The Word Web of horror - Clue Twenty Two

Question

_{<<---First clue
<---Previous clue}

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As you say the word, the floor starts rising. You are now able to reach the trapdoor.
You push it open and climb out. You blink in surprise. You appear to be in the same place you were for Clue Sixteen. When you take another glance, however, you notice that it's different. You see that there are six instead of four boxes, in both places. In addition, the words seem... quite odd. You look:

Continuing with your progress, I see. Onwards with your hunt! Until you solve this puzzle, however, you aren't going anywhere. No way to avoid it.

To solve this puzzle, it is mostly the same as the previous puzzle like it. Don't make the mistake of thinking this will be easy - it's really not. On the bottom part of this plaque, there are several types of puzzles. On your neck is your head. Kryptics, sudoku, enigmatic-puzzle - it's all there. Unless you want to stay here, you must solve it - and don't forget to go in deeper.

Group A - steganography
1.) 4,4,5 | 1,1,6 | 5,2,1 | 5,1,1
2.) 1,3,4 | 7,7,5 | 8,3,1
3.) 1,4,6 | 9,1,3 | 5,2,5
4.) 6,1,2 | 6,5,2 | 7,5,2
5.) 9,2,2 | 1,4,1 |
6.) 3,5,6 | 10,3,2 | 1,4,2 | 5,2,1

Group B¹ - cryptic-clues
1.) Diamonds formed in lattices. (3)
2.) Broken bar within intelligence (5)
3.) Restriction pistol without exclamation (4)
4.) Finish that man's top (3)
5.) Angry mate's anger (5)
6.) Beginning a Christmas tree drive (5)

_{¹Created by @TheGreatEscaper and @ChrisCudmore}

Group C - enigmatic-puzzle

1-6.)

Group D - rebus
1.)
2.)
3.)
4.)
5.)
6.)

Group E - word-web
1.) Apple, brother, sister, deal, talk, time
2.) lose, cucumber, blow, heels, keep, off
3.) chew, grab, dust, bark, nails, tongue
4.) over, jump, false, scratch, out, running
5.) hit, raise, snow, live same, over, tile
6.) pull, wag, sting, bushy, chase, legs

Group F - cipher

1.) noo p q rssr
2.) vscgc
3.) Κάτω από
4.) ai/jws
5.) עוהש
6.) B38b 4C6G3B`B?7F` 7K?JJbJ32E` AG6AJC`

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_{Next clue--->}

Answer 1

The initial message

Taking the first letter of each sentence (I spotted this because of the strange word "Kryptics") gives COUNT DOOKU. According to the OP, this is not relevant for this particular puzzle and will only be used later on in the series.

Group A

This is a steganography puzzle. Interpret each triple $(a,b,c)$ as

the $c$th letter of the $b$th word of the $a$th sentence.

This gives the following words:

DUST
RUN
EYE
OFF
UP
EARS

and the final solution

DRY (dry as dust, dry run, not a dry eye, dry off, dry up, dry behind the ears) - thanks @Volatility!

Group B

1. Diamonds formed in lattices. (3)

   ICE (ice crystals are like diamonds, and the word is found in lattICEs)

2. Broken bar within intelligence (5)

   BRAIN (bra is a "broken bar", with "in", and brains have intelligence) - thanks @Will!

3. Restriction pistol without exclamation (4)

   LOCK, as found by Neil W.

4. Finish that man's top (3)

   HAT (the finish of "that", and on top of a man) - thanks @Will!

5. Angry mate's anger (5)

   STEAM (anagram of "mate's", "angry" being an anagram indicator and "anger" the definition) - thanks @Sid!

6. Beginning a Christmas tree drive (5)

   FIRST ("beginning" as the definition, a Christmas tree is a fir, and drive and street are both words for types of road) - thanks @Will!

The final solution is

PICK (ice pick, pick your brains, lock pick, pick out of a hat, pick up steam, first pick).

Group C

I solved the Sudoku by first filling in all 9s, 4s, 7s, and 2s (in that order) and then catching the low-hanging fruit. The final solution is:

As Sconibulus discovered, there is a second image hidden behind the Sudoku: a square of letters instead of numbers. Sconibulus's answer details the rest of the solution for Group C: we find

the words HEART, COLD, DEAD, FOX, CROW, THROW, giving the final solution STONE.

Group D

1.

THIN

The rest are as found by Chris Cudmore:

POINT, UP, NOSE, SHORT, NECK,

and the final answer is

STICK (stick-thin, pointed stick, stick up, stick your nose in the air, short stick, stick your neck out) - thanks @Rubio!

Group E

1. Apple, brother, sister, deal, talk, time

   BIG - solved by Sconibulus

2. lose, cucumber, blow, heels, keep, off

   COOL - solved by Sconibulus

3. chew, grab, dust, bark, nails, tongue

   BITE (bite and chew, grab a bite, bite the dust, bark worse than bite, bite your nails, bite your tongue)

4. over, jump, false, scratch, out, running

   START (start over, jump start, false start, start from scratch, start out, running start) - thanks @Rubio!

5. hit, raise, snow, live same, over, tile

   ROOF (hit the roof, raise the roof, snow on the roof, live under the same roof, roof over, roof tile)

6. pull, wag, sting, bushy, chase, leg

   TAIL - solved by Sconibulus

The final solution, as found by Sconibulus, is

HEAD (bighead, cool head, bite your head off, head start, head to tail).

Group F

1. noo p q rssr

   DEEP (Morse code with "n" and "s" being dashes and the other letters dots) - thanks @MOehm!

2. vscgc

   THICK - if you go into the markup of the question, you'll find a hidden word "clues" next to this clue, which is the key for a Vigenere cipher.

3. Κάτω από

   According to Google, this is Greek for UNDER.

4. ai/jws

   SOAKED - shift each character one to the right on a qwerty keyboard, assuming / is next to A since that makes SO?KED a word.

5. עוהש

   THIN (typing these Hebrew letters on a keyboard with both alphabets gives GUVA, which rot13's to THIN) - thanks @Will!

6. B38c F=4FC2aB38a 4C6G3B` B38bJG2Cc

   SAVE. Rubio had the idea of applying ROT47, which turns B38b 4C6G3B`B?7F` 7K?JJbJ32E` AG6AJC` into qbg3 crevbq-1qnfu-1 fznyy3ybat-1 pvepyr-1. Then apply ROT13 to that, to get dot3 period-1dash-1 small3long-1 circle-1. This can be rewritten as ... .- ...- ., which is Morse code for SAVE.

The final solution is

SKIN (skin-deep, thick skin, under the skin, soaked to the skin, thin skin, save your skin).

Final answer

The respective groups of puzzles yielded the following words:

DRY, PICK, STONE, STICK, HEAD, SKIN

giving the final solution

BONE (bone-dry, bone to pick, sticks and stones can break my bones, bonehead, skin and bone).

Answer 2

NOTE: I helped the author with Group B only. The rest is all new to me.

Group D:

1 ???

2

POINT

3

UP

4

NOSE

5

SHORT

6

NECK

Answer 3

Partial Answer:

I solved the Sudoku,

which when mapped to the words behind yields:

1 heartcold
2 deadfoxcr
3 owthrowho
4 jltiiverr
5 vtaaztcny
6 hmrrunxat
7 fwtnlgher
8 dpmpsskgt
9 rohdzacap

Which likely makes the result of section C:

1: Heart
2: Cold
3: Dead
4: Fox
5: Crow
6: Throw

Group C Final:

STONE: Heart of Stone, Cold Stone, Stone Dead, Stone Fox, Stone Crows, Throw Stones

Group E:

1: BIG: Big Apple, Big Brother, Big Sister, Big Deal, Talk Big, Big Time
2: COOL: Lose Cool, Cool as a Cucumber, Blow to Cool, Cool one's Heels, Keep Cool, Cool Off
3: BITE: Stolen from @Rand al'Thor 4: BACK: Back over, Jump Back, False Back, Scratch one's Back, Outback, Running Back START: Found by @Rubio, Stolen from @Rand al'Thor 5: ROOF: Stolen from @Rand al'Thor
6: TAIL: Pull one's tail, wag one's tail, tail sting, bushy tail, chase one's tail, tail between legs

Total E:

HEAD: Big Head, Cooler Heads, Bite off one's Head, Head Start, Roof Overhead, Head over Tail

Overall: (mostly stolen)

BONE: Bone Dry, Bone to Pick, Stone Bones, Break Bones, Bonehead, ?

Answer 4

B3

pistol without exclamation = glock without GEE! = lock = restriction

Answer 5

Partial Answer

B5.

STEAM   Angry(mates)—[anagram]→STEAM; Anger (def.).

Group D:

STICK   stick thin, stick point, stick up, stick your nose into ..., draw the short stick, stick your neck out

F6:

is ROT47ed to: qbg4 ulcura2qbg2 crevbq1 qbg3yvar4
OP suggests this is a step in the right direction.

Noted previously in comments,
E4.

START   start over, jump-start, false start, start from scratch, start out, running start