Puzzle Night – Season 2 Night 2

The journey through the newspaper continues with a stop at the weather pages.

Code Sheet

Location Puzzle – Horoscopes!

Hint 1

The columns where the astrological signs above and below DON’T match may be important.
Hint 2

Each of the horoscopes have things in common with other horoscopes…
Hint 3

Pairs of horoscopes will use the same word in the same position – check the first letters of all of these pairs.
Solution

Find all of the places where the same word is used in multiple horoscopes in the same position. These will also each be in the same place that the astrological signs on the top and bottom DON’T match. Take the first letter of each of these word pairs.
For example: Look/Look (the first words of two horoscopes) = L, a/a (in the fourth position, the word ‘a’ is used in two separate horoscopes) = A, key/key = K, etc.
Taking the first letters of these pairs, you get L A K E M O N S T E R B R E W E R Y. Lake Monster Brewery. That’s where the event was!

Puzzle 1, Collection

Hint 1

Match each picture to a clue on a side of a collection beaker. Think of missing words that can complete the hint.
Hint 2

The missing words are 3 separate types of precipitation, and each 2 of the six beakers utilize one precipitation word.
Hint 3

That picture is ‘eighties’ and clues the Paul’s Boutique song ‘Hey Ladies’ using the ‘hail’ beaker. Once all connections are matched, count the droplets contained in the resulting polygons.
Solution

FLAKES.
Walkthrough

The trick is figuring out what you are not being told. ‘From the sound of it’ implies some wordplay. Some of these matches are more obvious than others. It’s also not entirely clear what all three types of ‘precipitation’ are, which can add some confusion at first. But the droplets at least should suggest rain.
Some of the easier break-ins are: ‘UK-rain’ for former USSR country, and ‘hail-o’ or ‘hail mary’. The full list of matches, in beaker order:
hail-mary (hail mary)
hail-o (helo)
snow-urkel (snorkel)
snow-cone (sno-kone)
UK-rain (Ukraine)
rain-bow (rainbow)
snow-ring (snoring)
snow-ball (snowball)
x-hail (exhale)
hail-eighties (Hey Ladies)
rest-rain (restrain)
ref-rain (refrain)

Once the matches are made, you can seal off each beaker by drawing the final line in the polygon. This defines a shape that contains a number of droplets. Count the droplets. As hinted by the ’26 inches’ measurement in the beakers, the number should be converted to a letter. So in the end, the beakers contain the following amounts:
6, 12, 1, 11, 5, 14
Which in letters is:
F L A K E S

Flakes, which is the answer.

Puzzle 2 page 1 page 2, Clouds

Hint 1

In general, cycling through the following strategies should help: try to satisfy numbers, don’t allow 2×2 blocks, make sure that an ‘escape’ or ‘connection’ path connecting all clouds is guaranteed, and make sure that your ‘storm’ clouds can fit properly. Be careful – note that no storm block can be placed adjacent to a clued (number) block due to their constraints.
Hint 2

The bottom left square of the grid and the upper left square of the grid are both storm blocks.
Hint 3

On page 2, your radio stations should be at the intersection of the following multi-word items: The White Stripes (T), John Lennon (N), Jimi Hendrix (I), Howard Stern (R), Buddy Holly (Y), Cab Calloway (C), and Beach Boys (B). Remember that each diagonal of a radio station can be charge only once.
Solution

VOLTAGE.
Walkthrough

The logic puzzle is not simple, and does require knowledge of all of the logical rules at play. The general flow should start at the bottom left corner, and build a path that moves right and through the middle. Eventually, there will be fewer options for places that Storm blocks can go, and this should fuel progress through the bottom right corner of the grid and upward. Also, note that the 4-2 blocks at the top, trickily, require the two blocks between them and the upper 2 block. Finally, the upper left and upper right should be determined by the remaining Storm blocks.

On page 2, the word search should result in the following ‘stations’: The White Stripes (T), John Lennon (N), Jimi Hendrix (I), Howard Stern (R), Buddy Holly (Y), Cab Calloway (C), and Beach Boys (B).
If you enter the lightning bolts onto the grid, carried over from the previous page, you can start drawing diagonal lines between them and the stations. If you draw diamonds around the stations like in the example, it’s easier to determine how many ‘touches’ each station has by lightning.
From top to bottom:
T – 2 touches
N – 1 touch
I – 3 touches
R – 2 touches
Y – 2 touches (note that 3 lightnings are in the diagonals, but 2 are in the same direction form the station)
C – 4 touches
B – 3 touches

T + 2 = V
N + 1 = O
I + 3 = L
R + 2 = T
Y + 2 = A (this wraps around the alphabet, which may not have been obvious)
C + 4 = G
B + 3 = E

VOLTAGE, which is the answer. And matches our thunderstorm theme!

Puzzle 3, Heat

Hint 1

The names of the counties are where you should start looking. Are there any missing words that could help you make sense or patterns of these counties?
Hint 2

You should find names that you can add ‘Hot’, ‘Cold’ and ‘Zero’ to. After you find some of these, you should be able to form some groups based on the list in the lower left corner – but there’s also a spatial component you should be aware of – try to make some sense of the ‘Temperature Triangulator’.
Hint 3

Each category should have 3 items (make sure you have the full names of the items), one of which is a ZERO, and the others are either HOT or COLD. The ZERO should be placed in the middle of an L shape that connects the set. After this, you should think about the heat index to find your answer.
Hint 4

Reading the ‘heat index’ portion, you can translate temperatures to indices as follows: Max index = HOT and HOT, means you index into the zero by +11. Medium index = HOT and COLD, means index into the zero by +3. Min index = COLD and COLD, means index into the zero by +1.
Solution

KELVIN.
Walkthrough

There are a number of leaps here that can be tricky.
Your first area of concern should be the county names, and looking for patterns. Ideally, you should have a few associations right away and may start guessing at HOT and COLD. The ZERO entries may be more tricky, especially since they are not easy to connect to HOT and COLD without a reason, but things like Zero Sum Game or Zero Dark Thirty should be smooth. The hope is that once you start forming sets that fit in the categories on the bottom left, that things fill out easier. There is some ambiguity in the categories for things that are both books and movies, but the spatial arrangement should generally be able to disambiguate that later as the categories fill out.
The ‘Temperature Triangulator’ indicates that there is an L-shaped arrangement, where the ENDS of the L correspond to hot or cold, and the 0 at the ‘pivot’ corresponds to a ‘zero’.
NOTE also that the L shapes next to the categories correspond to the orientation of the L shape in the county map. With this information, you should be able to finish categories and draw L’s on the map defining them.

The items in categories should be:

refreshments (drinks) = HOT buttered rum, coke ZERO, COLD press coffee
diversions (games/toys) = HOT wheels, ZERO sum game, HOT potato
manuscripts (books) = COLD mountain, less than ZERO, in COLD blood
anthems (songs) = HOT blooded, love minus ZERO/no limit, stone COLD crazy
features (movies) = HOT shots, ZERO dark thirty, HOT fuzz
groups (musical acts) = HOT chip, renato ZERO, COLD play

The ‘pivotal complete named counties’ language for the heat index is referring to the ZERO item for each set. And the heat index itself is derived from the ‘temperature’ of the set. Max temperature = two HOTS = an index of ’11’
Medium temperature = one HOT one COLD = an index of ‘3’
Min temperature = two COLDS = an index of ‘1’

This ‘index’ is actual mechanically an index into the full name of that category’s ‘zero’ item.

coke zero [3] = K
zero sum game[11] = E
less than zero[1] = L
love minus zero / no limit [3] = V
zero dark thirty[11] = I
renato zero[3] = N

KELVIN, which is our answer. And also a temperature scale!

Final Puzzle, Regional Map

Hint 1

Those icons really stand out – maybe see what you can do with them. Also – did you notice the morse code?
Hint 2

You should have been able to use your previous answers to extract two words from each ‘semi-category’. These should be placed in order into the left side of the provided grid. And if you haven’t already, you should have found the morse code in the contour lines, which spell out the cryptic phrase: TRI-STATE ZONES GAIN ONE LETTER FOR FOURCAST.
Hint 3

In trying to determine what ‘Tri-state zone’ means, make use of the pressure zones on the map, and note that the ‘under pressure?’ answer phrase has six words. There are 18 arrows of three sizes on the map pointing to states.
Hint 4

The pressure lines each have three contiguous groups of three states. The first letters of the states can be used to form words, which happen to be clued by the ‘Attain Kardashian card label grain today!’ words. The sizes of the arrows even provide an ordering. Try to think of the letters that you can add to these ‘Tri-state zones’ to make ‘fourcasts’. (three letter words -> 4 letter words)
Hint 5

Making use of the words that you got from your previous answers, you should have the following sets in preparation for finding 4 letter words:
breeze
sushi
midge
kid
truck
ragged

win kim sim tag oat now

And to help you out, here’s one of them:
midge = GNAT = tag + N
Solution

DANGER.
Walkthrough

First you should use your previous answers to extract the semi-category:
breeze
sushi
midge
kid
truck
ragged
Following this, the morse code in the contour lines, read clockwise from the center out should give the instruction TRI-STATE ZONES GAIN ONE LETTER FOR FOURCAST.
You should notice the pressure front lines, and that they have arrows pointing to states. Also, note that each line has 3 giant letters and 9 states. When pulling the obvious letters from the states (the first letters), you get the following: NOWIMSNIW and OTAAGTKIM, not enough to mean much of anything. Further inspection should show that there are different sizes of arrow pointing to states, which could lead you to the ordering of these three letter words. But even if you don’t, you could get them from the clues below.
The ‘Under Pressure?’ question line at the bottom of the puzzle lists 6 words in a cryptic sentence: Attain Kardashian card label grain today! Each of these words clues one of the ‘tristate’ words. SO if we split those 9-letter strings into three, we can unscramble them to find answers.
NOW IMS NIW
OTA AGT KIM
‘Now’ is pretty good as is, for the ‘today’ clue. Same with ‘Kim’ and Kardashian.
NOW => NOW (today)
IMS => SIM (card, a sim card)
NIW => WIN (attain)
OTA => OAT (grain)
AGT => TAG (label)
KIM => KIM (Kardashian)

Finally, we can attempt to ‘add letter’ to these ‘tri-states’ to make ‘fourcasts’. One forecast reference that we already have is our list form before, which we will use as clues for this operation – breeze means wind, which is just adding a letter to ‘win’. It’s not clear from just this example, but the ‘adding a letter’ also means scrambling, which makes the task harder. But each subsequent word constrains the possibilities for future ones. Another easy break-in might be ‘oat’ -> ‘goat’.
breeze – win – wind
sushi – kim – maki
midge – tag – gnat
kid – oat – goat
truck – sim – semi

For the four-letter words, we can extract the letter that we added to produce it. This gives us
D A N G E R

Danger, which is the answer. And possibly a forecast for our future as per the clue text.

Bonus Puzzle, Global

Hint 1

What kind of temperatures are those? It doesn’t label what type of degrees those are!
Hint 2

The compass indicator on the map seems to indicate something, perhaps relating to our numbers.
Hint 3

Those dots in the squares might be important too… but what bearing do these hints have?
Solution

FLUKE.
Walkthrough

There’s a lot of numbers being presented, and times. The trick is that the degree measurements are not actually temperatures, but compass headings (as hinted by the map and the compass rose). The compass rose also indicates how to measure the degrees (starting from the right side and going counterclockwise, as is standard).
From each city’s letter, you assume that the ‘speed’ of tracing is constant, which means the time gives you a distance. So each city is drawing a letter. The accompanying boxes for each city provide a ‘dot’ from which to start the letter drawing.
The easiest letter is Seattle, which moves due West for 5 hours, then North for 7 hours. This should be a clear ‘L’ shape. So far so good. Then Denver is also easy, which goes South, then East, then North, making a crude ‘U’. The remaining letters are harder, but the follow the same rules. You should get the following:
Anchorage: F
Denver: U
Miami: E
New Orleans: K
Seattle: L
But how to arrange?
If you arrange them on the world map (or even just a a US map) based on the cities’ actual locations, it should spell FLUKE (regardless of if you go North to South or West to East)
And that’s our answer!