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I'm somekindofguy, and my nerdy thing is solving puzzles. I love puzzles so much, that I started a thread because I want to hear about your favorite puzzles. Tell me about Wordle and its many variants, your favorite crosswords and sudoku, your favorite physical puzzles and old chestnuts. Hell, even if you just liked one clue in one puzzle, tell us about it! Let's chase those A-HA moments together. I do have one request for this thread: Please spoiler your solutions to puzzles as to give people a chance to solve them first. As for me, I can classify my favorites into three broad types: *WORD PUZZLES, like crosswords and cryptics, where your knowledge of language and wordplay is your best friend. Classic sources include the New York Times (https://www.nytimes.com/crosswords) and USA Today (https://puzzles.usatoday.com/), though there is a thriving scene of independent crossword makers on the zeitgeist of cluing and fun entries. *LOGIC PUZZLES, much like Sudoku. Again, a whole ecosystem of blogs exists for Sudoku and pencil and paper puzzles like them. One of my go-to sites is Grandmaster Puzzles (https://www.gmpuzzles.com/blog/), where top puzzle makers from around the world post six days a week (Monday is easiest, Saturday is hardest). *PUZZLE HUNT PUZZLES*, or the "I like pain" type. These tend to overlap with the types mentioned above, but the trick is you aren't given explicit instructions on what to do. The answers to these puzzles are often words or phrases, which can often be combined into larger metapuzzles. The granddaddy is the MIT Mystery Hunt (http://puzzles.mit.edu/), an event put on every year in Boston (or online, as is the case with 2021 and 2022). Smaller puzzle hunts have been put on throughout the year by different teams though, as indicated on Puzzle Hunt Calendar (http://puzzlehuntcalendar.com/). I can go into more detail on these types if people want, but let's leave it there for now. Enjoy!
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Mar 5, 2022 10:51
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I like this sudoku app.
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Mar 6, 2022 15:16
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somekindofguy posted:Tell me about Wordle and its many variants I fuckin love word games, so Wordle coming around was a nice way to have a quick little one to do every morning and chat about with discord friends. My favorite variant is Squardle, which does a crisscross pattern of six words that you work through sequentially. It took a while to get into because it's a *much* busier interface with a whole bunch of different indicators for the letters you've guessed relative to the hidden words. But once it clicks, it's very fun, and a much more involved game than the original.
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Mar 10, 2022 17:34
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I highly recommend the youtube channel Cracking the Cryptic. It's two middle-class English guys (and puzzle champs) doing mostly Sudoku-based variants, and they always have a link to an online version of the puzzle so you can play along. I like to try the puzzle myself, and then if I get stuck I can play the video to get me past the hurdle. They're absolutely charming to watch (many people comment that they find it relaxing). And Simon in particular goes to great lengths to explain how he comes to his conclusions, so it's a good resource to learn techniques. They complete most of the puzzles within 30 mins - 1 hr but I typically take many times longer. They also sporadically do puzzle-based video games; there's a multi-part series where Simon plays The Witness, going in completely blind. And it's bonkers how quickly he grasps the puzzles and works out solutions. The other host, Mark, sometimes does "GAS" (Generally-Approachable Sudoku) puzzles where he basically speed-runs 5 sudoku variants as fast as he can. He typically gets each done in ~3 mins, while I'm still taking 10-20 mins on the same. A good taster is Simon taking on The Miracle Sudoku. 25 mins long, but a really stunning puzzle design.
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Mar 10, 2022 19:26
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minato posted:I highly recommend the youtube channel Cracking the Cryptic. It's two middle-class English guys (and puzzle champs) doing mostly Sudoku-based variants, and they always have a link to an online version of the puzzle so you can play along. I like to try the puzzle myself, and then if I get stuck I can play the video to get me past the hurdle. I was about to make such a post but now I'm just agreeing with yours. Simon is great. Mark is good.
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Mar 10, 2022 19:28
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As an extension to Cracking the Cryptic, the founder of Grandmaster Puzzles and World Sudoku Champ Thomas Snyder has a channel where he breaks down the daily puzzles on his site. It is intersting to see him work through tougher steps, though the videos are likely less of a blind solve than Simon and Mark do. In addition, there is Unshackling Sudokus and Puzzles, run by two Indian constructors and solvers. They tend to cover a wider variety of logic puzzles than Sudoku, but they seem to tackle them in an interesting way as well. In hunt puzzle news, an indie constructor named Jack Lance should be releasing his annual Pi Day Hunt on the 14th, and his puzzles tend to bend the envelope in terms of what you can do with the form. I would recommend Pi Hunt 4 and Pi Hunt 5 if you want peak Jack.
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Mar 11, 2022 01:51
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Hope this fits into the general aesthetic of the thread. I was given this by my in-laws for Christmas either because they want to see me suffer...or they want to see me really suffer. Found on facebook, naturally... It's a create your own date puzzle. Cute wooden block, with some standard (and non-standard) Tetris style pieces.  Each day purportedly has it's own unique answer When it works, it looks quite pretty  When it works but you have to turn some of the pieces round, it looks slightly less appealing.  And sometimes, if I'm super tired, or just over trying to fit pieces in, I admit defeat and become a massive cheat.  I'm having a ton of fun trying to sort these dates out - and some are significantly easier than others, but there has to be a way of automating this - some sort of program that can be created whereby the dates entered, and it spits out the correct answer for the day...
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Mar 14, 2022 11:38
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Red is Dead posted:
That is pretty neat, I haven't seen one like that before. Yeah, a little more polish would be nice with the reversed pieces, but otherwise it's a cool idea.
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Mar 14, 2022 14:48
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Are you sure that there isn't a solution without flipping the pieces?
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Mar 14, 2022 15:48
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cant cook creole bream posted:Are you sure that there isn't a solution without flipping the pieces? Not 100%, no. I did have a date where I had the small L reversed and found the proper way about ten minutes after… Logically it should be possible though, right?
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Mar 14, 2022 18:48
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Red is Dead posted:Not 100%, no. Is there a 2021 version with different pieces? Perhaps there's some mathematical optimization I'm not aware of. IE, I'm not seeing a proof that it's solvable for all dates. (Additional observation that it likely admits excesses such as Monday, February 31, and so forth, so it's probably under-constrained.)
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Mar 20, 2022 15:12
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I do the jumble
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Mar 20, 2022 17:09
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PhantomOfTheCopier posted:Given that a single month and single day of week are required, the number of placements can be reduced quite a bit. Otherwise it looks like a brute force search, and it's probably just easier to go through all the combinations and record the valid results. I’m brute forcing every date. I do go back and check on previous weeks (Twitter uploads) to see if placements can be copied week on week. I assume every option is possible and I’m getting quicker at realising which pieces CAN’T go in a certain place…
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Mar 20, 2022 22:13
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Red is Dead posted:I’m brute forcing every date. I do go back and check on previous weeks (Twitter uploads) to see if placements can be copied week on week. When I permit piece mirror images (flipped pieces) every day in February works... except the 21st and 28th for some reason. January has all 1--31 though. It's always possible I got a piece size wrong somewhere.
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Mar 21, 2022 06:51
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I like to do the LA Times crossword. It's a bit more challenging than the US Today crossword. But unlike the NYT, you don't have to pay for it. The New Yorker Crossword is my favorite, but it's only three times a week. Consistently hits the sweet spot of obscure trivia you can figure out from the crosses and some genuinely clever cluing.
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Mar 21, 2022 23:18
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AKA Pseudonym posted:I like to do the LA Times crossword. It's a bit more challenging than the US Today crossword. But unlike the NYT, you don't have to pay for it. LA Times is my go-to, it's kind of surprising that it's free every day. It's easy early in the week but hits its stride later on, and the Sunday ones are great. I haven't tried the New Yorker, I'll check that one out.
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Mar 21, 2022 23:25
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538.com's The Riddler series is the best for serious math nerd puzzles. https://fivethirtyeight.com/tag/the-riddler/ Every Friday they release two puzzles and the answers to last week's puzzles. I think in all the time I've followed 538 I've solved a total of one. They are very hard. Here's a random day I picked: quote:You are the coach at Riddler Fencing Academy, where your three students are squaring off against a neighboring squad. Each of your students has a different probability of winning any given point in a match. The strongest fencer has a 75 percent chance of winning each point. The weakest has only a 25 percent chance of winning each point. The remaining fencer has a 50 percent probability of winning each point. quote:From Michael Fienberg comes a tower of not so much terror: For that same day, here's the solution to the previous Friday's: quote:Putting this all together, the surface-area-to-volume ratio was (6−(3−√3)x2/2)/(1−x3/6). BigHead has a new favorite as of 01:31 on Mar 22, 2022 |
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Mar 22, 2022 01:28
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The Riddler is fun. I actually submitted a puzzle and got it in.
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Mar 22, 2022 02:21
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Lots of good sources for puzzles, thanks for sharing everyone! Recently, Ive been toying with Jack Lance's PI Hunt 8, which is...a giant jigsaw wrapped in a sharable program state. There's quite a bit more to it, but I'll leave you to experience it yourself. I've also been playing with Foggy Brume's latest edition of Puzzles and Answers magazine, or P&A for short. It's $12 for a digital issue, but you get a bunch of standard puzzles and an "extravaganza" of 12 to 17 hunt-style puzzles where the individual answers tie into a punny final answer. Foggy also releases a team extravaganza of 100+ puzzles each year called Puzzle Boat, and they're usually pretty fun. On the less insane side of the brain, there's Patrick Berry's puzzle suites, a series of variety puzzles leading to final answers. Patrick is a killer constructor, and knows how to make an entertaining challenge, and I can heartily recommend any of them. If anyone has any questions about these sets, let me know and I can try to answer them. Also, we stickied boys 
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Mar 23, 2022 05:29
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Mid-way through the first lockdown I decided to start streaming cryptic crosswords on twitch as a sort of desperate grab for human contact. I've been doing it every weekday lunchtime for nearly two years now (Christ!), and my love/hate relationship with cryptics hasn't changed. I was initially drawn to them because I like puns and wordplay. I think there's something really fun about playing about with meaning and subverting expectations. Cryptic crosswords are like that, but turned up to eleven and written by and for bastards. If you've not seen a cryptic crossword, they're like normal crossword, but set by a smug leather armchair from a gentleman's club in the 1800s. Regular crosswords have clues where the whole clue is the definition, like "Seats around a table (6)" for chairs, while cryptic crossword clues are dicks. Generally* the first or last part of the clue is the definition, and the rest of the clue is stuff you need to gently caress around with to get there. While the clue may look like a sentence, it's actually a stupid series of codes and instructions, and you need to train yourself to stop reading things like a human being, and pretend to live in a magical place where the concept of meaning is entirely fluid. One of the easiest traps to fall into is to read the clue like a sentence. Don't do that! Mush words together. Ignore punctuation! (Or, do do that, because this time it's an extended cryptic definition, or the punctuation is actually a vital part of the clue). You see the word flower in a clue? Bet you thought of a plant, didn't you? Like a rose or a daisy. You idiot. You stupid piece of poo poo. It actually means river. You know. Something that flows. A flower. gently caress you. Unless it doesn't. Unless it means flower. In which case also gently caress you. Supply? Like in economics? NO. That's an anagram indicator. You know. "In a supple way". You know what else is an anagram indicator? Everything. As of this point in this post, I've typed at least sixteen things that could be considered an anagram indicator in a cryptic crossword clue. See if you can find them! It might be fun! (It won't be.) Sailor? That means "tar". Or maybe "AB". Or maybe "AS". Or maybe a hundred other things. I hope you like Bridge, fucko, because you sure need to know poo poo about that. Church? CH! Because of the Ordnance Survey maps! Or maybe RC, because Roman Catholic. Or maybe COE, because Church of England. WE'RE NOT DONE YET. Work is OP. Sex is IT. Posh is U. Why? Because gently caress you that's why. (Incidentally, "Y" could mean "unknown", like Variables. X & Y). Broadcast could well be an anagram clue, but it could also indicate a homophone. You know, like how heir and air sound the same. Also "air" could be a homophone indicator, because when you broadcast something you air it. So could "picked up", "heard", or "announced". "Reverend" could be an instruction to swap the first letters of two words around, because of this guy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Archibald_Spooner Here. Have a huge bastard of a list of things that could be an abbreviation. Or could be something else entirely: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crossword_abbreviations "Presides over church with certain appearances (6)" that's right it's "CHAIRS", MOTHERFUCKER. "Presides over" is the definition, "Church" gives "ch" and "certain appearances" gives "airs", as in "airs and graces" "Remember what, until her rude awakening, Goldilocks didn't have?(4,2,4)" was a clue in the Guardian cryptic a while ago that made me genuinely angry. I mean, i love it, and think it's really clever, but at the same time OH MY GOD. Answer: It's a double definition. "Remember" and "what, until her rude awakening, Goldilocks didn't have?". "Bear in mind" I love it. I hate it. I love it. Question marks? Indicate even more fuckery-boutery. Exclamation marks? Maybe it's a pun. Or the setter is feeling extra smug about it. Sometimes, part of the clue is in the god drat answer itself. When I solve them, I genuinely exist in a state where I'm both impressed by the cleverness of the setter, but also hate their goddamn guts. It's great fun. Want to know more? FifteenSquared is a good resource for people who want to get more into cryptics: it's a blog where they break down puzzles from that day's papers, and explain how they work: https://www.fifteensquared.net/ Also, as I said, I stream myself solving them at 1pm UK time most weekdays. It's more fun that it sounds (and I swear I'm less insufferable than this post makes out), so if you want to join me and a lovely and diverse audience of 60 or so people (turns out a whole lot of queer folk enjoy watching a man solve a cryptic crossword. Who knew?), you can do so here: https://twitch.tv/brainmage https://twitch.tv/brainmage *except, of course, for when it's not Flint_Paper has a new favorite as of 16:00 on Mar 23, 2022 |
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Mar 23, 2022 13:53
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I'm sure most of you are familiar with or at least heard of Picross, which is a logic based puzzle where you have to determine a grid of squares based off of clues that tell you the length and order of contiguous blocks in the rows and columns. However, I was introduced to this in the mid oughts by stumbling across conceptis' version called 'pic a pix' which is like the picross you'd get on nintendo consoles but on steroids. TBH I've always been unsatisfied with the limited size of the Picross series on the switch and 3DS, since you can get puzzles of 100x100 or more from Conceptis lol. https://www.conceptispuzzles.com/index.aspx?uri=puzzle/pic-a-pix Also holy poo poo their website has not changed since I first saw it. They also have some other fun picture puzzle varieties as well that I'd recommend. E: ^^^^ Chairs is also a verb that means to preside! Watermelon Daiquiri has a new favorite as of 15:15 on Mar 23, 2022 |
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Mar 23, 2022 15:11
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God dammit. A great big effortpost and I manage to write the wrong answer to my own drat clue.
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Mar 23, 2022 16:00
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I loving love cryptics and need to get more, even though my solving process for them is "stare at, knock out a couple of clues, put down, repeat several hours later until puzzle is solved or (far more likely) abandoned"
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Mar 24, 2022 00:01
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Well if you like hunting types of games, there's always https://www.penguinwatch.org/ after you've had enough sudoku for a few weeks.
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Mar 24, 2022 01:22
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Flint_Paper posted:God dammit. A great big effortpost and I manage to write the wrong answer to my own drat clue.  I enjoyed the writeup, I like it when crossword clues start to get clever along those lines but the full version sounds like it might be a bit much for me. I'll check some out, though, the general idea is great.
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Mar 24, 2022 01:30
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In 2020 I was sad that I couldn't do my annual jigsaw puzzle (printed from my own outdoor photos, 1000 pieces double sided), because my table had stupid work gear on it, so I made my own generalization (up to around 80 pieces): Last year was sliding tile puzzles (up to around 40 tiles):  If anyone is interested I can turn the cloudy thing back on. Otherwise I do a tonne adhoc. Most recently I was playing Beleaguered Castle quite a bit. A couple years ago I constructed gameplay for "Poker Tournament Solitaire" ( yeah you read that right). I'll drop a few basic mazes but I'm very interested in higher order complexity so I'll need to find a place to host some of the fractal dimensional mazes. Guess I need to figure out which blogs are worth it in 2022. PhantomOfTheCopier has a new favorite as of 05:02 on Mar 24, 2022 |
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Mar 24, 2022 01:53
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Antivehicular posted:I loving love cryptics and need to get more, even though my solving process for them is "stare at, knock out a couple of clues, put down, repeat several hours later until puzzle is solved or (far more likely) abandoned" This is my experience with cryptics as well. I got into them after seeing a few in the Sunday NYT insert. I'm mainly a crossword player, playing the hard ones for fun. Ironically enough I take the Monday most seriously, as my goal is to get a sub-4:00 some day. My best time is 4:29. But cryptics are amazing. When you really figure one out, ah, it's the smartest I feel all week. Have any of you ever considered building crosswords? It's a puzzle in itself, really. I've built a few but never got one accepted at NYT. Someday, maybe 
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Mar 24, 2022 13:55
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sephiRoth IRA posted:Have any of you ever considered building crosswords? It's a puzzle in itself, really. I've built a few but never got one accepted at NYT. Someday, maybe I would like to know more about this.
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Mar 24, 2022 15:23
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I made a videogame-themed cryptic crossword, and a greek myths one, but both need to be revisited to get them anywhere near up to snuff. My favourite from the videogame one was Transubstantiation! (4,6) Which is, of course, Mass Effect
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Mar 24, 2022 16:42
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Captain Hygiene posted:I would like to know more about this. Making crosswords is fun! There's actually a pretty neat series the NYT put out on how to create crossword puzzles. I've also linked a specific article on tools which I found was helpful. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/14/crosswords/how-to-make-a-crossword-puzzle-the-series.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/11/crosswords/how-to-make-crossword-puzzle-grid.html?action=click&module=RelatedLinks&pgtype=Article -> we'll cover tools in a minute Initial caveat: I'm just some dummy, there are probably people here much more successful that just don't happen to be in the thread atm. This is my process, it's probably suboptimal 1. Starting your crossword I generally start my process by thinking up stupid puns. The goal being to come up with a theme, not necessarily for the puzzle as a whole but just for the major clues across the board. Wordplay is frequently involved, but it's not that way for every crossword, obviously. I just like coming up with wordplay puzzles for the major clues. For example, on a recent puzzle I decided I wanted to explore spoonerisms. Here is the key clue that gives a hint to my starred or theme clues: A certain slip of the tongue... or a hint to 19-, 31-, and 41- across? (10) SPOONERISM I came up with three clues that would serve as my wordplay clues: A crazy person.. or a funereal foundation? (10) - CASKETBASE Tend the front lawn... or increase the vicar's headcount? (11) - GROWTHEMASS Use the plumbing... or rock the castle? (11) - SHAKEATOWER Notice that I had to balance my clue numbers - two clues with 11 letters, and one with 10 to offset my key clue. 2. Building the grid Once I had the basic theme, it was time to start building the grid. There's a lot of different ways to construct grids, but my favorite tool for actually building the final product is a free online applet called Phil : http://www.keiranking.com/apps/phil/. In terms of ease of construction, phil is awesome - it can even export in proper formats that can be submitted to places like the NYT. I like Phil because you can also download both a PDF export but also the crossword file itself, so you can load your work back into Phil and continue even though it's all online. Phil can generate patterns for you, but you can also go in and selectively edit squares to be black and white. Symmetry is turned on by default, but you can definitely turn it off to build weird grids for custom purposes. For my spoonerism puzzle, I generated a few patterns to see how they caught me and finally settled on one that I could change up a bit to fit my big answers.  Notice I left myself with some issues - namely filling in these monster-sized clues at the top left and bottom right of the grid. But that's okay, that's future me's problem. First things first, jam my theme clues in.  Now it's time to build off those and get the puzzle complete. I usually just start typing words and building up the grid from those, using my own wits to come up with most of the clues. I admit, however, I am no genius, and need help with the corners. To note, Phil will only help you with construction, it doesn't have the solver abilities of other (paid) construction apps. What is a solver? It's a neat bit of programming that will look through a dictionary and come up with a set of words that fit the constraints you give it. As you can imagine, you can't really apply this to an empty or even partially complete whole grid, as it's way too open in terms of possible words. I only use solves for the corners, and then only when I really get myself stuck. In terms of paid constructors, I like crossfire: http://beekeeperlabs.com/crossfire/. Even without paying for Crossfire, you can still (for free) use their powerful solver. Here's a screenshot of my filled grid in Crossfire - I axed the top right corner to show the context I gave the solver. With the "quick fill" option you see there, Crossfire will pop in (if possible) words that will fit the constraints. What's cool about Crossfire too is that as you type it will suggest words/letters that fit your constraints without actually needing to use the Quick Fill.    3. Writing clues I love writing clues. Once you have all your answers, you can use your wits to make the puzzle as difficult or as easy as you'd like. I usually make a first pass and have either my wife or one of my smarter friends edit them for me. I don't always make sense, and part of it is making sure you're not being so coy that people will think you're an rear end in a top hat. Some examples: hard: Convincingly diverting (10) - DISSUASIVE Traditional Vietnamese garment (5) AODAI That second one? It's a bullshit clue / answer. One of my big challenges is that the solver will give me awkward, difficult words. Your options are to blow up the grid or roll with it. So sometimes you're just going for whatever the dictionary definition of a word is, like ERSE : Gaelic Language Easy: Garfunkel of folk fame (3) - ART The A of an IPA (3) - ALE And there's many in between. I find that I am good at coming up with individual clues, but trying to come up with a difficulty bell curve is tough. Typically I end up having four murder-hard clues and then overcorrect with something like "first three letters of the ABCs"  One puzzle in particular I'm trying to work out involves two different sets of star names (Rigel, Vega, Betelgeuse, Sirius) and having two pairs of them cross in different parts of the puzzle. I then plan on making another major clue using these "starred" clues - ROMEO AND JULIET WERE THIS (11) "Star Crossed" For the starred clues, I came up with dumb stuff like "First name in horror (BETEGEUSE)" and "Last name in crime (VEGA)". It's fun to have multiple connections rolling through the puzzle. All told, this process can take a long time, hours, to get everything put together, and even then it's not always the best-constructed puzzle. 4. Submitting your puzzle (for money!) I someday would love to get a puzzle accepted by the NYT. You can submit puzzles to a bunch of different places. Note that they have specific submission guidelines, so make sure you follow those: https://www.nytimes.com/article/submit-crossword-puzzles-the-new-york-times.html So yeah, that's building crosswords for you. As I mentioned there's many ways to do it but this is how I do it. I'm sure some purist somewhere with their worn down pencil and notebook is freaking out 
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Mar 24, 2022 20:05
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Everybody and their Brother (by me, 2017 May 27): You've all heard the phrase "everybody and their brother", but logically that's 100% of all people (and we ignore everyone and their brother who's dead or a zombie  ). Likewise you might here, "Sheesh everyone in the county is on this loving road today!". Perhaps more accurately we meant "every fifth person".Estimate the percentage of the population that would be included in the set "Every Mth person and their Nth cousin(s)". IE, how many people are there when we proclaim, "Dammit every third person and their fifth cousin is on the highway today!"?
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Mar 24, 2022 22:40
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sephiRoth IRA posted:Making crosswords is fun! There's actually a pretty neat series the NYT put out on how to create crossword puzzles. I've also linked a specific article on tools which I found was helpful. I read all this yesterday and completely forgot to come back to it. That's fascinating, and something I really want to try myself. Thanks for the in-depth writeup!
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Mar 25, 2022 15:00
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I sent one in to the NYT a while back but it got rejected because I'd completely missed that you need a higher word density in a non-themed puzzle and mine had about 4 too many black squares. I've got another one nearly ready to go, I need to get off my arse and finish it. I see they actually accept them over the internet now, last time I had to print the fucker out and mail it. edit: pretty sure this is the one I sent off if anyone wants a go. I was thinking a tuesday/wednesday for this, pretty straightforward. 
Unkempt has a new favorite as of 00:26 on Mar 26, 2022 |
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Mar 26, 2022 00:09
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Puzzle things! I enjoy doing cryptic crosswords but I'm absolutely rubbish at them so I can only do the basics but my partner is an absolute genius at them. We're in the UK so I can recommend a few things from here! The Times newspaper is great if you want a wide variety. There are two cryptics every day, the Quick and the back page, which is harder. I think you can get these online for a subscription? My other half likes to do the really complicated ones though which are published here every Saturday and usually have names. The biggest one in the Times is called The Listener.  The other papers that publish these ones are the Telegraph (called Enigmatic Variations) and the I paper (inquisitor). So far, my other half had had three published in the I and the Telegraph so I know a little about the process of writing these if you were interested!
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Mar 26, 2022 08:20
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Oh man. gently caress the Listener crossword! One of my twitch viewers sent me a book of them and it's like I've forgotten how to read. Most of them have an explanatory paragraph at the start laying out the specific rules/intricacies for that crossword and I don't think I've ever felt so dumb. Mad props to your partner for getting them! If they have any advice I'd sure love to hear it. Edit: I'd also be keen to hear about the process of writing them! Flint_Paper has a new favorite as of 10:51 on Mar 26, 2022 |
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Mar 26, 2022 10:48
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sugar mouse posted:Puzzle things! I enjoy doing cryptic crosswords but I'm absolutely rubbish at them so I can only do the basics but my partner is an absolute genius at them. We're in the UK so I can recommend a few things from here! What's the one that used to be in the Independent magazine on a Saturday? Is that still going? I used to send that one in whenever I finished it, which was maybe 1 in 4. Never won whatever the prize was. I still do the Guardian cryptic occasionally but I live in the US now and I find the app really annoying. Besides, you're supposed to do these with a pen down the pub, where if you haven't finished after about 3 pints then it doesn't seem to matter that much. ( 1 across is 'libra')
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Mar 26, 2022 13:02
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Flint_Paper posted:Oh man. gently caress the Listener crossword! One of my twitch viewers sent me a book of them and it's like I've forgotten how to read. Most of them have an explanatory paragraph at the start laying out the specific rules/intricacies for that crossword and I don't think I've ever felt so dumb. I know he started by just seeing if he could grasp the instructions and getting one or two of the answers. They vary in difficulty, so half the trick is getting an easier one. In the super hard crossword world, they have a rating system, A is the easiest and E is the hardest although mostly the Listener will be A to D grades. If you get a feel for the writers as well, that can help! The setter Chalicea usually writes quite easy accessible ones, Ifor writes absolute bastards for example. I would ask my other half but he's literally away today at the annual listener dinner where they do awards and get drunk and talk about crosswords. Writing them (at least, normal cryptics ) is easier to get into though, he started by writing funny ones for friends, mostly lots of rude bits. If you enjoy a dirty cryptic, then see if you can get hold of Private Eye which is every 6 weeks or the Viz one, which is absolute filth but both are well written. There is software which people use for writing the more complex listener style ones, but you can do the normal ones using good old pen and paper. We only both learnt how to do cryptics 4 years ago so I don't know as much about stuff prior to that. Honestly, I'm still at the point of trying to read through listener instructions and getting lost half way through, it really is for galaxy brained folks.
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Mar 26, 2022 15:43
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Different type of logic puzzles found here. Some are classics, some are weird, some are word games, some are other types: https://logic.puzzlebaron.com/puzzles.php
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Mar 26, 2022 15:52
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Yay, more cryptic crossword fans! My mom got me into them when I was a kid, and I'm pretty sure my fiance and I figured out we were meant to be together when we each found out the other liked them (he proposed to me over a cryptic crossword, no less). We no-poo poo have conversations about whether we think certain clues are valid and which crossword setters we like or dislike for various reasons. Anyway, I skimmed through here real quick and was mildly surprised to see that nobody had linked to The Guardian's cryptic repository. It's free, there's tons available, you can print them out or do them online. So there ya go.
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Mar 27, 2022 13:00
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| # ? May 13, 2024 00:34 |
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Every now and then, when I've got a deadline, I have to temporarily block myself from visiting Otto Janko's logic puzzle archive (yes, it's in German, but English versions of the instructions are provided also, and Chrome will automatically translate). Other time sinks include Jim "Krazydad" Bumgardner's puzzle archive (especially the Variety Slitherlinks) and Simon Tatham's Portable Puzzles Collection, which includes small puzzle generators.
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Mar 27, 2022 15:49
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