Announcement: ACF Fall Northeast at MIT - 11/3/07

[vierrann]

MIT will be hosting the Northeast manifestation of ACF Fall 2007 on November 3. Registration will start in room 1-190 (map) at 8:30 and play will begin at 9:00. Fees are described below:

Base fee: $110
Buzzer discount: -$5
Moderator discount: -$15 (up to three moderators)
Travel discounts negotiable

Packet submission is required; details can be found here. Discounts/penalties as follows:
Submitted by September 1: -$50
Submitted by September 15: -$20
Submitted by September 29: $0
Submitted by October 6 +$20
Submitted by October 20 +$50
No packet submitted by October 20: Dropped from tournament
Submit packets to ekwartler at gmail dot com.

Minimum fee: $60

MIT is readily accessible from Central Square on the Red Line (walk south on Massachusetts Ave. until you hit 77, with the big columns and steps and so forth; building 1 is to the right as you walk in) or by the #1 bus, which stops right in front of 77 Mass Ave. Free parking is available in the East/Northeast Lot (map).

Email abeck at mit dot edu with questions/concerns/financial problems (we don't want to keep anyone out due to monetary concerns).

Annelise Beck
MIT Quiz Bowl President

[The Logic of Scientific Disco]

Just giving this a bump. Remember to email Annelise (abeck at mit dot edu) with a number of teams, buzzers, and moderators if you're interested in coming. Also, the no-penalty packet submission deadline is this weekend, so get going!

[The Logic of Scientific Disco]

Thread bump, with bonus field update. We currently have:

BU (1)
Dartmouth (2)
Swarthmore (2)
Columbia (1)
Rutgers-NB (1)
Rutgers-Newark (1)
Brown (1-3)
Harvard (2?)
Brandeis (1-2)
Yale (2)

Remember that the deadline for submitting a packet is October 20. Also, please let us know if you can bring/be a moderator--it looks like we could be in need of them.

EDIT: Field updated.

[pray for elves]

Brandeis will be sending either one or two teams.

[Mike Bentley]

Swarthmore's quizbowl team is active again? Good to see that. Although it seems like making a trip to VCU would probably be closer than MIT, but whatever. Do you have their contact info, Chris?

[grapesmoker]

Brown will send at least one team, and I will be coming to moderate.

[The Logic of Scientific Disco]

Field updated above. If you're planning on sending a team, please tell us as soon as possible so we can start getting moderators and house teams sorted out.

[The Logic of Scientific Disco]

Brief results:

Harvard A and Brown A sort of tied for the title with 10-1 records; Harvard's only loss came to Brown when they had an extra dinosaur. Eric "Optimus" Mukherjee took home the scoring title. I'll post more detailed stats when they're available (tomorrow afternoon or thereabouts), but for now I'd like to thank all the teams that came out (18!) and our intrepid guest moderators Jerry and Dennis, as well as all the other MIT people that helped pull this off. While there were certainly some bumpy moments, I think nothing went horrendously wrong and we have lots of things to improve on for next time (speaking of next time--look for a Beaver Bonspiel announcement soon).

[Kyle]

Thanks to Annelise and Chris for a good tournament and to Jerry for refusing to let us win this thing too easily. Next time, Jerry.

Seriously, though: the northeast is pretty good. Eighteen teams? That's awesome!

[Sima Guang Hater]

Thanks to Annelise and Chris for a good tournament and to Jerry for refusing to let us win this thing too easily. Next time, Jerry.

Seriously, though: the northeast is pretty good. Eighteen teams? That's awesome!

Kyle, Lisa and Aaron would have fought you guys to the last man too. But that round was pretty awesome.

Awesome tournament, MIT; you guys had it all, what with the great moderating, creative bracket names, prompt stats compilation, etc. We look forward to going to more tournaments you guys host, especially ones that have leadins about buildings on your campus that we discussed 4 rounds earlier.

It was great to see 18 teams come out for fall, especially newer teams like Swarthmore. I look forward to playing all of you again at some point.

[pray for elves]

Thanks to MIT for doing a good job hosting. The moderating was generally solid, and it was nice not having to go outside in the torrential downpours to get to another match.

[Kyle]

You're right, of course, Eric — and Lisa and Aaron each got one tossup on the first sentence in that game (as did pretty much everybody playing that round). I was just referring to what Jerry said at the beginning of the playoffs, which was something to the effect of "If you guys are going to win, it wouldn't be any fun unless you have to beat me to do it." Which is 100% true.

This is irrelevant, but I received the nicest compliment of my life when Jerry told me after the tournament that I "don't look hideous." I was touched. You guys at Brown have a classy team.

[Sima Guang Hater]

This is irrelevant, but I received the nicest compliment of my life when Jerry told me after the tournament that I "don't look hideous." I was touched. You guys at Brown have a classy team.

My god that's hilarious.

[conker]

Thanks to MIT for a great tournament. It was smoothly run and well moderated. There was significant lag in some of the brackets for whatever reason, but I think that was more because of some teams arriving late than because of the moderators. Seriously, there should be a "we'll start without you" policy enforced at these tournaments in the future.

[grapesmoker]

I too want to get on board this already-overloaded bandwagon of praising MIT's mirror. I think they ran a model tournament and any delays experienced between rounds were minimal, in my opinion.

This is irrelevant, but I received the nicest compliment of my life when Jerry told me after the tournament that I "don't look hideous." I was touched. You guys at Brown have a classy team.

I think the full context of that statement is important. I was trying to convince Kyle to grow a beard, as part of my plot to make sure the Northeast has the highest concentration of facial hair on the circuit, and Kyle protested that it might make him look bad. To which I replied that a beard will only make you look bad if you're already ugly, but that he wasn't hideous, a statement I still stand by.

Thanks to MIT for a great tournament. It was smoothly run and well moderated. There was significant lag in some of the brackets for whatever reason, but I think that was more because of some teams arriving late than because of the moderators. Seriously, there should be a "we'll start without you" policy enforced at these tournaments in the future.

Uh, no. Sorry if I'm being a little brusque here, but not all of us have the luxury of riding one stop on the T to get to tournaments. Some of us have to actually find out way around your unnavigable city, with the consequence that we're going to be a little late. Seriously, deal with it, delays aren't going to affect you all that much given that your school is almost literally right next door. Everyone makes every effort to be on time, but transportation is a problem for many schools, and no one should be penalized for these things.

[Dartmouth College Bowl]

Some of us have to actually find out way around your unnavigable city, with the consequence that we're going to be a little late.

Agreed. Boston is absolutely unnavigable, but I'm very glad to say that that was the only negative yesterday. The question set was very solid and while one moderator kept pointing out typos as he was reading, no other packets seemed to have been affected.

We would also like to publicly apologize to Mark for abducting him yesterday as we tried to find a parking spot. We spotted him walking across Mass Av. and essentially forced him into our car to direct us to a parking spot. I may or may not have yelled, "get in the car!"

What proceeded was 15 minutes of driving, during which we went in the exact opposite direction. We then came back to the spot where we originally picked him up (the intersection of Vassar St. and Mass Av.) and after dropping him off with our C-team and buzzers, we miraculously found both our B-team whose van had been separated from us courtesy of the labyrinthine roads of Boston and Cambridge as well as the Northeast Parking Lot. The parking lot was actually just two minutes from that intersection, so the moral of the story is to never abduct people for directions, unless they actually do know more about the city's roads than you do.

[Sima Guang Hater]

We would also like to publicly apologize to Mark for abducting him yesterday as we tried to find a parking spot. We spotted him walking across Mass Av. and essentially forced him into our car to direct us to a parking spot. I may or may not have yelled, "get in the car!"

That's not sketchy at all.

And I'll agree that boston is unnavigable, but its really funny to watch Jerry drive around and get madder and madder as he loops around the same set of streets over and over.

[The Logic of Scientific Disco]

Yeah, Boston really is pretty ridiculous driving-wise. I wonder if it might be a better idea to park at a Park-and-Ride and then take the T in? This would work at Alewife for teams from the north and Braintree for teams from the south, and parking is only $5/day (which most Boston tournaments would probably gladly take out of your entry fee for being on time). On the other hand, it's also an extra step, which just takes more time.

[grapesmoker]

And I'll agree that boston is unnavigable, but its really funny to watch Jerry drive around and get madder and madder as he loops around the same set of streets over and over.

LET US NEVER SPEAK OF THIS AGAIN

[Not That Kind of Christian!!]

Re Boston navigation: I really love it when public transportation does the navigating for you.

Thanks again, MIT. As Eric mentioned, the bracket names were appreciated by all.

[The Logic of Scientific Disco]

Stats for this tournament are now up:

Preliminary round-robins

Playoff standings

Full standings, including playoffs

Individual awards were based only on the prelims.

Edited to include: After 9 rounds of preliminary play in 2 brackets, we split into 3 brackets of 6 for playoffs, and had the teams in each bracket that hadn't yet faced each other play for 3 rounds. The playoff standings tallied above are for all 5 games played within a playoff bracket.

[pray for elves]

Someone should probably point out that only three playoff rounds were played, so the "playoffs only" stats aren't quite right since everyone has two extra games. Did you guys combine the prelim round matches against the team from each team's bracket into that?

The overall combined stats and prelim round stats appear to be correct, though.

[Frater Taciturnus]

Someone should probably point out that only three playoff rounds were played, so the "playoffs only" stats aren't quite right since everyone has two extra games. Did you guys combine the prelim round matches against the team from each team's bracket into that?

What appears to have happened is that since the teams had already played some of the teams in their new bracket, there was no repeat of said matchups.

[pray for elves]

Someone should probably point out that only three playoff rounds were played, so the "playoffs only" stats aren't quite right since everyone has two extra games. Did you guys combine the prelim round matches against the team from each team's bracket into that?

What appears to have happened is that since the teams had already played some of the teams in their new bracket, there was no repeat of said matchups.

...I was there, and I know that's what happened, thank you very much. I was wondering if they lumped those games in with the stats.

[The Logic of Scientific Disco]

Yes, as I said in my earlier post, the playoff stats are for the 5 total rounds played between teams in a playoff bracket (2 during prelims, 3 during the playoffs).