Terrapin Mirror - Skype - 5/4/13

[Mike Bentley]

The Quizbowl Team at the University of Washington will be hosting an online mirror of the Terrapin Invitational Tournament on Saturday, May 4th, 2013. This tournament will be played over Skype.

ELIGIBILITY:

This tournament is open to all players. However, all players must be in the same physical location to play.

To register, e-mail me at [email protected].

PRICING:

$100 - Base Fee
-$50 - Discount for writing a packet by March 2nd
-$20 - Discount for providing a moderator

I may be willing to offer some discounts for people playing solo or paying out of pocket.

LOGISTICS:

I'll post more specifics later, but the gist of it is that two teams connect via audio connection on Skype to a moderator. The moderator reads questions like normal, and teams buzz by both yelling buzz and typing "buzz" into the chat. The first team that the moderator sees to have typed "buzz" will be recognized. It will be up to teams to figure out which individual player buzzed in if there's something close to resembling a tie. We'll organize rounds and moderators in an IRC chat.

We'll probably do fewer rounds than a normal tournament because reading over Skype takes longer than usual. The tournament will also likely start later than usual for East Coast teams so that we don't have to start it super early for West Coast teams.

We tried a similar thing at Pennance and it worked pretty well. I would encourage you to attend a real in-person version of this tournament if possible, but this online mirror will provide maybe 80% of the quizbowl experience and let you play some people you don't typically get to play.

[Auroni]

I'll play.

[Tanay]

I'm tentatively expressing interest on behalf of at least one Berkeley team.

[Sima Guang Hater]

However, all players must be in the same physical location to play.

Do you mean all players on a given team?

[Mike Bentley]

However, all players must be in the same physical location to play.

Do you mean all players on a given team?

Yes, sorry.

[Mike Bentley]

Field Update (as of 5/2/13):

Washington (1)
Me and some other people (1)
Rutgers (1)
Robert Pond et al (1)
Dartmouth (1)
Boise State (1)
Greg Peterson et al (1)
UNC (1)
Texas A&M (1)

As for the base fee, I'm willing to offer discounts for people playing shorthanded or paying out of pocket; contact me privately.

Freelance Moderators:
Mike Cheyne
Eric Mukherjee
Delano Barnes

[Cheynem]

I can probably play or staff this; the fact that I'd have to play solo makes me more willing to read I guess.

[Mike Bentley]

I can probably play or staff this; the fact that I'd have to play solo makes me more willing to read I guess.

I also might be willing to let people in two (but not more) different locations play on one team, but I haven't decided yet.

[ryanrosenberg]

Just to be clear, this mirror does not have a packet requirement, right?

[Mike Bentley]

Just to be clear, this mirror does not have a packet requirement, right?

Correct, although you get a discount for writing one and it would really help out the editors.

[Lightly Seared on the Reality Grill]

I plan on playing this with other people.

[Auroni]

I can't play this anymore.

[Mike Bentley]

Updated the field. Also, I'm going to cap this at 8 teams for now until I confirm the moderator situation.

[Cheynem]

Oh, I'm not playing this anymore, but I can still staff.

[t-bar]

Some people from MIT, possibly just me, are interested in playing this. If we don't end up playing, I'd be interested in staffing.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

I'm definitely interested in playing this if I can, hopefully along with some other non-Nick Jensen members of our quizbowl team.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

UPDATE: Now that we've got funding, Dartmouth (sans Nick Jensen) plans on playing this tournament if there's room in the field. Also, we'd greatly prefer if you guys allowed people from multiple sites to compete, since Aaron Pellowski is currently in Germany but is interested in playing with the rest of Dartmouth if he can.

[gyre and gimble]

How does a Skype tournament work?

[Mike Bentley]

The gist of how a Skype tournament works is that two teams call a moderator, who then reads questions like in a normal quizbowl tournament. You both yell "buzz" and type "buzz" to buzz in. The first typed "buzz" that appears on the moderator's chat window is credited. Teams work out amongst themselves which played buzzed in locally if there is any contention. We use an IRC chat to track the overall tournament (i.e. "we're done", "go to your next room", "there was a protest").

When things run smoothly, the experience is pretty similar to a real quizbowl tournament. However, it takes a bit longer to get everything set up, and there are sometimes technical issues like the audio going out. The buzzing is also a bit less fair, since some teams may have a higher latency than others. My main reluctance in allowing people at more than one site to compete is around the technical issues--I fear that they'll multiply if we have more and more connections to one game.

[Maxwell Sniffingwell]

I'll be playing this (solo or with teammates if I can find them).

[Mike Bentley]

Ok, we're at around 10 teams right now. I'm going to cap the field. I think we have enough moderators, but I don't want to increase the complexity of organizing the tournament anymore.

I'm also going to decree that all teams must be in the same location. It's just too much of a hassle with Skype to deal with more than three people (moderator + two teams) connecting at once.

By the way, remember that this tournament will start a little later than usual. Probably around 11:00-11:30 AM EDT.

[Maxwell Sniffingwell]

Not sure if the "Greg Lawrence" was intentional or not, but it won't be a Lawrence team. Just me, maybe Jonah Greenthal or something.

[Mike Bentley]

Not sure if the "Greg Lawrence" was intentional or not, but it won't be a Lawrence team. Just me, maybe Jonah Greenthal or something.

Nope, whoops.

[tiwonge]

We'll definitely be playing. Joe and I will play, even if we can't find anybody else.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

Mike, can you please send us an invoice? We aren't able to get you guys the money without paying out of pocket if we don't have an invoice.

[Mike Bentley]

Sorry for the delay. I've sent the invoice.

I've also updated the field. Rice is out, so Texas A&M is now in.

[Mike Bentley]

MIT dropped, so I believe we now have an open slot (although I feel there was someone interested who I forgot to put on the waitlist). If you're interested in playing, let me know.

[Mike Bentley]

Thanks everyone for playing. Greg Peterson won in the first game of an advantaged final against Dartmouth. Full stats can be found at http://www.hsquizbowl.org/db/tournament ... nal_stats/.

[Mike Bentley]

By the way, a big thanks to Mike Cheyne and Delano Barnes for helping to moderate.

[Tower Monarch]

I just want to thank Mike and the readers for a well-run tournament. We only had one game affected by Skype issues and that is way better than we (or at least I) expected.

[ryanrosenberg]

I believe we actually lost our game against Washington since that protest was decided in their favor. Also, the "James" and "Jim" in our stats are the same person.

Thanks to the moderators and Mike for setting this up, it certainly was an interesting experience and a good chance to play quizbowl against new people.

[tiwonge]

It's not a huge deal or anything, but Joe only played the first 6 games for Boise. He didn't play in the TAMU game in the last round.

We had fun. My computer, for some reason, kept turning the volume of my microphone down. My apologies for the delays due to that. I think the only other issue was some background buzz or static in a couple games, and one where the opponent's laptop's battery died in the middle of TU19. (They had already won the game, so it didn't change the outcome of the game, but I'm not sure what the best policy is for something like that.)

It also ended a bit earlier than I expected, which was good.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

This tournament was enjoyable and as well-run as you could reasonably expect from an online tournament. It was good to finally get to play against Ryan after not getting to play with him this time last year at Maryland Spring. Also, congratulations to Greg.

Will packets be posted now that this mirror is complete?