It's been a while since the last time I posted anything about treasure hunts. Last year I went to KL quite frequently for treasure hunts. But this year I've been quite busy with work and Rotary activities; and although hunts are usually held during the weekends, I have missed out on some interesting ones.
Although I've only known treasure hunt for a little over 3 years now, I have come to a point of saturation somehow. From the several hunts that I've joined in west Malaysia last year, I noticed that most of them were generally the same in terms of ideas.
To back track a bit, we had some interesting discussions in the Riddle Raiders Blog; and because of those discussions, I felt that there was a sudden increase in the standard of hunt questions. Since then many new ideas have been introduced into the sport. And there is also some sort of competition amongst the many Clerks-of-Course (CoCs) to improve in terms of accuracy in their questions. But in the end, I felt we have more or less come to a standstill in terms of new ideas to keep the sport exciting.
A well-known CoC did not set any hunt for about 2 years, and suddenly when he decided to make a comeback, his questions which used to be considered tough, turned out to be just like any other ordinary hunts, thus indicating a marked increase in overall hunt standard.
Most of the ideas have been used over and over again, and the master hunters find little challenge in the sport. Therefore, to counter this worrying trend, many CoCs have come up with something quite outrageous—they conjure up questions which are very far-fetched, those which require extreme stretch of the mind.
Clues were set in the order of "take a break" which hunters had to solve several layers deep, sifting through many, many possibilities to arrive at a very specific instruction to take away the letters T, I, M and E from a word. The words "stand up" had to be solved by sifting through many, many possibilities to arrive at the instruction to remove the letters L, A and P from a word. Starting from "stand up", the hunter had to think of, perhaps, "on your feet", "balance", "extend legs", "no rest", and many, many other possibilities associated with standing up, to arrive at the specific "no lap". And one would have to almost know the answer to actually guess that "no lap" was the specific one that the CoC had intended for his solution. Yet that's not the end of the riddle; that "no lap" in itself was to be taken as yet another cryptic clue of which hunters were required to remove the letters L, A and P from a word on account of "no". I might be willing to accept this kind of questions if the scope of search is narrower.
The net result is that as we continue to "improve" on the difficulty level, the sport of treasure hunt becomes increasingly beyond the reach of the new hunters. Today, treasure hunts are not really about riddles and cryptic clueing. No—most of them are about searching for a needle in a haystack. To be fair, however, not all of the questions are about finding a needle in a haystack, but these are the ones which matter—they are generally the ones which will determine the winners of the hunts.
When I first started clerking hunts, I sought out to maintain the element of fun—that an average hunter had a fair shot at solving the clues. I tried to keep my questions "entertaining" and with a bit of twist to deceive the hunters, but not to the extent of "take a break" and "no lap". That said, however, during my first official hunt, i.e. the Sutera Harbour-Angkatan Hebat Treasure Hunt, I was unable to judge the standard of the hunters. It turned out that that hunt was probably up to the standard of an average KL hunt, but too tough for our local hunters. I have since learned quite a lot, and have been able to adjust the difficulty level accordingly.
My idea of a good hunt question is not about stretching the mind so far to the extent of teetering into the realm of impossibility. The most beautiful questions are those which are simple and achieveable by almost everyone, and yet at the end of the hunt, they remain unsolved. That is the kind of question which would make my day as the CoC. It's the question which would make the hunters kick themselves in their butts when I reveal the answer!
Consider this question which was shared in A Hunter's Tale (of which I borrowed in our recent annual dinner, with some modifications):
Q) Top is on the head
A) Lima Sen
There's no need to stretch the mind so far, sifting through so many possibilities. A general knowledge which even a kid might know!
I once created a treasure clue which caught many strong hunters by surprise. Something simple yet no team solved the riddle—or rather, no team solved it accurately.
There are times when I myself come up with questions requiring several levels of solving, but when there are alternative possibilities, I always try to limit the scope of search. An average hunter with basic cryptic knowledge who analyses my questions methodically is bound to solve them. But of course there are other elements in the hunt such as time pressure, observation skills etc.
I think we need to inject some new ideas into the sport of treasure hunting; not mere levels upon levels of impossibility. This is where we need the CoCs to actually think of something fresh and entertaining instead of taking the easy way out by "hiding" the answer in several layers of thick conrete slabs.
I bring all this up because we're having a hunt—Tembak Series 1—next Saturday by Team Main Tembak. I met Alvin, the CoC for this hunt, recently over lunch and we spoke in general about hunt questions. Unfortunately, I was unable to get even a single question for next Saturday. Alvin agreed that the good questions are those which are simple and solvable even by the new hunters.
KK hunters don't have many hunts organised, and we're all so excited that Alvin is organising this hunt (without making any profit out of it). Over the last couple of years, apart from the KK City Hunts, I was practically the only one clerking the local hunts. So everyone welcomes a different CoC for a change and looking forward to a good hunt.
Keeping my fingers crossed...
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