NAQT-format submission tournament

[naan/steak-holding toll]

Since the idea of an NAQT-style tournament was floated in the VCU Open/second summer open thread, I was wondering if people would be interested in running some sort of FICHTE-inspired NAQT-style tournament outside as part of the regular season next year. I know that there is a subset of the quizbowl community that rarely attends anything besides NAQT tournaments, and I think that an event like this would be a good way to get them to play more tournaments besides just SCT (and ICT, if they quality), as well as providing a fresh alternative to regular ACF and mACF events. I would like it to be packet-submission, though, since I want to see if that can work well with an

My idea is for the tournament to be something of a hybrid between ACF-style packet submission and rules and NAQT question length and distribution (with a few tweaks - for example I would prefer to use line limits instead of character limits because I think that would work better with packet submission). I would instead like to try a five line length cap for all questions before powermarking, since that is roughly what NAQT questions come out to be. I would like for the target difficulty to be around that of 2014 SCT or a regular-difficulty mACF event like DRAGOON.

Alternatively, this could be held over the summer and the difficulty appropriately increased.

A distribution for final packets at this tournament might look like something like the following (roughly adhering to NAQT distribution, with some alterations):

4/4 Literature (1/1 US, 1/1 British, 1/1 Euro, 1/1 World/Other) - somewhat more world/other lit than NAQT
4/4 History (1/1 US, 2/2 Euro, 1/1 World) - if we want more NAQT style, we can do 1.5/1.5 US and 1.5/1.5 Euro
4/4 Science (1/1 Bio, 1/1 Chem, 1/1 Physics, 1/1 Minor Science)
1/1 Additional Big Three (no more than 1 of each; any extra science should be minor science)
1/1 Mythology
1/1 Religion and Philosophy (1 of each)
2.5/2.5 Arts (1/1 Visual (painting, sculpture), 1/1 Aural (classical, jazz), 0.5/0.5 architecture, ballet, opera, other performance art, etc.)
2.5/2.5 Geography/Current Events/Modern World (1/1 Geo, 1/1 CE/Modern World, 0.5/0.5 extra)
1.5/1.5 Trash
1.5/1.5 Social Science/Thought/Other Academic
1/1 Mixed Academic/General Knowledge

Submission requirements might look something like this (28/28 overall):

5/5 Literature (1/1 US, 1/1 British, 1/1 Euro, 1/1 World/Other, 1/1 Your Choice)
5/5 History (1/1 US, 2/2 Euro, 1/1 World, 1/1 Your Choice)
5/5 Science (1/1 Bio, 1/1 Chem, 1/1 Physics, 2/2 Other Science [to be pared down])
1/1 Myth
1/1 R/P (1 of each)
3/3 Arts (1/1 Visual, 1/1 Aural, 1/1 Other [to be pared down])
3/3 Geo/CE/Modern World (1/1 Geo, 1/1 CE/Modern World, 1/1 Your Choice)
2/2 Trash
2/2 SS/Thought/Other Academic
1/1 Mixed/GK

If requiring 28/28 in submissions is too much, it can definitely be toned down.

[Rococo A Go Go]

Well I certainly like the idea. Didn't there used to be (MLK perhaps?) a tournament run every year that was similar to NAQT in style and format?

[fett0001]

I suspect a five line cap for submissions will give you a lot of unusable material.

[Frauny Von Smiley]

I had actually been considering trying to write a tournament like this, so I'd be interested in playing/writing for/whatever for it.

[Frauny Von Smiley]

I should add that William & Mary is also very interested in collaborating on writing a tournament.

[The Ununtiable Twine]

Well I certainly like the idea. Didn't there used to be (MLK perhaps?) a tournament run every year that was similar to NAQT in style and format?

I don't recall off the top of my head. Regarding Will's idea, I'm pretty much up for this kind of product being produced yearly.

[Corry]

I would definitely do this.

[Ndg]

I know that there is a subset of the quizbowl community that rarely attends anything besides NAQT tournaments, and I think that an event like this would be a good way to get them to play more tournaments besides just SCT

I'm pretty sure a main reason teams only go to SCT is that it's not packet submission, so I'm not convinced a packet submission tournament would accomplish this. Also, if we're trying to attract more of these teams, it might make sense to go a little below regular difficulty, since most of those teams are playing DII SCT.

I'm certainly not trying to discourage this from happening, though. I would probably be willing to write a packet for this, especially if it ends up happening over the summer.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

I know that there is a subset of the quizbowl community that rarely attends anything besides NAQT tournaments, and I think that an event like this would be a good way to get them to play more tournaments besides just SCT

I'm pretty sure a main reason teams only go to SCT is that it's not packet submission, so I'm not convinced a packet submission tournament would accomplish this. Also, if we're trying to attract more of these teams, it might make sense to go a little below regular difficulty, since most of those teams are playing DII SCT.

But these people aren't going to Penn Bowl, MFT/IFT, and other housewrites, so I don't know if this statement really holds. I think the format difference is important.

[Corry]

I know that there is a subset of the quizbowl community that rarely attends anything besides NAQT tournaments, and I think that an event like this would be a good way to get them to play more tournaments besides just SCT

I'm pretty sure a main reason teams only go to SCT is that it's not packet submission, so I'm not convinced a packet submission tournament would accomplish this. Also, if we're trying to attract more of these teams, it might make sense to go a little below regular difficulty, since most of those teams are playing DII SCT.

I'm certainly not trying to discourage this from happening, though. I would probably be willing to write a packet for this, especially if it ends up happening over the summer.

My personal perspective: While Amherst doesn't solely attend NAQT events, personally, I enjoy going to SCT far more than most other college tournaments. However, it's not because SCT doesn't require packet submission. The NAQT distribution just suits me. And although I understand that this view is somewhat heretical, some of us on the Amherst team particularly like the short tossups (myself included).

To elaborate on my previous post, as long as this happens during the regular school year, I will go to this tournament no matter what. Come hell or high water.

[The Kid Who Collects Spider-Man]

I'd really like for this to happen and for something like this to happen during 2015-2016, as well.

[Everything in the Whole Wide World]

I, too, would be all for this tournament happening and would be happy to write for a packet submission style. At least in my experience talking to members of my team, I think the shorter questions do make a big difference because a long day 8-9 line tossups can really wear one down. I think the faster pace will appeal to teams more causally committed to quizbowl.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

Though tossups and bonus parts would be shorter (with something like five and two line hard caps), packets would be 24/24 and played without stupid clocks.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

After recent events, I now feel obliged to (in addition to my work on Penn Bowl) work to produce a tournament of reasonably high quality that can actually be appreciated by the majority of people who play it. I'll start contacting people privately, but would anybody who hasn't posted already be interested in working on a project like this? I wouldn't be opposed to doing it as a housewrite, either, since it would probably be a decent bit easier to write a regular difficulty tournament with five-line cap questions instead of the standard seven or eight.