NG 203

New game 203 is now available.


Round 1: E S L O W E A N C

I had LOSE, SWALE ("a low place in a tract of land, usually moister and often having a ranker vegetation than the adjacent higher land"), CANOES / OCEANS, LANCES, SOLACE, and was contemplating ENSOLACE (not a word) when I spotted ENCLOSE for seven.

Seven appears to be the limit (although I am rather taken by the idea of an OWLSEANCE); the others are CLEANSE / ENLACES / SCALENE ("(of a triangle) having three unequal sides").

My selection: ENCLOSE


Round 2: B O H D I U C D I

I had an uncertain BODHI (valid: "the awakening that is achieved by a buddha; enlightenment"), an uncertain CHID (it is an alternative past tense of CHIDE, but I thought it might be archaic; it is listed, however), OUCH, wondered if CHIBI had made it into the Macquarie (it has not), and was relieved to find CUBOID for six.

CUBOID seems to be the only six; the other fives are IODIC, IODID (variant form of IODIDE), and DHOBI ("South Asian English someone employed to do washing; a launderer (traditionally a male Indian who washes clothes by hand)").  For good measure, the other fours are ODIC ("of an ode"), CHUB (a type of fish), and BIDI ("Indian English a cheap cigarette made from tobacco twisted in a tobacco leaf").

Update: Commenter Mike pointed out another four of DUCO ("a type of paint, especially as applied to the body work of a motor vehicle").  Thanks, Mike!

My selection: CUBOID


Round 3: Target 172 from 25 2 8 10 4 4

I went on a bit of a wild goose chase at first trying to make this as 344/2, then adopted a more prosaic approach to find 172 = 8*25 - 2*(10 + 4).  Then I pulled out the factor of 4 for the simpler 172 = 4*(25 + 10 + 8).

My selection: 172 = 8*25 - 2*(10 + 4)


Round 4: M E S M I S L A N

I had MIMES, SEMIS, SLIMES, AIMLESS, and MISNAMES.  If only one of those M's had been an N then MANLINESS would have been there.

The other eights are MELISMAS (MELISMA: "a group of musical notes sung to one syllable") and MELANISM ("the condition of having a high amount of dark or black pigment granules in the skin, hair, and eyes of a human being or the skin and surface structure of any other animal").  Moreover, it's reasonable that this latter is pluralisable, so MELANISMS could be a full monty here.  There's been quite the run of those in recent days.

My selection: MISNAMES
Best: MELANISMS (probably)


Round 5: R O I P A Y T M I

I had PAIR and TOPIARY.

TOPIARY is the only seven, but there is an eight: IMPARITY ("lack of parity or equality; disparity; an inequality").  The sixes are IMPAIR, IMPART / ARMPIT, PARITY, IMPORT, MYOPIA, and OPTIMA (one plural form of OPTIMUM).

My selection: TOPIARY
Best: IMPARITY


Round 6: Target 569 from 25 50 75 7 9 5

I started a little confused, then decided to use 7*75 as a base point.  The offset is 44 so I wrote down a fallback one-away 570 = 7*75 + 9*5.  I should have spotted the right tweak at that point but I got to the same result by a different route, considering the target as 560 + 9.  That led me to an answer of 569 = 7*(75 + 5) + 9.

My selection: 569 = 7*(75 + 5) + 9


Round 7: N U U S F E C T I

I had FUSE and INFECTS, no doubt helped by its appearance in yesterday's game.

INFECTS appears to be the only seven and the best to be done.

My selection: INFECTS


Round 8: Target 667 from 25 50 100 5 10 9

I struggled far too much with this one.  After a bit of flailing I went for two away with 665 = 9*(100 - 25) - 10, then realised that I could improve it to one off with 666 = 9*(100 - 25 - 5*10/50), but that was my limit.

There is a solution, however -- just the one -- and I was close to it in a sense: 667 = 9*(100 - 25) - (50 - 10)/5.  On a better day I might have found that.

My selection: 666 = 9*(100 - 25 - 5*10/50)  [1 off]
Best: 667 = 9*(100 - 25) - (50 - 10)/5


Round 9: AFTER LUBE

I pulled out the -ABLE fragment but could not make anything from the rest.  Then I tried -FUL, also with no success.  In the end my only plausible answer was BEATERFUL, but I didn't even like it enough to try it.

As it turns out, I needed to pay a bit more attention to that -ABLE fragment.  Which should have been clear, really, it was by far the most tempting option.  Oh, well.

My selection: [no answer]
Best: REFUTABLE