"Power Pack" May 26, 2023

[TeaJenny]

I only stumbled onto the correct path because I googled "hermit power," which led me straight to tarot cards. That's when 62D made sense. I was hung up on "thermite" for quite a while.

Not my favorite, but I lack the arcane knowledge needed to suss out this meta without resorting to the internet. I wonder if this is how people with no knowledge of sports feel when there's a sports themed puzzle?

[31 Down]

R Cane. Not a fan of this one.

[DBMiller]

You know how in movies or TV when someone is being chased, or they're wanted by someone and they duck into a side street/alley/hallway, press themselves back to the wall and hope whoever is looking for them just passes on by without looking to the side? Well the rabbit did that to me, and I went right past him.

As I'm filling the grid, the thought of things being packed together fills my mind. The 5 (Wait 5? Not 8?) clues are starred. They do contain various words packed in them.

THERM/THERMITE/HERMIT/HERMITE
DEVIL/EVIL
STAR/START/TART
TOWER
LOVER/VERSE

But when I finally get to 62d, I know that TAROT cards are part of the metanism. I didn't realize the major arcana were ranked, and as I googled around, I come across some pages with pictures of various Tarot decks over the years. Oh... Which deck is Matt using? No idea at first. Will have to ponder it, but one deck has "The House of God", which looks like a tower - I'll lean towards one of the other variants that uses "The Tower" as the name.

So I'm looking at pictures of cards and write down...

Tarot Card Rank
---------- ----
The FOOL 0

The HERMIT (?)
The DEVIL (15?) LSA
The STAR (17?) [G]IN
The TOWER (16?) [H]AULER
The LOVERS (6?) [T]SA

Only the image of the major arcana cards I was looking at was very worn and used VIIII for nine, but the V and the first I wasn't legible, so I all saw was III and thought it was eight. Well 8d was SHELVE. So my first 5 letters are:

SIGHT

Power Pack. Power of what?
EYESIGHT?
FORESIGHT (9 letters)
PRESIGHT? the act or power of foreseeing
OUTSIGHT? the power or act of perceiving external things

Either of the last two are extremely possible. But why only 5 starred clues when we're looking for an eight-letter quality?

Well, when the grid isn't enough look to the clues! And I find three more Tarot references to the minor arcana suits.

World CUP cry - (39a) [O]LE
WAND wielding org - (6d) [T]SA
croation COIN - (25d) [E]URO

EIGHT+OTE=goethite?

To quote Charlie Brown from the Halloween show... "I got a rock". And extremely appropos, as I found there are things called "Prophecy Stones", and some of them are made of goethite!

https://www.amazon.com/Prophecy-Pseudom ... B09JN4YDG1

But Goethite isn't a quality. Although it's a mineral and what you find of it may be of varying quality, this just doesn't feel right. I try to put it out of my mind, but it's extremely difficult. I know Tarot is the right mechanism. How can these eight items not lead me to the solution?

Ok, there's a missing suit - SWORD - Anagram of WORDS Also in crosSWORD
(53a) WORDS from... - AYESIR

Do the words in the clues correspond to the grid?

CUP -> CUB?
WAND -> LAWN? WNBA?
COIN -> ENIAC

Are there other missing major arcana items?

The WORLD? (6d?) TSA (Repeat - Maybe there are two T's in the answer)

So I GOOGLE a little more, and that takes me to a list of the major arcana for various types of Tarot decks. OK... which one am I looking at? I narrow it down and see I've made a "major" mistake. The HERMIT has rank 9! Not 8! 9d is EAR, and SIGHT becomes EIGHT. EIGHT? That's the # of letters, why repeat that? And I resume looking for other major arcana in the grid or clues. Moon? Nope. Sun? Nope. Strength? Wait... what? Strength is #8 in some decks and #11 in others (It switches with Fortitude). But the deck I've now been using has it as #8 (And the deck that uses it as #11, has "The House of God", not "The Tower"). Was it that simple? Why didn't I find this page sooner and not mistake it as #9? Arrrrrgh.

So major arcana #8 is Strength. 8d starts with an S. And strength is a quality you can have. All tied up, nice and neat.

[hcbirker]

[caf.caf]

I completely missed the fool/zero/eight connection, but went with the 8 in 8-letter answer:))

[ship4u]

You know how in movies or TV when someone is being chased, or they're wanted by someone and they duck into a side street/alley/hallway, press themselves back to the wall and hope whoever is looking for them just passes on by without looking to the side? Well the rabbit did that to me, and I went right past him.

As I'm filling the grid, the thought of things being packed together fills my mind. The 5 (Wait 5? Not 8?) clues are starred. They do contain various words packed in them.

THERM/THERMITE/HERMIT/HERMITE
DEVIL/EVIL
STAR/START/TART
TOWER
LOVER/VERSE

But when I finally get to 62d, I know that TAROT cards are part of the metanism. I didn't realize the major arcana were ranked, and as I googled around, I come across some pages with pictures of various Tarot decks over the years. Oh... Which deck is Matt using? No idea at first. Will have to ponder it, but one deck has "The House of God", which looks like a tower - I'll lean towards one of the other variants that uses "The Tower" as the name.

So I'm looking at pictures of cards and write down...

Tarot Card Rank
---------- ----
The FOOL 0

The HERMIT (?)
The DEVIL (15?) LSA
The STAR (17?) [G]IN
The TOWER (16?) [H]AULER
The LOVERS (6?) [T]SA

Only the image of the major arcana cards I was looking at was very worn and used VIIII for nine, but the V and the first I wasn't legible, so I all saw was III and thought it was eight. Well 8d was SHELVE. So my first 5 letters are:

SIGHT

Power Pack. Power of what?
EYESIGHT?
FORESIGHT (9 letters)
PRESIGHT? the act or power of foreseeing
OUTSIGHT? the power or act of perceiving external things

Either of the last two are extremely possible. But why only 5 starred clues when we're looking for an eight-letter quality?

Well, when the grid isn't enough look to the clues! And I find three more Tarot references to the minor arcana suits.

World CUP cry - (39a) [O]LE
WAND wielding org - (6d) [T]SA
croation COIN - (25d) [E]URO

EIGHT+OTE=goethite?

To quote Charlie Brown from the Halloween show... "I got a rock". And extremely appropos, as I found there are things called "Prophecy Stones", and some of them are made of goethite!

https://www.amazon.com/Prophecy-Pseudom ... B09JN4YDG1

But Goethite isn't a quality. Although it's a mineral and what you find of it may be of varying quality, this just doesn't feel right. I try to put it out of my mind, but it's extremely difficult. I know Tarot is the right mechanism. How can these eight items not lead me to the solution?

Ok, there's a missing suit - SWORD - Anagram of WORDS Also in crosSWORD
(53a) WORDS from... - AYESIR

Do the words in the clues correspond to the grid?

CUP -> CUB?
WAND -> LAWN? WNBA?
COIN -> ENIAC

Are there other missing major arcana items?

The WORLD? (6d?) TSA (Repeat - Maybe there are two T's in the answer)

So I GOOGLE a little more, and that takes me to a list of the major arcana for various types of Tarot decks. OK... which one am I looking at? I narrow it down and see I've made a "major" mistake. The HERMIT has rank 9! Not 8! 9d is EAR, and SIGHT becomes EIGHT. EIGHT? That's the # of letters, why repeat that? And I resume looking for other major arcana in the grid or clues. Moon? Nope. Sun? Nope. Strength? Wait... what? Strength is #8 in some decks and #11 in others (It switches with Fortitude). But the deck I've now been using has it as #8 (And the deck that uses it as #11, has "The House of God", not "The Tower"). Was it that simple? Why didn't I find this page sooner and not mistake it as #9? Arrrrrgh.

So major arcana #8 is Strength. 8d starts with an S. And strength is a quality you can have. All tied up, nice and neat.

DB, you could start your own podcast: "Tails of a Crossword Rabbit!"

[mrmd]

I got all the way to EIGHT, and then couldn't flex enough to realize that I needed to use that number to get the answer from the Tarot deck. Duh.

Same! The tarot clue first got us to notice the words inside the theme answers on Friday.

Then looked at 62D again and realized there are numbers associated with the major arcana. Thanks to Wikipedia, got those and got to EIGHT on Saturday morning.

But then stuck. Spent a day and a half in rabbit holes trying to find 3 more letters to add to it. WEIGHT is a quality but only six letters. FREIGHT? Not a quality. And only seven letters. Etc.

Oh look there are many alliterative clues! “Pot pour” is too weird to not be connected. Most of them are using P! And SATE/SATIE and MARS/MAORIS are pairs with letters added! All the whole knowing that couldn’t be it. Metas don’t have two different puzzles going on. Then looked at the letters associated with multiples of eight in the grid. Or, because “power,” maybe it’s 2,4,16, 256?

Finally with two hours to spare, realized eight is a number too, sheesh. Looked it up on that same Wikipedia article from the day before.

My rabbit hole for a day was missing the central themer, doing the other four (because how do you get from 5 to 8, right?!) and then getting the only 8-letter anagram from the first letter of the Tarot and the first letter of the grid answer which is - you guessed it - FISHNET. Duh.

[mikeB]

We bring personal resources to the solving of each meta: Innate problem-solving skills, general knowledge, meta-specific knowledge (accrued through experience on these puzzles), and perseverance. A shortfall in any of these resources can block the solving process. In this case, one needed to have some knowledge of Tarot decks, or game over. In my case, before this meta came along, all I knew about Tarot decks was that there were such things and that they related to something like astrology. My lack of knowledge thwarted my solving this one, but that’s the way it is with meta crossword puzzles. If it's not one thing, it's another. Am I any worse off if a knowledge gap does me in, versus missing a visible connection between entries and clues (or one of the many other mechanism elements)? By the way, the constructors must have all these same resources – and then some – to put these marvels together. Mr. Shenk and colleagues are to be applauded for that. And thanked.

[Kris Zacharias]

My personal resource in solving this week’s meta was the James Bond Film , Live and Let Die, where Jane Seymour played a Tarot Card reader. She resisted James Bond’s charms until she did a reading for herself and drew the Lovers card. It turns out that good old James had stacked the whole deck with the Lovers card. Had I not remembered that, I may not have been able to figure out the meta. Had to google the numbers, of course.

[DrTom]

Fun seeing all the different things people focused on. Our limited experience has taught us to check everything that pops out. My husband noticed the tarot card names within the starred answers because 62d sparked his thoughts. We tried all sorts of things with the numbers on the cards after a google search. I finally thought of seeing what letter each number was on the grid and saw it spelled eight. We had already decided the answer must be strength because it was the only card that expressed a quality. Just needed to verify and low and behold… that was the number of the strength card! We were so proud! We have had so much fun with these puzzles and having this forum and the muggle zoom has added to our fun! We laugh at how obsessed we have become! Can’t wait for Thursdays!

No need to wait Trish, there is a meta almost every day, just check the “Other Meta Crosswords” section. We’ll get you TOTALLY addicted!!

[jenirvin]

Good grief. I got the Tarot theme right away, highlighted the numbers of the Major Arcana referenced, and... in my deck VIII is Justice (so down rabbit holes I went, never to return). Should have Googled to see that depending on the deck, it could also be Strength. Live and learn! Hats off to those who got to the right shore!

[kfahey714]

We bring personal resources to the solving of each meta: Innate problem-solving skills, general knowledge, meta-specific knowledge (accrued through experience on these puzzles), and perseverance. A shortfall in any of these resources can block the solving process. In this case, one needed to have some knowledge of Tarot decks, or game over. In my case, before this meta came along, all I knew about Tarot decks was that there were such things and that they related to something like astrology. My lack of knowledge thwarted my solving this one, but that’s the way it is with meta crossword puzzles. If it's not one thing, it's another. Am I any worse off if a knowledge gap does me in, versus missing a visible connection between entries and clues (or one of the many other mechanism elements)? By the way, the constructors must have all these same resources – and then some – to put these marvels together. Mr. Shenk and colleagues are to be applauded for that. And thanked.

I agree to an extent but the depth of knowledge about something I would consider to be fairly obscure was a stretch in my opinion. Can’t win em all!

[The XWord Rabbit]

The cards were stacked against those Muggles who didn’t recognize the importance of the clue at 62D (ZERO) in Mr. Shenk’s “Power Pack” puzzle. The five words buried in the five anchor entries (HERMIT, DEVIL, START, TOWER and LOVERS) are all cards in a tarot deck, each bearing a number in Roman numerals. Find the five squares in the grid with those numbers and you get the word EIGHT. Finally, find the #8 tarot card and you have the meta: STRENGTH.

In reviewing your reactions to this week’s puzzle the X-Word Rabbit was a bit surprised at the number of Muggles who were unfamiliar with tarot cards. Some googled the anchor words and were pleasantly surprised to see there was a connection. Others … well, they weren't so lucky …

Nominees? Here’s a few:

lancangah jumped all over the grid, trying to connect segments of the anchor entries with other grid entries, like so --

I submitted SOBRIETY.

18A - featHERMITE - Hermite, the mathematician from which is named a polynomial sequence, or POWER SERIES. SERIES shares 4 letters with AYESIR, leaving out E and S.
29A - COUPdeville - a POWER GRAB. GRAB shares 3 letters with RAGS, leaving out B.
40A - loSTART - a POWER BUTTON. BUTTON shares 4 letters with UNBELT, leaving out T and O.
48A - OTTowernicke - Mr. OTT is a POWER HITTER. HITTER shares 4 letters with HOTTEA, leaving out I and R. (Having ‘OTT’ seemed like a sign we were on the right track…)
63A - clOVERSEEds - to OVERSEE is to have a POWER EYE (ok, a stretch). EYE shares 2 letters with EEL, leaving out Y.

Anagram ESBTOIRY to get SOBRIETY. Easy-Peasy.

And then there’s KscX who now holds the Muggle record for the shortest response worthy of a nomination.

Hermit Crab, Devil Ray, Star Fish, Tower Jellyfish, Seed Shrimp. But then what? Nothing. Because it was wrong.

The X-Word Rabbit would be remiss not to mention DBMiller’s stream-of-consciousness essay #289. Amazingly, he found the meta in spite of taking yet another long and winding road. Each week is a wild ride with Mr. Miller – and each week your Rabbit reacts like this:

Thanks to all, and may you all find strength with the next puzzle.

[Ergcat]

Good grief. I got the Tarot theme right away, highlighted the numbers of the Major Arcana referenced, and... in my deck VIII is Justice (so down rabbit holes I went, never to return). Should have Googled to see that depending on the deck, it could also be Strength. Live and learn! Hats off to those who got to the right shore!

Same! And then I saw that JUSTICE is also called “FAIRNESS” which is an “eight-letter quality” so I almost went with that but then I read some more and saw that “depending on the deck” STRENGTH is numbered VIII or XI. So I went with STRENGTH… seemed more straightforward!

[NuYear68]

Oof! I had Star Power, Tower of Power and Power of Love, but couldn't connect Devil/Evil nor Therm/Thermite/Hermit as cleanly as those. And then the holiday weekend began in earnest and that was that.

Nice job by those who read the cards correctly.
Paul

[Streroto]

Not a Tarot guy and more of a scientist. I saw THERM(al power) and PED(al power) in the first two themers and thought well this will be a snap…then karma bit me hard in the rear end. I saw FERMI and thought ok it will be atomic physicists. I looked all over for the hint and 62D was indeed clued weirdly but not knowing anything about the Tarot (though my wife did get her cards read in NOLA once-clearly I was not paying attention) it did nothing for me.

Grandkids were here all weekend so I gave up but reached out for a lifeline Sunday evening and got the nudge “see 62d” (thanks for that!!!) and that was all it took to get to shore (sort of, since it was assisted) in a few minutes. So strange how this works.

So, no mug…but I got the excellent MGWCC week 4 and have the longest streak there I have ever had (only 5 but still).

Stay well all. Thursday soon come.

[MikeMillerwsj]

The contest answer is STRENGTH. Each of the starred answers contains the name of a tarot card. As hinted at by the clue for ZERO (“Number on the Fool card in many tarot decks”), taking the letters in the squares whose numbers match those cards (HERMIT: IX; DEVIL: XV; STAR: XVII; TOWER: XVI; LOVERS: VI) spells EIGHT. The contest answer is the name of the card numbered VIII.

This was a tricky one! We had 1060 entrants, with about 85% correct. The incorrect answers suggest that some solvers were in the right neighborhood (magic/spirituality) but didn't get the final step: ELECTRIC (15), MYSTICAL (12), ESOTERIC (7), CHARISMA (4), MORALITY (2), KINDNESS (2), SOBRIETY (2), and a scattering of others.

Congrats to this week's winner: Joseph Chaput of Des Plaines, Ill.!

[ReB]

I only stumbled onto the correct path because I googled "hermit power," which led me straight to tarot cards. That's when 62D made sense. I was hung up on "thermite" for quite a while.

Not my favorite, but I lack the arcane knowledge needed to suss out this meta without resorting to the internet. I wonder if this is how people with no knowledge of sports feel when there's a sports themed puzzle?

I actually followed the same basic path, and then once I saw the reference to the tarot deck, remembered that LOVERS was also a tarot card and it was off to the races (with the help of online pictures of the major arcana).

Nice little twist that three of the suits were intentional clue words.

[LadyBird]

I didn't get to the forum here until Sunday evening and saw lots of references to the need for Google. Am I the only person who wasted her last bit of solving time on the Power Pack (Marvel comics about a group of young super heroes)?

[KayW]

I didn't get to the forum here until Sunday evening and saw lots of references to the need for Google. Am I the only person who wasted her last bit of solving time on the Power Pack (Marvel comics about a group of young super heroes)?

Lucky for me I would have to have heard of that in order to waste time on it