New Clue!

Replies

  • Okay, now, plan of attack:

    We've got fifteen entries in the parsec table. I can see two very general ways to try to use this.

    1) The fifteen entries may each correspond to one cypher-key character, which would mean we can take the table plus the dials and find a key for decoding the message text @CG_SBCrumb gave us. Then just apply the same fifteen-character cyper-key string through repetition, a bit like the polyalphabetic(?) cypher someone mentioned earlier. This strategy leaves us with the problem of what to read off the dial once we've got it set correctly. I've had a couple thoughts on this, but it's not obvious to me yet.

    2) The dials may combine with the cypher-text in Crumb's message in some way, where we set the dials and then find the associated character in the dial, and do something based on that. This has some obvious problems, though, because we've got characters repeated in the dials.

    Another possibility, although I haven't figured out how to get this to work either:

    3) The dials may give us the plaintext after some sort of manipulation I'm still not clear on. Arguing against this is that I don't have any idea how to get to that point. Arguing for this is the fact that we know every character appears in the dials, meaning that every character can be obtained through them. Then again, maybe that's just an argument for why the dials should be the cypher keys (since keys for many cyphers need to include every character in some way).

    Going to try to play around some more, maybe see if I can manipulate the dial images manually on my computer. Anyone have any thoughts?
  • Dk_rek
    3299 posts Member
    31j2o381yw39.png
  • Looks like one of my messages got eaten, so two bits:
    Grue wrote: »
    I corrected another mistake. The second character of the inner circle is 1 not L. Other than that, I think the rest are right.

    I went through 'em too, and I concur with Grue. There were two mistakes, the G/Y and the L/1, and the rest looks right to me.


    CG_SBCrumb wrote: »
    @CG_SBCrumb it looks like @Tsuo_Vook is on the puzzle. I’ll give you less than an hour before it’s solved. Book it!
    I'd take that bet. You haven't even scratched the surface yet bwhahaha

    Though Vook doesn't mess around so I expect the pace to pick up

    You guys are too kind. Unfortunately, it's already after 2am where I am and I need to get up early to help clean out someone's storage shed / garage later. So there's a good chance I'm going to have to abandon this one before it gets finished, if only for preservation-of-health reasons.
  • Not sure if it helps or not cause no idea but is there anything to his message above it cause it makes no sense like its missing letters or words from it?
  • The dials look like the rotary slide rule on an aviation watch.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-XxsXp5TEQ

    I'm not sure which numbers to multiply or divide, though. If you read it the normal way it always points to the same letter, so you'd need to reverse the use of the dials to get anything that makes sense. I've been trying the first column/60 but it's not giving me much.
  • Don't know if this helps but it's from u/Xupaosso

    http://imgur.com/gallery/mFybGWQ

    It's the dials put together.

  • One more post before we get to work, because I want to flag something we should be looking at:

    That cypher text is weird. @DarthJarX2 was on this earlier, looking at the number of letters per word. I'm not sure if that's the key bit of information, but there's something to the structure of this message we're going to need to deal with. Things I'm noticing are lots of small words, and poetic structures (rhyme, alliteration). People calling this Crumb's poem are spot on.

    So how do you get a cypher text like that? Well, it'd be a pain in the butt to do a simple encoding and get back something like that; normally, cypher text looks like garbage characters, as it has in many of our previous puzzles. It may be that the cypher text is something other than the plain text on display---i.e. going along with DarthJarX2's letter counts as cypher text; or possibly only having some of the letters matter, like every third letter, or doing some sort of modulo operation based on the number of letters in the word and an initial or terminal letter.

    Or our puzzle-makers might be using a cypher that would let you conceal a message inside another plain-text message. I don't know my cyphers well enough to know what could do that, but it'd need a pretty crazy floating cypher key to manage it. The dials might just be complicated enough to pull that off, what with the three rings of text, but I'm still worried about whether that's possible since there are only 15 settings we've got instructions for.

    Okay, off to think about this some more now.
  • Found a better source for reading rotary slide rules - http://www.seiko.in/support/ib/pdf/rt01_e.pdf
    specifically look at page 12.
  • Haha!

    I made a thing. You may find it useful if you can use Adobe Photoshop and know how to rotate layers.

    Rotatable Adobe Photoshop Dials
  • Found a better source for reading rotary slide rules - http://www.seiko.in/support/ib/pdf/rt01_e.pdf
    specifically look at page 12.

    Nice find, @KaseySpacey . I'm currently seeing if I can use this method to get a set of 15 characters.

  • I've made the dial in English: https://imgur.com/gallery/mFybGWQ

    No clue where to go next, though.
  • KaseySpacey
    22 posts Member
    edited January 2019
    Using the letters that correspond to the number of minutes, I get
    1. S
    2. C
    3. O
    4. C
    5. N
    6. D
    7. R
    8. E
    9. L
    10. S
    11. 4
    12. L
    13. I
    14. F
    15. E
  • Using the letters that correspond to the number of minutes, I get
    1. S
    2. C
    3. O
    4. C
    5. N
    6. D
    7. R
    8. E
    9. L
    10. S
    11. 4
    12. L
    13. I
    14. F
    15. E

    Yah, aside from a U being incorrect, I think you got it.
  • Oh shoot, duh. Scoundrels 4 life. Welp.
  • Scoundrel ships...how surprising....
  • Well it was going to be related to ships so no point in being disappointed....😐
  • Using the letters that correspond to the number of minutes, I get
    1. S
    2. C
    3. O
    4. C
    5. N
    6. D
    7. R
    8. E
    9. L
    10. S
    11. 4
    12. L
    13. I
    14. F
    15. E

    Okay, how are you getting that? I'm getting

    H R(?) 4 8 Y(?) M C G Z J O E L 1 L

    But I think there's a good chance I don't have anything, because the R and the Y are really not well lined up. I'm doing what Page 12 of that pdf suggested: lining up the rate marker w/ the distance on the outside, then finding the speed on the outside and reading the letter below that.
  • He's using only the inner dial and reading letter under the minutes from the table.
  • Can confirm, at least in part. I just tried reversing my method (line up rate marker w/ rate on outside, find distance on outside, read down) and I get S C O U for the first four characters, and much more clearly lined up than the list I generated. I think you've got that, @KaseySpacey . (Also, @CG_SBCrumb liked your post, which is a good sign.)
  • I don't think I've ever seen a community become so downhearted like this one. I for one am looking forward to finding out what "scoundrels 4 life" means. If I don't get whatever is coming first try, I'll just get it second try no use in complaining now or getting sad.
  • secondsmeg wrote: »
    I don't think I've ever seen a community become so downhearted like this one. I for one am looking forward to finding out what "scoundrels 4 life" means. If I don't get whatever is coming first try, I'll just get it second try no use in complaining now or getting sad.

    Scoundrels to unlock Ot Falcon? I don't know, I'm not an expert of puzzles. Great work guys, I can't wait to see the solution. Crumb is a genius as always. 😉
    Do or don't there is no try
  • Tsuo_Vook wrote: »
    Okay, how are you getting that? I'm getting

    H R(?) 4 8 Y(?) M C G Z J O E L 1 L

    But I think there's a good chance I don't have anything, because the R and the Y are really not well lined up. I'm doing what Page 12 of that pdf suggested: lining up the rate marker w/ the distance on the outside, then finding the speed on the outside and reading the letter below that.

    Make sure you adjust the decimal (logarithmically, so divide or multiply by 10 to get a value between 10 and 99 inclusive) and that youre treating the outside ring as the “bezel”.

  • Tobias Beckett: "If you come with us, you're in this life for good."
    Scoundrels for life? Maybe I'm stretching a bit but I wonder if Beckett could be a possibility? Still probably pointing towards the Falcon.
  • How disappointing. Both thr datanine and the forum already speculated that scoundrels will be needed.
    Next time please give a teaser before we know exactly its outcome. Its much more effectivr that way.
  • I'm confident this isn't done yet, but I'm having a hard time seeing what the next step is. (Darn it, Crumb! I should be asleep!)

    I have, however, noticed that the title of Crumb's post ("Get the nod, Ace") anagrams to The Agent Code. And anagrams seem like they might be a reasonable place to go for that weird-as-heck text he posted.
  • VonZant
    3843 posts Member
    Beckett and the solo crew needed because they are literally in the ship when it turns into the OG Falcon?

    At least thats been my guess/hope for a while. I am biased and run scoundrels in arena, so I have been really wanting Beckett anyway. Would love it if we got Beckett and he had an arena oriented lead. /selfish.
  • The paragraph of text reminds me of clues for cryptic crosswords. But hey thats just me
  • That's a good start but your journey has just begun...
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