I wish I was good enough to do the cryptic crosswords. I have to stick the the regular crosswords
Cryptics are awesome. Once you get used to the rules they become easier but you have to do them often. I find when I don't do them for a while, it takes me a while to get back into them. If you can do regular crossword, you can do cryptics.
They may be intimidating at first but they aren't all that bad. I find that the best way is to attempt one and if you struggle, look at the answer. Once you look at the answer, try to determine how they arrived at the answer and what rules were followed. Sometimes with cryptics, you'll just know the answer right off the bat, if this happens, you should still try to figure out what rules they used to arrive at the answer.
The Globe and Mail used to have cryptics that were fairly easy. I still have a stack of cryptics from the Globe somewhere. If they still have them, that's a good place to start. I stopped doing regular crosswords once I discovered the Globe cryptics.
Just don't attempt to do British cryptics. Those are hard unless you are very familiar with the culture and vernacular. I am pretty good with all things British but the cryptics are a nightmare for me.
Hopefully you give them another try because it's so rewarding whenever you get an answer.
