How to play and score
Four questions,
one number.
Every day asks the same underlying question in four ways: what percentage of your campus will choose Scissors? That one number, published each day at noon, settles Games 2, 3, and 4, and the full campus mix settles Game 1.
Each game is scored out of 100, so a day is worth up to 400 points. Your rank is the sum of your 3 days, drawn inside your own campus. Answers lock at 11:00 AM IST the next morning; the latest version you submitted before the lock is the one that scores. A saved draft you never submitted does not count.
Question 1: your mix
Split 100 throws across Rock, Paper, and Scissors. You are not playing one opponent: your mix is scored against the average of every locked mix at your campus, your own included. Your User ID decides which payoff row you get, so a friend can hold the same mix and score differently.
Rock earns from the share of the campus that chose Scissors, Paper earns from Rock, and Scissors earns from Paper. The value of a move is:
value(move) = payoff(move) × campus share of the move it beats ÷ (0.25 + campus share of your move)
That 0.25 in the denominator is the twist. Without it, a move almost nobody played would pay effectively infinite odds, and one lonely voter would take the whole game. With it, crowding a move dilutes its value smoothly instead of exploding, and a deserted move is worth a lot without being worth everything. It is the same instinct as a crowded trade paying less than a lonely one.
Your score compares the average value of your mix with the best single move you could have played: 100 × your value ÷ best value. Matching the best move scores 100.
Question 2: set a price
Quote a bid and an offer on the campus Scissors percentage. Everyone trades against everyone: if your bid is at or above another player's offer you buy from them at their offer, and if their bid is at or above your offer they buy from you at yours. At the lock, every trade settles against the real campus number, so buying below it and selling above it both make money.
- Your spread must be between 10 and 30 points. If you quote outside that, the lock moves the nearer boundary until the width fits, keeping your midpoint.
- A tighter spread trades more often, which cuts both ways: more chances to be right and more chances to be run over.
- Profit is zero-sum across the campus and then ranked: the best profit scores 100, the worst scores 0, and equal profits score the same. A tight spread is not a bonus by itself.
Question 3: probability ranges
Spread 100 confidence points across five ranges for the final Scissors percentage. After the lock, exactly one range happened. Your deviation is the total distance between your forecast and that outcome, and the lowest deviation on campus scores 100.
Honest spread beats false precision. Betting everything on one range wins big when you are right and costs the most when you are not.
Question 4: buy, sell, or leave it
Some of these markets may be mispriced. Buy, sell, or leave each one based on where you think the campus will land. Buying earns the settlement minus the offer, selling earns the bid minus the settlement, and leaving earns nothing. Your score compares your total profit with the profit that was actually available, so leaving a fair market alone costs you nothing and trading it does.
Worked example
Take a four-player campus so the arithmetic stays visible. You hold the payoff row Rock 3, Paper 5, Scissors 9.
| Player | Rock | Paper | Scissors |
|---|---|---|---|
| You | 30% | 20% | 50% |
| Player B | 10% | 30% | 60% |
| Player C | 40% | 26% | 34% |
| Player D | 20% | 40% | 40% |
| Campus outcome | 25% | 29% | 46% |
The campus lands at 46% Scissors, which settles the other three games. With the stabilizer, your move values are Rock 2.76, Paper 2.31, and Scissors 3.68. Your 30/20/50 mix averages 3.13 against a best move of 3.68, so Game 1 scores 85.1.
| Player | Bid | Offer | Profit at 46 |
|---|---|---|---|
| You | 40 | 50 | +10 |
| Player B | 55 | 65 | -6 |
| Player C | 30 | 40 | -18 |
| Player D | 44 | 54 | +14 |
You sold at 50 and bought at 40, both the right side of 46, for +10 points. That is second best of four, so Game 2 scores 66.7. Player D quoted around the outcome and finished best; Player C sat under it and finished worst on 0.
| Player | Below 30% | 30% to 34% | 34% to 38% | 38% to 41% | 41% and above | Deviation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| You | 5% | 10% | 20% | 30% | 35% | 1.3 |
| Player B | 20% | 20% | 20% | 20% | 20% | 1.6 |
| Player C | 0% | 0% | 10% | 20% | 70% | 0.6 |
| Player D | 40% | 30% | 20% | 10% | 0% | 2.0 |
46% falls in the 41% and above range. Your deviation of 1.3 is second lowest, so Game 3 scores 66.7. Player C, who put 70% on the range that happened, takes the 100.
| Market | Bid | Offer | You | Your profit | Available |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Market 1 | 30 | 40 | buy | +6 | 6 |
| Market 2 | 48 | 58 | leave | 0 | 2 |
| Market 3 | 40 | 50 | buy | -4 | 0 |
| Market 4 | 20 | 30 | buy | +16 | 16 |
| Total | +18 | 24 | |||
You took the two clearly mispriced markets and the fair one, and left the fourth. Capturing 18 of the 24 points available means Game 4 scores 75. Leaving Market 3 alone instead would have scored 100.
Day total: 85.1 + 66.7 + 66.7 + 75 = 293.5 of 400.
How you qualify
Add your 3 daily totals. Rank 1 is the highest total, exact ties share a rank, and the top 250 inside your own campus are selected to play the Da Vinci Cricket League with Rahul Dravid. You do not need to answer all 4 questions to submit a day, but every question you leave untouched is submitted at its default, so it is still a decision.
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