Puzzles Etc.

Starting with E in the corners, I quickly found that E in bottom right was impossble. Trying the others, and with the A and I constraints, C/B/D/G next to E, there are not many possiblities.

Jonathan Allan

6:09 PM

@Henkie getting put on the Wall Of Fame already (look right for the stars)

we will soon be treated with a Henkie puzzle no doubt :D

Gordon Allocman

And i probably won't be able to solve it :P

Jonathan Allan

oops left COLLISIONS at the top of the post. I'll wait (I hate conflicts)

Deusovi

done!

gray letters are gonna be Backtracking

Gordon Allocman

This puzzle has a ridiculous amount of depth to it, damn

Deusovi

got Backtracking

all of these are previous puzzles!

Jonathan Allan

6:16 PM

ohhh

Deusovi

and the numbers are the letters in the solutions

Jonathan Allan

was about to say - what's that Goal In Sight?

Deusovi

first one: BALANCE IS THE RECTIFIER

(H)

@f'': i love how you featured all these previous high-quality puzzles

i've added the puzzles i recognize to the spreadsheet

anyone recognize any others?

(docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/…)

Jonathan Allan

A&D only is "you are in a coma"

Is the 2nd one...

50

Q: Game of Life: Move the Sun

Based on Game of Life: Kill the Sun Conditions are the same: Below is an initial state for Conway's Game of Life with a single pulsar. Living cells are white. The area marked with red is your base. You are free to modify any of the red cells, but only those, and only in the initial generatio...

Deusovi

no, that's not it

Jonathan Allan

6:24 PM

hmm thought colours may be off

but yes penultimate one is

173

Q: This is important. I need you to listen…

Look, you don't know me. We've never met. But, like I said, I need you to listen... I had the most disturbing dream the other night... Woke up in a cold sweat and couldn't get back to sleep. It wasn't a nightmare as such, just ... eerie, I guess? I don't even remember the details, but it left me...

riddle enigmatic-puzzles visual story cipher

Deusovi

yeah, got that

look at the spreadsheet

i've compiled the ones i know

Jonathan Allan

oh :)

manshu

anyone from hyper-modern art?

f''

I tried to include as many different puzzle creators as I could, so BmyGuest and Alconja are the only ones represented twice

Deusovi

hypermodern art is the butterflies

Deusovi

6:39 PM

any ideas for Mind Games?

Jonathan Allan

not yet

f''

damn, I made a mistake on block cipher

the block on the right should be nether brick

Deusovi

oh alright!

that makes sense

i was just wondering about that

woo!

manshu

I have no idea how are you solving it but I'm loving it.

Jonathan Allan

A what not a what??

oh some gaming slang?

Deusovi

6:47 PM

Block Cipher is from Minecraft

Jonathan Allan

< is clueless

Deusovi

(that popular lego-like survival game)

Gordon Allocman

This whole puzzle is completely mystifying to me

Jonathan Allan

never seen it

seen it in app store

Deusovi

huh, really? it was HUGE not too long ago

Jonathan Allan

6:48 PM

I'm 36

Gordon Allocman

It's incredibly popular with 12 yr olds it seems

Jonathan Allan

:p

dont hang with 12 year olds :)

LeppyR64

If you take the numbers of the bricks in Block Cipher and convert them to letters you get "KEYISIDS"

Gordon Allocman

I played it back in alpha and thought it was kinda fun (not a 12 yr old)

Jonathan Allan

my nephew is 5

Deusovi

6:49 PM

yeah, disappointingly - it's a really good game but the 12-year-olds give it a bad reputation

so that just tells us what we already knew, Leppy

Gordon Allocman

I just got bored of it fairly fast, since I wasn't big into building and enjoyed spelunking more

Jonathan Allan

interesting that mind games has 10 circles, 10 pastebin-esque strings but only one door

Deusovi

yellow is red + green

Jonathan Allan

yeah only 3 greens though

Deusovi

dunno how to match up the strings with the circles though

Jonathan Allan

6:50 PM

they already line up in a way :p

Deusovi

yeah but the letters don't

Jonathan Allan

^^

and there are 10 :)

Deusovi

Multiple Parts looks like cryptic clues, but I can't make heads or tails of them

Jonathan Allan

long words

f''

they're not cryptic clues - I can't write those at all

Deusovi

6:52 PM

aw :c

f''

also I didn't separate the words for those letter counts

Deusovi

@f'': are the keys going to be words? or can you not answer that?

f''

the keys will look like random strings of letters

Deusovi

oh, great

f''

you will be able to verify them when you reach the final room

Deusovi

6:54 PM

alright, at least we'll have some way to confirm

Jonathan Allan

:p

Gordon Allocman

It has been a pretty slow day in terms of new puzzles it seems

Deusovi

f'' just gave us at least a dozen

Gordon Allocman

well yeah, besides his million part one

Jonathan Allan

well len("youretheexecutionernow") = 22

manshu

6:57 PM

@question_asker hint added. :)

Deusovi

so... WONRENOITUCEXEEHTERUOY?

Gordon Allocman

sneaky sneaky manshu....

f''

nah, that wasn't intentional

Deusovi

damn

manshu

@GordonAllocman :D

Jonathan Allan

6:58 PM

not wonrenoitucexeehteruoy?

Gordon Allocman

cant make out 2 of them though'

manshu

I never thought that I'd have to add a hint.

Deusovi

aha! figured out Manshu's trick

Gordon Allocman

So far I have Spanish, albanian, welsh, but cant make out the other 2

Deusovi

frisian, esperanto

Gordon Allocman

7:00 PM

are those languages?

Deusovi

yeah

esperanto is a constructed language

Jonathan Allan

FYI @Deusovi I don't understand the Block Cipher entry at all

manshu

very well then :D

Deusovi

updated

better?

f''

did you know that "air" means water in Malay?

Jonathan Allan

7:03 PM

along the bottom of the pic?

Deusovi

no, the ones behind the signs

Jonathan Allan

yeah dont breathe the air in Kuala Lumpur

oh well I got no idea

Deusovi

on what?

Jonathan Allan

Desmond and the writing on the fence is what?

Deusovi

haven't gotten that yet

that's the other exit presumably

Jonathan Allan

7:05 PM

oh OK

manshu

I am gonna add the 'title of the room' besides those links in that answer.

Those links are really confusing without the titles

Deusovi

go for it manshu!

if you do the same block ID → ASCII thing on the bottom blocks you get "Red5T0nE"

Gordon Allocman

I posted the filled in crossword (sorry for rushed mspaint job)

Deusovi

("redstone" is a fictional material in Minecraft used to make circuitry)

Jonathan Allan

So reversal is either 'ruoeeie' or 'nrntcox' depending on whether f'''s string 'wonrenoitucexeehteruoy' is 1 or 0 based respectively

Deusovi

7:08 PM

f'' said that that wasn't it

Henkie

with DES encryption you get i.stack.imgur.com/nCXwy.png

Deusovi

DES encryption?

Jonathan Allan

oh yeah I was thinking of doing that @manshu

Deusovi

what, with key Red5T0nE? nice

also "fifteen" is definitely gonna use the bottom right things

Henkie

lJ9FwMMulXk= is in base-64, and can be decrypted with DES using Red5T0nE

Jonathan Allan

7:11 PM

yep right shape :)

Deusovi

anyone mind helping me copy down the shapes?

Jonathan Allan

on it... you keep plugging away

Deusovi

i'm doing it on the spreadsheet again

Jonathan Allan

oh ok

Deusovi

that way multiple people can do it at the same time

question_asker

7:14 PM

god dammit manshu

Deusovi

???

manshu

@question_asker what happened? :D

question_asker

@manshu you posted your hint while I was busy :P

manshu

@question_asker I gave you the hint when you were free. :p

in this room

f''

take the first letters of each word and you get "FATED"

manshu

7:16 PM

@f'' TA-DA

Jonathan Allan

how are you fitting them?

Deusovi

hm? the shapes?

Jonathan Allan

y

Deusovi

based on room locations

manshu

@GordonAllocman f'' got the answer.

Jonathan Allan

7:17 PM

oh not the Fifteen arrows :)

Deusovi

fitting what then?

Gordon Allocman

@manshu Is that the whole answer?

Jonathan Allan

dont worry :p

question_asker

OK I'm lost - I assumed the languages just shared an initial with the elements

Deusovi

@q_a: hidden in the image are language names

question_asker

7:18 PM

but the answer says something about "zooming in"

manshu

@GordonAllocman Yup.

Deusovi

we need to get Mind Games before we can keep going

Jonathan Allan

I dunno which room is where... I was ignoring that due to all the colours :)

manshu

@GordonAllocman Can you change the image so the the crossword and languages both show up

question_asker

I don't see anything when zooming in

(on the original image)

Deusovi

7:19 PM

i used a paint bucket tool, not zooming in

question_asker

what

why

Deusovi

it's not size that hides them

Gordon Allocman

I can when I get home probably, harder to do with mspaint, or if someone wants to do it for me I can accept the edit

Deusovi

they're hidden in the black

in a grayish but not black color

Gordon Allocman

I added an explanation though, not sure how to get the final answer if there is one though

Deusovi

7:20 PM

@Gordon: First letters spell FATED

question_asker

yeah I see artifacting but no letters

manshu

@question_asker use the bucket in the black space

Deusovi

Gordon Allocman

Someone also pointed out the intersections spell oreo

question_asker

Well I mean it's a little late for that now

no

just oeo

Jonathan Allan

7:21 PM

mmmm Oreo

Deusovi

there are four intersections

manshu

i knew it before posting.

oh nevermind

:p

yeah

7:22 PM

it's the fated oreo

question_asker

still not seeing how I was supposed to know to paint-bucket the crossword

haha

Gordon Allocman

mind if I steal that image @Deusovi ?

Deusovi

go for it

Jonathan Allan

In mind games many of the "five bullet gun chambers" (for lack of a better term) are at different rotations to each other.

Deusovi

yeah, i noticed that too

f''

7:24 PM

they are all, but the rotations aren't important

manshu

@GordonAllocman One last thing remaining. Add the word in the answer

f''

I oriented them randomly because it looked better than having them all the same

question_asker

OK yeah I'm not the only person not seeing anything zoomed in

f''

(ideally, all five small circles would be evenly spaced around the big circle, but it's hard to do that in Paint)

Gordon Allocman

Sorry, that was just how I saw it

Jonathan Allan

7:26 PM

paint is a b...

len('toomuchspaghettiturns') = 21

but dunno if that can be used

f''

that's also not intentional :/

Jonathan Allan

thought as much

Gordon Allocman

@manshu alright I didn't know which so I added both

question_asker

I'm guessing it's FATED, since that's our in-joke here

manshu

@GordonAllocman Allow me to edit the answer to give it a good look. :p

Gordon Allocman

7:28 PM

@manshu go for it

f''

oreo

Noun: oreo m ‎(plural oreos)

breeze
fresh air

Verb: oreo

First-person singular (yo) present indicative form of orear....

manshu

@question_asker I, seriouly, never thought about that joke while making this puzzle

Jonathan Allan

@f'' but reversal is using 'wonrenoitucexeehteruoy', yes: 'ruoeeie' or perhaps 'nrntcox'

f''

@JonathanAllan no

Deusovi

i think i've figured out Fifteen Puzzles

Jonathan Allan

7:28 PM

oh

Deusovi

@Jon: f'' already said that that wasn't it

Jonathan Allan

:(

oh thought he was replying to something else ^^

Deusovi

ooh, what i have for Fifteen looks promising

question_asker

I'm not too bothered about the image @manshu - the puzzle works without what's hidden in the image

manshu

@question_asker But it would have been too broad without those hidden things.

question_asker

7:33 PM

not really

Gordon Allocman

It would definitely have taken a while longer to solve

Deusovi

not too broad

a bit unfair IMO

but not broad

Gordon Allocman

I now realize I probably looked ridiculous staring at my screen from an inch away trying to make out the languages

question_asker

tbh the intended method of solving is unfair

but I mean, assuming a reasonable subset of all human languages (that is, a set that involves languages with words that could be machine translated), there are only so many that begin with the same letters as those words and whose translated-words actually fit into the puzzle

Deusovi

got 15!

YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME

Gordon Allocman

7:37 PM

I think it was reasonable due to the visual tag that we largely glossed over at first

or at least I glossed over

question_asker

I saw the visual tag

Deusovi

@f'', i love your puzzles so much

2

question_asker

but in no way was it ever hinted that "visual" means "you have to inspect this with some other tool in a way that doesn't make sense in the context of the puzzle"

@Deusovi oh my fucking god

Deusovi

I KNOW

Gordon Allocman

amazing

question_asker

7:38 PM

i'm screaming

Deusovi

same

manshu

plot twist: You have solved only 1% of f'''s puzzle

Jonathan Allan

a plastic bag :p

we won :)

Gordon Allocman

It was only fate that a plastic bag would end up in a very good puzzle sooner or later

but we least expected it

manshu

Oh, wow...My first fate puzzle

f''

7:42 PM

that is the final room, but it's not solved yet (although the actual answer is probably a letdown compared to that)

Deusovi

yes, i'm aware that it's not solved

still need to use the keys

i just thought it was funny :P

manshu

checks the definition of different types of puzzles

hmmm...my puzzle is more plastic bag.

question_asker

no it's a good puzzle

manshu

Still Yay

question_asker

I'm just jealous that I wasn't around for more of it

manshu

7:47 PM

@question_asker I guess that's a good thing. You are upto something.

meanwhile I was just sitting here looking at this chat. Found out nothing.

question_asker

making sure I keep getting a paycheck, mostly

Deusovi

q_a, what's more important though: basic survival? or puzzles?

question_asker

now that you put it that way...

Gordon Allocman

Deusovi

i guessed that before it loaded

question_asker

7:49 PM

but seriously y'all my heart sinks when I see that you guys have started working on a puzzle I am working on

manshu

What's your choice @Deusovi

Deusovi

hey, i have my priorities in order

puzzles obviously :P

question_asker

jesus h god @manshu

Deusovi

?

question_asker

May 13 at 15:13, by Khale_Kitha

manshu has no brain - just a database.

Deusovi

7:51 PM

true

manshu

:D

Gordon Allocman

That was under his folder "Things Deusovi has said"

Jonathan Allan

wish I had a database, or a brain...

Gordon Allocman

I just have a stack of floppy disks

manshu

@GordonAllocman No it was in the "goosebumps" folder.

Jonathan Allan

7:52 PM

yeah and no disk drive :(

Gordon Allocman

@manshu but from there are you going to go to page 53 or back to page 24?!?!

question_asker

I thought goosebumps were regular linear stories and not cyoa

manshu

@GordonAllocman Sorry, I don't have info about it. I deleted the db browsing history. :(

Deusovi

i kinda want to make a big puzzle hunt with f'', Alconja, and BmyGuest

Gordon Allocman

@question_asker maybe I only have the weird ones

Deusovi

7:54 PM

if they're all up for it, that would be really fun

Jonathan Allan

Don't truncate the database!

f''

I already used all my ideas on this one :P

manshu

@JonathanAllan I need some space. (and sleep too)

Gordon Allocman

@Deusovi but if you guys all make the puzzles, who will solve them? (besides Jonathan)

3

question_asker

"I'm not at all sure what the [trivia] tag means in this context. Does it mean a person with detailed knowledgeable in the New Testament should have access to the solution? If so, the puzzle seems kinda boring." I don't understand this

Gordon Allocman

7:55 PM

That puzzle was awful

manshu

@GordonAllocman lolololol

Deusovi

yeah, but we all kinda expected it to be

question_asker

the jesus one?

Gordon Allocman

indeed

question_asker

because yeah

not great

but I don't understand that comment.

Jonathan Allan

7:56 PM

me?

um

Gordon Allocman

Actually I wouldn't even consider it a puzzle

Jonathan Allan

ok

Deusovi

yeah, not really

question_asker

because clearly we value trivia in the form of "knows all the different mathematical formulae"

that's basically puzzling.se's most prized quality in a participant

Deusovi

@q_a: not really? I can't think of any questions that are just "apply mathematical formula here" that have been highly upvoted

except maybe one or two of Gamow's, but that's a different issue

question_asker

7:57 PM

...

Deusovi

most of them at least require SOME thought

i agree that we have way too many math problems that aren't puzzles

Gordon Allocman

I think he was trying to say that having specific knowledge needs to be used cleverly in the puzzle. He may simply have been referring to the exact puzzle, not the general idea of having knowledge