Scoring, XP and the leaderboard

A correct answer scores points, and answering faster scores more. That second part is what makes a round tense: two players who both know the answer are separated by who committed to it first, so a quiz is never only a test of knowledge — it is also a test of nerve. The scores stay live through the round, and the final one can still turn on the last question.

A platform running the clock and the scoring is also what lets the host actually play. Nobody has to keep tally or read out results; the game does it, and the leaderboard updates itself.

Points from a single game roll up into XP that persists across all your games, and XP into levels. This is the thread that connects one evening to the next — you are not starting from zero every time, you are building a record. It rewards showing up regularly rather than winning any single night.

The home page leaderboard shows the players with the most XP. It is a public, browsable page — part of what a visitor sees before they even sign up — and it is the long-run version of the per-game scoreboard: not who won tonight, but who has played well over time.

The scoring is deliberately simple. There are no paid boosts, no way to buy a better position, and no advantage for spending money — a leaderboard only means something if every place on it was earned the same way.