The Sphinx's Lair

12:10 AM

@Avigrail I am now. What's up?

12:59 AM

Hidden in the source of avigrail's question:

by the hint that we indirectly described mode 2 in chat, I'm guessing mode 2 anagrams the words themselves rather than letters in each word, but I didn't get anything meaningful out of that

that's my status report

Apep

1:12 AM

the +7 and -14 shifts on the 3rd letter narrows it down.

Gareth McCaughan

1:51 AM

not if the shifts can be cyclic, like rot13

ffao

2:03 AM

I'm thinking the -14 shift is likely just for the force joke

because it would be hard to make shifts that worked for two different answers given that you don't choose your imgur URLs, unless the second answer is also nonsense

Sphinx

5:14 AM

0

Q: 13-by-13 SIKAKU puzzle

A SIKAKU puzzle consists of a square or rectangular grid in which some of the cells contain a one or two digit number. To complete the puzzle, a Solver must divide the puzzle into a number of rectangles so that each rectangle contains exactly one of the numbers, and that number must be equal to t...

Puzzling Meta

6:26 AM

0

Q: Best puzzles of 2017 Q3 (July - September)?

This question is part of the best-puzzle award series. What are your nominations for the best puzzles, here on Puzzling.SE, of the third quarter (July / August / September) 2017? Suggested guidelines for nomination: Nominate each individual puzzle in a separate answer, so they can be up...

discussion best-of

Avigrail

@MikeQ I wanted to help out a little

Avigrail

7:04 AM

@ffao You are right. Imgur links are not really predictable. The second answer is not a joke!

Sphinx

12:31 PM

0

Q: I apologise in advance for this

A man has 17 cigarettes. He gives half of the cigarettes to his oldest son. He gives one third of the cigarettes to his oldest son. He gives one ninth of the cigarettes to his youngest son. Question:

lateral-thinking

Sphinx

1:16 PM

0

Q: You would have heard it Riddle?

Hit me once I start crying , Hit me again I sleep like a baby . Touch my neighbors I undergo me metamorphosis , Keep hitting them I create time travel. And I am there where u all watch. What am I ?

riddle

Avigrail

2:15 PM

@feelinferrety You have that code thing for me?

Sid

2:36 PM

R Dye seems to remind me of someone we all are not quite fond of.

Avigrail

Hey @Sid What is the best time to post a puzzle ?

Sphinx

-2

Q: This was in my Twitter feed this am:

It's not really a question, so please feel free to delete or whatever. I just thought someone here might find it of interest. (I do not have an answer, of course.) It is from the account @alt_uscis Message for @JulianAssange Whoops. Political. Sorry. Edited out. (Thanks for the dv's, ...

cipher

Sid

@Avigrail Not now. :P

Beastly Gerbil

..... Why? Just why? ^^

Sid

Also, @Rubio Have you given any hints to your C4?

@BeastlyGerbil Like I said, their last few posts have been quite.... suspicious

Rubio

2:50 PM

Directed at nobody. But directed at everybody. —

And, better question, why are you not just deleting it now? This goes for everyone here -- Please don't make the community (or, worse yet, the Mods) be your janitor. If you know it doesn't belong here, be it an obviously off-topic/too broad/bad question, an obviously incorrect answer, an obviously obsolete comment, or any posting of any of these types that is clearly inappropriate, delete it yourself please. The rest of us would prefer not to have to clean up after you. — Rubio ♦ 2 mins ago

Sid

@Rubio VTD is only for 10k, no?

Rubio

I mean that in the context of cleaning up your own messes. Anyone can delete their own stuff, usually.

Deusovi

Unless it's upvoted or has a bounty, I believe.

Rubio

I think the restriction is if it has an upvoted answer, you can't delete your own question

Questions with bounties may actually be deletable anyway, though I haven't tested that

For sure you can always delete your own answer or your own comment, regardless of votes on it. (Though it may not always be ok to, if it amounts to self-vandalism, but that's a different topic entirely)

Deusovi

Yes.

feelinferrety

2:57 PM

@Avigrail - It's a quick 'n dirty script but it works so far:
https://codepen.io/anon/pen/pWOKYg

Avigrail

Thanks @feelinferrety

Avigrail

3:16 PM

Lovely

Sphinx

3:53 PM

0

Q: Been stuck on this for a long time. Please help

Any help on this would be great. It should be a one word answer.

riddle word-problem

Beastly Gerbil

5:59 PM

@rubio and for some reason he thinks that downvoting a question makes you lose rep...

Rubio

Yeah I noted that. but since it was already deleted I didn't feel like following up with more commentary

nice timing btw. I just walked in the door :)

Beastly Gerbil

Timing is everything :P

ffao

8:18 PM

6 hours ago, by Sid

Also, @Rubio Have you given any hints to your C4?

^ @Rubio

also, while I'm asking mods questions: @Deus, do you know when I should expect the mystery hunt to end?

Rubio

I haven't given a hint, no

I suppose I should.

Mithrandir

And no, I haven't gotten around to squashing things yet

If there was a button on the site it'd be easy, but nooo, they have to make you use the command line

And I don't use the command line. Ever.

ffao

I think you can just do something like "git reset HEAD^2" "git commit" "git push --force"

without the command line? I have no clue

Mithrandir

I have to figure out how to get to the thingy in the command line first

I might just close this PR and create a new one that doesn't have syntax errors :P

ffao

yeah, I guess that might be a hacky way to go about it without needing the command line

Rubio

8:24 PM

CCCC hints: Englishman's here is a simple adjective, not an indicator in disguise. A better word for "terrible" might be "dreadful".

Mithrandir

I know that I have squashed things via the command line before but that was almost a year ago and I have no idea how I managed to do it now :p

So I may just cheat in the morning

ffao

hmm, not a possibility I hadn't considered for that hint, but that's still useful in that it eliminates other choices

boboquack

@ffao which mystery hunt?

John Dvorak

8:44 PM

the CCCC explanation has become unpinned, BTW

Rubio

CCCC is Cryptic Clue Chat Chains! Latest clue is ⤴ there! Join the fun! See Deusovi's Cryptic Clue Guide and GPR's Archive & Statistics of past clues.

4

could one or two of you star the current C4 please

hm

John Dvorak

preferably two (thanks)

Rubio

ordering on pins is so freaking bizarre

John Dvorak

It's ordered based on a magic formula that increases with the number of stars and decreases with time and gets recalculated each time a star is cast.

The CCCC is much older than the CCCC guide.

it should be possible to make a bot that refreshes the pins automatically before they expire

I think the star score is along the lines of #stars / sqrt(time)

Rubio

8:59 PM

I don't think that's possible, since the bot could only pin it once and once you unpin it you can't repin it

Also, pins weigh in the formula heavier than stars

John Dvorak

The bot can post a new message

Rubio

eh. well sure.

but it's infrequent enough that I don't really mind having to do it manually

it's just annoying that I have to have two separate versions of the pin text to handle the variations in placement.

enough stars would boost even an old message above a new pin, but meh. i'll just use the alternate text until the next C4 is posted.

John Dvorak

perhaps devise a direction-independent message?

Rubio

that would ruin the fun :)

Sphinx

9:37 PM

0

Q: Driving me Crazy

You use these to count, but every second doesn't feel like a second. This hurts you, but is found fun by some. You'd think it would interrupt your thought process, but it does all the work for you. Old fashioned, it grows tedious with the times. What is it?

no-computers

Sphinx

9:50 PM

0

Q: Logic Coin Question

If there are 23 coins that are on a screen, and there are two players and you get to pick if you go first or second, how can you guarantee that you will not get stuck with picking the last coin? Basically, the objective is to force the other person to pick the last coin.

strategy coins

boboquack

10:04 PM

^ dupe, surely?

Alconja

10:35 PM

@boboquack How close does it need to be to to be classed as a dupe?

boboquack

@Alconja Is there just a general case where there are n coins and you can remove 1 to m coins?

Alconja

I haven't seen a specific puzzle to that end, but I assume there must be such a generalised solution... that being said, does a slightly tweaked set of numbers really change the underlying puzzle?

boboquack

11:08 PM

@Alconja I'll VTDupe

Sphinx

0

Q: I am not the first

I am not the first. To some I am the second. To others I am the third. But I'm never the fourth. I am the first. I'm no help in "a way out." But I'm first in "I don't know." I can't be left alone. If I'm alone, I will hurt someone. You can't make peace if you cut me off. But on the othe...

riddle

Mike Q

11:20 PM

@Avigrail Why did you give me the bounty? I didn't solve the puzzle.

boboquack

@MikeQ probably so it doesn't go to waste. Congrats on 5k!

Mike Q

Eh, I feel like I don't deserve it. All I did was lazily python through some string permutations, and then give up on the question. But @feelinferrety is the one who did the actual critical thinking.

Deusovi

It'll be over by Sunday afternoon. Typically the schedule is:

- opening Friday at noon
- puzzles unlock at 1pm Friday
- ...
- coin is found Sunday morning
- Hunt HQ closes around 6pm Sunday
- everyone sleeps/showers/eats (in some order, probably not at the same time)
- Monday at noon there's a wrapup where some of the puzzles are discussed and any particularly funny submissions are shared (if you can't make it to this, it's always filmed and put online)

boboquack

@Deusovi Is this the MIT hunt?

Deusovi

yup

ffao

11:40 PM

oh, cool, I was wondering if I would have to take Monday off in case I decided to go, but if it ends on Sunday afternoon then I don't think I need to

Deusovi

well, it depends on how long you stay Sunday

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