The Sphinx's Lair

Q: What a tangled web we weave

3:28 AM

0

The answer is a relevant word.

word enigmatic-puzzle visual

Anonymus 25

4:22 AM

#Legend (6)

SYMBOL ddef

^^^^^^Legal or not?

4:38 AM

The hash mark is an example of a symbol, so it needs some indication.

4:48 AM

Also, how is legend = symbol? A legend explains the symbols in a map, but is isn't a symbol itself.

5:50 AM

maybe "is engaged in room service" could be something like EATS IN?

It's 'room service', in quotation marks, wink, wink. That doesn't sound like eating in to me.

Your suggestion that Garibaldi is missing a rib s ingenious, but I suspect it's just GI. If it's really G(a rib)ALDI, "engage" might be an anagram indicator.

6:09 AM

is a "boneless garibaldi" a thing? if not, seems weird to use a word like that for content removal when any of the standard ones would fit just as well... whereas if it's removing RIB or ULNA or something it would make more sense

or, you know, the letters BONE

Yeah, that's a weird phrase. RIb seems like a good candidate. ASR worried about too much indiraction, so Garibaldi might be something else. GIUSEPPE? BISCUIT? No idea. And if "Canary Island fare" is the def, what does "cover" refer to? I suppose it's a position indicator, not LID or CAP or so.

Perhaps Canary Island is just CI. The names of individual islands are too long, except maybe GOMERA.

6:27 AM

(the obvious choice for content removal would obv have been "on vacation" which fits both the surface and the recent c4 theme)

I somehow don't imagine Garibaldi "on vacation".

geometry optimization dissection construction

7:08 AM

0

Q: Clash of the Robinsons

"Ridiculous!" you think "What can be the odds? Either I'm hallucinating or the amateur writing this story plunged to new depths of incompetence." Both being equally likely you don't bother finding out which but just accept that after drifting aimlessly in the ocean on a makeshift float for days y...

Q: Egg drop problem for infinite floors

12:50 PM

0

This is a modification of the infamous egg drop problem, which I have seen formulated as in the following manner: Given $e$ eggs and a building of $f$ floors, how can we find the lowest floor at which the egg drops in the minimum number of throws? Given $e$ eggs and $t$ allowed throws, what is t...

mathematics strategy optimization

1:02 PM

Gonna undelete my maze for a moment so I can grab the inner contents for reshaping.

2:51 PM

@Sphinx reworked this puzzle for clarity purposes.

Chris Cudmore

3:47 PM

@TacoタコスI still don't see how I get to the exit.

Q: Alright, I've had enough learning greek. Let's move on to english!

4:06 PM

0

Another cipher. But it isn't about greek or unicode. The story One day, Fred woke up, got dressed, took a shower, ate breakfast, then headed off for work at a software design software. He sat down on his chair and booted up his computer, to see that all the files were gone. Hundreds of popups pop...

cipher

4:20 PM

C4 HINT: The entry in Merriam-Webster, for the the word sweetheart clues, says next to it "chiefly Scotland"

Q: What comes next in this sequence? 2, 3, 1, 5, 7, …

0

Here's a sequence I can't solve. It includes every number from 1-14, does not include 15 and 16, and then has a 17. I think there may be a pattern in natural number progression but can't find it. What comes next? 2, 3, 1, 5, 7, 4, 11, 6, 8, 9, 13, 10, 17, 12, 14

number-sequence sequence

4:57 PM

@ChrisCudmore you have to get to the center of the maze using the portals, or is there something more specific that I can clarify?

Chris Cudmore

If I have a 2 digit number, I teleport to '2'. What number teleports me to the the 花?

The equation in the post must evaluate to 9 based on the number of turns you take while traversing the maze, up to your final portal, along with the one digit number you’re left with after transformation in region 1.

I’m a little upset that I left a loophole. 😢

@Deusovi or @GarethMcCaughan; I left a loophole in my puzzle. Should I politely explain this to the answer that exposed it and award a bounty for their efforts, while closing the loophole in an edit, or should I accept the answer, and create a new post that closes the loophole?

Chris Cudmore

Ok, I think I understand.
I must FIRST get to region 1.
Then I must enter a portal with DELTA=9 and that will teleport me to the 花.
Clarification: Key value is irrelevant at this point as the sum of one digit is the digit itself, so there is no transformation of the key.

Correction: Key is not irrelevant, but it still doesn't transform.

7:11 PM

So the sweetheart might be JO, which would fit with "rojo" or "mojo" that could appear in Canary Island fare.

Avi

Do we have moderator elections for puzzling anytime soon?

Does anyone have an opinion as to what might be wrong with my maze puzzle? Outside of the simplistic answer permitted by a loophole I failed to account for? I put a lot of effort into it so I'd like to improve it and salvage it if possible.

Since the existing answer technically solves the problem at hand, and uses sound logic to arrive at the answer:

The neat thing about the puzzle (which should've been exposed if the loophole didn't exist) is that every sixth value for T will work which means T must be an odd number; but only single digit factors of T will work for N.

The intended solution would've identified this, and would've been able to note that 9 is the minimum number of turns the puzzle permits, and that the final value for N should be a factor of 9; so 1, 3, and 9 will work.

From there, it's a matter of building the starting number.

However, since it was solved by starting with 1; it's not as satisfying and doesn't do the puzzle justice.

Gareth McCaughan

8:19 PM

It's painful and difficult to deal with the situation where a puzzle has an unintended much-too-easy solution. I think the received wisdom is that you should give the glorious green checkmark to the person who solved the puzzle you actually posted, and then -- if you think it's worth it -- make another version that fixes the loophole and hope that it attracts a more interesting solution.

@AncientSwordRage So I think this is MOJO ROJO, but I can't wrap up the wordplay. There's ROOM* "service" and the Scottisch sweetheart JO. That would leave another JO as the boneless Garibaldi, which I can't make heads or fail of.

@GarethMcCaughan sounds fair; that's what I'll go with then.

8:34 PM

@MOehm make sure your room is serviced correctly

Amoz

@Tacoタコス I think the part about it being a "miserable experience" may have rung too true? ; ) This is partly my own shortcoming, but I've read through the instructions many times and don't understand the puzzle at all. It seems to me a bit over complicated.

It starts out clear, and then all the sudden there is a complicated Key to Freedom which is okay, but then we get into a complex equation which "must be true to escape" and multiple factors and portal rules to consider and variables to keep track of; I'm sorry but for my part by that point I'm totally lost. Maybe less rules is my vote. While still ensuring there is an elegant solution, short of random guessing or a computer solver.

That's fair :)

It helps getting feedback because I can tailor future puzzles around it.

Deusovi

agreed that it seemed very complicated - even if i did fully understand the rules, the fact that there were four(?) separate variables to keep track of made it seem like simply moving through the maze randomly would be a chore

and the explanation was unclear too: for instance, "To succeed in escaping the maze, the following equation must be true with respect to the image (e.g. Δ=9)"

it reads as if Δ was defined elsewhere, and the goal is to make both sides of the equation true... but that's not the actual meaning at all! "e.g." means "as an example", and that wasn't an example of anything -- it was the *requirement* for the value of Δ, not just an example of one way the equation should be satisfied

Amoz

You're making my head hurt : )

Deusovi

the actual condition is "Your escape is dependent on the value of Δ, defined as follows: [...] You can only escape if Δ=9."
not
"Here's an equation involving Δ. (Δ might be the number 9, for example.) [...] You can only escape if this equation is true."

8:50 PM

I admit I had trouble phrasing that; the original release was even worse.

Thank you for the feedback!

Ultimately, the goal was to solve each piece individually in a way that ultimately worked together, but the packaging over complicated it to be fair.

I'm going to try to strip out the story aspect and the maze element to get it to the bare bones mathematical relationship I was trying to expose, but I fear the result may be too simple at that point

In the long run, I've gotta work on simplifying my puzzles.

9:17 PM

@Tacoタコス the line between too easy and two hard is sometimes razer thin

Don't let yourself get cut

9:35 PM

How does this read:

> Find the relationship between t and r, along with the properties of each, that ensures Δ=9.

msh210

@MOehm Garibaldi's first name was Giuseppe, which would be Joseph in English. Maybe Jo for short? But that doesn't explain the "boneless", unless it somehow means to take a hypothetical English nickname in lieu of the actual name.

0

Q: An unusual subtraction

I saw this note jotted on a piece of paper on my friend's table. Jickpom 1–0 Ecarombhp ½–½ Khalerop 0–1 What did he mean by it?

enigmatic-puzzle

9:56 PM

@msh210 that's the wrong Garibaldi

10:08 PM

there's a joseph garibaldi, but i don't see how boneless would remove the "seph"...

mathematics logical-deduction number-property

1

Q: A dance between numbers

Given the following equation: $$\Delta = \Biggl(\frac{t \mod 6}{(t \mod r) + 1}\Biggr)^2$$ Find the relationship between $t$ and $r$, along with the properties of each, that ensures $\Delta = 9$. For clarity, the correct answer is not looking for values that ensure $\Delta = 9$, but rather an exp...

when you finally have the chance to go back into meta to see Emrakul's goodbye...

msh210

If you fillet a garibaldi fish, then it's boneless. If you then name it Jo....

10:59 PM

2 hours ago, by AncientSwordRage

@MOehm make sure your room is serviced correctly

maybe it's M(OJ)ORO*+JO instead of MO(JO)RO*+JO

not sure why boneless garibaldi would be OJ either though

maybe it was the room service who brought the OJ and the garibaldi was just there to throw us off

ah no wait a garibaldi is a cocktail containing orange juice

so a boneless garibaldi is just the OJ?

that 200 rep bounty... i want that...

@Jafe YES! 😃

liquor.com/recipes/garibaldi

was that unfair?

I wasn't sure if that part was too easy or too hard or just unfair when I wrote it

11:07 PM

i don't quite understand the boneless part tbh... is that another term for a "virgin" cocktail?

in any case i think MOehm should go next since he did the lion's share of the solve

@Jafe yes

interesting, TIL

I don't drink, so I assumed it was a fairly well known term 🤷🏻‍♂️

in that case i think boneless garibaldi = OJ is fine

For this question, the only strategy I can think of is a one with the rubix cubes: take a preserved words on the side and turn the wheels on the other side, then put it back. hmmmmmmmmm, interesting.

i really need code for that question.

11:17 PM

i didn't know the term garibaldi either btw... i've heard of a "campari orange", although i'm not sure if that's the same or different