Lollapuzzoola is … [checks notes] … tomorrow! Here’s a little more detail about the events of the day. (The venue in NYC is sold out, but there are still unlimited tickets left for the PDF download or the snail mail puzzles.)
Please note: There is no live virtual event happening this year. All home solvers have the option of PDFs (which you print out) or snail mail (which we print out).
WHERE ARE WE?
Our location is Riverside Church, and we’re in a room called South Hall. There are two entrances to the building — 91 Claremont Avenue and 490 Riverside Drive.
The Riverside Drive entrance leads you immediately into the part of the building where Lollapuzzoola takes place. It has a staircase and is not handicap accessible. These doors will open at 9am.
The Claremont Avenue entrance is on the other side of the church. It IS handicap accessible, and it is also (probably) open a little earlier than 9am. It is also a bit of a distance from South Hall. That said, if stairs are a concern, please use the Claremont Avenue entrance.
If you choose to drive to the church, there is a parking garage underneath, and elevators that come up immediately outside South Hall. If you choose to take public transportation, we don’t have a lot of information about that, so check https://new.mta.info/ for local news.
WHO ARE WE?
Lollapuzzoola is run by Brian Cimmet, Brooke Husic, and Sid Sivakumar. This year, we’ve commissioned the talents of Sara Cantor, Ricky Cruz, Kevin G. Der, Rebecca Goldstein, Matthew Gritzmacher, Doug Peterson, and Erica Hsiung Wojcik to create our tournament slate of puzzles.
The tiebreaker puzzle is by Emily Sharp and Kunal Nabar, with a variety puzzle meta suite by Neville Fogarty, and a crossword meta suite designed by Sid Sivakumar and constructed by Laura Braunstein, Zhouqin Burnikel, Emily Carroll, Rachel Fabi, Olivia Mitra Framke, Kate Hawkins, Jenna LaFleur, Ryan McCarty, Will Nediger, Tony Orbach, joon pahk, Paolo Pasco, Brendan Emmett Quigley, Caitlin Reid, Matthew Stock, and Robyn Weintraub. Read more about all of them here.
SCHEDULE OF THE DAY
- 9am-10am: Check-in, registration, get a party hat, solve some casual warm-up puzzles
- 10am-12pm: Puzzles 1, 2, and 3
- 12pm-1:20pm: Lunch (pizza in house, if you ordered it … otherwise, you’re on your own!)
- 1:20-3:00: Puzzles 4 and 5
- 3:30ish: Local Finals and Pairs Finals (in two different locations)
- 4:00ish: Express Finals
- 4:30ish: Award Ceremony
TOURNAMENT SCORING
Lollapuzzoola is a crossword tournament where players are assessed on a combination of speed and accuracy.
There are five main puzzles in the tournament. At the end of five puzzles, the top three players in the Express and Local Divisions, and the top three pairs in the Pairs Division, will all compete in a Championship Final to determine the winners.
- Correct Squares: Gain ten (10) points for every correct square in the grid.
- Time Left on the Clock: Gain one (1) point for every second remaining on the clock.
- This score is only applied if your puzzle is at least 50% accurate. Otherwise, people would be inclined to turn in an unfinished puzzle to get the time points without caring about wrong or blank squares.
- Perfect Puzzle Bonus: Get a bonus of one hundred (100) points if your puzzle is totally accurate and you didn’t cheat.
- Google Tickets: After half the solving time has elapsed, players are invited to trade tickets for answers, at the cost of 25 points per ticket (plus forfeiture of the “perfect puzzle” bonus).
Example 1. Imagine a 30-minute puzzle that had 290 squares to fill. If you solved it perfectly in 10 minutes, there would be 20 minutes (or 1200 seconds) on the clock, and you would get 10 points per correct square plus a 100-point bonus for being perfect. That’s a total of 1200 + 2900 + 100 = 4200 points.
Example 2. If you used ten minutes but only got 120 of squares right, you would get no points for time (120 is less than half of 290), and a total of 1200 points for your correct squares.
Example 3. If you used twenty minutes, got 150 squares right, and used two Google Tickets, you would get 600 (for time remaining), 1500 (for correct squares), and lose 50 (for two Google Tickets). That’s a total of 600 + 1500 – 50 = 2050 points.
N.B.: Missing one square is ultimately a loss of 110 points – and that’s almost two minutes worth of time. Check your work!
What about rebus squares, do you do that sort of thing?
We might! And if there’s ever a rebus in the puzzle — that is, if more than one letter goes in a box — you must enter all the letters or it won’t be considered correct. We warned you!
As a matter of fact — it’s always better to do more. If there are boxes that look like they could be filled, they probably should be filled.
What if there’s a tie?
We have an extra puzzle! And even if we don’t use it as a tiebreaker, everyone gets to solve it anyway. What fun!
How are the finals scored?
The winner will be the first person to complete the puzzle with no mistakes. If no one completes the puzzle with no mistakes, then the winner is whoever has the fewest mistakes, regardless of time.
SPONSORS AND SUPPORTERS
We are grateful to be supported by several wonderful puzzle people and organizations.
American Values Club Crossword • Daily Crossword Links • Games World of Puzzles • Fill Me In • Fireball Crosswords • Matt Gaffney’s Weekly Crossword Contest • Outside the Box Puzzles • P&A Magazine • XWordInfo
There’s more information on our Sponsors page as well.
