I know this is a subject that evokes some pretty strong feelings on this board and other places, so I'll attempt to explain myself and brace for impact...Austin Powers wrote:I agree. With all due respect to the poster who was on this show, if you're going to do it, it has to be because it works to your advantage. That apparently wasn't the case. Find a category you're good at, build up momentum, then maybe strategically hop to find a DD, or to get higher valued clues in a pinch.joepozz wrote:For all those who have posted about how slow or lethargic the game seemed, I'll repeat what I've said before. When there's a clue-jumper, the board will usually not get cleared.
Just hopping around, having someone else answer it, have that person go to the top of a new category altogether, then have you answer that, hop in the middle of a new category... yikes. If you got the DD, you wouldn't have even been in position to make great use of it. Build up some money, then DD hunt. At least it was mainly low valued clues that went unrevealed.
I can identify three elements of the game that can be controlled by the player through critical decision-making. The player cannot control the categories or clues, their own knowledge base or recall (in the moment), the knowledge or actions of the other players, Alex's actions, or (possibly controversial) even their own buzzer speed. (I'm not saying the buzzer cannot be mastered--it clearly can, but I don't see it as an act of critical decision making; I suppose if you want to take more of a metaphysical stance about choosing to exercise your will over the buzzer you could make that argument, but I'm not going to.)
The three elements that are controlled by the player's critical decisions: clue selection, wagering (DD and FJ), and how to calibrate their use of educated guessing (i.e. how sure do I need to be that my answer is correct before I'll ring in?)...
In my mind, if a player can gain an advantage in any of these areas, that has the potential to be a game-changer.
The first-time player gets one shot to incorporate these elements into the overall gameplay, with little opportunity for real-world play testing in advance. (Say what you want about the preparation offered by the mock game at the regional interviews and the warm-up/practice sessions before the game, but I don't think you can make an argument that either of these occurs under anything approaching real-game conditions, which include the studio audience, Alex and the intangible "this is really happening!" element.) I suppose if someone has done quiz bowl or academic decathlon in school or if one has previously been a contestant on a national TV program, these things could help a great deal, but most contestants have not done them. (I would start quoting Eminem's "Lose Yourself" here, but I think you get the idea...)
Obviously I did not do well in the game with my decisions about when to make educated guesses. I planned a very conservative strategy going in, but frankly the real-game conditions affected me far more than I thought they would and I got buzzer-drunk early in the game.
So much of a player's critical decision making relies upon the psychology of self-perception. For instance, if there is a category on the board I think is in my wheelhouse, I'm much more likely to make an instinctive guess, under the presumption that it will be a more educated guess than if I'm just parsing the clue in a random category.
My self-perception and self-identification as an upcoming Jeopardy! contestant included the following elements: I will probably know more about sports than my competition (and then I ended up against a baseball guy...go figure). I will probably know about the Bible than my competition (due to years of parochial schooling and being a preacher's kid; of course, this ended up being a non-factor). I will probably know more about other categories X, Y and Z than my competition. I am probably more right-brain oriented than my competition. I am probably more comfortable with non-linear thinking and thriving in chaos than my competition....
I don't think board jumping has any value in the search for Daily Doubles (or at least I've never understood the science of it, if indeed there is one), but I specifically chose that strategy in order to create chaos. And I don't think it was the strategy that failed me; in fact, I would have expected it to work best early in the game until my competitors made adjustments to cope with it, and I was strongest (if I may recklessly use that word) early in the game. This is also why I intentionally selected higher dollar values early on, because I hoped to gain a quick advantage amidst the chaos. I think the vitriol with which some people react to this strategy at least bears out the principle behind it; if it makes people this upset, that may be something I can exploit if it does not upset me. (In fact, my strategy appeared to be the cause of a number of in-game technical errors early on; I don't think the board operators were ready for that on their Monday morning! We ended up having at least two clues that were read but never appeared on screen, and two clues in which the wrong dollar value disappeared afterward and they had to briefly stop to reset the board.)
It certainly can be argued that because I selected this strategy and because I fared poorly the two are causally related, but I did not experience it that way. Call it self-deception if you'd like, but I clearly made some legitimate mistakes in one of the other areas of critical decision making (e.g. ringing in on half-heard clues and with under-educated guesses) and to me, when combined with some of the uncontrollable factors, it just wasn't my game or my day.
I took my one shot with an intentional strategy I don't think would work for most people. For me, I still think it was the right decision, because I know me best. There certainly is room for question about the assumptions I made, but in my sample of actual games played n=1, so I would hesitate to draw any larger conclusions.