2019 EFT - Specific Question Discussion and Errata

[naan/steak-holding toll]

Discuss specific questions here. Until we have packets up, if you'd like to request a question, please provide a reason as to why you'd like to see it.

[Santa Claus]

I don't understand why the tossup on "purple" remains. Many of the clues rely on subjective perceptions of color as opposed to things that are named for the color.

A superficially similar problem I have is with the clues on the color of octahedral and tetrahedral complexes of cobalt, which entirely relies on the assumption that people who may or may not have done a specific introductory lab in inorganic chemistry remember the color of the two compounds both before and after and the specific metal used.

EDIT: Going to add a few thoughts here as they come up.

As Jason noted on Facebook, Sufism is not a sect.

The first two clues of Huntington's remain too difficult.

There were some factual inaccuracies in tossups: Neutrons do not transform into neutrinos and positrons during beta decay and the Feynman diagram tossup heavily implies all virtual particles are denoted using squiggly lines.

It would be nice if the tossup on tRNA did not have a clue whose papers have ~100 citations in its first line and a lead-in from ACF Nationals in its second line.

I think the lead-in for the Rydberg tossup has overshot its difficulty mark a little bit. The RKR method isn't really used at all in microwave spectroscopy (or rather, hasn't been used since 1970) and even the Wikipedia page lacks any citations so I don't really see who's going to be getting that.

The tossup on John the Baptist lead-in is a little confusing since the Ginza Rba is also called the Book of Adam.

Sharecropping is not a profession.

[karstenontheshore]

I generally really enjoyed this set, and it was an awesome first experience in college quiz bowl. That said, I have a few specific comments. The iodine tossup's powermark seemed to go way too late. Keith Haring was a REALLY hard answerline for this level. The Procrustes tossup seemed like math for the first half (maybe that's intentional, but it was strange) The Iliad tossup really frustrated me, as Madeline Miller wrote both The Song of Achilles based on the Iliad and Circe based on the Odyssey, and having read both, the clue about it being the first published wasn't helpful at all, leading me to neg on content I knew, so that clue could be reworked. The stone tossup should probably accept quartz, as tiger's eye is a type of quartz, so that should be at least promptable. The WWI tossup was just super transparent. The Vonnegut tossup read really hard, as I've read most of his books but couldn't get it until the Ilium clue, which was a bit of a cliff. I agree with William on the "funny" stuff, which didn't add to the set in any meaningful way. These are the things I think of first, but I'll edit if I remember others.

[jinah]

I've spoken about most of these with people already, but:

- The Pygmalion bonus part is incorrect. Eliza does not learn how to speak with a Cockney accent; she learns how to not do that.

- The tossup on Emile Zola should come after the bonus on Clemenceau, as the Clemenceau part notes that Zola wrote J'Accuse, but the Zola tossup does not mention Clemenceau (i.e. the bonus can be used to answer the tossup, but not vice versa).

- IIRC there are two bonus parts on Tiresias in literature, which seems like possibly one too many for a single tournament.

- It feels bizarre to me to claim that SoftBank "has opposed" "WeWork's proposed IPO." As far as I am aware, SoftBank's intentions for WeWork were always to take it public, and that is still presumably the end goal. It recently pushed for a pause on the IPO after the rollout/leadup became a complete shitshow, and the governance changes + writedown undertaken by WeWork have largely been interpreted as trying to clean it up for a future IPO. The clue as written is a very questionable framing of the situation.

- The easy and middle parts for Dead Poets Society and the Coen Brothers seem very similar in difficulty.

[warum]

The First Great Awakening tossup should not mention the United States, since the US did not yet exist at the time of the First Great Awakening.

The "69,000" bonus on mean, confidence interval, and standard deviation did not have a hard part. Also, I'd like to see the definition of confidence interval used in the question again, since defining what a confidence interval is has some nuances that a lot of people (and even textbooks) get wrong.

I was confused by the "Mafia" part on the Neapolitan Novels bonus because the crime organization in Naples is typically called Camorra, not Mafia. It's possible that the English translation of the novels uses the word Mafia though (or maybe the criminals in the Novel are Sicilians in Naples); someone who has read one of the books can check that.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

I've spoken about most of these with people already, but:

- The Pygmalion bonus part is incorrect. Eliza does not learn how to speak with a Cockney accent; she learns how to not do that.

- The tossup on Emile Zola should come after the bonus on Clemenceau, as the Clemenceau part notes that Zola wrote J'Accuse, but the Zola tossup does not mention Clemenceau (i.e. the bonus can be used to answer the tossup, but not vice versa).

- IIRC there are two bonus parts on Tiresias in literature, which seems like possibly one too many for a single tournament.

- It feels bizarre to me to claim that SoftBank "has opposed" "WeWork's proposed IPO." As far as I am aware, SoftBank's intentions for WeWork were always to take it public, and that is still presumably the end goal. It recently pushed for a pause on the IPO after the rollout/leadup became a complete shitshow, and the governance changes + writedown undertaken by WeWork have largely been interpreted as trying to clean it up for a future IPO. The clue as written is a very questionable framing of the situation.

- The easy and middle parts for Dead Poets Society and the Coen Brothers seem very similar in difficulty.

From what I've read, SoftBank has been urging WeWork to not go public for some time, though I suppose they'd definitely want to take the company public if they can get a high valuation for doing so. In any case, the wording has been clarified.

The Zola and Tiresias things will be fixed (the latter already has) and the Coen brothers part probably needs to be changed out.

[Bosa of York]

Alcohols having a broad peak in IR spec due to hydrogen bonding was mentioned in both the hydrogen bonding bonus part and the alcohols tossup.

This is a fantastically minor quibble but there should probably be a pronunciation guide on periodic [“purr”-“eye”-oh-dihc] acid (by analogy with peroxide or perchloric acid) in the round 9 diols bonus part since everyone who hasn’t already heard of that will pronounce it like the periodic table.

[Vembanad]

I want to second Karsten's comment: I had a great time at my first college quiz bowl tournament, and thought the questions were in general very accessible. I don't have too many comments on individual questions (as previously mentioned, the 69,000 clue seemed terribly unprofessional; I thought the first line for Grover Cleveland was on the easy side; and it might just be New York bias, but Suffolk County seemed pretty early for the Long Island question), but I wanted to ask if I could see the text of the music theory bonus in Packet 9 or 10. (I wanted to see what notes it mentioned, because it seemed like our answer was correct from what I remembered but I might have just written down the notes wrong.)

[AGoodMan]

Can I see the question and answerlines for the Korea tossup? I said Joseon and then said Korea, but I believe the identifier in the question was "this kingdom."

A few observations:
- There were at least 3 bonus parts on the Netherlands. IIRC, there were two history bonus parts on the Netherlands and the Dutch auction bonus part.
- Two "commodity" tossups in the same round ("information" and "bananas"). Not a huge deal, but might be worth shuffling around.
- This may only be me, but I think there was a relative lack of Christianity compared to Islam content. But I'm clearly biased here and it may have been the editors' intent anyway.
- I concur with what other people said about the "69,000" "naked mole-rats" bonus.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

Thanks for the feedback, folks. A few clarifications:

Keith Haring was a REALLY hard answerline for this level.

The Procrustes tossup seemed like math for the first half (maybe that's intentional, but it was strange)

The stone tossup should probably accept quartz, as tiger's eye is a type of quartz, so that should be at least promptable. The WWI tossup was just super transparent.

The Vonnegut tossup read really hard, as I've read most of his books but couldn't get it until the Ilium clue, which was a bit of a cliff.

I've heard this comment about Haring in a few places and thought I'd address it. Keith Haring is an extremely famous modern artist who has not been asked much as a tossup answer before, and thus perhaps has been arbitrarily defined as "very hard." However, he is extremely famous and is probably one of the most-interacted-with modern artists on the planet in recent decades. I not only heard several teams at the most PACE NSC talking about him, but many of our writing staff had encountered his work early in their education. At my site, that tossup was gotten just out of power on the clue about the very famous musical Radiant Baby. To me, this is similar to complaints about tossing up La Bayadere at last year's SGI - by any measure, that's a top 5 or top 10 ballet, so if we are to "take ballet seriously" then we need to be able to toss up La Bayadere at regular tournaments.

The Procrustes tossup was a miscellaneous academic tossup, not a myth tossup, so this was very much intentional.

The quartz comment is on-point and we'll add that in. Thanks for catching that!

The early clues of the Vonnegut tossup were meant to focus on unique aspects of his work other than his novels, such as the popular essay "Here is a Lesson in Creative Writing" and the clue about his signature. Advanced stats show that many people were able to buzz on these clues.

This may only be me, but I think there was a relative lack of Christianity compared to Islam content. But I'm clearly biased here and it may have been the editors' intent anyway.

There was significant Christianity content in the tossups on Martin Luther, African-Americans, the Holy Trinity, John the Baptist, and Russia and bonuses on St. Francis, Ignatius of Loyola, and Mary Semple McPherson. In addition, there was 1/1 Old Testament content in the Legends/Myths distribution (Judges and Gog/Magog) and a bonus on Nestorius in the bonus about the Syro-Aramaic Qur'an, as well as a question on Mormonism. Perhaps one more question on Christian practice would have been ideal, but I think this is well within the orbit of reasonable.

The Korea tossup accepted Joseon until it was read:

12. A protest movement in the former lands of this kingdom began when a group of intellectuals left a declaration of independence with their check at a restaurant. Academics in this kingdom were targeted by the “Short Hair Act,” part of a set of reforms passed after its empress was assassinated. The March 1st Movement sought to restore the independence of this kingdom, which was made a protectorate in the aftermath of the Treaty of (*) Portsmouth and annexed five years later. Before her death, Empress Myeongseong (“m’yung-sung”) reformed the yangban caste system in this kingdom, which lost its traditional Chinese protection after the 1894 Sino-Japanese War. For 10 points, name this kingdom whose Joseon (“choh-sun”) dynasty was ended when it was conquered by Japan.
ANSWER: Korea [accept Choson or Joseon until “Joseon” is read]

[AGoodMan]

The Korea tossup accepted Joseon until it was read:

12. A protest movement in the former lands of this kingdom began when a group of intellectuals left a declaration of independence with their check at a restaurant. Academics in this kingdom were targeted by the “Short Hair Act,” part of a set of reforms passed after its empress was assassinated. The March 1st Movement sought to restore the independence of this kingdom, which was made a protectorate in the aftermath of the Treaty of (*) Portsmouth and annexed five years later. Before her death, Empress Myeongseong (“m’yung-sung”) reformed the yangban caste system in this kingdom, which lost its traditional Chinese protection after the 1894 Sino-Japanese War. For 10 points, name this kingdom whose Joseon (“choh-sun”) dynasty was ended when it was conquered by Japan.
ANSWER: Korea [accept Choson or Joseon until “Joseon” is read]

So relatively minor, but I want to point out a couple quibbles I have with this question. When I heard this question, it took me an additional 1-2 seconds to buzz despite recognizing the clues.

First, Joseon officially ends in 1897, and the Korean Empire ruled from 1897-1910. Yet this question draws clues from the Joseon period, the Empire period, and the Japanese annexation period. Given the identifier of "kingdom," it wasn't immediately clear what was being asked. I was especially confused/afraid to buzz because I had been negged before for saying "Korea" on tossups asking about Joseon.

Second, Korea is not a kingdom. There has never been a kingdom called "Korea." It's not like England or France, where different dynasties ruled but people generally considered themselves to subjects of "England" or "France" from relatively early on.

I think the question can be improved by restricting clues strictly to the Joseon period (and therefore having the main answer be "Joseon" and prompt on Korea) or changing the identifier to "this region" or something along the lines of that.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

Second, Korea is not a kingdom. There has never been a kingdom called "Korea." It's not like England or France, where different dynasties ruled but people generally considered themselves to subjects of "England" or "France" from relatively early on.

I take it that this identifier was chosen because we didn't want to cause any confusion with the word "country" or "no-longer-extant country" (that was certainly my reasoning in not objecting to it as head editor).

I think Jon's perspective is reasonable, but I'm not sure I quite agree for the following reasons: 1) The word "Korea" itself comes from the name of the Goryeo kingdom, much like how a now-deprecated Japanese term for Korea, Chōsen, refers to the Joseon (don't use this word, though, as you'll sound like a Japanese imperialist - the preferred term is "Kankoku"). 2) From the Goryeo period until the Japanese annexation, Korea was a well-defined, unified geopolitical unit, and the transition from the Goryeo to Joseon dynasties didn't change this as much as a lot of Chinese dynasty upheavals did for China (and even the latter is quite arguable). 3) In the strictest sense, Korea meets the loose definition of kingdom as "territory ruled by a single monarch" (as contrasted with empire, another loosely defined term, but which generally refers to a monarchial state encompassing many different nations). 4) The question is specifying a territory, not the line of people who ruled it.

Ultimately, there are benefits and drawbacks to selecting identifiers such as "region" versus "kingdom." Most people will say "Korea" for "region" but what if someone says a sub-region and you didn't think to put it in the answerline? What if someone says a very broad region? With this answer, clearly there are some edge cases as well. It's not a simple decision to make. We could have written the tossup on Joseon as well, but I did that at EFT 2016 and we wanted to save some of the slightly-harder answer slots for elsewhere.

For what it's worth, this question should also probably accept Hanguk as well and I'll be adding that in.

[a bird]

This set contained two references to the SI system of units that have small issues.

[10] Sèvres houses the International Bureau of Weights and Measures, which stores platinum-iridium cylinders that
serve to officially define the units of this system, which was formalized by an 1875 convention in nearby Paris.
ANSWER: metric system [accept SI or International System of Units or Système internationale d’unités; accept
mks or cgs or meter–kilogram–second or centimeter–gram–second system; prompt on kilogram and meter ]

While I applaud the inclusion of metrology history in the set, you should note that as of 2019, the international prototype kilogram (the cylinder housed in a vault in Sèvres) is no longer a defining part of the SI system.

In 2019, this constant was redefined such that the fine-structure constant equals [read slowly] “this
quantity, times c , times e -squared, all over two times Planck’s constant.” The product of this quantity with
the speed of light equals approximately 377 ohms. This constant’s units are equivalent to [read slowly]
“seconds squared, divided by farads times meters,” as can be shown by rearranging Maxwell’s formula. This
constant can be experimentally measured by finding the force between two wires of known length, current,
and separation. It equals exactly (*) 4 pi times 10-to-the-negative-7 henries per meter. The current enclosed by a
loop of wire, times this constant, equals the line integral of the B-field along that loop by Ampère’s circuit law. For
10 points, name this constant symbolized “mu-nought” that gives the ability of a vacuum to support a magnetic
field.
ANSWER: magnetic permeability [or vacuum permeability or permeability of free space; or mu-nought ; accept
magnetic constant until “constant” is read, but prompt after; prompt on mu until “mu-nought” is read; do not accept
or prompt on “permittivity”]

This question actually references the current (2019) definition in its first line, but then refers to the old definition (exactly 4 pi times 10-to-the-negative-7 henries per meter) which is no longer accurate!

[1.82]

A couple errors I noticed:

The first clue of Tossup 20 in Packet 5, on Polish-Americans, refers to Roman Hruska as a Nebraska senator of this ethnicity. Hruska is a Czech name, and while it may be that Hruska had Polish ancestry, I find a number of sources online that refer to him as Czech, which means that this clue is either incorrect or not uniquely identifying.

Bonus 13 in Packet 12 refers to Compton as a neighborhood of Los Angeles, which is inaccurate. Compton is a separate municipality and not part of Los Angeles.

[Zealots of Stockholm]

Just chiming in to say that Keith Haring seemed fine to me, and I edited a bonus themed around him for last year's WHAQ

[A Lust-Fanned Dairy Tale]

I really enjoyed this set and many thanks to Will & everyone for their hard work on it. A few small things I noticed:

1) TU 6, round 1 (dogs in lit): you clue The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time and refer to Christopher as "socially awkward." He has autism. I don't know if it was chosen on purpose because using that specific word would be more of a giveaway, but IMO it would be reasonable to use the word autistic there.

2) TU 17, round 5 (teachers): Cluing "dance of the lemons" as the first line here seems too easy (that's probably the most memorable sequence in Waiting for Superman, which is part of the tell), especially considering the second clue is pure social theory. Seems to me like they could be reversed.

3) TU 18, round 2 (Long Island, NY): As someone who spent a lot of her childhood on Long Island, I appreciate how it seemed specifically designed to appeal to me. I do agree with Cerulean that mentioning Suffolk County, Sag Harbor, and (to a lesser extent) Route 27 in power is probably a little too early.

I agree with what's already been said about the naked mole rats bonus, as well, both in terms of professionalism and the e/m/h distribution.

[benmillerbenmiller]

By and large, I thought this was a very solid set. It hit its difficulty mark effectively and did so with very few fundamental issues (which is more than a lot of sets can say!). All I can comment on with any degree of insight is the history, which I think Jakob, Matthew, and others were broadly successful in handling. The questions were interesting, had a great diversity of answerlines, and were almost-uniformly free of factual or grammatical issues.

There are a handful though that I think are worth critiquing. I outlined some thoughts below, which since we don't yet have access to advance stats I caveat with the fact that they reflect only my experience playing the set.

-It struck me that this set tossed up very little in the way of classics. Sassanids, copper, Hanging Gardens, and a little interdisciplinary referencing is all that I can remember. I would have liked to see the Greco-Roman content be a little more in keeping with typical history distributions.

-The Flight 93 question was an okay idea poorly executed. Using "this vehicle" (rather than say "this specific vehicle" or something like it) clouded what the question was looking for, and it was frustrating to watch someone buzz on "Let's Roll" and not know you're looking specifically for "Flight 93." A directed prompt would have been useful.

-There were several instances where famous things were dropped very early in questions that were actually pointing another direction. For instance, saying Ben Chifley in the first line of the Liberal Party tossup led me to immediately go in with Labor. I know get what I deserve for going in super early, but it is important to recognize that at game speed it is difficult to parse things like that early in questions where players have not had a chance to contextualize anything.

-The Hruska lead-in on Polish Americans was deeply confusing for the reasons Naveed mentioned.

-The tossup on Buddhist monks really had no reason to require Buddhist in the answerline. I went in relatively early and ended up saying Shinto because I didn't have enough info to say one way or the other. Obviously it would have been easier if I knew more things, but I'm not sure what you gain by making that answer harder than it needs to be.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

The tossup on Buddhist monks really had no reason to require Buddhist in the answerline.

You seem to have answered your own question - as the question makes clear, Buddhist monks often got involved in warfare, whereas this was not the case for Shinto priests or religious figures, which suggests to me that this distinction is both culturally and historically relevant. It seems that you were unaware of this fact, as evidenced by saying "Shinto" when prompted (and this should have been a directed prompt).

The Flight 93 question was an okay idea poorly executed. Using "this vehicle" (rather than say "this specific vehicle" or something like it) clouded what the question was looking for, and it was frustrating to watch someone buzz on "Let's Roll" and not know you're looking specifically for "Flight 93." A directed prompt would have been useful.

It would seem to me that the singular pronoun "this vehicle" would imply such a thing, but I suppose there's no harm in adding "this specific vehicle" to the question. I'm very surprised that this issue occurred but I'll add it.

It struck me that this set tossed up very little in the way of classics. Sassanids, copper, Hanging Gardens, and a little interdisciplinary referencing is all that I can remember. I would have liked to see the Greco-Roman content be a little more in keeping with typical history distributions.

This is fair, and I noticed it fairly late in the production process, but in general I think it's fine to have a few sets that are lighter on traditional Greco-Roman content, in particular because classical Greek history honestly isn't that deep of a well at this level and can be a bit hard to make fresh and interesting. Of course, not everything has to be fresh and interesting, but not every set has to be EFT 2019 either. There was a good amount of classical mythology and I think a decent amount of classical literature too, at the very least.

[benmillerbenmiller]

The tossup on Buddhist monks really had no reason to require Buddhist in the answerline.

You seem to have answered your own question - as the question makes clear, Buddhist monks often got involved in warfare, whereas this was not the case for Shinto priests or religious figures, which suggests to me that this distinction is both culturally and historically relevant. It seems that you were unaware of this fact, as evidenced by saying "Shinto" when prompted (and this should have been a directed prompt).

Well, buzzing before any military clues were provided, that relevant distinction was not all that helpful for me. I remembered that Empress Kōken was involved with a monk, and I think on a Regs- set that should be enough to get points. If you want to specifically test knowledge of Buddhism in Japanese history, toss that up instead.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

I really don't think this is the case - institutionalized Shinto was, frankly, not that relevant in politics before the Imperial Japanese era, and most shrine attendants were not full-time religious devotees. This strikes me as a very relevant cultural and historical fact, since this was one of the big motivations behind trying to institutionalize Shinto, an effort which completely collapsed after 1945. The only exception I that comes to mind are the yamabushi, who mostly practice syncretic Shugendo as opposed to pure Shinto - and these were just not very numerous compared to sohei warrior monks.

[Zealots of Stockholm]

I believe the "stone" TU in packet 12 should accept rock as the churches in Lalibela are often referred to as "rock-hewn." I know I learned about them using that language in an intro art history class, at least.

[AGoodMan]

14. ​This character asks “Do you repent?” shortly before releasing a man from prison who discovers that his hair has gone entirely white.

This is the leadin to the Edmond Dantes tossup. I buzzed shortly after with Javert because I remembered that Jean Valjean's hair also turns white. I have no doubt that the clue as it stands is uniquely identifying to Dantes, but in game speed I think it's bait-y; at least it definitely got me. I'm not sure how known/easy the white hair Jean Valjean thing is (and therefore would/should not be included in the leadin of a hypothetical Javert tossup, but EFT is also a relatively easy set), but I think it's still worth looking into.

[Mike Bentley]

1) TU 6, round 1 (dogs in lit): you clue The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time and refer to Christopher as "socially awkward." He has autism. I don't know if it was chosen on purpose because using that specific word would be more of a giveaway, but IMO it would be reasonable to use the word autistic there.

It's actually only the book's dust jacket that refers to the character as autistic. It's not explicitly mentioned in the novel and I don't recall it being stated in the play, either. I'm curious to see this dog question though since I don't recall hearing it on the online mirror.

Regarding Keith Haring, I more or less agree that he's under-asked about in quizbowl compared to his fame among a lay audience. His iconic and approachable style has helped him cross-over into the mainstream more than many quizbowl-canon artists of the same era.

[Votre Kickstarter Est Nul]

I'll try and post more general thoughts in the other thread, but I'll try and give my off the top of my head comments on the questions I have any knowledge of on a packet-by-packet basis. I'll also only be commenting on TUs since I don't write bonuses fully on my notes and could mess the parts up. I'll also only be commenting on what I heard of questions, so I apologize if at any point my awareness of the question is limited in a way that would change my understanding of it (though I'll do my best to go back and doublecheck afterwards).

Packet 1
witch doctor was a cool idea
prisons was fraudable, but cool, so this comment isn't particularly helpful. I don't think it was the writing though—it was well written—I think the conceit overall is just a tad fraudable.

Packet 2
Cuzco seemed (I say seemed since I know rather little precolombian stuff) very cool and well executed. The Puma clue was super cool!
Hollywood was cool (I enjoyed the US History in this set alot)
Vonnegut seemed awesome—Darren firstlined it and seemed excited by it and the clue was certainly cool.

Packet 3
Sade seemed well executed and interesting.
Maybe I'll be wrong about this, but Bhutto seems like a subpar answerline selection for this tournament. My gut instinct is it's a bit difficult for this level, and the sort of answerline that caters best to those who have hung around QB for a while and buzz on history at all moreso than novice players (though my instinct on what people know about Pakistan may be wrong idk). If I'm right, which I don't have the data to back up (and will obviously retract if it shows I'm wrong), then I'd say that I generally prefer a "harder end of the history at this tourney" to be a bit more creative, like sharecroppers (though I agree with Kevin that it isn't exactly a "job" and I'm not entirely sure if not outright accepting farmers is worthwhile). The tossup was fine other than that.
Copernicus was a cool tu!

Packet 4
Sabbath was pretty fraudible, since the combination of "this observance" "need help of a goy" and "alternate electronic device" made it pretty apparent what was happening.
MHC was tough at this level according to Joelle but I know nothing so I can't say more.
Nabokov was well-themed and cool, though a bit of the prose (at game speed) sounded a bit contorted for thematic purposes, but that could be my memory playing tricks on me.
United 93 seemed super awesome to me (who knows nothing about this stuff)
An Enemy of the People seems like another Bhutto-style answerline to me, and my guess (which could be super off) is that it played like the Major Barbara TU at Terrapin 2019, where, because it's standard canon material, it's gotten by most teams that have experience and is less novice-friendly (for reference, Major Barbara has a solid power rate and buzz distro but ended up at 75% conversion (a bit lower if you remove the playtest).

Packet 5
Big I don't buzz on music caveat: Legetti seems rather tough for this level.

Packet 6
Warren was fun, and the kind of cool thing I imagine will play well despite being (I imagine) pretty fresh in terms of "has it been done before."
Unions was quite fraudable.

Packet 7
passports was cool, and in my opinion didn't seem particularly fraudable. It seemed somewhat clear to me early that it was some form of identification of otherwise official document, but I don't actually think the answerspace for that is so small that it would be overly fraudable.
I know literally no econ, but, information seemed strange and fraudable to me. First, calling it a commodity was strange to me (maybe that's something that makes sense in econ circles, but it was a bit strange to me, who knows nothing lol). The second line also seemed to point directly to information in a fraudable sense (what other commodity would need to spread fast for a market to be efficient?) Again, if this comment is straight ignorance please correct me.
Courbet was cool, though I suspect that it was maybe a tad tough (is Lacan owning Origin of the World a second line at this level?)
Mrs. Dalloway seemed well done from an outsider's perspective (in that I have never read any Dalloway-related Woolf).
bananas was a cool idea and continues my "I really liked the US history in this" thread of commentary

Packet 8
Will, I already talked to you about this, and before I say this I understand that in the end, ya gotta know things, but: I really didn't like the Pearl River Tossup. It was pretty frustrating to buzz on Octopus cards, know what they are, where they're used, etc. and not be able to pull the river, which isn't, imo, a fundamental part of knowing what Octopus Cards or the other HK architecture clues are. The tossup also didn't seem, from a player's perspective, to be themed in any way that made this answerline necessary (as in, it didn't appear to be cluing things all related to the Pearl River on any level deeper than "these cities are all on the Pearl" and I would react similarly to a common link on various things in Vienna and Bratislava with the answerline being Danube). I think this question would function much better as a question on Hong Kong.
Stalin seemed to cliff at the Doctor's Plot, but maybe the things before it are more well known than I realize, in which case I will check the advanced stats when they are released and take this back. The first line was funny, but do people really know that?
Oscar. Thanks for the New Brunswick s/o
G. W. Carver was well done and a great selection of an answerline.

Packet 9
monkeys seemed good, in that I don't know anything, but Joelle and Darren both seemed to enjoy it alot.
Hansberry is great and I think a great answerline.
I know nothing about it, and did not convert it, but would like to give a big ole shout out to monopoly, which was a truly fun tossup to play.

Packet 10
hands was strange. At game speed I recall the first line saying something along the lines of "holding these objects larger" or something, which is tough to parse at game speed, since holding is very often an action involving hands. I know nothing about this, so if the facts of this make it such that this is fine, never mind. But it certainly seemed strange to me.
Freud was very cool.

Packet 11
Bildungsroman seemed to be pretty fraudable, as it somewhat early started describing plots that sounded very "coming of age"y. I'll go back in a bit to check if this is true, and if not, retract, but I certainly remember feeling this way.
Keith Haring is a great answerline, and I think the sort of answerline that caters super well to a person coming from outside, playing quizbowl for the first time, that is into modern art. He is wildly famous and a great way to ask about modern art at this level.

Final 1
Massachusetts seems to have the non-rhotic clue to early. Maybe it's a northeast thing, but to me one of the most famous linguistics clues about MA is the classic "i parked my car in harvard yard" said without the "r"s joke, and hearing non-rhotic early in the Q threw me for a loop.
I don't think sharecroppers is a profession, and this question should probably have just accepted farmers. I'm not sure what that extra level of prompting really screens out. That said, I thought this question was alot of fun and, answerline minor quibble aside, I thought it was very well done.
cowboys was cool.
motorcycles was a good idea for a tossup

That's all I played on Saturday, though we'll play the next few packets in practice and if there's anything commentable I'll add to this. As you can probably tell, alot of these comments are "this is cool" which I like to think is a fun comment to hear as a writer, so I hope this is a helpful list. I had a ton of fun on Saturday, and, to reiterate (Henry's I think??) comment from the other thread, this was the best EFT I played in my undergrad career. Thanks a ton for the hard work y'all!

EDIT: We played Finals 1, not Packet 12, in the finals so that is now fixed.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

Massachusetts seems to have the non-rhotic clue to early. Maybe it's a northeast thing, but to me one of the most famous linguistics clues about MA is the classic "i parked my car in harvard yard" said without the "r"s joke, and hearing non-rhotic early in the Q threw me for a loop.

To be fair, New York and New Jersey also have prominent non-rhotic dialects, but I'll be fiddling with this regardless (I think Jakob's original clue ordering was correct in retrospect).

Stalin seemed to cliff at the Doctor's Plot, but maybe the things before it are more well known than I realize, in which case I will check the advanced stats when they are released and take this back.

At least one person buzzed on the Stalin leadin. Also, Robert Conquest's works are very famous and a lot of people buzzed on that clue as well.

as in, it didn't appear to be cluing things all related to the Pearl River on any level deeper than "these cities are all on the Pearl" and I would react similarly to a common link on various things in Vienna and Bratislava with the answerline being Danube

The Pearl River tossup was meant as a way to ask about Shenzhen and Guangzhou as well as Hong Kong; both of the former two cities would certainly be too hard to toss up at this level. There have been a million Hong Kong geography tossups, so I wanted to write something else.

hands was strange.

The wording of this tossup probably could use some improving, for sure

(is Lacan owning Origin of the World a second line at this level?)

Several people buzzed on this, so I hope so!

Bhutto seems like a subpar answerline selection for this tournament

This is perhaps a generational thing, but Benazir Bhutto's assassination was a huge deal when I was growing up, and the Bhutto family's influence on Pakistani politics has been tremendous. I didn't even bat an eye at this answerline when it was included, but since several folks have commented that it was tough, I guess I'll just defend it as one of the harder answers in the set.

To make a broader point, I don't think EFT needs to be all simple fastball answers. The original EFT aimed for a minimum of 75% ACF Fall answers, not 100%, and this tournament aimed for a similar number. Indeed, I think it wouldn't do its job as a "welcome to college quizbowl" event for experienced high schoolers if it didn't have a number of these. There are many different audiences that have to be balanced with a tournament like this - tossing up Keith Haring, Gyorgy Ligeti, the Bhutto family, the Sassanid empire, etc. as well as off-the-beaten-path answers like Flight 93 and witch doctors are part and parcel of achieving this goal. It greatly pleased me that (I think) all of these answers got first-clued in at least one room on Saturday.

[Votre Kickstarter Est Nul]

At least one person buzzed on the Stalin leadin. Also, Robert Conquest's works are very famous and a lot of people buzzed on that clue as well.

I take that back then! I apologize, it's simply a gap in my knowledge and it's cool/good to know I am wrong.

The Pearl River tossup was meant as a way to ask about Shenzhen and Guangzhou as well as Hong Kong; both of the former two cities would certainly be too hard to toss up at this level. There have been a million Hong Kong geography tossups, so I wanted to write something else.

I certainly understand this, which is why my attitude when we talked was mostly, rip, I guess I should know things. I just wouldn't be shocked to hear Pearl River had an under average conversion rate, and I'm just not entirely sure I think the question (which, don't get me wrong, included some cool clues) justifes that.

(is Lacan owning Origin of the World a second line at this level?)
Several people buzzed on this, so I hope so!

I was one of these people hah, it was just moreso one of the thoughts I had hearing the clue. It was more of a random thought than a well-thought out critique, and figured on the off chance I was right and it was too tough it'd be good to have someone say it.

This is perhaps a generational thing, but Benazir Bhutto's assassination was a huge deal when I was growing up, and the Bhutto family's influence on Pakistani politics has been tremendous. I didn't even bat an eye at this answerline when it was included, but since several folks have commented that it was tough, I guess I'll just defend it as one of the harder answers in the set.

Yeah I think the is the sort of thing that is no longer going to be a thing that featured in many of the coming to college now generation's childhoods. It was a bit before my time and I'm a senior now. That said, the tossup is fine otherwise and as one of the harder answerlines, I think it's fine. I still sort of feel like it's a slightly harder way to ask about Pakistan without (at game speed) it being entirely clear to me why this was necessary. But it's certainly fine regardless.

To make a broader point, I don't think EFT needs to be all simple fastball answers. The original EFT aimed for a minimum of 75% ACF Fall answers, not 100%, and this tournament aimed for a similar number. Indeed, I think it wouldn't do its job as a "welcome to college quizbowl" event for experienced high schoolers if it didn't have a number of these. There are many different audiences that have to be balanced with a tournament like this - tossing up Keith Haring, Gyorgy Ligeti, the Bhutto family, the Sassanid empire, etc. as well as off-the-beaten-path answers like Flight 93 and witch doctors are part and parcel of achieving this goal. It greatly pleased me that (I think) all of these answers got first-clued in at least one room on Saturday.

I agree with this philosophy, and think those answerlines are totally fine as part of that goal. My primary purpose for pointing these things out is, on the off chance any of the answerlines were intended to be a fastball 90% auto conversion kind of question, that it would be helpful to hear that it didn't seem that way in my games. But as questions in that last 25% of the distro, I think they worked well. (I apologize for my garbage quoting formatting)

[A Dim-Witted Saboteur]

I don't think sharecroppers is a profession, and this question should probably have just accepted farmers. I'm not sure what that extra level of prompting really screens out. That said, I thought this question was alot of fun and, answerline minor quibble aside, I thought it was very well done.

Emmett, thank you for the kind words about the history in general. I'm glad you enjoyed it!
I noticed this question has been attracting a bit of criticism, so I might as well include my rationale for some aspects of it. farmers was just prompted since sharecropping represented a specific social class or type of farmer that was meaningfully different from other farmers in the context of the events discussed in the question, including bondage using vagrancy laws and the formation of Sharecroppers' Unions. To my mind, asking for sharecroppers tested the question hearer's knowledge of the subject matter better than simply accepting "farmers".

After a bit of discussion, we've decided to keep the pronoun as is in this question. Here's why. First, there is a dearth of other pronouns for this that suggest themselves, and second, since much of the first half of the question covers, as I mentioned, unionization efforts among sharecroppers, we're asking about it in the context of labor history, in which "this profession" is probably the least transparent and most helpful pronoun. I'll admit I'm mildly confused as to why this critique is so prevalent, given that sharecropping fits well within the rubric of "one's method of doing work in exchange for pay", which I consider an adequate definition of "profession".

[1.82]

The Flight 93 question was an okay idea poorly executed. Using "this vehicle" (rather than say "this specific vehicle" or something like it) clouded what the question was looking for, and it was frustrating to watch someone buzz on "Let's Roll" and not know you're looking specifically for "Flight 93." A directed prompt would have been useful.

It would seem to me that the singular pronoun "this vehicle" would imply such a thing, but I suppose there's no harm in adding "this specific vehicle" to the question. I'm very surprised that this issue occurred but I'll add it.

Strictly speaking, United Airlines Flight 93 refers to the United Airlines route from Newark to San Francisco, and not the specific aircraft, which was a Boeing 757–222 with registration N591UA. In practice I am not sure that this would cause any ambiguity, but it's not clear to me that referring to a "specific vehicle" would be helpful, since the answerline is not in fact a vehicle.

Bhutto seems like a subpar answerline selection for this tournament

This is perhaps a generational thing, but Benazir Bhutto's assassination was a huge deal when I was growing up, and the Bhutto family's influence on Pakistani politics has been tremendous. I didn't even bat an eye at this answerline when it was included, but since several folks have commented that it was tough, I guess I'll just defend it as one of the harder answers in the set.

Being the same age as Will, I have been surprised in the same way in the past at younger people's lack of knowledge of the Bhutto assassination. In any case, the Bhutto family is the most prominent political family of Pakistan and among the most prominent political families in the world. In contrast to what Emmett posits about this answerline being better for people who have spent a lot of time in quizbowl, I would have been very pleased to hear a question like this at my first quizbowl tournament.

[Stinkweed Imp]

Overall, I really liked this set. The questions (at least in the categories I know about) did a good job of balancing accessibility with interesting hard clues. A few questions I remember having (minor) problems with:

• The painting tossup on Matthew was good, but the depiction of Matthew writing with the angel is a common enough scene that it's probably too easy for the first line
• The tossup on Futurism clues Joseph Stella in the second line, who is also associated with the Precisionist movement, particularly his paintings of the Brooklyn Bridge. The first two lines should probably be switched or rephrased to make the description unambiguous.
• My teammate answered "violence" for the tossup on aggression and when prompted said "violence against dolls". Violence and aggression aren't quite synonymous, but they seem similar enough that this tossup could be confusing. (I believe it ended up going dead against a team with a more than competent psych player, so we weren't the only ones confused by it)
• I guess it's not really a "document" but Canadian money also has UV ink designs
• The bonus part on Borah mentions that William Borah was the leader of the Irreconcilables, a title that could easily be applied to the equally notable Robert La Follette and Hiram Johnson. I don't know the intent of this clue but it doesn't seem to provide any information unless you also know about the author.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

The tossup on Futurism clues Joseph Stella in the second line, who is also associated with the Precisionist movement, particularly his paintings of the Brooklyn Bridge. The first two lines should probably be switched or rephrased to make the description unambiguous.

This was brought up earlier as well and I didn't get around to making the change. Whoops. Will be fixed.

[Father of the Ragdoll]

[*] My teammate answered "violence" for the tossup on aggression and when prompted said "violence against dolls". Violence and aggression aren't quite synonymous, but they seem similar enough that this tossup could be confusing. (I believe it ended up going dead against a team with a more than competent psych player, so we weren't the only ones confused by it)

I did not play that tossup (it was a bye round) but I thought that question was perfectly fine. The Bobo doll study is notably a study in aggression and every previous clue (to my recollection) was specifically aggression. I aggree with prompting on violence due to the overlap, but aggression is, in my opinion, a reified enough psych concept that it is fine as an answerline on its own.

[Votre Kickstarter Est Nul]

I don't think sharecroppers is a profession, and this question should probably have just accepted farmers. I'm not sure what that extra level of prompting really screens out. That said, I thought this question was alot of fun and, answerline minor quibble aside, I thought it was very well done.

Emmett, thank you for the kind words about the history in general. I'm glad you enjoyed it!
I noticed this question has been attracting a bit of criticism, so I might as well include my rationale for some aspects of it. farmers was just prompted since sharecropping represented a specific social class or type of farmer that was meaningfully different from other farmers in the context of the events discussed in the question, including bondage using vagrancy laws and the formation of Sharecroppers' Unions. To my mind, asking for sharecroppers tested the question hearer's knowledge of the subject matter better than simply accepting "farmers".

After a bit of discussion, we've decided to keep the pronoun as is in this question. Here's why. First, there is a dearth of other pronouns for this that suggest themselves, and second, since much of the first half of the question covers, as I mentioned, unionization efforts among sharecroppers, we're asking about it in the context of labor history, in which "this profession" is probably the least transparent and most helpful pronoun. I'll admit I'm mildly confused as to why this critique is so prevalent, given that sharecropping fits well within the rubric of "one's method of doing work in exchange for pay", which I consider an adequate definition of "profession".

Hey Jakob. That's a pretty fair reason for the answerline. I have always tended to define sharecropping as "farming under a set of conditions" rather than a different job; it's not a great analogy but maybe something like "non-unionized teachers" might be similar to how I viewed it. That said, I buzzed in game with farmers and on being prompted pulled sharecropping, so I may be inventing an issue that isn't there. My only real concern is: is there any point during the question that people would be buzzing, saying farmers, and displaying a level of knowledge you don't think is worthy of points? I'm not sure I see one, but this rationale is certainly reasonable.

[Santa Claus]

At least one person buzzed on the Stalin leadin. Also, Robert Conquest's works are very famous and a lot of people buzzed on that clue as well.

I take that back then! I apologize, it's simply a gap in my knowledge and it's cool/good to know I am wrong.

I was the person who got the buzz. In fact, Corry and I were both sitting on that clue (because we know the exact same things) and were frustrated that the pronoun for the question was put at the very end of the first line - was namedropping Kingsley Amis really important enough to not simply lead with "this person" and then continue on with the quote? This is certainly a very minor quibble but it is also a very easy fix, and I really think every question should be embedding the answerline as early as possible without straining the phrasing.

[The Story of a Head That Fell Off]

Miscellaneous thoughts on specific questions:

There are some questions that had a good concept that felt a bit fraudable - "God is Dead" and bildungsroman come to mind, but both are good ideas.

I was confused by the hands tossup, because I was unsure what it was looking for - especially the first line, when "holding out one of these objects" made me rule out a body part until I heard 2 clues that both definitely are about hands because I was thrown off by the first clue. Same issue with the African-American tossup in religion because I honestly was expecting a more specific answer than "African American" - and it didn't help that the question stopped saying "ethnic group" like 2 lines in, so when at the end I said "slaves" I didn't know what was being prompted on despite me knowing these are clearly spirituals.

Perhaps I don't find QB as serious as some other people do, but I found a small joke or two to be a good break. The "shitty" modern art bonus themed around, well, shit, made me chuckle a little, but it didn't really distract from the content of the question and still had a good clues. It was a good theme and made a small joke about how many people hate modern art - a fine little joke! I liked similarly concepts like "polling errors" or "dead poets in film" and these types of questions sometime show unexpected links between its answers.

As for the 69 thing most people have commented on, I believe the intention (for the last part) was to test knowledge of the confidence interval - a surprise "pencil and paper" part was a bit jarring, but I found that sudden transition more jarring than the Big Chungus 69 memes. The bonus is a bit easy, which many have also remarked on, but that's a separate issue with the meme content.

For me at least, a small, harmless joke breaks the monotony for me. The jokes are so short and brief it doesn't get in the way of real clues, and I understand that it is not for everybody, but I don't see this as some set-wrecking joke that completely invalidates the hundreds of other well-crafted questions.

I loved the Keith Haring tossup, and definitely not because I was wearing a Keith Haring shirt that day.

The CE/econish stuff like Obamacare, teachers, and cap & trade bonus are examples of approachable but important topics that I enjoyed hearing about a lot.

Other misc. tossups I liked: Brazil from film, Monopoly, storms in Shakespeare, tRNA, accordions

This was another very solid set, and thank you to all the writers and editors (especially Will Alston) for producing such a high quality set!

[whatamidoinghere]

I liked the Dumping/Intellectual Property/Most Favoured Nations bonus (even though it was pretty hard) as well as the Coca tossup. Overall, I thought the other academic in this set was very well done and it was a pleasure to play too.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

I appreciate the compliments on the misc academic and the off-the-beaten-path questions! For the CE-ish topics (which I much prefer to traditional CE) I tried generally to reach for a mix of important topics from around the world that have significant relevance to contemporary politics, but which don't require you to keep up with minutiae of politics. Not all of these fit neatly into one category, and I didn't really intend for them to. So you got questions on Japanese corporate law and culture, the Affordable Care Act, Elizabeth Warren's writings, and bonuses like the trade bonus Avinash mentioned, Kim Jong-il's trains, etc. These probably gravitated a lot towards my personal areas of interest, but I hope they were educational and enjoyable nonetheless.

Accordions was one of my favorite other arts tossups, though Ophir is responsible for convincing me to make it a lot easier. It was definitely one of those "why not try it" ideas and I'm glad to hear people enjoyed it.

[warum]

I'll add to the chorus of appreciation for the current events. I especially enjoyed the climate change economics bonus and the Flight 93 tossup.

[Amizda Calyx]

I thought the bio was (unsurprisingly) very good, especially the bonuses, which seemed well-controlled. I especially liked the helicase/progeria/mismatch repair and predator-prey/diff eq/bifurcation bonuses.

I don't understand why the tossup on "purple" remains. Many of the clues rely on subjective perceptions of color as opposed to things that are named for the color.

I agree, this tossup was extremely frustrating since basophilic materials can be blue, purple, or black (although wiki says the term *literally* means "blue-loving").

Also, I know this was a completely untenable protest on my part, but I somehow forgot the word "polymerase" when I buzzed on "PCNA" and said "replicase", which I knew to sometimes be used interchangeably with "polymerase", including in the context of sliding clamps ("DNA polymerase δ (pol δ), the principal DNA replicase in eukaryotes... pol δ requires an accessory protein, the proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA), to carry out highly processive DNA synthesis."; "The E. coli replicase, DNA polymerase III (Pol III) holoenzyme...").

"Suppressor of white apricot domain" and "SWAP domain" are, respectively, the leadins to the 2015 NASAT and 2015 CO tossups on splicing. I think it was the second or third clue in the EFT tossup. That's some considerable drift!

[Santa Claus]

"Suppressor of white apricot domain" and "SWAP domain" are, respectively, the leadins to the 2015 NASAT and 2015 CO tossups on splicing. I think it was the second or third clue in the EFT tossup. That's some considerable drift!

You’ll be pleased to learn that that clue was to replace a previous, even harder clue.

[Zealots of Stockholm]

Some feedback, by packet, with some more general feedback weaved in:

P1: witch doctors was a cool idea, even if I didn't know any of the clues really. I also really enjoyed getting Johnny Cash points from the prisons tu. The IBM tossup felt like it had a pretty long powermark, as it becomes pretty easy once the question makes it clear its about an old computer company. Victorian/domesticity/sphere bonus was a really cool idea (as was all of the historiography in this set, I was super happy to see Jakob + Will team up for this reason especially), and I was sad our team didn't get it. Supreme Court bonus seems like it could've made the easy part a bit easier, we goofed on this a bit. Mormonism bonus was very cool and interesting to listen to. The Maori/Australia/Malouf bonus felt quite difficult for this set (and serves as an example of my larger complaint that the lit felt all over the place in difficulty), as both Maori and Malouf seem to be both harder than a middle which would get 50% conversion.

P2: Canada also feels quite hard since it only clues Canadian immigrants (I believe?), though perhaps Ondaatje is more famous than I think. I liked the photography tu on Paris here, the Luther TU was also interesting. The Vonnegut TU seemed like a very good idea and I don't understand complaints about it. For the Lusiads bonus, I wasn't sure why I couldn't be prompted on "Africa" for the Cape of Good Hope part, as I wasn't sure how specific i needed to be. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch bonus, like much of the rest of the OtherAc, was a cool idea.

P3: WWII TU made me realize I had no clue which war Jarrell wrote during. Really enjoyed the Bhutto TU (as did our Pakistani mod), Pinter bonus felt like it had a pretty soft 30, I really loved the bonus centered on Gertrude Stein quotes, the race/Clark/stereotypes bonus feels like it has 2 easy parts, linking Anne Boleyn and Anne Bradstreet felt quite odd to me.

P4: "God is dead" TU felt super fraudable as it told you its a "phrase" in philosophy from the first line. The Quebec TU also felt fraudable to me, although less so. Vilanelle felt like a difficult tu that might've worked better as just a TU on Bishop to me. I enjoyed the power clues of the Nabokov tu, I liked the Futurism tu, An Enemy of the People felt hard to TU at this level to me. Unsure why the painting bonus in this packet needed an easy part on film, the bonus about slaves escaping into Mexico was really interesting.

P5: Out of Africa also felt kinda hard for this level though admittedly its something I just don't know much about. I really enjoyed answering the Gwendolyn Brooks TU in this packet because it allowed me to proclaim "that's my second buzz today about beans!" The God of Small Things also felt quite hard to be tossing up at EFT. While it's no doubt an important novel, I'll be surprised if it was converted very well. I know I buzzed several lines before anyone else at our site (I read it in a lit class). Asking for the Lenape and naming "Delaware" instead of just allowing players to say Delaware (in the New Haven/Yale/Lenape bonus) annoyed me, and I'm sure I wasn't the only player who would've converted if Delaware had been acceptable.

P6: Really enjoyed the TU on African-Americans in religion, was cool to see spirituals come up in qb. The posters tu felt kinda transparent but was a cool idea. My teammate admitted to just frauding the unions tu, so make what you will of that. Hawthorne bonus felt like the easiest of the day, as staff is the hardest part here and feels like a pretty reasonable middle, and there's no need to name the Piazza Tales in the Melville part.

P7: I enjoyed the Beat poetry bonus here, and a teammate seemed to enjoy the bonus part on magazine covers.

P8: The faith TU seemed to play quite hard, though perhaps it played better at other sites. Looking at this Oscar TU after the fact, I think the Hijuelos clue and the Oscar Wao clue could be switched, though that's just a guess.

P9: Despite me being dumb and negging it, everyone in our game with Vanderbilt A was surprised to hear the clue about the painting of Washington being saved still in power for Madison. The Liberal Party tu felt like it had a very small answerspace. I thought the Grand Embassy tu was a really cool idea.

P10: I thought the clue selection in the Their Eyes Were Watching God tu was excellent, clueing important and memorable passages, and is a great example of how to do a "deep cut" on a core work. The salons bonus was really interesting even though I couldn't pull philosophes. The Warhol/Mickey/cars bonus has two easy parts imo.

P11: bildungsroman felt really fraudable without knowing many of the clues. I'll stand by tossing up Keith Haring being a good idea. The slave auctions bonus might've been my favorite of the day.

P12: My earlier comment about rock being accepted for the stone tu wasn't addressed, so I'll reiterate it. I said this privately to Jakob, but I didn't understand why the South Africa tu couldn't just use "this country" for its pronoun. The geo bonus about rap music was super cool also.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

P12: My earlier comment about rock being accepted for the stone tu wasn't addressed, so I'll reiterate it. I said this privately to Jakob, but I didn't understand why the South Africa tu couldn't just use "this country" for its pronoun. The geo bonus about rap music was super cool also.

Your comment was, in fact, addressed for the most recent version of the set! I appreciate the point.

The Maori/Australia/Malouf bonus felt quite difficult for this set

I was worried a bit too, but the conversion stats suggest that Maori fell around 40-45% conversion across the first two live mirrors and Malouf fell in the 6-8% range. Both lower than ideal, but within the range of acceptable, and certainly one was much harder than the other.

P11: bildungsroman felt really fraudable without knowing many of the clues

Could you elaborate? I'm not sure what I'm supposed to take away from this as an editor.

The God of Small Things also felt quite hard to be tossing up at EFT.

I'd group it with some of our tougher answers, but I'll note it's been tossed up at PACE as well.

Canada also feels quite hard since it only clues Canadian immigrants (I believe?), though perhaps Ondaatje is more famous than I think.

Yeah, Ondaatje is really famous.

"God is dead" TU felt super fraudable as it told you its a "phrase" in philosophy from the first line.

I thought about this decision for a while, as there are many phrases in philosophy, but I'm gonna take out the word "philosophical" from the first line.

Vilanelle felt like a difficult tu that might've worked better as just a TU on Bishop to me.

Is Bishop really any easier than vilanelle? I feel like "Do not go gentle into that good night" is famous than any single Bishop poem. Maybe not everyone knows it's a vilanelle.

I said this privately to Jakob, but I didn't understand why the South Africa tu couldn't just use "this country" for its pronoun.

It originally did, but my editorial call was that "I prefer to avoid the phrase modern-day country when possible" and it seemed to me that the Cape Colony / British South Africa would be a plenty well-known answer. As it was not an independent country at the time, I went for "this colony." I think phrasing the question this way also tests historical understanding in a meaningful way.

The faith TU seemed to play quite hard, though perhaps it played better at other sites.

Also not sure what to make of this. I'll admit that Kierkegaard is really dense and difficult to understand, so I'm not surprised there weren't a ton of buzzes on the first two clues, but this tossup had ten powers across the first two mirrors.

Asking for the Lenape and naming "Delaware" instead of just allowing players to say Delaware

This is why it was the hard part.

[A Dim-Witted Saboteur]

Asking for the Lenape and naming "Delaware" instead of just allowing players to say Delaware (in the New Haven/Yale/Lenape bonus) annoyed me

To give you a more in depth answer, in my understanding of Native American historiography the term "Delaware" for the Lenape is significantly more in disuse than other similar ones (Cherokee for Ani Yun Wiya, Iroquois for Hotinoshonni) to the point where I felt comfortable requiring the more modern name for players to show that they know about this topic. This was definitely a conscious choice on my part; I apologize if it was frustrating to play.

[Zealots of Stockholm]

Thanks for interacting with my feedback, Will and Jakob!

To elaborate a little more on a few of my points:
bildungsroman felt fraudable in the sense that I couldn't think of any other possible "specific term required" literary genres, especially considering the question makes it pretty clear (imo) from line 2 that its an original-language term. Perhaps the answer space is wider than I'm realizing here, but my mind jumped to bildungsroman before the question really even started.

Regarding the villanelles tu, I think I just have a knowledge gap regarding "Do Not Go Gentle into that Good Night" being a villanelle. Ditto with the Canada tu, I should just learn more things.

Using the pronoun "this colony" for the South Africa tossup does make sense if you want to test players' historical understanding, as I'll admit my knowledge on that tu was pretty fake.

The comment on the fate tu came from the fact that iirc, nobody buzzed until the tossup was finished at our site, and I didn't look at other sites' data. I know the SE site was weaker than others, but there were still a few good teams and I'd expect at least someone to buzz before the end of the tu.

Regarding the bonus part on the Lenape, do you have conversion data yet? It seemed to me that New Haven was the hard part there, though I would still argue the part isn't that much easier if you accept Delaware but remove the clue about Penn. I do appreciate Jakob's feedback about Native American historiography, as its not a field I know much about, though it does make me wonder if the general playing audience would prefer consistency in cases such as this one where (according to Jakob) people would know Lenape for Delaware, but likely wouldn't know Ain Yun Wiya for Cherokee.

Again, I appreciate the engagement as this is my first attempt at going packet-by-packet and trying to note things I both enjoyed and didn't from a set.

[Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock]

I have no idea if this really helps or not, but waaaaaaay back when I learned about Pennsylvania's Native Americans in 3rd grade (!), we were taught about the Lenape people (the Lenni Lenape, specifically), rather than the Delaware people. I can totally understand the frustration of only knowing Delaware and being told "no, you can't say that," but I guess my point is that Lenape isn't too far "out there" as a name.

I certainly enjoyed playing this set! Perhaps I will go back and do question-by-question analysis myself at some point, not sure yet.

[1.82]

I had serious misgivings about the South Africa tossup when I read Packet 12 at the Auburn site, and looking back at the set I find that those concerns were well-founded. It is not possible to substitute "this colony" for "this modern-day country" in the context of South Africa, because there was never a colony called South Africa and the present-day state of South Africa is not equivalent to any historical colony. The Union of South Africa was formed in 1910 from four separate colonies, none of which could reasonably be called "South Africa", and the Union of South Africa itself was not a colony but a dominion, a distinction that is not academic. Any player with sufficient knowledge of South African history would naturally conclude upon hearing a tossup on South African history with the pronoun "this colony" that the answer must be one of the colonies occupying the territory of present-day South Africa, which is a problem because the tossup does not unambiguously point to any such colony.

A businessman based in this colony, Alfred Beit, co-founded a company whose interests led to this colony’s annexation of Stellaland. This colony’s forces fared rather poorly when its opponents actually had effective firearms at the Battle of Qalabani during the so-called “Gun War,” which helped bring about the censoring of Henry Bartle Frere. A man based in this colony won the largely fraudulent Rudd Concession from Lobengula. Discrimination against (*) settlers from this colony led some of its residents to launch an abortive coup called the Jameson Raid against the government of Paul Kruger. Those settlers from this colony, called Uitlanders, flocked to the Witwatersrand at the encouragement of Cecil Rhodes. For 10 points, name this colony that annexed Bechuanaland and the Boer Republics.
ANSWER: South Africa [or British South Africa; or Republic of South Africa or Cape Colony; prompt on Bechuanaland until read]

Most of the clues apply accurately to the Cape Colony, which is a listed answerline, although for the reasons aforementioned it should be the only answerline, since South Africa is not actually a correct answer. The clue about Uitlanders is questionable in this context, since Uitlanders did not come specifically from the Cape Colony and in fact came in large numbers from Europe; it would be difficult to call that clue uniquely identifying. The giveaway, however, is actively incorrect and has no right answer, because no colony annexed the Boer republics. The British government did annex the Orange Free State and the Transvaal, but those two states then became separate British colonies. Consequently, as written the giveaway is unbuzzable.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

I have heard the Cape Colony referred to as "British South Africa" a few times and it strikes me as unforgiving to require that much of a specific answer at the giveaway for this level - though I'll think about this, since I'm generally inclined to agree with Naveed. That said, this giveaway is bad as you say and should be fixed. These errors were all of my own introduction in order to avoid a question on "this modern day country."

[1.82]

I think that one could reasonably prompt on South Africa but not accept outright. I agree that Cape Colony is too hard an answerline for this level. I don't think that there's a way to make this question playable at this difficulty without "this modern-day country" being the pronoun, although I am not a particularly good judge of difficulty.

[Smuttynose Island]

I thought the set was great, but had some minor quibbles with the two math questions.

Maybe it was moderator error, but I remember the sine tossup describing the topologist sine curve as the "union" of sine with 1/x. Could someone post that tossup?

My other issue was with the final part of the naked mole rate bonus. I answered "5000/1.96" which was not accepted. I don't remember any instructions to round the final answer to n-decimal places nor do I remember any instructions to round the z* to 2 for the 95% CI. Could someone post the full answerline?

EDIT: Nevermind, I found the post with the packets. Looks like both of these were moderator errors.

[zxc]

The first line of the Pearl River tossup (packet 8, tossup 1) is inaccurate. The Statue of the Five Rams in Guangzhou is found in Yuexiu Park, which is not in the Temple of Five Immortals.

I also found that for packet 13, bonus 20, the name of the preacher who led the Azusa Street Revival is William Seymour, not George Seymour.

[naan/steak-holding toll]

The first line of the Pearl River tossup (packet 8, tossup 1) is inaccurate. The Statue of the Five Rams in Guangzhou is found in Yuexiu Park, which is not in the Temple of Five Immortals.

I also found that for packet 13, bonus 20, the name of the preacher who led the Azusa Street Revival is William Seymour, not George Seymour.

Thanks for the catches - will fix these