Pub Quiz

THE PUB QUIZ

Quizzica take on the traditional pub quiz. Its designed to challenge and entertain a team with a range of knowledge. The quiz is played in two halves, each covering the full range of general knowledge. There’s something for every player player – and there’s plenty to discuss within the team , making for a real social occasion. The format was devised as a response to the low-quality, boring, question-list type quizzes that are two-a-penny on the internet, and the ones the landlord has cobbled together in twenty minutes from a copy of today’s Daily Mirror (and are entirely unanswerable if you’ve read the Sun or the Star instead this morning). If you just want six rounds of UK number one hits, or Who won the FA Cup in 1981?* – then you’re not in the right place.

TUNING TO YOUR REQUIREMENTS

While Quizzica can provide off-the-shelf quizzes we find that bespoke, or slightly tuned versions, are more enjoyable for players and lead to more successful long-running quiz nights.

Tuning can be – among other things, changing:

  • Level and range of difficulty of questions
  • Mix and balance of subjects
  • Features: cryptic, link, list questions, etc.
  • Structure, rounds or halves, number of questions.

At our regular venues, we often make a feature of including one question in each week’s quiz on an appropriate theme – the weekly Irish Question in an Irish pub, for example, or the Australian Question in a pub with a popular Australian barman.

Contact us with your requirements and we’ll see what we can do.

FORMAT

The standard Quizzica Pub Quiz consists of thirty questions, scored out of 40 points.

  • The quiz is arranged in two halves, with a break in between.
  • The last question in each round is a ‘multiple’ requiring a list of answers worth one point each. For example: Name the last six British Labour Prime Ministers.
  • There are five Link Questions that have answers that are in some way associated, with a bonus point for working out the link. See the sample quiz below for an example.
  • There are a two word-play questions which roughly equate to one coffee table and one cryptic crossword clue.
  • Other questions cover the gamut of general knowledge: history, sport, science, popular culture, the arts, geography, and so on.

SAMPLE QUIZ

Here is a sample Quizzica Pub Quiz.

HOW IT WORKS

The Pub Quiz is usually run one evening a week with a start at around 8:00 or 8:30. Before the main quiz a warm up Picture Quiz is often run, perhaps with a prize of a round of drinks for the winning team. The time allowed for the pictures can be varied to allow for late comers, more teams to arrive, or problems with the PA system to be sorted. If preferred the picture quiz can be run at half-time while the main quiz is scored.

We recommend teams of no more than four players.

Marking is best done by the MC or an assistant at the end of each half. If this is not possible, collect the scoresheets from all the teams and redistribute them randomly to other teams to mark. (Don’t let two teams choose to swap answer sheets.)

Prize Allocation

Along with entry fees, this is up to you.

Here’s a possible prize allocation scheme, that we’ve used before:

  • Less than 8 teams: winner takes all.
  • 8-15 teams: winner 75%, second 25%.
  • Over 15 teams: 75%, 15% and 10%.

Tie break

In the event of a tie in scores, tied teams elect champions to go head-to-head. These champions face off, with first to answer a tie-break question correctly winning the quiz.

OTHER FEATURES

Handicapping

If you have one regular team that starts to win every week you can introduce a handicap. Last weeks winners lose two points. If they win two weeks in a row despite the handicap, then next week they have a handicap of four points. And so on.

Jackpot Rollover

One feature that some venues run is a rolling Jackpot. This increases – say by £5.00 each week – until won by a team answering all questions correctly for a maximum forty out of forty in the main quiz. In the event of two or more teams getting full marks the prize should be evenly split.

Raffle Rollover

A weekly Jackpot question, separate from the main quiz. Like the Jackpot Rollover, the prize increases each week until won. Raffle tickets are sold – say for £1.00 each. The holder of the winning ticket must choose from one of three envelopes that contain jackpot questions. If the raffle winner answers the question correctly, they win the jackpot.

TIPS FOR QUIZ MASTERS

  • Don’t rush.
  • Make sure everyone can hear you.
  • Read each question once, wait a few seconds to see if anyone asks for clarification, then read it again.

It was *Spurs*, but you knew that already – see what we mean?