Mystery Hunt 2012 Recast: COMPLETE!!!

[Gomez*]

Not much to add except that the picture of the pipe is not from Magritte's famous 'Treachery of Images' but rrom his lesser known Two Mysteries. You can tellby the background. Also Two Mysteries features a shrunken version of Treachery of Images, which would fit with the 'Puzzle in A Puzzle' theme.

[Suspence]

Even cooler...a jigsaw puzzle within a jigsaw puzzle that reveals a painting within a painting.
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[LordKinbote]

[Suspence]

How many of the words I have listed are in your group of 7? Or is that cheating...
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[LordKinbote]

[Suspence]

Hmm..a search on MIDNIGHT APOLLO ENGINEER led me here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midnighter

And MIDNIGHT in the word search actually continues to be MIDNIGHTER...

And now here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Authority
The Doctor, Swift, Apollo, Jenny Sparks, The Midnighter, The Engineer, and Jack Hawksmoor
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[L'lanmal]

I rather liked this puzzle too.

[Suspence]

That leaves 121 left-over letters, which should fit an 11x11 grid. I already see MEXICO in the unused letters.

[gftt*]

[Suspence]

h i g h l y
u n p l e a s a n t
t h i n g s
i t
i s
s o m e t i m e s
n e c e s s a r y
t o
k n o w

Which is a fictional guidebook in John Barnes's novel, One for the Morning Glory

A: Scream 3
B: Slaughterhouse 5
C: Grand Theft Auto 4
D: The Two Mysteries
E: One for the Morning Glory

7, 8 - TH
14 - E
1 - S
14, 12 - OU
7, 6 - TH

Call in THE SOUTH
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[LordKinbote]

THE SOUTH is correct.

Which I guess leaves this last puzzle in the Okla-Holmes-a round:

Zugzwaang by Paul Jeray

[Suspence]

I have to say that was one of the best puzzles I've ever worked on.

I also have to say I'm out on the current one. I have no idea what is even going on.
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[jesternl]

Just for reference.. 'zugzwang' is the notion that a player in chess, or another game, is forced to make a move while (s)he would prefer not to, since it makes the position weaker.

[Suspence]

Is anybody working on this one? I'm still totally lost with nowhere to start.
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[jesternl]

I've been lost since the very beginning...

[gftt*]

I peeked at the answer to this one a month ago. Sorry.

One hint, maybe: catalog all the ways in which these do not look like your average chess problem.

[Suspence]

I do not know how to solve even a basic chess problem, so that rules me out.

I do know the game is not typically played with coins, but that's about all I've got.
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[Scurra]

I spent some time this afternoon searching, and I think that these puzzles are for the game of Arimaa*, which is played between Gold and Silver and can use chess pieces to represent its own specific pieces.
As I knew nothing about this game until about five minutes ago, I am not sure I want to try and figure out what exactly is going on...

*the title would seem to suggest this too.
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_{still Quiz Olympiad champion. Must get a life.
New definitions: COFFEE - someone who is coughed upon}

[Suspence]

I'm ready to move on...anyone else?
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[gftt*]

You've done the hard part already!

On the Betsy Johnson meta, the 100 words in each bit of correspondence suggest placing the words found into a 10x10 grid, or something like that.

Other than the 9/10 rhymes found, there are: Column (cocoon), memory (medley), jay (joy), learned (leader), backroom (bookworm).

Letter 1:
backroom = word 28
memory = word 36
immune = word 78

Letter 2:
feeder = word 8
unmatched = word 21
learned = word 73

Letter 3:
column = word 9
tell = word 25
jay = word 36
boys = word 81

Letter 4:
splicing = word 8
hookworm = word 16

Letter 5:
deadly = word 61
deploy = word 71

Letter 3: all squares. But Dudes (word 1), Know (word 4), appealing (word 16), and it (word 100) [those are the easy ones to find] don't really have many letters in common with the puzzle answers. We are missing one answer word, granted.

[Suspence]

Are you indicating that we find words of the same length that have the same first and last letter?

If so LEADER, would go with LINEAR, word 4 of paragraph 4. Not sure what the connection with LEARNED is, except for an anagram + 1. Are there more of those?
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[Suspence]

Betsy Johnson Meta-Puzzle

SOLUTIONS
Joy
Bookworm
Hell
Leader
Enticing
Medley
Attached
Cocoon
Poise

RHYMES - Letter - Word #
Immune 1 - 78
Feeder 2 - 8
Unmatched 2 - 21
Tell 3 - 25
Boys 3 - 81
Splicing 4 - 8
Hookworm 4 - 16
Deadly 5 - 61
Deploy 5 - 71

SAME START/END/LENGTH - Letter - Word #
backroom 1 - 28
Memory 1 - 36
edifying 2 - 34
column 3 - 9
Jay 3 - 36
Hail 4 - 1
linear 4 - 4
asteroid 5 - 47
peace 5 - 59

ABOVE WORDS ORGANIZED BY LETTER - Letter - Word #
backroom 1 - 28
Memory 1 - 36
Immune 1 - 78

Feeder 2 - 8
Unmatched 2 - 21
edifying 2 - 34

column 3 - 9
Tell 3 - 25
Jay 3 - 36
Boys 3 - 81

Hail 4 - 1
linear 4 - 4
Splicing 4 - 8
Hookworm 4 - 16

asteroid 5 - 47
peace 5 - 59
Deadly 5 - 61
Deploy 5 - 71

Letter 1 seems to be triangle numbers. Letter 2 looks to be Fibonacci numbers. Letter 3 is squares. Letter 5 is all primes.
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[gftt*]

[Suspence]

Looks like synonyms is another path.

1-21 is STUCK, for ATTACHED
1-45 is HEAD, for LEADER
2-5 is BIBLIOPHILE, for BOOKWORM
2-13 is BEARING, for POISE
3-16 is APPEALING, for ENTICING
3-64 is ASSORTMENT, for MEDLEY
4-64 is DELIGHT, for JOY
5-43 is INFERNO, for HELL
5-53 is ENVELOP, for COCOON

Summarizing again:

stuck, 1 - 21, Attached
backroom, 1 - 28, Bookworm
memory, 1 - 36, Medley
head, 1 - 45, Leader
Immune, 1 - 78, Cocoon

bibliophile, 2 - 5, Bookworm
feeder, 2 - 8, Leader
bearing, 2 - 13, Poise
unmatched, 2 - 21, Attached
edifying, 2 - 34, Enticing

column, 3 - 9, Cocoon
appealing, 3 - 16, Enticing
tell, 3 - 25, Hell
jay, 3 - 36, Joy
assortment, 3 - 64, Medley
boys, 3 - 81, Poise

hail, 4 - 1, Hell
linear, 4 - 4, Leader
splicing, 4 - 8, Enticing
hookworm, 4 - 16, Bookworm
delight, 4 - 64, Joy

inferno, 5 - 43, Hell
asteroid, 5 - 47, Attached
envelop, 5 - 53, Cocoon
peace, 5 - 59, Poise
deadly, 5 - 61, Medley
deploy, 5 - 71, Joy
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[Suspence]

I'm expecting the solution to come from each of the numbers in the series that aren't used for each letter. It's heading towards:

THROW GRAMMAR (or POLITENESS) OUT THE WINDOW.

Meaning the solution to Blinkenlights uses:

INSPECTORS / GUARDIANS / and either GRAMMAR or POLITENESS

EDIT:

PROTECTORS seems to work. Rhymes with INSPECTORS, synonym of GUARDIANS, matches first/last/length with POLITENESS.

So:

For Betsy Johnson, call in THROW GRAMMAR OUT THE WINDOW.

For Blinkenlights, call in PROTECTORS

Still ready to skip the current puzzle, though...
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[LordKinbote]

[LordKinbote]

Let's head over to Critic #2: Charles Lutwidge Dodgson.

Investigator's Report

This critic puzzle reuses the following answers:

ENUMERATE
OCTOPOD
VESTIGE
SO CLOSE

It also introduces 8 new puzzles, in no particular order.

Here's the first: Audio Games by Michael Constant

[Suspence]

For Audio Games, all but one seems familiar, but I can only ID the easiest one. #7 is Super Mario Bros, sounds like Level 1-1.

Unfortunately, Shazam isn't helping me
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[gftt*]

Can't help much with Audio Games - was never big into video games. I do find it extremely suspicious that the audio files are all 26 seconds long, however - does this mean that one is supposed to identify a major event in each gameplay audio selection and find which second it occurs in? Good luck if so.

On Zugzwaang, I'm quite sure I could have completed it given the Arimaa aha. Shall I go ahead and do so even though I saw the answer?

[LordKinbote]

[gftt*]

Fair enough. I'm stumped on the Okla-Holmes-a meta, though. 6/7 answers, each of length 6-8 letters, two that are two-word phrases. I got nothing.

Looking at the Dodgson meta, it is going to require pretty much all 12 answers to make progress, it seems like. Charles Lutwidge Dodgson is Lewis Carroll's real name, btw. (Haven't we already seen Carroll? I guess that puzzle's answer shows up here, appropriately enough.)

[Suspence]

Just to get the Okla-Holmes-A meta here for ease:

1. CARPAL
2. THE SOUTH
3. STERNO
4. BYLINE
5. SO CLOSE
6
7. VESTIGE

I''m assuming the numbering is important somehow.
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[LordKinbote]

[LordKinbote]

[gftt*]

I guess the other thing to think about would be how Oklahoma or Sherlock Holmes might lead to a meta (in the same way that circuses led to the Circus Line meta - 3 rings for 3 O's). I don't know the Holmes canon very well, though - is there a group of 7 objects somewhere in there?

[Suspence]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0075194/
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[Gomez*]

For the Oklaholmesa meta, Each answer can be broken down into periodic elements (C Ar P Al, for example). Not sure what to do with that, though.

[Suspence]

Get the atomic numbers would be my first thought.

C Ar P Al
6 18 15 13
F R O M

Th Es O U Th
90 99 8 92 90

S Te Rn O
16 52 86 8

B Y Li Ne
5 39 3 10

S O Cl O Se
16 8 17 8 34

???
???

V Es Ti Ge
23 99 22 32

So CARPAL gives FROM. Doesn't seem like a coincidence. I'm not sure what to do with the rest. Trying mod26 with these doesn't get me anything intelligible.
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[gftt*]

At least I was sort of on the right track: "Elementary, my dear Watson."

[Scurra]

Coming back to this after a break, I can now see what at least some of the trick is, although I can't quite make out the final answer.

I am impressed by the "aha" that spotted the elements though - I can't see anything that really points to it, although I grant you that "elementary, dear Watson" is a fine clue; it just seems a bit like hindsight in action.

Anyway, it's all in the numbers. There is one number in each set that doesn't really match with the others, and the first three spell out C - O - Rn - Y, which looks promising for an Oklahoma! reference.
Can anyone else fill in the rest?
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_{still Quiz Olympiad champion. Must get a life.
New definitions: COFFEE - someone who is coughed upon}