Bon Voyage

[Amb]

The above puzzle was to be used as part of a now cancelled online puzzle hunt. I have approx 10-12 completed and tested puzzles ready for use. This is the first.

Each puzzle resolves to a single final answer, that of a key word or phrase.

This puzzle was designed to be solved in a group of puzzlers. Delegation may be useful, but it's up to you guys what you want to do.

[ralphmerridew]

pakistan: r3, c10. N2, W
taiwan: r7 c1. N, SE, E3 (or S, NE, E3)

[Scurra]

From just the horizontal/vertical ones I can see that the message says something like

TO PRO (G?) RESS YOU MUST --- YPE --- GRAT (I?) ON

...but I hadn't noticed the diagonal TAIWAN although that would put an I in that last spot which would be nice.

edit: and a G from a diagonal GHANA too.
_________________
_{still Quiz Olympiad champion. Must get a life.
New definitions: COFFEE - someone who is coughed upon}

[referee]

Numbers next to countries is the number of turns? Some numbers look too high for that...
_________________
Jan 21st, 2008: The pillaging continues.
Mar 4th, 2008: Rest in Peace, Gary Gygax. May your dice always roll a natural 20 wherever you are.

Be the Ultimate Ninja! Play Billy Vs. SNAKEMAN today!

[Scurra]

Numbers just appear to be an index - for the first stage at least - I am guessing that the instruction will be to tell you to do something else, (perhaps with the remaining flags?)
_________________
_{still Quiz Olympiad champion. Must get a life.
New definitions: COFFEE - someone who is coughed upon}

[referee]

Could be. Qatar starts in 9,2 to the left, then climbs up. But I don't see any J in the grid. Am I blind or what?
_________________
Jan 21st, 2008: The pillaging continues.
Mar 4th, 2008: Rest in Peace, Gary Gygax. May your dice always roll a natural 20 wherever you are.

Be the Ultimate Ninja! Play Billy Vs. SNAKEMAN today!

[Zag]

[Scurra]

Index into the names of the countries that are in the grid.
So, in the top line
#1 (still unsure what country this is!)
#2 Qatar - in grid so that gives a T
#3 Tonga - in grid so that gives an O
#4 Palau - in grid so that gives a P
#5 Turley - not in grid
#6 Mongolia - not in grid
etc.

As this method appears to give a coherent message, I assumed it was a good place to start...

I haven't exhaustively identified the flag grid though, but I've run out of countries that I could easily spot in the letter grid. So my stab at the message still has holes in it.
_________________
_{still Quiz Olympiad champion. Must get a life.
New definitions: COFFEE - someone who is coughed upon}

[Zag]

Ahh. I had found a bunch of countries in the grid. If I had been serious about solving the puzzle, I would have looked up all the flags and realized that some are in the grid and some not, but that seemed like too much work. I did, however, find this site, which is really cool: You can select the characteristics and colors of the flag and it shows you all that match.

World Flag Database

The closest match to that first one, that I found, is Uzbekistan, but it has the wrong device on it.

[Scurra]

Yeah, well I messed up my first pass by failing to actually note the letters down when I found the matching flag, so ended up going through the whole process twice (which is why I haven't been able to bring myself to go back and exhaustively search for the missing ones.)
_________________
_{still Quiz Olympiad champion. Must get a life.
New definitions: COFFEE - someone who is coughed upon}

[Suspence]

Always liked flags. Here's a list of the ones in the first 3 rows:

Row 1: Lesotho Qatar Tonga Palau Turkey Mongolia Nauru Myanmar Aruba Ethiopia
Row 2: Cameroon Iran Australia Chile Seychelles Botswana Ukraine Monaco/Indonesia (flags look the same) Senegal Ghana
Row 3: Japan Zambia Italy Haiti Iraq Niger Afghanistan Belarus Libya Portugal
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I hate people who try to write interesting things in their signature.

[Suspence]

4) Cyprus Hungary Angola Cuba Malawi Canada Egypt Fiji Guam Sudan
5) Tanzania Guatemala Denmark Thailand Uzbekistan Burundi Vietnam Suriname Jordan Tuvalu
6) Yemen Venezuela Mauritius Pakistan Armenia Brazil Dominica England Kiribati Latvia
_________________
I hate people who try to write interesting things in their signature.

[Suspence]

7) Liberia Bhutan Norway Sweden Mali Slovakia Poland Namibia Andorra Mexico
8) Libya (again?) Tunisia Israel Benin Togo Bahrain Nigeria Rwanda Chad Argentina
9) Swaziland Myanmar Austria Eritrea Lebanon Singapore Spain Croatia Syria Oman
_________________
I hate people who try to write interesting things in their signature.

[Amb]

Regarding the mini flags, the first flag no longer appears in my source, so something has changed (including it being incorrect). I'll leave as is for now, but If I have to, I will replace it with another flag.

[Suspence]

I seem to be missing a letter, but looks like the intended solution may be emigration.

Edit: Found my missing letter....Chad and Romania look pretty much the same. Looks like my solution is correct.
_________________
I hate people who try to write interesting things in their signature.

[Amb]

It's basically been solved.

So I won't use invisible.

There are 31 countries in that grid each with a single 90 degree bend in it. Every single letter is used at least once. I was very proud of getting 31 countries into that grid.

If anyone wants a challenge and wants to ignore the flag section, just try finding the 31 countries.