Six tasks that always work, and why

After enough games you start to see a pattern. Some tasks are beautifully written, sound clever in the planning meeting, and simply die in the field. Others are almost embarrassingly simple and work every single time.

The difference is nearly always the same one: how long it takes from a team arriving to a team doing something.

1. Photograph one specific thing

The team arrives, looks around, finds the detail, takes the picture. Thirty seconds from arrival to action.

It works because a specific detail forces real looking. “Photograph the square” is a bad task. “Photograph the one window on the square with an arched grille” makes five people stand there searching together, which is the whole point.

2. A question whose answer is written on site

A sign, a memorial plaque, a date carved into stone. The answer is right there, but only if you actually look.

The big advantage: it cannot be looked up from home. The team has to be standing there.

3. Something that needs the whole team

A photo with everyone in frame, a human pyramid, lining up by height. These sound childish and forty year olds do them with enthusiasm.

It works because it is the one moment in the game where a team has to stop and coordinate. It is also the photo everyone sends around afterwards.

4. Counting

How many steps, how many pillars, how many windows on the second floor. A task that looks trivial and takes longer than you expected, because someone always miscounts and it has to be done again.

One tip: allow a tolerance on the answer. If the true count is 23 and someone got 22, that should not be a failure.

5. Something that uses what is alive on site

A market stall, a shop sign, a bus timetable. Tasks tied to the living place rather than only to its stones.

A warning: these are the most fragile tasks you can write. If the shop is shut, the task is dead. Always keep a way to close a station in the middle of a running game.

6. Something with no right answer

“Find the most beautiful corner of this street and photograph it.” There is no correct and incorrect, only an argument inside the team.

This is the task people remember a month later. It is not measurable, so it should not be worth many points. It is there for the experience.

What they have in common

All six start within a minute of arriving. None of them requires reading a whole paragraph before you understand what to do.

That is the most useful test we have: read the task out loud and ask how long until somebody moves. If the answer is more than a minute, write it again.