Learned League

My first time on this year; would love a place to kibbitz on prior days questions and brag and bitch.
I'm 3-0 but I'm chalking that up to beginner's luck and a rookie rundle.
how about you?

Riding the bottom of A babee. Did we not have a thread already?

nope.

this is really making me use some muscles that have long been neglected. I've always prided myself on fast reference google-fu. LL is just about information that you've been exposed to or otherwise can puzzle out from your memory. You don't generally seem to be able to "figure out" clues logically or utilize your skillset to uncover information... you just have to remember it! I'm approaching it where I read the questions late night, answer whatever i know immediately and sleep on the rest till the morning and that seems to help a bit.

Oh hey! I remember James Redd and the Blecchs and I talked about starting a LL thread on ILX a few years ago, but we clearly never got around to it.

I'm 1-2-0 so far this season in A Keystone.

I occasionally post on the LL message board, too.

You don't generally seem to be able to "figure out" clues logically or utilize your skillset to uncover information... you just have to remember it!

I don't actually think this is true! I don't know that the first few questions this season have necessarily been representative, but one of the things I like about LL is that you often can puzzle things out if you read the question closely.

Actually, the Vaseline question from the other day might be a good example of this. I'd never heard of the Chesebrough Manufacturing Company, but I kept focusing on "Titusville, Pennsylvania" and thought, is it related to the coal industry? If I'd thought harder, I might have landed on oil instead, which could conceivably have led me to petroleum jelly. (It didn't happen, but it could have!)

You're right, though, that a fair amount is dredging stuff up from memory. I always read the questions when I wake up in the morning and then usually let them rattle around my noggin for a while before submitting answers. Sometimes an answer will come to the surface in the interim. For instance, one time, on my way to work, I suddenly and inexplicably recalled the name Zamfir.

Anyway I never use my invites so hmu ilxors. Word is league growth will be capped eventually at which point I guess it becomes one in one out, so get in while getting is good.

Baffling

for the confused:
https://learnedleague.com/

Some other useful links:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/the-coolest-weirdest-internet-community-youll-never-be-able-to-join/2014/08/20/3c3f565e-26eb-11e4-958c-268a320a60ce_story.html

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/11/magazine/letter-of-recommendation-learned-league.html

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/mick-mulvaney-learned-league-trivia_n_5c941573e4b0a6329e147a61

Thanks

3 of 6 correct today, 2 that i kinda thought i coulda got right and 1 that was just no chance at all

Hey don’t post about questions until the results are in, even obliquely! You don’t know who’s submitted yet.

well sure, but how is saying what i think i got right by the numbers revealing anything?

I’m sure there is some ruling from the Commissioner on this on the site, pro or con.

i challenge jaymc to 'smith' a one-day about ilx

forks if I were to know you intimately I could derive third-order insight into the answers by analyzing how well you thought you did, imo. Best to avoid even the appearance of etc.

Makes sense

i've been doing learned league for a few years on an invite from jaymc. i'm in C rundle, which seems to be about right since i almost always end up right in the middle of the rankings at the end of each season. i've had a strong start to this season so far but i'm sure i'll hit a rut and end up back in the middle again.

my ongoing minor issue with the main learned league is the "classical music" category, which seems very specific for a stand-alone category (that i suck at). i wish they just had a "music" category that spanned all genres.

silby OTM about not posting *anything* about a Match Day until it's over

U guys are playing 3D chess but whatever works is fine. Meet you back here at 1 in the morning to discuss.

I can't immediately find anything from the Commissioner about this, though it is a widely accepted norm within the LL community. On the LL board, whenever anyone posts even the most innocuous thing about a question while the Match Day is live, the post gets deleted.

Also, here's someone in a Learned League thread on the Jeopardy! message board:

With the new season and new players, it is a good time to remind everyone of the rule about discussing matches on this board. Please do not make any comment about the questions until that day's results have been posted on the LL board. Do not say how many you got right or wrong. Do not say if you thought they were hard or easy. Just do not say anything at all about the questions until the LL day has ended and the next day's questions are up.

As extreme as it may seem, I think it makes sense to stick with that rule here, too.

Oh, it's also in WestJ's LL84 welcome post:

Please remember, do not post anything here or elsewhere about any LL questions while a match day is underway. Not with a spoiler warning, not with oblique references, not asking if a question has an error in it, not anything. Period.

Well it's tomorrow now and I can reveal the secret that a plurality LL'ers are not fans of Bhad Bhabie

Haha. That was actually my route in, and I almost thought the answer was "Bad" until I remembered that "Suge" was the name of a song by Da Baby.

I lost 8(5)-7(5). Always disappointing to get the same number of questions right but lose on defense.

I am averaging about three right per game, but in the rookie league with some judicious defense, that seems to be enough to stay fairly competitive.

damn i almost missed this thread. u can find me having terrible defense to start, i'm 2-2 :/ i'm usually decent on defense? but i have been getting steadily worse somehow season over season. idk why.

also there was a thread but like a fool i smushed the words together LearnedLeague - any iLLx0rs out there?

i was gonna give a cryptic clue to my name since i don't like saying it on here (i mean i guess it's already too late to run for office due to my history on this site, i would guess) but then i realized i put it in the other thread so go look there!

also yes i haven't used an invite in ages so if anyone needs, hit silby up and then hit me up

and i 100% got that q yesterday on account of bhad bhabie (almost went with lil on account of yes indeed, until i read closer lol) (also i feel like lil was a question super recently???)

and yeah esp if this is a public board, no talk on today's results is always a good move. also no talking abt the random comedians u found and you're like "wow no way they're just like me!" and you sometimes check in to see what they got. its bad form

Completely new to this, but really like the idea. It seems like it's too late to join this season--is that correct?

yeah you have to join in between seasons

or you might be able to join but you wouldn't be able to play this season.

also no talking abt the random comedians u found and you're like "wow no way they're just like me!" and you sometimes check in to see what they got. its bad form

What about high-ranking White House officials

I too would like to join! Will M, silby, or any other kind ilxor have a spare invite?

theo von is a beast at learned league guys

Oh wait $30 for membership, gotta think about this.

What about high-ranking White House officials

Actually, I am going to answer my own post and note that the Commish has laid down the law about this, so I am going to respect that decision, but I still find the whole thing amazing sometimes.

@Leee: You only have to pay after you've completed a full rookie season, so you can try it out and decide if you like it. I have plenty of invites to spare, too.

can one of you kind individuals send me an invite, please? ilx webmail reaches me :)

Ah ok, that sounds reasonable. You can ilx mail me, and thanks!

Suge was one of the year’s biggest rap hits; surprised that didn’t give away that clue. I guess people aren’t much listening to that world unless they are specialists.

the 30 also covers a full year, which is i believe 3 or 4 seasons, so if you like the first season you're not paying too much to keep going!

i don't see where to send invites tho, is it possible to do so during the season or do we have to wait a month?

also if we have this many ppl i am definitely thinking ilxor private rundle next go around

Okay, I just looked, and you can only give out 1 invite per season (unless you are a Premier or Commissioner's Circle member). Pretty sure there were more at one point, but I don't blame Thorsten for wanting to put some controls on growth.

I'll give mine to you, Leee, since we've actually met IRL!

Oh, and Will, the referral page is here:
https://www.learnedleague.com/thorsten/referral.php

if my quick scan is right, leee, unctious, and jim want invites? and jaymc has leee? so i will send one to Unc & someone else get jim? (lmk if i missed any. i am so tired rn)

Unc contacted me, I will take care of ‘em

ok jim i'll send you a message then!

Why the low get rate on Q4 yesterday, Charles Pathé? This was the flaw in my defense, since I thought everybody must know this, especially an opponent with .761 in Film so assigned it a zero, allowing him to tie me 4(4)-4(3). Note: really don’t care that much, long ago gave up agonizing on defense, valuing speed over accuracy, having long ago settled down into C Rundle, most of my enjoyment now coming from the occasional 1DS or ML.

I got it, but had to really think about it as it's not a thing in Scotland

My first season back in LL for ages, doing absolutely terribly as my defensive play is terrible.

As is my vocabulary, obvs

the questions may or may not be slanted towards americans, but in any case i can imagine defense being extremely difficult for non-yanks

also middle-aged childless ppl : /

At some point I decided to stop worrying that much about defense and just try to get it over with as quickly as possible.

yeah defense is the BABIP of LL

so to speak

WAR = wrangles answers readily

I used to do more opponent research (I'm sure you're shocked), but now I limit that mostly to a) digging into Games/Sports % to get data on specific sports or to assess general video game knowledge, b) googling to see if I can determine age for a pop culture question where that could matter. But most days I don't do more than a quick glance at the category percentages on the page.

at any rate i have been shit this season (two forfeits didn't help) and am currently in the relegation zone

why did i submit 'horse latitudes' instead of 'trade winds' ffs

Because you were under the influence of my evil spell!

I keep making especially unforced errors this season. Good thing I got my booster shot of dgaf.

And I made that exact same mistake.

Also neglected to put FROZEN, even with the new bolding of the ask on.

I have forfeited three times on my return to LL this season. Annoyingly yesterday was one I'd have won easily if I'd remembered to play.

I forfeited on MD4 and was very annoyed at myself. I set it up to get a text message at 10 PM if I haven't submitted by then, but I think my phone died beforehand.

Generally doing OK this season, though. A few times, I talked myself out of the right answer (Lee Krasner, Merle Haggard, Dien Bien Phu), but they luckily didn't affect the results of the match.

i'm doing better than usual so far but i assume i'll regress to my usual .500 mark by the end of the season

As far as defense goes I have very little idea what others people might actually know. For instance (and I know such statements are viewed as trolling in many LL situations) I thought NINE STORIES might have a higher get rate.

i think a lot of people's knowledge of Salinger begins and ends with Catcher in the Rye.

also, the Nine Stories question was a classic example of "the answer is in the question," but it's hard to see those hints if you're not familiar with the answer to begin with.

Sounds about right.

i think a lot of people's knowledge of Salinger begins and ends with Catcher in the Rye.

I also know Franny and Zooey but that didn't help

5 pages in 2 days arguing whether "Oscar Isaacs [sic]" should be marked correct?!

After a pretty miserable start to the season, I ended up flirting with promotion, finished in 4th, and hit 100 TCA again on the last day, no less, while also setting a personal best of 4 9(6)s.

i think all my final week opponents got 9(6), tho i got two of my own

ended in a way that gave me an even-steven career record: 536-536-203.

Got a preseason promotion so I'll be in A again!

bring it!

... and I lose my first match despite being 5 right, because my opponent got 6. Don't know what else I was expecting from A.

I lost because I moneyed badly. I'm just lucky I even played my first match tbh, since I often forget to the first day.

Whoa, I finished in the 95th %ile with the highest point total in the MSC for my rundle (though not the entire league, someone in B beat me)! My best finish ever.

When?

Oh, never mind.

i am having a dreadful season

I started off strong but have sunk in the standings. Doesn't help that I accidentally forfeited on Monday.

pretty rude to let me make a wild but correct guess on the math question . . . and then ding me for having them in an ‘improper order’

hahaha i did the exact same thing!! i didn't even put a comma between them tbf, i was so defeated and just throwing any words i knew at the wall

ha me too

me too, iirc that was more common than the correct answer

I might even know of some people who studied math and were answering hastily and put them in the wrong order.

Which of course in that case uttimately didn't matter anyway since the defense assigned them zero points in their best category.

Also came to ask how many "Freedom" video supermodels everyone here remembered.

Knew they were supermodels, but didn't know which ones. Considered Cindy Crawford but thought it might have been too early for her, so I went with Elle MacPherson, alas.

crawford was my first thought but i wasn't 100% sure, but i was definite about evangelista so i switched to her. didn't try to think beyond that but would've probably gotten naomi campbell too

naomi campbell was the only one i knew for sure

I wrote schiffer and changed it last minute to Crawford bc it seemed safer, which it...... Was

Was going to showboat with Tatiana Patitz (who passed away quite recently) but played it very safe with Cindy Crawford.

Yeah that maths one was annoying and I definitely didn't not read the word "respectively" in the question.

I read it and knew it perfectly well but didn't want to bother to focus and make sure I got it right before submitting.

8-10-7, 16th of 26

third-worst defense in the rundle at .554

tenth in TCA at least? whatevs

Of likely interest to Mr. Redd: I was looking at the American Regional Theater 1DS results (64th percentile for me), and one of the two co-champions appears to be cultural critic/author Mark Harris. I looked in his rundle and Chris Eigeman is in there, too. They were referred by the same person, who is a casting director.