What to Do When Two Scavenger Hunt Teams Tie

A tie feels like a nice problem to have, right up until it’s actually happening and you’re standing in front of two teams with one trophy between them. Ties come up more than most organizers expect, and the worst possible time to figure out how to handle one is in the middle of it, live, with both teams watching your face for a decision.

Why they happen more than you’d guess

Points come in chunks, not fine gradients. A task is worth ten points or it isn’t; multiple choice is right or wrong. There’s rarely a stray decimal hiding in the math to break a deadlock. Two teams that played almost identically well will often land on the exact same total, especially in a shorter hunt where there simply aren’t enough tasks for small differences to add up into a real gap.

Settle it before the game starts, not during

This is the same idea as agreeing on a grading rubric ahead of time — see the guide to grading fairly and fast — a decision made calmly beforehand beats one improvised under pressure every time. It doesn’t need an announcement to every player. It just needs to exist somewhere before the first task unlocks, ideally written down instead of left as a vague intention in your head.

Pick a tiebreaker that feels earned, not invented

A few options hold up well:

• Total time — whichever team hit the final point total first, using timestamps you already have.
• Fewest failed attempts — rewards accuracy over raw speed, no extra setup required.
• One sudden-death bonus task, revealed only if a tie actually happens — the most memorable option, and usually the one players end up talking about afterward.

What doesn’t hold up is falling back on something that looks arbitrary after the fact — whichever team happened to join the game first, say — even if it’s technically a rule. If it wasn’t decided and announced in advance, it reads as making up an answer to give one team the edge, whether that’s actually true or not.

Or just let the tie stand

Not every hunt needs a single winner. For a casual group — friends, family, a birthday party — two teams sharing first place isn’t a failure to resolve, it’s just the result, and splitting whatever prize is on offer is often the answer nobody argues with. Save the sudden-death drama for the hunts where a single winner actually matters to someone.