Listener No 4237 Restitution By Schadenfreude

[trux]

Very well crafted grid with some devilish elements. Clues not too difficult but quite a lot of cold solving required before one can start hazarding any sort of gridfill. Much enjoyed the PDM after which relatively quick progress to the end. This type of cipher device seems to be becoming a bit of a trademark for SF. Many thanks for the work-out. Back to the golf!

[Ruthrobin]

Yes, there was rather a lot of cold-solving but this was most satisfactory in the end. As usual, I have learnt something new. Many thanks, Schadenfreude.

[jim360]

As far as I can make out I have a full grid but my correct letters seem to spell gobbledygook! Been a bit of a grind so far but I expect once the PDM comes it will be all worth it.

[Ruthrobin]

Yes it will jim360 - say no more! We were exactly where you are not long ago!

[jim360]

And it was worth it! Though the decoding process was a bit of a grid too, a nice theme and learned something new - or indeed two things!

[AHearer]

Quite delightful. How splendid that the causes of the losses had just the right number of letters -- and how brilliant of Schadenfreude to spot it. What a contrast to last week: here the construction is superb AND there are rewards for the solver right up to the end.

[Grubb]

Just right! A slow solve but the grid fill and endgame came smoothly. Very enjoyable.

[TheBear69]

Yes, this was first rate in every respect.

[perseverer]

Perhaps just a little too much cold solving needed for my liking, but all in all an outstanding puzzle.

[upsetter]

Grid filled and instruction obeyed but can't help feeling that one of the correct letters is out of sequence

[tilbee]

2 hours in, 30 clues cold solved but still nothing firmly entered into the grid. Time to sit back and do some futher analsyis before considering the remaining 6 methinks.

[tilbee]

Or even further analysis.

[tilbee]

Reading the rubric a bit more carefully I soon saw the error of my ways, and just now have the deciphering of the final instruction to complete. However I do have the same concern as upsetter so I must still be missing something.

[tilbee]

Ok finally all completed. Agree with previous comments that this was an outstanding piece of setting and a most enjoyable challenge. So many thanks to Schadenfreude.

Just the one nagging issue to justify for total final satisfaction.

[perseverer]

I think I have all 26 letters in the right order but am a bit dubious about how I got the second last of them

[jim360]

Given a few of the rows about technology use in crosswords it's nice, too, to have a code that really needs to be solved by hand. All around a great puzzle, thanks, SchadenFreude.

[Scorpius]

For the benefit of tilbee and upsetter, none of the letters is out of sequence, though I initially thought so.
A typical Schadenfreude puzzle, elegantly constructed with a theme that was beautifully exploited. The clues, as always, were very fair.
This was one of those occasions when a crossword compiler proved very helpful. I guessed where the blank entries might be, and when I blanked those off in a Symphony grid I found that the statistical read-out matched the correct number of each entry length as given in the clues. Once my guess was confirmed, filling in the 24 answers I had so far was a doddle.

[Cruncher]

Yup Scorpius, I did that too and made it much easier. Puzzled about my answer for the Jody clue - guess I'm missing some reference there. Likewise didn't know half this history. Many thanks

[tilbee]

Still don't see this. I cannot find another justification for the wordplays that puts the letters in the correct order. Since I am fairly confident (maybe misguidedly) I have the correct solution, and in any case I do not submit, would be grateful for any explanation at [email protected].

[tilbee]

Cancel that. Literally seconds after posting suddenly realised the explanation (post delayed only by Windows deciding it needed to restart my PC).

[AndrewG-S]

Was away skiing so only got around to this on the flight on the way home. Lovely grid construction and an unusual cypher which were both fun to work out. I also thought the clues were particularly well done. I did start the grid fill without too much cold solving, maybe 10-15 clues but this required a bit of a guess as to the missing elements of the grid. Overall very enjoyable. Thanks schadenfreude