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Since November 2016, there has been a game ongoing in The Sphinx's Lair called Cryptic Clue Chat Chains. It involves one person thinking up a cryptic clue, such as might be found in a Cryptic Crossword, and everyone else trying to solve it.

We have been maintaining an archive of these clues, but many excellent clues, especially if they get solved relatively quickly, disappear into the chat transcript and the archive and are rarely seen.

This post is an attempt to highlight some of those excellent clues, and to allow more people to enjoy the ingenuity of some of the excellent puzzle-setters in chat.

If you see (or have seen) a particularly clever or well-constructed cryptic clue in the game, nominate it here. Hopefully, over time, we will develop a repository of great cryptic clues.

Don't forget to vote on your favourites!

Please post one clue per answer. Answers should be of the following form, without any other content:

Cryptic clue as it was posed (don't forget the enumeration) — Author

Answer in a spoiler

Explanation

Explanation in a spoiler. This explains how the answer is derived.

Description

Explanation of what makes this clue so great, or why you think it deserves mention. Please keep it to 2 or 3 sentences.

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    $\begingroup$ It will continue until November 2106 :-) $\endgroup$
    – Rand al'Thor
    Jun 30, 2017 at 18:42
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    $\begingroup$ Should the setters be credited in these answers? (Yes, because they deserve it. No, because then voting might be influenced by knowing whose clues they are. Not sure how it balances out.) $\endgroup$
    – Gareth McCaughan Mod
    Jul 2, 2017 at 15:23
  • $\begingroup$ @Gareth I suspect that most people who are voting already know who the setter is. Even if that's not true, almost all other voting on this site is subject to the same bias, so why not allow it here as well? $\endgroup$
    – GentlePurpleRain
    Jul 6, 2017 at 14:35
  • 1
    $\begingroup$ I think I think it would be better to credit setters. But I wanted to give both sides of the argument. $\endgroup$
    – Gareth McCaughan Mod
    Jul 6, 2017 at 14:54
  • 2
    $\begingroup$ I've made the executive decision and added all the authors. $\endgroup$
    – Alconja
    Aug 21, 2017 at 1:16

9 Answers 9

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Note: I'm going to have to bend a few rules with this submission. For example, even though it's technically about a single clue, I'd have to at least mention many other clues for reasons that will be obvious soon.

Regarding potentially common solution to an archived minipuzzle?? (2, 4) — Sp3000

ON TIME

Explanation

First, let's have a look at the "solution to an archived minipuzzle" part. What archive? What minipuzzle? Well, archive refers to the CCCC archive put together by GentlePurpleRain, but that's not supposed contain a minipuzzle or anything, right?

Wrong. As ffao astutely observed, Sp3000 (the author of this clue) has been setting some rather unusual clues for the CCCC for the last two months. Here are the clues with answers:

Help cut commercial for negative neophyte (6) NOVICE
One rhythmically moved about, five moved forward (8)  ADVANCED
Deluxe therapy uses water regularly — it's a waste (7)    EXHAUST
Countless use tin if nickel selection's recalled (8)  INFINITE
Force it inside cushy sort of train (7)   GRAVITY
That woman provided nothing but dismissed leads? Wonderful (8)    HEAVENLY
Greatest saying about Greek character (7) MAXIMUM
Simple, as in extremely elementary (4)    EASY
Mother left after Weasley returned - typical (6)  NORMAL
Shy person, on the inside, is overly excited (5)  HYPER
Letter from old flame (2) EX
Pale pickle's pepperless (5)  LIGHT
Moderate channel (6)  MEDIUM
Defeat consumed a monster (5) BEAST
Fear in @GarethM: being wrong (9) NIGHTMARE
First time out, caught a local train back (5) DEBUT
Even leaders of alpine race followed sledder going the wrong way (7)  REGULAR
Naked apron is a plus (3) PRO
Jack let go from drifting scrap, receding, with first sign of Rose being overcome (6) MASTER
Nauseous, couple left a piece of cake (4) EASY
Casual's first to leave without loud type of Pokémon (6)  NORMAL 
Fragment cut head forcefully (4)  HARD
Cycling Dino, a silent performer (5)  EXTRA
Gin and tonic, essentially, consumed by alcohol newbie (8)    BEGINNER
Hack back, restricting half of site's early programming language (5)  BASIC
Very loud one in returning type of dream, with time, becomes troublesome (9)  DIFFICULT
Make an effort to conceal opener of pair ace (6)  EXPERT
Gabriel perhaps stripped following the lead of Chuck Berry for dare (9)   CHALLENGE

ffao figured out that the answers are all difficulty settings of rhythm games. Here are the corresponding games (image courtesy Deusovi, click to enlarge):
enter image description here
As noted by Deusovi, if we count the number of difficulty settings for each game, say $n$, and take the $n$th letter from the corresponding game, we get the letters of the answer, ON TIME.

Now what about the "Regarding potentially common" part? "Regarding" of course means "ON", and "potentially common" denotes TIME, as in Common time.

Description

  • The amount of effort and time spent on planning the whole thing, making the clues, sneaking them into the CCCC archive without anyone noticing over a period of two months is not like anything else we've seen so far in CCCC.
  • The individual clues are very well-polished.
  • The overall puzzle, on its own, is clever and enjoyable.
  • The fact that one can be so productive even without the incentive of imaginary internet points, is fairly shocking, to put it lightly.

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It makes wet god - disgusting! (6) — Deusovi

ROTTEN

Explanation

ROT(10) (or ROT TEN) changes wet into god. Disgusting = ROTTEN. So, it is a double definition.

Description

This clue is one of those clues where you just applaud the ingenuity behind it. These quotes will justify why I consider this clue so great.
- Sconibulus: "I think I hate you"
- Alconja: "You said I will love it or hate it. Love the clue, hate you"
The above was said to Deusovi and can be found on his profile too.

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Mistake Gates for Jobs? (7) — Sp3000

ERRANDS

Explanation

ERR(~mistake)+ANDS(~Gates)=ERRANDS(~Jobs)

Description

This is misdirection at its best. In isolation, the first images that the words Gates and Jobs elicit are rather mundane ones, but there clever positioning in the clue immediately makes us think of two of the biggest names in the tech field. Even if you manage avoid that false lead, you still need to get over your first impression to figure out what gates here sneakily hints at.

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000-ish (5) — Deusovi

OVOID

Explanation

O(~0)+VOID(~0)=OVOID(~0-ish).

Description

It's unbelievable that there's even a word that's so magnificently clue-able. Sheer brevity, novelty and cleverness make it one of the finest clues ever posed in CCCC.

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    $\begingroup$ Thanks so much! :D $\endgroup$
    – Deusovi Mod
    Jul 1, 2017 at 16:27
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What's missing from my CCCC contributions from July up until now - can you find it?? (1) — juicifer

E

Explanation

This isn't really a proper traditional cryptic clue, but is more a metapuzzle. Each of the previous 25 clues set by juicifer, along with their answers, omit the letter E. The "can you find it?" part of the clue refers to the clever hiding of the constant e in the clues and solutions, as detailed below.

Description

In addition to the omission of the letter E as stated above, juicifer very cleverly hid the constant e (sometimes referred to as Euler's constant) within the 25 clues previously set.
Each clue begins with a distinct letter of the alphabet (except, of course, E). If we order the clues alphabetically, then take the first letter of each clue and find its position in that clue's solution, we end up with the digits of the constant e. (2.718281828459...)

See the clues and solutions in this spreadsheet

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I inseminate article of clothing (3) — Rand al'Thor

TIE

Explanation

inseminate = in semi nate = inside half of NATE = inside TE

Why?

Sounds a lot worse than it actually is. Rand seems to be fairly proud of it too.

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Crawler trap top spins discourse (7) — Sconibulus

CAPTCHA

Explanation

CAPTCHA = Crawler trap = CAP (top) + (CHAT -> TCHA)

Why?

Well of course we should include the infamous longest standing clue (as of this moment). Some have come close, but none have yet overtaken it. I also think it's a very misleading clue, which are often a sign of a good clue.

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  • $\begingroup$ How do you get CAP from crawler trap? $\endgroup$
    – ErikE
    Jul 9, 2017 at 14:52
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    $\begingroup$ @ErikE CAP is clued by "top", "Crawler trap" is the definition of the whole answer, CAPTCHA. $\endgroup$
    – Dan Russell
    Jul 11, 2017 at 13:43
  • $\begingroup$ All the others had the whole-answer clue at the end, so I was not expecting it at the beginning. $\endgroup$
    – ErikE
    Jul 11, 2017 at 16:21
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Not end ends not end, not end ends end (4) — HTM

BUTT

Explanation

[[Not end] ends] [[not end], [not [end ends]] = end

[[(no)T] comes after] [[DEBUT], [minus [E(n)D]]] = end

[_T after] [(-de)BUT] = end = BUTT

Description

The clue stands out because it is constructed from only three different words (with two in fact having the same base word)! I still cannot believe that the English language and cryptic clue construction customs, as we know them today, have aligned to make such a beautiful surface possible. Cheers to HTM for bringing that surface into reality.

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An old saw ends like this: part of the precipitate (5) — msh210

Answer

Trash

Explanation

An old saw ends like TRASH (def), and part of the word THE is the letter T, plus RASH, which is an adjective from "precipitate".

Why?

This is the one which stumped the chat the most. We started talking about chemistry, double definitions, rain patterns, antique tools, music, you name it, it really stumped us. But, once again, @jafe's problem solving skills threw that c4 in the TRASH!

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