> SHORT RULES

> The purpose of this game is as follows: for each of the questions, your
> objective is to give an answer that
> (1) is correct, and
> (2) will be duplicated by as FEW other people as possible.

> ** Answers must be submitted by email only. DO NOT POST ANSWERS HERE **

> QUESTIONS

> 0. Name a person we have seen who was a member of UNIT other than The
> Brigadier, Captain Yates, or Sgt Benton
> 1. Name a word which occurs in at least two Doctor Who story titles.
> For the purposes of this question, "word" does not include words of
> three letters or fewer.
> 2. Name an alien race which appears in at least four separate stories.
> 3. Name an alien race which appears in exactly one story.
> 4. Name one of the ten actors who have officially played The Doctor.
> 5. Name any performer who has played The Doctor on the BBC tv series
> other than the official 10.
> 6. Name a character other than The Doctor who has been played by more
> than one actor (programme credits will be used to determine this).
> 7. Name a character, other than The Doctor or a companion, who has
> appeared in more than one story and was always played by the same actor
> (again, going by programme credits).
> 8. Name a character other than a companion who has travelled in the
> TARDIS with the Fifth Doctor.
> 9. Name a married couple we have seen.

> LONG RULES

> In order to participate in the contest, send your answers to me by
> email (tomsalin...@googlemail.com) before noon on Friday 9 June 2006.
> It is of course essential that nobody sees the answers given by other
> entrants before the deadline, so please do NOT post your answers here!

> If there are fewer than 10 entrants, I may not bother working out who's
> won, so if this sounds like fun, do encourage others to play.

> Make sure you have read the rules before submitting your answers.

> 1. Answers
> For each of the questions above, your objective is to give an answer
> that (1) is correct, and (2) will be duplicated by as FEW other people
> as possible. Feel free to use any reference material you like to
> RESEARCH your answers; but when you have found enough possible answers
> for your liking, you are expected to choose on your own which one to
> submit, WITHOUT mechanical or computer assistance: this is meant to be
> a game of wits.

> 2. Scoring
> The scores on the different questions are MULTIPLIED to produce a final
> score for each entrant. Low score wins; a perfect score is 1. If your
> answer to a question is correct, then your score is the number of
> people who gave that answer, or an answer I consider equivalent. A
> wrong answer, or a skipped question, gets a high score as a penalty.
> This is the median of:
> - the number of entrants
> - the square root of that number, rounded up to an integer
> - double the largest number of entrants giving the same answer (right
> or wrong) as each other on the question

> 2.1 More Specific Variants
> On some questions it's possible that one entrant will give an answer
> that is a more specific variant of an answer given by someone else. In
> that case the more specific variant will usually be scored as if the
> two answers are different, but the other, less specific variant will be
> scored as if they are the same.

> 2.2 Scoring Example
> Say I ask for someone the Doctor has kissed. There are 27 entrants: 19
> say "Rose" or "Rose Tyler", 2 say "Cassandra in the body of Rose
> Tyler", 4 say "Captain Jack", 1 says "Daphne Ashbrook" and 1 says
> "Lynda Moss". The 4 people who answered "Captain Jack" get 4 points
> each. Since "Cassandra in the body of Rose Tyler" is a more specific
> variant of "Rose Tyler", those who said "Rose Tyler" get 21 points
> each, and those who said "Cassandra in the body of Rose Tyler" get 2
> points each. The Doctor never kissed actress Daphne Ashbrook (although
> he may have kissed Grace Holloway) nor Lynda Moss,
> so those answers are both wrong. The persons who gave them both get the
> penalty score, which is the median of:
> - number of entrants = 27:
> - sqrt(27) = 5.196+, rounded up = 6:
> - double the most popular answer's count = 21 x 2 = 42:
> or in this case, 27.

> 3. Entries
> Entries must be emailed to me personally by email:
> tomsalin...@googlemail.com. Do NOT post your answers on the the forum!
> In general there is no penalty for errors of spelling, capitalization,
> English usage, or other such matters of form. Sometimes a specific
> question may imply stricter rules, though. And if you give an answer
> that properly refers to a different thing related to the one you
> intended, I will normally take it as written. Once you intentionally
> submit an answer, no changes will be allowed, unless I decide there was
> a problem with the question. Similarly, alternate answers within an
> entry will not be accepted. Only the first answer that you
> intentionally submit counts.

> 3.1 Clarifications
> Questions are not intended to be hard to understand, but I may fail in
> this intent. (For one thing, in many cases clarity could only be
> provided by an example which would suggest one or another specific
> answer, and I mustn't do that.) In order to be fair to all entrants, I
> must insist that requests for clarification must be emailed to me, NOT
> POSTED in any mailing list. But if you do ask for clarification, I'll
> probably say that the question is clear enough as posted. If I do
> decide to clarify or change a question, all entrants will be informed.

> 3.2 Supporting Information
> It is your option whether or not to provide supporting information to
> justify your answers. If you don't, I'll email you to ask for it if I
> need to. If you provide any explanatory remarks along with your
> answers, you are responsible for making it sufficiently clear that they
> are not part of the answers. The particular format doesn't matter as
> long as you're clear.

> 4. Scope
> Questions refer to the transmitted episodes of the BBC television
> series "Doctor Who" in its original run from 1963 to 1989, the TV Movie
> of 1996 and the current series which began in 2005. Only episodes
> transmitted at the time of posting are included, and all other Doctor
> Who related works are excluded. This excludes audio plays, comic
> strips, spin-offs, TARDISodes, novelisations and probably more.

> 4.1 "Story" refers to one or more episodes, generally with the same
> production code, writer and director, which tell a complete tale. Where
> story names are in issue, the most common name will be used. This will
> generally be the name used for the DVD, VHS or novelisation ("The
> Daleks", rather than "The Mutants" or "The Dead Planet" for example).
> For the avoidance of doubt "Mission to the Unknown" is one story and
> "The Trial of a Timelord" is four stories.

> 4.2 "Companion" refers to anyone who travelled with the Doctor for two
> or more consecutive episodes. For the avoidance of doubt, the following
> all have honorary companion status: Katarina, Sara Kingdom, Brigadier
> Lethbridge-Stewart, Adam, Captain Jack, Mickey. No other UNIT soldiers
> have companion status (Harry Sullivan and Jo Grant obviously are
> companions).

> 4.3 "Appears" or "Seen" mean seen on-screen, as opposed to merely
> referred to in dialogue or implied.

> 4.4 "Alien" means not originating from the planet Earth.

> 4.5 "Actor" includes both male and female performers, but excludes
> stunt-people, stand-ins doubling for a credited actor etc. unless the
> question indicates otherwise.

> 5. Judging
> As moderator, I will be the sole judge of what answers are correct, and
> whether two answers with similar meaning are considered the same,
> different, or more/less specific variants. I will do my best to be fair
> on all such issues, but sometimes it is necessary to be arbitrary. I
> may rescore the contest if I agree that I made a serious error and it
> affects the high finishers.

> 6. Results
> Results will normally be posted within a few days of the contest
> closing. They may be delayed if I'm unexpectedly busy or for technical
> reasons.

> Have fun!

> Cheers

> Tom