Silph Puzzle Hunt 2021

The 2021 Silph Puzzle Hunt was a puzzle hunt run in December 2021. This was the 4th puzzlehunt from the writers, with the previous three iterations having run as Smogon Puzzle Hunt. The hunt is Pokemon-themed, and the story takes place in the Pokemon universe. Notably, all teams in the hunt also selected one of three factions to join as part of their pre-hunt registration.

The hunt was renamed from Smogon Puzzle Hunt to Silph due to no longer being strongly associated with the Smogon forums, where Smogon Puzzle Hunt originated and was usually run. This was also the first iteration of the hunt which ran on a website instead of a Discord server. The name of the Hunt is a reference to [https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Silph_Co. Silph Co.], a fictional company in the Pokemon universe.

Plot
The story takes place in the Pokemon GO universe; the solver plays the role of a goon for an unnamed team in Round 1, going to various Puzzlestops on a map to carry out some unspecified task. As puzzles are solved at the Puzzlestops, new Puzzlestop locations are revealed, until finally the Round 1 meta is unlocked. After solving the Round 1 meta and remembering what their task is, solvers unlock the second round.

Round 2 has a similar structure, but with the more specific task of interacting with Candela, Spark, and Blanche, the three team leaders in Pokemon GO. Round 2 comprises 21 puzzles, which feed into 3 different metapuzzles&mdash;one for each team leader&mdash;and one final metameta.