K
obviously

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DAYKO, -- MIDNIGHT MO-NTAIN -AY

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Dayko, Up Midnight Mountain Way

Yes, indeed. It is "Dayko, Up Midnight Mountain Way."

I came around to the M:EM during the latter stages of Jakkard's development, and while I vaguely remember weighing in on the great "guns vs wands" debate, I really didn't have anything to do with the plane's initial development. My first foray into the Waste was a story called "Showdown," originally posted all the way back in May of 2013. It introduced the character of Antine, although it was never successfully voted it, so Antine didn't become a thing until The War of the Wheel. One thing that did stick, however, was my creation of a town called "Dayko," which Antine gives as an answer to the saloon keeper Muck when the latter asks where Antine is from. And when Antine (trying and failing to act tough) says "Dayko," Muck's response is, "Up Midnight Mountain Way?" Midnight Mountain, as the location of Dayko, has not been mentioned much since. It is mentioned twice near the beginning of Chapter XVII in WotW, and basically nowhere else. The city of Dayko, though, has become engrained in the world of Jakkard, which I'm happy about.

Well done on hard mode, everyone! Thanks for playing.

Dunno why, I was absolutely sure Dayko had an I instead of a Y

Totally favorable on using these hangman rules again btw.

Honestly, it was Up that kept tripping me

The reason most of these are not too hard to guess is that they simply contain too many letters. It is possible to increase difficulty without adding rules. Here, let me try one:


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A B C D E F G H I J K L M
N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Standard rules, guess whatever you want.

A

So I take that to mean you didn't enjoy my alternate rules? If that's the case, sorry. I just wanted to try something a little different.

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------a-

- B C D E F G H I J K L M
N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Raven, your special rules were fine as a variation, but I wouldn't want to play that way all the time. I personally just prefer actual difficulty to artificial difficulty. Which is why I'm trying to see if I can make this hard the old school way.

I feel like I'm still not expressing myself well. I did enjoy the game we played with the special rules.

I?


I see your point, and taste is obviously subjective. I'd just like to point out that since our Hangman is supposed to have a M:EM theme its possible solutions are way more limited compared to the vanilla version, which causes a number of problems. Having the alternate rules offers "game masters" the chance to pick whole phrases and even come up with their own (as I did) and still have a relatively challenging game. And as you say, it's fine as a variation because it changes how you approach the problem just enough to make it feel less repetitive*. Like the chess variations I learned when I was on my chess school team when we studied theory or practiced 6-8 hours per day - one of such variations was such a simple but complete rule reversal that it was unwise to play it before a serious game

*having a whole phrase to dig out makes it somewhat akin to a crossword, where guessing a word can give you hints about the others and you can hop around hunting for clues, which that makes my brain do the fun sparks

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- B C D E F G H - J K L M
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There is no I!

And the chess variants metaphor is good, because I also liked playing those things in chess club. I just didn't want them to be the main thing I was playing.

E?


Ooo, what were your favorite? Mine were "magna-magna" and "quadriglia".


(not sure if I'm sorry for these parallel off-topic... we could port this topic in the shop talk?)

Yeah, I get it. As Huey alluded to, I just figured the other set of rules allowed for more variety in puzzles.

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- B C D - F G H - J K L M
N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

There is no E!

And those are the exact chess versions we would play as well! We also played "submarine chess", where you can only see your own pieces. It requires a messenger who checks if each move you make is legal, and three boards (one for each player with only their own pieces, and one for the messenger with all of them).

O?

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-o----a-

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N - P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

There is one O!

N

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-o----an

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There is one N!

L?