Presentation elements

Presentation elements are pieces of an individual puzzle's presentation (visual or surface-level functional) that tend to change how a puzzle looks or behaves without significantly impacting the solve path itself.

Core Characteristics
The main aspects of a presentation element are that they affect things that are seen almost immediately upon opening a puzzle (or at least relate to something seen immediately, even if it's not immediately obvious), and that they could theoretically be replaced or removed without drastically affecting the solve path of the puzzle. However, not all presentation elements hold to this description strictly.

Certain presentation elements may creep into the realm of solve path elements, playing a large role in how a puzzle is solved (such as a puzzle in the form of a spreadsheet that could only be presented on a spreadsheet due to the mechanics it uses). Others may even be described as puzzle types due to how often they've been used (such as TEAMWORK TIME since its introduction in 2020). Regardless, all presentation elements will likely be noticed by solvers immediately upon opening a puzzle, or at least the aspect of the puzzle affected will be something core to puzzles in general (like the answer-checker or the flavortext).

History of Use
Presentation elements include many things that could be and have been applied to non-puzzle content over the years, things like content warnings and creative use of non-traditional media. When looking at their use in puzzles, there's a similarly deep timeline at play. Abnormal grids for things like crosswords have existed for decades, especially with the advent of the diagramless crossword allowing setters to play with what was 'acceptable' for crossword shapes. Audio and video have been used since they were capable of being shared publicly for things like pub quizzes and trivia. Even the idea of enumerations and givens as ways of providing hints to solvers have existed almost as long as certain puzzles have existed, if not existing with them from the start.

Many presentation elements are in fact core mechanics whose presence is not so much a surprise, but whose absence is often noticed, or aspects of a puzzle that are a pleasant surprise when they show up, not because they're rarely used but because some people enjoy to listen to a song while they work, and audio puzzles let them streamline that process.

Subtypes
Presentation element subtypes are mostly differentiated by the aspect of the puzzle they affect.

Accessibility
Accessibility elements affect how easy-to-access puzzles are. That means things like alternate clues for image-based puzzles, transcripts for video and audio, and content warning for puzzles that may have inappropriate, harmful, or triggering content.

With the puzzling community growing every day, these measures are becoming more and more common as part of an effort to make the hobby of puzzle-solving that much more enjoyable to everyone.

Appearance
Appearance elements deal with how a puzzle looks, and any twists on 'normal' presentation that puzzles may throw at a solver. These include presenting clues in odd ways, using nonstandard grids or fill gimmicks, and using a particularly notable presentation style (all images, heavy amounts of text, etc.)

Instructions
Instruction elements deal with the different ways instructions, hints, and clues can be given so solvers during a puzzle. These can include things that are already baked into the puzzle content, like enumerations and givens, or hints hidden away in other aspects, like the title or the flavortext.

Media Types
Puzzles can involve various non-text/-image types of media, and they're collected under this subtype. The most common of these include audio and video, but it can also extend to other (not-really-media) ways of presenting a puzzle, such as through interaction with hunt staff, or (in rare cases) food given to teams.

Submissions and Answers
Not to be confused with the hunt element subtype of the same name, individual puzzle elements relating to how a puzzle responds to submissions are found here. Since many hunts don't involve submission gimmicks on a round- or hunt-wide level, or at least don't explicitly state the presence of them, these elements will apply anywhere that a submission gimmick occurs as long as they're not present everywhere.