Re: PB8 packets in the chat room

Packets are often a late night occurence. (I can
recall doing some as late as 4am at times.) Although the
chatroom is voice capable, it is done in text. The
"reader" cuts-and-pastes a tossup a clue-by-clue, so as to
allow people to buzz in where they think they would
know it, by typing in "buzz" or some equivalent.
Bonuses get read too, but not as often.

The
practice allows for fun for the chat room participants,
and gives authors a chance for feedback. Participants
can intersperse comments with the text, and as long
as the "moderator" uses a unique text effect,
players can ignore the chatter. We don't keep score, we
just play for fun.

The one bug of the chatroom
is that it does not allow people to type consecutive
messages which are the same. Thus if someone beats you on
the buzz, you either have to "clear" your buzzer by
typing something else, or type in a different buzz
message, for example "buzzbuzz" instead of
"buzz."

Also, we've tried to work out a mechanism for declaring
that you've withdrawn your buzz if someone buzzes in
ahead of you and negs with your intended answer.
Personally, I'd rather test my mettle and see if I can pull
something out of nowhere.

Anyways, just drop by and
see how it goes, play some, and read when you feel
comfortable. Just remember that sometimes, we talk about other
things besides quizbowl. Also, the chatroom is a good
place to get opinions on certain tournaments after they
happen.

This archive was generated by hypermail 2.4.0: Sat 12 Feb 2022 12:30:43 AM EST EST