2014-2015 BISB General Discussion

[adamsil]

General discussion of the set goes here: difficulty, distribution, general trends about categories/answerlines/powermarking, writing style, bad jokes, etc.

The ideology behind this set was basically the same as last year's: relatively easy answer-lines for tossups and easy parts of bonuses, but leadins and hard parts of bonuses that tested quite deep knowledge. Again, we were especially trying to emphasize things that people who had never played quizbowl before would likely have heard of, both as tossup answerlines, and even as bonus parts.

I'd like to thank my co-writers: Brady Weiler wrote nearly all the US history and music, as well as a big chunk of the other arts; Mostafa Bhuiyan wrote the painting; Alex Liu wrote several literature questions when I needed him to; Brady, Alex and Joey Reifenberger also contributed the majority of the trash category between them. Most of the rest of the categories you can blame on me. All of us helped out quite a bit on the editing front as well.

I'm going to be incapacitated by Yom Kippur and then a football game tomorrow evening, which is why I'm posting this now, but I'll try and respond to posts as best I can.

[AKKOLADE]

Every bonus part doesn't have to be two-lines long. Did I say this last year?

Either way, stop it! It's bad!

[pajaro bobo]

Every bonus part doesn't have to be two-lines long. Did I say this last year?

You didn't.

Either way, stop it! It's bad!

Sorry!

[AKKOLADE]

Every bonus part doesn't have to be two-lines long. Did I say this last year?

You didn't.

I really don't remember if it was such an issue last time, but this time it was pretty much out of hand. There were a lot of cases of clues being added just for the sake of it multiple times in a bonus. Having read for the first time at HSNCT and NSC this year, I think I can say that excluding travel, reading 12 rounds of this was more exhausting than the 18 or whatever at HSNCT and NSC that I read.

That said - I thought your tossups were great, and difficulty was pretty reasonable.

[pajaro bobo]

I'm just a little surprised that the bonuses turned out to be a problem that way, but looking back at some of the packets I can see where you're coming from. Guess we never really thought about that over the summer.