Happy UTC new year 🎉

I still have no idea for the first puzzle

From searching the transcript I know what I need to do but I don't know where to get the key

Check Slate's hint.

Still trying to figure out how to change chat parent? Anyone know?

so... literally been trying to figure this out for 10 days or so. I just figured it out here. I guess you can't change it when on the yellow chat sites? instead of the blue?

@JamesRisner Click your chat user profile and click [change]

Got time to star me on star room?

@JamesRisner Sure

@Ethan Where, exactly, are you stuck? It's not clear to me from your message. Are you still trying to decode the lines of text?

@JamesRisner So... there are 3 chat servers here: chat.stackoverflow.com, chat.stackexchange.com, and chat.meta.stackexchange.com. Stack Overflow chat uses SO's theme (which is orange and yellow), and you can't change your parent there, because the parent is always your SO account. This room is on the Stack Exchange chat server, which is used by all SE sites. That's why you can change your parent here.

The Meta Stack Exchange site also has its own chat server, mostly for historical reasons and because it allows staff to create private chat rooms that SE network moderators don't have implicit access to because they're not mods there. You can't change your parent there, either, because that chat server is only for MSE (just like SO Chat is exclusively for SO).

SE Chat and MSE Chat are both blue. Hopefully that explanation helps. :-)

I just got Explorer for a question but it only has score:1. My reputation indicates that it didn't get downvoted. The question is on a beta site. Maybe it's different for beta sites? I heard somewhere it was supposed to be score:2

@Catija Will there still be another secret hat?

I don't think that's how secrets work!

@CodyGray Haha. It was mentioned by Catija like a week ago :)

I think they're all out now right? The most you can get is 47, 48 hats total because of Solstice?

The "Introverts Unite" hat just showed up

Oh, that's a nice hat! :-)

Good job my book is labelled 'Book' otherwise I'd lose track of it :D

"Introverts Unite seems to just for 'a comment on a post on 1st Jan'. I've got two already & that's about the only commonality.

Were your comments replied to? Based on the name "unite", it'd make more sense if a conversation were required.

I think it’s “ask, answer or vote on Jan 1” (same as Solstice)

Got it right after casting a vote

That would be pretty redundant with the glasses, no?

Hmm just realised that too

Perhaps it’s even easier – visit any question page

It's definitely not that simple!

@CDJB Congrats! Looks like you got all hats. I am missing 1.

Perhaps a hat for any action on any SE site on the second of January @Catija

Hmm, maybe so. I thought it couldn't be that simple because I hadn't earned them, but then they just showed up, so I guess I just wasn't waiting long enough.

"introverts unite" well no need to call me out like that

@CodyGray That helps a lot. I created a chat room without understanding there were three sites. So I've just created one in "The Stackexchange Network". Should I (can I) move all the chats from the original chat room to the new one?

@JamesRisner I don't entirely understand. You are the owner of two rooms here on this chat server (chat.stackexchange.com): Risner's Magnificent Masion and Risner's Tiny Hut. Are you talking about one of those rooms? Or a room on a different chat server?

Why would you need to move the messages anywhere? It's fine to create chat rooms on any chat server you want.

Well, the faq said duplicate rooms shouldn't be created.

It's preferred that duplicate rooms not be created, yes.

If you're asking whether you can move a room from one chat server to another, the answer is no. That's not possible. But you can just stop using a room and it will go inactive, then be eventually deleted.

So I don't think I'll use Magnificent again, now that I understand how these work I'll use Tiny.

ok thanks

Just got "Introverts Unite" while reviewing, I'm not sure what triggered it

Was it just added to the bash today? :O

@pitamer clearly it's because we spend our time hunting down hat triggers instead of socialising :p

Yes, it is a new addition, I got it on two different sites where I had several activities in a short time, not on the others where I did fewer actions.

@lyxal Well one of those activities is certainly more interesting than the other, isn't it? :D

it sure is

imagine socialising with real life people

a horrible thought

:p

Sends shivers down my virtual spine

I wonder, are hats regularly added during bashes?

@lyxal Isn't that socializing?

As I understand they are all added at the start but not revealed till handed out.

So the trigger can be something you have been doing over the whole Bash so far or something you could only start doing today or something else we have not figured out.

@pitamer Yes, almost always. They were programmed in since the beginning (since staff goes on vacation during most of the latter portion of Winter Bash), but they have date-specific triggers that prevent them from being awarded until later.

@CodyGray well I suppose it is in a sort of a way - it's not as hard as real socialising though :p

I think every year we have had hats for Christmas Day or Hanukkah and/or New Years' Eve/Day. The exact days differ from year to year.

Oh, cool! But we did know in advance about the 2023 hat though

even before it was handed out

Yeah

We've had one I think pretty much every year, so it wouldn't be much of a surprise :-)

If we figure out the new one, is there anybody here to verify our theories? :p

haha

I wonder if the introvert is visiting the site every day for a set number of days or even on a given time for a set number of days.

@pitamer You know the Fanatic badge? Several of the staff members have it. :-)

So they periodically check in, even though they're officially on vacation.

What is 100 days? Visited 2762 days, 1741 consecutive

I wonder why I missed that day before this last stretch.

I think "Introverts Unite" is for doing something (e.g. posting) on a site within a particular time period (maybe during 2023 UTC)?

I've done nothing on Veganism & Vegetarianism today except post a question, and I got it for that. Then got it on Science Fiction & Fantasy almost immediately after posting a question there.

Neither question has any upvotes yet, so it can't be for posting well-received content.

Posting definitely isn't a requirement; I've earned it and haven't posted anything. (Except some mod messages...)

It is not posting an answer, as I did not do that today before I won the hat, but it can be any of several moderation activities (checking on older Q, cleaning out comments)

It's not even posting a comment

@Willeke It can't be that, because I don't have it on Literature where I've definitely visited every day.

@CodyGray Have you voted?

Yeah

Maybe not in a given time frame?

Pretty sure

It might be one of those hats you get for any activity (posting, voting, commenting) within a particular time period.

We have had a hat in the past where you needed to post (a question or an answer?) on the hour.

But that did run every day during the bash.

Hi, I'm looking for some hint or help on the unicorn hat

I really don't know where to ask without being banned from the game

because posting stuff publicly will probably remove the hat

Try here: chat.stackexchange.com/transcript/message/62631463#62631463

sweet

unfortunatelly I already decoded the first thing the first day

I feel like the complication between solving the first part and the next one is kind of exponential

or maybe I just need a happy idea, and cannot have it

So, you've decoded the lines of text successfully, but you aren't sure how to follow its instructions?

Oh, in that case there's nothing I can contribute since I'm also stuck there :p

yes, is that

the instructions are quite clear

I tried using the offset with which the lines are encoded

to find one char from each line

but the results are weird

Did you try to see if the letters can make more than one word?

I tried decoding the results with caesar with random offsets and nothing that makes sense comes up

Yeah, that's exactly what you should do. Slate's second hint tells you whether you're on the right track with the letters you get.

You don't want to decode that set of letters so much as unscramble them.

second hint?

the html comment that says rotten?

I thought that was like a first hint

Yeah, pitamer linked you to a chat message from Slate. There's two hints there. Those hints you have to decode.

The HTML comment isn't a hint, just a comment

checking that, thank you! <3

I got "Introverts Unite" on several sites now, once for 1 upvote, once for 1 comment and once for deleting some of my comments & answering.

Got 2023 at the same moment, so wonder what the difference is

i just got introverts unite too

i did make two comments

but i didn't even upvote anything

I have what I think are the right letters, and I can kind of recognize a related word, but I can't figure out which two words to use

for the unicorn puzzle

introverts unite seems to be just do anything, i got it on mse for upvoting

@pigrammer Try all of them?

@nohillside The problem is, none of them make sense

If I use all the letters, that is

January 2nd is World Introvert Day. @Catija I assume the hat is for any activity ("post a question, answer, vote, or comment") on that day (plus or minus timezone shenanigans)?

Oh wow, I didn't know that

Yeah, that makes perfect sense, then

Never mind I got it

@Glorfindel I got the hat today in Britain where the date is 1st Janurary?

lol just realised all of my hats came from StackOverflow...

oh well I got the Eleven hat

@pigrammer There are two words which make sense, and you need all letters.

@nohillside Yeah, I figured it out, but thanks

@Cornelius-Figgle See the very first item in this answer

@Cornelius-Figgle Everyone knows Stack Overflow is the best. ;-)

@Glorfindel yeah

@CodyGray ah that makes sense

@CodyGray the one site to rule them all

Anyone got time for staring me here: chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/141674/risners-tiny-hut

I can't quite figure out the Flagging & Unflagging hats. n out of last nn flags marked as helpful. On AskDifferentSE, my last flag marked as anything other than helpful is 4 pages back in my history, from April last year. No Unflagging hat yet...

@Tetsujin it's about flags cast during Winter Bash.

unflagging is 23 of your last 25 are helpful. It's only about flagging, has nothing to do with unflagging, retracting, etc.

hmm… OK. I've got it on SuperUser where I tend to flag about 5 spam posts a day. AD just doesn't get that much spam, comparitively.

Also they flags must be after Dec 14 before Jan 4 this bash

find "thank you" comments, flag 25 of them - auto-poof = unflagging in 5 mins

mind lending me some stars? @Tetsujin chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/141674/risners-tiny-hut

@JamesRisner honestly, I'm not that desperate :P

Grr. Stuck after decoding the note on the door. I understand what I need to do in general, but not how to do it.

And yes, I've read the hints. They just confirm that.

@Tetsujin how do people find things to flag?

i can never find anything to flag

i never see any spam lol

charcoal takes care of a lot of the spam so it's gone in like 1 min

@SQB What after decoding the note on the door are you stuck at? You've read Slate's hints?

Yes, I've read them. The first one confirms what I already figured.

The second can only help me confirm that I have done it in the correct way (being vague here on purpose).

I mean, I already understood I was meant to get one from each.

But I don't know how to get one from each.

I'm trying different methods but getting nowhere.

Or do I need to do it on the original?

:O book hat!

@Catija for "I'm okay", does it get witheld if you don't get manually awarded the bounty, but get half the amount for having enough score?

So I’m too afraid to ask 4 questions on stackoverflow to get cubed away? What’s a good site to ask and answer 4 of each other than rpg/board games/meta?

@SQB So you've taken Slate's second hint, and verified/confirmed you are on the right track. Have you considered the hint in the 1st page's source about the rotten luck?

Oh, you are still trying to get the one from each? Consider the "translation" from each line.

Hmm. Having trouble getting past the entrance to the melancholy citadel. But, since I'm actually a robot and so clearly a failure, how can I earn my consolation prize?

Robots still need to enter a correct key into the keypad.

Does anyone know if you can't get Verified on a site other than Stackoverflow and Meta.SE?