We have noticed a several quiz nights including a lot of multiple-choice questions, and even True or False questions. We are not sure what is behind this trend. Perhaps the quiz masters are trying to make their quizzes easier; clearly having two or three possible answers allows anyone a reasonable chance of guessing correctly.
Some questions are de facto multiple-choice questions. For example, a question starting “Which primary colour . . .” is a choice between Blue, Red and Yellow. However, you do have to know the primary colours, which most people do. But a question starting “Which Tudor monarch . . .” requires you to know the five Tudor monarchs before making your choice.
These types of questions are pretty much unavoidable, and we are happy to include them in our quizzes.
It is the potential for teams to guess their way through a round of multiple-choice questions where the issue lies. A team which knew the answers without the options could get irritated when the team at the next table had a series of lucky guesses. The flip side is that teams getting higher scores because of the options are happier.
As we have said many times before, each round of the quiz needs a mixture of difficulties – a few questions that all the teams are likely to get right, a few questions that some of the teams will get mostly correct, and a couple of questions that one or two teams will get right. In that way all the teams feel as if they have taken part, and one of the better teams will win.
Perhaps if a question is so difficult it needs to be multiple-choice you should consider rewording it, or even not using it.