2022 Chicago Open: August 6, 2022 @ Evanston, IL

[Galadedrid Damodred]

This is the official announcement for 2022 Chicago Open, to be held at Northwestern University on Saturday, August 6. Jacob O'Rourke will be the tournament director, Em Gunter will be the assistant tournament director, and Mia McGill will be the misconduct representative.

Editing Team

The head editors are Austin Brownlow and Kurtis Droge. The subject editors are as follows:

Sameer Apte - Auditory Fine Arts
Austin Brownlow - History, Religion, Physics, Astronomy
Kurtis Droge - Literature, Social Science, Modern World, Other Academic
Vincent Du - Chemistry
Alistair Gray - Computer Science
Eddie Kim - Math, Mythology (also supervising editor for Auditory Fine Arts)
Shan Kothari - Biology, Earth Science, Miscellaneous Science
Young Fenimore Lee - Visual Fine Arts, Philosophy
Ashish Subramanian - Geography

Difficulty Level

We would like this tournament to be closer to ACF Nationals in difficulty than the past few Chicago Opens. In fact, if it ends up being roughly the same difficulty as 2022 ACF Nationals, we'll consider that a feature instead of a bug. Please keep this in mind when writing questions, especially for tossup answerlines and the hard parts of bonuses. Basically, you can't go wrong by pretending that you're submitting a packet for ACF Nationals. But rest assured, there will still be room to push the envelope!

Distribution

The below distribution applies to the edited tournament packets, or if you elect to write a full packet for your submission. The distribution for half-packets is as follows: 1/1 Literature, 1/1 History, 1/1 Science, 1/1 RMPSS, 1/1 Fine Arts, 5/5 Your Choice. Including the Your Choice questions, please do not exceed the full packet quota for any given slice of the distribution. For example, do not submit more than 1/1 Social Science.

1/1 American Literature
1/1 British Literature
1/1 European Literature
1/1 World Literature + Miscellaneous Literature

Please vary your literature submissions with respect to genre and time period.

1/1 American History
2/2 European History
In addition to Europe, this category will include North Africa, the Caucasus, the Levant, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.
1/1 World History

1/1 Biology
1/1 Physics + Astronomy
Please submit at least 1/0 or 0/1 physics; the remaining 1/0 or 0/1 can be either astronomy or more physics. For this category, the set will contain ~75% physics and ~25% astronomy.
1/1 Chemistry + Earth Science + Miscellaneous Science
Please submit at least 1/0 or 0/1 chemistry; the remaining 1/0 or 0/1 can be either earth science, miscellaneous science, or more chemistry. For this category, the set will contain ~50-75% chemistry, ~25% earth science, and ~0-25% miscellaneous science.
1/0 or 0/1 Math
1/0 or 0/1 Computer Science

3/3 Fine Arts
Please submit at least 1/1 visual and 1/1 auditory; the remaining 1/1 is your choice. For this category, the set will have a roughly equal split between visual fine arts and auditory fine arts. We welcome submissions that include a mix of both visual and auditory topics.

1/1 Religion
1/0 or 0/1 Mythology

1/1 Philosophy
1/1 Social Science

1/0 or 0/1 Geography
1/0 or 0/1 Modern World
1/0 or 0/1 Other Academic

Submission Schedule and Fees

Please submit packets to Kurtis Droge (kurtisroxs AT gmail DOT com).

Base fee: $250

By Saturday, May 21: -$50 (half packet) / -$100 (full packet)
By Saturday, June 4: -$25 (half packet) / -$50 (full packet)
By Saturday, June 18: $0 (half packet) / -$25 (full packet)
By Saturday, July 2: +$25
By Saturday, July 16: +$50
Each day after July 16: +$10/day
After July 23: We will drop you from the tournament, barring extenuating circumstances.

The above deadlines are at 11:59 PM Pacific time on the given dates.

Other discounts:
-$50 (half packet) / -$100 (full packet) for an excellent quality packet (to be awarded at the editors' discretion)
-$25 (half packet) / -$50 (full packet) for a good quality packet (to be awarded at the editors' discretion)
-$10 per working buzzer system

Team Formation and Registration

The field cap for this tournament is 27 teams.

Unofficial team formation and staffer availability spreadsheet

Official team registration

Official staffer registration

Registered teams as of 8/5/22 [packet status in brackets]:

1. BHSU (Tejas Raje, Rob Carson, Andrew Hart, Billy Busse) [-$25]
2. "WUSTL A" (Vishal Puppala, Rohan Rai, Rachel Hua, Jonathan Mishory, Erik Tomasic) [+$25]
3. Up yours woke Borel-ists, we’ll see who open covers who (Taylor Harvey, Nick Jensen, Jonathen Settle, Jordan Brownstein) [-$100]
4. Hurray for Our Ancient Pathways! (Mike Bentley, Andrew Wang, Alston Boyd, TBD) [+$25]
5. We Found Michael Kearney at Gmail Dot Com (Stephen Eltinge, Michael Kearney, JinAh Kim, Annabelle Yang) [-$50]
6. When life gives you lemons, use information asymmetry (Tim Morrison, Matthew Lehmann, Kai Smith, William Golden) [-$25]
7. Doc Doc Doc Goose (Charles Hang, Jeremy Cummings, Amith Punyala, Cyrus Zhou) [-$100]
8. DAMN son, where'd you find this? A Quiz-a-holics remix (Matthew Bollinger, Natan Holtzman, Daniel Hothem, Aseem Keyal) [+$25]
9. Forget it, Huckle. It's Busytown (Ryan Rosenberg, Matt Weiner, Sam Bailey, Mike Sorice) [+$50]
10. 2020 Ontario Hybrid Champions (Michael Coates, Eric Chen, Rohin Devanathan, Rahul Keyal) [-$50]
11. I have negged / the tossups / that were in / your categories (Mike Cheyne, Conor Thompson, Joel Miles, Zach Foster) [-$100]
12. You go Matt, Jack, do it again, wheel turnin' 'round and 'round (Adam Fine, Isaac Kirk-Davidoff, Dylan Minarik, Matt Jackson) [-$25]
13. Krik? Krak! des Chevaliers (Will Alston, John Lawrence, Eric Mukherjee, Stephen Liu) [-$0]
14. Enby 15 Whale (Athena Kern, Weijia Cheng, Bradley McLain, Caroline Mao) [-$50]
15. Two Whoppers Junior and a Side of Hashes Brown (Mazin Omer, Arthur Delot-Vilain, Anson Berns, Chinmay Murthy) [-$50]
16. illibois (Iain Carpenter, Mitch McCullar, Justin Wytmar, Alex Fregeau) [-$50]
17. Oroonoko Flow (Sail Away to Suriname) (Tracy Mirkin, Leo Law, Leah Honsinger, Graham Cope) [-$25]
18. No, Patrick, Rainfall is not an Instrument (Halle Friedman, Connor Mayers, Doug Simons, Alex Li) [+$50]
19. Propaganda of the Vent (Henry Atkins, Sheena Li, Paul Kasinski, Tony Chen) [+$25]
20. Operation Urgent Furry (Aiden Dartley, Dan Ni, James Orefice, Max Brodsky) [+$25]
21. Michigan C (Jon Vaysman, Sean Higgins, Subhamitra Banerjee Roychoudhury, Yichen Wang) [-$0]
22. He Disrespected the Wu Gang Plant (Chris Ray, Ophir Lifshitz, Aadi Karthik, Amogh Kulkarni) [+$25]
23. Kevinyon (Kevin Wang, Lauren Onel, Jack Paganelli, Hayden Toftner) [+$110]
24. The Book of Overthrowing Apep Guardiola (Justin Hawkins, Caleb Kendrick, Alex Akridge, Finn Bender) [+$50]
25. Kenji, Benji, and Two Thought-Provoking Beavers (Benji Nguyen, Anderson Wang, Josh Xiong, Kenji Shimizu) [-$25]
26. The ACF cabal is not happy with me—that’s okay, I’ll still keep playing that garbage. (Chris Sims, John Marvin, Vivek Sasse, Ned Tagtmeier) [-$0]
27. The October Crisis on Infinite Earths (Victor Pavao, Matt Lafer, Erik Christensen, Naveed Chowdhury) [no packet required]

We look forward to creating an enjoyable tournament experience for everyone!

[kdroge]

I'm bumping this to say that we're going to be keeping the poll for the date open through the end of next week (January 15th)- at that point we will want to go ahead and look into the room reservations. So, if you haven't voted yet, but you wanted to chime in, it's not too late!

[Aaron's Rod]

I'm bumping this to say that we're going to be keeping the poll for the date open through the end of next week (January 15th)- at that point we will want to go ahead and look into the room reservations. So, if you haven't voted yet, but you wanted to chime in, it's not too late!

Was a final date ever decided?

[kdroge]

Was a final date ever decided?

We have selected August 6th as the date for the tournament and have sent emails to book rooms for that date. I'm aware that the July date ended up being more popular in the last-minute votes but we went with August 6th at the start of last week when we had planned to close the poll.

[Cheynem]

Can you put the date in the thread name?

[Galadedrid Damodred]

Can you put the date in the thread name?

I have updated the OP accordingly. I would also like to note that Mia McGill has joined the CO team as our misconduct representative.

[Cheynem]

Thank you CO CEOs.

[VSCOelasticity]

Are there length caps for the tossups and bonuses?

[kdroge]

Are there length caps for the tossups and bonuses?

Tossups will be capped at 8 lines in TNR 10 pt, with most questions coming close to the length cap. For bonuses, there is no hard cap, but most will be in the 8-10 line range.

Teams are of course welcome to submit questions that are longer than the final lengths to give editors more clues to work with.

[Galadedrid Damodred]

I updated the OP with a list of the teams that have officially registered as of 4/6/22. I also added the Caucasus to the list of geographical areas that are part of the European History distribution for this tournament, in case that wasn't clear before.

[Cheynem]

Did you get our team's registration?

[Galadedrid Damodred]

Did you get our team's registration?

Yes, you must have signed up shortly after the last time I checked. I've updated the list.

If any team marked "TBD" comes up with a name over the next 3 months, just send me a PM. Otherwise the editors will assign you a team name.

[Galadedrid Damodred]

Due to the unprecedented level of interest, we have decided to make 2 important changes:

(1) We are switching to a half-packet submission model.
(2) We are imposing a tentative field cap of 26 teams.

Please refer to the OP for further details. If you have any questions, we would be happy to answer them.

[ryanrosenberg]

What would be the schedule for a 25-team CO?

[Galadedrid Damodred]

What would be the schedule for a 25-team CO?

(Disclaimer: Jacob owns the official schedule, so I'm just speaking as an individual here, not in an authoritative capacity)

If we do reach 25 teams (which would be amazing!), I envision something like this:

Prelims: 9/8/8, 9 rounds
Playoffs: 6/6/6/7, 7 rounds, losses don't carry over
Finals sequence (as needed): 3 rounds
Total number of packets: 19 (9 submitted + 10 housewritten)

Teams in the bottom playoff bracket are guaranteed either 13 or 14 games, while teams in the top three playoff brackets are guaranteed either 14 or 15 games (not counting the finals sequence), depending on whether they're from an 8-team or 9-team prelim bracket. Teams in the bottom playoff bracket play a full 6 game round robin with byes to determine the final standings, while teams in the top three playoff brackets play 2 rounds of inter-bracket crossover games that don't affect the final standings, followed by a full 5 game round robin.

[Tejas]

What would be the schedule for a 25-team CO?

(Disclaimer: Jacob owns the official schedule, so I'm just speaking as an individual here, not in an authoritative capacity)

If we do reach 25 teams (which would be amazing!), I envision something like this:

Prelims: 9/8/8, 9 rounds
Playoffs: 9/9/7, 6 rounds, losses to teams in the same playoff bracket carry over from prelims
Finals sequence (as needed): 3 rounds
Total number of packets: 18 (9 submitted + 9 housewritten)

This setup guarantees 12 games for every team, since the teams that play 7 rounds of prelims and then go into the bottom bracket will play 5 rounds of playoffs, while the teams that play 8 rounds of prelims and then go into the bottom bracket will play 4 rounds of playoffs. Teams in the middle and top brackets play either 13 or 14 games (not counting the finals sequence), depending on whether they're from an 8-team or 9-team prelim bracket. Each team plays all of the other teams in its playoff bracket exactly once (not counting the finals sequence).

To be honest, I would consider 12 games to be lower than I would like from a CO, especially because I believe it means 2 byes for teams in the bottom bracket. Is there a chance the field cap could be adjusted to 24 or 26 teams, both of which would provide a better schedule?

[Auks Ran Ova]

guarantees 12 games for every team, [...] Teams in the middle and top brackets play either 13 or 14 games

This seems to be moderately to significantly undershooting the number of games I, at least, would expect a CO to provide.

Also, 25 teams is an awful number to schedule sensibly--26 and 24 can both be done in the same number of rooms, even accounting for packet sub, and won't create awkward situations like unbalanced prelim bracket numbers.

[Galadedrid Damodred]

Yes, this is what I get for posting late in the evening, and it's part of why I'm not the TD! Ryan helpfully pointed out to me in DMs a 26 team schedule that only uses 12 rooms, and I belatedly realized that this is possible for 27 teams as well (a 9/9/9 into 9/9/9 schedule where prelim losses carry guarantees every team 14 games in 16 rounds and has at least 3 teams on bye in any given round). Therefore, I've increased the tentative field cap to 27. I've also edited my post upthread with a better idea for a 25 team schedule that guarantees every team at least 13 games, and the majority at least 14. Obviously some numbers are much easier to deal with than others, but I'm sure we can make it work if we end up with an "unfriendly" field size.

[Perturbed Secretary Bird]

So is "American" history and lit U.S. history or all of the Americas?

[kdroge]

American history and lit for this tournament use the standard quiz bowl norms for those categories- the U.S. and the area of the U.S. prior to the creation of the country (including but not limited to colonial America and Native American groups living in what is today the U.S.). If you have a question that straddles the line for the category or that overlaps multiple categories geographically, just use your judgment as to whatever makes for a better fit and I'm sure that it will be fine.

[Galadedrid Damodred]

There are 26 teams currently registered, so there's only 1 spot left to claim before the field cap is reached! After that, we will put you on the waitlist.

[Cheynem]

When the deadline states "by Saturday," does that mean the packet needs to be in by 12:01 AM Saturday or just any time that day? I would love to have more time of the weekend to work on the packet if needed.

[Auks Ran Ova]

When the deadline states "by Saturday," does that mean the packet needs to be in by 12:01 AM Saturday or just any time that day? I would love to have more time of the weekend to work on the packet if needed.

Seconded--traditional deadlines tend to be more along the lines of "11:59 Sunday" (or "when I wake up Monday") for this reason, since many people have regular school or work weeks (not me though, I'm built different).

[Galadedrid Damodred]

When the deadline states "by Saturday," does that mean the packet needs to be in by 12:01 AM Saturday or just any time that day? I would love to have more time of the weekend to work on the packet if needed.

Seconded--traditional deadlines tend to be more along the lines of "11:59 Sunday" (or "when I wake up Monday") for this reason, since many people have regular school or work weeks (not me though, I'm built different).

The deadline is at the end of the day on Saturday for all dates in the OP. For example, if Kurtis receives the email at or before 11:59 PM Pacific time on Saturday, May 21 (= 1:59 AM Central time on Sunday, May 22, and so on for other time zones), you will receive the highest possible time-based discount.

In other news, we've reached the 27 team field cap! We will post an update in June after we determine whether we have the capacity (rooms, staffers, buzzers) to expand the field further.

[BurteL]

One free agent looking for a team if a spot is available. Thanks. [email protected]

[Here Comes Rusev Day]

Quick question. Will there be an email address where we can submit proof of vaccination beforehand?

[1992 in spaceflight]

Quick question. Will there be an email address where we can submit proof of vaccination beforehand?

We're still discussing some things, we'll make announcements as soon as we can.

[1992 in spaceflight]

Hello folks,

We have some COVID policies to announce. Only point 1 is a change from last year's requirements.

1. We're requiring folks to be fully vaccinated for the tournament, as per the CDC definition. (Look at the "Adults ages 18 and older" section and click on the vaccine you received to find the definition of fully vaccinated for you). We highly encourage everyone who can to get a booster shot before the tournament. To submit your vaccination info, please fill out this form.

2. Masks will be required while you are indoors for the tournament. The only exceptions to this policy are: if you are eating or drinking; if you are making a tournament announcement; and if you are reading a game.

3. I should have hand sanitizer and wipes available again this year in game rooms.

If there are any questions you have about these policies, please post below or email/DM me.

[1992 in spaceflight]

Also, we have 16 rooms reserved for both the tournament and for CO Trash on Sunday. We won't be raising the field cap until we get more staffers and we get 30 teams registered for CO (so this would be one more team).

We're currently at 18 staffers signed up for CO, so please consider this an open call for staffers for CO if you are not already playing the main tournament. Please fill out this form to indicate you want to staff.

[Zealots of Stockholm]

Also, we have 16 rooms reserved for both the tournament and for CO Trash on Sunday. We won't be raising the field cap until we get more staffers and we get 30 teams registered for CO (so this would be one more team).

We're currently at 18 staffers signed up for CO, so please consider this an open call for staffers for CO if you are not already playing the main tournament. Please fill out this form to indicate you want to staff.

If this expansion happens, will packet deadlines be changed/waived? With roughly a month until the absolute "we will drop you from the tournament" deadline, I don't think its reasonable to expect that teams on the waitlist had been working on a packet.

My personal opinion is that waiving the packet submission for additional teams might make sense, depending on set progress/number and quality of current submissions. Giving teams ~3 weeks to submit by the +$50 deadline (assuming the field expands this week) would be reasonable for a half-packet, but from my experience working on packet sub tournaments in the past (not CO), not much coming in at that deadline is getting used anyways. If you want something earlier to work with, I would guess submissions would be of a lower quality due to being rushed. Perhaps waitlisted teams might be willing to pay a slightly higher base fee so teams who submitted don't feel that they were treated unfairly for signing up early?

[1992 in spaceflight]

Also, we have 16 rooms reserved for both the tournament and for CO Trash on Sunday. We won't be raising the field cap until we get more staffers and we get 30 teams registered for CO (so this would be one more team).

We're currently at 18 staffers signed up for CO, so please consider this an open call for staffers for CO if you are not already playing the main tournament. Please fill out this form to indicate you want to staff.

If this expansion happens, will packet deadlines be changed/waived? With roughly a month until the absolute "we will drop you from the tournament" deadline, I don't think its reasonable to expect that teams on the waitlist had been working on a packet.

My personal opinion is that waiving the packet submission for additional teams might make sense, depending on set progress/number and quality of current submissions. Giving teams ~3 weeks to submit by the +$50 deadline (assuming the field expands this week) would be reasonable for a half-packet, but from my experience working on packet sub tournaments in the past (not CO), not much coming in at that deadline is getting used anyways. If you want something earlier to work with, I would guess submissions would be of a lower quality due to being rushed. Perhaps waitlisted teams might be willing to pay a slightly higher base fee so teams who submitted don't feel that they were treated unfairly for signing up early?

We were discussing this earlier today and will make an announcement as soon as we come to a decision.

[kdroge]

If this expansion happens, will packet deadlines be changed/waived? With roughly a month until the absolute "we will drop you from the tournament" deadline, I don't think its reasonable to expect that teams on the waitlist had been working on a packet.

So, first off, we are going to give until July 2nd to give a potential 30th team the chance to sign up. If no team signs up by then, the field cap of 27 will remain in place and people on the waitlist / free agents will have to join existing teams if possible.

If a team does sign up and the field expands, the formerly waitlisted teams (teams 28-30) will have two choices. Either they can pay a +50 fee and not submit a packet, or they may write a half packet and submit by July 16th (the +50 deadline for others) to receive no penalty. Hopefully this gives these teams reasonable options for packet submission while being fair to those who signed up early.

[DumbJaques]

Dropping a line here because we've had some teammates drop and have 1-2 open spots right now. Shoot me an email if you're interested.

[Galadedrid Damodred]

Due to administrative considerations, we are setting the final field cap for this tournament at 27 teams. We encourage free agents to reach out to teams that are still looking for players, and we also encourage teams to communicate roster changes promptly if someone has to drop between now and the day of the tournament.

I updated the OP to reflect the most recent information I have concerning team names, rosters, and packet submission discounts/penalties. Please DM me if you have any questions or emendations. To the four teams that haven't submitted their half-packets yet, please do so as soon as possible! Remember, the penalty will increase by $10/day after July 16, and July 23 is the final deadline to retain your spot in the field.

[theMoMA]

Hey, I'm cross-posting this from the trash forum because we need staffers for CO Trash, and potential staffers may not be reading that subforum.

Please fill out this form if you're interested in staffing. Pay is $40 plus lunch for all staffers.

Additionally, we anticipate having capacity to add several more teams to the field beyond those that are registered, so please head over to the CO Trash thread if you're interested in registering a four-person team or putting your name on the team formation/free agents spreadsheet.

[miamc]

Hey y'all—reminder to submit your vaccination information if you haven't done so yet! This is required of all players, staff, and spectators.

[ThisIsMyUsername]

Hey y'all—reminder to submit your vaccination information if you haven't done so yet! This is required of all players, staff, and spectators.

Why are you asking for photo ID?

[CPiGuy]

Hey y'all—reminder to submit your vaccination information if you haven't done so yet! This is required of all players, staff, and spectators.

Why are you asking for photo ID?

Yeah I think this is not necessary. The point of asking for photo ID at vax check at, say, in person nationals is so that John Doe (who is not vaxxed) can't show up with Robert Smith's vax card, present it, and get a vax wristband through exploiting the fact that the vax check staffers don't know what Robert actually looks like, or for that matter can't just show up and claim to be Robert who has already sent in his vax information. Submitting photo ID online does not actually solve this problem. If you're going to hand out physical vaccine wristbands or something you should be checking ID on arrival at the tournament, not now.

[miamc]

Thanks for the feedback, the photo ID question has been removed. Please continue to submit vax info if you haven't already!

[Galadedrid Damodred]

I've updated rosters and team names based on the unofficial spreadsheet. Please DM me with any corrections. To the teams that haven't provided a team name: if you don't DM me a team name by the end of this weekend, the editors will assign you one, and I can't guarantee that a late-breaking request to change it next week will propagate through to the official schedule.

[Galadedrid Damodred]

A team has dropped from the field, and a team has joined the field. We remain at 27.

[meebles127]

The schedule is now available.

[meebles127]

I've posted a list of team names in the discord, I'll post them here when I get home from work.

[meebles127]

As promised:

Ravensburger
1. Krik? Krak! des Chevaliers (aka Alston)
2. You go Matt, Jack, do it again, wheel turnin' 'round and 'round (aka Fine)
3. Forget it, Huckle. It’s Busytown (aka Bailey)
4. 2020 Ontario Hybrid Champions (aka Coates)
5. Two Whoppers Junior and a Side of Hashes Brown (aka Berns)
6. Congo Only Pawn in Game of Leopold (aka Nguyen)
7. The October Crisis on Infinite Earths (aka Pavao)
8. Kevinyon (aka Onel)
9. Michigan C (aka Higgins)

Educa
1. DAMN son, where'd you find this? A Quiz-a-holics remix (aka Bollinger)
2. BHSU (aka Busse)
3. He Disrespected the Wu Gang Plant (aka Lifshitz)
4. We Found Michael Kearney at Gmail Dot Com (aka Eltinge)
5. illibois (aka Carpenter)
6. Enby 15 Whale (aka Cheng)
7. I have negged / the tossups / that were in / your categories (aka Cheyne)
8. No, Patrick, Rainfall is not an Instrument (aka Friedman)
9. "WUSTL A" (aka Hua)

Pomegranate
1. Up yours woke Borel-ists, we’ll see who open covers who (aka Brownstein)
2. When life gives you lemons, use information asymmetry (aka Golden)
3. Hurray for Our Ancient Pathways! (aka Bentley)
4. The Book of Overthrowing Apep Guardiola (aka Akridge)
5. Oroonoko Flow (Sail Away to Suriname) (aka Cope)
6. The ACF cabal is not happy with me—that’s okay, I’ll still keep playing that garbage. (aka Marvin)
7. Doc Doc Doc Goose (aka Cummings)
8. Propaganda of the Vent (aka Atkins)
9. Operation Urgent Furry (aka Brodsky)

[Abdon Ubidia]

We had a late drop from our team so if anyone wants to be the fourth on a team with me, Mazin Omer, and Arthur Delot-Vilain (you won't have to write etc), message me! (or if the organizers know of any free agents that still want to play)

[1992 in spaceflight]

Hello folks,

We have some COVID policies to announce. Only point 1 is a change from last year's requirements.

1. We're requiring folks to be fully vaccinated for the tournament, as per the CDC definition. (Look at the "Adults ages 18 and older" section and click on the vaccine you received to find the definition of fully vaccinated for you). We highly encourage everyone who can to get a booster shot before the tournament. To submit your vaccination info, please fill out this form.

2. Masks will be required while you are indoors for the tournament. The only exceptions to this policy are: if you are eating or drinking; if you are making a tournament announcement; and if you are reading a game.

3. I should have hand sanitizer and wipes available again this year in game rooms.

If there are any questions you have about these policies, please post below or email/DM me.

We have the following update to announce about the masking policy at CO.

Due to the case load in Evanston, masks are going to be recommended, but not required. If a staff member asks you to wear a mask in their room, you are required to wear a mask. We expect all players to respect everyone's decision about whether to wear a mask or not to wear a mask.

EDIT on 08/02/2022: We're reverting back to the originally announced masking policy.

[DumbJaques]

I would like to urge a reconsideration of this policy (in favor of required masking).

For one, the case loads in Evanston are close to irrelevant; very, very few of the participants at this event are from Evanston, or will have spent significant time there during a likely infectivity window prior to this tournament. People are coming from all over (including places with both lower case loads and much higher case loads). I can think of no reason why that statistic would justify updating the policy.

I also don't understand the justification for masks to be required in a particular room if a mod requests it. For one, we know that ba2 is infectious enough that spread can happen very easily - someone walking by in the hallway would be enough, and of course those moderators (who absolutely should have the right to require masks in their room!) do also need to use hallways, bathrooms, meeting rooms, etc. Beyond this, immunocompromised or just otherwise cautious players at this tournament deserve the same protections that moderators do.


Seriously, please reconsider this. The chance that somebody attending this tournament will be covid+ is probably pretty decent (recall that ACF Nats at Northwestern had such a case, despite transmission risk for vaccinated individuals being MUCH lower then than it is right now). If we're going to require vaccines (with photo IDs, initially), it seems bizarre to me that we wouldn't require masks, given the current data on waning effectiveness against the new strain.

Wearing a mask for the duration of CO is perfectly doable - we've all done it plenty of times at this point. There's a basic responsibility to each other, and I would really expect that at our premier community event, we would be able to live up to it.

[DumbJaques]

(Also it seems like, pretty unacceptable to change the masking policy days before the event, after it had been in place for months, when people made travel arrangements based on said policy, etc. Perhaps I missed something, but I can't see anywhere that notes the announced policy would be subject to change - it seems quite emphatic - and 4 days seems unreasonably late to make such a change even if it did).

[jinah]

As someone who is fully vaccinated, boosted, and still caught COVID in Chicago a few weeks ago (after avoiding it for two years), I strongly agree with Chris. “You must wear masks unless actively moderating, making tournament announcements, or eating/drinking” is already a pretty lax mask policy, and everyone who has registered to staff or play this tournament has done so under the assumption that they will be required to wear masks most of the time.

In addition to the reasons Chris gave, not having a uniform mask policy is not really fair to staffers, who may find it awkward or uncomfortable to ask players to mask up if other staffers are not doing so. It’s also obviously unfair to players who are high risk, live with someone who is high risk, or just don’t want to get covid, who are even more likely to feel like they can’t ask others in their room to wear masks without coming across as pushy or rude.

[Cheynem]

I do not particularly care if CO has a masks policy or not, but I would basically say that the current policy is equivalent to "no masks."