The Sphinx's Lair

Rand al'Thor

11:14 PM

But which one of them is going to play against the blancmange? — rand al'thor 1 hour ago

+1 to anyone who gets this reference.

boboquack

Monty Python?

Blancmanges playing tennis?

Rand al'Thor

@boboquack Bingoquack!

Rubio

Blancmanges from Skyron. They're very into tennis.

Walt

Hi all

Rand al'Thor

Well, hello @Walt!

Rubio

11:17 PM

hey @Walt

boboquack

Hello @Walt!

Rand al'Thor

Looking for film-related puzzles? :-)

Rubio

hey @Randal'Thor - your last cryptics puzzle is still kicking my kiester

boboquack

Ping ping ping (pong pong pong)

Walt

I have a potential answer for something, but I'm really not sure about it. Can I delete it if it's wrong?

Rubio

11:18 PM

Certainly

Rand al'Thor

@Rubio I was going to say - why hasn't that puzzle got more attention? I was hoping it'd be more popular.

Rubio

Though (unless it's so wrong it starts pulling in negative votes) it's often not a bad idea to leave wrong guesses up, so others don't keep making the same wrong guess

Rand al'Thor

@Walt You can, but there's no need to. Wrong answers can still be good, if they're mostly plausible.

Walt

@Randal'Thor No, just random lurking :)

Rand al'Thor

@Walt Come now, we all know I'm the random guy around here :-P

Rubio

11:20 PM

Oh. No, for random lurking you want room 12A, next door

2

boboquack

What puzzle?

Rand al'Thor

@Rubio ROFL!

Nice one.

Rubio

(*bow*)

Walt

@Randal'Thor But writing something wrong makes me feel tainted :O

@boboquack Do you mean me? Can I run it by you guys? Maybe it'll save me the embarrassment

Rubio

@boboquack if you were asking me and rand, puzzling.stackexchange.com/questions/48842/…

If you were asking Walt, no idea ;)

boboquack

11:23 PM

@Walt No-one is going to criticise you for guessing, unless it's really stupid.

And I meant the cryptic, yes

Walt

@boboquack See, now I'm really conflicted ;)

It's pretty dumb IMO

Rubio

@Randal'Thor It got a passable view count, but then the first two of four fell quickly and then the other two sat unsolved for a while. I think people are somewhat reluctant to start in on a puzzle that's halfway solved (I know I am anyway), and in any event, those last two are *hard*.

boboquack

BTW, some people have said that my puzzle is creepy. I only just got why, however it was constructed as random sentences strung together.

Rubio

@boboquack Really? It has a definite creepy vibe and feels constructed more than random.

boboquack

Yes, really. Maybe it's the english property that makes it jarring...

Walt

11:26 PM

OK, I posted it anyway :/

Hopefully it's not that awful

Rubio

Random-but-not-really-random looks like this: (hehe) puzzling.stackexchange.com/questions/48912/…

Rand al'Thor

@Walt It shouldn't. Often you can't tell for certain beforehand whether a plausible solution is really the right one or not, unless the puzzle is really well-designed or you understand all the clues right away.

Rubio

Dude. That's actually a really good answer.

Walt

@Randal'Thor Yeah, I usually prefer to be certain

Rand al'Thor

@Walt Sounds like you've got it! +1 for sure.

Rubio

11:27 PM

Well explained for all the parts, and I think it's the right solution.

Rand al'Thor

@Walt Riddles actually have a lot in common with ID questions, in many ways.

Walt

Love the site, BTW. Love riddles but not so great at solving or constructing them. ;)

Rand al'Thor

Except that in one case the OP knows the answer but in the other they (usually) don't.

Rubio

Heh. Don't sell yourself short. I tried answering that very riddle and didn't get it.

Walt

@Randal'Thor You mean the 'debut riddle'? Really? OK. Maybe I was overreacting

Rand al'Thor

11:29 PM

@Rubio @boboquack Creepy vibe? Are we all forgetting "I need you to listen"?

Rubio

Hehehee. Who could forget that.

Atmospheric eerieness amped to 11

Walt

@Randal'Thor And thanks :)

Rubio

I wasn't even here for that - I found it after the fact - and thought it was brilliant. Creepy. But brilliant.

Rand al'Thor

For the new guy in the room, in case @Walt hasn't seen it before ... may I present the second-highest-voted question on PSE:

249

Q: This is important. I need you to listen…

Look, you don't know me. We've never met. But, like I said, I need you to listen... I had the most disturbing dream the other night... Woke up in a cold sweat and couldn't get back to sleep. It wasn't a nightmare as such, just ... eerie, I guess? I don't even remember the details, but it left me...

boboquack

Me too

Walt

11:31 PM

@Randal'Thor Gah. Looks cool

Rand al'Thor

@Walt Have you checked out the final answer too?

boboquack

Where's your answer, @Walt? It's not showing up for me

Walt

@Randal'Thor I can barely wrap my head around that pic. Is that a 3D poster?

@boboquack The one I talked about before? It's called 'debut riddle'

Rand al'Thor

3

A: A debut riddle: What am I?

OK, I'm probably way off, but what about... "I am constructed to house nothing" "When back is met, new life may I give" "If I belong to you, then supporting is a friend within" "Your rich Uncle Pennybags encourages you to apply me to a market" "No orbit can I fully touch"

boboquack

Just popped up, anyway

@Randal'Thor did you get to help in the 36-grid puzzle?

Walt

11:35 PM

@Randal'Thor Seems way too advanced for me. But expertly made

Rubio

@Randal'Thor We need to pester Alconja into a Making Of for that. hehe

Rand al'Thor

@boboquack The what? (So no, I guess.)

boboquack

13

Q: GRID-THIRTY-SIX

Solve 36 puzzles (or more) to find the final 6 letter answer.

enigmatic-puzzle visual rebus cryptic-crosswords grid-deduction

TGE's latest

A veritable delight.

Rubio

That was really fun

boboquack

(I'm not quite sure what veritable means, so I hope it's used correctly)

Rubio

11:38 PM

I missed a hunk of the solving when I went to sleep. (And you used it right. It basically means "genuine")

boboquack

What do people think of this proposal?

0

A: What should the subjects of our fortnightly topic challenges be? (with updates!)

Rabbit-Hole Many puzzles lately have been quite deep in terms of how far you have to worm your way into the puzzle, and giving just enough information. I personally would like to see more puzzles of this type, especially in terms of information re-use.

Rubio

I like it. I wish my puzzles weren't (mostly) one trick ponies.

boboquack

Humn says that too:

Feb 4 at 5:59, by humn

my martian mentor manshu holds the secret of, but has not yet taught me, how to make an unspecialized puzzle

Rubio

My wordplay one actually goes a couple levels deep. It's gratifying to see something like that come together.

boboquack

BTW, am I weird or do other people read this chat room like it's a verbal speech?

Rubio

11:41 PM

I think it's mildly amusing that your proposal is in direct opposition to another one, "one-level" :)

boboquack

(That's why I say '?!' and 'Hmmm...' a lot)

@Rubio That is one-level enigmatic-puzzle though, so not quite direct

Rubio

Eh, yeah I guess you're right hehe

Walt

@boboquack I just read it in a Grover voice. Like all text

boboquack

@Rubio IMO that's like having to find the tag yourself. I support that one.

@Walt From Sesame St?

AFK for some time

Walt

@boboquack Yeah, but the Ed Sullivan version, oddly enough

Rubio

11:44 PM

I like that Mithrandir put his name in steganography in his steganography proposal.

Huh. I'm one answer upvote shy of rep-cap. Didn't know I was anywhere near there today.

Walt

Anyway, KUTGW everyone and thanks for the pep talk. And stop solving things so quickly. :P

ttfn

Rubio

KUTGW?

oh. Wow.

Keep up the good work. That took a minute.

Rand al'Thor

@Rubio Sounds like FGITW.

Knife Under The Great West?

Rubio

Maybe it's @dcfyj's sockpuppet.

WE'RE ON TO YOU DCFYJ

Rand al'Thor

So anyway, how about those three blind mice?

11

Q: Three Blind Mice - rhyming cryptics!

Each line of the following poem is a cryptic clue. Free blind mice with spirit are bound; Hack tail off, our first glorious inch. Tool is almost fine after quick sound; The mice's tails in the breeze did flinch. I'll provide the word lengths too, but in a spoilertag in case you want t...

rhyme cryptic-clues

For the record, I'm very proud of the second line, and basically built the rest of the puzzle around that.

Rubio

11:53 PM

That's the one I've been beating my head against all day.

Rand al'Thor

Proud enough of it that I didn't want to 'waste' it as a CCCC.

Rubio

My fear is it's assembling first and last letters of synonyms for words with multiple meanings, together with another word that may be itself or need another synonym, in a desperate attempt to connect them together into a short word that's synonymous with either of two other words (or phrases) that, in turn, have multiple possible senses.

Actually "fear" is the wrong word. I'm pretty much certain that's what it is. :)

Rand al'Thor

@Rubio You may want to kill me after it's solved :-)

Rubio

@Randal'Thor cuz if that's what it is I'll be grumpy :)

that was weird.

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