Combining talents
by Lunqui (Lunch and Quip)
Combining talents to write Enigma puzzles offers yet another way to have fun and develop friendships in the NPL. Why not just write your own flats? Well, for one thing, if you’re new to writing flats, you might doubt your ability to present a wordplay discovery to its best advantage. For another, you might notice that combining your nom with another can create an amusing result (more about that in a second). And of course, there is the simple reason that collaborating with fellow puzzlemakers is a pleasure in itself, and the shared creative process can take you somewhere you might not reach on your own.
Collaborations can take many forms, of course, but the most common method occurs when one Krewe member discovers a base (wordplay) for a flat and another contributes the verse. The usual protocol is that the base goes to the versifier, the result comes back for approval or more give-and-take, and eventually a completed flat goes to the flats editor for Enigma consideration. Naturally, the most common method is far from the only method, and you may enjoy working with someone to, say, find more examples of phrases that can be made from a letter bank, or brainstorm about a rhyme scheme.
When people collaborate on a puzzle, a combined byline (“combinom”) readily or fancifully identifies both authors. Historically, the general guideline for combinoms has been that the first part of the base-finder’s nom is attached to the last part of the versifier’s nom. For instance, if Wabbit contributes a base and Mangie writes a verse, the byline might be WABBIE or WANGIE. Quip and Panache have combined as QUICHE; Ulk and Joker, as ULKER.
The guideline is flexible (especially since it doesn’t apply to all forms of collaboration) and often bent with an eye to aesthetics. For instance, LUNKHEAD is the combinom Lunch and QED use. (The Lun from “Lunch” followed by “QED”—or, at least, the sound “QED” would make if you pronounced it as a single word instead of its individual letters). Meki and Teki have collaborated as TEX-MEX.
To complete the byline, the authors’ cities are similarly combined. The first part of the base-finder’s city precedes the last part of the verse-writer’s city and each author’s state abbreviation contributes one letter (with appropriate accommodations for international collaborations).
The individual contributors to a “combiflat” (the NPL term for a flat written by more than one author) are listed in the puzzle notes in the front of The Enigma.
[This article originally appeared in the Guide; Lunch has updated it]