Puzzles Etc.

Alconja

00:02

you're closer than you think... seems like you're collectively one realisation away... maybe take a fresh look at the hints that relate to the thing(s) you're uncertain about...

Deusovi

oh hey @Alconja, didn't notice you were here!

a "paradox prevention system"...

maybe we had it backwards? crossing paths makes %s blocked, rather than unblocked?

that could cause a paradox in a case like

```
< <
> %#
```

hm, not sure if that's easily formattable

basically, beam passes through %, splits, goes back and crosses itself

Jonathan Allan

@ffao - I'm glad I didn't answer the balance one now LOL

Deusovi

balance one?

Jonathan Allan

coins

Deusovi

oh right

Jonathan Allan

00:11

lots of confusion about how the right answer works

Deusovi

my idea (that didn't work) was that each place for a number represented a direction

ie up, then down, then left, then right

so 2245 would fire 2 up and down, 4 left, and 5 right

and hopefully some order of that would make the messages work out

...it didn't

ffao

@JonathanAllan ikr. Even OP doesn't understand, and some people are angry at me because they don't understand...

But I guess many people got it, e.g. that new user attempting to help me

Deusovi

@Alconja: Just curious, what software did you use to make that "I need you to listen" puzzle?

Alconja

@Deusovi Which bit? ...I made the ambigram manually in photoshop, then wrote a few lines of code to produce random static that had rotational symmetry (limited to max channel colours, so that they could be diffed against each other to produce black and white "what difference does it make?"). Cut the ambigram in half horizontally, used it as a selection mask and inverted the colours in the static. All the text stuff (cipher/riddle/crossword/layout) was done manually.

Finally put it all together in photoshop (over a photo I took of a bit of torn paper)

Also, no comment re: paradoxes and %...

ffao

04:56

I'll be so embarassed if my answer to Alconja's puzzle turns out to be wrong

Alconja

05:12

@ffao got a theory? (and don't worry about embarrassing yourself, you can't do worse than my cock up of noguessing/dontguess)

that being said, it should be pretty clear that it's the correct answer if/when you get it

ffao

05:23

@Alconja I do have a theory, but there are so many clues it's taking me forever to type it :P

Alconja

fair enough, I look forward to it... and like I said, if you've ended up with a rock solid argument for a given 4 digit code, it's almost certainly correct. (i.e. you should be able to explain how the security system works, and thus why it's that specific code)

Deusovi

@ffao: ooh, can't wait to see

Khale_Kitha

05:57

I know that feeling, @Alconja

I ran my puzzle through another person, this time, to try and make sure to alleviate mistakes.

(Btw, cute guess on my puzzle. :P)

ffao

ok, it's up :P

Wesley Situ

clenches butt

Deusovi

NICE

that HAS to be it

Alconja

I'm just walking away from my computer, so don't have time to double check it all right now, but superficially looks good (also means I won't get to give it the tick for 12hrs or so, but hey, at least this way you'll get some upvotes in the meantime)

...welcome to the League of Puzzlers though ;)

we have cake

Deusovi

...do I get to be in the League of Puzzlers for solving your previous one? :c

ffao

06:11

oooh, cake

Alconja

Actually just having a quick scroll down, i notice you don't have the specific clue for % (not that it actually impacts the final solution)... Look again at: "X or %?" "Yes!"

ffao

yep, I handwaved hard on that part

Alconja

@Deusovi Nope sorry. :P We only accept the concious

Deusovi

hey, I'm conscious now!

...probably

ffao

let me add it's beautiful how the 1s block the 0s perfectly for the ENTERPASSCODE/DONTGUESS thing

Alconja

06:14

gtg now, but when I accept i'll post a link to a jsfiddle which simulates the panel

ffao

anyone has any ideas on how to find % the right way? :P

Alconja

"X or %?"

Wesley Situ

blocked or open

the line goes through the two circles

Deusovi

ooh

Mars Ultor

@Everyone What are the acceptable/not accepted formats for puzzles?

Deusovi

06:22

formats? what do you mean?

Mars Ultor

As in images/text/linked images are obviously allowed

Deusovi

pretty much anything is acceptable on this SE as long as:

1. it's a puzzle or related to puzzles

2. some effort has been put into it

yeah, images/text are good - what are you thinking of?

Wesley Situ

i think anything is fine as long as it requires an additional step above straight up logic (math) and the question isnt too vague

Mars Ultor

I have no idea (I'm probably really bad at creating puzzles)

But I was going for something more interactive

Deusovi

hm... we've had proposals for that before and they didn't pan out

Mars Ultor

06:24

@Deusovi ?

Deusovi

like, people post things in the comments and you respond with updates?

Mars Ultor

@Deusovi No

Wesley Situ

unless its hosted on another server

Deusovi

or like a flash/javascript game?

Mars Ultor

@Deusovi Yeah, something like that

But not really a game

Deusovi

06:25

generally puzzles have to be self-contained, but we might not mind depending on what it is

Mars Ultor

@Deusovi Wait, do Stack Snippets work here?

Deusovi

...hm, not sure!

I don't see why they wouldn't!

Mars Ultor

Apparently not

Wesley Situ

do puzzles necessarily have to have the 'cipher' tag?

if it includes a cipher of some sort

just wondering so im not going crazy over KK's puzzle

Mars Ultor

Can I post test questions on meta?

Deusovi

06:28

@WesleySitu: hm, not necessarily, but intuition tells me that KK's puzzle isn't a cipher

Wesley Situ

ok got it

are you past the first bit of it?

Deusovi

nah

so I might be wrong

(especially if you've found something out!)

Wesley Situ

dont want to spoil it yet lol

KK might post a hint soon

but i dont think its necessary

Deusovi

@MarsUltor: not sure if you can - might get deleted, but I honestly don't know what you should do to test it :/

Mars Ultor

@Deusovi nvm tested using the live preview

Deusovi

06:31

oh alright

Mars Ultor

Doesn't work :(

Deusovi

did it work?

do snippets normally work in live preview?

Mars Ultor

@Deusovi Yes

But it only works on sites where it's enabled

Deusovi

:c

Mars Ultor

Should I write a meta post on interactive puzzles?

Deusovi

06:36

I'm sure if you had to link to something off-site it wouldn't be too much of a rules violation (we're pretty lenient when things are cool)

but yeah, go for it - I'm interested to see what you have

question_asker

11:48

buhhh. I have missed so many puzzles

question_asker

12:51

oh boy, I didn't see the meta question about account deletion

blech, what a cesspool

what a bizarre thing to think, that someone would go to a website, post a question, and then go to all the trouble to delete their entire account when they got an answer out of... spite? apparently? just... what an utterly bizarre thing to imagine that anyone has ever done.

Khale_Kitha

wow, this rhymezone.com site really has some interesting responses, sometimes.

I don't know about you, but I had no idea (sarcasm) that "I am" almost rhymes with "autograph"

question_asker

...

OH GOD yeah

I know the site you're talking about.

Khale_Kitha

13:09

Maybe it's a Ghoti thing.

question_asker

13:58

wow i just wrote up an answer on meta

I kind of wish I had come up with some good/bad examples but I have a headache AND other stuff to actually do

Matt

there's also the case where puzzles ask answers to look things up

like coordinates

question_asker

Well, I sort of figure those are beyond the scope of this question

you can't really expect people to, uh, know exactly where a coordinate points to

Khale_Kitha

new puzzle up =D

question_asker

jesus h god

"I'm in beehives, and snowflakes, most of the time" smh KK

Khale_Kitha

?

question_asker

14:09

it just reminded me of a certain other puzzle

you know the one I mean

Khale_Kitha

plastic bag?

funny - hey, I didn't write it. Dias did.

question_asker

no no, a certain other puzzle that went unsolved for a long time, because people were not focusing on the right things

anyway

Khale_Kitha

oh, lol

This one's pretty easy as it serves as a clue, itself, for the catacombs, in general.

Deusovi

@question_asker: which one?

question_asker

which which?

if you're asking about the puzzle of KK's, I meant the "hex" clue from his password puzzle

(spoiler alert, "hex" was the first thing I thought of when I saw the thing about beehives and snowflakes)

lol oops, my bounty (half of it, anyway) was awarded to that samuel pepys answer on the sculpture puzzle

Khale_Kitha

14:21

You've only got 3 clues right, currently, Deusovi. =D

question_asker

well, @KeyboardWielder gets 50 rep. Fine by me, but I still want to know the answer.

this one is killing me btw puzzling.stackexchange.com/questions/31699/…

Deusovi

@kk really, only three? huh

the ones I'm confident in are seraph wings, sexy primes, and tricorne hats

Khale_Kitha

One of those three is totally off. (It doesn't match the clue at all =D)

question_asker

oh, a touchdown is 6 points

Deusovi

maybe it's "six points" rather than just "six"? I know it's somehow linked to "six"

oh! highly skilled people make hat tricks (sets of three wins in a row)

Khale_Kitha

14:28

:)

question_asker

(I assume the touchdown thing is the answer to the gridiron bit?)

Deusovi

(probably?)

question_asker

here's how much I don't know about sports - I literally just looked that up after doubting myself

Khale_Kitha

....I just learned what a Gridiron is, in relation to sports.

question_asker

I guess it's not "not knowing" so much as "I never watch football so I had a moment of 'am I remembering this wrong?'"

Khale_Kitha

14:30

So I know the feeling.

It was the best way to obfuscate football, lol

Deusovi

just got the "standing on a line" clue

Khale_Kitha

.....that update is really funny, Deusovi

Deusovi

hm?

Khale_Kitha

Those lines appear in many other places, besides dice, btw - but still funny.

Deusovi

yeah, I know - dice were just the first place that came to mind

funny? how so?

Khale_Kitha

14:32

Because it's the answer to the only clue you haven't solved, instead of that one. :P

By the way - they tried Six and the door opened.

Deusovi

oh! that makes sense :P

Khale_Kitha

Hehehe

Deusovi

yeah, that's pretty funny

OH, I think I've got it

Closed eye, groups of six - it's braille!

question_asker

oh, is the "affects your wealth" line the one about dice?

Deusovi

yeah, gambling games

Khale_Kitha

14:35

yeah

question_asker

boxcars

Deusovi

it IS braille - first few groups say "THE"

i'm gonna have to transcribe by hand though since I'm on mobile - give me a bit

q_a, don't steal this from me :P

Matt

go, Des, go!

question_asker

oh I won't, don't worry!

Deusovi

14:51

THE GEMS OF FOUR SHOW THE WAY BUT THESE OF SIX BEHOLD THE NUMBER

so... I guess we take door 1 of whatever path we need?

(that's from interpreting 1s as dots and non-1s as spaces)

and I guess we'll need to divide the grid into groups of four to do something with the letters

question_asker

WHOA new site design just kicked in for me

Deusovi

ooh, really? I'm gonna take a look

NICE

Matt

Wow!

but now it looks less like stack overflow :/

feelinferrety

:3

Deusovi

I like it!

Will

14:59

That was temporarily disorienting.

Deusovi

Yeah, I expected some message like "site design goes live tomorrow", not just a sudden "OH SHIT WE'RE GREEN NOW"

question_asker

hahaha for me, it happened to happen when I switched to the meta for a moment, so I actually didn't know if they had done both meta and regular at the same time or not

Deusovi

...still looks off-center to me

tbh it seems like they didn't listen to any of our responses to the design

3

Khale_Kitha

From what I read of the post, they had the design they wanted, and were just letting us know what they were doing to do. Our opinions be damned.

Deusovi

yeah, but even our actual suggestions that didn't change the design were ignored

like the off-center looking logo

Khale_Kitha

15:07

Gah, the chat window, in here, looks weird now, once you refresh.

Like I'm typing letters into the ocean.

Deusovi

still hasn't changed on mobile

lemme try to refresh

Will

I refreshed and I don't notice anything particularly weird.

I think it looks nicer.

Deusovi

ooh

I like the color scheme, just disappointed that they didn't listen to us

seriously, that logo/title combination looks pretty bad since the logo is vertically "lopsided"

Khale_Kitha

Personally, I still have issue with the logo. Not a single person is going to see this logo in NHQ and think "Oh, that's a question on the puzzling site."

Deusovi

yeah, not a fan of it either

he said he was going for lock and key and impossible figured

*figures, but to be honest it doesn't look like either

question_asker

15:09

I like it but I'm not like, married to it

my only real nitpick with the redesign is how much of the site still just looks like a plain old SE site, though I understand the desire to keep it as familiar as possible.

Khale_Kitha

I don't know - a puzzle piece, in it's simplicity, would have been perfectly adequate. Sure, it wouldn't have demonstrated all of the possible types of puzzles that this site contains, but it would have been a visual indicator of what site you were on, or were about to visit, and that's what matters.

Deusovi

yeah - if they wanted to be more minimalist, they could've done a puzzle piece with only one "connection"

Khale_Kitha

As for the braille...

Good to know that my transcription of dots to 1's was successful. I triple checked that.

Matt

the ampersand logo is for English Language and Usage

I had no idea

question_asker

I liked somebody's (humn's maybe?) puzzle-piece-overlaid-with-crossword-boxes thing, although that might not work as well as the tiny version we use for sidebar/favicon

because that indicates "puzzle, but not literally jigsaw puzzle"

Deusovi

15:16

yeah, I liked it too (but he explained nothing at all)

jigsaw puzzle pieces would be fine too since they immediately evoke "puzzle"

Khale_Kitha

Funny that I accidentally said NHQ and no one noticed (not even myself)

Oops.

Rofl

The new site design dug Rand out of the depths, and into the Sphinx chat room.

And there he disappears =D

Deusovi

isn't he still banned?

Khale_Kitha

Apparently not chat banned

Deusovi

huh weird

Khale_Kitha

Or it showed him as he attempted to get in - no idea.

But, from what I saw yesterday, the regular ban is til August

Deusovi

15:22

yeah, he was banned for a year

Khale_Kitha

Btw, Deu - have you already discarded your notes on the Braille?

Deusovi

no, why?

Khale_Kitha

I wouldn't.

Deusovi

my notes are just the grid, divided into groups of 2x3, with letters written over them

plus a picture of the braille alphabet off to the side

question_asker

I still never understood why rand was banned

yes, yes, I know, it rhymes

Deusovi

15:38

apparently for advertising his site in his puzzles

it was his third offense too

that's all i know

question_asker

hmm.

I can't figure out what that means - I'm looking through his last questions and not seeing it, even in edits

Deusovi

the mods could've had some way to remove it

he was banned several times before, for shorter periods of time

Zandar

I think it was actually to do with a separate account that he had joint control of

but no one really gave many details at the time

Deusovi

oh, d'alar'cop?

yeah, I had no idea what was going on with him

having several accounts is allowed though

Zandar

yeah, but it was that account that was doing the advertising

Matt

15:50

puzzle is up ...

Deusovi

oh, makes sense

@Matt: hm?

Matt

well this is awkward

I posted it

but it's not in the list yet

Zandar

I can see it

Matt

yes, it's there now

question_asker

16:06

oh man, you know what puzzles I liked?

those "reverse puzzling" puzzles

where you had to figure out what puzzle someone was doing from their "worksheet"

Wesley Situ

16:17

@Deusovi Not sure if relevant, but 4 and d have the same braille pattern, and 6 and f are the same. I couldn't make anything out of that though

Deusovi

@question_asker: yeah, those were cool!

@WesleySitu: they're distinguished by number marks before the numbers: a is 1, b is 2, all the way up to j is 0

Wesley Situ

@Deusovi also with regards to ciphers, i associated gems of 4 and 6 to be birthstones of the months, so diamonds and pearls/alexandrite, but didn't get anywhere with that either

Deusovi

ooh, that's an interesting idea

question_asker

RIP Prince

question_asker

16:32

blrb

Khale_Kitha

17:04

Hehe

question_asker

17:25

oh lol I just realized there's a bunch of stuff I can't do anymore

2

Deusovi

hm?

oh yeah, rep caps

that worried me when I heard we were graduating

:/

Will

Now that we've graduated, since there are only two users with enough rep to cast delete votes on answers with negative scores, can answers even get deleted w/o a mod?

2

Deusovi

...shit, I guess not

that's a 20k thing, isn't it?

Will

Yup.

Deusovi

man it's gonna be weird getting used to the new caps

Deusovi

17:51

...is there any way to ungraduate

Khale_Kitha

Yeah, most everything moved way up

close/open isn't even available to most people, now, unlike in beta, so that'll change things

Deusovi

honestly I think we're too small for these rep caps

Matt

maybe the graduation will bring new growth

question_asker

yeah I was wondering about all this myself

Matt

18:08

I think my puzzle is too hard :/

the starting direction is not clear at all

question_asker

@Deusovi yeah I agree with you. I almost feel like graduating site users should be prorated (or something), but I have no idea how that would even work, all things considered

Deusovi

I wish there was some way to lower the rep caps but still graduate

question_asker

18:48

1

Q: May the 4th be with you!

A line of people has formed to enter a building where only members are allowed inside. There is a doorman who says something to each person, and based on the person's response he can determine if they are a member or not. A former member who recently returned from a 10 year prison sentence approa...

I feel like this must require some knowledge of the new movie

but maybe I'm wrong

Khale_Kitha

No idea - seems reaaaaly broad

I'm sure there's an intended answer, but....

question_asker

yeah

Khale_Kitha

My first though: The building is a Catholic church and when he says it, he expects people to say, by reaction: "And also with you."

Because if you're a Star Wars fan who grew up Catholic - that's pretty much impossible to not do. Hahaha

question_asker

usually (I'm thinking about the "security to the party" questions) there's an explicit mention of a "wrong" answer to give you an idea of what the pattern isn't

hahaha yeah I think the "also with you" thing too (though I was never catholic, we protestants did that too)

Khale_Kitha

Hah

I've asked several others who were previously Catholic, like myself, and they all have the same issue. =D

Will

18:53

I'm thinking it could have something to do with a countersign

But that would indeed be quite broad

Matt

the former prisoner: "I'm no longer a member"

done and done

Khale_Kitha

lol

Matt

not excluded due to the broad nature of the question

Khale_Kitha

Meh, might as well post my idea, since it's reasonable, despite not being the right answer.

(If it's a church that doesn't allow non-members in, then why do they exist? :D)

Matt

it's also not the first puzzle to reference star wars today ;)

Khale_Kitha

18:56

lol

true

I have no idea where to go on the riddle/cryptic part of yours, sry.

Matt

within the last 10 years, the church changed "and also with you" to be "and with your spirit"

there are about 5 hints for varying stages of the puzzle hidden in the post

Khale_Kitha

Did they? It's not going away for me - nevermind them

Matt...

Matt

yes?

Khale_Kitha

Is DCIPHERTEXT part of the puzzle

or just an indication of what's next?

I've been wondering, due to it's identical length to the crypto

Matt

it is most assuredly part of the puzzle

;)

Khale_Kitha

19:04

4

Q: My Keyboard Broke

Hey guys, I've been into brainteasers since I was little and recently decided to make a puzzle-related website. I figured that this will be the best place to share some of my problems and see if they are any fun. I guess they are too easy, but hope that will entertain you for a bit. Perfect D...

story

Haha, just ran into this, by accident

I'm curious as to how he typed all of the "!" marks without the 1 key working :P

question_asker

oh I think KW might have gotten the answer to that star wars one

Matt

omg, gannolloy posted what I just said about "and with your spirit" -_-

guess I should have posted it myself

Khale_Kitha

hehe

I actually didn't notice you type that above, Matt - funny

Yeah, I've not been to a catholic church in 20 years

question_asker

I feel like the "and with your spirit" answer AND the SW answer are both pretty good EXCEPT (plot hole!) lol at a catholic church that would not let somebody enter because they don't know the right codeword

Khale_Kitha

The heaven one has the huge hole of the fact that people don't tend to leave the membership of heaven to go to prison for 10 years, and come back...

Matt

19:10

ex-con: "I'm late on my dues ..."

boom. booted.

Khale_Kitha

lol

"I broke out of prison. Can you hide me?"

question_asker

yeah I'm not trying to be pro- (or anti-) catholic church or anything but I'm pretty sure they like it when new people join

Khale_Kitha

The puzzle never says that he came back after 10 years =D

Yeah, that is why I mentioned that several times - heh

question_asker

increasing church membership is like, a big thing in most churches

even if only for the cynical reason that it potentially brings in more money

Will

Whoa, they released the whole cantina song from TFA today.

question_asker

19:19

is there a new cantina song?

we were in the disney store this weekend (shut up, we sometimes go to malls to waste time out of the weather) and there was some SW medley being played that involved all the SW "hits"

Will

There was the "cantina" music being played in Maz's castle.

question_asker

19:42

oh I haven't seen the new movie yet, I probably should have specified that

but what I was kinda-sorta thinking was that I didn't know, when I was listening to it in the disney store, whether it was the original version or a revamped version for the new movie(s) (I assumed the latter, since it would probably be weird to leave the music completely untouched since 1977)

Khale_Kitha

20:25

@Deusovi These should be Those - then it is correct - though the word, itself, doesn't help with solving it, so I guess it doesn't matter.

Khale_Kitha

21:11

That second answer, on my puzzle, reminds me of Minesweeper =D

Wesley Situ

i tried doing minesweeper stuff but ended up with gibberish

Khale_Kitha

Yeah, I actually just noticed that it looked that way, myself. Hehe

Wesley Situ

also tried to imagine the entire thing as a chunk of ore

where the letters were gems

Khale_Kitha

Hah, nice. Starbound meets Puzzling =D

(Replace Starbound with any other 2D Mining game that you enjoy)

To be honest....

The solution is right there - you're looking at it - but you don't realize it

Wesley Situ

well im... blind

Khale_Kitha

21:19

Haha, funny =D

No, I understand. As much as I enjoy creating these types of puzzles, I have trouble solving them.

That's why I keep notes during creation.

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