Puzzles
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I look the look of this puzzle, especially having watched episode 1 of Ludwig recently, but haven’t had a chance to try it myself yet. I haven’t been given the solution either, so you embark on it at your own risk! In general, if you want to submit your own puzzle for everyone’s delight, then please do include a solution so we can check it is doable! Harry
UPDATE: Thanks for the solution. I have scheduled it to go live on January 1st. Think this is a good way to do it. If anyone wants to publish their favourite puzzle then make two posts, one with the puzzle and another with the solution (making it clear which is which in the post tags!) and I will schedule the solution for some time later during the competition. Harry
5 people are standing in a queue for plane tickets in Germany; each one has a name, an age, a favorite TV program, where they live, a hairstyle and a destination.
Names: Bob, Keeley, Rachael, Eilish and Amy
TV programs: The Simpsons, Coronation Street (“Corrie”), Eastenders, Desperate Housewives and Neighbours.
Destinations: France, Australia, England, Africa and Italy
Ages: 14, 21, 46, 52 and 81
Hairstyle: Afro, long, straight, curly and bald
Where they live: A town, a city, a village, a farm and a youth hostel1. The person in the middle watches Desperate Housewives
2. Bob is the first in the queue
3. The person who watches the Simpsons is next to the person who lives in a youth hostel
4. The person going to Africa is behind Rachael
5. The person who lives in a village is 52
6. The person who is going to Australia has straight hair
7. The person travelling to Africa watches Desperate Housewives
8. The 14-year-old is at the end of the queue
9. Amy watches Eastenders
10. The person heading to Italy has long hair
11. Keeley lives in a village
12. The 46-year-old is bald
13. The fourth in the queue is going to England
14. The people who watch Desperate Housewives and Neighbours are standing next to each other
15. The person who watches Coronation Street stands next to the person with an afro
16. A person next to Rachael has an afro
17. The 21-year-old lives in a youth hostel
18. The person who watches Corrie has long hair
19. The 81-year-old lives on a farm
20. The person who is travelling to France lives in a town
21. Eilish is not next to the person with straight hairHi, Haryy,
Here is a solution. Feel free to refrain from publishing.
I did! Interestingly, your solution is not entirely consistent with the one provided by the setter, so I guess I might need to check them both myself! Harry
Here is another solution. I believe both are consistent with the clues. This solution does not assume what I said about clue 21.
Edited by Harry: Thanks for the update, will check them both this evening!
If either is wrong, please post the offended clue. Thanks.
Hello
Hello! Do you have a puzzle for us? Harry
I have a riddle for you Harry.
A man called Andy is walking through a forest. He stumbles across 8 witches. They mean no harm, but all they want is for him to help them. They say that they have a circular one layer cake, and they want him to help them cut it into 8 pieces. The witches have a magical knife that can only make 3 cuts. How can he cut 8 slices with only 3 cuts?
Hi Harry,
Can also confirm two solutions. 1 means the start/front of the queue, and 5 means the end/back. (I’m sure you can work out what my abbreviations mean!)
Thank you! Are there only two? Just asking, haven’t checked this for myself. Harry
Yes Harry, I believe there are only two (unless my reasoning is faulty!).
To cut the witches cake, like how I cut up my onions very fine, you have to think in more than one dimension!
We received this yesterday, but I thought I would hold it back to give you something to think about after, or to distract you while, looking at Challenge 1. Hope that is OK, Harry
[Warning: Long post alert!]
Here’s something a little different…
A Puzzle Hunt is a series of puzzles, normally without instructions, so that working out how the puzzles work is itself part of the puzzles! Almost always, there are a bunch of standalone puzzles (called ‘feeders’), and then a puzzle that relies on the answers to the feeders (called ‘metas’). Metameta puzzles can also exist, which rely on the meta answers, and so on, but my Puzzle Hunt doesn’t go this far (thankfully!).
Over the next few weeks, I will post four feeder puzzles and a final meta for you to solve at your own peril. For each puzzle, I will also post an MD5 checksum, so you can check your answer without needing to post to the forums. All answers should be treated as a series of capital letters from the Latin alphabet with no punctuation or spaces – so if the answer was ‘THIS IS AN EXAMPLE ANSWER’, then the MD5 would be:
324c70d3f078e87bec400b3c1b698ad1
(Please check you can recreate this.) You can then confirm in the forums that you have solved the puzzle, by doing something like MD5(Name + Answer).I will not post guidance here on how to solve Puzzle Hunts (that sort of thing can be found using your search engine of choice), but I will mention a few quirks about my Hunt:
– You might notice that the answers will seem a bit arbitrary. Sorry. I didn’t have much time to create this Hunt, so you will have to deal with any weird side-effects of this by yourself!
– I also didn’t have time to create a background story to my Hunt. Maybe that is something you could think about in-between puzzles…
– For each puzzle, I have put in the number of letters in each word of the answer (because I am not a completely evil puzzle-setter!).
– As of writing this introduction, I technically haven’t completed all details of my puzzles, hence why I am releasing them in a staggered manner. I will try to finish them quickly, though!Have fun, and good luck! I will (try to) post the first puzzle shortly.
Puzzle Hunt, Puzzle 1: Doubly Difficult (4,5,7)
MD5: ae987d3c21b4a2f878081318d94cce1f[PUZZLE]
Oh, why did I press that annoying ‘Sort’ button in my Excel spreadsheet?
– A circle, and the identity element with respect to multiplication
– A gram, and James Bond
– A litre, and 1/(0.07692307…)
– A metre, and the first prime
– A shorthand for ‘exponential’, and XIV
– Common in most plural words, and null
– Element 92, and the final challenge in this year’s NCC
– Hydrogen, and (the first prime) raised to the power of (the second prime)
– Last letter in the Latin alphabet, and the number of numbers on a typical analogue clock face
– Least common letter in the English language, and the value of (1 + 1/12 + (1/12)^2 + (1/12)^3 + …)^(-1)
– Phosphorus, and the second odd square
– Sulfur, and the largest possible value of a 4-bit number
– The origin, and V
– The second most common letter in the English language, and the lowest composite
– The value of (1 + 1/1! + 1/2! + 1/3! + …), and the second triangle
– Union, and the value of 2^[ln(6)/ln(2)]Erratum in post #97265 (Doubly Difficult):
I put (1 + 1/12 + (1/12)^2 + (1/12)^3 + …)^(-1) in the 10th bullet point. This should be (1/12 + (1/12)^2 + (1/12)^3 + …)^(-1). Correct me if you find any other mistakes!Just made this up, though it may have already been a given – lets see how it goes
===================================== Whiz Sister.
My sis wrote these numbers down8 5 4 9 1 7 6 3 2 0
She says these numbers are in the right order!!!
She wrote more and says these numbers are also in the right order!
8 5 4 9 0 1 7 6 3 2
Whats more, she says, so are these…
8 5 4 9 0 1 7 6 3 2 0
Woah! Who will tell me why?
Next puzzle!
Puzzle Hunt, Puzzle 2: Cryptic Crosswords (4,3,5,4?)
MD5: 2176e95407a69c3dd288097e4b9aa628[PUZZLE]
When Crosswords Attack!
Clues:
ACROSS
1. Tree of the fraxinus genus
1. Tree of the ulmus genus
1. The last match in a standard knockout tournament
2. A cool supporter?
3. Unwell
4. ??
4. ??
4. ??
4. ??
5. ___ of the line
6. Greater than
7. Slimy fish (plural), beginning with a repeated vowel
7. Also, a couple (we hear); ends with a repeated vowel
8. Burning ball of gas in the night sky
8. Boolean 1
9. What Humpty Dumpty is cracked up to be!DOWN
1. A unit of pressure, and a cash machine
1. Palindromic bit of your head
1. A quick break from food?
1. Chew on it; singular version of a famous shark
2. Get down, and tell a false statement!
2. Over a big stretch of time (or space)
2. Footwear one wishes to get rid of, we hear
3. In one’s current location
3. Wet brown earth, commonly associated with pigs
3. Bug that reverses a common metal?
5. In an unknown location
5. Like ice turning into water
5. A rock containing valuable metals (e.g. an oxide)
6. Many auction items?
6. Winter sport similar to bobsleigh
7. Goes with fruitGrid W:
.?…..
???….
.????..
..???..
…????
…?…Grid X:
???
???
???
.?.Grid Y:
?????..
?…???
?????..
????…
.???…
..?….Grid Z:
???..
????.
????.
.????
…?.[N.B. All crossword grids are numbered in the usual manner. ‘.’ represents a black square (which is not to be filled in), and ‘?’ represents a blank square (which will contain a single letter when finished). This note is not a puzzle.]
@Kingswinford, (and Harry) if it doesn’t give too much away, I definitely had some fun to solve the first two. Looking forward to the third!
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