The Sphinx's Lair - 2018-12-10

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1:38 AM

0

Q: Riddle Number Three

Time for a challenge! Here, the riddle is encoded using a specific cipher. You must decode the numbers and answer the riddle correctly to solve it. Good luck! 83191143|2367|02|41026731|434771|02|41026731? Note: I will start adding bounties to my riddles, should they continue to be unsolved...

2:15 AM

I'll join the partial answer train and give a theory on "cis¼πx|1U3U5,7"

The vertical line is notation for "calculate the previous expression, with the variable taking on this value", so graphing cis¼πx for the values x=1, x=3, and every value in the interval [5,7], draws a smiley face in the complex plane

Don't know what to do with the "Mig" after it though; it doesn't seem to go with the whitespace subpuzzle, and it seems a little small to be a puzzle on its own

2:34 AM

@stacksfiller - is SAKE an answer?

@ManyPinkHats that's the second 3 char extra bit (Msc before the AFOOT one, though that could go with the one previous)

could M stand for meta? there are a few of those 3 char bits lying around

oh the two chars after the M are acronyms for social media sites

fb, ig, sc, g+ (not sure about Mt)

oh MMt is probably (meta-meta-twitter)

SAKE isn't an answer

@stacksfiller is SMILEY an answer?

not quite...

2nd guess?

SMILE?

2:49 AM

yup

awesome

3:01 AM

@stacksfiller is ACRES an answer?

ACRES is! NICE! :D

woot!

3:32 AM

trying to backsolve... STONER isn’t an answer is it?

3:52 AM

ooh, a metameta? neat

huh, how does KARATE work then? because CHINESE 6 produces S

STONER is right

According to Google Translate, that character is a possible translation for 'six' into Japanese, so I think it's just the original parsing

JAPANESE has it more commonly - which is why I favored that char over 六 - i had a couple other obscurer options but computer didn't display those characters so I wen't with japanese, didn't realize it makes a word if you use chinese too though :o

4:08 AM

Is the movie A Bug's Life one of the answers?

Hey @Volatility, mind if I edit what you have so far into my answer?

@ManyPinkHats yeah!

(also, think it might be worth it to CW my answer at this point?)

also, @Alconja, you said you got BXFIPF.?

ay, excellent. Feel free to edit that one in for the GLITCHES+NOTDEATH, Deus, plus the SMILE from before

ha! nice

4:09 AM

cw?

community wiki - gives the answer no "owner"

That means the G+ answers so far are SIMPSONS and A BUG'S LIFE, so both television/movies

yeah, I was wondering if they were all some media production

I'm looking for some well-known media named Downward Dogs or something similar

UNDERDOG? There were both a TV series and a film for that

4:14 AM

+s

ah right plural

There's a 2013 sports movie called Underdogs, so might as well ask

UNDERDOGS?

@stacksfiller

wowie thats funny but no

maybe there's some form of wordplay based on "turn down"?

i.e. "decline"

4:18 AM

huh hmm 🤔

Yeah, probably CW time... "🎌➡️🐷BXFIPF." goes together: Semaphore to Pigpen cipher (eg. B is one flag left & one down with semaphore flags, which when interpreted as pigpen cipher gives G) => GUITAR

ahhh, nice

hm, I figured most of the answer was still mine, which is why I've been holding off

(but that might just be me being selfish :P )

Fair enough. I haven't been keeping track of who did what. I trust your judgement.

"I trust your judgement." oh boy that's a huge mistake

@stacksfiller is LION an answer?

4:29 AM

What could possibly go wrong. :P

not in this case in particular, just in general

LION is :)

ahhh

I see now

Sweet. "Leo #49 left" is essentially a cryptic clue, yeah

yep

4:30 AM

so Facebook has the answers CAVE, GUITAR, and LION so far

I was looking for something like that but kept skipping over the # for some reason

"what's LIOEL?"

5:15 AM

@Deusovi yeah go for it!

sorry was offline for a bit

alright, thanks!

here are the sections we have left:

sxrt⑷ni,⑶txsin,r

ᴜĆ🚇H11⎕2N⠰Λ

🍕+👕=💕,👂+🛑+φ=?

⟐̅◬ᐆ⍍

👸:🍑::👨‍🔧:

↴̯͕̹̠̹̼̰

U+(🥤-🍵+🍒)+(💷-🎵)(946)

for the first "addition", I noticed that the Unicode hex values seem suspicious:
pizza: 1F355
shirt: 1F455
hearts: 1F495

but have no idea how that would produce anything useful for the second part of that

are you going to put the meta stuff in your cw? you can take what i’ve got in my answer and i’ll delete it

yeah - I'm adding it to my answer, though not sure if I should CW it yet

(would be happy to if general opinion is that I should)

i think stacks confirmed that the princess peach one was MARIO

oh, I didn't realize that

6:06 AM

i have an idea for the snapchat meta

the three answers so far can be paired with another four-letter word

and the third letters presumably are shared (like in SNAP CHAT)

dunno about SWAN though -- "swan lake" doesn't work

swan song?

hmm maybe

would be neater if the third letter was an A though...

maybe each pair overlaps on one letter, and the overlaps give the meta answer?

maybe

what words do you have?

6:10 AM

uric acid (I) and sand dune (N)

@stacksfiller is INSET an answer?

Yea!!!

oh cool

nice one!

ooh nice one

so the meta answers we have are INSET and ACRES, right?

6:20 AM

yeah - probably all five letters

same VCCVC pattern as well

and presumably they are somehow going into that weird downward bit for the meta-meta

all very common letters, very anagrammable

hm? why do you say that

i think that's just the rendering; if you look at the transcription the downward bit is before the metameta

looking at the image it seemed that part overlapped the meta-meta marker, but that's not where it is in the text

err, yes, my bad

6:22 AM

(also, backsolve guesses: BETA, TUBE, ZOOT) @stacksfiller

ZOOT is right

amusingly, TEST could give E from BETA or T from TUBE

yeah trust me i know

haha

and TEST CASE -> S

huh, neat!

hah never heard of a zoot suit before

6:23 AM

and to complete it, "test suit" is apparently a legal term

do we think the final meta is a pure meta because MMt has nothing before it?

yeah, probably

...unless it involves his previous puzzle, which is also a possibility

twitter has five distinct letters which anagram to WRITE, which also has two vowels and three consonants, but not in the same pattern

RIGHT is not write

er...

hahahaha

6:35 AM

note: not sure if that was a guess but I assumed it was from the caps

didn't think it was an answer, just an observation

(i presume the solution's going to be a phrase this time too)

a bad pun, hopefully

2 hours later…

8:47 AM

0

Q: Which two numbers replaces the question mark?

I was solving some number puzzles. I am finding difficulty in solving this puzzle what two number will replace the question mark. I need answer with examination.

calculation-puzzle number-sequence

9:26 AM

for the google plus meta, I think each of the answers is a movie character that's a color in the google logo, which goes blue, red, yellow, blue, green, red

the Simpsons are yellow

in A Bug's Life, the main character is blue

Mario is red and blue (?)

9:50 AM

oh neat

hm, we can't really index into them that way though, because the last "red" is the sixth letter, and MARIO only has five letters

maybe that's intentional though?

ABUGSLIFE
MARIO
SIMPSONS
ABUGSLIFE
????????
MARIO

there are also five puzzles but only four colours, so i'm not sure how that would work

MARIO: blue+red
?: red+yellow
SIMPSONS?: yellow+blue
ABUGSLIFE: blue+green
?: green+red

that might be a bit of a stretch

10:17 AM

only thing i've noticed for the facebook meta is that the words have the same number of consonants as vowels, but have no idea how to use that to extract

11:04 AM

1

Q: Maybe u should investigate carefully?

I'm covered in numbers but I do no maths. I'm sharp and pointy but I do no harm. I get paid to do what costs me nothing. Some people like me but others may prefer my friends. What am I?

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