Treasure Hunt

(This is mostly a response to Max's post, but itgot long enough that I decided to make it a full post instead of a comment.)

1. This hunt was intentionally structured linearly. ALL the clues were in the same sequence for everyone, with the exception of four which we thought would not work out with more than one group at a time (Hewitt, Brekkens, the one in the downspout by kixters, and the Water Treatment Center). We wanted the close contact with other teams as an added obstacle (requiring stealth) and as a source of motivation, because you can see how close the other teams are. We weren't sure whether this would be better or worse than having different orders for everyone, but we wanted to try it. In retrospect, I think the linearity is good, but perhaps in smaller doses (maybe a 50/50 split). Also, very few of the clues were intended to lead to twenty-thirty minutes of searching (with the exception of the four aformentioned divergent clues, which we did that way for exactly that reason). It is only due to unforseen cicumstances (the two Bus 110s and, um, whatever happened at First Lutheran) that any required that much time at the location.

2. Speaking of Brekkens: the clue was originally intended to be located under a Mannequins clothing. However, dispite evidence we had to the contrary, Brekkens seemed to be closed that morning when we went to plant it, and we (incorrectly) assumed that, as it wasn't open at 10:30, it wouldn't be opening all day, so we had to put the clue outside. It sucked that they opened, because everyone went inside and missed the note outside. Sorry, but it wasn't really our fault.

3. The ending was supposed to be better. However, acres of poison ivy had grown in between the time when I scouted the location and the actual day of the hunt, so after going down to plant the box (which actually ened up being a few minutes after Slytherin got there, because we had to turn around to replace the missing clues at 1st Lutheran which turned out to not actually be missing) we had to immediately leave so Mattson could take ashower due to his near-deathly allergic reaction to poison ivy. Sorry about that too.

4. I don't know what the "half-hour check-ins" were that you're talking about, but I remember no such thing. And honestly, we wouldn't have had time for any such thing. We were pretty much busy the entire time running around checking on supposedly (and one actually) missing clues and doing some last-minute preparation. Admittedly, I guess the time we spent filling up balloons for the personalised water-balloon strikes could have been devoted to this, but I think water balloons were better.

In conclusion: I guess everyone had a good time, but honestly doing it just made me (and JM) feel like absolute shit. We spent an incredible amount of time planning and preparing this, and then on the day of the only contact we had with people was calls from them yelling at us for screwing shit up. After how miuch time we spent, it just seemed like everyone was ungrateful (I realise this was probably not the case, but it's just how it seemed to us). I really enjoyed planning the clues (and planting them was fun too), but executing it was just such an unenjoyable time for us. I would really like to plan another one (and we still have a lot of really great ideas that didn't get used in this one due to time constraints and other circumstances) but if the experience of running it would be the same, I just don't really think I want to.

(EDIT: After reading some people's responses to it, I can see that they really did enjoy it, and I guess I don't feel so bad about it now.)