Inquisitor Review of 2016-17 by Nimrod

26 comments on “Inquisitor Review of 2016-17 by Nimrod”

1. Another splendid year, perfectly summarised by JH. I’ve struggled much more than usual this year to get to the IQ having experienced a bad year from a personal point of view. Which also explains my fewer contributions to the blog comments than previous years.

   However I did manage to finish all this year’s IQs (though perhaps not always correctly….) and thanks in particular go to Gaufrid who has furnished me with electronic copies whilst I am currently out of the country for an extended period.

   I keep weekly notes when at home, starring the puzzles which stand out. Being away, I have had to rely on memory so have just spent an enjoyable hour or so reliving the year’s IQs thanks to this site’s very useful archive.

   As ever choosing is quite an ordeal; these are three lovely puzzles, 2 points each :

   1478 Toppers by Schadenfreude
   1488 Captain’s Log by Harribobs
   1495 Two’s Company by Lato

   Thanks to everyone involved in creating and maintaining a quite extraordinary range of entertainment, wit and fun throughout the year, both in print and here online at 15 squared.

2. Only started this fascinating (and addictive) puzzle in June, so missed out on the first half of the year, sadly – particularly 1487, which, being a Victoria Wood fan, I suspect I’d have loved. (Two soups, by any chance?)
   But since then I’ve been perplexed, entertained and often delighted by these clever puzzles.
   Thanks to all setters, and some very kind solvers for helpful hints when I was struggling.

   My favourite three were:
   1495 Two’s Company by Lato – 1.5 points
   1507 Confessions by Ifor – 1.5 points
   1513 Alphaperimetrical Jigsaw by Nimrod (in tribute to Araucaria) – 3 points

    

    

3. Please ignore the above post (if it’s still there), which was pasted from a Word file.

   I’ve been relatively well organised this year — not only did I find time to test-solve all but two of the Inquisitor puzzles; I also made a note of the theme in my spreadsheet, and gave each one a personal and completely subjective mark out of 10. As John has pointed out in his review, sometimes the puzzle as test-solved is not quite the same as what is eventually published, which may occasionally mean I rate one less highly than if I had solved the published version.

   When I solved Schadenfreude’s brilliant and very enjoyable Toppers (Team GB Olympic gold medallists) during last year’s Christmas break, I said it would take a hell of a lot of beating for puzzle of the year. And, despite some excellent competition, it keeps that place as far as I’m concerned.
   Others that get a ‘special mentions’ rating include:

   •  Changes by Lato (Trigger’s broom)
   •  Pallo by Ifor (April Fool letters)
   •  From A to B by Triton (tunnels and Tower Bridge)
   •  Confessions by Ifor (Clouds / Both Sides Now)
   •  Work by Schadenfreude (SOUP)
   •  CONTROL + ALT + DELETE (Tennyson: Crossing the Bar) by Ifor

   Having decided not to award points to more than one puzzle by the same setter, my allocation is:

   2½ points to Toppers by Schadenfreude
   1½ points to Confessions by Ifor
   1 point to Changes by Lato
   1 point to From A to B by Triton

   Thanks to all Inquisitor setters for the challenges and the entertainment; also to the bloggers, who do an astonishly impressive job.
   Happy setting, solving and blogging to you all in 2018.

4. Sorry to be off topic somewhat, but reading through this, interesting as it was, it really struck me how small the lettering is. I don’t need spectacles in order to read but it became a strain after a while.  I don’t know of any other website which has such small letters. May I humbly suggest this website has a little makeover for 2018 and increases the font size by one or two points? Apart from that niggle, long may this excellent website continue!

5. Tony, if you’re using a computer, press Ctrl-+ on your keyboard.

6. Thanks, jetdoc. I can increase the viewing size myself, but then I would have to reset it whenever I went to another site. I just don’t know of any other site that uses such small lettering. The BBC site and the Crossword Solver site are ideal.

7. I’ve had a free morning for my annual trawl through the year’s offerings and enjoyed every minute of reliving the trials and joys of yet another wonderful set of puzzles. The ingenuity, variety and consistency of quality just get better and better and there are so many that deserve mention. I’ve decided to spread my points more thinly this year to reflect this:

   2 points to 1476 – Contest by Lavatch – I do like the blank grids and this was a wonderful example.

   1½ points to 1480 – Bookshelf by Phi, one of my most memorable PDMs of the year

   ½ point each to the following, each of which stand out for one reason or another and exemplify all the things that make the IQ such a pleasure to anticipate each week:

   1470 – Plunder by Pointer, a classic of the misdirection genre

   1474 – Plucky Hero by eXternal, which had everything a classic Inquisitor should have

   1489 – Blank Verse by Triton, which deserves recognition for the rhyming couplet clues alone (but for much more too)

   1490 – Clue Two III by eXternal, for the ongoing inventiveness and monopoly of the maze genre

   1507 – Shift Work II by Ifor, for the most amazing construction – a memorable WOW!

   Thanks to all, setters, bloggers, editor and anyone else involved in making these pleasurable moments of escapism.

8. I think I started solving every IQ only some of the way into 2017, so sorry if I neglect anything great from the start of the year, but my favourites were: Captain’s Log, Control-Alt-Delete and Two’s Company, to which I’ll give 3, 2 and 1 points respectively, with Mirror Image as my runner-up. I’m hooked now and will keep better track of my thoughts on all 52 puzzles next year!

9. As OPatrick says @7, so many puzzles deserve to be noted – my points are also spread thinly.
   So 1 point to each of
   1496 Charybdis Best Friend
   1470 Pointer Plunder
   and ½ point each to
   1473 Serpent Toast
   1475 eXtent 13-1
   1493 Ifor Four in a Row
   1499 Triton From A to B
   1508 Gila A Big Sell
   1516 eXtent One in Pieces
   1490 eXternaal Clue Two III: Hide and Seek
   1512 Ploy Boom and Bust

   Thanks once again to all involved.

10. I started marking the puzzles out of ten in 2016 to make the year-end selection easier and this year I gave 9.5 to one by Triton and 9 to three others, all by Ifor, who therefore wins whatever is the cruciverbal equivalent of the Golden Boot. Translated into points for this exercise it looks like this:

    3 for Blank Verse

    1 each for Four In A Row, Confessions and CONTROL + ALT + DELETE

    Like jetdoc’s scoring mine is “completely subjective” and looking at my leaderboard now it is very clear that I tend to award higher marks if the subject of the puzzle interests me.

    Honourable mention, as ever, to Schadenfreude, whose half dozen puzzles every year are always ingeniously constructed with tough but fair clues and unambiguous endgames. Toppers was his best of the year and just missed my top three.

    Thanks to everyone involved in setting and editing another superb batch of puzzles and also to the person in Derry Street who pulled the envelope from Mrs T and me out of the hat three times for the second year running!

     

     

     

     

11. I would like to allocate my points as follows:

    1476 Contest by Lavatch  3 points

    1482 Changes by Lato  2 points

    1478 Toppers by Schadenfreude  1 point

    Thanks to the editorial team, solvers, bloggers and setters. Looking forward to some great stuff this year.

12. Having been officially branded an “Only Connect” addict, I thought I ought to cheer on “The Inquisitors”  last night, thinking that La Bella Rossa might be flying the flag for us, like she did on Hive Minds … but it seemed that their team name was purely coincidental, which made their losing less traumatic.

    These days, I can barely remember the content of crosswords from more than a couple of weeks ago, but I do remember being highly tickled by both Two Soups and memories of Manuel, so am pleased to award:

    2 points each to :   Eclogue’s 1487

    Schadenfreude’s 1518

    Plus the remaining 2 points to

    Ploy’s 1512, for reminding me of a very brave man.

    I am looking forward (NOT !) to the “Playfair carte blanche without word lengths” which our editor promised me was in the pipeline !

13. Thanks to John for a great summary and to all of the setters for once again providing such imaginative and engaging weekly entertainment. My year-on-year improvement continues: I managed to complete 35 this year, including my first ever jigsaw, and a couple of wins to boot 🙂

    My points are as follows:

    2pts = 1503 (Are you being served?)

    1pt each for:

    1478 Toppers

    1475 13-1

    1488 Captain’s Log

    1516 One in Pieces

     

    Thanks again and best wishes for 2018

14. The annual task of reviewing the year’s IQ offerings stimulates pleasurable memories of many hours well spent in many different places. I unfortunately had to miss the Manchester get together to mark IQ 1500 but a compensating highlight was Tom Johnson’s (Doc, Maskerade and others) 70th birthday dinner, the following week-end. I would like to award my points as follows:
    1488 Captains Log Harribobs 3 points
    1490 Clue Two III eXternal 2 points
    1482 Changes Lato 1 point
    I look forward to 2018’s challenges

15. Thanks to all for a year of excellent puzzles (and blogs). For various reasons I didn’t attempt them all, but from the ~40 that I did have a go at, I would award 1.5 points each to:

    1476 Contest by Lavatch

    1478 Toppers by Schadenfreude

    1480 Bookshelf by Phi

    1488 Captain’s Log by Harribobs

    Of course, I enjoyed plenty of the other puzzles but these happened to be the ones that particularly grabbed me due to either the subject matter and/or the devices involved. All the best to everyone for 2018.

16. Another excellent year of puzzles, many of which – as usual – I started and failed to finish. It’s been a pleasure re-reading all the blogs. My points as follows:

    3pts – Captain’s Log by Harribobs
    I’ve just spent 15 minutes trying to get my head round how this one worked, then read my comment stating I did exactly the same thing back in May! I described it as ‘next level clever’ then, and that still stands. Outstanding stuff.

    1.5pts – Bookshelf by Phi
    A very nice theme, very cleverly worked. 

    1.5pts – Work by Schadenfreude
    Because I’m a sucker for a nicely highlighted final grid (which means Shadenfreude is pretty much guaranteed to get some points from me every year!)

    Many thanks to all fellow setters for the fun and inspiration, JH and the team for all the hard work behind the scenes and all bloggers/commentators for the excellent write-ups and feedback. Here’s to 2018!

     
    Ali/Gila

17. I attempted every one of the IQs last year, which was a first for me.  I even finished some of them. Yay!

    I remember that once in a desperate attempt to catch up I did three puzzles in one day.  A real mental bruising that was, and a lesson to make an effort to keep more up to date.

    I apologise for not giving any points this year. They were all excellent in their way and it would be unfair to the setters to pick puzzles at random. So often a puzzle feels special just because a theme is familiar.  For me this isn’t much of a reason to award it points.  For example a puzzle might be either brilliant or a flop depending on your personal TV viewing habits.  Generally speaking collating scores for puzzles like this promotes uniformity rather than brilliance.  The high scoring puzzles are those with the widest appeal, not necessarily the best individual puzzles.

    Regardless, thank you to all involved for producing such a wonderful series of puzzles.

    JH – you may inform your editor that on the strength of this puzzle series I have taken a subscription to the i newspaper (and dumped the Guardian).

18. JH – you may inform your editor that on the strength of this puzzle series I have taken a subscription to the i newspaper (and dumped the Guardian)

    You’re not the only one!

    I’m not saying this to be unkind to the Guardian, more suggesting to them that they could lure me back with a sufficiently good weekly barred puzzle 🙂

19. Thanks again to all IQ setters (and the Editor!) for another great year of puzzles. It gets harder to choose every time, and this year I’ve broken with my tradition of awarding one point to each of six – this time, like OPatrick, I’ve spread my votes more thinly, so there are ten that get half a point each:

    1474 Plucky Hero by eXternal

    1477 Why by Chalicea

    1482 Changes by Lato

    1489 Blank Verse by Triton

    1493 Four in a Row by Ifor

    1494 Mirror Image by Serpent

    1510 Work by Schadenfreude

    1512 Boom and Bust by Ploy

    1513 Alphaperimetrical Jigsaw by Nimrod

    1519 Space Invaders by Shark

    and one point for my 2017 favourite:

    1520 NOTCH by Encota

20. Thanks to John and his team for all their hard work over the year.  2017 provided another excellent crop of IQ puzzles and I’ve found it very difficult to decide how to allocate my points.  In the end, I decided to award one point to each of the following puzzles:

    1476 Contest by Lavatch

    1482 Changes by Lato

    1488 Captain’s Log by Harribobs

    1490 Clue Two III by eXternal

    1495 Two’s Company by Lato

    1517 Control + Alt + Delete by Ifor

21. 2 pts each

    1476 Contest – Lavatch

    1480 Bookshelf – Phi

    1490 Clue Two II – eXternal

22. My choices, mainly on the basis of memories stirred:

    1478 Toppers – 2 points

    1482 Changes – 1 point

    1487 Delivery – 1 point

    1494 Mirror Image – 1 point

    1518 Establishment – 1 point

23. Hi John. thanks for everything during 2017 – both Inquisitor related and otherwise.

    Here are the votes from the Donegal-based jury:
    1507 Sealobair II: admháil. trí phointe – Shift Work II: Confessions. Three points (3)
    1494 Íomhá Mirror. dhá phointe – Mirror Image. Two points  (2)
    1488 Logáil isteach an Chaiptein. pointe amháin – Captain’s Log. One point (1)

    With apologies (on behalf of Google Translate) to any Irish speakers of which I am not one.

24. Just in time to stick my halfpenny worth in:

    Ctrl + Alt + Del – Ifor – 3 points

    Work – Schadenfreude – 1 point

    Mirror Image – eXtent – 1 point

    Best Friend – Charybdis – 1 point

     

    Thanks to all setters and bloggers for another great year of puzzles

25. Joyce had great trouble choosing but in the end singled out 6 puzzles so 1 point to each please.

    1495 Two’s Company Ifor
    1478 Toppers Schadenfreude
    1507 Shift Work II Ifor
    1482 Changes Lato
    1488 Captain’s Log Harribobs
    1493 Four in a Row Ifor

    It wasn’t until Joyce listed them, that she realised that 3 out of the 6 were compiled by Ifor. A special thanks then to Ifor for all the fun and enjoyment.

    Thanks also to all the IQ setters and bloggers – and you too John for bringing it all together!

26. Bert also had a major problem narrowing the field down from a brilliant year. If he went through the puzzles another time, he’d probably come up with a different set, but this evening he’s ended up with four puzzles with top marks, so 1.5 points each to:

    1480 Bookshelf / Phi

    1488 Captain’s Log / Harribobs

    1495 Two’s Company / Lato

    1507 Shift Work II / Ifor

    Many thanks to all the IQ setters and bloggers for another year of weekend fun and especially to John for saving the IQ from oblivion!

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