Quoted from Matthew Taylor Below is my guess of the standings at the end of round 4 - there's nothing scientific about it, literally just the average of the final positions in each round (Which assumes that the difference between top score and the bottom score remains consistent across all rounds) - I've only included those who have had an entry every round so far. Given how my round 5 script is going, I expect Gary and Anthony to overtake me... probably John as well Warren Paul Rene Rick Matthew Gary Anthony John Zack Stevie Alex SPQR Frank Jayrex

I'm personally a big fan of this list

Quoted from Warren I'm personally a big fan of this list

So am I, actually - before the tournament I thought I would be battling to get into the top 10, so I'm chuffed to (potentially) be so high in the rankings - although round 5 will drag me down a bit

If we ever do this Writers Tournament again, can we change it to 4, or maybe even 3 weeks? I lost a lot of steam after round 3. Lol. This has been fun, but brutal.

Quoted from Zack If we ever do this Writers Tournament again, can we change it to 4, or maybe even 3 weeks? I lost a lot of steam after round 3. Lol. This has been fun, but brutal.

Zack, Zack, Zack...no one ever said it was going to be easy. If you can't hang with the big dogs, get off the porch!

I thought the reading was the toughest challenge, mostly because they were all variations of the same thing. What's the object this round? Where is this round supposed to be set? What's the genre again? It all started to blend together, especially since I was forced to do reading right up until the last minute and then jump right into the next round of scripts.

Writing every week for 5 weeks was refreshing for me. I'd do it again for sure. It was stressful at times to get things in but I really enjoyed the challenge of the criteria and having to come up with interesting entries in a very short amount of time.

Gosh, after this a OWC is going to be a cake-walk.

Quoted from Zack If we ever do this Writers Tournament again, can we change it to 4, or maybe even 3 weeks? I lost a lot of steam after round 3. Lol. This has been fun, but brutal.

Five rounds were fine for me, just a couple specific weeks happened to be inconvenient. I'm sure that was true of just about everyone else as well.

Maybe something along the lines of X rounds, drop your lowest score, so that competitors could skip a round without serious consequences.

Another idea would be to space out the rounds, though it might be difficult to maintain interest over many weeks with dead spots in the middle. On the plus side, regular submissions could sneak in during the off-weeks.

Mind you, if the exact same format ran next year I'd be in it (just hoping for better placement than this year).

Quoted from ReneC Writing every week for 5 weeks was refreshing for me. I'd do it again for sure. It was stressful at times to get things in but I really enjoyed the challenge of the criteria and having to come up with interesting entries in a very short amount of time. Gosh, after this a OWC is going to be a cake-walk.

Totally agree. What am I going to do with the extra four days in the next OWC?! This little exercise really got my thought process kicked into gear and a lot of ideas sparked. It's been a while since I'd written so much in such a short time.

Thanks, Don and Sean.

The writing wasn't really my issue, despite what the quality of my scripts says. I just struggled to keep up with all the reading. BTW, if I missed one of your scripts and you want my opinion on it, just send me a pm.

Seems like everyone has moved on, but will there be any sort of resolution to the WT?

Quoted from Warren Seems like everyone has moved on, but will there be any sort of resolution to the WT?

WT? What WT?

I'm sure a final result will be posted soon.

Sean had a lot going on at work so perhaps the final tally was delayed.

Quoted from Warren Seems like everyone has moved on, but will there be any sort of resolution to the WT?

Maybe it just has one of those those “artistic” ambiguous endings that leaves you with more questions than answers...

“Huh? Credits are rolling? What the...”

Round 5 standings.  Still calculating overall scores

1 Off Grid by John Staats (JEStaats)  writing as A Prime Customer - Top Score, Top Everything
2 Unforeseen Changes by Frank MacCrory (FrankM)  writing as Loyal Subject
3 Husks by Zack Akers (Zack)  writing as Anonymous 70
4 Loophole by Paul Knauer (PKCardinal)  writing as Anonymoust 75
5 A New Present by Warren Duncan (Warren)  writing as Somebody I Used To Know
6 Close Encounters of the Nerd Kind by Gary Howell (Hawkeye)  writing as Richard Doofus
7 The Cold Invasion by Rene Claveau (ReneC)  writing as A Fellow Human
8 SimplyScript Fest by Javier Torregrosa (jayrex)  writing as Dr. Draper
9 A Message of Hope by Matthew Taylor (Matthew Taylor)  writing as I Wish I Was Asleep
10 The Bridge by Anthony Cawood (AnthonyCawood)  writing as Wells Farrago- Top Criteria
11 To the Poor by Alex Brauck (PrussianMosby)  writing as Carson Sawmill- Top Criteria
12 Duel in the Desert by Joe Garza (SPQR)  writing as Hermann Buhl- Top Criteria

Well, well, well. This is interesting to say the least. Will likely make for a surprising top 10.

Woohoo! Thanks everyone for your comments and votes. I know I don't have a snowballs chance in the overall but it sure feels good to have an outlier from mediocrity.