The Sphinx's Lair

12:04 AM

oh. my.

Not the prettiest thing in the world. I initially tried to put punctuation in to force a surface reading, but it was no better, so I just went all in with the structure.

Though I repeat my warning, there's one word which might be slightly "controversial" in it's grammatical crypticity (don't hate me Sensei @Deusovi).

Rubio

I'm having trouble getting to the answer, but I'm sure I know what it is.

Alconja

That doesn't come as a surprise to me. :)

Rubio

I think you're doing something unexpected with a "redo" that I'm not understanding

I have MIRRORED - mimicked(def); redo core→MI, (horrid core)→RR, (redo mimicked)→ORED

Will

ED is also redo core

Rubio

12:12 AM

that or I have that backwards. either way I think one of (horrid core) or (core horrid) is giving the middle RE

yah Will

Alconja

You're close, and indeed "redo" is the controversial word...

Rubio

but then I have an unexpected redo on the other side

Volatility

"core horrid core redo" is probably hoRRid cORe rEDo

Oh, I see

Rubio

(mimicked redo) giving MI, core horrid giving RR, core redo giving ORED, def at the end?

i think that's it

Volatility

That's kinda the ECHO clue what with "Redouble (-double)" cluing E

Alconja

12:14 AM

Between the two of you, you've got it

Yeah, "Mimicked" (the word) redoes "MI", so it's the mimicked redo... or that's my argument anyway

Rubio

"core redo" doesn't give cORe rEDo, but gives ORED directly

Volatility

2 mins ago, by Volatility

"core horrid core redo" is probably hoRRid cORe rEDo

Alconja

^

Deusovi

oh, nice!

Rubio

OHhhh. well, yah that works also

actually either way works though

Alconja

12:17 AM

But once again, solved before it even got the star up :)

Rubio

core (horrid core redo) or (core horrid) (core redo) if you read "redo" as reorder(=anagram)

Deusovi

but that would give MIRROREC

not MIRRORED

Rubio

lol. uh, yeah, I can't words. nvm :)

I knew what I wanted too much to read the right letters hehe

Alconja

So, who's taking the next one? Rubio had it first, but Volatility had it most correct.

Rubio

@Volatility is up

Volatility

12:19 AM

Am I? I was just about to give it to you @Rubio :-P

Rubio

Nah, you had it much more right. Go for it :)

Volatility

It occurs to me that this is the second time in a few days that you've come up with the right answer to one of Alconja's clues, and I got the wordplay

Rubio

Indeed :)

We make a good team?

Volatility

Absolutely :D

Alconja

Or maybe you're both just my sock puppets...

Will

12:23 AM

speaking of sockpuppets I still hav-- I mean Lukas still hasn't written that vanity/deprecation puzzle about me.

Alconja

@Will A riddle: "Testament / Future tense / Actions free / Known events"

Rubio

nice

Sconibulus

My brain isn't picking up on 'known events'

Alconja

events that will happen

Deusovi

that's just future tense

you cheated :P

Alconja

12:28 AM

:P

Display name

@Will 3rd January 2017, 18:22 UTC

Alconja

I needed a rhyme more than another alternate meaning

Will

I hate it when I see the word "will" and think it's my name. At least my name isn't like Even or something I guess; that'd be way more confusing.

Alconja

Will's will, will wish Wally well

Will

@Displayname Oddly specific yet comforting

Volatility

12:31 AM

CCCC: Rock single about wild times (9)

This new puzzle is interesting...

Sconibulus

Which?

Volatility

0

Q: What's my first name?

The puzzle is explained in the title. Good luck. Note: This post isn't missing any information, to get to the next step you need to think click outside the box!

Rubio

^ that one

Will

I can almost make that CCCC work if it contained two definitions...

Sconibulus

It's feeling off topic, there's a link to a blog post in their profile

Which looks clue ish

Deusovi

12:41 AM

Yeah, it definitely is.

(a clue, not off-topic, although I'm thinking it's off-topic too)

Alconja

Yeah, the "blog" is definitely the next step (I'm hesitant about this type of puzzle because it's so easy for links to die and make the whole thing pointless)

Gareth McCaughan

yeah, I agree (despite the answer I posted, which was mostly for fun)

Deusovi

Yeah, exactly.

Gareth McCaughan

the other thing I don't like about this sort of puzzle is that it's kinda encouraging people to go following random links on the internet :-)

so the HTML source of the blogpost has lots of random-looking bits in it but for all I know they are just part of what Google Sites pages always have.

Rubio

I can't find anything relevant out of Bethzy VanGorden Carr

who knows

Alconja

12:43 AM

Apparently there's a facebook page, someone already posted an answer

Gareth McCaughan

oh god

we're supposed to find this name and stalk some random person on Facebook

?

who for all we know may be a real person?

Alconja

Makes me wonder how I could most effectively harness the collective minds of PSE to my advantage... Maybe some sort of Ender's Game (sorry, spoilers) scenario, hacking the military?

Gareth McCaughan

I mean, a real person who is not in any way either the poster or the poster's sister?

I don't see any actual particular way for this to do actual concrete harm, but it feels all kinds of creepy and terrible.

Rubio

How do you VTC for "reliance on off-site resources" heh

Will

@GarethMcCaughan I just created a new site for the heck of it and the default template code it spit out for me is quite similar

Gareth McCaughan

12:49 AM

@Will yeah, it turned out the answer was to look up someone with the same name as this person's (pretended) sister on Facebook and see what her FB page says about her brother's name.

Will

Yup, I saw the answer. I was just pointing out you (we) probably shouldn't be too concerned about the "random link" being dangerous in this instance

Alconja

Since there's a few people in here atm, what do you think next steps should be on this (if anything). Should I have a crack at creating a concrete list of awards and post a new meta post, or should I create a chat room to discuss specific options, or create a new meta post for people to nominate and vote on specific, individual award ideas?

Sphinx

-5

Q: What's my first name?

The puzzle is explained in the title. Good luck. Note: This post isn't missing any information, to get to the next step you need to think click outside the box!

lateral-thinking enigmatic-puzzle

-3

Q: Decode this uncommon cipher

Can you decode this simple cipher? Full explanation required as usual. STPVR WTSEP KQ VRE ATVREP UA FYDE QDLXTFDEP If no one has cracked it in a couple of days, I'll add a hint or two. Good luck!

cipher

Gareth McCaughan

@Will oh, sorry, I think I was unclear. My point about the random stuff wasn't "eeek, this could be Evil L33t H4xx0r stuff that will compromise my computer", it was "hmm, this could be some sort of cipher, or bits of imgur URL for an imgur maze, or something".

Display name

@Alconja +1 vote for "create a new meta post for people to nominate and vote on specific, individual award ideas"

Alconja

1:12 AM

Yeah, I think my only concern is that some awards make more sense as a "set" (eg. the whole of my option 3 - probably doesn't make sense to have one topic category without the others))

Though, I suppose I could post the set a single answer, and if people really wanted to split it up, they could downvote and post individual ones

Will

Oh I got the CCCC

wow

Deusovi

Hm?

Rubio

But the solution is too long to fit in the margin.

Will

nah, just not sure I wanna come up with the next one :P

Rubio

quack.

Alconja

1:22 AM

Do it! Give in to the cryptic!

Will

I have been working on some cryptics, but they're... kinda niche & I was maybe gonna post a themed cryptic puzzle

but sure I'll give in

Rubio

Good! Use your puzzling feelings, Will. Let the cryptic flow through you!

Will

@Volatility LIMESTONE; LONE + TIMES all jumbled up with the two anagram indicators = LIMESTONE, a rock.

Rubio

huh. if people upvote my darth vader answer I could get that silly badge.

Volatility

Umm, correct answer, although I've learnt not to do indirect anagrams ;-)

Gareth McCaughan

1:25 AM

@Will LONE isn't jumbled

Will

ahh

about

Volatility

right

Rubio

derp. I didn't consider 'wild' as anagram indicator. i'm slow today.

boboquack

@Will Your turn!

Sconibulus

1:48 AM

HATS!

TheGreatEscaper

Morning all

Alconja

morning

Rubio

Howdy @TheGreatEscaper

@Sconibulus HATS ?!

Alconja

winter bash

Rubio

oh

hehe, I just saw the icon has changed

Sconibulus

1:51 AM

When I met you I was but a learner, now I am the master

TheGreatEscaper

Oh, Sconibulus is Darth Vader now

Volatility

Cool!

TheGreatEscaper

Any minute and we're going to get dramatic parenthood announcements from Sconibulus

Sconibulus

I have altered our deal, pray I do not alter it any further

Search your feelings, you know it to be true

Alconja

I guess the pink gravatar is the fleshy pink Mr Skywalker face underneath the mask?

There we go, now I'm the real vadar

(refresh not included)

Rubio

1:57 AM

@Alconja Nice :)

Sconibulus

Join me, and we'll rule the galaxy together

Rubio

as father and son?

Alconja

No, join me and we'll rule the galaxy together

TheGreatEscaper

What a difficult decision

I can't decide whether to join pink vader or black vader

Sconibulus

@Alconja what is thy bidding, my master>

Alconja

2:02 AM

I mean it's vader... whoever heard of a pink vader? Though, I just noticed I'm ~40 question upvotes away from a sweet top hat... Maybe soon I'll give up my dark side ways

Rubio

you will join 15x8x8x20x26x9x11x25x5x21x26x18

Will

this is probably awful and easy but

CCCC: Rodent's tattered toy rat tastes good (11)

bleh

1

Q: A very jumpy riddle

I am the creator of five cent cigars, The creator of an American-Chinese dish. I am a Navy Rear Admiral, the creator of a programming excuse. But very simply, I am a container, A funnel for everyday objects. What/who am I?

riddle

yay a 2 minute riddle

Sphinx

1

Q: A very jumpy riddle

I am the creator of five cent cigars, The creator of an American-Chinese dish. I am a Navy Rear Admiral, the creator of a programming excuse. But very simply, I am a container, A funnel for everyday objects. What/who am I?

riddle

Alconja

Ahh crap, another vader. Nothing more embarrassing than wearing the same dress to a party.

bleh

2:08 AM

sphinx lair has a feed now?

yay

42! I'm sure it's 42. — Spencerkatty May 29 '15 at 19:42

no one can upvote

Rubio

It's been back for a while now

bleh

i havent been here in a while :P

Alconja

@bleh give in to the dark side...

TheGreatEscaper

Thoughts

*are we allowed to post thoughts on the CCCC?

Alconja

Yes. But the poser shouldn't comment on said thoughts.

TheGreatEscaper

2:18 AM

Ah right.

Tastes good seems like the only decent definition, and tattered seems like an anagram signpost

So my first thought was to anagram 'mouse toy rat' which has 11 letters

I got excited when I saw 'oyster' in there which fits the definition a bit, but then i

*I didn't really have anything to do with the 'tamou'

Alconja

Maybe somehow related to "ratatouille"?

bleh

or the movie but probably

Rubio

2:34 AM

I'm guessing so, but I'm not convinced there's a (def) in there then

Sconibulus

"tastes good" would probably be it

Rubio

also @TheGreatEscaper "mouse toy rat" as anagram fodder is an indirect anagram, generally very frowned upon

Will

Indeed, there's no indirect anagram; though it turns out the word is much rarer than I thought... :|

Rubio

I think I know how it ends, but I can't find a fitting word

especially not at (11) hehe

oh. found it.

DEGUSTATORY - (rodent)→DEGUS, which i'd never heard of; (tattered toy rat)—anagram→TATORY; (tastes good)→def

Will

that's it

Rubio

2:46 AM

sorry to put the game on hold but I gotta run out for a while. i'll post up something when i get back

hm. DEGUS is plural. I didn't notice that. Your clue should have been "Rodents' ..."

Will

I had "Degu's" in mind but you have a point

bleh

3:08 AM

44

Q: Join all circles together only with 6 lines

In the below image, can you draw 6 straight lines that pass all the circles? As soon as you start drawing lines you can't take your pen up until you draw all six lines. hint: you don't have to keep the polyline inside the square. Edit: Best answer is the one in which straight line passes center ...

geometry

must be the most trolled question

well "lateral-thinking"

Saiid

Anyone gain any more ground on #4?

Volatility

@Saiid Nope.

Rubio

CCCC: Field of diva leaders takes initiative on a mission. (9)

Finally a decent surface reading on one of these

Saiid

@Volatility Well good. I might have a chance, if I can fit the clues to one of my solutions

As for the CCCC, I think I get 'diva leaders takes initiative' but I'm not sure about 'field of' or 'a mission'

hmm

ah, wait nvm I think I get the 'field of' part

Sconibulus

3:29 AM

going to post it?

Saiid

maybe xP

from what I can tell, 'leaders' is referring to the first letters of the words, and 'takes initiative on' just means that it's coming before whatever 'a mission' means

Volatility

But what would the def be?

Saiid

that's where I run into a problem

@Volatility I'm thinking 'field' is the definition, and 'leaders' applies to 'Of Diva'

not sure what word it could be, though

Ankoganit

3:55 AM

@Rubio In the cryptic reading, is 'takes' grammatically correct, or it should be 'take'? You don't have to answer.

Saiid

^^ That could change it completely

Ankoganit

Wait, why doesn't my hat show up?

Lemme try leaving the room and coming back

What about now?

Nooo where's my haaat

boboquack

Try posting after this one (it might be taking the old pic)

Ankoganit

Okay does it work now?

Noo

Volatility

It might just take some time for chat to update

Ankoganit

4:00 AM

I'm ruined

Saiid

ARGGG

With #4, I'm stuck between RAND, FOOD, TOUR, and URGE, in decreasing likelihood

Ankoganit

@Saiid rand's cryptic?

Saiid

yeah

that last one is a real sucker

Ankoganit

Hmm

It doesn't even sound like a cryptic lcue

More like a cryptic definition

Saiid

lol

my incomplete arguments:

I = rand(al'thor), you are(R), sounds like(rhymes with) you should do it(errand)

Ankoganit

4:08 AM

@Saiid Why should I do errands

I've got better things to do

Yay my hat!

Congratulations to me!

Saiid

song called 'I do it', first words are 'I feel', I(1) of Food, OO' sound like(rhymes with) 'you'(regardless of whether it's actually a word), not sure about the D

@Ankoganit well, it's just my thoughts.

nice btw

Ankoganit

@Saiid Haha

It kinda ruins the ambigram tho

Saiid

what's it mean, anyway?

Ankoganit

You get the hats for performing some tasks

Like I got this for voting on meta

Saiid

like what

oh

Ankoganit

4:12 AM

Head on to winterbash and grab some!

Saiid

lol

welp, I'm going to head off for a while

be back later

Ankoganit

see ya!

Rubio

About the C4 - "takes" is correct in both surface and cryptic contexts.

Ankoganit

@Rubio Damn, you spoiled the only theory I had :P

Rubio

4:34 AM

No ROs here to unpin Will's C4 eh

boboquack

4:48 AM

@Rubio I'll regular-star pin yours then in the mean time.

Rubio

It already was, but thanks ;)

boboquack

@Rubio Not on the top-9 that my computer displayed

Rubio

The site seems ... slow right now

I edited a puzzle and it didn't pop on the activity page for almost 2 minutes

But my C4 shows 2 stars now on the board, and I assume it shows that for you too, so yeah - it was already starred before ya

boboquack

@Rubio Must be people hat-shopping

Rubio

Most likely, yes

boboquack

4:55 AM

Oh, not your love-or-hate word-property one again :D

And Helpfulness level x hints

Alconja

@Rubio OPERATION - OPERA (field of diva) TI (leaders Takes Initiative) ON (def: a mission)

Rubio

There it is!

Alconja

...except that i'm ill prepared for another. Gimme a minute.

Rubio

@boboquack Not a fan of the Helpfulness level x? hehe

The last time I used that, I had 5 levels of helpfulness ready to put up. Didn't get very far into them before someone solved it. This one? Well, I think I'll have to use a few more than last time.

@Alconja That one wasn't too easy was it? I had a bit of fun concocting it

boboquack

@Rubio How many do you have this time?

Alconja

5:04 AM

Not at all. 'twas a good one. Multiple things threw me off. Wasn't until I noticed the TION that made me get it pretty quickly (since it's a common word ending, especially at ~9 letters)

Rubio

@boboquack I only have 3 prepared, so I'll have to come up with some in-betweeners

boboquack

Anyone got any ideas on the fruit equations? The only thing on the keyboard I can come up with that would make sense is ! for banana, (or maybe |), but I can't find any solution for those.

Sid

I doubt the fruit equations are completely correct. There is something missing, somewhere. The operators can't be variables as we have 5 variables for 4 equations which I don't think is solvable..

Will

how does the leaderboard work???

Volatility

I think it just hadn't updated the rankings; I see it correctly

Alconja

5:22 AM

CCCC: Curt Oregon is back, in: "Double Cross" (reprint) (5)

(everyone's favourite action star)

Volatility

ah

boboquack

@Alconja Is this one of your echo etc. themed ones?

Alconja

:) No. This one's more "normal"

I have one more "special" one, but there's a broken bit I never got around to fixing.

boboquack

@Sid We are given that all the numbers involved are positive integers... have you done diophantine equations (e.g. xy+x+4y+4=15 only has the one solution x=1, y=2 in positive integers)?

Rubio

i've done brute force substitutions of fruit/+/* with any integer 0..20 or any of + - * / with no solutions

currently expanding that to any two digit value, and still getting nothing

I posted a comment looking for some additional clarity to help refine the problem but don't think there's been an answer to it yet

Alconja

5:32 AM

Question for the cryptic rule-mongers: is capitalisation considered the same as punctuation (i.e. fair game for surface reading and ignored for solving)?

Rubio

According to one source I found, yes

Alconja

one source is enough for me. :)

Rubio

Deusovi suggests required capitalizations are, well, required, which seems fair enough

Alconja

Yeah, that makes sense

Rubio

if you mean the Blue Devils, you need to say that, not blue devils; otherwise, extraneous caps seem to be fair game

Volatility

5:34 AM