req.co.uk Codex newsletter #29
posted by Breadmower on Sun 6th May, 07 at 09:08:59
What's this newsletter all about then?
Welcome to the Codex newsletter, where we bring you up to speed what's going on at the site and - more importantly - letting you know the results of the weekly leaderboard, and what accolades have been awarded to the movers and shakers this week.
Bored of this waffle already? You can unsubscribe by going to the preferences page on the site...
In this issue
- New Name, Same Game
- Like the Oscars, but with less tears
- Leaderboard update
- Prizegiving
- Predictions
New Name, Same Game
If you're feeling particularly observant, you might have noticed a few changes to Mastermind - most notably that it's not called Mastermind any more!
Yes, the big update has finally happened, and in addition to a lot of cosmetic changes, we're now sporting a new name: Codex. Don't worry - despite the new look and new moniker, it's still the same game: find the coloured code in as few guesses as possible. Those of you who have been reading the newsletter for a few weeks will have some idea of the new features that have been added in as part of the update, but even if not, you'll hopefully be able to spot one or two things.
A few of the interesting ones: * Your req.co.uk profile and avatar are now shown on your Codex userpage (so now would be a good time to tell us a little about yourself), * If you've added anyone into your friends list, they'll be highlighted on the leaderboards (and also shown on your new personal leaderboard), * We've got some new graphs dotted around the site - the most interesting one shows the scores of the top five players through the week, so you can see them jostling for first place, * There's also a new tutorial and an FAQ which will give you a quick refresher on how to play.
As if that's not enough, there's a few more odds and ends that will be added over the coming weeks, such as teams, time zones and group leaderboards (such as guys vs girls, and UK vs US etc). No doubt that there'll be some cleaning up to do as well - if you find any bugs, or spot see something on req.co.uk that needs updating to use the new name, then let us know - leave a comment below.
Like the Oscars, but with less tears
I might be the one who does all of the programming for the site, but without you lot playing, there wouldn't be much point, would there? I'd like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who's playing the game - it's good to know that people are enjoying it. Special thanks go to the following players, who have made an above average contribution to this update: Bunnery (for the original idea, doing loads of testing, and for making fantastic hot chocolate whilst we played Mastermind (the hardware version!) at work), Laura (for doing loads of testing, submitting the most precise bug reports that I've ever had, and for helping to test the site on multiple devices (such as her Sidekick 3)), bin1 (for SQL advice, bug reporting (complete with screenshots), and for putting up with me twisting the conversation around to Codex pretty much every time we speak), Martin & Yodi (for both helping to come up with a new scoring system), Sarah (for keeping an eye on the stats, and letting me know when something's gone wrong). Don't be offended if you suggested something recently and weren't mentioned there - there'll be another 'Thanks to' list with the next update :-)
Anyway, you keep playing, I'll keep coding, and let's see where we go from here.
Leaderboard update
When the leaderboard closed for the week, here's how things looked (rank - user - average guesses):
1st - DOM - 3.89 (9 games)
2nd - bin1 - 4.4 (5 games)
3rd - Breadmower - 4.89 (9 games)
4th - Bunnery - 4.92 (12 games)
5th - Janet - 5 (25 games)
5th - Mike - 5 (13 games)
7th - laura - 5.12 (50 games)
8th - Sarah - 5.14 (42 games)
9th - Mr.Puzzlewit - 5.32 (19 games)
10th - ICE CREAM - 5.43 (7 games)
11th - sharon - 5.55 (78 games)
12th - jfkauthor - 6.2 (5 games)
13th - Barb - 7.05 (19 games)
Total games played: 314
See the full leaderboard, along with a trend graph for the top five players on the .
Prizegiving
This week:
- The Secret Admirers award (for receiving the most challenges) goes to Sarah, who was challenged 33 times
- The Open Relay award (for sending the most challenges) goes to Bunnery, who sent 55 challenges
- The Turing award (for the most solo games played) goes to sharon, who played solo 68 times.
- The Enigma award (for sending the hardest codes) is awarded to Mike, whose codes took an average of 6 guesses to break
- The Plaintext award (for sending the easiest codes) is given to laura, whose codes took only 4.5 guesses to break on average
- The Quick Thinking award (for the fastest game) goes to Sarah, who completed a game in 4 seconds
- The Deep Thought award (for the slowest game) goes to laura, who took 1 day 22:42:35 to finish one game
- The Brute Force award (for the highest average) goes to Barb, who took an average of 7.05 guesses to break codes
- Optimal Algorithm awards (for finding a code in one guess) are given to Barb and Sharon
- The Bletchley award (for top codebreaker) is this week awarded to DOM, whose average number of guesses to break codes was 3.89 over 9 games.
Another quiet week, with only 314 games played (48 less than last week), but wait - what's this? Perhaps there was something to my 'DOM Quantity/Average Theory' - a quiet week, and not only is DOM up at the top of the leaderboard, but he's got an average of 3.89. Mind you, though - we very nearly had a draw: DOM spent most of the week sharing first place with Mr.Puzzlewit, and I was starting to think that it was going to stay that way until the leaderboard closed. On Friday, though, DOM decided to take a risk and play a few more games - the risk paid off, and he completed two games in three guesses, and another in four guesses, bringing his average down to 3.89. Now left in second place, Mr.Puzzlewit tried to follow suit, completed his next game in four guesses, but things didn't go quite as smoothly after that, and he tumbled down the leaderboard, finishing 9th overall. Well done DOM, but bad luck Mr.Puzzlewit - that second Bletchley award was tantalisingly close.
Interestingly, the results are rather close together this week with a spread of only 3.16 between the highest and lowest players on the leaderboard. Perhaps that's due to the fact that no-one's been deliberately trying to lose this week, or maybe we're seeing another shift across the board as players find new, more effective techniques. Whatever's caused this, it's meant that one of our new players - ICE CREAM - made their debut on the leaderboard with a respectable 5.43, but was only ranked 10th. Our other new player - margaretlittle - didn't manage to play enough games to qualify for the leaderboard, but hopefully we'll see how they do next week.
Congratulations to everyone who won an award - they'll now be visible on your personal statistics pages so that the rest of us can marvel at your skills.
Got a suggestion for a new award? Let us know - leave a comment below.
See the full award details on the .
Predictions
Last time, I based my predictions on a slightly modified version of Bunnery's idea - instead of predicting the same names that had just won, I went for the players that won the week before, giving 'DOM, Mr.Puzzlewit, Barb, Sharon'. As it happened, the results were 'DOM, bin1, Breadmower, Bunnery', so that's one name in the right place, though for a while DOM and Mr.Puzzlewit were tied for first place, so it was nearly two names in the right place.
Still, it's not quite as interesting as trying to pick them myself, so I'll go back to my old system. This week, I'm going to go for 'Mike, Janet, Bunnery, Sarah' - that's based on some complicated statistical trend analysis, so it's bound to work!
Until next week...
That's it for this newsletter, thanks for reading. Want to make a comment or suggestion? Leave a comment leave a comment below.
Remember, you've got under seven days to make your mark on this week's leaderboard... get to it!
Have fun,
Breadmower and the rest of team req.co.uk
Hmm Sharon says wont it be good if we have a theme week so like you can change your name to like a theme so every week have a different theme so one week fruit and veg next famous people Etc. you would still have to keep you original name or people wouldnt know who you were but have like a second name that you could change and have little competitions at whos the most creative (by the way this really was sharons idea!)
Hmmm...posted by Breadmower on Tue 8th May, 07 at 20:46:25Sounds fun - I just need to work out how to do it :-) I'll keep you posted...
Untitled commentposted by bin1 on Tue 8th May, 07 at 21:46:46Mental noteposted by Breadmower on Wed 9th May, 07 at 06:48:17Mental note: put fruit in the swear filter...
Heeheeposted by Sarah on Wed 9th May, 07 at 18:03:35Yea you might want to do that :D