3.10 Detention and Dance
Contents
Order
3.075
Status
::FINAL::
Location
This puzzle has three locations: the entrance (where all teams arrive), a sectioned-off section of the Gym, and an area outside the Student Journalism Office.
"Paine Memorial High School" -- actually Highlands Rec. Center, 1851 Lexington Ave. San Mateo, CA 94402
GC PoC: Erik & Melissa
Parking: Outside, parking lot (no teams park there)
Notes: Reserved
Type
Mandatory Puzzle
Plot Setup
The players have used the time machine to visit the high school itself in 1986. As they arrive on campus, they're caught by a hall monitor who sends them to Saturday detention.
Props
Entrance
- Checkoff list of teams
Gym
- List of teams
- Door sign
- Painter's tape
- Chair
- Tape player with Time Warp tape
- Wall sign, "PASS WITH HARD WORK"
- 16 Copies of SAT practice test
- 32 blank SAT answer sheets
- 1 copy of SAT answer key
- 16 notes sending teams to dance class
Outside
- Boom box
- mix CD of 80's music
- "Buffy's Awesome Dance List" - 16 sheets
Plot Point to Convey
The players are in an 80's high school movie - with Saturday detention (a la Breakfast Club) and thinly-motivated dance scenes!
Short Description
Players must figure out how to escape detention.
Open Time Period
10:15 AM Sunday - 12:30 PM Sunday.
Staff Instructions
Entrance
Your Role: You are a student hall monitor at Paine Memorial High School.
Handout Instructions: No handouts. When a team arrives at the school, tell them
“Hey - it's Saturday! If you're here on Saturday, that means you're supposed to be in detention!”
To you, the players _look like 1980's high school students_. Feel free to ad-lib some comments to that effect (referring to their spiked hair or bangs, leg warmers or pegged jeans). Don't listen to any objections that they're not high school students: you're taking them to Detention no matter what (or else they'll have to leave campus entirely).
Escort the teams quickly to the right door to the gym (marked with a sign saying “DETENTION”). Open the door and announce, “More troublemakers!” Check off the team on your list. Then hurry back to the front of the school to pick up the next team.Repeat until all teams have been sent to detention.
Other Instructions:
- Stay in character.
- Except ... if a team says "time out," break character and help them.
Gym
Your Role: You are the bane of every high school student's existence: the evil test proctor. Like the one in "Breakfast Club," but with the charm of the principal in "Back To The Future.".
Setup Instructions:
- Have a list of teams so that you can check when they’ve all arrived.
- Have a sign on the door saying “DETENTION”.
- Have a chair to sit in and a tape player.
- Have copies of the SAT practice tests.
- Have copies of the SAT answer sheets.
- Have the SAT answer key.
- Have 16 notes to teams telling them to send one person to dance class.
Handout Instructions: When teams arrive, say to them:
You little hooligans! You're mine now. I can keep you in detention all day if I want to, so you'd better behave and hope I change my mind.
Now: the state of California says I have to make this an "educational opportunity," but I wouldn't waste a teacher's valuable time on you young punks! So I had our janitor Tiresias make up some "busy work" for you. It's SAT practice - even though you slackers don't look like anything close to college material. Now get to work!”
Give each team one copy of the SAT practice test, and 3 copies of the SAT answer sheet.
5 minutes after a team arrives, poke your head out the door (as if talking to someone), then go to the team and hand them a Note, saying something like:
“Turns out it's a lucky day for one of you. Buffy, the head cheerleader, needs an extra person to help fill out the group in her dance class. Of course, none ”
Give the team the Note. A
When the player comes back from the bathroom, say:
“Well, that sure took a long time! Get back to work.”
When the players finish the Current Events quiz and want to go outside, follow them. They should perform the Time Warp dance as a team - you should dance with them! When they’re done, say:
“Oh, that was wonderful! I love the Rocky Horror Show! I guess you're good kids after all - you can leave detention early.”
Hints: Teams can’t call for hints, since they’re in 1986. If they want help on individual SAT answers or Current Events answers, they can ask you. You should ask them to perform a dance of your choice - The Robot, YMCA, disco, and The Twist are examples. The number of answers they get for doing a dance is up to you; we advise that you start out giving out one or two answers per dance, and for slower teams give up to 5 answers (or even more) per dance. Ideally, all teams should finish this puzzle by 12:45.
Once they have the answers to the SAT questions, they get the first message by using pairs of answers as 2-digit base 5 (with answers A=0, B=1, C=2, D=3, E=4), and then making the resulting number into a letter. To hint this, point out that the answer sheet seems to highlight pairs of answers. If they’re still not getting it, point out that pairs of A-through-E answers can correspond to 2-digit base 5. They then get the message ONEPERSONONLYGETBATHROOMPASSBUTGOTODANCECLASS. The Current Events Quiz has 5 sections. Each section has 6-8 groups of true-false questions; each group contains 1-4 questions. Each group is a Morse code letter; each section is a word. The quiz answers say DANCES VIGENERE POMPON PERFORM OUTSIDE. If teams don’t know what VIGENERE means, they can look in the children’s cipher book. The players need to take the first letter of each dance performed by their teammate who learned the dance sequence (in Dance Class) and decode it as a Vigenere cipher with the keyword POMPON (that’s the original word, not pompom). The resulting message says TEAMTIMEWARP, so the team should go outside with you and perform the Time Warp dance. They should have the song on the mix tape from Act 2, and they can use your tape player to learn the dance (which provides verbal instructions in the lyrics). Answers: The final answer is for the teams to perform the Time Warp for you (outside, so the other teams can’t see it). If they’ve brought a tape with the Time Warp on it, they can use your tape player to play the music while they dance!
Site Close Down: Once last team leaves,
- Clean up
- Open up partition to rest of gym so that the science fair can use the full gym
- Pack up all materials and return to GC HQ
Other Instructions:
- Stay in character.
- Except ... if a team says "time out," break character and help them.
Outside
Your Role: You are Buffy, head cheerleader...and alpha female...at Paine Memorial High School (or her assistant)
Handout Instructions: When players arrive, say “Welcome to dance class!” Buffy will lead the dance instruction. Your job is to operate the tape player, and ensure safety. Make sure players stay on flat ground (not sand). Make sure there are no loose objects where players are dancing. Make sure players are dancing “under control.” Also, make sure players are actually dancing - not just writing down what Buffy does or says. If a player is merely watching and taking notes, tell them:
“This is dance class! You have to dance!”
It’s fine if they take notes while they’re dancing.
When players leave the class, hand them a copy of Buffy’s Awesome Dance List and tell them:
“Make sure to show your friends what you’ve learned!”
If any players are very hesitant to dance, suggest to them that they go back and have one of their friends come to dance class in their place.
Site Close Down: Once last dance student has left
- Clean up
- Return materials to GC HQ
Other Instructions:
- Stay in character.
- Except ... if a team says "time out," break character and help them.
Detailed Description
Players are sent to Saturday detention; to escape (so that they can continue with the plot), they must figure out how to appease the Mean Proctor. They are first given an SAT practice test designed by Tiresias the janitor, which suggests that one person get a bathroom pass and go to dance class, where they learn a dance routine taught by Buffy. Meanwhile, the other players are given a current events quiz. When the dancer returns, the quiz answers and dances are combined to give a final instruction, which tells the team to perform the Time Warp for the proctor (outside). The proctor is so delighted that he/she lets them go.
Puzzle Answer
The puzzle is completed when the team collectively takes the proctor outside and dances the Time Warp for him.
Puzzle Solution
- The SAT practice test is composed of actual SAT questions. If players need help, or need to verify answers, the Mean Proctor will give them answers from his answer key, but requires a dance in exchange. (The dances and dance/answer exchange rate are subject to the proctor's discretion.)
- Pairs of SAT answers become 2-digit base-5 numbers (where a=0, b=1, c=2, d=3, e=4) between 0-24, which then becomes a letter (with 1=A, 2=B, and so on). The SAT test thus spells ONEPERSONGETBATHROOMPASSBUTGOTODANCECLASS.
- The current events quiz is true/false; each question must be answered from a "May 31, 1986 perspective". As with the SAT test, if players need help, or need to verify answers, the Mean Proctor will give them answers from his answer key, but requires a dance in exchange. (The dances and dance/answer exchange rate are subject to the proctor's discretion.)
- The answers in each subcategory (e.g., a continent in the International section) form a letter in Morse code, with True = Dah and False = Dit. Each category forms a word. The current events quiz thus spells DANCES VIGENERE POMPON PERFORM OUTSIDE.
- Meanwhile, the dancer learns a dance routine containing the following dances, in order: In & Out Arm Wave, Sprinkler, Moonwalk, Box Step; Hokey Pokey; Voguing; Bump & Grind; Shopping Cart; Irish Stepdancing; Pee Wee Herman; Flashdance; Chicken Dance.
- Doing a Vigenere decryption on the first letter of each dance (ISMBHVBSIPFC) with the keyword POMPON reads "TEAMTIMEWARP".
- The whole team must perform (outside) the Time Warp for the Mean Proctor.
Budget
About $150 for Buffy's dance costume, hall passes, reference materials for the detention room, batteries for the boombox, and copies of written materials.
Credits
Design & execution by Erik Stuart
Manager
Erik
Hints
- Hints for this puzzle should generally come from the Mean Proctor or his assistants.
- If players need help with the tests or need to verify answers, the Mean Proctor will give them answers from his answer key, but requires the asker to do a dance in exchange. (The dances and dance/answer exchange rate are subject to the proctor's discretion.)
- If players are stuck with the SAT message, point out that the answer key always shades answers in pairs. If still stuck, point out that there are 5 possible answers - a through e - and thus 25 possible combinations of pairs of answers.
- The Proctor may want to discreetly verify that a team has solved the full SAT message (including the "dance class" phrase) before giving a player a bathroom pass.
- Players should be discouraged from looking up answers online - e.g., the Mean Proctor may say "put that Walkman away!"
- If players are spending time looking at the dance list (thinking there may be a hidden message there), the Proctor should tell them to stop wasting time and get to work on the current events quiz.
- If the players are stuck on the current events quiz message, remind them that Tiresias was nice enough to group the questions by subcategories, and comment that true / false tests have only two possible answers. If needed, the Proctor can describe the answers as "truuue" and "false" (said very quickly).
- If teams simply come up to the Proctor and say "Time Warp" or "Team Time Warp" or something like that, the Proctor can respond, "I LOVE the Time Warp! Would you do it for me? But not in front of everyone - here, let's go outside."
Response to Correct Answer
"I LOVE the Rocky Horror Show! I guess you're not such bad kids after all. I'll let you out of detention early."
To Do
Alex/Melissa - get Buffy's dance costume
