Mystery Caches

[+Glen Falcon Terrors]

Is there a record for how long a Mystery Cache has gone unsolved? ?

[+HHL]

Create a PQ and check "Have not been found":

https://www.geocaching.com/pocket/gcquery.aspx?guid=fc441778-5353-4f95-b2b6-01479bd128e1

And - if not obvious - check the preview and sort by placed date.

 

Hans

Edited November 5, 2018 by HHL

[+baer2006]

I know of a few which were archived after one or two years without a "public" solution (i.e., the geochecker "green" count was still at 0). And there are lots of unfound puzzle caches out there which are several years old. E.g. a search on project-gc.com for unfound mystery caches in the USA, hidden before 12/31/2016, yields 126 hits. The oldest one is GCZ19X .

 

That said, it's more or less trivial to design a puzzle, which is to all intents and purposes unsolvable. A puzzle cache, which is placed in an active cacher community (and not in the middle of nowhere) and stays unsolved for months and years, is IMHO a failure.

[+Isonzo Karst]

I'd use Search, ask for Mystery, and rank on date found.

https://www.geocaching.com/play/search?ot=4&types=8&e=1&sort=DateLastVisited&asc=True

Doing that, there are more than 1000 Mystery caches unfound. Of the first 1000 here's the oldest

 

https://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GCZ19X

[+J Grouchy]

6 hours ago, baer2006 said:

That said, it's more or less trivial to design a puzzle, which is to all intents and purposes unsolvable. A puzzle cache, which is placed in an active cacher community (and not in the middle of nowhere) and stays unsolved for months and years, is IMHO a failure.

 

Having designed several puzzles that are very much solvable, but went unsolved for long periods, I respectfully disagree.

In fact, I still have three out there that are not yet solved, but are actually quite simple (actually, I don't have a checker on two of them because once they are solved there is absolutely no need for one).  I'd say the vast majority of folks aren't willing to put in the effort.  The only failure is on the part of the people who haven't even tried.

[+TeamRabbitRun]

24 minutes ago, J Grouchy said:

 

Having designed several puzzles that are very much solvable, but went unsolved for long periods, I respectfully disagree.

In fact, I still have three out there that are not yet solved, but are actually quite simple (actually, I don't have a checker on two of them because once they are solved there is absolutely no need for one).  I'd say the vast majority of folks aren't willing to put in the effort.  The only failure is on the part of the people who haven't even tried.

 

I agree with you, except for the last part about 'failure'. It isn't a failure on the part of a cacher who chooses to not attempt a puzzle, the failure comes when they try and don't solve it, and don't get the cache.

 

Hopefully, that failure will inspire them to try again to overcome it.

 

I don't see failure as necessarily bad. A plain DNF isn't intrinsically bad. Having one on my record, puzzle or plain, doesn't make ME a failure, just that one effort. That's why people shouldn't shy away from Puzzle Caches.

[+J Grouchy]

2 minutes ago, TeamRabbitRun said:

 

I agree with you, except for the last part about 'failure'. It isn't a failure on the part of a cacher who chooses to not attempt a puzzle, the failure comes when they try and don't solve it, and don't get the cache.

 

Hopefully, that failure will inspire them to try again to overcome it.

 

I don't see failure as necessarily bad. A plain DNF isn't intrinsically bad. Having one on my record, puzzle or plain, doesn't make ME a failure, just that one effort. That's why people shouldn't shy away from Puzzle Caches.

 

True...perhaps I didn't state it correctly.

 

I always tell folks that I enjoy creating puzzles more than solving them.  I'm actually not great at solving puzzles.

My creations aren't always successful, of course.  I've had a few that have either had errors I've had to correct after publication...or some that were solved in ways I did not foresee or through brute force.  For the most part, though, I get good feedback and learn from my mistakes.  Quite often an idea just pops into my head and I'll rush to put it together and publish.  In maybe two or three cases, it's backfired on me.  Now I tend to quickly put something together, then let it sit for a day or two and revisit it and work through to see if I missed something or if I have any errors or if perhaps there is some clearer way of presenting it.  

[+arisoft]

20 minutes ago, J Grouchy said:

Having designed several puzzles that are very much solvable, but went unsolved for long periods, I respectfully disagree.

In fact, I still have three out there that are not yet solved, but are actually quite simple (actually, I don't have a checker on two of them because once they are solved there is absolutely no need for one).  I'd say the vast majority of folks aren't willing to put in the effort.  The only failure is on the part of the people who haven't even tried.

 

I just tried but didn't find the solution any of those three unfound puzzles. ?

I have made some difficult puzzles but all of them have been found in a reasonable time.

When you described these puzzles as "much solvable" what do you mean? Evidence seems to be against this idea.

[+J Grouchy]

Just now, arisoft said:

 

I just tried but didn't find the solution any of those three unfound puzzles. ?

I have made some difficult puzzles but all of them have been found in a reasonable time.

When you described these puzzles as "much solvable" what do you mean? Evidence seems to be against this idea.

 

I mean that the methods for solving do not require any special ability or knowledge beyond what the average person ought to be able to handle.  

Some of my least favorite puzzles are those that require delving into things like flight navigation or having a better-than-average ability to identify plant or tree species...and not just being able to Google terms, but actually understanding certain subject matter to a fair degree.  I don't think any of my puzzles require such commitment or understanding.  Several may require looking up certain terms or subjects, but the puzzles themselves can be solved after doing quick searches for pertinent information.  

Basically, if I have to study for a physics final exam, I'm not going to be interested in attempting the puzzle...so I try to make my own for people with a similar mindset.

[+TeamRabbitRun]

43 minutes ago, arisoft said:

 

I just tried but didn't find the solution any of those three unfound puzzles. ?

I have made some difficult puzzles but all of them have been found in a reasonable time.

When you described these puzzles as "much solvable" what do you mean? Evidence seems to be against this idea.

 

You took twenty minutes to try to solve three puzzles, and because you didn't get the answers right away you question whether they're "much solvable"?

[+arisoft]

9 minutes ago, J Grouchy said:

I mean that the methods for solving do not require any special ability or knowledge beyond what the average person ought to be able to handle. 

 

That is a good base. The problem is that even the puzzle is easy to solve without major education it may need to guess right too many times in a row. Guessing is easy but guessing right is not easy at all. When I see a puzzle which seems to have mostly guessing, I hand over quite fast for two reasons. At first, I have experienced that most probably I can not guess correctly even if I try harder. Secondly, if I finally guess correctly, I do not feel that I solved anything. I like to follow clues which limit the guesswork to a minimum. Your beacon puzzles promised to have a visible hint. I found some potential hints but I am not sure, did I find the promised one or something else. I fear that it is just impossible for me to solve the mystery by available means.

[+arisoft]

2 minutes ago, TeamRabbitRun said:

You took twenty minutes to try to solve three puzzles, and because you didn't get the answers right away you question whether they're "much solvable"?

 

Sometimes it happens that you run out of ideas very quickly. When the puzzle is as plain as these three are, there is not very much what you can do unless you get the idea behind the puzzle.

[+J Grouchy]

7 minutes ago, arisoft said:

Your beacon puzzles promised to have a visible hint. I found some potential hints but I am not sure, did I find the promised one or something else. I fear that it is just impossible for me to solve the mystery by available means.

 

Sorry.  In my book, hand-holding through the puzzle is not giving a proper hint.  I actually gave a fair amount...about as much as I can without just coming out and saying exactly what people need to do.  In fact, I may have already hinted at how to solve it right here today.  Maybe.  Maybe not.

 

To be honest, if I look at a higher-rating puzzle and understand what to do right away, it's slightly disappointing for me.  

 

It's all very subjective. 

[+arisoft]

1 minute ago, J Grouchy said:

In fact, I may have already hinted at how to solve it right here today.  Maybe.  Maybe not.

 

I am already working on it ?

[+J Grouchy]

2 minutes ago, arisoft said:

 

I am already working on it ?

 

 

See.  That's how I deal in hint-giving.  I try to make people wonder if something I said, or some subject I touched on might be tangentially hint-ish.  In a few of my caches, hints of some form are "baked into" the entire published page...the title, the description, the theme.  It's not always just about the encrypted ROT13 line under the description field on the cache page. 

[+arisoft]

6 minutes ago, J Grouchy said:

 

 

See.  That's how I deal in hint-giving.  I try to make people wonder if something I said, or some subject I touched on might be tangentially hint-ish.  In a few of my caches, hints of some form are "baked into" the entire published page...the title, the description, the theme.  It's not always just about the encrypted ROT13 line under the description field on the cache page. 

 

Yes, I solved both Beacon mysteries. The idea was well known for me and the hint was as visible as promised. I overestimated the difficulty because those caches were not found.

[+baer2006]

1 hour ago, J Grouchy said:

 

Having designed several puzzles that are very much solvable, but went unsolved for long periods, I respectfully disagree.

In fact, I still have three out there that are not yet solved, but are actually quite simple (actually, I don't have a checker on two of them because once they are solved there is absolutely no need for one).  I'd say the vast majority of folks aren't willing to put in the effort.  The only failure is on the part of the people who haven't even tried.

Point taken and accepted. Maybe I was thinking too "Germany centric"  ... around here, we usually have several mystery geeks who give 100%+ effort to solve a puzzle, especially if it remains unsolved for some time. It's just my experience with many many puzzles, that the solvable ones are actually solved after a reasonable time. But as I said, that experience is limited to a specific region, so I retract my point that every long-unsolved riddle has "failed".

 

Actually, I was once approached to beta-test a puzzle, which was designed to be extremely difficult but solvable by logical deduction. I couldn't solve it myself (the CO didn't want to wait for months), and when presented with the solution (and the required steps to get there) I said it's way too convoluted. It was published anyway ... and was solved only after 11 months or so, after the CO had posted several notes with additional (semi-hidden) hints. I'm quite sure that it wouldn't have been solved in years without these additional nudges, even though the CO was convinced that their puzzle was perfectly "logical".

[+The A-Team]

2 hours ago, baer2006 said:

I'm quite sure that it wouldn't have been solved in years without these additional nudges, even though the CO was convinced that their puzzle was perfectly "logical".

...and that's often the root of the problem. For the person that created the puzzle, of course it's logical. Since they know exactly how the puzzle works, it's hard for them to consider how other people would approach it. Having someone beta test it like with the example you described is a great way to determine how hard it will be for the finders and learn whether assumptions have been made that no solver would. After you learned how their puzzle works and still said it's too convoluted, they shouldn't have pressed forward.

 

We had a puzzle in my area that was out for almost 2 years before GZ was destroyed by construction. Nobody ever solved it, despite a lot of time being put in. The CO posted a note at the end to put us all out of our misery and described how the puzzle worked and how their various cryptic hints should be interpreted. It turns out that the puzzle and hints were far too convoluted to be solved by anyone other than the CO. There were also some additional steps needed to get to some final coordinates even after you worked out the puzzle, with no indication that there were extra steps or what those might be, which only made this puzzle even more unsolvable. I can't say that I was sad to see this one get archived.

[+colleda]

3 hours ago, The A-Team said:

...and that's often the root of the problem. For the person that created the puzzle, of course it's logical. Since they know exactly how the puzzle works, it's hard for them to consider how other people would approach it. Having someone beta test it like with the example you described is a great way to determine how hard it will be for the finders and learn whether assumptions have been made that no solver would. After you learned how their puzzle works and still said it's too convoluted, they shouldn't have pressed forward.

 

Seven months ago I devised a Mystery cache with a puzzle I thought should not present too much difficulty to all the puzzle solvers hereabouts. I looked forward to a string of finds on it but so far have only there have been seven. As mentioned above, it seemed a logical, straightforward puzzle, to me. (I confess that I am terrible at solving puzzles and only solved a handfull of the eighty or so set prior to a local Mega event earlier this year). But I wait and hope. I guessed it as a D3, too hard perhaps?

GC7HJBE

https://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC7HJBE_formerly-violet-town

 

 

Edited November 6, 2018 by colleda
spelling typo

[+barefootjeff]

2 hours ago, colleda said:

Seven months ago I devised a Mystery cache with a puzzle I thought should not present too much difficulty to all the puzzle solvers hereabouts. I looked forward to a string of finds on it but so far have only there have been seven. As mentioned above, it seemed a logical, straightforward puzzle, to me. (I confess that I am terrible at solving puzzles and only solved a handfull of the eighty or so set prior to a local Mega event earlier this year). But I wait and hope. I guessed it as a D3, too hard perhaps?

GC7HJBE

https://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC7HJBE_formerly-violet-town

 

 

 

You're lucky, you've had seven finders. I published one (GC7J902) in February and it's only had two finders, both coming up from Sydney for it. Three more have put the correct solution into the checker, though, so there's still some hope although the checker log shows the most recent of those was two months ago.

 

As for yours, I immediately thought of a few possibilities and hit pay dirt on my third attempt, so I guess I'll have another trip up north sometime soon.

Edited November 6, 2018 by barefootjeff

[+zeze1]

First to solve GC7MZCD! Don't worry, FTF hunters, I'm about 4500 miles away :-)

[+arisoft]

6 hours ago, colleda said:

Seven months ago I devised a Mystery cache with a puzzle I thought should not present too much difficulty to all the puzzle solvers hereabouts. I looked forward to a string of finds on it but so far have only there have been seven. As mentioned above, it seemed a logical, straightforward puzzle, to me. (I confess that I am terrible at solving puzzles and only solved a handfull of the eighty or so set prior to a local Mega event earlier this year). But I wait and hope. I guessed it as a D3, too hard perhaps?

 

I just looked at this puzzle and at the first glance it seems to be something like the player should guess correct method from many possible options and try the guessed solution with the checker to find the one the CO used. My first feeling about the puzzle may be wrong but it may frighten many not to even try. I tried one method but it was not accepted by the checker.

Edited November 6, 2018 by arisoft

[+colleda]

35 minutes ago, arisoft said:

 

I just looked at this puzzle and at the first glance it seems to be something like the player should guess correct method from many possible options and try the guessed solution with the checker to find the one the CO used. My first feeling about the puzzle may be wrong but it may frighten many not to even try. I tried one method but it was not accepted by the checker.

I agree that could be a possibility. Those that have solved it so far seem to have had little difficulty.

[+Team Microdot]

10 hours ago, The A-Team said:

...and that's often the root of the problem. For the person that created the puzzle, of course it's logical. Since they know exactly how the puzzle works, it's hard for them to consider how other people would approach it.

 

And this is why handing out solutions for puzzles is a bad idea - because the CO never gets the feedback they need to be able to tune their puzzles to a state where they are solvable by logical means by those willing to invest the effort.

 

We have puzzles now in my local area where the only finder(s) have been handed the solution by the CO who classed the situation of zero finders as silly and so decided to hand-hold someone to the solution who then claimed FTF and praised the fantastic puzzle.

 

People who complain bitterly about impossible puzzles often have only themselves to blame for undermining this feedback loop.

[+NYPaddleCacher]

10 hours ago, The A-Team said:

...and that's often the root of the problem. For the person that created the puzzle, of course it's logical. Since they know exactly how the puzzle works, it's hard for them to consider how other people would approach it. Having someone beta test it like with the example you described is a great way to determine how hard it will be for the finders and learn whether assumptions have been made that no solver would. After you learned how their puzzle works and still said it's too convoluted, they shouldn't have pressed forward.

 

 

 

Agreed.   There are many puzzles out there that some describe as moon logic, or "guess what I am thinking".   For those kinds of puzzles,  the CO may consider it to be "easy" because they know how it was constructed.  Some might solve it quickly because they were able to guess, based on no clues in the puzzle what the CO was thinking.  Other might looked it for hours, days, or weeks and never guess that the CO might have been thinking.  There area also puzzles that may be very difficult to solve, simply because they consist of many layers.  There's one that took me over a month to solve that has three obvious starting points on the cache page, which upon solving only reveal another layer, and another, and another.  

[+J Grouchy]

2 hours ago, zeze1 said:

First to solve GC7MZCD! Don't worry, FTF hunters, I'm about 4500 miles away :-)

 

I wondered who that was!  Congrats.

[+baer2006]

32 minutes ago, Team Microdot said:

And this is why handing out solutions for puzzles is a bad idea - because the CO never gets the feedback they need to be able to tune their puzzles to a state where they are solvable by logical means by those willing to invest the effort.

The feedback may depend on who receives the solution. When I can't solve something, and eventually get help (or even the outright solution), I usually say either "Ok, I see now that there are subtle hints, so I should have been able to find it myself" or "How the **** was I supposed to come up with this?!" ... and by far the most cases fall into the first category (sometimes even in the more extreme form "Oh man, do I feel stupid now!").

 

36 minutes ago, Team Microdot said:

We have puzzles now in my local area where the only finder(s) have been handed the solution by the CO who classed the situation of zero finders as silly and so decided to hand-hold someone to the solution who then claimed FTF and praised the fantastic puzzle.

What kind of lame FTF is that?! For (most) puzzle caches, the whole point of the "FTF" is to solve(!) the puzzle first. One of my personal weaknesses in geocaching is that I like the "competition" to first to solve (and hopefully first to find) difficult mystery caches. And I'm always irritated, when I invest time in a puzzle, cannot come up with a solution ... and then read in the FTF log something like "after some hints from the CO I could finally solve the puzzle". I sure would be pissed off (even though I shouldn't - it's only a game) if it turned out that the CO had provided the solution to the FTF logger on a silver platter.

[+Isonzo Karst]

 

14 hours ago, baer2006 said:

I'm quite sure that it wouldn't have been solved in years without these additional nudges, even though the CO was convinced that their puzzle was perfectly "logical". 

 

Puzzle owner clearly sees the path to solution, looking in their rear view mirror. They fail to see the near infinite branching pathways from the solver's forward direction.

 

And sometimes the leap from here to there requires clairvoyance, or  personal knowledge of the CO,  or (my personal favorite, as I've witnessed it twice local to me), making the same error(s) that the CO made ;-)   

Edited November 6, 2018 by Isonzo Karst

[+Team Microdot]

3 minutes ago, Isonzo Karst said:

 

 

Puzzle owner clearly sees the path to solution, looking in their rear view mirror. They fail to see the near infinite branching pathways from the solver's forward direction.

 

And sometimes the leap from here to there requires clairvoyance, deep personal knowledge of the CO,  or (my personal favorite, as I've witnessed it twice local to me), making the same error that the CO did ?   

 

Excellent analogy ?

[+CAVinoGal]

5 hours ago, Team Microdot said:

they are solvable by logical means by those willing to invest the effort.

 

And not all cachers are willing to invest the effort.  I enjoy a good puzzle; I have some I've been working on for some time (the creator is my daughter in law, and I DON'T WANT HINTS!).  She's told me I've at least found a thread or two when she looked at my various attempts... I WANT to do it on my own!

 

OTOH, there are some I know I will never solve - and others I can do in my head.  I pick and choose.  If I know we are headed to an area with puzzles I'll pre-solve as many as I can so we can go after those when we get there.  I've got lots of puzzle piece icons on my map scattered across the state we have yet to go find!

[+Team Microdot]

5 hours ago, CAVinoGal said:

 

And not all cachers are willing to invest the effort.  I enjoy a good puzzle; I have some I've been working on for some time (the creator is my daughter in law, and I DON'T WANT HINTS!).  She's told me I've at least found a thread or two when she looked at my various attempts... I WANT to do it on my own!

 

OTOH, there are some I know I will never solve - and others I can do in my head.  I pick and choose.  If I know we are headed to an area with puzzles I'll pre-solve as many as I can so we can go after those when we get there.  I've got lots of puzzle piece icons on my map scattered across the state we have yet to go find!

 

You sound like the sort of person I used to create puzzles for.

 

Sadly, you're a rare breed.

[+colleda]

3 hours ago, Team Microdot said:

 

You sound like the sort of person I used to create puzzles for.

 

Sadly, you're a rare breed.

I'm with CAVinoGal. I don't ask for hints. I've occasionally had hints given to me by COs at events but by the time I get home I've usually forgotten them. I do it on my own or not at all (stubborn old bugger/codger/fart that I am). I do have the Cully Long book How to Puzzle Cache which is helping, a little.

[+barefootjeff]

16 minutes ago, colleda said:

I'm with CAVinoGal. I don't ask for hints. I've occasionally had hints given to me by COs at events but by the time I get home I've usually forgotten them. I do it on my own or not at all (stubborn old bugger/codger/fart that I am). I do have the Cully Long book How to Puzzle Cache which is helping, a little.

 

Unless FTF is still up for grabs, I'll ask for a hint from the CO if I'm completely stuck and unlikely to make any further progress on my own. There was one I did a while back that had no less than ten separate sets of coordinates embedded in it, all of which were needed for the final solution, and after several months I'd managed to tease out nine of them before swallowing my pride and asking for help on the tenth. Just as well I did, as it was concealed in a way I didn't even know was possible and would've been unlikely to figure out unaided - it was certainly something that's not covered in Cully's book or any of the online puzzle help sites I've looked at. As it happened, a couple of months later another completely unrelated puzzle was published using the same trick so I was able to quickly solve it and grab FTF. So far there's been only one other finder, the CO I'd asked for help from on that first puzzle!

 

Asking for help when it's needed is a good way to learn new tricks, even for this old dog, otherwise I'd just keep banging my head against the wall of ignorance until the cows come home.

[+CAVinoGal]

38 minutes ago, barefootjeff said:

As it happened, a couple of months later another completely unrelated puzzle was published using the same trick so I was able to quickly solve it and grab FTF. So far there's been only one other finder, the CO I'd asked for help from on that first puzzle!

I've been working on one puzzle, when suddenly the light will go on for another puzzle using similar or the same methods.  I just didn't recognize it when I was trying to solve it earlier.  The more puzzles you are able to work out and solve on your own, the easier others become when they use similar ways of disguising the coordinates.

 

Then again, some of them require you to read the mind of the puzzle creator...

[+fizzymagic]

On 11/5/2018 at 7:28 PM, colleda said:

Seven months ago I devised a Mystery cache with a puzzle I thought should not present too much difficulty to all the puzzle solvers hereabouts. I looked forward to a string of finds on it but so far have only there have been seven. As mentioned above, it seemed a logical, straightforward puzzle, to me. (I confess that I am terrible at solving puzzles and only solved a handfull of the eighty or so set prior to a local Mega event earlier this year). But I wait and hope. I guessed it as a D3, too hard perhaps?

GC7HJBE

https://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC7HJBE_formerly-violet-town

 

There are a couple of conceptual issues with your puzzle.  That's completely natural, as in anything, you learn by doing.

 

Your first (and biggest) problem is that the puzzle is only for the decimal parts of the minutes.  I absolutely hate puzzles of that type, as there is no way a solver can tell if they are on the right track or not.  There is no feedback until the solver has completed to the puzzle, and then it's either right or wrong.  The best puzzles allow the solver to tell that he or she is on the right track; that can be puzzle-contained clues, or partially-known results. 

 

Indeed, more that one log implies that the solver just tried random things until they got the green light form the checker.

 

My second criticism is that the flavortext appears to have nothing to do with the puzzle.  Perhaps it contains some subtle hints, but I certainly could not see them.

 

I'm sure you think the puzzle is easy, since you created it.  But from my perspective, it looks like moon logic (the solver needs to read the hider's mind).

 

 

[+colleda]

2 hours ago, fizzymagic said:

 

There are a couple of conceptual issues with your puzzle.  That's completely natural, as in anything, you learn by doing.

 

Your first (and biggest) problem is that the puzzle is only for the decimal parts of the minutes.  I absolutely hate puzzles of that type, as there is no way a solver can tell if they are on the right track or not.  There is no feedback until the solver has completed to the puzzle, and then it's either right or wrong.  The best puzzles allow the solver to tell that he or she is on the right track; that can be puzzle-contained clues, or partially-known results. 

 

Indeed, more that one log implies that the solver just tried random things until they got the green light form the checker.

 

My second criticism is that the flavortext appears to have nothing to do with the puzzle.  Perhaps it contains some subtle hints, but I certainly could not see them.

 

I'm sure you think the puzzle is easy, since you created it.  But from my perspective, it looks like moon logic (the solver needs to read the hider's mind).

 

 

What's " flavortext"? Never heard of it.

Edited November 7, 2018 by colleda
spelling

[+colleda]

2 hours ago, fizzymagic said:

 

  There is no feedback until the solver has completed to the puzzle, and then it's either right or wrong.  The best puzzles allow the solver to tell that he or she is on the right track; that can be puzzle-contained clues, or partially-known results.

 

Are you suggesting that perhaps I should done this for all the numbers so that as they go along they can see that the degrees, for example, match the locality?

Would a hint help point in the right direction? I thought of a cryptic one such as "Crazy male bovine".

Sorry, have gone a little OT here.

[+niraD]

27 minutes ago, colleda said:

Are you suggesting that perhaps I should done this for all the numbers so that as they go along they can see that the degrees, for example, match the locality?

I think that's it exactly. For example, around here, coordinates look like "N 37° aa.bbb W 122° cc.ddd". If the puzzle provides only the decimal part of the minutes (bbb and ddd), then those six digits can be anything. Any idea a solver might have that produces six digits looks as reasonable as any other idea a solver might have that produces six digits.

 

But if the puzzle produces all 15 digits, then ideas that don't generate 37 at the beginning and 122 in the middle are clearly wrong, and ideas that do generate 37 at the beginning and 122 in the middle seem plausible, and even likely.

 

A middle ground is for the puzzle to provide ten digits (aa and bbb and cc and ddd). It is possible for the minutes (aa and cc) to differ slightly from the bogus posted coordinates of the listing, but they must be close for the final to remain within 2 miles of the posted coordinates.

[+arisoft]

1 hour ago, colleda said:

What's " flavortext"? Never heard of it.

 

It is the part which makes the puzzle interesting and probably tells something about the subject of the puzzle.

 

1 hour ago, colleda said:

Would a hint help point in the right direction? I thought of a cryptic one such as "Crazy male bovine".

 

Are you saying that the puzzle do not have any cryptic or straight hints yet?

 

I thought that the idea was that the flawortext or puzzle words leads to some mysterious subject where the player can define correct numbers with some certainty. For example, if those words can be found indexed form a book about the subject, it would be clearly the correct answer.

[+colleda]

Now I'm puzzled - but learning.

[+kunarion]

12 hours ago, colleda said:

I'm with CAVinoGal. I don't ask for hints. I've occasionally had hints given to me by COs at events but by the time I get home I've usually forgotten them. I do it on my own or not at all (stubborn old bugger/codger/fart that I am). I do have the Cully Long book How to Puzzle Cache which is helping, a little.

 

I looked at your example puzzle here, and have no idea how to solve it. I can't tell if the text nor the hint has any relation to the puzzle, and I'm guessing that the hint applies to the hide only (if I've even figured that out). A puzzle where I can't even think of something I'd try goes to the bottom of the pile. There are buhzillions of puzzle caches, 99.9% of which I'll never solve.

 

You have a coordinate checker, so it's OK. If I have no idea about a puzzle, I'm guessing many things, and might get the solution wrong. So I really need that the coordinate checker.

 

Your example was solved by people who have found many caches and especially found a reasonable number of Mystery caches. So they've likely seen something like that puzzle before. Once I've done a lot more puzzles, I may realize I can solve one I skipped.   I often don't have the chance, because this kind tends to get archived, at least where I live they do, if unfound for a long time.

 

If you don't mind few finds, it's cool. It's a puzzle for the few. You know it's possible to solve. Maybe if nobody solved it after a long period of time, add a hint or something. But in this case, you simply ensure the Difficulty is correct, and wait. One reason I don't take moon logic puzzle caches seriously is they get archived, so of course I never find them and never find out what the thought process was that could solve them. I may have many notes, and now all of that is useless.  Once I know of a CO who archives his moon logic puzzles, I won't put any work into any of his.

 

Around here, once one of the power players solves it, everybody does. There would not be few finds, there'd be FTF and then a whole list of “did a PAF and found it!” logs. Even then, if I can't figure out the puzzle, it stays at the bottom of the pile.

 

 

Edited November 7, 2018 by kunarion

[+cerberus1]

2 hours ago, kunarion said:

Around here, once one of the power players solves it, everybody does. There would not be few finds, there'd be FTF and then a whole list of “did a PAF and found it!” logs. Even then, if I can't figure out the puzzle, it stays at the bottom of the pile.

 

Same here. 

Got tired of people calling,  "Saw your truck as I was going by.  Want a hint?" or similar, and calls/mails asking where the final on some tough-to-find hide (that isn't mine) was. 

 - Apparently "Did you ask the CO for help?" isn't a game plan ...  

My few PAF numbers now are folks who can help me get out of a pit, or know how to set a fracture.  

I feel folks lose if "friends" are just handing everything to them, never accomplishing anything on their own.

I don't ignore list tough puzzles anymore (there's just too many), but I can disregard them just fine.    

[+kunarion]

On ‎11‎/‎5‎/‎2018 at 8:10 AM, baer2006 said:

 it's more or less trivial to design a puzzle, which is to all intents and purposes unsolvable.

 

Yes.

 

As we see by some posts in this thread, having a record unsolved puzzle cache is not necessarily an accomplishment, nor necessarily a thing to which to aspire. I can make one right now that will be unsolved forevermore. And I can place a nano like a needle in a haystack, but I won't, for the same reason I would keep my puzzles balanced (actually I keep mine especially easy, just because ).

 

The cachers in the immediate area where I live are great at solving puzzles. So if one goes unsolved for a little while, the CO gets a lot of... special notes... on the cache page, and eventually, if part of the community (you know, if he likes to attend local Events and stuff), can't take the heat. And it tends to mean that there's an error in the puzzle that makes it tough. I have solved a couple of those. Knowing that the best minds haven't found a cache allows me to rule out many possibilities. But I've also found errors in puzzles that nobody solves, and that eventually get archived. It could be that there are more errors, or it could be just an amazingly cool unique puzzle waiting for someone to come up with an answer. Probably the former.

 

But they remain, it's OK for you to make one, and I could churn out “unsolved” caches all day. Pending review, of course.

 

Edited November 7, 2018 by kunarion

[+fizzymagic]

Just for an example, I tried solving the puzzle in question.  Here's what I tried that did not work:

• Number of letters that are also in "VIOLET TOWN"

• Word value mod 10

• Word value digital root

• First letter of word mod 10

• Number of vowels in word

• Number of consonants in word

• Number of letters in word mod 10

 

Then I stumbled on the correct thing to try.  Whew!

 

Edited November 7, 2018 by fizzymagic

[+kunarion]

2 hours ago, fizzymagic said:

Just for an example, I tried solving the puzzle in question.  Here's what I tried that did not work:

• Number of letters that are also in "VIOLET TOWN"

• Word value mod 10

• Word value digital root

• First letter of word mod 10

• Number of vowels in word

• Number of consonants in word

• Number of letters in word mod 10

 

Then I stumbled on the correct thing to try.  Whew!

 

 

I like how one word is longer than 10 letters. That tells me I'm not to simply count letters. On the one hand I'm kept from being led astray. On the other hand, I immediately ran out of ideas.

[+barefootjeff]

1 hour ago, kunarion said:

 

I like how one word is longer than 10 letters. That tells me I'm not to simply count letters. On the one hand I'm kept from being led astray. On the other hand, I immediately ran out of ideas.

 

Interesting, as the solution turned out to be one of the first things I thought of when I saw that list of words; well actually digital root was the very first thing I thought of but I thought I'd try a few simpler things first and would've hit it on my second attempt only I was a bit unsure on one of them. I'd been almost going to suggest the D3 rating was a bit high but after seeing the response here perhaps not. I can only think it's something I've encountered on other puzzles around here although none immediately come to mind.

[+colleda]

4 hours ago, fizzymagic said:

Just for an example, I tried solving the puzzle in question.  Here's what I tried that did not work:

• Number of letters that are also in "VIOLET TOWN"

• Word value mod 10

• Word value digital root

• First letter of word mod 10

• Number of vowels in word

• Number of consonants in word

• Number of letters in word mod 10

 

Then I stumbled on the correct thing to try.  Whew!

 

You went kinda close with 5 & 6. I've now added a hint for the puzzle.