Here’s hoping that there are some other fans out there… I am no expert, but enjoy the mental gymnastics that crosswords offer. I have recently graduated to cryptic clues (nowhere near The Times standard yet) and enjoy the sense of satisfaction that you get when you finaly solve them.
So, here’s a thread for you to post your puzzlers in so that the collective mind of the Teeming Millions can come to your aid, or to simply post those clues that tickled your fancy.
Ooh! I love crosswords. I’m a pro Scrabble player, so I absolutely ace any of the anagram clues, but I’m a bit shakier on the other ones. Are there any good free cryptics on the web? My only source is my subscription to Games magazine.
This might not be what you want, Opus1, but there’s a puzzle website that I frequent where there’s a discussion forum dedicated to visitor-submitted puzzles. One thread in particular is a running cryptic thread. If you like cryptics, it’s fun to page through. The thread is much like this one (but a lot longer), only they have a dummy user name, with the password set as the answer to the current cryptic. Answer the cryptic, get the password, and post your own under the dummy name. There’s some additional cryptics in their archives, but you’ll have to search.
How bizarre. I do a cryptic crossword every lunchtime and this very day came back intending to start a SD thread on the topic (usually I’m left with one annoying clue, which was to be the basis of the thread, though today I finished it).
Coincidence or what?
Best clue today, in my opinion:
Devestated brother with two men securing organ (6-7).
I must say, it’s more fun setting the clues than answering them. I use a computer program (link on my site) to do the tedious work of putting words into the frame (you can add your own words - I include quite a lot of Hong Kong-related words). The program helps you do anagrams and so on. But obviously you write the clues yourself. It takes a bit of effort to maintain a consistent standard of easiness/difficulty.
Guiltless
But danged if I can figure Hemlock’s out. I did searches on some really strange combinations of words, thinking that maybe it was a Hong Kong thing (perhaps a non-Yank sports reference?), but haven’t come up with anything yet.
As a relative newcomer to the cryptic game, can I ask people to give a few words of explanation when they solve… Herculean and guiltless I see, but I’m not sure why there should be two men in Devestated brother…
Generally (but not always) the clues are two-part - the actual clue (that you might find in a quick crossword) and the cryptic bit. The cleverness on the part of the crossword setter is to make the two halves add up. There are official words for these bits, but I can’t remember what they are (and I’m junior-intermediate when it comes to solving clues, too). Anyway though, the simple one I got:
Humming sailors with a pungent preparation
Humming = smelling (smelly)
Sailors = salts (slang term)
with a = filler words
Pungent preparation = smelling salts.