for a few more regions that what played it last year. We're especially looking for mirror sites in the Georgia area, the Kentucky/Ohio area, Southern California, Illinois, Texas, and the DC/MD/VA area. The mirror fee will be $15 per team and the tournament may be mirrored up until three weeks before HSNCT, which is when I will upload the set online for those who wish to practice on it. If you're interested in using our questions for your tournament, you can send me an email at 7h3 dot white dot rabbit @ gmail dot com. This is the email listed on my profile.

Sample Questions

Last year's set is probably the best predictor for what this year's will be like. It is available here: http://www.hsquizbowl.org/db/questionsets/581/. (I'm aware that Round 2 is currently missing but I uploaded it so it should appear soon.)

Tournament Format

We ran 36 team tournaments successfully in the past, with prelim and playoff round robins plus crossover matches between the top two playoff brackets. If the field remains at 36 we will stick to this format, but we will consider expanding the field depending on staff, room, and buzzer availability, which will be accompanied by an appropriate change to the tournament format. EDIT: This tournament has been certified Platinum by PACE, meaning that the top 25% of the field will qualify for the NSC. Since this tournament will happen after November 1, that means that if you qualify at HFT, you will be able to register your team for nationals as soon as PACE confirms the standings.

Fee Structure

$80 base fee
-$10 buzzer discount
-$20 (experienced) staff discount

Field (Teams/Buzzers/Staff)
Ridgewood, NJ (1/2/0)
St. Joseph, NJ (2/2/1)
DCC, MI (1/0/0)
Arlington, MA (2/0/0)
Dunbar, KY (2/0/0)
Kellenberg, NY (2/3/1)
"Suba Nation," DE (2/0/0)
Essex, VT (3/0/0)
AMSA, MA (2/2/0)
Thomas Jefferson, VA (1/2/0)
Lexington, MA (2/1/0)
Smithtown East, NY (2/1/0)
Smithtown West NY (2/1/0)
Sharon, MA (2/0/1)
E. O. Smith, CT (3/2/1)
Hunter, NY (2/2/0)
Livingston, NJ (1/1/0)
Hingham, MA (1/0/0)
Brookline, MA (1/0/0)

Total: 34/20/4
Last edited by gyre and gimble on Wed Nov 06, 2013 4:27 pm, edited 22 times in total.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by High Dependency Unit »

November 9th or 19th? You said one, the title said the other.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by Eddie »

geolawyerman wrote:November 9th or 19th? You said one, the title said the other.
I'm assuming 9 November since it's on Veteran's Day weekend.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

Right, the 9th. It's been fixed.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

The field has been updated in the original post. It looks like registrations are starting to come in, so reserve your spot!
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by SHM »

P. L. Dunbar would like to bring two teams.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by Schmidt Sting Pain Index »

Players from Wilmington Charter would like to register a team.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by donnacapern »

Please register one team from Portsmouth Christian Academy at Dover. One team, two lockout systems.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by sid96 »

TJ from Virginia would like to register one team.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by jaseavey »

Could you please post to whom payment should be directed? Thank you.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by Edward Powers »

Any update on the field?
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

jaseavey wrote:Could you please post to whom payment should be directed? Thank you.
Checks can be made out to "Harvard College Bowl," and we'd prefer that payment be made on the day of the tournament rather than sent by mail. Thanks!
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

Edward Powers wrote:Any update on the field?
The field is now up to date. Only one team has registered since the previous update.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by vgundlah »

I have emailed the above cited email three times to register 2 teams from Sharon High School yet I have received no confirmation email, nor have our teams been added to the roster of teams attending.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by rpirrie »

E. O. Smith would like to bring 2 teams, 2 buzzer sets. Thanks.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

There are only five spots left in this tournament! We may seek to find more rooms and expand the field, but in the meantime it is still capped at 36.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by Kate Fleming »

I have emailed the gmail address to register Concord Carlisle but received no reply.

We would like to bring 1 team and 1 buzzer set. Please reply.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

Kate Fleming wrote:I have emailed the gmail address to register Concord Carlisle but received no reply.

We would like to bring 1 team and 1 buzzer set. Please reply.
Sorry, I missed that. But your team is registered.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by hhsquizbowl »

Hingham HIgh School would like to bring one team.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

The field is now full, so additional registrations will now be added to a waitlist. We're working on getting more rooms for the tournament.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by Schmidt Sting Pain Index »

So I assume "Suba Nation B" is on the waitlist then? I sent you an email about adding a second team pretty much immediately after you updated the field to 34 teams, so I am kind of surprised we did not get in.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

Oh no, I messed this up. Suba Nation B is in, sorry. Hingham is on the waitlist, unfortunately.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

With the withdrawal of State College's two teams and the addition of Brookline, there is currently one spot open in the field.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by kcommo »

Stephen,

Can you say specifically where and when teams need to be for the start of the tournament? Also, what time do you project being done? The Essex team needs that information to complete its travel plans.

Thanks.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by Redgrass1 »

If that last spot is still open, I'd like to enter a Ridgewood B into this tournament.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

kcommo wrote:Stephen,

Can you say specifically where and when teams need to be for the start of the tournament? Also, what time do you project being done? The Essex team needs that information to complete its travel plans.

Thanks.
We're not sure yet where the tournament will be, but you should plan to be in the vicinity of Harvard Yard by 8:30 am. In the past couple of years the top bracket of the playoffs has finished play at around 6:30 pm, though neither year saw a final. If your team is involved in a final, the finish time could end up being more like 8:00 pm.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

Redgrass1 wrote:If that last spot is still open, I'd like to enter a Ridgewood B into this tournament.
Sure thing. We've had another drop, so actually there's still one spot left even with the addition of Ridgewood B.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by rpirrie »

E. O. Smith would like to squeeze in one more team if possible. Thanks.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by Redgrass1 »

I don't know if you guys got my email, but a Ridgewood team is dropping unfortunately.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by jessbowen »

We're not sure yet where the tournament will be, but you should plan to be in the vicinity of Harvard Yard by 8:30 am. In the past couple of years the top bracket of the playoffs has finished play at around 6:30 pm, though neither year saw a final. If your team is involved in a final, the finish time could end up being more like 8:00 pm.
I realize it might be a little late to suggest this, but an 8:00 end time is really late for us - in fact, 6:30 is too. Kids are hungry, tired and cranky by then. I see you're planning on 15 rounds. I much rather play 10 rounds and then finals and be out at a more reasonable hour. I'd hate for our kids to do well but then need to leave early and miss play-offs. Starting promptly would help too - I recall a long wait last year. There are teams who travel even further than we do - I feel badly for them. Am I the only one who feels this way?
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by mohanmal »

jessbowen wrote: I realize it might be a little late to suggest this, but an 8:00 end time is really late for us - in fact, 6:30 is too. Kids are hungry, tired and cranky by then. I see you're planning on 15 rounds. I much rather play 10 rounds and then finals and be out at a more reasonable hour. I'd hate for our kids to do well but then need to leave early and miss play-offs. Starting promptly would help too - I recall a long wait last year. There are teams who travel even further than we do - I feel badly for them. Am I the only one who feels this way?
Haha nice, I'd love to see Abhinav and Shashank cranky :grin: . I don't know about others, but for us more rounds is a plus side. It justifies us spending time and money traveling out to play this. I am in full support of hearing all 15 rounds of competition at this tournament.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by KnicksRule »

Mohan, I agree with you that more rounds are always better for the players. I personally would love to play more rounds.

However, it is important to consider that it is tough on the coaches that have to be at the tournament for 12 hours.

Keep in mind that its not just the players that are affected.
Last edited by KnicksRule on Mon Nov 04, 2013 8:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

jessbowen wrote:
We're not sure yet where the tournament will be, but you should plan to be in the vicinity of Harvard Yard by 8:30 am. In the past couple of years the top bracket of the playoffs has finished play at around 6:30 pm, though neither year saw a final. If your team is involved in a final, the finish time could end up being more like 8:00 pm.
I realize it might be a little late to suggest this, but an 8:00 end time is really late for us - in fact, 6:30 is too. Kids are hungry, tired and cranky by then. I see you're planning on 15 rounds. I much rather play 10 rounds and then finals and be out at a more reasonable hour. I'd hate for our kids to do well but then need to leave early and miss play-offs. Starting promptly would help too - I recall a long wait last year. There are teams who travel even further than we do - I feel badly for them. Am I the only one who feels this way?
We try to pack in as many rounds as possible because we traditionally get teams flying in from all over the country, and we want to give them as much quizbowl for their dollar. We'll try to be as efficient as we can to cut down that 6:30 finish time if possible.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by hanbarasu95 »

Stephen, when you get a chance, I sent you an email about staffing the tournament?
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by rpirrie »

Smith is sending two coaches and a quizbowl alumnus, so we can provide one staffer too. That ought to help with keeping things smooth. Are you distributing packets electronically? Electronic scoresheets too?
One last note--please update the field to show Smith as bringing 3 teams. Thanks!
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

I've just sent out an email to all teams in the field listed above. Please post here if you don't see that email in the next half-hour or so.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by Edward Powers »

For those using GPS devices to get to Sever Hall, what is the best address to plug into our GPS devices to arrive at Sever Hall?
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by BroNi »

.....or any recommendations for parking our vans or buses?
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by Jcarlson »

Charter School of Wilmington would like to register 2 buzzers.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by Jcarlson »

gyre and gimble wrote:
kcommo wrote:Stephen,

Can you say specifically where and when teams need to be for the start of the tournament? Also, what time do you project being done? The Essex team needs that information to complete its travel plans.

Thanks.
We're not sure yet where the tournament will be, but you should plan to be in the vicinity of Harvard Yard by 8:30 am. In the past couple of years the top bracket of the playoffs has finished play at around 6:30 pm, though neither year saw a final. If your team is involved in a final, the finish time could end up being more like 8:00 pm.
Since it's been a while since this post, do you have any more exact information about where to meet in the morning? This will help us greatly for traveling and parking.

Thank you!
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

Jcarlson wrote:
gyre and gimble wrote:
kcommo wrote:Stephen,

Can you say specifically where and when teams need to be for the start of the tournament? Also, what time do you project being done? The Essex team needs that information to complete its travel plans.

Thanks.
We're not sure yet where the tournament will be, but you should plan to be in the vicinity of Harvard Yard by 8:30 am. In the past couple of years the top bracket of the playoffs has finished play at around 6:30 pm, though neither year saw a final. If your team is involved in a final, the finish time could end up being more like 8:00 pm.
Since it's been a while since this post, do you have any more exact information about where to meet in the morning? This will help us greatly for traveling and parking.

Thank you!
We'll be meeting in Sever Hall and registration will be between 8:15 and 9. We hope to start promptly at 9. You should have received an email with information at whichever address your team used to register, so let me know if that email didn't go through.

Re: parking, I've never actually dealt with cars or parking in my 3.5 years living in Cambridge, so your guess is as good as mine. I could point you to some options, but that would just be based on a Google search so it might be better for you to find the best option for your team independently. I do know that there are several parking garages around Harvard Square, though, that charge around $27 for the day. A van might be all right, but a bus probably wouldn't work.

Re: GPS, the best I've got is that Sever is right in the middle of Harvard Yard and there aren't any parking lots right next to the Yard, so picking an address for your navigator is really a matter of where you want to park your car.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by Excelsior (smack) »

How to park a car or other small vehicle at Harvard for $6.00:
1. Go to (https://www2.uos.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/permit/purchase.pl)
2. Register an account (assuming you haven't already done so)
3. If it asks you for department information, select "Visitor to Campus" and use code "7700"
4. On the "Add Parking Permits" page, select:
----Parking Lot: (a parking lot of your choice, being sure to select one labeled "Weekend". 1033 Mass Ave is closest to Sever, I believe.)
----Affiliation: Event Participant (specify "Harvard College Bowl")
----Permit Date: Saturday, Nov 9, 2013
----Plate Number: (whatever your plate number is)
----State: (whatever your plate state is)
5. Then, checkout. If you have issues with Paypal, try going to checkout in an incognito (or private browsing or whatever) window.
(If you need to park a bus or other large vehicle, though, I have no idea.)

As far as GPS is concerned: 30 Quincy Street, Cambridge, MA gets you to the street closest to Sever. Quincy Street is not, however, amenable to prolonged stops, so keep that in mind.
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

DCC defeated St. Joseph's A in the first game of an advantaged final to win the tournament. The rest of the super-playoff teams were Suba Nation A, Kellenberg A, Ridgewood, and Hunter A; because Hunter had to miss their last two rounds, we made the decision to not count their games in determining the finals teams, because we thought that otherwise it would give an unfair advantage to those teams that were awarded automatic wins by virtue of the fact that they were scheduled to play Hunter later in the day. I understand that this is not an ideal situation and that some folks feel this may not have been the appropriate procedure, so I'd like to open this up for discussion.

Otherwise, I'd like to thank everyone for attending, and I hope everyone enjoyed their experience. There were a few trip-ups to start the day due to mock trial teams showing up and claiming that they had registered with us (without telling us that they were mock trial teams and not quizbowl teams) and forcing their way into our brackets, and also due to a B team showing up just before the tournament started after their A team told us they weren't coming. I apologize to Hunter A and Essex C about this, as they were unable to play the first round of the tournament as a result.

The playoff stats should be up soon; we have them done and I'm just waiting for them to be emailed to me.

Lastly, many thanks to Stephen Eltinge for coming to staff and helping the tournament move much faster.
Stephen Liu
Torrey Pines '10
Harvard '14
Stanford '17
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by Rococo A Go Go »

gyre and gimble wrote:There were a few trip-ups to start the day due to mock trial teams showing up and claiming that they had registered with us (without telling us that they were mock trial teams and not quizbowl teams) and forcing their way into our brackets
Boy were they in for a surprise!
Nicholas C
KQBA member
gyre and gimble
Yuna
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by gyre and gimble »

Stephen Liu
Torrey Pines '10
Harvard '14
Stanford '17
Jcarlson
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by Jcarlson »

Thanks to Harvard for running a great tournament! Everything ran very smoothly overall, despite the many other events in the building, which was very impressive. Personally, I wish the games with Hunter hadn't been canceled, but I understand the decision.

Just so you know, I think there might be an error in your stats. Toss-ups heard are listed as 0 for many people; I think some of the columns got shifted to the right, and games played got substituted for powers, powers got substituted for negs, and negs got substituted for toss-ups heard.

Thanks again!
Jaimie Carlson
Charter School of Wilmington '14
Quizbowl Team Captain
HSNCT '12, '13

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Banana Stand
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by Banana Stand »

Besides a bit of a delay in the morning for our bracket, this tournament ran very well and was very fun to play. I thought the set was great minus a few issues. Is there going to be a usergroup for this set?
Jack Mehr
St. Joe's NJ '14
UVA '19
Lo, Marathon Ham!
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by Lo, Marathon Ham! »

Jcarlson wrote:Thanks to Harvard for running a great tournament! Everything ran very smoothly overall, despite the many other events in the building, which was very impressive. Personally, I wish the games with Hunter hadn't been canceled, but I understand the decision.

Just so you know, I think there might be an error in your stats. Toss-ups heard are listed as 0 for many people; I think some of the columns got shifted to the right, and games played got substituted for powers, powers got substituted for negs, and negs got substituted for toss-ups heard.

Thanks again!
I don't believe this changed any individual stats...just makes them annoying to look at.
Mohan Malhotra
The Independence School '12
Charter School of Wilmington '16
New York University '20
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KnicksRule
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Re: Harvard Fall Tournament VIII @ Cambridge, MA (11/09/13)

Post by KnicksRule »

This was a really fun tournament to play, especially with teams from other parts of the country participating.

I just have one request for future tournaments. Is it possible that teams that didn't make the SuperPlayoffs could play in a consolation bracket. Since there were plenty of packets that were not played by most teams, this seems easy to implement. Our team was in one of the two top brackets for Playoffs, but didnt make the SuperPlayoffs. As a result, we only had the opportunity to play 9 rounds.

Thanks again for running an awesome tournament.
Abhinav Kurada
AMSA Charter School '12-'16
Captain '13-'16
2x winner of United States Geography Olympiad (2013, 2014); USGO International Team Member (2015)
SSNCT Runner-Up (2014); T-21 HSNCT (2015)
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