Discussion: ideas

CompassSport always has some articles on exactly this sort of thing. Some of the things I remember seeing:
- you have to visit a certain central control between every X number (and X can change for different age groups)
- you get bonus points for doing controls in numerical order
- you have to get all the even numbered ones before any odd numbered ones or a slight variation, you can get as many even numbered as you want, then as many odd numbered but you can't go back and get any more even.
- haven't seen this, but alternating odd even would also be reasonable I think

Then there was the West Point one where there were time windows during which each control was allowable.

I'll be curious to see what you decide to do.

They did the bonus for numerical order at the Corn Maze Night-O Champs (or whatever they call it). Seemed like a nifty idea with one simple rule.

Sprint Camp oftentimes has a "dog bones" exercise where score-o controls are paired (connected with a line) and once you get one of them, you are committed to getting the second one next, which creates some route optimization challenges. Some pairs are close, others far apart, and the connecting lines oftentimes cross.

Cascade's Choose Your Adventure Series is a series of score-o's, but at the smaller venues, we use a map exchange to make a smaller area larger. (Most of these aren't true score-o's, though, since the time limit is ample enough for most people to clear the course).

Sandy and Patrick have some good ideas. The even/odd concept was used once by WCOC, where the control circles were printed in different colors (normal red/magenta, and green). I don't know how well the different colors would work at night. To learn more, ask George Walker (walk).

I expanded the concept and started with a small section of the map with the controls in that part for two short sprints, one with green control circles and the other the red. Then you got the full map with both circles and more controls further out. Get alternating colors which, if I remember correctly, were odd and even making it easy to sort out the route selections.

Thanks for all the suggestions, gives me lots of ideas!

If you wanted to do something a bit different you could try something like Poker Score-O. I've only done it once but I think it was a success -- small area, a playing card at each control, you don't know what it is until you visit. You can only punch 5 controls and your "hand" is comprised of the cards at each control that you've punched. This means the slower runners can still have a valid hand to play even if they can only make it to 5 controls, and the faster runners will re-visit controls to make the best hand possible.