Clue review: Results from the Gametime cluing activity, and the divide between two Tango trains of thought

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In a previous newsletter, we had a cluing contest and I asked you to clue the word STAR. Here are some notable ones:

[___ crossed lovers] (Renée Padmore ): The last clue roundup started with a fill-in-the-blank Shakespeare quote, and this one keeps the tradition going.

[Often used in lieu of a bullet] (CJ C. ): As in bulleted lists, where stars (*) are sometimes used as symbols to denote items. In a fun touch, this clue was presented in a list of other clues — the list, of course, using stars as bullets.

[Rats walking backwards?] (Samuel Sanker ): This one’s fun, requiring you to interpret the clue literally — ”RATS” backwards is “STAR.” The literalism reminds me of cryptic crosswords , where wordplay like this is a staple. In fact, cryptic crosswords in newspapers have used a similar find before: the Daily Telegraph used [Expression of annoyance from celebrity performing U-turn] to clue RATS, where “Expression of annoyance” is the definition of RATS, and “celebrity performing U-turn” hints that you take a word for celebrity (STAR) and spell it backwards.

[At least one found on a Hollywood walk] (Charles Gaffney ): Referencing the stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame . I learned a lot about the Walk of Fame while writing up this clue — for example, did you know Muhammad Ali’s star is the only one to be mounted on a wall instead of the ground (he didn’t want people walking on his name), and that the Apollo 11 astronauts have moon-shaped plaques on the Walk of Fame??

[Michael Keaton in “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice,” or Betelgeuse] (Dan P. ): This clue was one of my favorites, using two definitions of STAR, tied together in a funny and relevant way.

I’d also like to shout out the clues [It can fall] (Lew Gordon ), [Night twinkler] (Jill Salter ), and [It brings life to canvas, rhythm to sound, and stories to the stage] (Frances B ), which show the wide range of senses you can bring out with a clue. You can be tricky, factual, or poetic — a lot of ways to go with just a four-letter word as the starting point.

?? Pinpoint: The Tuesday, October 15 things associated with pirates puzzle (clues “Parrot,” “Hook,” “Eye patch,” “Skull and crossbones,” “Walking the plank”) was by far the easiest of the group, with a solve rate of 93.5%. The average number of clues needed for that puzzle was just 2.3, indicating that solvers caught on between “hook” and “eye patch,” with a lot of commenters noting that “eye patch” in particular was a big help in getting them across the finish line. All in all, I’m just glad to see so many people talking like a pirate in the comments. Yar!

The Wednesday, October 16 things that require two people puzzle (“Duet,” “Handshake,” “See-saw,” “Singles tennis game,” “Tango (according to a saying)”) was a fun one, with a shout-out to our newest game, Tango. A list of some other things that require two people, which didn’t make the Pinpoint list for various reasons):

• Turning missile keys
• Running a three-legged race
• Playing It Takes Two

• Making a thing go right, according to Rob Base & DJ E-Z Rock

Play today’s Pinpoint?

?? Crossclimb: The Monday, October 14 puzzle ending with two pieces of fishing equipment (where one is tied onto the other) (HOOK/LINE) was the easiest puzzle of the week, with a solve rate of 94.8%. Of the clues, [Sound of a bike horn] seemed like it was the most commented-on, with some guesses of TOOT, BEEP, RING, et cetera. My favorite was the person who accidentally wrote HORN.

In the comments for Wednesday’s puzzle, @Aaron Augello writes, “Problem: Typically three to four of the clues are easy while one is hard and very knowledge domain-specific. Solution: Order words as you go to reverse-engineer that last one if you need!” This is a great tip — use the format of the puzzle to help you figure out words you may not know. Crosswords help you do this by having the words intersect, so if you don’t know a particular answer, you can try filling in the answers crossing it to help. In the same vein, the format of Crossclimb gives you valuable information (words that share all letters but one with your target word), so it’s a very good idea to use that information to help you solve.

Play today’s Crossclimb?

?? Queens: The story of Queens difficulty is normally similar from week to week: most days stay within the same difficulty range, except for one day on the weekend when the average solve time ratchets up to twice the normal average. This week, though, things were quite different. The average solve times for the Friday October 11, Saturday October 12, and Sunday October 13 puzzles were actually decreasing, with 3 minutes 29 seconds, 3 minutes 26 seconds, and 3 minutes 17 seconds, respectively. In fact, the Thursday October 10 puzzle was harder than all those puzzles, with an average solve time of 3 minutes 57 seconds.?

The Wednesday puzzle also gave some resistance, though if you know where to look, you can place a Queen after one reasonably findable deduction. Here’s the grid:

The deduction comes from the bottom three rows, using a strategy we’ve seen in a previous newsletter . Since the bottom row is entirely made of three colors, we know those three regions’ Queens are all in the three bottom rows. This means we can X out any cell in those regions that isn’t part of the bottom three rows.?

If you look at the fourth row from the bottom, we can see that there’s only one available place for a Queen! This is a great example of how knowing just a few strategies can help you make easy progress in your Queens game.

Play today’s Queens

?? Tango: Tango’s still pretty new, so it’s tough to talk about how difficult puzzles play from day to day — after all, it might take some time for some people to get used to the ruleset. I do want to talk about the Tuesday, October 15 puzzle, which played a little tough (though the solve rate was still at a very respectable 86.7%). I really enjoy the share object, which shows the first five correct placements you made. This works especially well for this puzzle, since Tango allows for a number of different initial approaches that all approach the same solution. For Tuesday’s puzzle in particular, I saw two prevailing approaches. The first placed all the cells that broke up potential three-in-a-row placements, then broke up the potential three-in-a-row placements that those first placements forced.

The second approach placed the first two cells by the same logic as in the previous approach (first moon blocks the two suns, and the sun placed afterward blocks the two moons), but uses the “=” sign to inform the third placement. The next two placements block the resulting three-in-a-row opportunities.

In our work Slack, there were comments on the divide between “horizontal brain vs vertical brain.” I personally landed on Team Vertical, but there were good arguments for both sides. How did you solve it?

Play today’s Tango

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This week’s topic: ??Arin Goldsmith Wins Week 3 of LinkedIn Games: Top Voice Duel! ??

Week 3 has wrapped up, and Arin Goldsmith , Top Voice and Senior Talent Marketing specialist at Blizzard, has claimed victory! This time, she outplayed two-time reigning champ Bill Young in a very close match-up and fierce competition across ?? Queens, ?? Pinpoint, ?? Crossclimb, and our newest game ?? Tango.

Now, as we move into Week 4, Arin is set to take on her next Top Voice challenger — Jesus Romero, M.Eng, PMP, CSM ! Stay tuned for an exciting showdown, and catch all the updates in the next Game Time Newsletter.

Think you can keep up with the Top Voices? Play along on LinkedIn Games and see how you rank.

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