Password Plus rule question

[Kevin Prather]

"The password is...boondoggle." *ding*

"Snafu", "trifle", "busywork", "political" (followed closely by "pork"). We'd probably get to that "alright, back it off or we'll be here all night" point, and lead into "Daniel...." and "coonskin" to get us to "Boone", and it would probably solve pretty soon after that.

Bravo.

[Bryce L.]

(I dunno if you use the puzzles format, or good ol' CBS-era rules),

Neither one, because while good TV, they both suck as an actual *game*: one point per word, loser of the previous word has the option on the next one, bounce back and forth between giving and receiving, a 30-second shot clock to give a clue and get a response, no opposites, no limit on number of clues, and we play a full card per side, so 20 words in a game.

or good ol' CBS-era rules), a word comes up that NEITHER honorable clue-giver can come up with a legitimate clue for (besides saying "boondoggle!" just to dump the abomination in the other guy's lap), do you just toss that word and resume play with a new, presumably easier-to-describe word?

That's a rarity.

And by this Travis means "it has never happened in the eight-or-so years I have been playing Password with these people." We LIVE for those words. Those are the words that make Password great. At the absolute worst, there comes a point in a particularly nasty word where the two givers kinda glance at each other and implicitly (and wordlessly) agree that it's time to back off the "plausible clue" restrictions a tiny bit, to include non-plausible words that rhyme with (or, more often, rhyme with a part of) the word in play. And that doesn't even happen until we're *at least* fifteen or twenty clues into a word.

When I tell people "if the National Password League ever caught on, I'd quit my job," I'm dead serious.

Thank you both for the explanation... you both got what I meant! And it's good to hear you folks don't go out of your way to write your own material for a Password game, specifically material that can't be described while holding to the traditional "one word only" clues, as well as the other restrictions Mr. Lemon mentioned.

[clemon79]

And it's good to hear you folks don't go out of your way to write your own material for a Password game, specifically material that can't be described while holding to the traditional "one word only" clues, as well as the other restrictions Mr. Lemon mentioned.

Lord, why would you? Password home games can be found at thrift stores and Ebay for a song. There is no shortage of vetted (well, semi-vetted, in the case of the Endless editions) words out there.

That said, I still maintain that if you open up the dictionary to a random page, point to a word, and can't come up with a single solitary word that would be a remotely-plausible clue (and remember, you get to give multiple clues if you need to, so if you need to link them to paint a picture, you can), then the problem is not with the word, the problem is that you suck at Password.

[TLEberle]

And it's good to hear you folks don't go out of your way to write your own material for a Password game,

Why would we do that? That would be terribly impractical: whoever "wrote" the material couldn't play. I dislike the "no-brainer" words: the ones that there's an absolute lay-up clue for 'em, and all it does is give a free point to the team with control. That's way worse than a word you have to struggle and claw over.

A couple of years ago I was playing Password with some HS friends. My partner had given clues of "crochet," "quilting," "pattern," and the like, and seeing that the word just wasn't getting there decided to start cluing parts of the word, so I got "hypodermic," "gesture" and "score." Since these clues came with no warning that I should be building a word instead of just trying to guess it whole, I had no idea that the word was "needlepoint," and it went dead. There's a way to tell your partner "don't listen to that guy's clue, he's an idiot," but not "we're approaching this piecemeal," and I think there oughta be.

[clemon79]

but not "we're approaching this piecemeal," and I think there oughta be.

Nobody's stopping you from implementing a convention. You could become part of Password history, man!

(For what it's worth? I didn't need the spoiler. If the tack of a word completely changes, it's usually a pretty safe bet they are going piecemeal. ESPECIALLY on that first piecemeal clue. If you take that clue (assuming it was given with proper inflection), give the PAINFULLY obvious answer, and are still called wrong, that should have given you some information.)

[Bryce L.]

The only reason I could envision "writing" material is if you were using the Puzzles format of Password Plus or Super Password, and wanted to write a puzzle regarding a person who was not notable at the time either of those shows were in first-run...

[Bryce L.]

but not "we're approaching this piecemeal," and I think there oughta be.

Nobody's stopping you from implementing a convention. You could become part of Password history, man!

(For what it's worth? I didn't need the spoiler. If the tack of a word completely changes, it's usually a pretty safe bet they are going piecemeal. ESPECIALLY on that first piecemeal clue. If you take that clue (assuming it was given with proper inflection), give the PAINFULLY obvious answer, and are still called wrong, that should have given you some information.)

Curious, any KNOWN instances of a difficult word being dealt with piecemeal on the CBS shows? (I'd ask about ABC, but since we only got one episode with Brett Somers and Jack Klugman, as well as part of an episode with Sheila McRae and Martin Milner to work with, I hardly consider that sufficient "sample size" to be meaningful...)

[TLEberle]

Curious, any KNOWN instances of a difficult word being dealt with piecemeal on the CBS shows?

Here's how you answer that: before you get to that point, wouldn't the word be thrown out and unscored? Is watching that sort of verbal groping enjoyable TV?

[Bryce L.]

Curious, any KNOWN instances of a difficult word being dealt with piecemeal on the CBS shows?

Here's how you answer that: before you get to that point, wouldn't the word be thrown out and unscored? Is watching that sort of verbal groping enjoyable TV?

You and I both know the answer to that question, some 50-odd years after the fact... a resounding NO! ...But did Goodson-Todman, CBS Television, and any other involved sponsors truly grasp that "Old El Stinko" concept, way back when the show was still broadcasting in Black and White, and while Jack Clark was still behind the announcer's microphone? ...There's likely no other way TO know the answer to THAT question, short of checking the episodes which have turned up on GSN (um, excuse me, Game Show Network) in the years following their original airings...

[jjman920]

The only reason I could envision "writing" material is if you were using the Puzzles format of Password Plus or Super Password, and wanted to write a puzzle regarding a person who was not notable at the time either of those shows were in first-run...

Shoot. I'd go out and buy a Taboo game for that.

[JasonA1]

Shoot. I'd go out and buy a Taboo game for that.

I suppose if you want to play without having seen the material yourself, and you don't want to eBay the old MB games, it does provide you five words with some link to a sixth word. But looking at a few Taboo cards right now, they often don't make good puzzles, and you'd be looking through them yourself to vet them anyway (YMMV, of course, just my opinion).

TWO-CITIZEN-FIRST-TRAVEL-TICKET
SECOND-CLASS
SHOES-SOCKS-SWIM-SANDAL-SUMMER
BAREFOOT
Among a decent one like...
SERVICE-WAITER-MEAL-MONEY-TOE
TIP
-Jason

[Bryce L.]

The only reason I could envision "writing" material is if you were using the Puzzles format of Password Plus or Super Password, and wanted to write a puzzle regarding a person who was not notable at the time either of those shows were in first-run...

Shoot. I'd go out and buy a Taboo game for that.

And lemme guess, if you wanna go "whole hog" and do Alphabetics as well, you just filter through enough MB Password games until you have a decent set of 10 consecutively-lettered words to try (using any possible setup, from A-J all the way to Q-Z)... right?

[clemon79]

And lemme guess, if you wanna go "whole hog" and do Alphabetics as well, you just filter through enough MB Password games until you have a decent set of 10 consecutively-lettered words to try (using any possible setup, from A-J all the way to Q-Z)... right?

No, I open my Password Plus home game and pull out an Alphabetics.

/why in the hell would I waste that much material?
//also you do not seem to understand that we're not PLAYING Password as a game show