Tournament Rules

General Rules

Debaters may prep with both their partners and coaches.

Speech times for all rounds will be 7-8-8-8-4-5.

There is no protected time in any speech.

No new arguments may be made in the rebuttal speeches.

POOs are allowed in rebuttals. POOs will stop time.

Prep Rules

Teams have 25 minutes between topic drop and round start to prepare their arguments. Competitors must either write onto blank sheets of paper or type onto a blank document, and only text on those sheets/documents may be brought with them into round. This means no copy-pasting, and no bringing in other materials. If debaters have pre-prepared arguments in other documents, they must re-type or handwrite them during the 25 minutes.

Forfeit Rules

Teams arriving at their room LATE, after the end of the 25 minutes prep, will have the time that they are late to the round subtracted from their first constructive speech (ex: if the affirmative team is 1 minute late, this would result in a 6 minute PMC, or a 7 minute LOC if the negative is 1 minute late). 

The team who is late will forfeit the round when the entirety of their first constructive speech has run out.

Flex Time

You should expect flex time after these speeches:

- 2 minutes of neg flex after the PMC

- 2 minutes of aff flex after the LOC

- 1 minute of neg flex after the MG

- 1 minute of aff flex after the LOR

Please note that there is no flex time in between the MO and the LOR.

Debaters aren’t required to use their flex time if they don’t want to, but you can prompt them to make sure they know it’s an option. You should expect debaters to time their own flex time just like they would for a speech, and you should time them as well just in case they forget.

During flex time, the team controlling flex may ask questions to the opposing team, take time to prepare their own arguments, or any combination of the two. Don’t worry if they talk with their partner, that’s allowed. They don’t have to ask questions for the entire time or prep for the entire time, it’s up to them how they use their flex time.