Running the Event

To do in the last week

• Close registration
  • Make sure you had a specific date and time for closing registration.
• Print and prepare all elements
  • If you are using a printing service, you will probably want to separate your files into B/W and color. Unfortunately, this can make it difficult to collate materials for the next step...
  • Stuff envelopes for each team for each location
  • Cut out materials if necessary
• Waivers, waivers, waivers
  • Account for both minors w/ guardian signature and adult signatures on waivers
  • Disseminate waivers so teams can sign in advance, speeding up check-in process
  • Bring enough copies of waivers to hunt so that teams who did not sign in advance can do so; have extras so that partial teams can get their materials even if not everyone has arrived yet.
  • Distinguish between “emergency contact in case you spontaneously combust” and “contact number for your team”
• Optional: print business cards or strips of paper with explanation of BAPHL and link to site for civilians who are interested, so they can participate next time!

Staffing

• More volunteers for running stations are better! Try to get at LEAST 1 staff volunteer for every 4 participating teams or at least 4 staff volunteers for each solving station, so that rotation is possible without abandoning stations.
• May want to consider running two+ check-in stations at each location in the first hour. The initial rush of people was overwhelming.
• Make sure volunteers know the process. Print out scripts for both the staffing process (mandatory) and team interactions (if desired). Brief volunteers on the scripts.
  • Make sure you address both general aspects of staffing (e.g., how to do check-ins and check-outs) and special cases (e.g., the physical packets in Las Vegas).
• Try to have a plan in place for when/how to close locations and move teams onward.

Competition

• A hunt is a competition, and a winner (or winners) will be declared at the end. Explicitly state the parameters of winning and tie-breakers at the beginning (first team to finish? team fastest to finish? most completed hunt?)
• If there are multiple categories for prizes, explicitly decide in advance what happens if the same team wins multiple categories: do they get multiple prizes?
• At the same time, consider whether you really want to track every single ranking precisely. Most hunters are there for enjoyment, and it may be more enjoyable to bend some rules (hint policies, allowing teams to go to next stage of hunt) for teams who are not in contention. If this is the case, fairness demands that rankings beyond a certain point be irrelevant.