Pitch Madness Clue Edition … the agent game rules and instructions!

For those of you not familiar with Pitch Madness, Pitch Madness is a contest where agents compete in a game against their peers for pitches. This time the game is . If you haven’t been a part of a Pitch Madness challenge before, please check out this post here for more information. The submission window is open for 24 hours (12:01AM EST to 11:59PM EST) on March 10. Our slush readers will read through the pitches and pick the top 60 pitches for the agent round starting on March 18. We try to get a good mix of various genres, but the writing comes first. Basically, if the submissions aren’t ready, it’s a pass.

So I bet you’re wondering how the agents are going to play the game? Well, here are the game rules for the agents so you all can follow along…

Starting on March 18 at 8AM EST through 12PM EST on March 20 the agents will visit the host blogs, read the entries, and enter their crime weapons (requests) for the pitches they want. (See the weapon list below.) All requests (weapons) are partial requests of the query and first 50 pages of the manuscript. If three or more agents request, the partial will become a full request.

Each pitch will have a murder clue to solve. All the agents have to do is guess what weapon was used in the crime. Don’t worry, they will be easy to solve. To trump all requests, the agents can also guess which character committed the dastardly deed (see the list of suspects below – hint: the agents are the suspects). The agents don’t have to guess the culprit, just the weapon to enter a request.  Whoever guesses correctly wins the pitch. If there are several correct guesses, the pitch will go to the challenge round (see below for details). There is not a cap on how many requests the agents can make this round.

Please note: Only one request per agent for each pitch during the first round.

Here’s the participating blogs’ urls (I’ll have the urls posted on my site to make it easier to hop between them):

Brenda Drake

Sharon Johnston

Summer Heacock

Rebecca Weston

The comments will be set to moderation so you won’t see what the  agents’ requests are until reveal day.

March 20 is reveal day. We’ll post all the comments and reveal the winning agents starting at 12:01 PM EST (noon). We will @ the agents on Twitter with the results. You can watch the game unfold on the hashtag #PitchMadness.

What happens with ties, you ask? Well, that’s where it gets tricky!

THE CHALLENGE ROUND ON TWITTER!

The challenge round starts after the reveal and if there are tying requests. We’ll announce the pitches that received tying requests on the hashtag #PitchMadness and @ the tying agents on Twitter. The agents will then be asked to go back to the tying entry’s post with their competitor(s) and use one of their alibis in the comments.

The agents will have a limited amount of “alibis” to use during the challenge round. There are several levels of alibis (see attached Alibi Tracking Sheet). The highest level alibi trumps the lower one and wins the request for that pitch. Each challenge will continue until there is a winner or until all but one player (agent) is eliminated (runs out of alibis) for that pitch. Best alibi wins!

Agent Prizes!

Agents won’t only be competing for requests, but for gift cards, too! We figured that it’s a lot of work playing a game, so we decided to reward the winners as an extra incentive and bragging rights. The winning agent, grand crime solver, ruler of the slush pile will receive a $50 gift card from either Amazon or Barnes & Noble (winners choice) with two runners-up receiving $25 gift cards. Each agent will get an entry into the drawing for the gift cards for just participating. For each pitch the agent wins, he/she will get another entry into the drawing for the gift cards. We decided to do a drawing since not all agents are looking for all the categories/genres in the game and felt this would be a fair way to handle that issue.

 

Mr. Boddy (aka Secret Agent) may be dead but his spirit will be ghosting around and making requests.

 

And the Butler (aka Secret Agent) will be serving up requests on a silver tray as she tries to figure out what crookedly evil guest committed some of the most horrendous crimes.

 

Could the maid (aka Pam van Hylckama Vlieg) be secretly conniving with the murderer or could she be more sinister than she would have us believe? The suspects will have to be on their toes or she just might swipe all the requests from them.

 

The suspects (agents) …

(click on image to enlarge)

The weapons …

 

The alibis …

Here’s the Pitch Madness schedule …

• Hosts and their teams Introduction on March 3
• Agent Introduction on March 4
• Rules of the Game on March 6
• Formatting Instructions March 7
• Submission window will be on March 10 and will be open for 24 hours
• The first slush round will be March 11-12
• The final round will be March 13-17
• The top 60 picks for the agent round will go up on the blogs on March 18 at 12:01AM EST (NY time)
• March 20 at 12PM EDT (Noon) the agents requests are revealed, and right afterward is the tying agents challenge round
• There will be a #PitMad Twitter Pitch Party on March 25 from 8AM to 8PM EST. Check here for rules of the Twitter Pitch Contest.

That’s it for now. Come back tomorrow for the formatting instructions!