How to Write a BANG Puzzle

(Work in progress... feel free to add, change, improve, etc.)

So you want to write a puzzle, eh? Simple! Create a simple substitution cipher, encode a crossword clue, and have the answer to that clue be the answer to the puzzle. Done.

Okay, so there can be a lot more to it than that. Team Snout has a page dedicated to the ins and outs of different puzzle designs from several different authors, as well as links to 8 years worth of advice from the GC Summit meetings. Included is a direct guide for writing puzzles, entitled "A Clue Design Primer." It is worth reading.

Getting Started

The overall guideline of your puzzle should be to provide a fun experience for your players. You could write the most elegant, complex, intricate puzzle, but people may not enjoy it.

Some Dos and Don'ts

Unless you are somehow using these as intricate parts of the puzzle (and you probably shouldn't), some guidelines:

• DON'T include intentional red herrings. It's frustrating enough when solving and ending up going down your own wrong path. To find out that GC intentionally put a wrong path in their puzzle is maddening.

• DO make sure players know they've solved the clue. A recognizable word or phrase works best for this; a puzzle that solves to "X(1n0f1" or "disorbilivality" may have teams going back to see where they messed up. (Of course, if your BANG is scifi-themed, is about a robot named X(1n0f1, and includes a vocabulary list that defines "disorbilivality" as "the manner in which something is unable to orbilivate", then it's fine.)

• DON'T make puzzles or experiences that only GC finds funny. Making teams sludge through cold mud to get the a clue may be funny to watch, but not to experience. "The challenge is not to amuse yourselves; it's to come up with something that 100+ people can all enjoy. Know your audience." - Team Snout

• DO make your puzzles and activities fun for the players.

• DON'T require a lot of obscure knowledge. If the average team has to use a smart phone to solve your puzzle, consider retooling it.

• DO set aside your masterpiece puzzle if it's not working. It either needs to be rewritten, incorporated differently, or set aside.

• DON'T make a puzzle harder. That is, once you've constructed a puzzle, don't try and make the crossword clues more obscure, for example. Adding an extra layer may work, just be careful.

• DO make your puzzles solvable by a majority of players.

• DON'T rely on hints to overcome a puzzle's shortcomings.

Resources

There are a lot of tools out there to aid in constructing puzzles. Here's a sampler:

• OneLook

• Inkscape

• Nutrimatic