Learned League

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.

HI DERE

Also I was in the 6% who put Friendly instead of Howard Johnson the other day.

I got it right, but I wasn't 100% sure about it.

(Pathé, that is.)

I have found the less I overthink defense and the more I just go with my gut, the better my defensive performance is. I have never heard of Charles Pathé before, even after seeing the answer it is totally unfamiliar to me and my lifetime film score is .776

dang, i somehow got to 5 and 0. pride goeth before a fall, i imagine i'm gonna get ganked now.

for every music nerd who's like "i'm surprised hardly anyone got this question about dababy" there's a math dork who's like "i'm surprised hardly anyone got this question about fundamental calculus concepts" etc. also "why did everyone else get this question wrong that i got right" inevitably comes off as bragging

on defense, i think 'age of opponent' is probably a more important factor than any particular subject percentage

lol, i seem to keep hitting the "most common wrong answer;" would not have thought a third of the missing group would've also gone with cornet!

also, i learned something on the "massif" question but holy shit are some of these questions ever posed in the most convoluted way possible

i don't worry too much about defense, i mostly focus on which questions seem hard/easy to me, factored through a glance at their strongest/weakest categories.

i went with cornet too. i overthought the "related to" aspect and the most trumpet-adjacent instruments i could think of were bugle and cornet.

Early in my LL career, I tried to figure out defense by researching my opponent, which is not against the rules (though some people think it should be). These days, I don't have time for that, so I mostly just glance at the info on their profile and occasionally look into their question history to see if their strengths lie more in Games or Sports.

also, i learned something on the "massif" question but holy shit are some of these questions ever posed in the most convoluted way possible

― Fuck the NRA (ulysses), Wednesday, February 26, 2020 9:25 AM (fifteen minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

This one didn't seem particularly convoluted? I think sometimes he just tries to provide a lot of information, to give players multiple ways to get to the right answer. ("Vinson" triggered "Vinson Massif" for me, so I didn't even read the second sentence.)

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.

The evolution ML was tough, I made the final but I and another qualifier both had DEs < 0.600.

Didn't do that one, but I'm doing well in '90s Music. :)

How do you feel about Indigenous America 2?

I am enjoying it, especially the range of questions about the entire Americas.

I forfeited too many times in one of the last mini leagues to be allowed to do 90s music, which is making me sad

How many was enough for that to happen?

Usually I get an alert if I forget to submit by a certain time but for some reason didn't for Indigenous Americas 2 and forfeited the first two.

At least I managed to be 90% in Cover Versions because of Nazareth and UB40.

Nazareth basically worth about six unmonied correct answers.

I can't believe I didn't recognize "Red, Red Wine." It sounded so familiar but I couldn't get there.

I embarrassed myself yesterday with the Offspring q, for which I inexplicably answered "The Outcast." All I can say was that my brain was broken.

anybody willing to spare me an invite?

Sure. Send me your email address (I think my ILX mail still works).

ty, sent!

Got it!

You may know the drill already, but I need to vouch that you are aware of the basic rules of the league, so I'll just drop this here:

https://learnedleague.com/thorsten/primer.php

Also, you should be getting an email with instructions on how to join the wait list, so let me know if you don't receive it.

(Email sent to the second email address you mentioned.)

received!

Another link in the jaymc (and Mary) chain.

Today's 1DS for 2025 Maps is pretty fun! I recommend it even if you live under a rock like me.

That was fun, though there is a minor error in one of the questions that made me second-guess myself.

(I'll explain tomorrow.)

^James won the Pulitzer Prize in 2025, but it was published in 2024.

got 25th place in the 90s Music mini league despite missing two answers

Nice! I finished 182nd. I only missed one, but I put money on it: I answered Gang Starr instead of Black Moon. Wasn't confident about that answer but thought it was worth the risk.

(Don't know that I have ever heard of Black Moon, tbh.)

Last few posts made me realize Player Tracker does not seem to work for ML Championships, although manual inspection tells me that Greg finished 59th and only missed one, the one you just mentioned.

I wonder if "astronomically named" and "funky, jazzy samples" led anyone to Digable Planets

my first thought was black star, which I knew was wrong, but it led me to black moon. it's probably good I didn't put more thought into it or I would have realized how many other options there were. I also got very lucky with the selena question, just guessed the first texas city I thought of that wasn't one of the biggies.

Yeah, I wasn't 100% on that, either, but figured that 8th-largest city ruled out Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, Austin, Fort Worth, and El Paso, and a South Texas city seemed likely.

always thought this sounded fun, if anyone else has an invite avail id be grateful..

Who else was part of the 18% MCWA on Q4?

I see that teh rock star got it right