MGWCC #778 — “What’s Wrong?”

[MikeyG]

I sent the SOL/SUN thing to Matt in a comment. I think we can technically argue that Sol is an official name of the Sun? That might have been part of the issue. I thought maybe FAILURE TO SIGNALS, which is also incorrect grammatically, and so that might merit a fix. But I went with FAILURE TO SIGNAL, initially, anyway, though "automotive term" seems more tenuous. ("The answer to the meta is a 15-letter violation" might have been a more apropos prompt.)

[ZooAnimalsOnWheels]

Ah, I see. I had the correct answer, but I had assumed 27A was somehow wrong, because I had THROW for 27D, and FOR for 41A. I think I just ignored the "dialectically" in the clue when I was filling the grid, or assumed that it was referring to two sides: a FOR and an AGAINST. Even though the errors referred to in 67A were obvious in other clues at that point in the grid filling, I was just on autopilot.

So I ended up wondering what was wrong with 27A. "Leaves without escape" was awkwardly worded for me, where I had to realize that "Leaves" was being used as a transitive verb. But I thought it was typical of tricky clue wording and didn't have anything technically incorrect, and that was right!

[BrennerTJ]

I was THROWn FOR a loop at first too before being O-Educated...

[BarbaraK]

I got some good preparation for this meta from being a test solver for Crosswords For Cancer.com. (Everyone is doing these, right? Great puzzles for a great cause!)

Having a list of the rules, reading everything very carefully, and fact-checking anything I wasn't sure of - that's just what Will had asked me to do for CCCC. And I found the 15 "errors" in this puzzle without much fuss, the only question of fer/threw vs for/throw being clear from the rest of the letters.

But without that recent experience, I might have found this more challenging. As just a regular crossword solver, I don't usually pay attention to that level of detail. If what fits in the grid seems reasonable for what I'm thinking from the clue, I just go with it. If it's a plural that I wasn't expecting or something like that, I'd probably just assume I read it wrong and only go back and double check the clue if things weren't working out.

[AaronT]

I was one of the earlier solvers whose name didn’t make it onto the leaderboard until later in the day. I had THROW/FOR like many others and I completely glossed over OCULI. I think I half-consciously determined that was a prefix and didn’t give it a second thought.

So I submitted FAILURE SIGNAL which felt awkward but I rationalized that it could be an alternative term for the Check Engine light or similar. Thankfully it was eventually accepted and Matt then sent out the revised prompt. It would have been a bummer to lose an almost-50 week streak so I appreciate the flexibility!

[Joe Ross]

I was one of the earlier solvers whose name didn’t make it onto the leaderboard until later in the day. I had THROW/FOR like many others and I completely glossed over OCULI. I think I half-consciously determined that was a prefix and didn’t give it a second thought.

So I submitted FAILURE SIGNAL which felt awkward but I rationalized that it could be an alternative term for the Check Engine light or similar. Thankfully it was eventually accepted and Matt then sent out the revised prompt. It would have been a bummer to lose an almost-50 week streak so I appreciate the flexibility!

Same, here, but I erred further in accepting ENURE, per whichever interwebbed dictionary I consulted, lazily, leaving FAILUR SIGNAL.

Thinking the misspeeling of FAILUR matched the mechanism, I followed suit & submitted the 15-lettered CHECK ENGINE LITE.