NG 218

New game 218 is now available.


Round 1: A I I S B N G A C

I had BIAS, BASIN, BIASING, and ABASING.

Those seem to be the only sevens.

My selection: ABASING


Round 2: E E O A R R T A L

I had ROAR, ERRATE, and RELATOR.  I wasn't completely happy about that last, but it is valid.  After time I noted AERATOR as another seven.

The other sevens are REALTOR (the safer anagram that I wish I'd seen), RELATER, AREOLAE (plural of AREOLA: "a small ring of colour, as around a pustule or the human nipple"), and AREOLAR (adjective derived from AREOLA).

But there is an eight here, another adjective derived from AREOLA: AREOLATE.

My selection: RELATOR
Best: AREOLATE


Round 3: Target 175 from 50 25 8 2 2 9

Multiples of 25 are rarely challenging, and this was no exception; I went with 175 = (9 - 2)*25.

My selection: 175 = (9 - 2)*25


Round 4: N E P A U S I M C

I had PANE, PANES, SUPINE, CAESIUM, and PUMICES.  A shame that the U was not an O as then COMPANIES would have been available.  Something nagged at me about the letters, and after time I put my finger on it: AUSPICE.

There is an eight here, and it's even one that I considered within time but thought was too unlikely.  PEMICAN is a variant spelling of PEMMICAN ("dried meat pounded into a paste with melted fat and dried fruits, pressed into cakes, originally prepared by northern Native Americans"), and so PEMICANS is good for eight.

The other sevens are CINEMAS, ENCAMPS, AMNESIC, PNEUMAS (PNEUMA: "Greek philosophy, etc. the vital spirit; the soul"), INSCAPE ("the essential inner nature of a thing, person, emotion, etc."), and perhaps ACUMENS.

My selection: CAESIUM
Best: PEMICANS


Round 5: O U D B I I C R T

I had CORD and OUTBID.  If only one of those I's had been an A then the eight of ABDUCTOR would have been an option.  After time I noted CUBOID as another six.

The other sixes are TURBID and BIOTIC.

My selection: OUTBID


Round 6: Target 372 from 75 50 100 4 6 10

I had some difficulties here at first -- the clear first instinct is to make this as 375 - 3, or 5*75 - 3.  But with neither a 5 nor a 3 particularly forthcoming it was not the most attractive approach.  (Well, I did see that 50/10 = 5, but could not make a 3 from the rest.)  I wrote down a fallback one-away 371 = 4*100 - 75 + 50 - (10 - 6), and kept looking.

I noted the factor of 4, with the cofactor being 93.  That would normally suggest making the 93 as 100 - 7 but I had no luck with that.  Fortunately I spotted that the 93 could also be made by working up from 75, leading to the solution 372 = 4*(75 + 10 + 6 + 100/50).

Seen later is that my original approach could have worked if I had thought more about making the 3 and less about making the 5.  That 3 is most plausibly 6/2, and the 2 can be made as 100/50.  That still leaves us needing a 5 with only 10 and 4 available, but we can also divide that 10 by 2.  The net result is that we solve this as 744 / 2 with the solution 372 = (10*75 - 6) / (100/50).

My selection: 372 = 4*(75 + 10 + 6 + 100/50)


Round 7: D R D E O A S L E

I had RODE, wondered about ROADED (not valid) before realised that ADORED was the safe anagram, DEALERS / LEADERS, RELOADED, and RESADDLE.  I was rather surprised later to find out that RESADDLE is not listed, and fortunate that I had decided on RELOADED as my choice.

The other eight is SOLDERED.

My selection: RELOADED


Round 8: Target 238 from 75 100 2 8 1 7

I was tempted to make this as 200 + (75+1)/2, but I needed the 2 to make the 200 in this approach.  That did focus me on the 2, though, and thus the factorisation 2*119.  Now, 119 is 7*17 but I overlooked that at the time as I had spotted that 19 was 75 - 56 and put the pieces together to get 238 = 2*(100 + 75 - 8*7).  Playing around with other approaches led me to an alternative solution of 238 = 2*(75 - (7 - 1)) + 100.

Commenter Sam's solution used the factorisation that I bypassed: 238 = 2*7*(100 - 75 - 8).

My selection: 238 = 2*(100 + 75 - 8*7)


Round 9: LAWYER LIT

I pulled out the WATER- fragment moderately early (certainly by my standards), and so found the answer of WATERLILY soon enough.

My selection: WATERLILY (3.1s)