Re: [Palindrome] solving statistics

[Eric Albert <Eric Albert alumni brown edu>]

>OK, let me step back and ask a clarifying question.
>
>Say there are six yellow puzzles.  Each one yields a word or phrase as 
>its solution (usually a word?)
>
>The six individual solutions are put together and manipulated to extract 
>the yellow meta-solution.
>
>And occasionally that can be done with only five solutions.
>
>Is that correct so far?

Yes.

>If so, are you saying that by reverse-engineering the solution to the 
>yellow meta-puzzle, you can also reverse-engineer the sixth answer - and 
>you would submit BOTH to the Huntmasters?

Ah.  The answer to the first half of that is "sometimes" and to the second 
half is "always, if we have it."

Also, when a team is stuck for fourteen hours on one puzzle, other puzzles 
often get solved or back-solved out of a desperate attempt to stave off 
suicidal boredom.

-- Eric