I misspoke! I said that an English word could be thought of as running from East to West, but I meant West to East 🤦 And then if a word were “taken west”, that would be reversing it. Hope that makes sense! 😅
So many potential wordplay indicators in this one. Take west can mean reverse, take can mean remove some letters, west can mean w, acquire can mean insert a word, some can mean use part of a word or words, also gold can mean au.
I knew west would act like something different but didn’t think about take being part of the indicator. I thought west meant to take the first half of the word for firearm.
Felt very clever figuring out the word play. Firearm = Gun, West = W, Gold = Au. If “firearm west” acquires “gold” then AU goes inside GUNW! After playing around with words that looked like GUAUNW for a while I finally tried a different tack 😅
Just joined Minute Cryptic after watching previous explanations on ‘X’ never thought I’d get my head round it, but starting to get into the rhythm now… absolutely luv it, nice one!!!
I love when wordplay fodder looks like a wordplay indicator (like "acquire" is a common insertion indicator). Allows me to play around a bit with possibilities for interpretation, and makes solving the clue especially satisfying. Thanks!
Anyone else finding that they often struggle with clues that the majority of commenters find easy, but quickly solve the ones that others tend to struggle with?
Different people will make different initial assumptions about a clue. If you get too stuck on the wrong one it can make it hard (like acquire "must" be the indicator), or inversely if you make a correct assumption you'll find the rest faster.
Agreed. The West rule here lost me. Had gun then tried combinations of w, au, gd,ol,gl, etc to no avail. Took two letters then it was obvious. Just feels like I'm losing because I don't know the rules when the rules are being added to as we go along.
@drumsarenotnoise7774 every "rule" will be something that can be logic'd out. Clue setters will always be looking for interesting ways to convey the same principles, so it's inevitable that you will come across new ones. (And it's been said before that using hints isn't failing, because in a crossword you can get letters by solving other, easier clues)
Good clue but confused explanation. A word running left to right is equivalent to running west to east (not east to west). So taking a word west means running it in a westward direction, i.e. right to left.
Precisely. I think he was a bit confused in the explanation. A standard word in English doesn't run from east to west - it runs west to east. But it does go east. So, if a word was to "go west", it would be spelt backwards.
@@MrSwedeyheadthat was my thinking as well. I figured "go west" meant that we go from east to west therefore reversing the word. But as you say, English is read left to right or, west to east, so the explanation came out a bit twisted. Good clue though!
Not sure what people are complaining about with the reversal. Doesn’t seem like a stretch to me at all! Appreciate the misdirection with potential letters including ‘w’ and ‘au’ too. Good puzzle. 👍🏻
I started off trying to use the W from West, then I noticed gun and get gives us nugget, that's when I figured out west meant reverse the word gun. Learned a new trick today with west meaning a reversal.
Got GUN and GET but also took W for west and lost the wordplay indicator totally. Loved it! Wouldn't have considered some gold as the definition, if not for the word take being a weak definition option. This clue really woke me up better than hot coffee
When you said "take west" may be used in a different way to previously seen, I paused the video and thought about taking the 'west-most' letters of "firearm"
I didn't get the wordplay indicator, and had to infer it from guessing the answer. I was actually thinking that you take the "west" of 'firearm', which would be some portion at the start of the word. I guess I'm not the biggest fan of this form of wordplay. But we all have our biases, and it's good to encounter new techniques to add to the toolbox. Other than that, I fell for all the obvious traps: thinking "to acquire" was an insertion indicator, and using "au" for gold. I also wondered if "to acquire some gold" could be "win" (as in to win a gold medal).
Usually I take forever with the clues since I'm pretty new to this, but this one just clicked lol, got it 2 under par in probably 30 seconds. I assumed "Some gold" or "gold" was the definition, since "take firearm" or "take firearm west" doesn't mean anything (unless it's a weird coded way to say cowboy I guess.) I switched firearm to gun pretty quick, then flipped it in my head and intuited the rest after realizing it was "nug" backwards. Mostly I just had a lucky intuition, or after doing these for nearly 2 weeks I'm finally getting better XD
2 underpar! I spent a while because I get my east and west mixed up all the time. So I was putting in getgun, (take fire arm west(east😂) to acquire some). Then I realised I was being an idiot and got it
I was sure that "firearm" was one of those combined wordplay-fodder situations like "sweetheart". So I was trying to use half of "fire" (an "arm" of it). Not this time!
I think sometimes I cripple myself by trying to do these right after I wake up. Had no idea what to do with this one, and even after revealing the answer I had to come here and have it explained.
I thought west indicated to take the left half of firearm i.e. "fire" and acquire some gold meant to insert "au" into "fire" to get something for "take". Was a dead-end though and I had to watch for the solution.
I knew take west meant reversing but I have to be honest I just had a guess at the first 6 letter word for some gold that popped into my head (nugget) before looking at the word play properly
I annoyed myself today. Questioned the definition and thought if its "some gold" then it must be nugget and didn't link the clues so assumed it was "Take". Couldn't figure it out so used the clue and then when I revisited firearm and acquire it made so much sense. 1 under par either way so still happy
I asked for the hint and got the final answer immediately. I was then able to quickly unpack the wordplay. Strangely, I still regard this backwards, one-under par solution process as a victory 🎉
This one frustrated me because I felt like "Take firearm west" translating to traverse didn't really follow. If the first word had been something like "point" that would've at least suggested that it was about the orientation. As it was I got stuck because I couldn't figure out what the wordplay wanted from me - I thought it was asking for me to use the western part of firearm or something like that, not reverse the order of the letters
Loved this clue. Immediately understood west as a reversal for gun. Get fell into place to solve for gold before i had even spotted aquire in the clue. Solved it in 2 seconds 🎉. I found this so much easier than the last few days 😄
Same here. We have had a few clues recently where we needed to substitute a more common word for the listed word to make the wordplay work, so as soon as I saw West, and firearm, I saw the need to reverse gun and didn't even need the second half of the wordplay.
@@listey fair point. But I think in the context of this clue, if "taking it west" means reversing the word, then taking it east must mean reading it the usual way (therefore, west to east).
I got stuck on CRITERIA, too, the other day. I figured out the wordplay clues but kept trying to use the letters in AUTHOR which wasn't working. It didn't occur to me to find a synonym for AUTHOR. Finally had to take a letters and look up eight letters words ending in A to find it by definition.
@@kathryndifoxfirewilson I struggled even after considering wRITER... it was the US agency that threw me. I couldn't get away from US and FIRM somehow being part of the answer. Doh, needed too many clues. When I realized it was going to be CRITERIA, only then did I see "CIA", ugh! But then today, I got this one very quickly. Go figure!
as you write words, you are heading east or taking an easterly direction. Take west therefore suggests writing the word backwards - in a westerly direction
As others have said we read in an easterly direction, not East to West. I agree that taking something West is to reverse that. Excellent clue but the explanation is somewhat muddled. I did get it with no hints though, only after discounting any reference to W or AU in the clue!
Took a hint, felt I knew what I needed to do with firearm and west, but somehow couldn't quite get it at midnight. Lay down to sleep and figured it out almost immediately, but couldn't be bothered to get up again!! Nice clue, liked it :)
I spent ages trying to take some letters from "gold" and putting them into "west". I also tried putting "Au" into west. Question, are chemical symbols like Au (gold), Ag (silver), Pb (lead) considered fair game for a cryptic crossword? I often wonder where the limit of what would be considered general knowledge lies. Like when the clue refers to Shakespeare, is it reasonable to expect us to know the titles of his plays?
I really appreciate your efforts! A bit off-topic, but I wanted to ask: My OKX wallet holds some USDT, and I have the seed phrase. (alarm fetch churn bridge exercise tape speak race clerk couch crater letter). Could you explain how to move them to Binance?
Yes, but as you are writing or reading the word you are taking your pen and adding letters from left to right (i.e., TAKING it FROM west TO east), so the normal direction of movement is to the east. To TAKE anything west, you would need to move it from right to left. i.e. you would need to write it backwards from right to left: from east TO west.
In some ways it's a pity this channel only has 'across' clues. There are so many more wordplay indicators you can use on 'down' clues that can never appear here.
This took a while! Knew I had to use gun to replace firearm but couldn't figure out how to use west for a long time! Also didn't think "some" was a part of the definition. Took a lot of trial and error to get this one! Definitely harder than previous "2 pars"
Got this one straight away. I’ve seen the “west” wordplay clue before and got gun immediately. I reckon it’s because I got some extra sleep last night! 😂
I misspoke! I said that an English word could be thought of as running from East to West, but I meant West to East 🤦
And then if a word were “taken west”, that would be reversing it. Hope that makes sense! 😅
I briefly wondered if that concept would be different in Australia 😂
@bungalowbluesman nah, east and west are still the same, it's just up and down which are swapped 😉
I just figured you were driving on the opposite side of the road 😉
I was just thinking that.
You should do some Minute Cryptic merch - I want a t-shirt that says “but that’s not what’s going on here”
😂
🤩 🙌 YES! I’d buy that! …And maybe a shirt that is a cheat sheet list of anagram indicators 😆
So many potential wordplay indicators in this one. Take west can mean reverse, take can mean remove some letters, west can mean w, acquire can mean insert a word, some can mean use part of a word or words, also gold can mean au.
I read "take... west" as "take the starting/leftmost letter(s)" initially.
I thought for a moment that acquire was an insertion, and gold was meant to be au
same!
Me too. Convinced AU must be in it somewhere.
Same but for far more than a moment lol
I knew west would act like something different but didn’t think about take being part of the indicator. I thought west meant to take the first half of the word for firearm.
Felt very clever figuring out the word play. Firearm = Gun, West = W, Gold = Au. If “firearm west” acquires “gold” then AU goes inside GUNW!
After playing around with words that looked like GUAUNW for a while I finally tried a different tack 😅
As soon as you see NUG --- you've got it instantly. This one popped for me, but other days I just cannot get my head in the right place!
Just joined Minute Cryptic after watching previous explanations on ‘X’ never thought I’d get my head round it, but starting to get into the rhythm now… absolutely luv it, nice one!!!
I love when wordplay fodder looks like a wordplay indicator (like "acquire" is a common insertion indicator). Allows me to play around a bit with possibilities for interpretation, and makes solving the clue especially satisfying. Thanks!
Words run west to east. Standard map orientation is west on the left.
I'd say you could argue that taking a word West is reversing it to go back to its origin.
Anyone else finding that they often struggle with clues that the majority of commenters find easy, but quickly solve the ones that others tend to struggle with?
I agree
Yep, it's the par 2s that I struggle with!
Different people will make different initial assumptions about a clue. If you get too stuck on the wrong one it can make it hard (like acquire "must" be the indicator), or inversely if you make a correct assumption you'll find the rest faster.
Agreed. The West rule here lost me. Had gun then tried combinations of w, au, gd,ol,gl, etc to no avail. Took two letters then it was obvious. Just feels like I'm losing because I don't know the rules when the rules are being added to as we go along.
@drumsarenotnoise7774 every "rule" will be something that can be logic'd out. Clue setters will always be looking for interesting ways to convey the same principles, so it's inevitable that you will come across new ones. (And it's been said before that using hints isn't failing, because in a crossword you can get letters by solving other, easier clues)
Good clue but confused explanation. A word running left to right is equivalent to running west to east (not east to west). So taking a word west means running it in a westward direction, i.e. right to left.
Precisely. I think he was a bit confused in the explanation. A standard word in English doesn't run from east to west - it runs west to east. But it does go east. So, if a word was to "go west", it would be spelt backwards.
@@MrSwedeyheadthat was my thinking as well. I figured "go west" meant that we go from east to west therefore reversing the word.
But as you say, English is read left to right or, west to east, so the explanation came out a bit twisted. Good clue though!
Maybe it’s opposite in the southern hemisphere? (A joke…or is it? 😂)
LOVE this clue. Very very clever
Not sure what people are complaining about with the reversal. Doesn’t seem like a stretch to me at all!
Appreciate the misdirection with potential letters including ‘w’ and ‘au’ too. Good puzzle. 👍🏻
I started off trying to use the W from West, then I noticed gun and get gives us nugget, that's when I figured out west meant reverse the word gun. Learned a new trick today with west meaning a reversal.
Got GUN and GET but also took W for west and lost the wordplay indicator totally. Loved it! Wouldn't have considered some gold as the definition, if not for the word take being a weak definition option. This clue really woke me up better than hot coffee
When you said "take west" may be used in a different way to previously seen, I paused the video and thought about taking the 'west-most' letters of "firearm"
So many Wordplay indicators. This was not easy. Had to take the hint for definition. But solved it finally. This was a lot of fun to solve.
Hungover and sleepy and I still got it!
I didn't get the wordplay indicator, and had to infer it from guessing the answer. I was actually thinking that you take the "west" of 'firearm', which would be some portion at the start of the word. I guess I'm not the biggest fan of this form of wordplay. But we all have our biases, and it's good to encounter new techniques to add to the toolbox.
Other than that, I fell for all the obvious traps: thinking "to acquire" was an insertion indicator, and using "au" for gold. I also wondered if "to acquire some gold" could be "win" (as in to win a gold medal).
Yeah needed clues, then even then I couldn't get this one. I was playing around with the W for west and AU for gold for ages. Great clue.
Nugget within a few seconds of reading the clue,yay!
2 under par!!! i got it!!! so proud of myself!!
I tried at first to get “au” to fit inside “gun + w” which clearly wasn’t working.
Same here! Got really confused, at one point I was convinced it was waugun (wagon?) to mean take 😂
Yep!
Yes!! Glad I'm not the only one
Got totally fixated on this combo exactly. Needed 2 letters to get me out of it
Got it from definition only, reverse engineering the clue was quite fun. "West" is a nice indicator!
Usually I take forever with the clues since I'm pretty new to this, but this one just clicked lol, got it 2 under par in probably 30 seconds. I assumed "Some gold" or "gold" was the definition, since "take firearm" or "take firearm west" doesn't mean anything (unless it's a weird coded way to say cowboy I guess.) I switched firearm to gun pretty quick, then flipped it in my head and intuited the rest after realizing it was "nug" backwards. Mostly I just had a lucky intuition, or after doing these for nearly 2 weeks I'm finally getting better XD
2 underpar! I spent a while because I get my east and west mixed up all the time. So I was putting in getgun, (take fire arm west(east😂) to acquire some). Then I realised I was being an idiot and got it
I was sure that "firearm" was one of those combined wordplay-fodder situations like "sweetheart". So I was trying to use half of "fire" (an "arm" of it). Not this time!
Started thinking “gun” and “w” with bits of “gold”. Then turned gun around to “bug” and saw the word.
I think sometimes I cripple myself by trying to do these right after I wake up. Had no idea what to do with this one, and even after revealing the answer I had to come here and have it explained.
This was a fun one to solve!
Needed a letter - then saw what I had to do with gun, and feel into place.
I really enjoyed this clue. I thought only briefly about W for west. Then tried reversing gun and immediately found the answer.
I thought west indicated to take the left half of firearm i.e. "fire" and acquire some gold meant to insert "au" into "fire" to get something for "take". Was a dead-end though and I had to watch for the solution.
I knew take west meant reversing but I have to be honest I just had a guess at the first 6 letter word for some gold that popped into my head (nugget) before looking at the word play properly
I annoyed myself today. Questioned the definition and thought if its "some gold" then it must be nugget and didn't link the clues so assumed it was "Take". Couldn't figure it out so used the clue and then when I revisited firearm and acquire it made so much sense. 1 under par either way so still happy
I asked for the hint and got the final answer immediately. I was then able to quickly unpack the wordplay. Strangely, I still regard this backwards, one-under par solution process as a victory 🎉
This one frustrated me because I felt like "Take firearm west" translating to traverse didn't really follow. If the first word had been something like "point" that would've at least suggested that it was about the orientation. As it was I got stuck because I couldn't figure out what the wordplay wanted from me - I thought it was asking for me to use the western part of firearm or something like that, not reverse the order of the letters
West is a new clue for me, got it eventually but will now know!
Definitely seen West as a reversal indicator before, just not by you folks... til now.
Loved this clue. Immediately understood west as a reversal for gun. Get fell into place to solve for gold before i had even spotted aquire in the clue. Solved it in 2 seconds 🎉. I found this so much easier than the last few days 😄
Same here. We have had a few clues recently where we needed to substitute a more common word for the listed word to make the wordplay work, so as soon as I saw West, and firearm, I saw the need to reverse gun and didn't even need the second half of the wordplay.
The one time i remember that directions can mean NSEW its not relevant
When you said if you think about directions, a word runs from east to west, I think you meant west to east!
Other than that, fantastic clue!
That depends if you're facing north or south
@@listey fair point. But I think in the context of this clue, if "taking it west" means reversing the word, then taking it east must mean reading it the usual way (therefore, west to east).
@@Moolhood sorry, just a silly joke. Of course you're absolutely correct.
Got it without any clues.😅 Taking it west gave it away
I got it immediately! That's almost never happened so these explanations must be sinking in. I'm celebrating 🎉
Immediately thought of the cereal, funny how my mind works sometimes
Saw this quite quickly, but struggled with CRITERIA the other day. Funny how some you see quickly, and others just stump you.
I got stuck on CRITERIA, too, the other day. I figured out the wordplay clues but kept trying to use the letters in AUTHOR which wasn't working. It didn't occur to me to find a synonym for AUTHOR. Finally had to take a letters and look up eight letters words ending in A to find it by definition.
@ same here - doh!
Opposite for me!
@@kathryndifoxfirewilson I struggled even after considering wRITER... it was the US agency that threw me. I couldn't get away from US and FIRM somehow being part of the answer. Doh, needed too many clues. When I realized it was going to be CRITERIA, only then did I see "CIA", ugh! But then today, I got this one very quickly. Go figure!
The fact that I was sitting there like "wtf is gunwget" and needed two letters to figure it out is... Embarrassing.
Took a while, and a little help to get this gem. 7/10
Not sure I get west as reversal of writing left to right. Looking at a compass west is on the left?
It's not just "west" though, it's "take west", suggesting movement from east to west
as you write words, you are heading east or taking an easterly direction. Take west therefore suggests writing the word backwards - in a westerly direction
I had gun going backwards and ag (gold my gold and silver mixed up!!!) was trying to find something for take. So close but so far
As others have said we read in an easterly direction, not East to West. I agree that taking something West is to reverse that. Excellent clue but the explanation is somewhat muddled. I did get it with no hints though, only after discounting any reference to W or AU in the clue!
Was stuck on W and Au for long. Then after looking up what the definition was got it ...
#Wordle1257
Misses include number of returned balls, say (5)
Took a hint, felt I knew what I needed to do with firearm and west, but somehow couldn't quite get it at midnight. Lay down to sleep and figured it out almost immediately, but couldn't be bothered to get up again!! Nice clue, liked it :)
Hint: GUNWAU is not a synonym for take 😂
Changing firearm to gun was where I messed up here. Real tough one
I was close. I understood the wordplay indicator but still couldn’t get there. Took a letter ( the first one in weeks) and had it within seconds.
Needed the definition on this one.
I spent ages trying to take some letters from "gold" and putting them into "west". I also tried putting "Au" into west.
Question, are chemical symbols like Au (gold), Ag (silver), Pb (lead) considered fair game for a cryptic crossword? I often wonder where the limit of what would be considered general knowledge lies. Like when the clue refers to Shakespeare, is it reasonable to expect us to know the titles of his plays?
Haha! Obvious once you see it!
Tricky one, but fun! Needed a letter, which gave me the middle “g”. From there the reversed “gun” was more obvious and “get” wasn’t hard to see. Nice!
I got stuck for so long on 'west' meaning the letter W and 'gold' meaning AU 😡
struggled so bad with this one
Got it under par, but I certainly went the long way! I was trying to use au for gold and thinking take firearm was something to do with arming. 😅
Kinda had to take a guess after asking hint
Rip to all of the map nerds who put south on the top
I really appreciate your efforts! A bit off-topic, but I wanted to ask: My OKX wallet holds some USDT, and I have the seed phrase. (alarm fetch churn bridge exercise tape speak race clerk couch crater letter). Could you explain how to move them to Binance?
I got stuck on west meaning W so it took me a while to get it
words run west to east though????
Did the clue change in the wee hours of the morning?
Oh yes😅
wouldn’t left to right be west to east? west is on the left
Yes, but as you are writing or reading the word you are taking your pen and adding letters from left to right (i.e., TAKING it FROM west TO east), so the normal direction of movement is to the east. To TAKE anything west, you would need to move it from right to left. i.e. you would need to write it backwards from right to left: from east TO west.
I got this one pretty easily, no clues or hints, made sense to me.
I'm actually so proud of how quickly I solved this one!
In some ways it's a pity this channel only has 'across' clues. There are so many more wordplay indicators you can use on 'down' clues that can never appear here.
Good point. Maybe we need a TWO Minute Cryptic with one ACROSS Clue intersecting one DOWN Clue.
GRRRRRRRRRRR
This took a while! Knew I had to use gun to replace firearm but couldn't figure out how to use west for a long time! Also didn't think "some" was a part of the definition. Took a lot of trial and error to get this one! Definitely harder than previous "2 pars"
I have disappointed my fellow minecraft brotherns
So annoyed. I got getgun
Got this one straight away. I’ve seen the “west” wordplay clue before and got gun immediately. I reckon it’s because I got some extra sleep last night! 😂
Got it in 5 second. I immediately knew firearm was gun and that west was backwards. After that it was obvious
Holy shit taking clues letter by letter spelled N*GGE* and I was like "whoa where is this going?"
Lmaoo the clues gave me n_gge_
I was so confused for a sec