Listener 4233: Elementary By Wan

[emcee]

Good grief, I can't believe I'm starting this thread off!

I thought this was an excellent puzzle by Wan. Very clever how the clues read on the surface and still produce real words after the adjustments.

The hardest part was to ensure there weren't any discrepancies in the use of the elements -- there are a couple of traps I found where I thought "I can't use that, I've already used it". It does all work out in the end.

Many thanks, Wan. A tough but entertaining puzzle.

[SwissWavey]

Sorry to ask for a tip, but I think I'm missing something. Are the swapped elements always in clue pairs? The 2 elements in 7 down, for example, are fairly obvious but I can't find any other clue which could swap them the other way.
Am I being blind, stupid or both?

[contendo]

They're not in pairs, SwissWavey. Think more in terms of a chain.

[dr b]

I'm not sure I completely understand your question, but...

Each clue has one and only one element removed, and it is not the case that clues swap elements directly. That is, if the element removed from 1A is inserted into 1D, it is not necessarily the case that the element removed from 1D is inserted into 1A.

However, every removed element is inserted into some other clue in the puzzle.

[SwissWavey]

Thanks folks, I had been assuming incorrectly, as soon as I got that out of my head I was able to complete the grid quickly. I only had 6 answers when I posted the question, including 6 and 16, and they looked like a straight swap.
I've finished now and I've found the two rows so that makes this the 2nd ever Listener that I've completed (last week was my first).
A lot of fun.

I now need to find the other neat 'element' that people have been referring to.

[SwissWavey]

I've just re-read the posts and think I got the wrong end of the stick - so thankfully won't spend time looking for something that isn't there.

I had the contents of the 2 highlighted rows before I even started, that gave me 35 without looking at the clue! Nice that the set of 24 letters was split exactly in half.

[Whenland]

Even though, like others, we thought we had the name of the creator before solving any clues actually finding the correct rows proved very difficult. Whilst grid staring, we began to wonder whether the concept of transforming elements could be extended further. For example Uranium can change to Thorium by Alpha decay and Carbon to Nitrogen by Beta decay. I wonder if there might be a way of incorporating this into a future Listener? jim360 will know what we're on about.

[Philoctetes]

Thankyou Whenland, but we have quite enough "science" in the Listener as it is. Perhaps we could have a puzzle where answers have to be entered as their Indo-European root (or Oriental equivalent), or modulated from Doric to Hypomyxolydian mode.

[borealis]

Late but pursuing; lovely clues, excellent two-letter alterations, good fun! Got about eight wrong and had to change them at the end by following the chain.
Many thanks, Wan.

[jim360]

Ah, Whenland - a challenge!

[Cloverjo]

Has anyone completed Wan's puzzle "Act 1" in this month's Magpie? I can't get a handle on it at all. Only two clues that I'm sure of plus three that I'm unsure of.

[Whenland]

Philoctetes - too much science? Impossible, I'd say! Seriously though, what's good about a good Listener is that it works well on different levels and the occasional science based one is good, surely. My all-time favourite was the one based on Maxwell's demon.

[NickorWan]

Thanks very much for your kind comments.

As has been raised on here there was a flaw in the puzzle in that solvers could fill the grid without necessarily resolving every element swap and some might consider it a chore to do so whilst others may even choose not to do so. I confess that I didn’t consider this aspect when setting and just assumed that solvers would want to parse each and every clue. The editors of course spotted the flaw but decided to go with it anyway because of course there was no easy fix as such and I assume they enjoyed the solve even with this flaw and thought others would too. I hope that they were proved right.

Someone else mentioned that it was a shame that the elements didn’t complete a full chain and I confess that was never the intention, only that each was in the wrong place, though looking at it now I think that would have been a better idea.

I also feel that I could have done much better with the endgame and somehow made the grid into part of the periodic but I am a novice setter with much to learn and often have better ideas after the event! With that in mind your comments are very valuable feedback so thanks again.

I hope to meet you again here or in another thread.

Best wishes

Wan