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Helen Glover- Posts: 293
- Joined: Sun Nov 04, 2012 10:04:01 pm
Why thanks, Jeff!
Like all things, the following is going to have my signature Helen-obsessiveness to it. Since Helen loves challenges. Let me explain...
I have a spreadsheet that serves as a compilation of essentially every Survivor, Big Brother, The Mole, Apprentice, etc. challenge in US reality television history (and in some cases, foreign, as well), along with some other gems thrown in. Included in this, I've filtered through Wikipedia to make lists of game shows, board games, card games, twists, and other types of game pieces and mechanics ad nauseum. (If anyone is actually interested in this, get at me.) I've kept this running for at least a handful of years now, updated annually, just since I like keeping track of it and to have it accessible as a catch-all resource for coming up with (or in many cases, copying or mixing up) new ideas.
Also, there was an ORG I ran about two years ago now that let me bunch together the vast majority of my internet friendly games into a neat little package (which you can find at the following link: http://www.sendspace.com/file/oec66n). This is a Microsoft.NET application, and can only be run on Windows, but it provided a nifty framework to have more freedom in challenges than most other ORGs do. With that said, it's an absolute nuisance to make sure everyone is able to run it, so I would never advise it for anyone ever again (plus, we're in the age of web and mobile apps now where EXEs are virtually extinct), but I'm going to refer to it to demonstrate a few of my ideas.
So where am I going with this?
Between these two "resources," I've sifted through to make a list of some challenges that could work well for Stranded, and also some other challenges that I just think are cool. By "work well for Stranded," what I mean is: it seems like most (read: non-endurance) challenges are run live, none take an outrageously long time, and the individual challenges try to keep things interesting (aside from Turtle Roll and arguably Survey, none of the games cater to the majority alliance-in-power to continue picking off the minority players, everyone has a fair shot, and politics aren't too heavy of a factor). And obviously, no [Mole] games where everyone is working together.
I won't necessarily expect any of these to get "picked up," but I definitely think some of them have potential, which could even be tweaked as a derivation on an existing challenge. In fact, many of them would be good one-to-one replacements for particular existing challenges, which might be nice to mix-up things in a FvF or ASS in the future. Think of them as part of a library where you can pick and choose which ones to shift-in and shift-out each year.
Point being: if you think they all suck, that's chill, I won't be offended at all. But here it goes. I've broken the ideas up into five categories of four, and will progressively post them over the next few days, so it isn't too overbearing. (Unless I decide this is what I want to do at work today.)
1. Game Shows turned Stranded Challenge
2. Board Games turned Stranded Challenge
3. Puzzles turned Stranded Challenge (or Challenge Component)
4. Former Tontine Challenges (from the link above)
5. Former Tontine Puzzles (from the link above)
Like all things, the following is going to have my signature Helen-obsessiveness to it. Since Helen loves challenges. Let me explain...
I have a spreadsheet that serves as a compilation of essentially every Survivor, Big Brother, The Mole, Apprentice, etc. challenge in US reality television history (and in some cases, foreign, as well), along with some other gems thrown in. Included in this, I've filtered through Wikipedia to make lists of game shows, board games, card games, twists, and other types of game pieces and mechanics ad nauseum. (If anyone is actually interested in this, get at me.) I've kept this running for at least a handful of years now, updated annually, just since I like keeping track of it and to have it accessible as a catch-all resource for coming up with (or in many cases, copying or mixing up) new ideas.
Also, there was an ORG I ran about two years ago now that let me bunch together the vast majority of my internet friendly games into a neat little package (which you can find at the following link: http://www.sendspace.com/file/oec66n). This is a Microsoft.NET application, and can only be run on Windows, but it provided a nifty framework to have more freedom in challenges than most other ORGs do. With that said, it's an absolute nuisance to make sure everyone is able to run it, so I would never advise it for anyone ever again (plus, we're in the age of web and mobile apps now where EXEs are virtually extinct), but I'm going to refer to it to demonstrate a few of my ideas.
So where am I going with this?
Between these two "resources," I've sifted through to make a list of some challenges that could work well for Stranded, and also some other challenges that I just think are cool. By "work well for Stranded," what I mean is: it seems like most (read: non-endurance) challenges are run live, none take an outrageously long time, and the individual challenges try to keep things interesting (aside from Turtle Roll and arguably Survey, none of the games cater to the majority alliance-in-power to continue picking off the minority players, everyone has a fair shot, and politics aren't too heavy of a factor). And obviously, no [Mole] games where everyone is working together.
I won't necessarily expect any of these to get "picked up," but I definitely think some of them have potential, which could even be tweaked as a derivation on an existing challenge. In fact, many of them would be good one-to-one replacements for particular existing challenges, which might be nice to mix-up things in a FvF or ASS in the future. Think of them as part of a library where you can pick and choose which ones to shift-in and shift-out each year.
Point being: if you think they all suck, that's chill, I won't be offended at all. But here it goes. I've broken the ideas up into five categories of four, and will progressively post them over the next few days, so it isn't too overbearing. (Unless I decide this is what I want to do at work today.)
1. Game Shows turned Stranded Challenge
2. Board Games turned Stranded Challenge
3. Puzzles turned Stranded Challenge (or Challenge Component)
4. Former Tontine Challenges (from the link above)
5. Former Tontine Puzzles (from the link above)
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- Helen Glover
- Posts: 293
- Joined: Sun Nov 04, 2012 10:04:01 pm
Category: Game Shows
Go
Preface: This is actually a pretty funny concept to watch play out. It's really intended for face-to-face games (as on a forum, it'd more or less become a speed test), but might be worth a shot.
Premise: One player is a "guesser" and two or more other players are "talkers." The talkers are shown a word or phrase, and have to come up with a question where the word or phrase would be the answer to it. The catch is that the talkers have to alternate words as they're asking the question aloud and aren't able to deliberate privately. So what we'd see is: give the pair a word, then in the thread, they have to alternate posts with a single word attempting to make a sentence. Post when they're done. And have the guesser figure out the answer. QUICKLY.
Examples: Lots of videos on YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNTRAsSzZ0w). I was lucky enough to have someone who sucked at this game last year leading to the interaction that follows (for the word "window")...
Person1: Where
Person2: Do
Person1: You
Person2: Put
Person1: A
Person2: ......... Apple Pie?
They lost, since "Apple Pie" is more than one word (not that they had a snowball's chance in hell with that attempt at a question anyways).
Recommendation: This would be a good replacement for a simple tribal counting challenge, adding a bit more complexity to it. Probably give each tribe the same word and have them run out the round in their tribal forum; first to guess gets a point. Play to 5, or something. Setup just requires a word list, and coming up with rules for screw-ups.
Newlywed Game (also Tattletales)
Premise: The age old "guess what your partner answered" game. Match the most to win.
Recommendation: Would be a good replacement for 7 Deadly Sins, or the equivalent of the survey challenge but pre-merge where each tribe splinters into pairs. Have one member of each pair answer the questions pre-challenge, and have the other member guess their partner's answers as the questions get asked live. Setup just requires a list of questions. Like survey, answers are typically player names, and unlike 7 Deadly Sins, pairs wouldn't be required to use each name once.
Hollywood Squares
Premise: The age old "guess whether someone is answering the question correctly or bluffing." It would essentially be a trivia challenge where someone on the other tribe (or in individual format, just someone else) answers the question, and you have to hedge your bet (could be 1 pt each, or you could actually do wagering) on whether or not they're telling the truth. Think Balderdash, but with questions instead of definitions. I've also used this with player-generated questions: "Parvati: anonymous asked you 'do you have a secret alliance with Catalie?'" which is more just-for-fun because it's hard (and compromising to the game) to ensure truthfulness in whether or not you actually admit to bluffing.
Recommendation: The personal questions doesn't seem like Stranded style. This has potential but hasn't been fully flushed out yet.
Hot Potato
Premise: The teams are given a category (for example, countries in Central America). One team starts with control, and going down their line of players, each player has to guess one of the answers. If they are correct, the next player on their team gets to guess. If they are wrong, that player is eliminated from the round, and control goes to the other team. The goal is to be the team to guess the final (or 7TH, or some NTH) correct answer, or completely eliminate the other team first. To make it more interesting, when it is their turn, a player can challenge someone on the other team instead of guessing. If the challenged player answers correctly, the player who made the challenge is out, and the challenged player's team takes control. If the challenged player answers incorrectly, they are out of the round, and control remains with the team that made the challenge.
Recommendation: With the internet at your fingertips to answer questions, this concept kind of goes to shit. But it's still fun if you're having a game night.
Go
Preface: This is actually a pretty funny concept to watch play out. It's really intended for face-to-face games (as on a forum, it'd more or less become a speed test), but might be worth a shot.
Premise: One player is a "guesser" and two or more other players are "talkers." The talkers are shown a word or phrase, and have to come up with a question where the word or phrase would be the answer to it. The catch is that the talkers have to alternate words as they're asking the question aloud and aren't able to deliberate privately. So what we'd see is: give the pair a word, then in the thread, they have to alternate posts with a single word attempting to make a sentence. Post when they're done. And have the guesser figure out the answer. QUICKLY.
Examples: Lots of videos on YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNTRAsSzZ0w). I was lucky enough to have someone who sucked at this game last year leading to the interaction that follows (for the word "window")...
Person1: Where
Person2: Do
Person1: You
Person2: Put
Person1: A
Person2: ......... Apple Pie?
They lost, since "Apple Pie" is more than one word (not that they had a snowball's chance in hell with that attempt at a question anyways).
Recommendation: This would be a good replacement for a simple tribal counting challenge, adding a bit more complexity to it. Probably give each tribe the same word and have them run out the round in their tribal forum; first to guess gets a point. Play to 5, or something. Setup just requires a word list, and coming up with rules for screw-ups.
Newlywed Game (also Tattletales)
Premise: The age old "guess what your partner answered" game. Match the most to win.
Recommendation: Would be a good replacement for 7 Deadly Sins, or the equivalent of the survey challenge but pre-merge where each tribe splinters into pairs. Have one member of each pair answer the questions pre-challenge, and have the other member guess their partner's answers as the questions get asked live. Setup just requires a list of questions. Like survey, answers are typically player names, and unlike 7 Deadly Sins, pairs wouldn't be required to use each name once.
Hollywood Squares
Premise: The age old "guess whether someone is answering the question correctly or bluffing." It would essentially be a trivia challenge where someone on the other tribe (or in individual format, just someone else) answers the question, and you have to hedge your bet (could be 1 pt each, or you could actually do wagering) on whether or not they're telling the truth. Think Balderdash, but with questions instead of definitions. I've also used this with player-generated questions: "Parvati: anonymous asked you 'do you have a secret alliance with Catalie?'" which is more just-for-fun because it's hard (and compromising to the game) to ensure truthfulness in whether or not you actually admit to bluffing.
Recommendation: The personal questions doesn't seem like Stranded style. This has potential but hasn't been fully flushed out yet.
Hot Potato
Premise: The teams are given a category (for example, countries in Central America). One team starts with control, and going down their line of players, each player has to guess one of the answers. If they are correct, the next player on their team gets to guess. If they are wrong, that player is eliminated from the round, and control goes to the other team. The goal is to be the team to guess the final (or 7TH, or some NTH) correct answer, or completely eliminate the other team first. To make it more interesting, when it is their turn, a player can challenge someone on the other team instead of guessing. If the challenged player answers correctly, the player who made the challenge is out, and the challenged player's team takes control. If the challenged player answers incorrectly, they are out of the round, and control remains with the team that made the challenge.
Recommendation: With the internet at your fingertips to answer questions, this concept kind of goes to shit. But it's still fun if you're having a game night.
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- Brenda Lowe
- Host
- Posts: 825
- Joined: Mon Nov 05, 2012 12:42:22 am
I'm afraid of interrupting the flow here, but I'll get it in early. Firstly, just with the mention of Sins, with the shuffle after two that's the perfect time to run it size-wise, (1 assigning to the other 7 of their new tribe) and hopefully will sow a little begrudgery among the brand new tribes, especially if there is a majority hanging round from the original tribes.
The other one I haven't seen in a while, but of course, layout needs to be tweaked depending on the outcome.
Both teams are offered the chance to claim individual immunity - at the cost of sending their own tribe to TC & granting the entire other tribe immunity. So say it's repost such and such a phrase or image after my go. The window to claim it stays open for 24 hours, and if no-one has by the end of the time, both tribes go to TC. Leaving the thread open for the full window, and allowing both tribes to post anything else they want into it, might encourage a little bit of Penny/Rob banter. Other thought is to make it something that might be said by accident? Like, first person to type "immunity" gets it?
idk, it's quick and easy and is another one that ties in to the me or my tribe mentality that the HII clue system ought create.
The other one I haven't seen in a while, but of course, layout needs to be tweaked depending on the outcome.
Both teams are offered the chance to claim individual immunity - at the cost of sending their own tribe to TC & granting the entire other tribe immunity. So say it's repost such and such a phrase or image after my go. The window to claim it stays open for 24 hours, and if no-one has by the end of the time, both tribes go to TC. Leaving the thread open for the full window, and allowing both tribes to post anything else they want into it, might encourage a little bit of Penny/Rob banter. Other thought is to make it something that might be said by accident? Like, first person to type "immunity" gets it?
idk, it's quick and easy and is another one that ties in to the me or my tribe mentality that the HII clue system ought create.
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- Jeff Probst
- Host
- Posts: 903
- Joined: Tue Oct 30, 2012 6:15:55 pm
Yea I invented that challenge 
I usually do it right before the merge. It's fun to do because it allows for underdogs to survive one more round.
I also want to revisit a twist I havent done since T&T
The Box... We swapped the tribes right before the merge at final 12 and then had them strategize for a day or so and then the next day we announced that there was a merge, and we put the tribes each in their own "box" (a special forum) this locked them out of the merge tribe. I forget what the challenge was, I'm sure Carl would remember, but it had to do with the last person to leave the box won the challenge for their tribe if they outlasted the last person to leave the other tribe's box. Something we can play with going into the merge. Splits the tribes up again and allows for new dynamics right before a merge.
I usually do it right before the merge. It's fun to do because it allows for underdogs to survive one more round.I also want to revisit a twist I havent done since T&T
The Box... We swapped the tribes right before the merge at final 12 and then had them strategize for a day or so and then the next day we announced that there was a merge, and we put the tribes each in their own "box" (a special forum) this locked them out of the merge tribe. I forget what the challenge was, I'm sure Carl would remember, but it had to do with the last person to leave the box won the challenge for their tribe if they outlasted the last person to leave the other tribe's box. Something we can play with going into the merge. Splits the tribes up again and allows for new dynamics right before a merge.
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- Brenda Lowe
- Host
- Posts: 825
- Joined: Mon Nov 05, 2012 12:42:22 am
Oh they do something similar in AusStranded a lot, only they call it the Igloo for whatever reason. It's generally first challenge as soon as they merge, and it's all in one thread. So long as you stay inside the thread that (and your confessional) are the only places you can post - and with that there are no PMs. If you opt to get out of the thread you get your PMs & permissions back, but you give up your chance at immunity. Last man standing inside the thread wins immunity, or alternately, last person to post before whatever time the challenge officially ends.
The catch being, if you stay in there till the very end you won't get any access to PMs before Tribal Council starts straight afterwards.
Also, the people not in the Box thread can't see what's happening inside the box. So it's a toss-up between trying for immunity & voting in the dark, or giving up immunity and getting to orchestrate the vote.
I am not sure why the two threads? Although half the merge tribe in each and double immunity up for grabs would be interesting. Plus the added factor of not knowing who is in or outside the other box thread I guess adds an extra layer too.
The catch being, if you stay in there till the very end you won't get any access to PMs before Tribal Council starts straight afterwards.
Also, the people not in the Box thread can't see what's happening inside the box. So it's a toss-up between trying for immunity & voting in the dark, or giving up immunity and getting to orchestrate the vote.
I am not sure why the two threads? Although half the merge tribe in each and double immunity up for grabs would be interesting. Plus the added factor of not knowing who is in or outside the other box thread I guess adds an extra layer too.
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- Helen Glover
- Posts: 293
- Joined: Sun Nov 04, 2012 10:04:01 pm
Category: Board Games
Quarto
Preface: I love this game in particular. I would strongly advise making a paper cutout and just trying to play a round or two with a friend to start to appreciate the strategy of it.
Premise: Teams are faced with a 4x4 game board. There are sixteen game pieces, each having 4 unique attributes: color (red or blue), height (short or tall), shape (square or circular), fill (solid or hollow). In a 2D representation, we're able to replace height with border or shading. Each team is given eight pieces of one color. Teams alternate placing one of their game pieces on the board. The first team to complete a row, column, or diagonal of four pieces which all share one same attribute win the round. Variations include also allowing 2x2 squares to count as a winning position or having the opposite team choose which piece you have to play each round.
Recommendation: I really do love this game, and think it would be a great replacement for the current Mastermind game (the kind of thing where they could alternate between seasons). Each tribe can either collaborate what to do, or have players take turns facing off against an opponent for a point.
Battleship
Premise: This is such a regular in ORGs that I'd be surprised if you haven't used it at some point before. Individuals pick a series of three connected tiles on a 5x5 grid to be their ship. Players take turns bombing a tile. Last player with their ship still standing in at least one space wins. For teams, give them a few ships.
Recommendation: This might be a good one to alternate with the guessing-who-has-which-number game at some point. I'm also preferable to, instead of having individuals take turns making hits, have them earn it by answering a trivia question first, posting a photo first, what have you. There's one kind of puzzle in particular in the next update that I think works well with this.
Boggle
Premise: Give the players or teams a totally random word search. Have them find as many words as they can. Use the Scrabble dictionary as the judge for what counts. You don't even have to create a word search with deliberate words; in fact, it's better not to. And to prevent people from using online solvers, make some crazy shapes instead (see: http://tontinegame.proboards.com/index. ... page=1#740).
Recommendation: Nothing special, but it's nice to mix it up on occasion from the monotony of posting challenges. Nothing pressing though. Takes a bit of time to judge, if it's an individual game. Better if they actually draw the lines on the picture, too (which makes doing it as a tribe kind of a clusterfuck, which could be fun).
Scrabble
Premise: No, not actual Scrabble. (Though I have done a fast-paced: run and get letters from the other room, come back and put them somewhere on the grid, mark it with your color while everyone else is doing the same thing on the same grid, which is fun, but wouldn't convert well to online.) I mean that "game" where you give the players a phrase and they have to come up with as many words as they can using only the letters in that phrase. But I don't think that's ever been given a name.
Recommendation: Even less special, and is probably prone to computational solvers.
Quarto
Preface: I love this game in particular. I would strongly advise making a paper cutout and just trying to play a round or two with a friend to start to appreciate the strategy of it.
Premise: Teams are faced with a 4x4 game board. There are sixteen game pieces, each having 4 unique attributes: color (red or blue), height (short or tall), shape (square or circular), fill (solid or hollow). In a 2D representation, we're able to replace height with border or shading. Each team is given eight pieces of one color. Teams alternate placing one of their game pieces on the board. The first team to complete a row, column, or diagonal of four pieces which all share one same attribute win the round. Variations include also allowing 2x2 squares to count as a winning position or having the opposite team choose which piece you have to play each round.
Recommendation: I really do love this game, and think it would be a great replacement for the current Mastermind game (the kind of thing where they could alternate between seasons). Each tribe can either collaborate what to do, or have players take turns facing off against an opponent for a point.
Battleship
Premise: This is such a regular in ORGs that I'd be surprised if you haven't used it at some point before. Individuals pick a series of three connected tiles on a 5x5 grid to be their ship. Players take turns bombing a tile. Last player with their ship still standing in at least one space wins. For teams, give them a few ships.
Recommendation: This might be a good one to alternate with the guessing-who-has-which-number game at some point. I'm also preferable to, instead of having individuals take turns making hits, have them earn it by answering a trivia question first, posting a photo first, what have you. There's one kind of puzzle in particular in the next update that I think works well with this.
Boggle
Premise: Give the players or teams a totally random word search. Have them find as many words as they can. Use the Scrabble dictionary as the judge for what counts. You don't even have to create a word search with deliberate words; in fact, it's better not to. And to prevent people from using online solvers, make some crazy shapes instead (see: http://tontinegame.proboards.com/index. ... page=1#740).
Recommendation: Nothing special, but it's nice to mix it up on occasion from the monotony of posting challenges. Nothing pressing though. Takes a bit of time to judge, if it's an individual game. Better if they actually draw the lines on the picture, too (which makes doing it as a tribe kind of a clusterfuck, which could be fun).
Scrabble
Premise: No, not actual Scrabble. (Though I have done a fast-paced: run and get letters from the other room, come back and put them somewhere on the grid, mark it with your color while everyone else is doing the same thing on the same grid, which is fun, but wouldn't convert well to online.) I mean that "game" where you give the players a phrase and they have to come up with as many words as they can using only the letters in that phrase. But I don't think that's ever been given a name.
Recommendation: Even less special, and is probably prone to computational solvers.
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- Helen Glover
- Posts: 293
- Joined: Sun Nov 04, 2012 10:04:01 pm
I'm skipping ahead to the last of the five lists since I'm tired and it's the easiest to recap (as I haven't yet gotten anything done yet today).
Category: Former Tontine Puzzles
(again, these can be found included in http://www.sendspace.com/file/oec66n)
Ciphers (Every Leg, Yield)
Premise: Each leg, teams faced a cipher puzzle, which can take between a few seconds or a number of minutes to solve. For some examples, google Bacon Cipher, Railfence Cipher, Beale Cipher, Straddling Checkerboard, or Playfair Cipher (along with your basic substitution ciphers like Caesar, Tap Code, Morse Code, or Numbers-to-Letters).
Recommendation: This is a really good test of player's mental acuity. I would envision this to have a similar setup as the Second Chance pentathlon at F5 last season (or could be a "solve as many as you can" setup) where the players would be given a list of possibly ciphers that they can google and figure out which algorithms to apply where. Would work for either individuals or tribes. Obviously, I'd be willing to put my money where my mouth is by doing the setup for it.
La Famiglia (Leg 5, Roadblock)
Premise: This challenge was a straightforward: match the pictures to city names and locations on the map. If you take the names out of the equation, and leave it to city names and labeled points on a map and they have to match them up, it could be a bit more interesting. If done as tribes, they'd probably use Google Maps or Google Image's photo search (which worked fine for my game, since they were all personal photos of Italy that wouldn't return hits). Variations include having to match actual screenshots from somewhere on Google Maps or Google Earth to spots on the map.
Recommendation: This isn't one that I'm tied to, but it would allow the chance to see teams truly work together as a unit and test how resourceful they are. It also offers good thematic integration for Stranded since it can be based in whatever country the season is.
Path to Perth (Leg 2, Roadblock)
Premise: A tweaked game from Endurance (if anyone else was a fan of the teenage reality show from a handful of years back). If you can actually run the application and try to play it, this is a lot easier to see and do than explain. Each player or team is faced with a grid. On the grid are stationary tiles of various colors. Players are given exactly enough flexible tiles (of colors matching the stationary ones) to fill the rest of the grid. Their goal is to connect (exactly and precisely) the stationary tiles of a given color by forming a path with the flexible tiles dropping them on the grid in between. There is only one possible solution where paths are completed for all colors.
Recommendation: While possible, this is a lot more difficult if players are left to do it on their own. It can finish pretty fast. It would be better as a single leg in a longer relay race, and even so, probably isn't a good fit here, but I still like it and think it's neat. (I'm a puzzle person.)
Irrigation Station (Leg 4, Roadblock)
Premise: Like above, this is easier seen and done than explained. Imagine a bunch of pipe segments on a grid (L shapes, I shapes, T shapes, and + shapes). Each pipe is fixed in a certain position on the grid but can be rotated. All of the pieces have to be rotated properly to form a single continuous loop. Variations include being given the pieces and having to place them all entirely to accomplish the same. A different but similarly structured puzzle is Guide the Sheep (Leg 2, Detour), where players need to position blockers to reflect and defect sheep from starting positions to a goal position.
Recommendation: Like above, difficult to setup. Like above, doesn't take that long. Like above, not really worth the investment, but I still found it worth mentioning.
Category: Former Tontine Puzzles
(again, these can be found included in http://www.sendspace.com/file/oec66n)
Ciphers (Every Leg, Yield)
Premise: Each leg, teams faced a cipher puzzle, which can take between a few seconds or a number of minutes to solve. For some examples, google Bacon Cipher, Railfence Cipher, Beale Cipher, Straddling Checkerboard, or Playfair Cipher (along with your basic substitution ciphers like Caesar, Tap Code, Morse Code, or Numbers-to-Letters).
Recommendation: This is a really good test of player's mental acuity. I would envision this to have a similar setup as the Second Chance pentathlon at F5 last season (or could be a "solve as many as you can" setup) where the players would be given a list of possibly ciphers that they can google and figure out which algorithms to apply where. Would work for either individuals or tribes. Obviously, I'd be willing to put my money where my mouth is by doing the setup for it.
La Famiglia (Leg 5, Roadblock)
Premise: This challenge was a straightforward: match the pictures to city names and locations on the map. If you take the names out of the equation, and leave it to city names and labeled points on a map and they have to match them up, it could be a bit more interesting. If done as tribes, they'd probably use Google Maps or Google Image's photo search (which worked fine for my game, since they were all personal photos of Italy that wouldn't return hits). Variations include having to match actual screenshots from somewhere on Google Maps or Google Earth to spots on the map.
Recommendation: This isn't one that I'm tied to, but it would allow the chance to see teams truly work together as a unit and test how resourceful they are. It also offers good thematic integration for Stranded since it can be based in whatever country the season is.
Path to Perth (Leg 2, Roadblock)
Premise: A tweaked game from Endurance (if anyone else was a fan of the teenage reality show from a handful of years back). If you can actually run the application and try to play it, this is a lot easier to see and do than explain. Each player or team is faced with a grid. On the grid are stationary tiles of various colors. Players are given exactly enough flexible tiles (of colors matching the stationary ones) to fill the rest of the grid. Their goal is to connect (exactly and precisely) the stationary tiles of a given color by forming a path with the flexible tiles dropping them on the grid in between. There is only one possible solution where paths are completed for all colors.
Recommendation: While possible, this is a lot more difficult if players are left to do it on their own. It can finish pretty fast. It would be better as a single leg in a longer relay race, and even so, probably isn't a good fit here, but I still like it and think it's neat. (I'm a puzzle person.)
Irrigation Station (Leg 4, Roadblock)
Premise: Like above, this is easier seen and done than explained. Imagine a bunch of pipe segments on a grid (L shapes, I shapes, T shapes, and + shapes). Each pipe is fixed in a certain position on the grid but can be rotated. All of the pieces have to be rotated properly to form a single continuous loop. Variations include being given the pieces and having to place them all entirely to accomplish the same. A different but similarly structured puzzle is Guide the Sheep (Leg 2, Detour), where players need to position blockers to reflect and defect sheep from starting positions to a goal position.
Recommendation: Like above, difficult to setup. Like above, doesn't take that long. Like above, not really worth the investment, but I still found it worth mentioning.
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- Helen Glover
- Posts: 293
- Joined: Sun Nov 04, 2012 10:04:01 pm
Category: Former Tontine Challenges
(again, these can be found included in http://www.sendspace.com/file/oec66n)
Fire + Water (http://tontinegame.proboards.com/index. ... y&thread=8)
Earth + Air (http://tontinegame.proboards.com/index. ... thread=156)
Premise: These are each board games where players pick a spot on the board, then the first player to post at a given time (or answer a question, solve a puzzle, whatever) gets to do something to the game board. For example, moving all of the players in a direction to make people fall off the board, removing a tile or row of tiles to accomplish the same, or moving some kind of dangerous game pieces like fire or boulders to kill people. Some players kind of blow it off, not expecting to work hard enough to win. Others take it incredibly seriously.
Recommendation: I think it's a good swap for Turtle Roll or an endurance challenge with a little more umph to it, but takes some stamina to execute on the parts of pretty much everyone.
Sand Safari (Leg 5, Roadblock)
Premise: The players have to navigate a maze (three levels, each a grid of 5x5, 4x4, and 3x3 with stairways connecting the different floors). Inside the maze are three different locked doors that players must get through with a specific passcode, each based on things found in the maze. One door is opened by unscrambling red letters. Another door is opened by plugging values into a blue math problem. The final door is opened by figuring out a secret word based on three clues.
Recommendation: Wouldn't expect you to do this unless you're a javascript genius. (I'm certainly not.) But the puzzle element to it, with unscrambling, solving, and guessing, has potential to it to be plugged into something else (like one of the "find the picture hidden in the forum" games).
Nexus Portal (Leg 8, Roadblock)
Premise: This takes after the "3 Rooms" or "Tick, Tock, Boom" games from The Mole US, as a mind-bending "escape the room" puzzle. Once you read ahead, you'll be spoiled to the solution. Players start given a note with instructions, and seeing a board that lists the departure and arrival airport codes of all of their flights in the game. First, they must unlock a 3-digit safe using the time written on the clock. From the safe, they obtain a cryptex and flashlight. Unscrambling letters that were covered up by red "?" from the initial note and board, players enter the word into the cryptex to unlock it, and collect a Roman post card and remote control. Using the remote control to turn off the lights, they can use the flashlight to view a map. Using the remote control to turn on the projector, they can see a series of five colors, which correspond to five of the airport codes on the original board. Locating those cities on the map, players jot down the letters marking the time zones those cities are in. Then, using the hints "ROMAN" (from the postcard) and "NUMERALS" (the solution to the cryptex), they must convert the ordered series of letters a number using a roman numeral substitution to escape the room.
Recommendation: Of course you'll never do all this, but I love this game more than life. (It also took days to create, much less plan, so I have to brag.)
Nel Buio (http://tontinegame.proboards.com/index. ... thread=259)
Premise: I honestly can't explain this one for the life of me. Check out the thread if you're even still reading this far. It's a board game where each player moves in secret, trying to collect keys to open safes to get gems that open the vault. You've got to have quit reading by now.
Recommendation: I love it, and would totally suggest you looking into it just to see if it stimulates any new ideas. (Other variations include playing RPS or having matches to attack other people.) But it's three hours of hell to run and almost obligatorily requires a chat client with realtime interaction.
(again, these can be found included in http://www.sendspace.com/file/oec66n)
Fire + Water (http://tontinegame.proboards.com/index. ... y&thread=8)
Earth + Air (http://tontinegame.proboards.com/index. ... thread=156)
Premise: These are each board games where players pick a spot on the board, then the first player to post at a given time (or answer a question, solve a puzzle, whatever) gets to do something to the game board. For example, moving all of the players in a direction to make people fall off the board, removing a tile or row of tiles to accomplish the same, or moving some kind of dangerous game pieces like fire or boulders to kill people. Some players kind of blow it off, not expecting to work hard enough to win. Others take it incredibly seriously.
Recommendation: I think it's a good swap for Turtle Roll or an endurance challenge with a little more umph to it, but takes some stamina to execute on the parts of pretty much everyone.
Sand Safari (Leg 5, Roadblock)
Premise: The players have to navigate a maze (three levels, each a grid of 5x5, 4x4, and 3x3 with stairways connecting the different floors). Inside the maze are three different locked doors that players must get through with a specific passcode, each based on things found in the maze. One door is opened by unscrambling red letters. Another door is opened by plugging values into a blue math problem. The final door is opened by figuring out a secret word based on three clues.
Recommendation: Wouldn't expect you to do this unless you're a javascript genius. (I'm certainly not.) But the puzzle element to it, with unscrambling, solving, and guessing, has potential to it to be plugged into something else (like one of the "find the picture hidden in the forum" games).
Nexus Portal (Leg 8, Roadblock)
Premise: This takes after the "3 Rooms" or "Tick, Tock, Boom" games from The Mole US, as a mind-bending "escape the room" puzzle. Once you read ahead, you'll be spoiled to the solution. Players start given a note with instructions, and seeing a board that lists the departure and arrival airport codes of all of their flights in the game. First, they must unlock a 3-digit safe using the time written on the clock. From the safe, they obtain a cryptex and flashlight. Unscrambling letters that were covered up by red "?" from the initial note and board, players enter the word into the cryptex to unlock it, and collect a Roman post card and remote control. Using the remote control to turn off the lights, they can use the flashlight to view a map. Using the remote control to turn on the projector, they can see a series of five colors, which correspond to five of the airport codes on the original board. Locating those cities on the map, players jot down the letters marking the time zones those cities are in. Then, using the hints "ROMAN" (from the postcard) and "NUMERALS" (the solution to the cryptex), they must convert the ordered series of letters a number using a roman numeral substitution to escape the room.
Recommendation: Of course you'll never do all this, but I love this game more than life. (It also took days to create, much less plan, so I have to brag.)
Nel Buio (http://tontinegame.proboards.com/index. ... thread=259)
Premise: I honestly can't explain this one for the life of me. Check out the thread if you're even still reading this far. It's a board game where each player moves in secret, trying to collect keys to open safes to get gems that open the vault. You've got to have quit reading by now.
Recommendation: I love it, and would totally suggest you looking into it just to see if it stimulates any new ideas. (Other variations include playing RPS or having matches to attack other people.) But it's three hours of hell to run and almost obligatorily requires a chat client with realtime interaction.
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- Brenda Lowe
- Host
- Posts: 825
- Joined: Mon Nov 05, 2012 12:42:22 am
Jeff Probst wrote:Yea I invented that challenge :D I usually do it right before the merge. It's fun to do because it allows for underdogs to survive one more round.
I also want to revisit a twist I havent done since T&T
The Box... We swapped the tribes right before the merge at final 12 and then had them strategize for a day or so and then the next day we announced that there was a merge, and we put the tribes each in their own "box" (a special forum) this locked them out of the merge tribe. I forget what the challenge was, I'm sure Carl would remember, but it had to do with the last person to leave the box won the challenge for their tribe if they outlasted the last person to leave the other tribe's box. Something we can play with going into the merge. Splits the tribes up again and allows for new dynamics right before a merge.
Brenda Lowe wrote:Oh they do something similar in AusStranded a lot, only they call it the Igloo for whatever reason. It's generally first challenge as soon as they merge, and it's all in one thread. So long as you stay inside the thread that (and your confessional) are the only places you can post - and with that there are no PMs. If you opt to get out of the thread you get your PMs & permissions back, but you give up your chance at immunity. Last man standing inside the thread wins immunity, or alternately, last person to post before whatever time the challenge officially ends.
The catch being, if you stay in there till the very end you won't get any access to PMs before Tribal Council starts straight afterwards.
Also, the people not in the Box thread can't see what's happening inside the box. So it's a toss-up between trying for immunity & voting in the dark, or giving up immunity and getting to orchestrate the vote.
I am not sure why the two threads? Although half the merge tribe in each and double immunity up for grabs would be interesting. Plus the added factor of not knowing who is in or outside the other box thread I guess adds an extra layer too.
Important to let them know this btw;
Tom wrote:What happens in case of a tie Probst?
Because you know that's happening. I'm surprised Guatuso haven't asked about it too.
Can you give us a run-through of how to shift their permissions if they drop and we're around before you are? Is the new group or w/e all set up? Are you gonna start tempting them with clues/food items (:P) and things??
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- Jeff Probst
- Host
- Posts: 903
- Joined: Tue Oct 30, 2012 6:15:55 pm
new groups all set up, you just have to go into groups and remove someone from their chorotega/guatuso tribe group and add them to the terrabas tribe group.
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- Jeff Probst
- Host
- Posts: 903
- Joined: Tue Oct 30, 2012 6:15:55 pm
What the tribes dont know is that i'll be requiring them to put 2 people into the merger tomorrow. And then Friday as well. Saturday I'll have them select 1 person to stay in the tribe. That will make ti much more difficult to stay when you know the other 10 players are all scheming.
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- Helen Glover
- Posts: 293
- Joined: Sun Nov 04, 2012 10:04:01 pm
So, I'm back at it again, since for some sadistic reason, I enjoy coming up with challenge ideas in my free time.
I realize that most of the ones I've penned out so far (and most of the challenges I've used in the past as a whole, for that matter) tend to be more cerebral, preparation-heavy, and dense whereas Stranded offerings tend to be simpler and faster with more of a "fun" factor. Prisoner's Dilemma and The Box from this year inspired me to try to shift gears and look to game theory for inspiration for some other ideas, but these would be more applicable to future seasons, so I'll post them in the locked forum momentarily.
Just to be a completist, though, I wanted to quickly list out the ones I never got around to hitting that were mentioned in my first post.
Category: Puzzles
Clue Boxes
Premise: Basically, each player gets a box containing some sort of unique clue (a letter, number, whatever), and players have to collaborate sharing enough boxes to "solve" what all the clues mean together. Individual challenge: sharing your box forfeits your individual power, but how else will you get other people to share theirs?
Logic Puzzle
Premise: A simple but mind-numbing game of "A is before B but after C." or multi-variable "Ami does not have red hair and arrived earlier than 4th. Mia has the same color hair as Ami and arrived after the guy with the blonde hair."
Phonetics Puzzles
Premise: Something where players have to sound it out to figure out what it is. Get it right first to earn points. Examples include...
License Plates: "B4DKCME" (before decay, see me > a dentist)
Mad Gab: "Watch choo ear nut washer tse" (what you hear, not what you say)
Rebus: "[picture of a dog] + [picture of a house]" (doghouse)
Word Play: "p walk ark" (walk in the park)
Fallen Phrases
Premise: It looks like Catalie did one of these in Malaysia. You see a crossword-puzzle-like grid filled out to spell a phrase across multiple lines. Each column has a list of letters that go into the boxes on that column. Figure out the order for each column to figure out the phrase.
I realize that most of the ones I've penned out so far (and most of the challenges I've used in the past as a whole, for that matter) tend to be more cerebral, preparation-heavy, and dense whereas Stranded offerings tend to be simpler and faster with more of a "fun" factor. Prisoner's Dilemma and The Box from this year inspired me to try to shift gears and look to game theory for inspiration for some other ideas, but these would be more applicable to future seasons, so I'll post them in the locked forum momentarily.
Just to be a completist, though, I wanted to quickly list out the ones I never got around to hitting that were mentioned in my first post.
Category: Puzzles
Clue Boxes
Premise: Basically, each player gets a box containing some sort of unique clue (a letter, number, whatever), and players have to collaborate sharing enough boxes to "solve" what all the clues mean together. Individual challenge: sharing your box forfeits your individual power, but how else will you get other people to share theirs?
Logic Puzzle
Premise: A simple but mind-numbing game of "A is before B but after C." or multi-variable "Ami does not have red hair and arrived earlier than 4th. Mia has the same color hair as Ami and arrived after the guy with the blonde hair."
Phonetics Puzzles
Premise: Something where players have to sound it out to figure out what it is. Get it right first to earn points. Examples include...
License Plates: "B4DKCME" (before decay, see me > a dentist)
Mad Gab: "Watch choo ear nut washer tse" (what you hear, not what you say)
Rebus: "[picture of a dog] + [picture of a house]" (doghouse)
Word Play: "p walk ark" (walk in the park)
Fallen Phrases
Premise: It looks like Catalie did one of these in Malaysia. You see a crossword-puzzle-like grid filled out to spell a phrase across multiple lines. Each column has a list of letters that go into the boxes on that column. Figure out the order for each column to figure out the phrase.
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