4 ms·

I think that would just encourage contestants to buzz in immediately, since I imagine that the risk of penalty of not knowing a question pales in comparison to

by kmkemp 11y ago

I think that would just encourage contestants to buzz in immediately, since I imagine that the risk of penalty of not knowing a question pales in comparison to the reward of getting to answer for a strong contestant. You effectively eliminate the only downside of buzzing early since contestants would get to hear the entire question regardless.

fennecfoxen 11y ago
The traditional College Bowl <TM> / Quizbowl <not-TM> technique is (a) to assign a 50% penalty to the early buzz with an incorrect answer, and (b) since it's game with teams and has two teams, the rest of your team is disqualified from answering the question, leaving the opposite team with lots of time to think about it (and subsequently secure access to the 3x bonus question following every toss-up question.) Which is lots of fun and very competitive, but a little bit less tele-savvy.
- colomon 11y ago
  Ack, we ran up against a "celebrity" reader in the final rounds of a Quizbowl tournament who didn't stop reading reliably when the other team buzzed in. I don't know how, but the other team was really good at taking advantage of this, buzzing in before the reader had given enough information to answer the question, and then answering after he'd finished the sentence. Our team got steamrolled.
  - gamegoblin 11y ago
    In Highschool Quizbowl, I'd take advantage of the fact that most untrained readers have a hard time stopping mid-syllable, or even mid-word, so any time there was a question that hinged on a single word, such as a world capital question, I'd buzz in on the first letter of the word, and they'd usually get out 2 syllables before stopping, providing enough information. Q: What is the capital of L-(BUZZ)-ithu-- [stops reading]. A. Vilnius. But if they had had really good reaction time and stopped on L--, I'd have been hosed. Latvia, Lithuania, Liechtenstein, Libya, Liberia, etc...
    - colomon 11y ago
      The team that beat us was doing more Q: What is the capital of (BUZZ) Lithuania? A: Vilnius.
vfa33 11y ago
Agreed that strong contestants would buzz in immediately. One solution would be to display the text of the question slightly beforehand to the audience, but not the contestants.

by kmkemp 11y ago

fennecfoxen 11y ago

The traditional College Bowl <TM> / Quizbowl <not-TM> technique is (a) to assign a 50% penalty to the early buzz with an incorrect answer, and (b) since it's game with teams and has two teams, the rest of your team is disqualified from answering the question, leaving the opposite team with lots of time to think about it (and subsequently secure access to the 3x bonus question following every toss-up question.) Which is lots of fun and very competitive, but a little bit less tele-savvy.

colomon 11y ago
Ack, we ran up against a "celebrity" reader in the final rounds of a Quizbowl tournament who didn't stop reading reliably when the other team buzzed in. I don't know how, but the other team was really good at taking advantage of this, buzzing in before the reader had given enough information to answer the question, and then answering after he'd finished the sentence. Our team got steamrolled.
- gamegoblin 11y ago
  In Highschool Quizbowl, I'd take advantage of the fact that most untrained readers have a hard time stopping mid-syllable, or even mid-word, so any time there was a question that hinged on a single word, such as a world capital question, I'd buzz in on the first letter of the word, and they'd usually get out 2 syllables before stopping, providing enough information. Q: What is the capital of L-(BUZZ)-ithu-- [stops reading]. A. Vilnius. But if they had had really good reaction time and stopped on L--, I'd have been hosed. Latvia, Lithuania, Liechtenstein, Libya, Liberia, etc...
  - colomon 11y ago
    The team that beat us was doing more Q: What is the capital of (BUZZ) Lithuania? A: Vilnius.

vfa33 11y ago

Agreed that strong contestants would buzz in immediately. One solution would be to display the text of the question slightly beforehand to the audience, but not the contestants.