Fed II Star - April 30, 2006

CRYPTOGRAMS
Saturday April 8
by Fancy-Fancy

I invited players this week to join me in Knobs and Knockers on Paradise with their tasty house special pastrami sandwiches. Salvador, Gradon, Gilar, and Catspaws joined me there, with Marius, Robius, and Grissom joining the channel from afar. I explained the game for our newest players, and when nobody had any questions left, we began with our warm-up puzzle...

Player names beginning with A:
Q Z I D M G N
Q J O Q V Z G M D
Q V I H V G Q
Q M G V R D M L M H G L
Q M I Z K M Q C I D M
Q J T Z Z Q

Gradon was first with the list (in 4:46), with Robius and Gilar finishing a couple minutes later for second and third this round. Next up, it was time to pull up the DI COMPANIES list, as we had...

Fed II Companies:
P N A G I / T J K L / T G Z A N O
E A G E / R G N N B I / A K I A N R N W L A L
Q G L M W B K L / W K / X A G I M A N
G Q I A N X W Q A / I N G U A X / G P A K F O
I M A / P B X E A K / I B J F M
R M B N T G K / G X A / H B N Z L

Catspaws and Gilar got in the first few companies one at a time, each closely following the other, but it was Salvador who decoded the whole list first in 6:25, followed seconds later by Gradon, and then Gilar. It was then time for our third puzzle...

Commonly used commands with a company:
P U G J X V R / I V A C W K R
U G G F N / P U B U P N Q P
K N J V U K / P N J W C
P U G J X V R / A W D J V Q R
P U G J X V R / V A A W F Q C G
I X F G O / I V A C W K R

Gilar got this list in 3:16, followed by Catspaws about 30 seconds later for second, and Salvador 45 seconds after Gilar for third this round. Next up were my salutes to Easter, starting with...

Things you could do with the Easter bunny:
X Q G / M Y T
B N G W M / M Y T / T E I G Y X I D
J Y R Q / M Y T / N / W N Z Z S G
Z E H / M Y F / Q N Z F
M E U G / C S Z / M Y T
F Q N Z W M / M Y F / H N F A Q G

This puzzle by far took the longest. Catspaws got the list in 6:40 for first place this round, followed by Gilar about 9 minutes later with the aid of a clue revealing what letter the R replaced, and Salvador a few minutes after that with another hint revealing which letter replaced R. That brought us to today's finale...

Easter treats:

W U P W P C R L H / Y K E E O H M
I R J M U I R C C P S / W U O W A M
W R Z Y K J G / W J H R I H V V M
Y K L L H J / W J H R I H V V M
W U P W P C R L H / H V V M
U P L / W J P M M / Y K E M

Catspaws sent me her list at the 5 minute, 29 second mark, leaving out just one word. She got the corrected, whole list in in 6:37. Within seconds after Catspaws got the complete correct list in, Gradon, Robius, and Gilar also sent in the solution.

Today's final scores were:

Catspaws: 8
Gradon: 7
Gilar: 7
Salvador: 5
Robius: 3

Congratulations to Catspaws, first place winner in this week's game of Cryptograms! Congratulations also to Gradon and Gilar who tied for second place right on her tail. Join us each Saturday at 4.00pm eastern time for Cryptograms, with our regular hostess Catspaws.