@Alconja I guess I get that, but still ... there's a difference between a puzzle being uninteresting-to-me and it being objectively uninteresting or of poor quality. Categorically downvoting all questions based solely on their genre, rather than on their individual merits or lack thereof, seems to me to be particularly bad form, and while I'd like to think the PSE community is above that sort of thing I'm seeing a depressing bit of evidence to the contrary.

It'd be llike me deciding I find the "What am I?" riddle format to be uninteresting and formulaic, and so just blanket downvoting any such puzzle on sight, just on principle. I guess there's nothing stopping someone from doing that, but it just seems so arbitrary and absurd.

@Rubio I do agree with you in general terms, and don't personally downvote things just because I don't like them (though I'm sure people do). However, it's not quite that simple... There is an argument to downvoting specific styles/genres of puzzle (assuming the given example is, at best mediocre), to try and disincentivise an influx of that type of puzzle.

I.e. as an indicator from the community that "this type of puzzle is bringing down overall site quality, and more of the same is not particularly welcome". (Of course that's only really relevant if it currently is or is likely to become an issue, which this currently is not.)

Sure; a case could be made for, say, IQ Test questions, though those are often downvote-worthy on other grounds - being overly broad, being copypasta from other sites, etc.

even so, I wouldn't just downvote them with reckless abandon Just Because.

@tpk No, I'm not joking. I'm serious - I know who MBB is.

A simple cryptic clue I wrote: "Online community Stack Exchange initially captured tech field (4)"

@Deusovi SITE

"A pen initialises cryptic answers with a spliced gene (4)"

@tpk: Stop removing your messages. You have been warned.

anyone else looking at MBB's new puzzle?

@Rubio I am. :/

weird huh?

@Rubio Yeah.

the obvious decrypt can't be the answer but i'm at a loss to find anything else sensible

@Alconja CAGE (pen=def, Cryptic Answers+GEne).

next one: "Yup, Alconja, chess fortnight finally is over (4)"

@Ankoganit PAST (yuP, AlconjA, chesS fortnighT (finally); is over=def)

hmm, VTC reasons being given as unclear what you're asking? puzzling.stackexchange.com/questions/45662/…

it's a bad puzzle of course, but it's clear as day.

@JonathanAllan I think people are using it in lieu of other alternatives

@Alconja I think you are correct, but I think it would be better and more fruitful to use "off topic because" -> "other" -> "I am voting to close this question as... it's not really a puzzle"

Over on codegolf - they close such questions as duplicate of <some other similar question>

CCCC: "Conversation shared between enchanted chariots (4)"

(PS: I've named the game "Cryptic Clue Chat Chains")

CHAT - shared(enCHAnTed CHArioTs); Conversation=def

What happens if I just decide to start another CCCC :p

could get confusing :)

you don't have to. If I'm right, I pass my question to you. I can barely solve the things, I sure can't make my own

you are right - I was just trying to figure out non-def side of "chat"; that works

@JonathanAllan Then you're breaking the rules. :) (exact punishment to be determined)

...and I know I don't have to :p

No I'm not :p

(I'm not going to do so by the way!)

Hey, it's my game! I'm taking my acronym and going home. >:(

^^

:) all good. Sounds like Rubio is effectively ending the chain, so someone else (you) can kick it off again.

ohhhhh no.

ok i'll try one

k

it's probably all kinds of not following the rules

Is my inner monologue bothering you? (7)

Is it "concern"? Def: bothering you. Not quite sure about the cryptic def, but CONscience + somthing?

nope

"Not following the rules"? Can it be split into two parts, a wordplay part and a definition part that don't interact? (The wordplay can be another definition.)

@Deusovi I believe so

Would it work as "inner monologue is bothering you"?

Yes

ok, that is much more in keeping with a normal cryptic :)

This is why I don't do cryptics. ;)

they are quite hard to write

(hence my "ohhhhh no.")

Will the logicians escape hasn't accepted my answer, but I can't find any way to improve on it. did I miss something?

@Rubio doesn't feel quite right, but is it THOUGHT? (Def: inner monologue, ...some of the letters in bothering are surrounding, and thus bothering, U)

nope.

I feel like I should just give the answer at this point, as the fault in not solving it by now is possibly mine. It seemed solvable to me though, hehe

@Rubio - have I made a mistake in my answer to the logician puzzle do you think?

looking at it right now actually :)

I sort of got where you are earlier, but I forgot to include it in my latest answer

he knows she has 6 or 8. he knows she knows he has (10 or 12) if she has 8, or (12 or 14) if she has 6, so he knows she knows he has 8, 10, or 12.

I don't think on day 4 that confines her knowledge enough to say anything.

oops. i meant 10 12 or 14

yeah (10,12) or (12,14)

so by not considering the case where it might be 10

which she has to consider, as it's actually one of the real possibilities from her perspective

you erroneously shortcut the last morning's required deduction to get to the answer

so yeah, i think your solution is wrong there.

but she knows he can't have 10 now

10+6 = 16 :p

no

she can only confine his range to 7-12.

she has 8, remember

her 8 plus his 7..12 could still be 18 or 20

if she has 8 she knows he has either 10 or 12

right

and she DOES have 8

she can't exclude 10

hmm... yeah

Um it looks like I am actually right - but I have not explained it properly (see comment)

I had it straight i my head before :/

*may actually be...

well

going into evening of day 4, Rose has the last opportunity to do better than day 5 morning when we know they'll escape

She can only use her knowledge that Mark has not answered

Mark's answer (or not) of the morning of the 4th day is limited, potentially, by two things - one, the progression of days that has confined things such that he knows Rose has between 6 and 13 bars, inclusive,

and two, whatever he can ascertain about the possibilities for her number of bars given that he has 12.

He knows he has 12 so she must have 6 or 8. neither are excluded by the other limit, 6..13.

He knows SHE knows he must have either (10,12) or (12,14), but that doesn't help him make a decsion because at the end of Day 3, that knowledge didn't help her decide (at that point, progression of non-answers led her to know his bars had to be between 5 and 14 inclusive, which rules out none of the possibilities she knows he has)

So he can't conclude yet anything about her number of bars, so he can't answer

Thus on the 4th evening, Rose has no more information than that his bars are between 7 and 12. At that point she knows 14 is not an option for his bars, but she already knew that because she knows he actually has only 10 or 12.

Oh yeah - He knows she knows he has 10, 12, or 14... She knows he knows she has 6 8 or 10.

So I think I switched them at some point

So Mark's knowledge of what bars she could have doesn't exclude any possibility until the 5th morning anyway, when he already concludes that they have 20 by the simple limiting

I sometimes wish I could downvote more than once. That answer is so wrong :p

I want to downvote the "additional note" that was added after my down vote :p

...and the fact that Overmind's rep has gone down by 2 since suggests to me that they downvoted both Rubios answer and the OPs new question since.

@Rubio alright, i give up... :(

Oh yeah I guarantee he's the schmuck who downvoted my answer. Whatever.

@Alconja So... it was: STALKER. monologue=talk, inner= __(TALK)__, bothering me=S(TALK)ER

I don't claim it was any good, but that's what I had. hehe

@JonathanAllan Someone downvoted Overmind's question, so I assume that's where the rep loss comes from.

@LukasRotter since then 2 more points have evaporated - and a downvote costs 1 point :p

(it was 169)

so they are now handing out salt votes

@JonathanAllan ? I can only see -2 on their profile (or doesn't a downvoted answer cost rep?)

@LukasRotter no it does cost 1

must be one of the three came from elsewhere then :p

@Rubio ahh. :) that's actually quite good, though it does feel like it breaks the rules, though I can't say why, since I'm new to cryptics too...

oh um downvoting questions costs nothing?

@JonathanAllan I think we're talking past eachother. I mean that Overmind's question has a downvote, which costed him 2 rep according to this

yeah a downvote on a question costs the asker 2

but we can see that both questions have a downvote

@JonathanAllan Oops, I mean answer, of course. But then I don't see how you can assume it's Overmind, wouldn't there be -4 or -5 on his profile if he also downvoted the answers/question?

CCCC: "Robot brain trapped in diminutive Asian necklace (5)"

Well, now it is -4 because his answer was downvoted again.

I downvoted a question earlier and Overmind's answer, and I only incurred negative rep from the latter.

but the first downvote of his answer took him to 169 (it was my downvote) :p

@ArbitraryKangaroo see starboard

@JonathanAllan Oh ok. I thought self-casted downvotes were also listed in the "reputation" tab of each user....

Hi

@ArbitraryKangaroo Dude for the love of God please stop deleting your comments. How many people — and how many Mods — have to tell you this for you to listen?

@ArbitraryKangaroo Still, no need to delete everything you say

I think it's a reflex he can't control. A usercript which blocks the "remove" button might be a solution.

they can

I think :P

@LukasRotter We can see the -4 from -2 * 2 answer downvotes and the +10 (answer upvote), but we cannot see the -1s from his/her cast down votes; however we can see the total rep change as and when if we happen to be looking. As far as I saw their rep went: 161, 159, 169, (168 unobserved) 167, 165. Note that this also works if you look at their full history (starts at 1, got 100 for site-wide, then +20, +40, -2, +10, -2 and now at 165, but 1+100+20+40-2+10-2=167 so 2 gone in downvote casting)

...and it looks like downvoting questions is actually free?

to the downvoter, I believe it is, yes

@ArbitraryKangaroo Maybe starring the message?

Yes, downvoting answers costs you 1, downvoting questions costs nothing. In both cases, the receiver ends up with -2.

;(

2.1: Win mod election

@Rubio - 1 bar exclusion changes everything :/

Day   Morning (Mark)            Evening (Rose)
1     [18,19]"20"               [1,2]"18"; [18,19]"20"

2     [16,17]"20"; [1,2]"18"    [3,4]"18"; [16,17]"20"

3     [14,15]"20"; [3,4]"18"    [5,6]"18"; [14,15]"20"

4     [12,13]"20"; [5,6]"18"    [7,8]"18"; [12,13]"20"

5     [10,12]"20"; [7,8]"18"    [9]"18", [11]"20"

* 0 bar exclusion, sorry

@Alconja CHAIN [AI (robot brain) trapped in CHN (diminutive for China, Asia), def=necklace]

CCCC: "However, nobody stands by the poor (11)"

NONE/THELESS = NONETHELESS

though I'm not wholly convinced by LESS for POOR

@GarethMcCaughan Whoaa, that was fast :O

Sole trader, we're told, in feet down under (5)

sorry, that should have said CCCC: Sole trader, we're told, in feet down under (5)

I'm sure it should be possible to identify MBB by stylistic analysis alone.

I expect everyone just assumed you'd be deleting the question and so didn't bother answering.

... also, did you solve the previous one? that's meant to be the precondition for setting the next one.

I can confirm that SHOES is not the intended answer.

@GarethMcCaughan FAUST (def: soul trader (sole told), in feet (in ft) down under (aus))

@Alconja right. @Arbitrary Kangaroo not a word but a name.

From an often-told legend used by (among others) Goethe, Marlow, Mann (in literature); Gounod, Berlioz, Mahler (music)

oops, Marlowe not Marlow

though given when he was I suspect he wasn't super-consistent about the spelling of his name

... ha, here's the cover page of the first ever publication of his work: upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/54/Edward2a.jpg/…

which spells it "Marlow"

sorry, not first publication of his work; just of one of his works; but the point stands

CCCC: Blasphemous tattoo overlay goes down (4)

Faust is a name. I heard that in beyblade a few years back, I think

@GarethMcCaughan so, that's your 2nd puzzle?

@Sid ho ho

@Alconja slay?

Nope.

Fall?

@Sid you have. :P ...I'll rephrase it slightly:

CCCC: Blasphemous tattoo merger is going down (4)

@tpk I don't think Alconja sohuld be answering that question.

Er, unless "you have" meant that FALL is the right answer

rather than that Sid had "fallen" by giving a wrong answer

or that Alconja misread FALL as FAIL

Lol, I did misread...

I guess I'm the fail

But no, it's still none of those answers..

@tpk why should A put up another one when no one has solved the existing one yet?

You've already got a partial clue, in that you have two phrasings, which helps (slightly) narrow which words are used how.

It's not. I read it as "fail", so I responded "you have [failed]"

@Alconja I think both clues are slightly unsound.

(because the definition part in each case would require an extra S on the end of the word)

@tpk You claimed, the last time I complained about you removing your comments, that you had stopped removing comments that were part of ongoing conversations. I would like to point out that just a few minutes ago you did exactly that.

@tpk ... or at least I think you did; actually I realise I am not certain what your (removed) comment said

@GarethMcCaughan hmmm. Re-reading, you're right...

@tpk none the less it is REALLY DAMN ANNOYING and you have been asked to stop by basically everyone you interact with, including at least one moderator.

@GarethMcCaughan Do you think it even matters anymore? Everyone from normal users to mods have said to him.

@Sid well, maybe there need to be some actual consequences

one of the mods used the words "final warning"...

@Alconja Also, I'm not convinced that "blasphemous" is quite correct ("blasphemy" would be closer).

@Alconja (note: I'm doing this more by way of offering hints than to complain at your clue, which I like)

(my own wasn't exactly a paragon of Ximenean orthodoxy -- it didn't exactly have a straight definition part)

@GarethMcCaughan then you clearly have it, because you're right again (only new to this whole cryptic thing, so I appreciate the feedback)

@Alconja yeah, I have it, but I only just played which is why I'm sitting back and waiting for someone else to get it :-)

How about: "Tattoo blasphemy, when merged, go down (4)"

wrong way round

Maybe going back to "overlay" makes that ok...?

I think either way I prefer them to be the right way round.

Especially as the construction you're using is a non-standard one in cryptic crosswords (at least I don't recall seeing it before) so it's best to be kind to solvers.

Me too, which is how i arrived at the awkward grammar in the first place :)

I can almost put it together to make a nice coherent-sounding clue but am having trouble with the last bit.

(but of course I can't explain what I'm trying to do and what trouble I'm having without giving too much away to others...)

"In decline blasphemy, perhaps, overlays scripture (4)" reads really nicely but is a little unfair because it requires a near-obsolete meaning of "scripture" and also a slightly iffy use of the word it's clueing.

Yay

@GarethMcCaughan definitely reads better, but no way I would've got it that way (still struggling a little to interpret... What does "perhaps" hint at in a cryptic?)

"perhaps" because blasphemy is an example of the thing being clued rather than a synonym for it.

Ah, gotcha

@Randal'Thor Sweet... ...but what's that do/mean?

It means we should expect an influx of answers-that-aren't-answers and poorly constructed riddles :-)

...better go post something with a click bait title and go newbie vote trawling. :)

Isn't anyone going to solve Alconja's clue? Surely there should be enough hints above now :-).

This puzzle though.. puzzling.stackexchange.com/questions/45683/… - Suggest everyone to look at the edit history...

@Sid apparently attention to detail is not a requirement in the CIA these days.

@Alconja I'm not sure exactly. I found it on the hot questions page - I guess we're today's "hot site"?

Yeah, they just give a welcome message and a "You are hired" message...

What's the answer to ALconja's clue?

@Sid since the clue before Alconja's was mine, I was deliberately not saying -- it seems against the spirit of the game for "possession" just to pass to and fro between two people -- but our discussion above has left quite a lot of hints that should make it easier to solve...

Well, pretty sure someone will solve it. :-)

@tpk No.

Hello again

Could I have the whole sentence?

If you want to type what you mean in French I can try to translate it for you too.

The end is just "won't let us go"

I'm just not sure about all those 's' at the end of each words

Though they are here in French

"These cannibal head-chopper aliens..." sounds better in English

since cannibal and head-chopper are describing the word alien

You could easily rewrite the sentence as "These aliens won't let us go."

Why not, maybe I'm over editing my puzzle

I'm going to think about it

I was just saying that since they describe aliens they aren't necessary, that doesn't mean you have to remove them completely :P

Oh, it's important for the context of the puzzle though

I'm looking at it as a sentence, not a puzzle ^^

head-chopper is not that important but I'd like them to be cannibals

Yeah, I know

That's why I just asked for pure correction :-)

Maybe "cannibalistic aliens"? :P Sounds better IMO, but I have no idea, I'm just some austrian.

That too

If you use that, I would say "These cannibalistic head-chopping aliens..."

I thought about cannibalistic too, not sure tho

Thank you two for your input anyway :-)

You know what's wonderful about being rep capped?

You can downvote idiots' answers with reckless abandon and not lose anything for it :)

If someone has a better title for my latest puzzle, I'll take it

"A letter from the Schmulrogs"

:)

@IAmInPLS Wubba lubba dub dub!

aaah i thought I had it. but then realised I was using the wrong name!

@IAmInPLS That's what I'd suggest.

@IAmInPLS "Can you save me and my friends?" sounds better to me. "Can you save my friends and me?" would also be a possibility, but sounds weird to me for some reason...

In the latter, me should be I

I think

Wait, that's allowed? Nevermind, then.

at least it sounds better

Then the title is correct.

@Sconibulus No, it's supposed to be "me" because you wouldn't say, "Can you save I?"

@Sconibulus No, it should be me regardless of where it's put. It's the object of the sentence.

ninja'd?

@dcfyj High five!

@GentlePurpleRain High Five!

@dcfyj You can't reinforce this too much... :)

Anyway Glorfindel got it so it doesn't really matter :P

English is hard :)

'my friends and me' sounds very wrong to my ear

@Sconibulus Agreed, but this particular thing is actually very consistent. Just take out the "my friends" part, and then which pronoun would you use?

When someone is the subject of the sentence (the one doing the action), you use I, he, she, they, we. When someone is the object of the sentence (the one having the action done to them), you use me, him, her, them, us.

@GentlePurpleRain you mean the object, not the subject. Otherwise I agree, of course.

I mean in your earlier comment, not the latest one which gets subject/object right

ah, you fixed it

@GarethMcCaughan What do you mean? :)

Thanks for catching that.

One ArbitraryKangaroo is enough, thanks :-)

(you're welcome)

How embarrassing! :)

clearly it should just be 'us' :) avoid all this confusion and me looking stupid

@Sconibulus Or should it be "we"? ;)

Don't confuse the poor guy

How about we change the title to 'We can't think of a correct grammatical sentence'

Or 'We cant agree on what is grammatically correct'

@Sconibulus It doesn't make you look stupid. It's a very common mistake, I think precisely because of what you said: It sounds weird to say "my friends and me".

That's because we use "My friends and I" for the actions we do :P

The key here is to think like Bender...

Ahhhhh, Save me!... and my friends, and my stuff, but mostly me.

puzzling.stackexchange.com/questions/45707/… -WHat (not) to do?

I was tempted to comment "Did they also link you to [code puzzles: what (not) to do]?" and downvote :P

@Sid That's what I said :P

Oh, sorry, I missed your comment. :)

Too many ciphers today..... First those horrible stuff earlier where the OP just gave the answers himself...

I'm not even sure about linking people to that question anymore. If the ciphertext has enough features to analyze, a "Can you crack it" puzzle might actually be valid. I don't know ;(

Even so, dumping a ciphertext and expecting someone to solve it without any clues whatsoever makes for a bad tedious puzzle.

I'm afraid this puzzle requires knowledge of D&D (because of Hint 1,3 & 4), so I'm out :D Hint 2 is also a little bit confusing, does everyone at the table have a laptop open they make a program to crack the entire ciphertext or what? (seems to be tedious when doing it by hand)

I think it's supposed to be crackable by hand

or, well, decodable by hand

Probably

Then I don't know why they even mentioned that in the hint.

As for clue 1, here you go

Kord is basically a god of fighting, and Father is probably somewhere in the plaintext

And apparently they do have laptops with them, according to OPS comment "I'm a little surprised the group, who is mostly software engineers, didn't try to do just that, but they didn't"

I have never played D&D, but wouldn't you want no one except the game master to have technology for help? :D

I've played it a couple of times, its very complicated

Actually, I have never heard of it. 'tis the first time..

Digital copies of rulebooks and stuff are pretty convenient

Character tracking can be easier potentially digitally too

I see, the footchess is back. Didn't notice it...

@Randal'Thor Surely not 100% answered...

@BmyGuest Math.round() is evil

@BmyGuest is here! Now we can ask him... Is he Mushroom Bang Boom?

Yeah, should be "Math.Trunc()" here...

@BeastlyGerbil Nope. Not my style. I like puzzles to be "usable" off-site, whenever possible. Originally I came to the site because I was looking into.... AD&D (puzzles for a DM) ;c)

I did think it couldn't be you because most of Mushroom's puzzles have been very poor..

( But I've noticed the profile picture is from one of my puzzles.)

2nd ed, that's recent :P

@BmyGuest Oh you're back, I thought that was all Beastly lol

@dcfy -->

@dcfyj are you suggesting i have conversations with myself :P

A funny question here- Express 7546 in a^b * b^a

@BeastlyGerbil Certainly a possibility, but I wasn't really paying attention to what was being said

@Sid a=7546 and b=1. Do I win?

(If a,b have to be positive integers, isn't that the only solution?)

@GarethMcCaughan very good :P

@GarethMcCaughan Of course, you do.... That was a question to me, today by my teacher. :P(The numbers were different)

Ah. The version with different numbers may be more interesting :-).

The question to me, was: "What was your Maths Marks this time around?" I answered, (Let it to be x). She then asked me to express it in the above format. :P

I have an embarrassing question for you guys: How can I calculate the angle of reflection from a point (m,n) of a given ellipse where x^2/a^2 + y^2/b^2 = 1? I guess you only have to find the tangent line, but I couldn't really understand the solution mentioned in this answer... First he says "x=m,y=n to find slope", but then the equation is (y-n)/(x-m), which doesn't make sense to me, since it would be just 0/0. Can someone help me plz?

The answer to your last question: no...

No no, x and y are any general point on the ellipse not at specific point m or n

slope of a straight line=y-y1/x-x1

Here, y1=n and x1=m

Ok thanks, that was the part that confused me. I'll tell you later if I managed to calculate the remaining parts :P (don't have time right now)

@Alenanno Ahah I thought about it while creating this puzzle!

@LukasRotter You might have better luck with that kind of question here.

@Sid How about: express 917615 as 917615^a + 917615^b

@IAmInPLS Really? lol

@GentlePurpleRain Thanks for the link! But I thankfully managed to do what I wanted already :)

The 18/20 bar castle question has gotten quite lively. People are silly, aren't they?