Octochamp Conundrum Difficulty

[Michael Wallace]

Hai guyz.

Because everyone is bored (yeah right) of the 'bestest player ever' argument, I thought I'd make a thread out of a recent discussion I've had about which octochamp has had the easiest/hardest set of conundrums. Obviously this calls for a poll! I've only included the last 10 octochamps, because it's a bit much to expect people to remember years back, or have to go through loads of sets (and 10 is a round number), so vote for who you think has the easiest set out of these 10. If you want to add "he's not included but so-and-so had a particularly easy/hard set", then that's cool, but do have a think about the poll as well.

Obviously it's a bit ambiguous what 'hardest' means, so vote for the set which you think is easiest to get all of. I've allowed multiple voting, and re-voting, so if you're unsure you can choose more than one, and even change your mind later. Go go go!

The list, in chronological order:

Kai Laddiman: COPPERING PLUMMETED SUBNORMAL TRICKLING SHODDIEST DECOMPOSE DEFERRING INJECTION

Charlie Reams: INSPECTED BRASSWARE CRUMBLING HAPHAZARD ESTABLISH LIKELIEST NOSEBLEED PERSUADED

Martin Bishop: CHECKLIST EXPLODING INCLUSIVE PROFUSELY SPRINGBOK PUNCHLINE TROUNCING MEMORABLE

Neil Zussman: DEPLETING FRACTURED HAMBURGER OVERTHROW PIPSQUEAK DIAPHRAGM LITERALLY CREEPIEST

Kirk Bevins: FANATICAL MITIGATED RAINSTORM UNDERLING LAMINATED ARTHRITIS CONDENSED FLEDGLING

Cate Henderson: PROLONGED CLOUDIEST BLUBBERED COLLUDING DIRECTIVE NAVIGABLE PURCHASED THRASHING

Shane Roberts: UNDRESSED SATIATING FURNISHED DEADLIEST NUMBSKULL PRETTIEST ANNOUNCER BLUNDERED

Jimmy Gough: PREFIXING FOREIGNER EXCITABLY RECLUSIVE UNLIKABLE TRANSLATE MISTIMING BARBARITY

Innis Carson: MARMALADE VIOLATING STERILISE CROSSWORD DEFLECTED MISFIRING SPONGIEST SAILMAKER

Andrew Hulme: COMMANDER CAPTAINCY GUTTERING HORRIFIED SMELLIEST WARRANTED COMPETING CRANKIEST

(no James Doohan because one of his conundrums (COURTEOUS/OUTSOURCE) was defective)

[Kai Laddiman]

Mine

[Innis Carson]

I went for Cate and Shane because there doesn't seem to be any one conundrum they had that is particularly obscure or hard to spot (like SUBNORMAL or SPRINGBOK).

[James Robinson]

I went for Innis & Shane's conundrums. I got all of Innis', with the exception of SAILMAKER and Shane's were fairly easy too.

If only I had some of those when I had my run.

My conundrum experience on the show is pretty rubbish compared to when I watch it at home.

I normally miss about 1 every month and get the rest in more or less next to no time, so my show record is really dire.

If you include my 2 shows as a youngster, it's 2 successes, 2 rubbish declarations (I'm being brutally honest about that) and 1 no-hoper.

[Michael Wallace]

Some interesting results already. Just thought I'd mention I've changed the poll so it will close in a week.

[Darren Carter]

I'm voting for Andrew's conundrums. I hardly ever get any but I remember getting practically all of his.....

[Andrew Hulme]

Me, Jimmy, Cate, Shane all had 8 very gettable ones, so I voted for those four

[Craig Beevers]

Cate basically had 7 very easy ones and a mildly tricky one (NAVIGABLE - false ING but with those letters there's not many plausible combinations), so I'm voted for her. Kirk's probably had the toughest run there, followed by Charlie. Although it does depend on how they were scrambled.

[Ian Dent]

Jimmy Gough surely had the most difficult.

[Gavin Chipper]

Jimmy Gough surely had the most difficult.

Maybe, but he never waited to find out how hard they were!

[Michael Wallace]

Right then. The poll closed ages ago, so time to see how 'right' you all were.

First off, the order based on votes by the forumites:

1: Andrew Hulme - 16
2: Cate Henderson - 10
3: Shane Roberts - 7
4: Kai Laddiman - 5
5: Neil Zussmann - 4
=6: Martin Bishop - 2
=6: Jimmy Gough - 2
8: Innis Carson - 1
=9: Charlie Reams - 0
=9: Kirk Bevins - 0

So Andrew runs away with a bit, with Cate a distant second and Shane 3rd. Now, if only there were a way of assessing how hard conundrums are, other than through one's own intuition...

Oh wait, there is! Charlie and I have been having lots of fun sifting through all the data apterous gives us, and one of the things it provides us with is a measure of how difficult conundrums are. So we ran the octochamp conundrums through my delicious Difficultyometer, and so can give a more objective ordering of the conundrum sets for each of the champs above. So, from easiest to hardest:

1: Kai Laddiman
2: Neil Zussman
3: Cate Henderson
4: Andrew Hulme
5: Martin Bishop
6: Charlie Reams
7: Jimmy Gough
8: Shane Roberts
9: Kirk Bevins
10: Innis Carson

So there you go. It turns out Andrew and Shane's sets weren't as easy as people thought, with Kai, Neil and Charlie's not as hard. Neat, eh?

Charlie and I have a fair few more things planned for these data than just looking at which octochamps had a hard time in conundrum land, but we thought we'd share this bit of fun. We'll keep you updated if anything else exciting turns up.

[Matt Morrison]

So there you go. It turns out Andrew and Shane's sets weren't as easy as people thought, with Kai, Neil and Charlie's harder. (easier?)

Good research. Enjoyed, especially as you made it sound like you and Charlie operate from some sort of sordid evil lair.

[Michael Wallace]

So there you go. It turns out Andrew and Shane's sets weren't as easy as people thought, with Kai, Neil and Charlie's harder. (easier?)

Good research. Enjoyed, especially as you made it sound like you and Charlie operate from some sort of sordid evil lair.

Cheers for the correction, edited it. And our evil lair is anything but sordid. Or something.

[Charlie Reams]

Our evil lair is actually made out of sorbet, so you were almost right.

[Michael Wallace]

Our evil lair is actually made out of sorbet, so you were almost right.

Yeah, you wouldn't believe how sticky we get.

[Derek Hazell]

Our evil lair is actually made out of sorbet, so you were almost right.

These incredibly close muggy days have made me think something that I would never in a million years have thought I would think, but I would like to lick your lair.

[Matt Morrison]

Our evil lair is actually made out of sorbet, so you were almost right.

These incredibly close muggy days have made me think something that I would never in a million years have thought I would think, but I would like to lick you lair.

I don't think Charlie would want you to lick him lair.

[Derek Hazell]

I don't think Charlie would want you to lick him lair.

I notice you only include Charlie in that. Anyway, ahem, I don't want to get any deeper into this . . . so, in a desperate attempt to get back on topic, Conundrums are only "easy" if you know the word aren't they. To expect Kai to know the word "laserdisc" (which was one of his subsequent Conundrums) when they were becoming obselete around the time he was being born, was a stretch of even the most vivid imagination.

[Simon Myers]

Conundrums are only "easy" if you know the word aren't they. To expect Kai to know the word "laserdisc" (which was one of his subsequent Conundrums) when they were becoming obselete around the time he was being born, was a stretch of even the most vivid imagination.

Well, not exactly. Especially with compound words one can take an educated guess without necessarily knowing the word. A few examples may include APPLEWOOD, SNAKEBIRD, and SHORTSTOP. Even if we discount compound words, one may take an educated guess using general knowledge of English orthography and spot something like ALTRICIAL despite never having heard of it before.

Conversely, there are plenty of words that everyone knows but are very difficult to spot in conundrum form. For a quick example, ORIGINATE isn't spotted very often despite being a fairly normal word. This is quite possibly because it has lots of red herring affixes like -ING, -TION and INTER-.

[Neil Zussman]

Interesting stats, although I'm not overly surprised by the results. I thought I would get more votes to be honest- I mean I solved 6 of them (and should've gotten the other two) so they couldn't have been that hard, clearly.
Innis had the hardest lot, despite having 7 fairly easy ones, just because of Sailmaker, I assume. Is there any chance you could give us some stats on which Octochamp had the best opportunity to get at least 7 right? I would guess Innis will climb the ladder a bit, but I could be wrong.

[Michael Wallace]

Innis had the hardest lot, despite having 7 fairly easy ones, just because of Sailmaker, I assume.

Interesting that you think the other seven were 'fairly easy'. Whilst SAILMAKER was the hardest (based on my analysis, at any rate), STERILISE, SPONGIEST, MARMALADE and MISFIRING were all pretty tough too.

Surprisingly often 'easy' sounding conundrums turn out to be a lot harder once you're faced with them from the scrambled end (although for some it's easy to see why - SPONGIEST is ostensibly straightforward, but it's got TION and (more importantly) ING as decoy endings).

(Edit: And yeah, can theoretically do 'easiest to get 7' or whatever, just need to get around to double checking some theory first)

[Gavin Chipper]

How were the hardnesses calculated? Was it done on the basis of getting all 8 - so just multiplying 8 numbers together or was it based on how many one would be expected to get?

[Charlie Reams]

vote for the set which you think is easiest to get all of

[Gavin Chipper]

vote for the set which you think is easiest to get all of

Yeah yeah, but I meant the thing you and Raccoon did.

[Charlie Reams]

Yeah yeah, but I meant the thing you and Raccoon did.

Well we did the same, otherwise it would be a pretty meaningless comparison.

[Gavin Chipper]

Yeah yeah, but I meant the thing you and Raccoon did.

Well we did the same, otherwise it would be a pretty meaningless comparison.

With you now - I was just being a bit thick.