Predator/Defender
Predator Defender is an applied improvisation exercise from Putting Improv to Work in which each player secretly chooses one person as their predator and another as their defender. On the signal to move, everyone must keep their defender between themselves and their predator at all times, creating a dynamic, self-organizing system of constant movement.
Structure
Setup
All participants stand in an open space. The facilitator asks each person to silently choose two other people in the room: one is their Predator and one is their Defender. No one reveals their choices. The facilitator confirms that everyone has chosen both roles.
Progression
On "Go," every participant must position themselves so that their Defender is always between them and their Predator. Since everyone is simultaneously adjusting, the group erupts into constant motion. The system never settles because each person's movement triggers repositioning by everyone else.
The facilitator lets the movement run for two to three minutes, then calls "Freeze." The group pauses and the facilitator asks several participants to reveal their predator and defender choices, tracing the invisible relationships that generated the movement.
A second round often follows with new choices. The facilitator may add constraints: move in slow motion, maintain a specific distance from your defender, or keep your eyes on your predator at all times.
Variations
A three-person version adds a Neutral party that each player must stay equidistant from. A reveal version has each person publicly announce their choices before the round begins, allowing the group to predict the movement patterns. A discussion version follows the physical exercise with a conversation about systems thinking and unintended consequences.
How to Teach It
Objectives
Predator Defender demonstrates how simple individual rules create complex group behavior. The exercise makes visible the dynamics of interconnected systems, where every action produces ripple effects through the entire group. It builds spatial awareness and introduces systems thinking through physical experience.
How to Explain It
"Silently choose one person as your predator and one as your defender. When I say go, your job is to keep your defender between you and your predator at all times. Do not tell anyone your choices."
Scaffolding
The exercise needs no scaffolding beyond clear instructions. The emergent behavior is immediate and unmistakable. The learning happens in the debrief, where the facilitator connects the physical experience to real-world systems, organizational dynamics, and the unpredictability of interconnected actions.
Common Pitfalls
The most common issue is participants who make their choices too obvious, staring at their predator or shadowing their defender. Coach subtlety. The exercise is richer when the invisible relationships remain hidden until the reveal.
Safety is a consideration in tight spaces. Remind participants to move with awareness of others and to avoid running or sudden direction changes.
In Applied Settings
Predator Defender is used in team-building, systems thinking workshops, and organizational development programs. The exercise provides a visceral demonstration of how individual decisions create collective patterns, a concept that transfers directly to understanding organizational behavior, market dynamics, and project management. Facilitators use the debrief to explore how small changes in individual behavior can produce large, unpredictable effects across a system.
Skills Developed
Worth Reading
See all books →
Putting Improv to Work
Spontaneous Performance for Leadership, Learning, and Life
Greg Hohn
Group Improvisation
The Manual of Ensemble Improv Games
Peter Campbell Gwinn; Charna Halpern
Improvisation for the Theater
A Handbook of Teaching and Directing Techniques
Viola Spolin
Pirate Robot Ninja
An Improv Fable
Billy Merritt; Will Hines
Theatre of the Oppressed
Augusto Boal
Improv Ideas
A Book of Games and Lists
Mary Ann Kelley; Justine Jones
Related Exercises
Wink Murder
Wink Murder is a social deduction game in which a secretly designated murderer eliminates players by winking at them. Surviving players must identify the murderer through observation before the group is eliminated. The game trains alertness, subtle communication, and the ability to read nonverbal cues across a group.
Opposite Side Speech
Opposite Side Speech is a communication exercise in which participants argue for the opposite of their actual position on a topic. One person states a belief or preference, then must immediately switch to advocating passionately for the contrary viewpoint. The exercise builds cognitive flexibility, empathy, and the ability to genuinely inhabit perspectives that differ from one's own.
Alliances
Alliances is a spatial awareness exercise in which each player secretly selects one person in the group as their ally and another as their enemy, then moves through the space trying to keep the ally positioned between themselves and the enemy at all times. No one announces their choices, so the resulting group movement becomes complex, organic, and unpredictable as every participant simultaneously pursues their own spatial objective. The exercise produces a constantly shifting formation that resembles flocking behavior, with sudden accelerations, direction changes, and clusters forming and dissolving. Alliances develops spatial awareness, peripheral vision, and the ability to read and respond to group movement patterns without verbal communication. It also demonstrates how simple individual rules can generate complex group behavior, a principle that applies directly to ensemble scene work.
How to Reference This Page
The Improv Archive. (2026). Predator/Defender. Retrieved March 19, 2026, from https://improvarchive.org/exercises/predator-defender
The Improv Archive. "Predator/Defender." The Improv Archive, 2026. https://improvarchive.org/exercises/predator-defender.
The Improv Archive. "Predator/Defender." The Improv Archive, 2026, https://improvarchive.org/exercises/predator-defender. Accessed March 19, 2026.
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