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We're still doing old geniuses and are on #30. Brick wall! We can't get anything after several passes through the clues.
Does anyone know if there are special instructions?

I’ve just looked at this, as I like a challenge. I'm sure there are. It looks to me as though each clue contains its own definition but the wordplay for a different clue, minus one letter. I deduced this, if it's of interest, by looking at 9a. It looks for all the world like an anagram, but the letters don't give anything. However, plug them into Quinapalus Word Matcher and adding one extra letter gives a word whose definition appears elsewhere among the clues. I already found two more to confirm that idea. I imagine those letters spell a message. See if that makes any sense.

I’ll report back if and when I complete it, though it won’t be for a while as I’m tied up now.

Link for anyone interested.

https://amp.theguardian.com/crosswords/2005/dec/05/genius-crossword-30

Thank you! I'd wondered if the definitions were separate from the parsings. We'll give that a go and check back in. Tomorrow, likely.
Thanks for responding so quickly!

I think you are right Quisling. 11a was my first indication (perhaps that’s what you meant). I find a Scrabble engine useful for this sort of thing as you can use one or two wild cards (blank tiles) per anagram.

Since you mention Quinapalus, I’ve just been experimenting with their Composite Anagram Finder which is rather interesting.

11a was my second idea to the instructions, Jono. Curiosity got the better of me and I have finished and parsed it all. I could narrow my earlier observation and define the preamble precisely to make it easier, but I’ll leave it till the morning.

I don’t play Scrabble (maybe I should), but I’m interested to study Quinapalus further.

I’m still kicking myself about Genius 13 (the cat is in hiding). It only occurred to me today that the number of the puzzle was significant. There are only about 20 words of 13 letters which don’t have a repeated letter, and the only common (?) ones would be UNPREDICTABLY, SUBORDINATELY and COPYRIGHTABLE, so I should really have twigged that the top row was key 🙈

My instructions for Genius 30:

"Every clue contains its own definition but its wordplay has been ejected into another clue, minus the first letter, which is always one of four"

It certainly got a lot easier when I realized the first letter bit. I wonder if there's some significance to the four first letters - did the setter just have a large meal, perhaps?

Aaaaand, finished! Thanks everyone for your help!