Request for event conundrum setters!

[Fiona T]

Please please don't set conundrums with one of the players names in.

Lots of people know at least some of the scrambles with their name, and it gives a huge potential advantage to that player.

Twice in tournaments I've faced crucial conundrums where the scramble started with my opponent's 6 letter name (to be fair I won one of them, but if I hadn't then I would have felt very hard done by!)

I got a (non-crucial) conundrum this weekend that started with my name (FIONASTEM) - no thought required, I know the answer - think I even used it as the example on our 'new players' guide - again a massive advantage to me, my opponent would have needed to be superhuman to get it before me.

Different scrambles are fine, but don't use one players name in the scramble!

(Please don't take it as a criticism - setting conundrums is a tough job - just intended as constructive feedback!)

[George Armstrong]

While I do feel it's nice utilising people's names in cons (we were kinda known for it on ZD), you can see why we stopped doing it so blatantly. There are ways around it, e.g. giving said conundrums to the game host rather than the players (or just to a random table). If I'm given GEORGETAN as a con, I know that that's REGGAETON, but most players won't get that so quickly. If I'm hosting a game with that conundrum, both players are in with a fair shout.

[JackHurst]

Yeah agreed. TBH I don't think people pay any attention to shuffles at co-events, and most of the Conundrums have a total viewership of 3 (if its Lincoln style), so there's very little value added to the event by having meaningful shuffles.

[Adam Beach]

Please please don't set conundrums with one of the players names in.

Lots of people know at least some of the scrambles with their name, and it gives a huge potential advantage to that player.

Twice in tournaments I've faced crucial conundrums where the scramble started with my opponent's 6 letter name (to be fair I won one of them, but if I hadn't then I would have felt very hard done by!)

I got a (non-crucial) conundrum this weekend that started with my name (FIONASTEM) - no thought required, I know the answer - think I even used it as the example on our 'new players' guide - again a massive advantage to me, my opponent would have needed to be superhuman to get it before me.

Different scrambles are fine, but don't use one players name in the scramble!

(Please don't take it as a criticism - setting conundrums is a tough job - just intended as constructive feedback!)

I also agree, and it's something I'll be aware of for any future event I'm setting the cons for. It was a pretty stupid idea.

Two of the player-themed examples I was pleased with, but that's about it. One of these was the appropriate one for Coral: OCTOHEATH > TOOTHACHE, the other being DOWNITMSR > WINDSTORM. I admit, the rest were dreadful. The hilariously bad MAUSUNION > UNANIMOUS was another shite one - I don't even think this came out of the pack, and there's no way it would be given to someone of Maus' ability, anyway. Squeak.

The biggest thing I'd like to apologise for, this time in relation to the Goatdown event on the Friday, is that a lot of my goatundrums were actually illegal. Huge thanks to Stephen Read for pointing this out to me after the game the hosted in round one so that I didn't repeat the error. When creating them, I'd mistakingly forgot to stem the eight-letter scrambles to see if the letters on display created more than one nine-letter word, and alas, the majority of them I made stemmed to three or four. One such was TELLLUCI + E, the answer for which was intended to be CELLULITE, but pre-E it could make CLITELLUM and MULTICELL with an M added. Ultimately, about 50 of them were like this (!!) and I was furious with myself.

Oh well. It's a learning curve.

[Fiona T]

Please please don't set conundrums with one of the players names in.

Lots of people know at least some of the scrambles with their name, and it gives a huge potential advantage to that player.

Twice in tournaments I've faced crucial conundrums where the scramble started with my opponent's 6 letter name (to be fair I won one of them, but if I hadn't then I would have felt very hard done by!)

I got a (non-crucial) conundrum this weekend that started with my name (FIONASTEM) - no thought required, I know the answer - think I even used it as the example on our 'new players' guide - again a massive advantage to me, my opponent would have needed to be superhuman to get it before me.

Different scrambles are fine, but don't use one players name in the scramble!

(Please don't take it as a criticism - setting conundrums is a tough job - just intended as constructive feedback!)

I also agree, and it's something I'll be aware of for any future event I'm setting the cons for. It was a pretty stupid idea.

Two of the player-themed examples I was pleased with, but that's about it. One of these was the appropriate one for Coral: OCTOHEATH > TOOTHACHE, the other being DOWNITMSR > WINDSTORM. I admit, the rest were dreadful. The hilariously bad MAUSUNION > UNANIMOUS was another shite one - I don't even think this came out of the pack, and there's no way it would be given to someone of Maus' ability, anyway. Squeak.

The biggest thing I'd like to apologise for, this time in relation to the Goatdown event on the Friday, is that a lot of my goatundrums were actually illegal. Huge thanks to Stephen Read for pointing this out to me after the game the hosted in round one so that I didn't repeat the error. When creating them, I'd mistakingly forgot to stem the eight-letter scrambles to see if the letters on display created more than one nine-letter word, and alas, the majority of them I made stemmed to three or four. One such was TELLLUCI + E, the answer for which was intended to be CELLULITE, but pre-E it could make CLITELLUM and MULTICELL with an M added. Ultimately, about 50 of them were like this (!!) and I was furious with myself.

Oh well. It's a learning curve.

Don't stress over it - it is one of those things! First time you'd done it, and mistakes happen. I only set a few goatnundrums for Callum's games at Leeds and it was very hard! I completely misjudged the difficulty too for Callum and those likely to be playing him after the first round. As George said, we did the name thing on ZD for a few episodes before realising that it really wasn't a good idea. Lots of conundrum setters do do it, and the suggestion wasn't aimed at you particularly - just one I felt I could more legitimately make when the conundrum was favouring me, then sounding like sour grapes when it favoured my opponent! It's definitely not a stupid idea - for casual players it's a lovely one, but the nerdiness of our co-eventers means they're likely to have seen their name scrambles before! Overall the dodgy goatnundrums were a minor hiccup in a brilliant event, and we all appreciate the work that went into it.

[George Armstrong]

Two of the player-themed examples I was pleased with, but that's about it. One of these was the appropriate one for Coral: OCTOHEATH > TOOTHACHE, the other being DOWNITMSR > WINDSTORM. I admit, the rest were dreadful. The hilariously bad MAUSUNION > UNANIMOUS was another shite one - I don't even think this came out of the pack, and there's no way it would be given to someone of Maus' ability, anyway. Squeak.

Playing Devil's Advocate here, I was involved in two of these cons, solving WINDSTORM vs MSR (so thank you ) and hosting Maus v Adrian with UNANIMOUS, with Adrian solving it first, so maybe we aren't all as good as solving our named cons as we'd like to believe...

[Fiona T]

Two of the player-themed examples I was pleased with, but that's about it. One of these was the appropriate one for Coral: OCTOHEATH > TOOTHACHE, the other being DOWNITMSR > WINDSTORM. I admit, the rest were dreadful. The hilariously bad MAUSUNION > UNANIMOUS was another shite one - I don't even think this came out of the pack, and there's no way it would be given to someone of Maus' ability, anyway. Squeak.

Playing Devil's Advocate here, I was involved in two of these cons, solving WINDSTORM vs MSR (so thank you ) and hosting Maus v Adrian with UNANIMOUS, with Adrian solving it first, so maybe we aren't all as good as solving our named cons as we'd like to believe...

Adrian is annoyingly good at conundrums!

But yeah variations on the name are less likely to be well known than someone's name. Also the longer the name, the easier. One of the conundrums I've had in the past v Maus was THOMASCED - I did get it before him, but he did kick himself saying he's known that THOMASC = stomach since he was about 4 years old! Safest bet is not to do it - even if the person doesn't know the scramble, it will leave their opponent feeling hard done by if they lose it.

[L'oisleatch McGraw]

I disagree with George that he was playing devil's advocate.
He was just making a really valid point that Fiona is overthinking this.

Conundrums with people's names in it are great fun at a co-event (a proper one with divisional QFs and a big screen showing selections).
I do it every year, and will never stop.

Most people here claim to prefer the social side of a co-event to the competitive part... maybe that's because ye are failing to make the competitive part fun enough? For me, the social side lasts all day, including in the games. Hidden easter eggs, fun stuff throughout, music, walk on anthems. The game-play should be so enjoyable that the players don't want it to end. More enjoyable than sitting out every 3rd game to play a "host" role, more enjoyable than playing pool, darts, running, or singing karaoke.

[Adam Beach]

Conundrums with people's names in it are great fun at a co-event (a proper one with divisional QFs and a big screen showing selections).
I do it every year, and will never stop.

Not when the name in the scramble belongs to someone present at the event, they're not. I learned that from last year's Birmingham event, which I set the conundrums for. As Fiona rightly pointed out, some people learn all the stems from their name, which gives an unfair advantage to the player with that name should it be included in a conundrum scramble.

Also, there's no such thing as a "proper" co-event.

Most people here claim to prefer the social side of a co-event to the competitive part... maybe that's because ye are failing to make the competitive part fun enough? For me, the social side lasts all day, including in the games. Hidden easter eggs, fun stuff throughout, music, walk on anthems. The game-play should be so enjoyable that the players don't want it to end. More enjoyable than sitting out every 3rd game to play a "host" role, more enjoyable than playing pool, darts, running, or singing karaoke.

Or, maybe because there's more to a Countdown tournament than just the Countdown? Much of these events is about making new friends who you have a common interest with. Each organiser runs their tournament the way they want to, whether that be by including a Goatdown preceder, ten-letter conundrums, or the large numbers as multiples of 30. The "Lincoln" style is more common because people actually get to make their own letters selections on the day — a critical feature the "Bristol" format lacks. Hosting games can be just as fun as playing, particularly when you're overseeing two strong competitors playing out a close game. Whatever. Each to their own...

[JackHurst]

Conundrums with people's names in it are great fun at a co-event (a proper one with divisional QFs and a big screen showing selections).
I do it every year, and will never stop.

The more I think about this, the more I am inclined to agree with Eoin. Let hosts do what they deem fit for an event and what they think will be fun! This will vary host to host, and that's a good thing because we don't want every event to be exactly the same.

Also for reference, the producer of Countdown seems to have no problems with putting player names in the shuffle

One of my episodes: https://wiki.apterous.org/Episode_5134
An episode which used a players entire name! https://wiki.apterous.org/Episode_5740

[Gavin Chipper]

I think it's good that Fiona brought up the thing about names in conundrums, so hosts will at least know the potential consequences and can't say they didn't know!