From Will's email
This week's puzzle: Length by Length
Difficulty: Challenging
I had intended to slowly increase the difficulty this week with a "medium" puzzle, but have been informed that this puzzle is actually "challenging". Many thanks to Emma and Dani for helping to make this puzzle much less challenging for you all than it was for them!
The answer to this week's meta is something that can be measured.
(I believe most folks won't need Google this week.)
Crosshare link: https://crosshare.org/crosswords/w5MU3F ... -by-length
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Hello, hello, is anyone out there?
I'm still all boxed up. See the first step, but so far 6 different ways of applying it have just led me to 6 different strings of gibberish.
Have a guess at an answer and tried to back-solve it, but no luck with that yet either.
Length by Length
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BarbaraK
- Posts: 2617
- Joined: Tue Apr 09, 2019 2:37 pm
- Location: Virginia
Length by Length
If you want help with a meta, feel free to PM me. The more specific you are about what you have and what you want, the more likely I can help without spoiling.
(And if I help you win a mug, I’ll be especially delighted.)
(And if I help you win a mug, I’ll be especially delighted.)
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boharr
- Moderator
- Posts: 3210
- Joined: Fri Sep 06, 2019 8:57 am
- Location: Westchester, NY
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oldjudge
- Posts: 1637
- Joined: Fri Apr 19, 2019 4:16 am
- Location: Pasadena, CA
me. Enjoyed this one a lot. Great job Will!-
Meg
- Posts: 2166
- Joined: Tue Apr 09, 2019 1:41 pm
- Location: St. Petersburg, FL
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benchen71
- Posts: 2453
- Joined: Thu Jul 22, 2021 8:50 pm
- Location: Melbourne, Australia
- Contact:
This is me, too. Frustrating!
Check out "The MOAT MEOW Mashup Pack" here. US$10 for 14 metas that don't always abide by the "rules" of the game: asymmetry, 2-letter words, uncrossed letters, who knows. And this time there's a mega-meta! 
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hoover
- Posts: 1369
- Joined: Mon Mar 29, 2021 7:26 pm
I have a meta-question about Pandora's Blocks. If you're solving on Crosshare, do you get only a single attempt at the answer, or can you resubmit if your first try was wrong?
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whimsy
- Posts: 2789
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- Location: Hopkinton MA
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Katiedid
- Posts: 346
- Joined: Mon Aug 30, 2021 8:53 pm
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ChrisKochmanski
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- Location: Saline, Michigan
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Abide
- Moderator
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- Joined: Thu Apr 11, 2019 11:16 pm
- Location: Biloxi
- Contact:
Solidly stuck at Step 1. Will look again tonight.
The site is just a web page, a meeting place, a clubhouse - it's the group that's special.
—Brian MacDonald
—Brian MacDonald
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schmidzy
- Posts: 303
- Joined: Mon Oct 11, 2021 8:56 am
- Contact:
Still no dinos here, either!
As a further question re Crosshare, does anyone know if Will can see all the embarrassingly wrong answers I've submitted hoping one of my many rabbit trails might be correct?
As a further question re Crosshare, does anyone know if Will can see all the embarrassingly wrong answers I've submitted hoping one of my many rabbit trails might be correct?
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BarbaraK
- Posts: 2617
- Joined: Tue Apr 09, 2019 2:37 pm
- Location: Virginia
I think he automatically gets the number of submissions but only sees the actual submissions if he requests them. A while back the prompt was a US state capital and he noticed a suspiciously large number of submissions from a couple people, so he checked and saw they were just entering every capital (and told them they would not qualify for the prize that way).
If you want help with a meta, feel free to PM me. The more specific you are about what you have and what you want, the more likely I can help without spoiling.
(And if I help you win a mug, I’ll be especially delighted.)
(And if I help you win a mug, I’ll be especially delighted.)
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hcbirker
- Posts: 2022
- Joined: Thu Apr 11, 2019 7:24 pm
- Location: Studio City, CA
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Cinny
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- Location: Minoa, NY
- Contact:
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dudeski
- Posts: 374
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benchen71
- Posts: 2453
- Joined: Thu Jul 22, 2021 8:50 pm
- Location: Melbourne, Australia
- Contact:
He'll see how many attempts, but only the last one is visible!
Check out "The MOAT MEOW Mashup Pack" here. US$10 for 14 metas that don't always abide by the "rules" of the game: asymmetry, 2-letter words, uncrossed letters, who knows. And this time there's a mega-meta!
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BrennerTJ
- Posts: 440
- Joined: Sun Jan 31, 2021 2:54 pm
- Location: Chicago suburbs
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AnswerPfinder
- Posts: 122
- Joined: Sat Aug 08, 2020 9:49 pm
- Location: Hadley, MA
Hi folks!
Yes - Ben is right - I can see everyone's most recent submission and their total number of attempts. The only time I will request the full backlog of submissions from Mike is if someone has sent in 49 answers on a puzzle whose answer is "a state capital" (or the equivalent for some other meta prompt that has limited options). There's no shame in trying different strategies and checking the answer you get from each line of reasoning - that's a great way to improve!!
This one definitely deserves to be upgraded from Challenging -> HARD. The second step is really well disguised. Email me if you need a hint! And congrats to those who have successfully solved!
Yes - Ben is right - I can see everyone's most recent submission and their total number of attempts. The only time I will request the full backlog of submissions from Mike is if someone has sent in 49 answers on a puzzle whose answer is "a state capital" (or the equivalent for some other meta prompt that has limited options). There's no shame in trying different strategies and checking the answer you get from each line of reasoning - that's a great way to improve!!
This one definitely deserves to be upgraded from Challenging -> HARD. The second step is really well disguised. Email me if you need a hint! And congrats to those who have successfully solved!
Contest Crosswords Combating Cancer (CCCC) is a bundle of 16 metapuzzles created to help raise money for cancer-related charities. It is available at CrosswordsForCancer.com.
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Abide
- Moderator
- Posts: 1310
- Joined: Thu Apr 11, 2019 11:16 pm
- Location: Biloxi
- Contact:
Got Step 2 after a long series of nudges from @BrennerTJ. That second jump falls into my kryptonite area.
The site is just a web page, a meeting place, a clubhouse - it's the group that's special.
—Brian MacDonald
—Brian MacDonald