Devil Ducks Solution
How It Works
There are two duck ponds (actually the fountains at Red West). Each is filled with 18 ducks.
In pond one, the ducks have colorful people's names (Brown, Cardinal, Plum, Hot Pink, etc) on the front and room names on their butts. The names all have a prefix (like Mr., Mrs., Col, Maj., Capt, Dr., Miss). The rooms are all rooms found in the game Clue (Ballroom, Conservatory, Library, Kitchen, Billiard Room, Hall, Lounge, Dining Room).
In pond two, the ducks have weapon names in the front and room names on their butts (room names are as above).
The papers inside the rather mysterious "TAKE ONE" envelope (from the depths of eternal hell) contain a grid of letters. Along the left side of the grid is the complete list of people names on the ducks. Along the top is the complete list of weapon names.
When you (and by you I mean the you that is either hot or drew the shortest straw) wade into the fountains, you should then collect all the data from every duck. You will notice that there are two weapon ducks in every room and also two people ducks in every room as well. So if you can then connect all the objects in the same room and mark the combinations on your gridsheet. For instance, Prof Plum and Prof Violet were the two people ducks in the Study and the Wrench and Cannon weapon ducks were also both in the Study. So you would mark on your grid sheet, with an X or circle the letter at the intersection of all those Study items. (in this case, S, A, E, and I) When you mark the combinations of all the contents of all 9 rooms, you can read a message reading from the top, left to right. It reads:
Eliminate all Imposters and Counterfeits
This means that you should disregard every duck containing a weapon or suspect NOT in the Game CLUE. The valid items are:
| Weapons | Wrench, Rope, Knife, Candlestick, Leadpipe, Pistol |
| Suspects | Mrs White, Col Mustard, Prof Plum, Miss Scarlet, Mrs Peacock, Mr Green |
Solution
Sooooooooo, if you match up the six Clue Suspects with the Clue Weapons and only pay attention to those six letters on the grid, you can read the answer left-to-right across the page: PLANES
Design Notes
Raggs' Note: Yes, I KNOW what you're thinking. You're thinking there was no Pistol in Clue, but a Revolver. Yes you know it was a revolver and I know it was a revolver, but those whiny ratbastards at IGStaff who only know how to look up the inferior British version of Cluedo in wikipedia kept whining until I changed it to pistol. So I changed it to stop them whining. One more thing: Stop Whining, IGStaff. Thanks.
Other thoughts on floating items early on included planks of wood, 2x4's, inner tubes, and floating monkeys. And even...NORMAL rubber duckies. (How lame is that!)
Other iterations of this puzzle didn't have the "Eliminate" message but just expected you to guess. Yes Raggs knows now how lame that sounds. It also had lots of noise in the grid that made people think it was a word search.
There were originally 24 ducks in each pond instead of 18. They were:
| Weapons | Candlestick, Cannon, Club, Crossbow, Flail, Garotte, Grenade, Icepick, Knife, Leadpipe, Longbow, Mace, Pistol, Revolver, Rifle, Rope, Saber, Scimitar, Shotgun, Spade, Sword, Trebuchet, Whip, Wrench |
| Suspects | Mr Apricot, Prof Aqua, Mr Black, Mrs Brown, Capt Cardinal, Mrs Cyan, Ms Grey, Mr Green, Maj Hot Pink, Miss Lavender, Capt Lime, Col Maroon, Col Mustard, Mrs Peacock, Miss Periwinkle, Mr Pink, Prof Plum, Dr Puce, Mrs Rose, Dr Rust, Miss Scarlet, Ms Thistle, Prof Violet, Mrs White |
It was shortened to 18 to reduce the data gathering portion. This made it better for the reason that it put exactly 2 weapons and 2 suspects each in each room.
This was indeed Raggs' first puzzle. Quick from last year was his second. So that's why it sucks.
GC Notes
This was originally done last year and was cut midway through the event due to time. It was going to be a standby this year, but got promoted when another puzzle bit the dust.
This puzzle became a joke in that it was hoped that this puzzle would just keep carrying over from year to year, never be played yet somehow appear on the T-Shirt.
The ponds ate the ducks, yes it's true. Six ducks total had to be remade as they were nowhere in sight. Luckily the puzzle designer Raggs had extra ducks in his car from a year ago. He is embarrassed at how little he ever cleans out his car.
When Raggs arrived at the puzzle, 3 teams had completed it already. In Duck Pond 2 he only saw a total of 3 ducks, 2 of which were wedged in the rocks in the falls above the pond. Seems our ducks had learned to fly.
Originally slated to be in the two HUGE Gisberg Twin Lakes in Arlington. If you've ever been there you would know that these ducks would have drowned and never been seen again in those huge things.
Also originally were going to be in two kiddies pools floating in the lake. As the Red West location was the perfect size, however, the pools weren't needed. (Anybody want to buy a kiddie pool?)
One staff member commented that it sounded like a Clue Expansion Set.
Nick's favorite devil duck was Maj Hot Pink. Now you know what color clothes to buy him for Christmas.
During the event there was a group of people wandering around who we thought were a team but turned out to be a group of employees filming each other with video cameras.
Raggs agrees walking on the bottom of those fountains is a very painful ordeal.