three seconds? five seconds? no seconds?

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three seconds? five seconds? no seconds?

Post by AlphaQuizBowler »

Is there a reason why PACE only allows players 3 seconds to answer after buzzing in instead of the (m)ACF standard 5 seconds?
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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by Auks Ran Ova »

AlphaQuizBowler wrote:Is there a reason why PACE only allows players 3 seconds to answer after buzzing in instead of the (m)ACF standard 5 seconds?
This is currently being discussed.
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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by Joshua Rutsky »

AlphaQuizBowler wrote:Is there a reason why PACE only allows players 3 seconds to answer after buzzing in instead of the (m)ACF standard 5 seconds?
Personally, I think that three seconds after a buzz feels like a LIFETIME for a coach, let alone a player on the opposing team. With that long a pause allowed, you might as well remove the stall rule entirely. The championship HSNCT match last year, won on a delayed answer that danced VERY close to a stall (in the mind of the answering party as well as many in the audience, as I recall from a post on this board, and clearly for members of the opposing team), is a great example of how long a three second count can be.
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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by Romero »

This is a topic near to my heart. The 5 seconds adds an element of gamesmanship to a match. Quiz Bowl is not just a game of reflexes, it is also a game of deep thinking and on the fly critical thinking. The 5 seconds allows players to think laterally and figure out where the question is going. We should not penalize a student who is using critical thinking to answer tossups.

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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by Down and out in Quintana Roo »

Romero wrote:This is a topic near to my heart. The 5 seconds adds an element of gamesmanship to a match. Quiz Bowl is not just a game of reflexes, it is also a game of deep thinking and on the fly critical thinking. The 5 seconds allows players to think laterally and figure out where the question is going. We should not penalize a student who is using critical thinking to answer tossups.

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So what do you want, 1 second? A half second? I love the 5 second rule and i think that any less is ridiculous for a player that's trying to come up with an answer when a question is being read incredibly fast.
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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by Whiter Hydra »

Carangoides ciliarius wrote:
Romero wrote:This is a topic near to my heart. The 5 seconds adds an element of gamesmanship to a match. Quiz Bowl is not just a game of reflexes, it is also a game of deep thinking and on the fly critical thinking. The 5 seconds allows players to think laterally and figure out where the question is going. We should not penalize a student who is using critical thinking to answer tossups.

Chris Romero
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So what do you want, 1 second? A half second? I love the 5 second rule and i think that any less is ridiculous for a player that's trying to come up with an answer when a question is being read incredibly fast.
I think he's in favor of five seconds on the grounds that it allows one to think of the answer.
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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by Charbroil »

Carangoides ciliarius wrote:
Romero wrote:This is a topic near to my heart. The 5 seconds adds an element of gamesmanship to a match. Quiz Bowl is not just a game of reflexes, it is also a game of deep thinking and on the fly critical thinking. The 5 seconds allows players to think laterally and figure out where the question is going. We should not penalize a student who is using critical thinking to answer tossups.

Chris Romero
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So what do you want, 1 second? A half second? I love the 5 second rule and i think that any less is ridiculous for a player that's trying to come up with an answer when a question is being read incredibly fast.
I think he's in favor of 5 seconds, though I'm also a bit confused.
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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by Down and out in Quintana Roo »

Charbroil wrote:
Carangoides ciliarius wrote:
Romero wrote:This is a topic near to my heart. The 5 seconds adds an element of gamesmanship to a match. Quiz Bowl is not just a game of reflexes, it is also a game of deep thinking and on the fly critical thinking. The 5 seconds allows players to think laterally and figure out where the question is going. We should not penalize a student who is using critical thinking to answer tossups.

Chris Romero
Texas A&M Quiz Bowl 1999-2007
So what do you want, 1 second? A half second? I love the 5 second rule and i think that any less is ridiculous for a player that's trying to come up with an answer when a question is being read incredibly fast.
I think he's in favor of 5 seconds, though I'm also a bit confused.
Yeah i have no idea what's going on actually in this post, now that i read it again.
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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by Frater Taciturnus »

Carangoides ciliarius wrote:
Charbroil wrote:
Carangoides ciliarius wrote:
Romero wrote:This is a topic near to my heart. The 5 seconds adds an element of gamesmanship to a match. Quiz Bowl is not just a game of reflexes, it is also a game of deep thinking and on the fly critical thinking. The 5 seconds allows players to think laterally and figure out where the question is going. We should not penalize a student who is using critical thinking to answer tossups.

Chris Romero
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So what do you want, 1 second? A half second? I love the 5 second rule and i think that any less is ridiculous for a player that's trying to come up with an answer when a question is being read incredibly fast.
I think he's in favor of 5 seconds, though I'm also a bit confused.
Yeah i have no idea what's going on actually in this post, now that i read it again.
"5 seconds: good, less than that: bad"
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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by Romero »

10 points to George for correctly figuring out that I favor 5 seconds.

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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by Captain Sinico »

Joshua Rutsky wrote:Personally, I think that three seconds after a buzz feels like a LIFETIME for a coach, let alone a player on the opposing team. With that long a pause allowed, you might as well remove the stall rule entirely. The championship HSNCT match last year, won on a delayed answer that danced VERY close to a stall (in the mind of the answering party as well as many in the audience, as I recall from a post on this board, and clearly for members of the opposing team), is a great example of how long a three second count can be.
I don't agree with any of this. I understand that you're exaggerating when you say "If you're going to increase the answer time by two-thirds, you might as well just increase it by INFINITY-THIRDS!" but I don't understand the point you're trying to make with the exaggeration. Players still can and often do stall with a five-second answer time, so the effect of changing to five seconds is not close to the same as changing to unlimited time.
NAQT's issue last year was one of rule enforcement rather than rule establishment in as much as the moderator presumably knew three seconds were to be had, but seemed to give longer than that. While it is inevitable that rules are not always enforced precisely, I see no reason to believe that a moderator giving extra time will give more or less extra time if the proper amount of time is less or more.
So I'm not misunderstood, this doesn't constitute a change in the rule and shouldn't even necessarily be construed as my supporting a change. Rather, it is a defense of a five-second answer time, which is to all appearances just as reasonable as a three-second one; necessarily, the converse applies.

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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by Important Bird Area »

Captain Sinico wrote:NAQT's issue last year was one of rule enforcement rather than rule establishment in as much as the moderator presumably knew three seconds were to be had, but seemed to give longer than that. While it is inevitable that rules are not always enforced precisely, I see no reason to believe that a moderator giving extra time will give more or less extra time if the proper amount of time is less or more.
Just so we're all on the same page here, NAQT rules set two seconds as the amount of time a player has to begin a tossup answer.
NAQT rules wrote:An answer to a tossup must begin within 2 seconds after the player has been recognized. An answer begun after the moderator has said "Time" will be treated as no answer. Ties between the player and the moderator are decided in favor of the player.
(Three seconds is the space after the end of the tossup for at least one team to buzz.)
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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by Joshua Rutsky »

Captain Sinico wrote: I don't agree with any of this. I understand that you're exaggerating when you say "If you're going to increase the answer time by two-thirds, you might as well just increase it by INFINITY-THIRDS!" but I don't understand the point you're trying to make with the exaggeration. Players still can and often do stall with a five-second answer time, so the effect of changing to five seconds is not close to the same as changing to unlimited time.
Mike, I have to base my comments on my own experience, which is limited to two HSNCTs, a few regional tourneys at the HS level, and local play; I am not familiar with mACF format, nor have I seen a match play out with a five second rule. From that limited experience, however, my opinion is that the purpose of the buzzer in quiz bowl is to indicate that you know the answer. If a player is "gaming", as Chris puts it, then he/she knows the rules in advance and games in accordance with them. All the events we've attended have had 3 second rules (or less), and as I said, waiting on that three count, which is variable with any moderator to some extent, can be excruciating, particularly when you are playing against a "gamer." If you need five seconds AFTER you buzz to come up with your answer due to lateral thinking, why did you buzz? I don't see why it is arbitrarily better to have five seconds to think about what you want to say than three, or seven, or ten. I have never played QB at the college level; is it a mark of particularly good quiz bowl players that they buzz before they know what they are going to say, then consider in that five seconds? Seriously, I want to know if I need to change the way I coach my kids.
Carangoides ciliarius wrote: So what do you want, 1 second? A half second? I love the 5 second rule and i think that any less is ridiculous for a player that's trying to come up with an answer when a question is being read incredibly fast.
Actually, what I want is for players to read minds so they can answer before the question was asked. Seriously, I'm not saying answers should be instantaneous, Mr. C. I'm saying that my understanding of the purpose of that three second period has always been to give the player leeway for having a momentary "brain freeze", not to offer a chance to think out the answer further. If you pushed the button, you declared you knew the answer, not that you would know it five seconds from now if you could think about it. Again, I understand strategy is involved. There have been players in our area who will buzz slightly ahead of the moderator's reading a key word, knowing they will pick up a syllable or even the full word 75% of the time before the moderator is able to stop reading. That's a calculated risk, and if they want to take it, fine. Five seconds, though, is a lot of time to allow for a player to think before having to begin answering a question they, by buzzing, claimed to know the answer to.
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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by The King's Flight to the Scots »

Joshua Rutsky wrote:
Captain Sinico wrote: I don't agree with any of this. I understand that you're exaggerating when you say "If you're going to increase the answer time by two-thirds, you might as well just increase it by INFINITY-THIRDS!" but I don't understand the point you're trying to make with the exaggeration. Players still can and often do stall with a five-second answer time, so the effect of changing to five seconds is not close to the same as changing to unlimited time.
Mike, I have to base my comments on my own experience, which is limited to two HSNCTs, a few regional tourneys at the HS level, and local play; I am not familiar with mACF format, nor have I seen a match play out with a five second rule. From that limited experience, however, my opinion is that the purpose of the buzzer in quiz bowl is to indicate that you know the answer. If a player is "gaming", as Chris puts it, then he/she knows the rules in advance and games in accordance with them. All the events we've attended have had 3 second rules (or less), and as I said, waiting on that three count, which is variable with any moderator to some extent, can be excruciating, particularly when you are playing against a "gamer." If you need five seconds AFTER you buzz to come up with your answer due to lateral thinking, why did you buzz? I don't see why it is arbitrarily better to have five seconds to think about what you want to say than three, or seven, or ten. I have never played QB at the college level; is it a mark of particularly good quiz bowl players that they buzz before they know what they are going to say, then consider in that five seconds? Seriously, I want to know if I need to change the way I coach my kids.
Carangoides ciliarius wrote: So what do you want, 1 second? A half second? I love the 5 second rule and i think that any less is ridiculous for a player that's trying to come up with an answer when a question is being read incredibly fast.
Actually, what I want is for players to read minds so they can answer before the question was asked. Seriously, I'm not saying answers should be instantaneous, Mr. C. I'm saying that my understanding of the purpose of that three second period has always been to give the player leeway for having a momentary "brain freeze", not to offer a chance to think out the answer further. If you pushed the button, you declared you knew the answer, not that you would know it five seconds from now if you could think about it. Again, I understand strategy is involved. There have been players in our area who will buzz slightly ahead of the moderator's reading a key word, knowing they will pick up a syllable or even the full word 75% of the time before the moderator is able to stop reading. That's a calculated risk, and if they want to take it, fine. Five seconds, though, is a lot of time to allow for a player to think before having to begin answering a question they, by buzzing, claimed to know the answer to.
What people are arguing here is that 3 seconds isn't enough time to overcome the "brain-freeze" you mentioned. I don't agree that we should go out of our way to reward gamesmanship, but we should realize how fast-paced games between even teams are going to be. During our finals match against LASA at Prison Bowl, for example, there was a tossup on "nitrogen," and I recognized a clue in the second or third line. I couldn't pull the answer immediately after hearing the clue, but I knew I could in the time limit, and more pressingly, I knew that LASA could too. After buzzing in, it took a little while to work out the answer (they're talking about this molecule, which has this structure, which contains...), but within the 5 second time limit, I came up with the correct response. I don't really see how your finger-wagging "You buzzed, so you should know the answer!" argument applies to this situation. The fact is that every clue after that one would have been useless to me, and it was very likely that LASA would buzz if I didn't. This isn't whatever issue of morality or maturity that you're making it out to be: it's just that the early clues to pyramidal questions can get very complicated, so that even if a team buzzes when they know a clue, it'll take a few seconds to draw out the answer. Rather than rewarding gamesmanship, the five second rule removes a player's fear of "brain freeze" and allows them to actually buzz once they hear a clue that they know. In my experience, three seconds is often just not enough time.

(LASA ended up thrashing us in that final anyway, so that buzz didn't matter, but you see my point).
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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by jdeliverer »

In my personal experience, it takes longer to come up the answer with real knowledge than stock clues or common quizbowl clues. A decent amount of my negs have been from early buzzes where I think "I've read that book, buzz," then can't pull the title, only to remember it right when time is called. Quickly associating the title/name of something with the description shouldn't be what we test - it should be the actual knowledge of the answer.

That said, I think 5 seconds is a reasonable time for someone to be able to come up with the answer. For reasons Matt pointed out above, you can't always wait until you already have the answer in your head to buzz.
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Re: three seconds? five seconds? no seconds?

Post by Susan »

AlphaQuizBowler wrote:Is there a reason why PACE only allows players 3 seconds to answer after buzzing in instead of the (m)ACF standard 5 seconds?
(these posts split off from the PACE NSC thread)
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Re: three seconds? five seconds? no seconds?

Post by Down and out in Quintana Roo »

Thanks for splitting this thread off. It's a good discussion.

I just don't like different sets of rules. It's very frustrating to practice on mACF format pretty much all year, and then suddenly at the end of the year it's "well guys, i'm going to read as fast as humanly possible to get through 26 questions in two 9-minute halves, and you'll have 2 seconds to start you answer after you buzz in, so get used to it." I hate rules like that. Why are we coming up with reasons to make answers incorrect? It's just like the thread that's talking about what types of answers are acceptable when it comes to extra information... if a person says the right after, who cares what else they say?

And why would we make time such an important variable in this game? It shouldn't be. I think 5 seconds is appropriate, any more would really slow the game to a crawl, but 2-3 seconds is so fast that a lot of people just can't come up with an answer fast enough in that time. Maybe that's just my personal experience (i blank a lot on questions when i play).
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Re: three seconds? five seconds? no seconds?

Post by kayli »

Five seconds is ideal because it gives you enough time to buzz on clues you actually know and churn out the answer. On harder clues, it's almost impossible to actually reflex buzz and get the question right. This is especially true in fine arts questions where you often have to take some time to think about that element in the artwork or that segment of the concerto. In that span, a question reader (especially at HSNCT where time is of the essence) will often blast through a couple more clues essentially making the harder clues impractical to get. Five seconds is a very fair time limit for answering a question. However at NAQT, this is problematic because you have to play with a clock. Theoretically those five seconds could be used to burn through more time when you're up before answering a question. This span on time is in a weird zone between negligible and very significant. One solution would be to stop the timer when someone is answering the question. The simpler solution is getting rid of the timer altogether while keeping the 26 question format.
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Re: three seconds? five seconds? no seconds?

Post by Rufous-capped Thornbill »

Even 3 seconds at HSNCT would be good. 2 seconds just puts players in bad positions. I know that sometimes it takes me 3-4 seconds to remember the answer when I buzz. I have a legitimate fear that I'm going to get a bunch of negs this weekend because of the 2 second rule.
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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by Captain Sinico »

Joshua Rutsky wrote:...waiting on that three count... can be excruciating, particularly when you are playing against a "gamer."
I don't understand how this is supposed to count against the rule. The other team getting or almost getting a question is always excruciating. So what?
Joshua Rutsky wrote:If you need five seconds AFTER you buzz to come up with your answer..., why did you buzz?
Because you knew you knew the answer.
Joshua Rutsky wrote:I don't see why it is arbitrarily better to have five seconds to think about what you want to say than three, or seven, or ten.
I didn't say it was. Your case is necessarily that it's worse; I'm countering that I don't see how it's worse, not that it's necessarily better.
Joshua Rutsky wrote:is it a mark of particularly good quiz bowl players that they buzz before they know what they are going to say, then consider in that five seconds?
I always tell my players to use their post-buzz time to consider their answer. After all, the time's there, so you'd better use it. At any rate, yes, good players often buzz when they think they know the answer, even if they don't think they can say it at that instant, and come up with it in whatever time they have, be it 5 seconds, 2 seconds, or "however long it takes an incompetent CBI staffer to notice that I have buzzed and read my nametag." Certainly other players have longer recall time, less confidence, less non-binary-association knowledge, less notion of how to win, or some combination of those things and will only buzz when they know they can already say the answer (or at least what they think to be the answer.)
So, the upshot is that, really, the play of the game doesn't change too much with post-buzz time. Players with recall times close to the margin will adapt their buzzing strategy or neg more due to tardy recall with shorter answer times. That's about it. I tend to prefer longer answer times to let people come up with things they know, within reason, to shift the balance in the game toward knowledge and away from recall speed.

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Re: three seconds? five seconds? no seconds?

Post by Dan-Don »

I think 5 seconds is absolutely necessary for your brain to catch up with your thumb, especially if one does a lot of impulse buzzing. Anything more than 5 would probably be overkill, but I think 2 is way too short and might actually punish quicker players. I realize NAQT is on the clock, so I would advocate them going to 3 seconds, but it seems that PACE could easily up it to 5 without making anyone unhappy.
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Re: three seconds? five seconds? no seconds?

Post by Jesus vs. Dragons »

Dan-Don wrote:I think 5 seconds is absolutely necessary for your brain to catch up with your thumb, especially if one does a lot of impulse buzzing. Anything more than 5 would probably be overkill, but I think 2 is way too short and might actually punish quicker players. I realize NAQT is on the clock, so I would advocate them going to 3 seconds, but it seems that PACE could easily up it to 5 without making anyone unhappy.
I disagree. I think that if you are "impulse buzzing" it would actually be easier to get the answer out quicker than if someone was trying to use lateral thinking to "figure out" the answer. I have had plenty of buzzes where I buzz in and think "oh crap what did they just say?" but when I got time called I didn't feel it was because I only had 3 seconds, I felt it was a bad buzz that I shouldn't have made.
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Re: three seconds? five seconds? no seconds?

Post by Unicolored Jay »

I don't like having anything less than 3 seconds. Probably a third of my negs (which aren't many of) have come from running out of time, and I remember a few times this year when the 2-second rule was used, which cost me FIFTEEN because I couldn't recall the name of something in time.

I think impulse buzzing can lead to instances where I can answer the question immediately or where i can't. The last time I got negged for running out of time, I had buzzed in on a clue I had heard maybe 3 times, but then forgot the answer. Other times, though, I can name whatever it is immediately. It can really go both ways.
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Re: three seconds? five seconds? no seconds?

Post by Charley Pride »

I'm definitely a fan of the 5-second-rule, if only because it lets me watch my brother snap his fingers and curse under his breath a little more.
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Re: three seconds? five seconds? no seconds?

Post by Charley Pride »

The thing about a longer time is that it does tend to reward knowledge and forgive a lack of instantaneous knowledge. I prefer this. Think of a player who recognizes something in the first line, but doesn't come up with the answer right away. In the 4 seconds it takes for him to remember, more clues have been read, and someone with less obscure knowledge beats him to the buzz. Longer stall times allow for pyramidality to work better.
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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by Howard »

Joshua Rutsky wrote:Mike, I have to base my comments on my own experience, which is limited to two HSNCTs, a few regional tourneys at the HS level, and local play; I am not familiar with mACF format, nor have I seen a match play out with a five second rule. From that limited experience, however, my opinion is that the purpose of the buzzer in quiz bowl is to indicate that you know the answer. If a player is "gaming", as Chris puts it, then he/she knows the rules in advance and games in accordance with them. All the events we've attended have had 3 second rules (or less), and as I said, waiting on that three count, which is variable with any moderator to some extent, can be excruciating, particularly when you are playing against a "gamer." If you need five seconds AFTER you buzz to come up with your answer due to lateral thinking, why did you buzz? I don't see why it is arbitrarily better to have five seconds to think about what you want to say than three, or seven, or ten. I have never played QB at the college level; is it a mark of particularly good quiz bowl players that they buzz before they know what they are going to say, then consider in that five seconds? Seriously, I want to know if I need to change the way I coach my kids.
Part of the problem here is that, any way we slice it, quizbowl is still a game. Teams win and teams lose. Good players will automatically tend toward a strategy that works best for them. This includes making buzzes at the point where they recognize a clue, figuring they can recall the answer. And this is of course, a gamble. Employing this strategy will result in more correct answers but also more negs. A higher time limit to answer skews the odds more toward correct answers and a lower limit skews the odds toward more negs.

But I think the discussion we've been having here misses one important point. Encouraging players to ring even before they know the answer pushes them to practice their thinking and recall skills. In time, repeating this type of situation will improve their overall recall abilities.
John Gilbert
Coach, Howard High School Academic Team
Ellicott City, MD

"John Gilbert is a quiz bowl god" -- leftsaidfred
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pblessman
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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by pblessman »

Howard wrote: A higher time limit to answer skews the odds more toward correct answers and a lower limit skews the odds toward more negs.
Maybe... but a longer time limit will encourage even more players to buzz in before they actually "know" the answer figuring they will recall within the time frame given. This could lead to MORE negs, not less...
Howard wrote:But I think the discussion we've been having here misses one important point. Encouraging players to ring even before they know the answer pushes them to practice their thinking and recall skills. In time, repeating this type of situation will improve their overall recall abilities.
Agreed- this is a KEY skill and players should be coached to get a good felling for this. You have to buzz when you know you'll know the answer in x seconds, not when you actually know the answer. (x=(time until prompted) + (time allotted to answer in this format) - (just enough so you don't get negged)).
Phil Blessman- Culver Academies Head Quizbowl Coach
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Re: PACE NSC: format changes, 2010 information

Post by Captain Sinico »

pblessman wrote:
Howard wrote: A higher time limit to answer skews the odds more toward correct answers and a lower limit skews the odds toward more negs.
Maybe... but a longer time limit will encourage even more players to buzz in before they actually "know" the answer figuring they will recall within the time frame given. This could lead to MORE negs, not less...
Yeah, I agree: the effect of a post-buzz time change depends on the type of player and how they're playing. For example, I always have liked exploiting my post-buzz time to a maximal extent, to the point that probably half or more of my buzzes in competitive games are the "buzz off clue I think I know and only then worry about what the answer actually is" type. However, the first time I played CBI, which had a "be recognized, then answer immediately" policy, I negged a ton because that post-buzz strategy is ill-adapted to that rule (and, of course, because they had other stupid rules and bad, hose questions that caused people to neg undeservedly...) Eventually, however, I almost never negged in that format unless my guess was actually wrong, because I only buzzed when I already knew what I was going to say or was damn sure I was about to.
That brings us back to the essence of what both John and Phil have said, which is that savvy or well coached players will pretty much adapt their play to whatever rules exist, especially this particular rule since it has historically varied most from format to format. Look at it this way: if I could make my notoriously deliberate game work within CBI's asinine rules, it has to be possible. Note, however, that that face doesn't mean that all rules are equal. The penalty for adaptation will always be paid disproportionately by some types of players, so it's always necessary to consider who will be hurt by a given rule and why.

M

PS:
pblessman wrote:Agreed- this is a KEY skill and players should be coached to get a good felling for this.
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