Tossup

A tossup is a question that is read out loud to both teams. During a game, any player who believes they know the answer to a tossup can use their buzzer to interrupt the question and deliver an answer to attempt to score points for their team. The tossup-bonus format, four-quarter format, VHSL format, and all other known forms of contemporary quizbowl use tossup questions as the staple of gameplay.

A tossup typically contains several sentences describing the answer and ends with a "giveaway" clue about the answer. Players can buzz in anytime they think they know the answer. Tossups should be written in a pyramidal style, with the result being that more knowledgeable teams should buzz in before less knowledgeable teams. Points are awarded to the team of the person that answered the tossup correctly.

Tossups are usually worth 10 points. Variations on tossup rules include neg penalties, meaning that a team that buzzes in first with an incorrect while the question is being read has points deducted from their score, and powers, meaning that a team that buzzes in during an early part of the question with a correct answer received more than the standard number of points.

Though players do not have to begin their answer to a tossup question immediately after buzzing in, there are typically time limits involved in answering tossups. In ACF, HSAPQ, PACE, and NHBB gameplay, players have five seconds to begin their answer; in the official NAQT rules, players have two seconds to begin. If a person buzzes in, they typically have three seconds to start giving their answer. Additionally, if nobody buzzes in within three seconds of the end of a tossup, then it goes dead.

Example tossup

From ACF Fall 2012, Buffalo packet

Nicolas Poussin painted this figure being helped by a faun onto a goat while looking at a putto attacking a young satyr. Four paintings also by Poussin depict this figure presenting weapons forged by Vulcan to her son. Jacques-Louis David's last painting shows this figure disarming Mars. Two paintings by Rubens depict this figure gazing into a mirror held by another son who has wings. Titian made a depiction of this goddess reclining on a couch in a painting commissioned by the Duke of Urbino. Botticelli painted the birth and arrival on a seashell of, for 10 points, what figure, the Roman goddess of love?
ANSWER: Venus [do not accept “Aphrodite”] [Category: Quizbowl basics]