While in the process of conjuring up a cryptic clue, the good setter will try to construct a sentence which appears to have a specific literal meaning or "storyline" for the sole purpose of deceiving the solver.
Good treasure hunt clues also obey almost all of the cryptic crosswords principles except for some variations. But as far as the surface readings are concerned, the setter will always try his best to mislead the solver. For this reason, the setter is quite often challenged to be creative; to come up with something that will conceal his true intention. A lot of the time, the challenge lies in the literal storyline instead of the cryptic puzzle. Occasionally, the setter throws in the word "answer" into the clue itself, and that word is taken in its literal meaning too!
Here is an example from one of my past hunts:
Q) Follow this way to get the answer, eight of which results in a gross outcome.
A) Jalan Lapan Belas
"Follow this way" tells the solver that the required answer comes after the word WAY, or in this case JALAN. It is designed to limit the scope of search to only those with the word JALAN on the board (or perhaps ROAD or STREET).
"eight of which results in a gross outcome" means we're referring to the answer that is to be multiplied by eight, and as a result of that multiplication, would give a "gross outcome". Doing a bit of simple calculation, we will know that we're looking for 18, because 8 x 18 = 144 (gross).
You will see that when I said "answer" in the clue, I literally meant it to refer to the required answer, i.e. Lapan Belas (18). But of course I protected myself here with the "Jalan", just in case that "18" could also be found elsewhere such as on the shop window etc.
If you like, you can replace the "answer" in the clue with "18", and you will see that it won't change the accuracy of the sentence, viz:
Q) Follow this way to get 18, eight of which results in a gross outcome.
Now look at this question which was given in the Christmas Charity Hunt 2008:
Q21) ONLY A LETTER AT THE END TO GET THE ANSWER.
A21) SAHAJ HAIR STYLING SALOON
When we reached this sector, I and Chai went for a toilet break; Vincent went to buy some of the treasures; Margaret was scanning the sector on foot. After my toilet break, I walked that sector too. I spotted the above answer and went to Margaret to tell her. But she had also found it. I saw the defect immediately, but again was able to convince myself that the setter had wrongly constructed the clue. So we took this answer anyway.
The explanation given by the CoC was like this:
"ONLY" is the definition part of the clue. Then "A LETTER AT THE END" means to add "A" on the board. In this case, when "A" is added to "SAHAJ", we will get "SAHAJA" which is the Malay word for "ONLY". Very good! I can find nothing wrong with that.
But then why "TO GET THE ANSWER"? I know the purpose of the setter was to complete the sentence so that it won't hang. But since he's using the word "answer" here, he must be sure that is will not affect the cryptic part of the riddle. Unfortunately, in this case, that word "answer" has not been used in harmony with the rest of the riddle.
Let us now remind ourselves—what is the answer that we're looking for? Essentially, what we're looking for is the word "SAHAJ". The rest of the words found on the board are only required to confirm that the solver has spotted that board and was not only guessing.
In other words, if we want to rewrite the clue, it becomes something like saying:
Q) ONLY A LETTER AT THE END TO GET SAHAJ
Is that so? Will we get SAHAJ if we put "A" at the end?
Good treasure hunt clues also obey almost all of the cryptic crosswords principles except for some variations. But as far as the surface readings are concerned, the setter will always try his best to mislead the solver. For this reason, the setter is quite often challenged to be creative; to come up with something that will conceal his true intention. A lot of the time, the challenge lies in the literal storyline instead of the cryptic puzzle. Occasionally, the setter throws in the word "answer" into the clue itself, and that word is taken in its literal meaning too!
Here is an example from one of my past hunts:
Q) Follow this way to get the answer, eight of which results in a gross outcome.
A) Jalan Lapan Belas
"Follow this way" tells the solver that the required answer comes after the word WAY, or in this case JALAN. It is designed to limit the scope of search to only those with the word JALAN on the board (or perhaps ROAD or STREET).
"eight of which results in a gross outcome" means we're referring to the answer that is to be multiplied by eight, and as a result of that multiplication, would give a "gross outcome". Doing a bit of simple calculation, we will know that we're looking for 18, because 8 x 18 = 144 (gross).
You will see that when I said "answer" in the clue, I literally meant it to refer to the required answer, i.e. Lapan Belas (18). But of course I protected myself here with the "Jalan", just in case that "18" could also be found elsewhere such as on the shop window etc.
If you like, you can replace the "answer" in the clue with "18", and you will see that it won't change the accuracy of the sentence, viz:
Q) Follow this way to get 18, eight of which results in a gross outcome.
Now look at this question which was given in the Christmas Charity Hunt 2008:
Q21) ONLY A LETTER AT THE END TO GET THE ANSWER.
A21) SAHAJ HAIR STYLING SALOON
When we reached this sector, I and Chai went for a toilet break; Vincent went to buy some of the treasures; Margaret was scanning the sector on foot. After my toilet break, I walked that sector too. I spotted the above answer and went to Margaret to tell her. But she had also found it. I saw the defect immediately, but again was able to convince myself that the setter had wrongly constructed the clue. So we took this answer anyway.
The explanation given by the CoC was like this:
"ONLY" is the definition part of the clue. Then "A LETTER AT THE END" means to add "A" on the board. In this case, when "A" is added to "SAHAJ", we will get "SAHAJA" which is the Malay word for "ONLY". Very good! I can find nothing wrong with that.
But then why "TO GET THE ANSWER"? I know the purpose of the setter was to complete the sentence so that it won't hang. But since he's using the word "answer" here, he must be sure that is will not affect the cryptic part of the riddle. Unfortunately, in this case, that word "answer" has not been used in harmony with the rest of the riddle.
Let us now remind ourselves—what is the answer that we're looking for? Essentially, what we're looking for is the word "SAHAJ". The rest of the words found on the board are only required to confirm that the solver has spotted that board and was not only guessing.
In other words, if we want to rewrite the clue, it becomes something like saying:
Q) ONLY A LETTER AT THE END TO GET SAHAJ
Is that so? Will we get SAHAJ if we put "A" at the end?
In fact, instead of adding the "A", we need to remove the "A" from SAHAJA (ONLY) to get the answer (SAHAJ).
As you can see from the comment box below, CK Loh suggested that the word REMOVE be inserted into the clue like this:
As you can see from the comment box below, CK Loh suggested that the word REMOVE be inserted into the clue like this:
Q) ONLY REMOVE A LETTER AT THE END TO GET THE ANSWER.
Perhaps not a very "attractive" way to phrase the clue, but at least this is more accurate than the original clue. In this modified version of the clue, we start with the word ONLY—or rather its synonym, SAHAJA, of which we remove a letter at the end, and that will give us the answer. It would certainly agree with what we get on the signboard, i.e. the answer, which is the word SAHAJ.
However, if it were me to set the clue based on the same intended answer, I'd probably do something like this:
Q) The answer is only lacking its last letter.
I think this would be a more efficient way to express the intention of the setter. The clue is short and direct to the point. It is irrelevant what that "last letter" is. We just have to find the word SAHAJA, and then lacking its last letter, which is the "A" in this case.
Having said that, however, the CoC must also scan the sector to ensure that there is no board containing something like JAWAPA or JAWA or ANSWE etc.
Nobody said it's easy being the CoC!
