Even if you play and answer hundreds of thousands of quizbowl questions, writing questions is a whole different beast. As every question requires consistency and details, tiny mistakes in how you write or research can fundamentally destroy the integrity of the question. The goal of a question is not just to challenge players but beautifully guide players to answers and reward them for their skills. Tiny mistakes can break this process by rendering questions unfair, tedious, or confusing. This guide will help you with both the broad ideas of question writing and some minute details that build the foundation for a writing philosophy.

Ideation

The first step is choosing a category and topic. More often than not, question writers focus on a specific category for what they write based on what they love and what they’re good at. If you still don’t know which categories you excel the best in, choose something random, and if it excites you, stick with it. 

Next, break the category into smaller parts. Let’s say you’re interested in writing a visual fine arts question. Thinking of a particular painting or artist can narrow down your options, and once you’ve reached an answerline you’re happy with, ask yourself two important questions.

1. Does this answerline match the difficulty that I’m targeting?

2. Do I know enough about this answerline?

If you said “No” to the first question, ask yourself if you can still use the answerline. Imagine you chose the Chinese artist Zhou Fang as your answerline for middle schoolers. Clearly, even for most highschoolers, this would be extremely difficult to answer during the actual game. You can either scrap the answerline completely, or edit it to be easier for others to answer, like changing the answerline from Zhou Fang to China to be broader.

If you said “No” to the second question, technically, you could write about it, but it’s common to make it too easy or too hard when writing the clues. Clues appear a lot easier to you when you have a Wikipedia page in front of you with everything about the answerline.

If you answered “Yes” to these two questions, you’re ready to start writing a question! 

Questions, Difficulties, and Lengths

Even before the ideation period, a writer should know what type of question they’re writing. Here are some examples of question types that the LIQBA uses.

1. Tossups:

A tossup is a question containing a set of clues, the best of which have clues that go from hard to easy as the question is read, often called “pyramidality”. During a tossup, players can buzz in at any time. The last line of your tossup, called the “giveaway”, should always state a question or the phrase “Name this…” to tell players that this is the final line of the tossup.

Pyramidality is essential to a tossup because it distinguishes the depth of a players’ knowledge. If you start with easy clues, the game becomes based on reaction time rather than general breadth of knowledge. Pyramidal clues should also be related and flow together for both the reader and players. Additionally, it’s better to have qualitative information about the answerline, while avoiding random statistics such as “This song was number 29 on the Billboard Top 100 in 2007.”

2. Bonuses:

Bonuses are multi-part questions (ranging from 2-4 parts) that are given to a team. Rather than anyone being able to buzz in, teammates discuss the answer to a given part, and the team captain says their collective answer to the moderator. While some question sets have bonuses with a varying difficulty order, LIQBA maintains pyramidality, where the first part is easier compared to the final, difficult clue.

3. Lightning Rounds:

Lightning rounds are also multi-part questions (often 8, 10, or 12 parts) with significantly shorter clues and are usually preceded by a specific category like “Airport Codes” or “Mythological Narratives”. They are often 60 to 70 seconds long. As such, lightning rounds should be as “lightning” fast as possible, so remember to trim question lengths and be concise.

4. 30-20-10:

30-20-10 rounds consist of three clues where clues are read in distinctive parts, and clues get easier but are worth fewer points. For example, the first hard clue is worth 30 points, the second medium clue is worth 20 points, the final “giveaway” clue is worth 10 points. This type of question is less commonly used in Quiz bowl, as only two companies currently produce them.

Difficulty

A major factor of question writing is difficulty control. Knowing when a clue is “feasible” for an elementary schooler, middle schooler, or high schooler requires intuition. But here are some basic values to help you designate difficulties.

• Easy Tossup: Convertible by 90% of teams at a given level
• Moderate Tossup: Convertible by between 80%-60% of teams at a given level
• Hard Tossup: Convertible by 50% of teams at a given level

Research and Drafting

Now that you know your category, answerline, difficulty, length, and question type, you can start researching and drafting questions. For research, look through previous questions, Wikipedia articles, or any other reliable source on the Internet. It is fine to take inspiration from other places, but direct copying is unethical and never allowed. Remember to research your topic using primary resources to maintain clue accuracy.

Artificial Intelligence

AI should not be used during the writing process, whether it be for question ideation, research, or writing itself. Artificial intelligence not only plagiarizes other people’s work, but it is often wrong. If you need help with writing, you can always ask other quizbowl editors or writers for what needs to be changed. 

Editing

If you’re writing formally (for a set or similar), be sure to check the question with an editor before submitting. If it is for the purpose of improving as a player, remember to go through all of your written questions and read them out loud, checking grammar mistakes or confusing clues. 

Answerline Syntax

When developing an answerline, only the required portions should be underlined, like in an acronym or last name. Furthermore, additional allowed answers should be placed in brackets with an underline. Prompts are used if a player gives an answer that’s too broad, and anti-prompts are used in rare scenarios when an answer is too specific. Rejects are automatically rejected questions even if they may seem promptable (“Java” for a question on JavaScript).

Common Mistakes

Indicator Confusion – Always stay consistent with your indicators. For example, if a tossup is about “This author,” do not randomly state “This work”. Furthermore, indicators should be simple. As an example, don’t use “compendium,” use “work”, and don’t use “titular”, use “title.” Always place an indicator in a tossup as early as you possibly can.

Frauding – Some answers are too easy based on the language used in clues. Players can fraud tossups by using the linguistic properties to narrow down their answers. If an answerline is “China” and you mention the city of Chengdu, many players will buzz even if they have never heard of the clue before. 

Syntax and Flow – Always ensure that your writing is grammatically correct and flows well. Avoid using weaker conjunctions like “and” as you want clues to flow seamlessly together. Saying your question out loud can help you spot any mistakes or confusing bits.

Stick to the category – Unless your category is general knowledge or you are explicitly writing a commonlink, always make sure all your clues are within one category. If an answerline is “heart” for a science tossup, it should not discuss hearts in video games.

Stock clues – These are clues that frequently come up for a specific answerline in quiz bowl games and should be avoided. Use clues from a diverse range of sources and never copy  from a question database.

Spelling – Always check your spelling for names and quotes and remember to always add pronunciation guides for words that don’t look intuitive to say. Pronunciation guides should be phonetic and indicate which part(s) of the word are accented. For example, [KUR-nul] for colonel.

Conciseness – Communicate clearly and understandably when writing a tossup. Try to cut out unnecessary wording or details to maintain the flow of a sentence. Along with that, avoid using vague descriptions and instead use specific names, titles, etc.