The Sphinx's Lair

this?

@Anonymus25 there aren't, look carefully

matt has a tilted bobble with green around the edges

user478740

OH! Are you like bobble's minion or something?

@Anonymus25 there aren't, look carefully

@Anonymus25 nope, just ... virtual acquaintance, I guess

user478740

Is it just a coincidence, or are you and bobble related or something??

12:04 AM

@Anonymus25 genealogically? not at all

user478740

Ok, solve this: The great christian symbol in letterland.(9)

user478740

@matt Ok

@Anonymus25 I have been cloned

user478740

Why

why what?

user478740

12:11 AM

you're cloned

user478740

Btw, any luck with my above riddle?

not yet

wait, riddle or CC?

cc

@Anonymus25 Uh, so the whole bobblecrown fiesta is mostly my fault

user478740

12:13 AM

@bobble Well, it's like a riddle, so here it is again: The great christian symbol in letterland.(9)

user478740

@NorthLæraðr How come?

@Anonymus25 it is a cryptic clue

um posting it again will not make us more likely to solve/try to solve

user478740

@bobble Guess cc works too

site is in read-only mode!

12:15 AM

@bobble ?

user478740

Hmmm?

Planned Maintenance - Tuesday October 13, 2020
We’ll be doing a planned failover of our SQL Servers at 12am UTC (October 13, 2020) / 8pm EDT (October 12, 2020) which will require us to go read-only for a few minutes. The disruption should be quick.

user478740

Ok

user478740

Bye

it is monday...

12:17 AM

the worst part of it being monday is it being monday

I liked how much tutoring I did today

I post a puzzle and the site goes into maintenance

What a fantastic coincidence :/

@Bubbler hm this darn comma key

Apparently Sphinx didn't have chance to pick it up either, so here it is:

1

Q: Trichain: The Capital "A"

Previous: Trichain: Going Higher Trichain is a puzzle type I invented. It is somewhat similar to Nurikabe, but it uses a chain of L-trominoes instead of a continuous wall. Example puzzle with solution: Rules: Numbers must be white, and match the size of their white islands. Each white island ...

user478740

Hmmm...

12:29 AM

(Maybe I should try out variations like dominoes and tetrominoes...)

To you music nerds

Bubbler, have you considered adding a text version of your picture grids? I usually do that for my puzzles that rely on pictures, though I'm aware that some people do not.

In the Hall of the Mountain King but it's a 6/8 latin jazz piece

►

Jeremy Dover

@Bubbler Nice trichain...anybody else have an answer yet? I just finished.

@Bubbler I'd suggest combining with a different puzzle type, though that may just be because of all the mash-ups recently

user478740

12:33 AM

Probably a crossword would be nice

@bobble I think I'll add it. Is there any preference between CSV and ASCII art grid?

user478740

@bobble Though the riley puzzles, well, ummmm... They are not popular these days, right?

user478740

@Bubbler idk

None that I know of, but I prefer CSV myself since there's a built-in way to turn it into a Google Sheets (and Google Sheets will turn itself into a CSV)

@Anonymus25 Crossword is out of my interest, unfortunately

12:35 AM

@Bubbler CSV so fancy computers can find the patterns

@bobble ah, google sheets, best thing out there

@Anonymus25 I personally don't like them so I ignored the tag and blocked it from my home page. Can't speak for anyone else.

The corporate firewall blocked Google Sheets...

@Bubbler stupid firewalls

try excel

Excel has encryption and Ctrl+CV ban

wtf why

12:39 AM

So I just use puzz.link or solve on my phone

I did solve the last nutakapa on my phone. It was doable but painful, and you know, it's hard to properly write Puzzling answers on the phone

logical-deduction grid-deduction

never tried. I don't use this site much on my phone

but then I'm not on my phone much

Sphinx

2

Q: Trichain: The Capital "A"

Previous: Trichain: Going Higher Trichain is a puzzle type I invented. It is somewhat similar to Nurikabe, but it uses a chain of L-trominoes instead of a continuous wall. Example puzzle with solution: Rules: Numbers must be white, and match the size of their white islands. Each white island ...

@Sphinx Hey, it's way too late!

user478740

12:55 AM

Am I alone? :.(

@Anonymus25 no :)

@Anonymus25 In this cold dark, abyss of space, what reality is present besides the dark, fateful embrace of death?

@NorthLæraðr spooky

It is... inevitable

baa-boow, baa-boow

1:03 AM

I AM... inevitable

@bobble wut

@NorthLæraðr I... am... IRONMAN

@NorthLæraðr the sound that baby bobblies make when they bobble

@NorthLæraðr that is the sound of the bobblecrowns approaching

ah

@bobble All that... for a drop of blood

@NorthLæraðr for a drop of puzzle

If Thanos wanted 1/2 of all living this to die, could he have been in that equation too?

1:06 AM

wated?

Geez I couldn't spell

@NorthLæraðr Yes if all living things are equal and there are even number of living things including Thanos, or Thanos == sum of all living things

been trying to think of a quote to misspell, but couldn't

In the latter case, of course Thanos would be killing every living thing except himself

will resort to other quotes

1:10 AM

oh boy

the most interesting thing would be if

Thanos sacrifices half the universe

including himself

INcluding himself

LMAO

instantly goes from tragic villain to self-sacrificial hero with misguided ideals

or misguided methods idk

And Thanos == sum of all living things gives the possibility of Thanos == the only one who is killed

user478740

Why the sudden avengers talk?

user478740

@NorthLæraðr Lmfao

1:36 AM

@Anonymus25 i do not know

user478740

2:21 AM

Ummmm

user478740

Am I alone?

user478740

Ok, here's a cc to get the conversation started again: Evil pushing a goat. (7)

2:41 AM

Hello :D

hi, 'borg!

Sorry I left for a bit, I had a piano concert

or do you have another preferred nickname?

My name is Mick so you can call me that if you want :)

Also the bobblies were too strong for me, they've taken over my profile

wait, you're using the bobble-fied picture!

awww they're so cute

2:43 AM

They've consumed me

They're draining my puzzle abilities

Send help

no

user478740

Can you bobblefy my picture?

If you ask @bobble she might bobblefy you :D

Also nice to meet you!

user478740

@Sciborg Just some regular penguins

user478740

@Sciborg You too

2:45 AM

Are you the one who posted the ice cream puzzle and a couple others a while back?

user478740

Please @bobble bobblefy my picture

user478740

@Sciborg yes

user478740

You liked it?

Awesome, I thought your penguins looked familiar :p

2:46 AM

Excellent

user478740

@bobble Nice!

@Sciborg Geez, that's terrifying

@NorthLæraðr They're slowly consuming me send help

sigh I guess it's back to the crown I go....

No, I must resist!

resists?

2:47 AM

SOLID :(

@bobble Did you inject your Bobblettes with some like addictive after linger or whatever after you remove it

@bobble Oh sidsvoydrbus whatever

user478740

There! Profile picture changed.

Imagine if everyone in Puzzling slowly had their profile pictures switched to bobbly versions

@Anonymus25 uhh...

user478740

CC incoming! Evil pushing a goat.(7)

2:50 AM

@NorthLæraðr I'm trying to parse this and am coming up with nothing

@Anonymus25 Is it 7 or 9? You said 7 initially

user478740

Oh, sorry

user478740

There

@bobble Basically, are there withdrawl symptoms that make me want to re-wear the bobblecrown after I remove it

of course

2:52 AM

Pfft what symptoms, I only get the shakes and vomit sometimes when they're away from me, that happens to everyone

I don't know if this flattering or creepy

user478740

Now I'm feelin it, the feeling of puzzling skills draining

Embrace it

user478740

But, it dosen't really hurt

Join us

2:53 AM

I don't see the change

user478740

Just a little stomach ache

user478740

Hidden...

Geez, what has the Sphinx's Lair devolved into? Memes galore and less Puzzl-y.

indeed

infinite memes

I wasn't intentionally trying to be memey I guess, I assumed it was always like this

But if this is supposed to be professional chatroom I can keep it to a minimum

2:57 AM

It's not supposed to be "professional" by any means

a lot of us, it seems, are just in high school

I mean, we're literally a site dedicated to Puzzling. ~~I'm not sure if we could get any less professional than that~~

I can try and be more on-topic for only Puzzle chatter then, I apologize if I ever derailed the chat unintentionally.

But I guess be respectful that other people use this chatroom too and would prefer it not be too overrun with... extraneous frivolities?

I mean we all joke and mess around here

Just be mindful of how far it goes, that's all. You're fine

Idk, if any mods want to comment on anything

user478740

There, it's out!

3:01 AM

I can stop side chattering, I didn't mean to annoy anybody or clutter up chat. I joined today and we were mostly goofing around to get to know each other, that's my bad for talking so much. I'll adhere better to Puzzle stuff in future

user478740

The bobble disease

user478740

@Sciborg Ok

not your traditional Slitherlink, but definitely Slytherin

@Sciborg Ah, naw you're not annoying anyone. A bit clutter-y, yes but I was just indicating for the future. We did derail a bit in the No Pickle Gang incident, and I would rather not let the bobble-fication turn that way either

It's a funny joke, but it only remains funny if it isn't exhausted out before it becomes old

@NorthLæraðr That's valid, we'll leave that meme alone for a bit. No worries.

3:04 AM

was hoping to make a new puzzle type out of the image but didn't have any particular inspiration

oh well

you can keep your bobblied image :)

basically, the double diagonal direction made it too hard to clue

:)

@Sciborg Eh, bringing it up is fine. Again, I'm just warning everyone (including myself) not to overdo it because it ruins the fun :)

@Avi This does look like an interesting image for a slither-adjacent puzzle

@NorthLæraðr You are an adorable book about a tree.

user478740

3:06 AM

@Avi Hmmmm... What do you want as clues?

@Sciborg Merci, uh, what's a gender-neutral title in French

Gentle-personne?

@NorthLæraðr That's lovely :D

"gentilhomme". That's still masculine af

gentil-personne, it is

Honestly doesn't matter to me, my pronouns are yes :p

@Anonymus25 that's the question/problem, isn't it.

3:09 AM

make a triangle slitherlink

user478740

@NorthLæraðr titre neutre Google translate says so

Oooh triangle slitherlink, has that been done before?

user478740

@Sciborg I don't think so

chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/puzzles/js/loopy.html

one of the options is triangular - those are equilateral, but same idea

Q: I'm stuck on this game of Slitherlink

Ahh, that could be an interesting direction!

Cursory search of the slitherlink tag also gives me this one, which is pentagons:

5

I'm stuck on this game of Slitherlink. What deduction (or deductions) can be made from here? Am I missing something obvious? I verified that everything I have so far is correct by looking at the solution. This is game 6x6t4:a4143b22a3a2g4d32a3a3b0a1b34b2h32a21b2a (width 6, height 6, grid type...

logical-deduction grid-deduction slitherlink

3:14 AM

@Anonymus25 That's a poor direct translation. I'm looking for a gender-neuter equivalent of monsieur/mademoiselle/madame. You don't call someone a sir or "Mr." Dear "Masculine Title"

Dear Bobble, you are an amazing FEMAELE TITLE. Dear Matt, you are an amazing MASCULINE TITLE

I've seen "Mx" being popularized, although I can't say it's definitively French

How do you pronounce that?

No idea, hence why it's probably not what we're looking for :p

Haha

It's a bit tricky that French is a strongly gendered language, there's really no common equivalent I can find

3:18 AM

I'm not French, btw. Dropped French after two years. Still like saying stuff in French though, because it make me sound... posh

@Sciborg I pronounce it "mix"

Yeah. All them gender-specific language just means more inflections and conjugations which is soooooo annoying

Like German has three

French has two

Yeah. Honestly either Monsieur or Madame works for me to be honest, so pick whichever you feel like :p

Latin had like 3 ish

@NorthLæraðr "human being"?

"person"

3:20 AM

@Avi We're specifically hunting for a French equivalent

I think gentil-personne works for "gentleperson", though I'm not sure how legal that's in French

All I know of french is that "the" is "le" and that's because of cryptic crossword clue

I like that, I don't mind if it's not strictly legal :D

Q: Given the lack of a gender-neutral pronoun in French, how should one refer to somebody of unknown gender?

17

Is there a specific rule on how you should refer to someone of unknown gender in French? For example, if you were writing a guide on how to do something and you wanted to indicate that the reader should do something, which of the below (or something else?) would it be best to write? Il doit ...

choix-de-mot genre genre-biologique pronoms

Oh, I know. I know a user in Linguistics SE that knows French (along with like three or four other languages)

I'll ask them

3:23 AM

@bobble That is an excellent thread, I'm partial to "Cher Monsieur" as a nifty construct

"Masculine until proven otherwise". Well, that's certainly something. Bobble, would you like to be called a "sir" until proven otherwise? ;P

nooooo

noooo

That's what I thought.... But French is French

~~Cher Monsieur~~

(kidding)

:p

I don't mind that one, it's kind of a portmanteau from the looks of it

Q: Selective attention: an unusual game

3:26 AM

So

I just gave this puzzle its 50th upvote

and boy did it deserve it

50

There's a park behind the local basketball courts, where I like to go for quiet time. The other day, a group of thirty people arrived with a basketball as I was sitting down. One sat next to me, introduced himself as Marcel, and said he wanted me to watch the game his friends were going to play. ...

word enigmatic-puzzle visual steganography computer-puzzle

Quick question: What does it mean to "derive" an equation?

derive, from known equations, the equation in question?

I suppose

take some know equations (F_net = ma, say) and make an equation to specifications

Okay, let me clarify. What counts as "deriving"

So plug in numbers, combine with other equations, etc.

3:27 AM

use derivation

@bobble Okay, thanks.

@Avi Oh, ~~shut up~~ thanks

you mean

~~Would you shut up man~~ Thanks.

please keep politics out of here?

@Avi That works on so many levels

I didn't even pick up on the reference there to be honest

3:29 AM

I didn't pick up until bobble mentioned that

but seriously check out that question

it's nuts

or even, bananas

Yeah that whole question is an absolute wild ride, I love it

The "BUT WAIT HOLD THE PHONE!" killed me

While we're pluggin in posts, might as well plug my own

Stiv's answers have an element of personality :)

SHucks, has to be a valid link

3:33 AM

@NorthLæraðr lol

That link, btw, is NOT my own post. Just throwing that out there

Stiv is a gem

I asked a puzzle creation question a few days ago and Stiv gave me the most beautiful, well-thought-out answer with like multiple paragraphs and all kinds of puzzler wisdom

"There are no questions tagged unsolvable. View available tags for this site."

hmmmmmmmmmmmmm

angrily makes unsolvable question

by the way @Sciborg, I have -130 from "serial voting reversed"

...i apologize. :(

logical-deduction grid-deduction

3:36 AM

6

Q: Trichain: Three Times Ten

This is a Trichain puzzle. The rules of Trichain are as follows: Numbers must be white, and match the size of their white islands. Each white island can only contain at most one number. Some white islands may have no numbers. Black squares must be part of L-trominoes. Black L-trominoes cannot b...

^ this was mine

accidentally made it unsolvable

oh well

joke's on me

@bobble I still don't get the derivative question? Perhaps a quick crash course on what you and Gareth did?

I tried for hours to make sure something like that wouldn't happen

@NorthLæraðr derivation not derivatives

@Avi Same difference

no

I know it's not but i'm tired and I'm too lazy to edit that

3:37 AM

fair

as long as you know then I'm a log and you're a tree

okay, so short proof/derivation:

You can figure out the measures of each angle

in A brief chat about inclined planes, Sep 19 at 0:04, by bobble

so yes, top angle = theta, bottom angle = 90 - theta

@bobble Eek, yikes. That's really eek

user478740

CC incoming:Take a crown, change the buzzers with pointy letters, then add a small hat.(6,3)

and then use trig to figure out F_norm in terms of F_grav

and then replace F_grav with mg

and then you done

Do you want the longer derivation?

Hm, hold on

So in the second box you would put Sum(Fy)=F_norm+F_grav?

Sorry I use slightly different annotations

3:42 AM

No?

Hold on, I'm confusing myself

in A brief chat about inclined planes, Sep 18 at 23:39, by bobble

F_norm_y + F_frict_y - F_grav_y = ma = m(0) = 0

you have to consider F_frict_y if you're using Newton's 2nd Law

bah

@NorthLæraðr F_norm is the normal force, or the force the surface pushes back against the object, in Newtons, F_grav is the gravitational force in Newtons. F = ma (force equals mass times acceleration). In the case of F_grav, a = gravity, which is 9.80 m/s^2.

I vaguely remember this stuff from physics kinda

@Anonymus25 Urm, we kind of in the middle of a conversation?

user478740

3:44 AM

Ok

Wait @bobble what is F_normy? We don't use that annotation in my class... (checks drawing in the chat)

@NorthLæraðr Normal force

The y (or vertical) component of normal force

@Sciborg No, she broke down the components of the Normal force.

3:46 AM

@NorthLæraðr my bad, I misread

in A brief chat about inclined planes, Sep 18 at 23:04, by bobble

F_normy = F_norm*cos(theta)

Oh, I see what you did

and F_normy=F_grav right?

Nooooo

bah, humbug

F_frict_y is there as well

I think I posted the equation above

3:48 AM

Gravity always points straight down at the center of the earth, while normal is perpendicular to the surface. So they wouldn't be equal on an angle

You would also have friction as Bobble says which always points against the direction of motion

Hnnnggggggg

F_norm and F_frict are perpendicular, so F_norm = F_grav cos(theta) and F_frict = F_grav sin(theta)

I label them as F_g(perpendicular) and F_g(parallel)

The "A brief chat about inclined planes" room has two separate derivations of F_norm

(the actual symbols that relate to perpendicular and parallel)

waves flag of resignation

I give up

3:55 AM

I'd really like to help. Is it just that there are too many symbols?

You can use the shorter derivation, with just 1 trig thing, that I posted above

Yes, too many symbols :P

cos(theta) = F_norm/F_grav
F_norm = F_grav * cos(theta)
F_norm = mg * cos(theta)

^^ the entirety of the short derivation

ohhh, I was looking at F_gravity(parallel)

It might be helpful to bring up SOHCAHTOA, where Sine = Opposite/Hypotenuse, Cosine = Adjacent/Hypotenuse, and Tangent = Opposite/Adjacent. So in this case, Cosine(angle) is being equated to F_norm (Adjacent) and F_grav (Hypotenuse).

That's why it wasn't making any sense

4:00 AM

F_grav_parallel = F_frict

F_grav_perpendicular = F_norm

Thanks, got it

I was just looking at the problem wrong

yayayay

:D

also, I'm out of puzzling juice

impossible

4:04 AM

I used every kind of cool deduction I could think of for tetromino minesweeper with today's release

so now I'll have to make some other kind of puzzle

@bobble statue park!

can you point me towards some good ones so I can get a feel for the kinds of possible deductions?

mellowmelon.wordpress.com/2012/03/13/puzzle-pack-2

this puzzle pack is very good! lots of interesting puzzles in here, especially the ones near the end

any easy way to transfer to Google Sheet, or am I stuck doing that manually?

no easy way that I know of - I would just solve them in an image editor personally

gmpuzzles.com/blog/category/objectplacement/statue-park has some other good puzzles

(including some minesweeper / statue park mashups!)

and I've shared a few Statue Park puzzles here myself as well! I like to think they have some interesting deductions in there

4:16 AM

current plan: solve a bunch of Statue Park puzzles, post a simple one, solve a bunch more, post some harder ones

then maybe that statue park/tetromino minesweeper mashup you were suggesting

sounds good! statue park is one of my absolute favorite genres because of how versatile it is with different shape banks

4:30 AM

I did the first one. This is cool!

user478740

Is anyone interested in continuing the cccc?

I don't think msh210's has been solved yet

user478740

Where is it?

user478740

Please link it

at the top of the starboard

the one with "An old saw..."

4:44 AM

I'm stuck on the logic of one of the statue park puzzles - I can see the solution, but I can't do formal logic to get it

show me your progress so far?

ah i got it

apparently complaining solved it

happens more often than you'd think

user478740

@Deusovi Wild guess: BRAIN?

well, it's not my clue

but also, can you explain why you think that's the answer? a guess should explain both definition and wordplay

user478740

4:56 AM

There is a blank, and then percipitation, so blank + rain. And because blank is ..., we make the last 4 letters blank, so b+rain.

user478740

=BRAIN!

that wouldn't use "part of the", or "an old saw ends like this" - it also doesn't really explain the definition

cryptic clues have a very specific set of rules for how they work, and that doesn't quite fit them

user478740

Well, then... since you hold a saw with hands, it means HAND_IN_BRAIN! PS. Hand-in-brain is a variation of chess

everything should be precisely indicated - if we need to use a specific word, either that word or a direct synonym of the word will be in the text. if we need to apply a specific transformation like "remove the last four letters", it will tell us directly to do that, and specify that it's four letters that get removed (or alternatively, specify how many letters are kept)

user478740

How bout you take a guess, Deus?

5:09 AM

I've been thinking about it, but haven't come up with anything completely plausible yet

apparently "precipitate" can also mean "very steep" - I don't see how that could be made from wordplay in the clue, but it could be something along those lines

Sphinx

5:41 AM

0

Q: Tapa-Nurikolor (Level 6)

Previous level: Massive NuriKolor (Level 5) (Red-Fury) We now have Tapa involved in the Nurikolor puzzle, and this is the 6th one (if you include a spinoff.) There are colored numbers on the grid, which indicate the number of tiles the group of its color holds. There are tiles with 1 color, whi...

grid-deduction

5:52 AM

I'm feeling like those low-quality Nurikolor puzzles are degrading the brand value of Nurikabe...

agreed

each one adds more and more convoluted elements, but the logic doesn't actually seem to be getting any more interesting - it's just harder to parse, not harder to solve or more interesting

They don't even try to check if their puzzles are uniquely solvable

yeahhh

or solvable at all

and the creator of the newest one doesn't appear to be sure that the rules they've written are correct

msh210

6:51 AM

@Deusovi More traditionally, "precipitous" means "very steep".

user478740

8:15 AM

Hello

jafe

8:27 AM

something that's part of the precipitate is a SOLID

like this is SO, and that's ended by LID which i hope we'll find out is some old word for a cutting device

(dictionary don't fail me now)

lovely surface, btw... had to google what it refers to :P

hm, doesn't seem like "lid" means anything like i'd like it to mean here

Sphinx

10:38 AM

0

Q: Nurikolor (Level 7)

Previous Level: Tapa-Nurikolor (Level 6) I saw that the last $2$ levels had a lot of flaws and were not unique. Hence this time I am giving an easy puzzle with uniqueness , with an 8x8 grid and 6 colours. There are colored numbers on the grid, which indicate the number of tiles the group of its ...

grid-deduction