EV 1706

Enigmatic Variations 1706 (Hints)

Impact by Ifor

Hints and tips by Phibs

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Keen to get ahead of the game, I asked Claude, “In a themed crossword puzzle, we are told that in the filled grid we must simulate the effect of an action by moving a thematic block of cells within the two central columns, thus displacing another block. What might the theme of the puzzle be?”

Claude was clearly in confident mood. He came straight back with:

Based on the description of moving a thematic block of cells within the central columns to displace another block, this sounds like a Tetris-themed crossword puzzle.

The key clues are:

Moving a “thematic block of cells” – this matches Tetris pieces (tetrominoes)
The movement occurs in “two central columns” – resembling the narrow playing field of Tetris
One block “displaces another” – just like in Tetris when pieces fall and can push other pieces or cause line clears
“Simulating the effect of an action” – mimicking the core Tetris gameplay mechanic

In such a puzzle, solvers would likely need to physically move groups of letters (representing Tetris pieces) down the central columns of the grid, potentially causing some answers to shift or disappear when “lines are cleared,” just as blocks disappear when you complete a row in the actual game.

Other possible but less likely themes could include elevator/lift puzzles or sliding block puzzles, but the specific mention of blocks displacing each other in a narrow vertical space strongly suggests Tetris as the theme.

Goodness, that’s going to make the endgame a doddle.

Preamble: Four horizontal bars have been omitted from the two central columns. Having filled the grid, solvers must highlight a pair of words in the outer two columns that describe an action, and show its IMPACT on the grid by moving a thematic block of cells within the central columns, displacing another block and creating five new down entries, no two of which have the same length, to be delineated by adding four bars. The thematic block must also be highlighted. Clues to the 17 across entries that are unchanged each contain a letter to be dropped to enable solving. In clue order these letters spell a thematic name. All changes to grid and clues create new words, including one proper name in the grid. Chambers Dictionary (2016) is recommended.

This preamble needs to be read carefully both before and after filling the grid. In terms of phase 1, it tells us that:

(i) 17 across clues contain an extra letter that must be removed prior to solving; their entries are the ones that remain unchanged in the final grid, so we can assume that 12 of them are those which don’t impinge on the central columns (ie 10, 13, 17, 19, 22 etc). These 17 clues will not be solvable while the bonus letter is present – for instance, in the clue “Setter provided bold resistance” for IFOR [IF O R], the word ‘bold’ must lose the letter B to become ‘old’. Note that in “Setter provided love closer to Easter” for IFOR, while removing an R to turn ‘closer’ into ‘close’ produces a valid clue, the clue is sound and solvable without that change, so there is no extra letter.

(ii) we must imagine four horizontal bars in the central columns; looking at the lengths of the entries for 5d (6), 25d (7), 12d (4) and 21d (7), we can see where these need to be. There is no reason not to insert them using pencil to assist in the initial fill, but clearly at least some of them are going to move during the endgame.

Across

11a  So much sun just flashes surreptitiously (8, 3 words)
A word equating to ‘so much’, which might make you think of ‘more’ and ‘merrier’, and a single-letter abbreviation are kept in check by a four-letter word. The loss of the extra letter leaves a containment indicator that means ‘secures with a rope or cord’.

19a  Last words on vile miscreant (5)
The key to this one is spotting that ‘miscreant’ can be an adjective meaning ‘villainous, scoundrelly, wicked’, which could perhaps suggest disturbance.

22a  Short lever succeeded after pressure equals (5)
Elements of three letters and one letter are to be placed after another singleton; the first two words of the clue, once the bonus letter has been surrendered, lead to the three-letter bit.

25a  Restricted opportunity once being caught (4)
The difficulty with this clue is not determining that it involves a homophone, but working out the familiar word with an archaic (‘once’) sense of ‘opportunity’ which sounds like the answer. Julius Caesar identified just such a thing in the affairs of men which would lead on to fortune (as well as to solving this clue).

27a  Priest’s assistant backing him briefly subsequent to sermon (6)
Here the ‘him’ in the wordplay references the definition part of the clue, so a three-letter element answering to ‘backing priest briefly’ (or ‘priest informally backing’) follows an abbreviation of the same length.

35a  Opinion without taking sides in spite (5)
An abbreviation from the world of classical music precedes a pair of letters selected from a word in plain view. If you look far enough down the list of meanings for ‘take’ in Chambers you will find ‘escort’, so it’s fair enough, although I know that some editors are not keen on verbs like ‘having’ and ‘taking’ being used as ‘neutral’ indicators (the sort that could be omitted without affecting the cryptic sense of the clue).

37a  Old town hospital rations reviewed in vain (5)
This is one of those ‘missing comma’ clues, where the cryptic reading requires a pause, provided by either a comma or a word like ‘with’, to be inserted between ‘hospital’ and ‘rations’. Having removed the stowaway letter, one can then work out the sequence of the two elements (one an abbreviation) that make up the answer. If the clue hadn’t needed to include a gimmick, it could of course have been written without the last two words.

Down

1d  Bass in bucket turned up in Iceland, maybe (9)
A familiar word is reversed inside a term which is exemplified by Iceland, along with many other businesses with a presence in multiple locations.

3d  Committed lovers, likewise lost (4)
A double definition clue, with the second word being archaic, hence the ‘lost’. The fact that their relationship is out in the open probably suggests commitment on the part of the lovers, although Chambers doesn’t explicitly mention this.

4d  Turning down words of agreement, hiding answer for the present (8)
An anagram followed by a three-letter plural is put round an abbreviation. Don’t fall into the trap of treating ‘for’ as part of the definition – it’s there solely to link the two parts of the clue.

7d  Pitched oboe for one admitting error (7)
Mentally replacing ‘for one’ with ‘for instance’ (though I don’t think they are the same thing) will surely help here. The definition might seem a little surprising, but looking up ‘pitch’ in Chambers will confirm its validity.

9d  Complicated harangue after old man’s misery mounts (9)
A familiar word for ‘[to] harangue’ follows a manipulation of an archaic (“old man’s”) word for ‘misery’ or ‘evil’, now only seen as an adjective produced by tacking ‘-ful’ on the end, and usually applied to such things as stares and glances.

24d  Tense, with no rent settlement (4)
Once you establish that there’s an anagram indicator in this clue, the rest should be plain sailing.

25d  Decorative pattern in render covering scratch (7)
It’s clear that a ‘render’ word has to be put around a ‘scratch’ one, but that sense of the former is an obscure one (the word is often indicated in cryptics by ‘go’ or ‘crack’), while the latter relates to the fifth headword with the same spelling in Chambers, the first being a term for a competitive trial of speed.

28d  Recycle pens finally, but with a blunt tip (6)
If you think ‘but, finally’ rather than ‘finally, but’, the wordplay should become clearer.

Definitions in clues are underlined

Having filled the grid, the first thing to do is to carefully re-read the preamble. We can ‘ink in’ all the letters outside the two central columns, as well as those letters within the central columns which came from gimmicked clues – this leaves a block of 18 cells whose contents are likely to change. I would strongly recommend clearly reproducing the entire contents of the central columns on a separate piece of paper (marking the unchangeable letters), because if there’s staring to be done, and moving to be tried out, that is where it should happen. The thematic name isn’t easy to find in reference books (it’s not in Chambers Biographical Dictionary), so a web search is likely to be required – the good news when it comes to someone who only gets four paragraphs on Wikipedia is that their fame probably depends on one thing, and so it is here, although the precise term that we seek is a hybrid of two names mentioned in the article. Once we’ve found that term in the central columns, the pair of words in the outer columns tells us what we must imagine doing to the grid, and thus the effect on the thing in the middle. When simulating this, remember that something which is ‘displaced’ must end up somewhere else. The five new words created in the central columns (including a proper name) range from two letters up to nine letters, and you (like me) will probably need to check the longest of them in Chambers. Change the contents of those 18 cells, insert the four horizontal bars (one doesn’t move from its imaginary position in the initially filled grid), highlight the thematic block that’s moved, and it’s job done.

The initial grid fill was far from easy. The combination of the name and the flanking words made it fairly clear what was required, and it was then a matter of finding the right block and trying out the likely move, including the displacement. I’ve never played Tetris, but I’m pretty sure this wasn’t it.

Phibs Toughness Rating : 4/5 (Tough, not suitable for barred puzzle novices)

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