A standard set of double-six dominoes has 28 tiles with 2 numbers on each side from 0 to 6. Tiles can be placed next to each other if the numbers at each end match. Can you place all the 28 tiles such that they form a loop?
A standard set of double-six dominoes has 28 tiles with 2 numbers on each side from 0 to 6. Tiles can be placed next to each other if all the touching numbers match (from all 4 adjacent sides). Can you place all the 28 tiles into a 7x8 rectangle? If this is not possible, then what is the maximum ...
Let's play a game. On the first step you place the number 1. On the $n$-th step starting from $n=2$ you place the number $n$ such that:
It is adjacent (horizontally or vertically) to one or more existing numbers, either below or to the right of them.
The sum of all adjacent numbers is a prim...
My beginning: steamy, but 2/5ths crazy - LOCOmotive
My middle, wailing, from spectres hazy - Ghosts say BOO
My end, demonic, lives in Hell - OSE is a demon that lives in Hell
My start, to there, does transport sell - You could die if you ride in a CAB
My middle, within, the original man - an ABOrigine is the original people living on a land
My end, ends, an ender of lifespan - A nOOSE can end your life
All shall fear my reflection - Flip the word, getting ESOOBAC
Its start starts matters of perplexion - ESOteric matters are perplexing
Its middle lives beyond the pale - matters that are taboo, or Out Of Bounds, are "beyond the pale"
Its end is my start's last tale - If your CAB driver has high BAC (blood alcohol content), you're dead meat
The skulls, stopping, cackle and grin: - "stopping" skulls (braking) skulls refer to brakemen, who rode in the caboose, and had an extremely high mortality rate
My start is not where I begin - "CAB" is not "LOCOMOTIVE"
My reflection is garbled and quite absurd Maybe you've guessed - it's not truly a word - ESOOBAC is not a word
My beginning runs so desperately - hinting that it comes behind a locomotive, which is true, since a caboose comes last on a train
From me why does it always flee? - same as above
My ends, each two, letters in sum - CAbooSE
Are a mystery and madness to succumb - A detective CASE is a mystery, and a head CASE has succumbed to madness
My letters are of number seven Ask for more hints and I'll send you to heaven - Seven letters, no more hints after this
it was pretty hard to make every hint relevant, rhyme, and have some acceptable meter D:
Whenever I used the word "beginning", I referred to a locomotive engine. Whenever I used the word "start", I referred to the starting characters of a word.
I want to start the creation of educational rebuses for kids, the subjects are math, physics and languages. I have never done it before and would like learn how to create rebuses in general and for a certain subject in particular. I guess there is some kind of guidlines or theory might exist. Is ...
@Alconja That’s right - you matched a surprisingly large number of the hints, though. The title is to set the theme of “terror”. You might be terrified if you are beneath a caboose, because you’d be in the process of being run over by the caboose.
As a whole, things aren't looking very bright,
Remove my rear, and something's just not right,
Remove my front, and you'll be at death's door, so crummy,
Remove my middle, and you might find me quite scummy,
What am I?
Alice and Beth both receive a random integer from 1 through 10, inclusive. They only know the number that they are given.
The two of them want to come up with an algorithm to check that their sampled numbers are indeed different, but ensure that they reveal no information about their individual...
@Avi Besides what @OmegaKrypton said, there are also the issues that (a) "bed lounge" doesn't (at least in my dialect) mean a daybed and (b) the answer is a compound word and one of its components is in the clue, which I think most setters try to avoid
@Avi I don't see how that works (even if a bed lounge is a daybed). Can you explain, please?
"Double trouble" means (1) a real nuisance and (2) a rustic dance. We could make it a Shakespeare reference: "First and fifth in line of witches are exceptionally annoying (6,6)" or something like that. (The "line of witches" is "Double, double, toil and trouble ..." from Macbeth, which I think is well enough known to be fair.)
Or maybe we can build it up as DOUBLET + ROUBLE.
A doublet is (among other things) an old kind of clothing. Perhaps the definition part could be "Really wearing" and we can make use of the double meaning of "wearing".
(I'd like something like "Really wearing old garment in Russian capital", so we also have a double meaning of "capital" for some nice misdirection, as well as the extra ambiguity that "Russian capital" could mean R, but "in" won't do.)
It could be e.g. "in front of Russian capital" but that's a bit ugly for surface reading because I don't think Moscow is really the sort of thing you can be "in front of".
I guess "approaching" will do. "Really wearing old garment when approaching Russian capital (6,6)".
I personally don't like "made" as an anagram indicator (because no one IRL uses the participle "made" alone to mean "made into something else"), but it's quite common
So, you get into a cab. The cab crashes. You die and find yourself in hell. Are you, there in hell, still in the cab? Not according to any religion or folk-religious idea I know of.
@Avi, for me it's not so much about the question. But I'm pretty new here and I'm trying to understand how misleading a riddle is allowed to be. To learn to be better at guessing them. The best riddles makes you go "why didn't I think of that?".
The idea of my riddle was to give a red herring in terms of a "terrifying" theme, which is resolved by a topical red herring in terms of "locomotive", which itself is not part of the solution, but establishes the true topic of trains
from there you go searching for all things trains, and find the solution
but I'll admit it was more of a puzzler than a clever riddle
Yes. I don't want to sound obsessed... It's just when you mention "Hell" in one line and in the next line says that "My start, to there, does transport sell" it sounds to me like "the start sells transport to Hell".
Another image sequence puzzle inspired by @Conifers, enjoy ;D
Colorblind-friendly version
Clarification: one or more tag(s) has been deliberately omitted to enhance the difficulty.
Hints
usefulness level 1
usefulness level 2
> "The prophecies differ," said Aziraphale, sliding into the passenger seat. "Certainly until the end of the century, although we may expect certain phenomena before then. Most of the prophets of the past millennium were more concerned with scansion than accuracy." Crowley pointed to the ignition key. It turned. "What?" he said. "You know," said the angel helpfully, " 'And thee Worlde Unto An Ende Shall Come, in tumpty-tumpty-tumpty One.' Or Two, or Three, or whatever. There aren't many good rhymes for Six, so
in a CC, are double layers of meaning allowed? For example, "squished components" -> "added parts" -> "sum"
the mayan proclamation doomed the world to damnation yet fear unfounded plentiful abounded for the year we know was twice too slow counting to doomsday's date till thirty-one twenty-four we must wait
fair enough, plus I keep on forgetting letter count when I come up with something clever ;-;
@OmegaKrypton For multi-word things like "pool table", does the definition for a CCCC have to match exactly, or can it be vague like "table", "game table", or "ball table"?
that's the crux of a CC - two ways of leading to the same point. The difference is that "ventilate farmlands" isn't a definition of airfields, whereas "plane lands" is
@Dmihawk I get the general idea (and have read the answer about CCs). Still I sometimes have problems understanding the specific examples. Is @Avi's latest CC a "double definition"?
@Dmihawk, i don't know if you're a native English speaker, but when you're not it's confusing with words that have several meanings. Sometimes it's the same as in English and sometimes it's different. So I'm often going in the wrong direction because the translated English word has another meaning in Danish.
yes, I'm a native speaker, at you have my utmost respect for tackling language-based puzzles in your non-native language. That being said, I still struggle with even simple CC's at times and you have to relish the little "aha" moments to get you through the frustrating times of going down the wrong path or having no idea how to make progress
the great thing is that PSE is a wonderfully supportive community and full of some incredibly talented puzzle-solvers who are always happy to provide advice, help and desperately-needed hints :)
If you're keen to learn to solve CC's, I'd highly recommend joining OK's home chat room, we generally try to keep the difficulty at an easier level and discuss how the solutions came about
is "valiants" a word? I feel like it should indicate multiple people who are valiant, but I'm not entirely sure that it exists, because dictionaries don't seem to have it?
oh wait, "valiant" is a noun for those who are valiant, so it is a word.
Good question. So far I've only seen examples where the word changes its meaning before being beheaded. So "headless orange" could become (-f)RUIT or something like that.
I found this note the other day...
Captured confidante without it returning (6)
Capricious committee is accommodating after rats return (4, 7)
Fearful leaders removed fractions nearby (6)
Precious drink messed up hearing aid (7)
Blind tiger talk; naive (9)
Dark times, clothing sound...
As a whole, things aren't looking very bright,
Remove my rear, and something's just not right,
Remove my front, and you'll be at death's door, so crummy,
Remove my middle, and you might find me quite scummy,
What am I?
A puzzle for those who does not know ASL. The answer is a phrase.
Source: https://youtu.be/gFIRSrbHrB4
Alice and Beth both receive a random integer from 1 through 10, inclusive. They only know the number that they are given.
The two of them want to come up with an algorithm to check that their sampled numbers are indeed different, but ensure that they reveal no information about their individual...
Another image sequence puzzle inspired by @Conifers, enjoy ;D
Colorblind-friendly version
Clarification: one or more tag(s) has been deliberately omitted to enhance the difficulty.
Hints
usefulness level 1
usefulness level 2
I found this note the other day...
Captured confidante without it returning (6)
Capricious committee is accommodating after rats return (4, 7)
Fearful leaders removed fractions nearby (6)
Precious drink messed up hearing aid (7)
Blind tiger talk; naive (9)
Dark times, clothing sound...
This is a puzzle, you don't need to look far for the answer.
Cryptic hint #1:
Non-Cryptic #1:
Hint #2:
Hint #3 (almost a giveaway)
