Codenames 38

[sunrise089]

Skis are Shoes, you wear to ski on ice (sort of) in the Alps or the Canadian rockies.

Why not 'snow' then? Because SnowBall I guess

[shallow_thought]

Pre spoilers:

There are several locations in which you might use skis.
ALPS - very strongly linked to skiing
ANTARCTICA
CANADA

Probably in that order amongst themselves.

Others:
SKIs actually run on a thin layer of ICE formed by melting the snow under pressure, although too much is a bad thing.
They can be made of PLASTIC? I'm not 100% sure of this - it might be some other composite (fiberglass, carbon fibre).
You use specialist SHOES / Skis replace or enhance shoes
Would you describe a resort as a Ski-CENTER?
It's also possible that any of several words a famous Ski brand that I don't know ...

Because ALPS is so strongly linked to Skiing, and once you've seen it I would go for the three locations + ICE. Except that the fact it's Skis not Skiing makes me nervous; perhaps we are supposed to associate more strongly with the device itself and away from the locations. So still ALPS (I think that different types of skiing, Alpine and Cross-country, use different types of ski?), SHOE, PLASTIC and maybe ICE?

Post-spoilers, most people seem to like ICE, SHOE, ALPS, CANADA, ANTARCTICA. And if the clue were Skiing I would agree; it's hard to work out a clue that cuts this group to four without pulling in another word (for example, Freezing or Winter would exclude Shoe but Pull in death).

If we go with that, I think the spoilers talk me into  preference order of ALPS, SHOE, CANADA, ANTARCTICA, ICE.

However, I would like to wait and get any response to my suggestion that we may be supposed to focus on the items. In that case I would go SHOE, ALPS, PLASTIC, ICE.

[T-hawk]

I think it very much has to be Shoe.  That's the only reason you'd clue Skis (particularly the noun form) as opposed to some other cold or wintery word.  Everybody mentioned it so I think we have enough consensus to point.

I like Ice second because it's absolutely unmistakable, you can't possibly clue Skis without expecting to hit that.  And inverting the clue totally gets there too, Ice + Shoe gets you thinking of Skis, you don't think of Skis first and then realize Ice is an acceptable gray.

Alps/Canada/Antarctica is a toss-up for order, Alps is probably a bit stronger for Skis.  One of these will be gray and we just have to plow our way past it.

Plastic would be my next choice if two of the locations are gray. I agree Skis could be pointing there, but it's less strong than all the cold places, which all have to be no-worse-than-gray.

[sunrise089]

Point to Shoe
Point to Ice
Point to Alps

[JR4]

Shoe is red
Ice is red
Alps is red

[shallow_thought]

Given that we all seem to agree that the locations are a strong possibility, and we all said CANADA while sunrise didn't suggest ANTARCTICA.

Point to CANADA.

[sunrise089]

Agree. Antarctica is fine too but people don't really ski there. It's obviously cold and snowy there but Canada is famously cold to so to me it's more direct. I'd probably go Antarctica over say Japan or Korea even though more people ski in the latter

[Azoth]

CANADA is Red

[T-hawk]

I'm actually tempted to try pointing to Antarctica too just for kicks, on the theory that it can't be worse than gray and might score us an extra point... anyone want to talk me off this ledge, or actually go for it?

[pindicator]

I think it's pretty clear he would go for 5 if Antarcitca was red. At best it is grey. Let's leave it be and pass.