The 6 Types of People Every Great Escape Room Team Needs
Every escape room has a varying skill set that is needed to complete each mission. When gathering your team, make sure to get a diversity of creative thinkers so you have all your bases covered. Here is our list of the 6 types of people every great escape room team needs! Which one are you?
The Leader
O’ Captain my captain! Every good group needs a fearless leader! Someone to help settle time wasting disputes and support their team mates when they need an extra set of hands. The Leader is usually elected into the role, either consciously or by habit, and others react and respond to the Leaders suggestions with little to no argument. The Leader doesn’t stick to any one puzzle though and can often be seen running about the room checking in with the rest of the team.
The Finder
This is the person you call when you lose the T.V. remote and need help finding it. This person is the one that pops up every three seconds while in the room and shouts “I found something!” The Finder is usually the one who finds most of the clues and puzzles and helps to figure out what things goes with what. They are also normally the keeper of keys and the knower of clues. They will sometimes also act as a courier running their new clues back and forth between team mates to trying to figure out if it can help solve any active clues.
The Thinker
The brains of the group. Usually this player is a natural puzzler. Often, they are referred to as the smart one and they derive the most enjoyment from being the one to crack the puzzle’s code! However, Thinkers do tend to have a really bad habit; The Thinker likes to focus on one puzzle until it is solved and hates it when they need to leave a puzzle half solved to try and solve a different puzzle. In extreme cases, this can lead to the Thinker being that one player who spends half the game in a corner by themselves working on a single puzzle.
The Worker
Do you have to look through several volumes of an encyclopedia? No problem! Bag full of puzzle pieces? No problem! Other process of elimination puzzles? No problem! This tireless worker doesn’t get frustrated by meticulous tasks and can finish up the busy work on puzzles that have already been “solved” while their team mates move on to other tasks!
The Leaper
Oh Leaper… What can we say about the Leaper other than this: every group has one and every group needs one. The Leaper is that one person on the team that chooses to ignore clues and make huge leaps in logic when trying to find a solution to a problem. The Leaper embodies the age old saying that “there is no such thing as a dumb idea.” They will leap to strange and confusing conclusions that often end up being wrong. However, whenever the thinker gets stumped, it becomes the leapers job to attempt to find new out-of-the-box ideas for the Challenger to work with. When the clock is ticking down and everyone else starts panicking, the leaper is always there with another solution.
The Challenger
The Challenger works in tandem with the Thinker and the Leaper and acts as a grounding force for their brainstorming. Simply put, the challenger challenges the solutions put forth by the Thinker and the Leaper to help them come up with solutions that actually makes sense. The Challenger’s role is not to shoot down ideas, but rather to prioritize ideas with highest chance of success. They are the ones saying things like “We can try that, but first let’s see if this works instead…” They also help the Leaper turn their crazy idea into a plausible one by working through the Leapers thought process and forcing them to think about certain ideas in greater depth. If the team is a factory that produces ideas, then the Challenger’s role is quality control.
You also may have some team mates that can take on multiple roles, but it is fun to figure out which habits fit your team mates and friends. Let us know what roles each of your team mates fill in the comment section below! Also, make sure to play The Hex Room and put your teamwork to the test!
Jason Sakal
Game Master and Manager
Cross Roads Escape Games
February 1, 2018 @ 6:32 am
It was really nice how you enumerated the type of people that were important to be present in ann escape room team. What got my attention the most though was how you talked about the worker and that they are the type of people who constantly think about the previous clues and problems even after the team has already solved them. I actually agree with that because I know that their overthinking quality will allow us to get out because they can remember the things that we’ve done prior and use the previous ideas to solve the new problem. I will definitely look for a person like that for when we do our escape room challenge next month. Thank you!
February 1, 2018 @ 1:36 pm
An awesome write up. I cannot choose the most important person on the list, as they all contribute in some way or the other to help their team win. I do think a finder has more uses as tracking down clues is a major part of getting out of escape rooms. A leader and a challenger, I feel can be the same person sometimes. I also think there is always that person who just doesn’t contribute anything at all, but keeps on joking around. They are highly useful to keep the morale up though.
February 27, 2018 @ 10:41 pm
Awesome description of each role. I’m trying to think what’s the most relevant? I like the challenger, prioritizing ideas is really important. But, of course, each one is essential for the team.
March 8, 2018 @ 6:48 am
It was great how you mentioned that one of the important people that should be present in an escape room game is that finder because they are the type of people who usually find puzzle pieces and clues and determine which goes where. I have a friend that fits the description of a finder perfectly as he often stumbles upon the things that are hidden by “accident.” Since we are joining an escape room next month, maybe I should go and tag him along. Thank you for sharing!
March 27, 2018 @ 11:42 pm
It was great how you said that it is important for an escape room team to have a “Leaper” because though these people usually ignored logic and jump to conclusion, they are the ones to come up with ideas outside the box when the team runs out of ideas. I think I have a friend who thinks and behaves exactly like a “Leaper,” I will make sure to bring him along. I was planning to do some escape room activities, and I was thinking about how I can spice things up. Thank you for the suggestion!
July 3, 2018 @ 7:28 am
Such a great content and find valuable and useful for my work too. Thanks for sharing such a helpful content.
jerry
July 13, 2019 @ 12:41 am
What a great post. Didn’t know it had this much. Every single position definitely contributes. Guess I’m the worker. Thanks a lot for sharing.
September 7, 2019 @ 5:46 pm
Yes!! If a team doesn’t have these six types of players, then this team will struggle a bit to complete the escape room. I am glad that my team has all these six players, so we don’t have to worry about not finishing.
December 23, 2019 @ 6:45 pm
I like the idea of having someone there to come up with unusual ideas being beneficial because it can help everyone get un-stumped when there’s a dead end. My brother doesn’t hold his attention very well, so we were thinking he might not enjoy going to an escape room with us because he’d have to focus. Maybe having him come would help us look at things from different angles when we find an escape room to visit.