Norcross BDAT I 12/3/11-Seeking Mirrors!

[BlueDevil95]

I am pleased to announce that Norcross High School (Norcross, GA) will be hosting the Blue Devil Academic Tournament, a varsity-level tournament, on December 3rd, 2011.

The set will be a collaborative house-write by current and former members of the Norcross Academic Team and alumni from Chattahoochee High School. We will check and revise each question to make sure they come out into a high quality set. The format will be as followed:

Tournament format:
A standard 20/20 set with 10 rounds and 2 finals packets. We will try our hardest to guarantee teams as many rounds as possible. Bonuses will be 3-part with no bouncebacks. Individual statistics, along with PPB, will be taken; 15-point powers with no negs.

Question Distribution:
4/4 Literature
4/4 Science
4/4 History
2/2 Fine Arts
2/2 RMP (Religion, Mythology, Philosophy)
1/1 Social Sciences (anthropology, economics, politics, etc.)
1/1 Geography
1/1 Trash
.5/.5 Non Computational Math
.5/.5 Computer Sciences

Fees:
The fee for each team will be $65 with a $5 discount for a buzzer and a $5 discount for a moderator. Limit one of each per team.

Mirrors:
PORTA High School (Petersburg, IL)- 1/28/12
University of VA (Charlottesville, VA) - 10/29/11
Bainbridge High School (Bainbridge, GA) - 12/3/11
Missouri University of Science and Technology (Rolla, MO) - 12/10/11
Raleigh Charter (Raleigh, NC) - 10/29/11
NIles West HS (Skokie, IL) - 1/7/11

The BDAT is also a PACE NSC platinum level qualifier, meaning that the top 25% of the field will receive a $75 discount off their NSC registration fees (if they so wish to attend), and they can start registering on December 1st (actually, automatically because this tournament is two days after the 1st).

Any questions can be posted on this forum or can be emailed to me at mostafa0104@gmail.com.

We hope to see many teams there! Thanks!

[mr_basque]

Any thoughts on mirroring your tournament?

Thanks,

[BlueDevil95]

Any thoughts on mirroring your tournament?

Thanks,

I was going to post something about schools interesting mirroring our tournament. We would be delighted to have mirrors! Please contact me at mostafa0104@gmail.com if you would like to further discuss this!

Thanks!

[BlueDevil95]

I expect to hear back from my coach for a confirmation of this date pretty soon. In the meantime, I've edited the first post with more information and I plan on attaching a registration form soon.

Here's a list of teams that have expressed interest. If I left anyone off, let me know.

Central Gwinnett
Chattahoochee
Duluth
Dunwoody
Flowery Branch
Mountain View
Mt. Paran Christian
Walker School
Westminster

[BlueDevil95]

I was going through some formats in my head for our tournament and I thought of one that I really liked. If I could have any external input, I'd appreciate it:

Say we get to 24 teams (or any other multiple of 6):

I'd break the field into 4 brackets of 6 and everyone would play a round-robin. That would be followed by rebracketing into 4 other brackets of 6. The 5-0's would play each other, the 4-1's play each other, and so on (or top 6 in one bracket, next 6 in another, etc.). Then, I would take the top two from the top bracket and they would play an advantaged final.

The only issue I can find with this is time.

How's that sound?

[idrayer]

You won't be guaranteed a 5-0, 4-1, 3-2 etc. in each bracket. Instead, I would do 4 brackets of 6 (5 rounds), then 3 brackets of 8 (2-2-2 from each prelim) with the carryover game from the original RR (6 more rounds), followed by finals if necessary (13 rounds total).

You also don't want to eliminate a team from championship contention with only 1 loss.

[in on these shenanigans]

You won't be guaranteed a 5-0, 4-1, 3-2 etc. in each bracket. Instead, I would do 4 brackets of 6 (5 rounds), then 3 brackets of 8 (2-2-2 from each prelim) with the carryover game from the original RR (6 more rounds), followed by finals if necessary (13 rounds total).

You also don't want to eliminate a team from championship contention with only 1 loss.

Too many rounds for not enough packets. They've got 10, plus finals maybe.

Because of the finals issue, you may want to collaborate with another housewrite to lighten the writing load and get to packet #12. It's a huge help with tourney formatting.

[BlueDevil95]

You won't be guaranteed a 5-0, 4-1, 3-2 etc. in each bracket. Instead, I would do 4 brackets of 6 (5 rounds), then 3 brackets of 8 (2-2-2 from each prelim) with the carryover game from the original RR (6 more rounds), followed by finals if necessary (13 rounds total).

You also don't want to eliminate a team from championship contention with only 1 loss.

Too many rounds for not enough packets. They've got 10, plus finals maybe.

Because of the finals issue, you may want to collaborate with another housewrite to lighten the writing load and get to packet #12. It's a huge help with tourney formatting.

I have no doubt that we'll finish all the packets before the end of Summer. I've made excellent progress so far.

Yea that was my bad. When I said 5-0's will play each other, etc., I meant top 6 will be in the championship bracket, next year in consolation bracket, etc.
In what type of situations is an advantaged final necessary?

[in on these shenanigans]

That's good then, re: writing progress.

Convention says you play a one-game final if #1 and #2 are tied and an advantaged final if #2 is one game behind #1. If #1 has a two or more game lead, it's over. (It's the extra shenanigans about ties for 2nd or three-way circles of death for 1st or 2nd that makes the advantaged final explanation longer, but 6 months ahead of the tourney, I don't care. :))

So if you have 24 teams, 12 packets, and are OK with using statistical tiebreakers (points per bonus) to figure out ties, then a 4 pools of 6 rebracketed into 4 pools of 6 will use 10 packets, leaving two for the finals. If you're not OK with using PPB to break ties, then you'll need to kill a round or two from the playoffs, but it's not ideal compared to the above.

[idrayer]

I've attached an xls with a bracket format that would get to a finals in a minimum of 9 rounds (assuming no tiebreakers), or 11 rounds maximum with tiebreakers at each stage. More comments later.

[idrayer]

The proposed bracket format that I had put last post has the benefit of not eliminating teams with 1 loss at any time, quickly grouping teams of similar skill, while it has the drawback of eliminating half the field from championship contention (potentially at 2-1 in prelims and losing a half-game) after 3 rounds. If you are confident in your bracketing, this format should work, but if not, then maybe something else will work better. It also has the drawback that it has 2 times for re-bracketing, but at a tournament this small, it shouldn't be terrible.

[BlueDevil95]

The proposed bracket format that I had put last post has the benefit of not eliminating teams with 1 loss at any time, quickly grouping teams of similar skill, while it has the drawback of eliminating half the field from championship contention (potentially at 2-1 in prelims and losing a half-game) after 3 rounds. If you are confident in your bracketing, this format should work, but if not, then maybe something else will work better. It also has the drawback that it has 2 times for re-bracketing, but at a tournament this small, it shouldn't be terrible.

Thanks for making that. I'm hoping for a major turnout at our tournament for a variety of reasons. It's only June, so we have time.

[Down and out in Quintana Roo]

While this term may be tossed around these days, we will aim for easy to mid varsity the first 5 rounds and increase the difficulty the other five.

Please don't do this. There are many arguments others have given as to why not to do this, first and foremost that it's almost impossible to gauge exactly how that difficulty will increase.

Also, if the bracketing doesn't work the way you want it (how on earth can you possibly be debating that now, already?), how are you going to know how many packets are needed for "medium" and how many are needed for "harder" until the week (or day!) of the tournament?

It's just inviting a whole lot of problems. Go for uniform difficulty and try to write the best fair set that you can.

[BlueDevil95]

Looking at the tossups/bonuses I've written now, the difficulty jump isn't that devastating. Teams MIGHT see a 1 or 2 point drop in PPB, but the tossup answer lines are pretty consistent throughout, I think. The 2 finals packets will be harder because, well, only the top 2 teams will be playing those packets.

As for your second point, this was just a thought I had in mind. If we don't get to a multiple of 6 (when that time comes), then I'll find a different format.

[Kenneth Widmerpool]

It's actually pretty hard to calibrate your difficulty exactly. You also run the risk of seeing some noise (this might be unlikely, but the teams at your tournament could be better than one another in a completely different order at higher difficulty than at your baseline difficulty). For consistency and reliability of results, it's therefore a good idea to pick one difficulty and stick with it throughout the tournament, even for the finals packets.

[BlueDevil95]

I think the difficulty jump of the first 10 rounds and the finals packets of GSAC XVIII is a good comparison of what we're shooting for. It's not much of an increase, but still challenging.

[Kenneth Widmerpool]

Uh, the GSAC finals from last year were probably the most difficult good high school quizbowl packets ever written.

[BlueDevil95]

Uh, the GSAC finals from last year were probably the most difficult good high school quizbowl packets ever written.

I never said quality (although I hope we have a high quality set). I just thought it was a good set to compare our desired jump to.

[Mechanical Beasts]

Uh, the GSAC finals from last year were probably the most difficult good high school quizbowl packets ever written.

I never said quality (although I hope we have a high quality set). I just thought it was a good set to compare our desired jump to.

And Auroni's saying that you should not jump so high at all.

[BlueDevil95]

Uh, the GSAC finals from last year were probably the most difficult good high school quizbowl packets ever written.

I never said quality (although I hope we have a high quality set). I just thought it was a good set to compare our desired jump to.

And Auroni's saying that you should not jump so high at all.

After thinking it over, I've decided uniform difficulty would be a good choice. Thanks for the input.

[Down and out in Quintana Roo]

I'm glad you took our advice to heart and reconsidered. It really will make your tournament better off in the long run.

I'm genuinely interested in seeing these questions sometime later next year. I'm sure they'll be great! Good luck with your tournament.

[Horned Screamer]

Glad to hear it. When our site mirrored GSAC it led to a bunch of basically normal scores for all the regular playoff games, then all of a sudden the scores went way down to the point that our third place game was literally, like, 100-90, which was a game nobody really enjoyed playing and which sort of left the competent but not national superpower teams that were playing at our site completely in the dust. I would go so far as to say that the finals packets were the single thing about the set that was really bad, so please, nobody emulate it.

[Madagascar Serpent Eagle]

Yeah GSAC had a huge difficulty increase in the finals. The other problem with increasing difficulty besides what Auroni said about the order of teams changing depending on the difficulty is that potential mirror sites may want to use a format that has a different number of prelim games from yours, meaning that the difficulty shift wouldn't coincide with the break between the prelims and playoffs. I'm not opposed to having more difficult finals, but increasing the difficulty as much as GSAC did is probably excessive.

[BlueDevil95]

I'm glad you took our advice to heart and reconsidered. It really will make your tournament better off in the long run.

I'm genuinely interested in seeing these questions sometime later next year. I'm sure they'll be great! Good luck with your tournament.

Thank you. Coach Chrzanowski, you and your team should give this a shot and attend a mirror. We've set up a mirror at PORTA High School in Illinois, and we'd love one close to Delaware. If anyone knows someone that's hosting a tournament and needs a set to use, please tell them about us.

Now that I think about, I overlooked a lot of potential problems with a difficulty swing.

[in on these shenanigans]

We've set up a mirror at PORTA High School in Illinois

Nice! Do you and/or Coach Grant know when that's going to be? Depending on the date and Coach Grant's opinion, you might also be able to mirror it in the Chicago area for double IL saturation.

[BlueDevil95]

Coach Grant said he'd prefer a January 28th mirror.

The University of Illinois-Chicago also contacted me a few days ago about a possible mirror.

[BlueDevil95]

Forgot to mention: the set is powermarked as well, with no negs.

[Down and out in Quintana Roo]

with no negs.

What? Are you telling mirrors who host this that they can't use neg 5's?

[huff paste]

with no negs.

What? Are you telling mirrors who host this that they can't use neg 5's?

I think he's saying that there won't be negs at the main site.

[BlueDevil95]

with no negs.

What? Are you telling mirrors who host this that they can't use neg 5's?

I think he's saying that there won't be negs at the main site.

Harry White Is correct; we won't use negs at the main site, but mirror are free to.

[BlueDevil95]

I am pleased to announce that the BDAT will be mirrored at the University of Virginia on October 29th, 2011.

[RountreeCHS]

I am pleased to announce that the BDAT will be mirrored at the University of Virginia on October 29th, 2011.

Mostafa,

Has UVA officially posted this on the boards somewhere, or am I just missing it? I would be curious to find some more info about the UVA event. Thanks!

[The Laughing Cavalier]

I am pleased to announce that the BDAT will be mirrored at the University of Virginia on October 29th, 2011.

Mostafa,

Has UVA officially posted this on the boards somewhere, or am I just missing it? I would be curious to find some more info about the UVA event. Thanks!

Hey, Mr. Rountree. For now I'm holding off on posting the announcement until I'm able to make the room reservations and confirm that it can actually happen (shouldn't be a problem, but just in case). This should go up in about two weeks.

[RountreeCHS]

Sarah,

Thanks for the quick response. We are very interested in heading back up to UVA; it has been a few years since we were last there. Looking forward to seeing the post in the coming weeks. Thanks again.

[BlueDevil95]

Mr. Rountree,

It would be pretty cool to see a Hooch team trek up to UVA to play the BDAT. I hope it all goes well!

Anyway, school's back in session (boo), so teams can go ahead and start registering. Also, if anyone is still looking for a tournament to mirror, then please don't hesitate to email me.

Also, field update as of 8/14/11. Let's get some out of state teams here!

EDIT: Attached a registration form to the original post.

[BlueDevil95]

For all the teams that are down deep in GA and FL, we are happy to say that Bainbridge HS will now be mirroring the BDAT!

[The Laughing Cavalier]

I am pleased to announce that the BDAT will be mirrored at the University of Virginia on October 29th, 2011.

Mostafa,

Has UVA officially posted this on the boards somewhere, or am I just missing it? I would be curious to find some more info about the UVA event. Thanks!

Hey, Mr. Rountree. For now I'm holding off on posting the announcement until I'm able to make the room reservations and confirm that it can actually happen (shouldn't be a problem, but just in case). This should go up in about two weeks.

I put the room request in a few days ago. I'll have an announcement up as soon as they're confirmed (lest we be unable to get them and have to move the tournament...).

[wareagle]

Marist is interested in send a couple of teams to this. I guess put us under the interested column for now until I can lock down availability.

Thanks,

[BlueDevil95]

Marist is interested in send a couple of teams to this. I guess put us under the interested column for now until I can lock down availability.

Thanks,

Cool, I'll put you down as interested.

[BlueDevil95]

I'm very happy to say that the BDAT will be mirrored at Missouri Science and Technology in Rolla, MO on December 10th, 2011. I would like to sincerely thank Charlie Dees for putting us and Missouri Sci and Tech in touch.

[BlueDevil95]

Field update as of October 1st, 2011.

Teams: 14-15
Brookwood - 3
Central Gwinnett - 1
Chattahoochee - 2
Duluth - 1
Eastside -1
Etowah - 2
Marist - 2
Mountain View - 1
Westminster - 1-2

I'd like to reach 24 teams and institute a field cap, but if we can get to more then I'd be happy to expand the field when we reserve more volunteers. There's still plenty of time to register!

[BlueDevil95]

Field Update as of October 10th, 2011:

Field: 17-22

Alpharetta
Brookwood (3-4)
Centennial
Central Gwinnett
Chattahoochee (2-3)
Duluth
Eastside
Etowah (2)
Marist (2-3)
Westminster (1-2)
Walker School (2-3)

The field cap is 24 teams, so if you want to participate in the BDAT, then sign up now! Of course, as we secure more volunteers, this may change.

[BlueDevil95]

I'm pleased to say that the BDAT is now a platinum-level PACE NSC qualifier! This means that the top 25% of the field will be able to register for the NSC starting on December 1st (which is 2 days before the tournament, so actually they can register automatically). Those top teams will also receive a $75 discount off their NSC registration fees.

Hope to see you here!

[BlueDevil95]

Alpharetta (1)
Brookwood (3~4)
Centennial (1)
Central Gwinnett (1)
Chattahoochee (2~3)
Duluth (1)
Eastside (1)
Etowah (2)
Marist (2~3)
Mountainview (2)
Walker School (2~3)
Westminster (1~2)

Total teams: 19-24.

I am going to go ahead and institute the field cap of 24 teams until we have more volunteers. If the teams with a range could give me a solid number of how many teams they're bringing, that would be great. This may also allow for us to increase the field cap. Thanks!

[BlueDevil95]

Happy to say we've expanded the field to 30 teams. Here's the current field.

Alpharetta (1)
Athens Academy (1)
Brookwood (3~4)
Centennial (1)
Central Gwinnett (1)
Chattahoochee (2~3)
Duluth (1)
Eastside (1)
Etowah (2)
Marist (2~3)
Mountainview (2)
Walker School (2~3)
Westminster (1~2)

Teams: 20-25

I haven't checked with my coach to see whose forms we've received, but if you've sent in the forms and still see a range of teams, that should change within the week.
Also, if you've signed up and haven't mailed in the form, then sending that in would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!\

EDIT: I guess adding this in wouldn't hurt. We're still looking for mirrors, especially some in the New England and Californian areas. If anyone needs a set to mirror, then please don't hesitate to contact me.

[BlueDevil95]

With less than three weeks to go until the BDAT, here is a field update:

Alpharetta (1)
Athens Academy (1)
Brookwood (3-4)
Centennial (1)
Central Gwinnett (1)
Chattahoochee (2)
Duluth (1)
Eastside (1)
Etowah (2)
Marist (2-3)
Mountainview (2)
North Gwinnett (2)
Walker School (2-3)
Westminster (2)
Woodland (1)

Teams: 24-27

If teams would start sending in their registration forms, that would be great. If you've already sent them in, coaches should receive an email confirming that we've received your registration.

We'll be taking teams up to the week before the tournament. I'd really love to get to 30 teams, so if you're interested let me know.

[BlueDevil95]

Here's the field update before we head into our Thanksgiving break.

Alma Bryant (AL) (1)
Alpharetta (1)
Athens Academy (1)
Brookwood (3~4)
Centennial (2)
Chattahoochee (2)
Duluth (1)
Eastside (1)
Grayson (2)
Marist (3)
Mountainview (2)
North Paulding (1)
Walker School (2~3)
Westminster (2)
Woodland (1)
North Gwinnett (2)

Teams: 27-29

Hopefully the teams with a range will be able to finalize before the end of next week. We'll be taking registrations up to November 28th, so if anyone has ONE more team they'd like to register, please please PLEASE let me know.

Also, we ask that teams bringing two or more teams also bring along a volunteer.

[BlueDevil95]

With one week left before the tournament and 4 days before the registration deadline, here is the field:

Alma Bryant (AL) (1)
Alpharetta (1)
Athens Academy (1)
Brookwood (3)
Centennial (2)
Chattahoochee *(1-2)
Duluth (1)
Eastside (1)
Grayson (2)
Marist (3)
Mountainview (2)
North Paulding (1)
Walker School (3)
Westminster (2)
Woodland (1)
North Gwinnett (2)

Teams: 27-28

*= Chatt's number of teams will be cleared by Wednesday.

[RountreeCHS]

*= Chatt's number of teams will be cleared by Wednesday.

We actually already know that we will have 1 (one) team on Saturday. And, just as a reminder, this is our "B" team since our A team already heard the set at UVA back in late October.

Hopefully, with 27 teams now, this will help you with creating a tournament format. Thanks, Mostafa!

[BlueDevil95]

*= Chatt's number of teams will be cleared by Wednesday.

We actually already know that we will have 1 (one) team on Saturday. And, just as a reminder, this is our "B" team since our A team already heard the set at UVA back in late October.

Hopefully, with 27 teams now, this will help you with creating a tournament format. Thanks, Mostafa!

That puts us at 27. Thanks, Mr. Rountree!

I am going to go ahead and close the field, unless 3 teams contact me within the next 3 days.