Search found 1116 matches

by The King's Flight to the Scots
Fri Feb 09, 2024 9:11 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: On Team Splitting at National Qualifiers
Replies: 19
Views: 3876

Re: On Team Splitting at National Qualifiers

So, the issue we have to confront is that team-splitting is seriously compromising the qualifier tournaments. For SCT, of the top 8 teams in this list, 4 split their rosters and 2 had players on the editing team; for Regionals, those numbers were 3 and 2, with 2 other teams missing key contributors....
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Wed Nov 22, 2023 12:08 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: How many "cooks" is "too many cooks" (when producing a set)?
Replies: 5
Views: 2860

Re: How many "cooks" is "too many cooks" (when producing a set)?

This is an insightful and well-reasoned post. In the past, posts on this topic have had a bit of a "kids these days" feel to them; this one seems more balanced, identifying the real trade-offs entailed when you increase the size of the editing team. From personal experience, 10 seems like ...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Tue Nov 14, 2023 12:53 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 ACF Winter Discussion
Replies: 23
Views: 7086

Re: 2023 ACF Winter Discussion

To clarify, "Full Fathom Five" etc. are songs included in Shakespeare plays, not pieces he composed separately.
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Wed Aug 09, 2023 3:40 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 Chicago Open - General Discussion and Thanks
Replies: 41
Views: 19530

Re: 2023 Chicago Open - General Discussion and Thanks

I would also like to thank Caleb Kendrick for including a literature tossup under philosophy in the Finals. I know this is a joke, but I made an honest effort to be less dogmatic in how I approached this set. I feel like I've mellowed out some since the pinnacle of my philosophy mafia days, and I h...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Wed Aug 09, 2023 1:47 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 Chicago Open - General Discussion and Thanks
Replies: 41
Views: 19530

Re: 2023 Chicago Open - General Discussion and Thanks

I wanted to thank all the CO editors for producing, overall, a rewarding and enjoyable question set. Around six months ago I was genuinely concerned that Chicago Open wouldn't happen, so it's great to see that so many younger editors came together to produce an event of this quality. A non-exhaustiv...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Wed Aug 02, 2023 11:23 pm
Forum: Collegiate Announcements & Results
Topic: Chicago Open 2023 (August 5 at Northwestern)
Replies: 44
Views: 25811

Re: Chicago Open 2023 (August 5 at Northwestern)

So...it's always hard to judge open teams before they play together, but these brackets are wildly unbalanced. May I ask what the process for seeding was? It doesn't make thaaaat much of a difference, but it's a bit suboptimal.
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Mon Jul 10, 2023 3:37 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: Should ACF tossups be shorter?
Replies: 30
Views: 12507

Re: Should ACF tossups be shorter?

I feel like that much length variation would be confusing to players. The difficulty structure of a 5-line tossup is going to be very different from the structure of an 8-line tossup; it'll be jarring to play the 5-line tossup and hear a clue in line 2 that you'd expect to hear in line 4 or 5. Gener...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Mon May 01, 2023 11:01 am
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2022-2023 End of Season Player Poll
Replies: 22
Views: 12493

Re: 2022-2023 End of Season Player Poll

MattBo is probably top 5 afa: his buzzes in that category in the play-in and finals were superb. I'm honored by the mention here, since I've always wished I were better at music questions, but unfortunately my interest in the subject way exceeds my knowledge. Those questions in the finals sequence ...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Sun Apr 30, 2023 1:54 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 ACF Nationals Specific Question Discussion
Replies: 53
Views: 50704

Re: 2023 ACF Nationals Specific Question Discussion

A couple of odds and ends: - I felt like the Painting/Sculpture tossups were harder than the tossups in other categories. It seemed like that category had a larger number of difficult outliers ( The Hunt in the Forest ) and tossups with very difficult clues (the Otto tossup with a minor Dieric Bouts...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Fri Apr 28, 2023 12:29 am
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 ACF Nationals Discussion and Thanks
Replies: 13
Views: 8822

Re: 2023 ACF Nationals Discussion and Thanks

I had a blast playing this set - so many questions (Baldwin and Wright, e.g.) asked about familiar topics with answers I never would have thought to attempt. Often I found myself pretty surprised at what struck me as a hard question topic, only to see a younger team answer it without difficulty. I t...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Thu Apr 27, 2023 1:47 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 ACF Nationals Specific Question Discussion
Replies: 53
Views: 50704

Re: 2023 ACF Nationals Specific Question Discussion

Minor note on the Morricone tossup: In a piece by this composer, the English horn, and later Edda Dell’Orso’s wordless soprano vocals, play a theme with the notes “short A, long C, short E, long C. Is this intended as a description of the opening of "The Ecstasy of Gold"? Bc that track ope...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Wed Apr 26, 2023 6:54 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: Why doesn't film come up more?
Replies: 24
Views: 8641

Re: Why doesn't film come up more?

I think it would honestly be criminal to put Better Call Saul or Succession in the arts distribution. Even with some of the most critically-acclaimed TV programs, showrunners have way less freedom to experiment than arthouse filmmakers do; these are products for consumption and it shows.
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Tue Apr 25, 2023 4:28 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 ACF Nationals Specific Question Discussion
Replies: 53
Views: 50704

Re: 2023 ACF Nationals Specific Question Discussion

I found the tossup on time series to be extremely confusing. I am currently taking a graduate-level class titled "Applied Time Series," but failed to connect my knowledge of the Durbin–Watson statistic and ARMA models to the indicator "these things," which I suspected was asking...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Mon Apr 17, 2023 5:26 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion
Replies: 59
Views: 35956

Re: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion

Could I see the "klezmer" tossup in Packet 7? Judging from the older version posted in this thread (and my memory of what I heard during the online mirror), it said that Prokofiev's Overture on Hebrew Themes was published as the "overture no. 34," but I can't seem to find any so...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Sat Apr 15, 2023 9:07 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 BHSU: General discussion
Replies: 35
Views: 14529

Re: 2023 BHSU: General discussion

So, this was always going to be a tournament that some people were going to really like and some people probably wouldn't like so much. We set out to write in a very particular kind of mode that appealed to our senses of humor and quizbowl aesthetics; if you have very different tastes in those areas...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Tue Apr 11, 2023 5:14 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion
Replies: 59
Views: 35956

Re: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion

I don't think it's quite accurate to say that clue is about the same kind of battle trance that berserkers go into. The character being described is Bodvar Bjarki, a (possible) Norse analogue of Beowulf with the ability to summon a ghost bear while he's asleep; the bear is his spirit animal in a muc...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Mon Apr 10, 2023 1:03 pm
Forum: College area archives
Topic: BHSU Online Mirror (4/15/2023)
Replies: 3
Views: 4778

Re: BHSU Online Mirror (4/15/2023)

With eight teams registered, the field for BHSU online is now closed. We may choose to expand the field if we get enough interested free agents to form two additional teams. For now, if you're a free agent and would like to play, please try to join one of the registered teams with open spots.
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Tue Apr 04, 2023 1:41 pm
Forum: College area archives
Topic: BHSU Online Mirror (4/15/2023)
Replies: 3
Views: 4778

Re: BHSU Online Mirror (4/15/2023)

We've got an excellent field shaping up, but please remember you have to email me to formally register. It would be great if the teams listed on the spreadsheet could do that by the end of Friday or so. Looking forward to seeing everyone in 11 days!
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Mon Mar 13, 2023 6:18 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion
Replies: 59
Views: 35956

Re: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion

Word forms like "introspective method" should be addressed in the "introspection" tossup, the moderator was unsure what to do with that answer. The answerline for "federation of Australia" could be fleshed out more to deal with answers like "the union of Australia...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Sat Mar 11, 2023 9:35 pm
Forum: College area archives
Topic: BHSU Online Mirror (4/15/2023)
Replies: 3
Views: 4778

BHSU Online Mirror (4/15/2023)

Hello, Ball So Hard University is pleased to announce the launch of its distance learning program, with a mirror of the BHSU set to be held on April 15, 2023 over Zoom. The tournament will be directed by Andrew Wang and me, Matt Bollinger. Fees Base Fee: $100 Payment should go to Billy Busse by Venm...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Wed Mar 01, 2023 8:33 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion
Replies: 59
Views: 35956

Re: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion

I've attached preliminary category stats here.

EDIT: Excel screwed up some of the references, so I'm linking copies of the Google sheets instead. Bonuses here, tossups here.
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Tue Feb 28, 2023 2:56 am
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion
Replies: 59
Views: 35956

Re: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion

And, last followup here.
colorados.png
(16.14 KiB) Not downloaded yet
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Tue Feb 28, 2023 2:55 am
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion
Replies: 59
Views: 35956

Re: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion

Posting this followup to include the distributions I mentioned. Also, I'd like to take a moment to address the issue of players feeling targeted by some of the category fake-out bonuses. Our intention was entirely to provide people with entertainment, rather than to have fun at players' expense; I d...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Tue Feb 28, 2023 2:49 am
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion
Replies: 59
Views: 35956

Re: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion

I think the answerspace issues that Mike and Matt bring up should be examined in relation to the goals of the set. As we announced from the beginning, we wanted to write a "Nats-" set that felt like a real midpoint between Regionals and Nationals. That goal necessarily entailed writing a s...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Mon Feb 27, 2023 9:09 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion
Replies: 59
Views: 35956

Re: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion

Buzzpoint and conversion stats from the Northwestern site can be found below.
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Sun Feb 26, 2023 6:21 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 BHSU: Thank Yous and Acknowledgements
Replies: 5
Views: 1710

2023 BHSU: Thank Yous and Acknowledgements

I wanted to start a new thread to acknowledge the people whose work produced this set over the past two years. Along with writing a combined 170 questions, in their categories and outside of them, Tejas Raje and Billy Busse provided an enormous amount of logistical and moral support throughout the p...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Sun Feb 26, 2023 4:27 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion
Replies: 59
Views: 35956

Re: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion

Some tossups that I recall thinking narrowed down the answer space too quickly included: "wireless Internet" in Africa (what else are people delivering to rural areas by balloon?), the Dominican Republic dance tossup (it's not Cuba but in the Spanish-speaking Caribbean and has musical gen...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Sun Feb 26, 2023 3:56 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion
Replies: 59
Views: 35956

Re: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion

BHSU packets that were played at the main site can be found here.
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Sun Feb 26, 2023 3:40 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion
Replies: 59
Views: 35956

Re: 2023 BHSU: Specific question discussion

Lastly: You really should remove the "Matt Bollinger's favorite 2020 presidential candidate Kanye West" gag from that one bonus immediately. I know many of us used to be fans of his music, but as worded it sounds like you're either glossing over Kanye's extremely public anti-Semitism, or ...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Sun Feb 26, 2023 3:30 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2023 BHSU: General discussion
Replies: 35
Views: 14529

Re: 2023 BHSU: General discussion

Hi folks, I subject-edited European Literature, European History, Philosophy, and Religion, and co-edited Music with Aaron Rosenberg. I also head-edited the set along with Rob Carson, which entailed helping the tone and philosophy for the tournament as a whole. I generally prefer to have the players...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Wed Feb 22, 2023 9:54 pm
Forum: College area archives
Topic: BHSU Main Site at Northwestern (02/25/2023)
Replies: 11
Views: 8015

Re: BHSU Main Site at Northwestern (02/25/2023)

Purdue has registered for the twelfth spot in the field. With that, the field is now closed. We hope everyone is looking forward to the twelve-team round robin this Saturday as much as we all are. In summary, get hype.
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Fri Feb 17, 2023 7:00 pm
Forum: College area archives
Topic: BHSU Main Site at Northwestern (02/25/2023)
Replies: 11
Views: 8015

Re: BHSU Main Site at Northwestern (02/25/2023)

Hi folks,

Looking forward to seeing everyone next weekend! Right now we're at 11 teams; we'd really like to get a twelfth so we can do a full round robin. If your team has any extra players to contribute to such a team, please let us know. Thanks!
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Sun Feb 05, 2023 2:48 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: Who's Doing CO This Year?
Replies: 31
Views: 8225

Re: Who's Doing CO This Year?

Like I said before, I am willing to edit the history, and, with proper support, I suppose I could be the head editor . Buddy I'm afraid you may have drawn the short stick. More seriously: you did an amazing job on the history for IO and both iterations of FRENCH, I think you'd do a great job subjec...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Sun Jan 22, 2023 7:35 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: Who's Doing CO This Year?
Replies: 31
Views: 8225

Re: Who's Doing CO This Year?

Also: With no formal institutional support, Could there... perhaps... be sources of this? CO is not exactly in the ambit of ACF or PACE or IQBT or NAQT, but perhaps some existing entity or entities see enough value in "capstone achievement that anyone can play" to support it a bit. For a ...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Sun Jan 22, 2023 3:05 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: Who's Doing CO This Year?
Replies: 31
Views: 8225

Who's Doing CO This Year?

So, we're getting rather deep into the academic year without anyone stepping up to edit Chicago Open. This situation was probably inevitable, given how much harder CO editing has become over the past decade. Since I edited CO, quality standards have gotten higher, packet submission has gotten rarer,...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Mon Jan 16, 2023 7:51 pm
Forum: College area archives
Topic: BHSU Main Site at Northwestern (02/25/2023)
Replies: 11
Views: 8015

Re: BHSU Main Site at Northwestern (02/25/2023)

Registered Teams Amartya Senpai Notice Me (© John Lawrence): Mike Bentley, Will Alston, Eric Mukherjee, John Lawrence Chicago A: Adam Fine, Matt Jackson, Claire Jones, Ned Tagtmeier (1 Staffer, 2 Buzzers) Chicago B+: Alston Boyd, John Marvin, Vivek Sasse, Liam Starnes Epic Games: Andrew Nadig, Ashv...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Mon Jan 16, 2023 3:27 pm
Forum: College area archives
Topic: BHSU Main Site at Northwestern (02/25/2023)
Replies: 11
Views: 8015

Re: BHSU Main Site at Northwestern (02/25/2023)

CPiGuy wrote: Mon Jan 16, 2023 3:28 am The spreadsheet appears to be read-only.
Thanks, should be fixed now.
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Sun Jan 15, 2023 9:59 pm
Forum: College area archives
Topic: BHSU Main Site at Northwestern (02/25/2023)
Replies: 11
Views: 8015

BHSU Main Site at Northwestern (02/25/2023)

Hello, Ball So Hard University is pleased to announce the main site of BHSU , to take place on February 25, 2023 at Northwestern University. The tournament will be directed by Rob Carson. Additional information on logistics will be forthcoming in the following days. Fees Base Fee: $150 Qualified Sta...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Mon Nov 21, 2022 7:08 pm
Forum: College area archives
Topic: CMST II @ UChicago (11/19/22)
Replies: 11
Views: 4087

Re: CMST II @ UChicago (11/19/22)

Are Logomachy stats available?
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Fri Aug 12, 2022 10:32 am
Forum: College area archives
Topic: MUSES III: First Online Mirror (August 27th)
Replies: 14
Views: 4119

Re: MUSES III: First Online Mirror (August 27th)

Alex Damisch and I are going to try to play this. Since it looks like it'll be tricky to hold a well-attended mirror during the school year, I'd encourage interested players to consider signing up for this event.
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Tue Aug 09, 2022 3:40 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2022 Chicago Open: Specific Question Discussion
Replies: 14
Views: 4636

Re: 2022 Chicago Open: Specific Question Discussion

Yeah, I concur with John that every clue in the Chekhov question sounded like the most Chekhov story ever; I held off from buzzing until late due to both situational pressure and sheer disbelief. I will say that I don't think I'd narrowed it down chronologically as much as John did, although I likel...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Tue Apr 19, 2022 10:14 am
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2021-22 Collegiate Player Poll
Replies: 37
Views: 17951

Re: 2021-22 Collegiate Player Poll

I'll try to keep this brief, but I'd like to take a moment to recommend my teammates from Georgia Tech this year. Coming off a very strong performance at ICT, S.A. Shenoy was an absolutely ideal fourth scorer in the Nationals playoffs this year. The highlight of their performance was answering three...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Fri Apr 15, 2022 9:53 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: Directed Prompts
Replies: 5
Views: 1953

Directed Prompts

Following my post in the Nats discussion, I wanted us to talk about some guidelines for when prompts should include additional instructions. Directed prompts, e.g. asking "In what country?" for a buzz on a tossup on "Chinese Muslims," have proven to be a positive development, and...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Wed Apr 13, 2022 9:54 am
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: ACF Nationals 2022 Thanks and General Discussion
Replies: 30
Views: 11975

Re: ACF Nationals 2022 Thanks and General Discussion

A couple more notes: Definitely think John's comments on difficulty inflation are correct. A significant pitfall for Nats editors is thinking a topic is more "canonical" than it really is, when it's come up a handful of times at harder events. While striving to ask about novel material and...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Tue Apr 12, 2022 2:37 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: ACF Nationals 2022 Thanks and General Discussion
Replies: 30
Views: 11975

Re: ACF Nationals 2022 Thanks and General Discussion

I had a great time playing this set. A couple of preliminary thoughts: - I appreciated having the directed prompts at several points as a player. Along with other welcome changes, like more concrete answerlines and notes before the tossup, they made for questions that produced much more satisfying o...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Fri Mar 18, 2022 3:56 pm
Forum: College area archives
Topic: Illinois Open 2021 - Errata
Replies: 8
Views: 1010

Re: Errata

Here are my two cents, I suppose: it is misleading to write a question with clues about Julius Caesar and ask just for the answer "Roman emperors." But it's not entirely wrong; I believe writers under the Roman empire usually listed him as the first emperor rather than Augustus. Although A...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Mon Mar 14, 2022 6:39 pm
Forum: College area archives
Topic: Illinois Open 2021 - General Discussion and Thanks
Replies: 12
Views: 2036

Re: General Discussion and Thanks

Read at Maryland this weekend after playing the set months ago - wanted to come back and observe that I really liked the set! In particular, this was one of my favorite sets of history questions ever. I was super happy to hear great new questions in the boring old areas I like.
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Mon Mar 14, 2022 3:33 pm
Forum: Collegiate Discussion
Topic: 2022 WORKSHOP: Thanks and General Discussion
Replies: 19
Views: 5535

Re: 2022 WORKSHOP: Thanks and General Discussion

I don't think you need to appeal to a Bloomean notion of the "Western Canon" to object to the way Other Arts was done in this set. Looking over the packets, a third or more of the Other Arts tossups were written on topics we'd usually consider popular culture. The clues, rather than emphas...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Sun Feb 13, 2022 12:39 pm
Forum: Community Discussion
Topic: Quizbowl-"Trivia" Community Relations: What Are They? What Should They Be?
Replies: 25
Views: 15758

Re: Quizbowl-"Trivia" Community Relations: What Are They? What Should They Be?

With apologies for coming to the thread so late, I wanted to post a couple issues I have with the "importance vs. interest" framing that's been brought up here. Although I'm interested in the prospects for a rapprochement between the quizbowl and trivia worlds, I don't think that framing d...
by The King's Flight to the Scots
Mon Jan 31, 2022 2:20 pm
Forum: Community Discussion
Topic: Quizbowl-"Trivia" Community Relations: What Are They? What Should They Be?
Replies: 25
Views: 15758

Re: Quizbowl-"Trivia" Community Relations: What Are They? What Should They Be?

Another big difference between quizbowl and most trivia formats I've played is that trivia gives you more to do when you're losing. If you play a quizbowl tournament and you're not one of the best teams there, you're likely to lose several games by margins of 500 points. In those situations, you're ...