Tavern
As always you can listen to some rumours here:
- people are talking about hard times
- Somebody has been seen on the course to the treasure island. Captain Aldcoran's log must have been deciphered
- 7 pirates ordered 7 bottles of rum to celebrate a victory against a convoy of 5 ships on their last expedition
- You can overhear a part of a conversation: "Have you heard that more and more people use concealment cipher? Ha that's stupid, if I only knew how to read I could decipher my captain's notes and steal the treasure."
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The bold sailor form yesterday keeps looking for somebody who can read. He says that he has ripped off few pages from captain's logbook and is willing to share the 10th part of the treasure if somebody reads the notes for him. As a proof he shows one of the pages:
Hello Captain
If you ever forget how to read this
No worries
This note is to help you
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A group of sailors is arguing:
S1 - As for the quartermaster election, who will you vote for? I'm thinking of Thomas.
S2 - I still hope Jacob will change his mind and stay. He is good at what he is doing and he's not that old. I wonder why he decided to leave. He says that he let the captain down and failed to see the trouble and that he is getting to old for this.
S3 - That's odd. Maybe he was plotting with that swabber we fed to the sharks and now is afraid of sharing his fate?
S2 - As if you knew anything . You enlisted only 8 weeks ago. Stop saying such things before somebody tells him or the captain. I'm warning you only because I like you and you're new. His betrayal is out of he question
S1 - You're right Jacob is a man of unquestionable loyalty. Captain trusts him. Furthermore his share is equal to the captain's. I bet he saved enough for a proper living till the end of his days. Maybe he just wants to settle down? Why risk if you've got so much gold?
S2 - That might be it. Getting back to the subject. I think that I'll vote for you. Many of the crew members speak highly of you, you're also a good fighter and could lead the boarding crew.
S1 - Ha. Don't you know the quartermaster duties? The quartermaster also needs to know how to read and write and know some basic arithmetic. Thomas is teaching me, but I'm still not good at all those letters and numbers. I'm not not going to candidate. Not yet. Even if I got enough votes captain would be displeased.
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To sum up:
Where: H1
What: Spoiler, the argument
How: H2, H4, logbook, H3
Or you can always try to make one of the solvers drunk and try to get a hint from them. If you follow the theme everything is permitted
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I've just read everything that was written in the meantime and... I did not make it. Not even to ITH. I knew that's where I had to go to, but I had no idea how. Even now, after reading the direction, I have no idea how to decipher things. I don't even know what to decipher or what you mean with "What: Spoiler, the argument". Is the argument the two sailors? I guess 775 was the key but I don't know what to decipher nor what LNLNLLNL is good for. Also, you changed so much I'm not even sure what was there a week ago when I saw it first which confuses me even more.
I really wish you wouldn't mind explaining me more detailed how to at least get to the ITH in a way that I understand how it is done. I guess with English only being a second language to me that didn't help me too much understand things. But as said, I don't even know how what... I'm lost.
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As for the changes, the only thing that has changed in the text is the way how different things were emphasized. At first only the most important parts were in italic, later on I changed that to bold font and used italics to show the important part of the text from the first post.
As the solutions says:
To begin with you had the spoiler containing 8 chars - it was both an indicator that its a ITH/jigidi code and as they both can contain both letters and digits it said which lines should be interpreted as numbers.
The whole message consists of exactly eight lines - those are the 8 chars/digits you were looking for. For characters you had to simply write down the first character in each line, for digits you had to count the number of letters in the first word and the result was to be used in the code instead of the first letter.
Hint explanation:
H1 - 8 letter code leads to ITH
H2 - mainly an indicator that few people managed to solve the puzzle and clarification that you need to decipher something - there were solvers looking for hidden text/references to old GAs etc, In this puzzle everything was in this topic and was visible from the beginning
H3 - did you notice that I didn't use italics for only 775 but for pairs number + word? It was supposed to help you determine the relation of words and numbers which were simply the sum of letters
H4 - Another hint about the cypher - no ROTations, no substitution etc. The first post required only conversion to numbers when necessary
H5 - stolen page - I think this one is self explanatory - reading it vertically tells you which parts of the text are important, the rest are null characters used to hid the code
H6 - argument between sailors - it gave away that you're supposed to be looking for a code containing letters and numbers and the LN spoiler was an indicator what type of character was on each place.
So:
Where - ITH
What - 8 characters long code containing both letters and digits
How - Look at the first word in each line and use the spoiler text to determine if you should use the word's length or only the first letter
Nice
Unskilled
This
To
Sometimes
With
Preferred
Good
Applying the mask LNLNLLNL reveals the ITH code n9t2sw9g
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Thanks a lot for the extensive explanation. I've read it two days ago but was too tired to get it.
Now I read it again and it makes more sense (i.e. I understand it better).
As for H3, no, I didn't notice that back then. I also didn't know what to do with H5 and especially not with H6.
The LN code now also makes much more sense that I know it means "letter" and "number". I thought I was part of who to directly decipher the code (as in it possibly being the key).
Anyways, this was way too hard for me and although it now makes perfect sense, I guess I have to get even more in the right mind set and also do more of your puzzles to better understand how you are thinking because I couldn't make the connections between your hints and the puzzle.
Anyways, again thanks for explaining.
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Let's gather the crew and set sail to Tortuga. First fellow pirate is already here.
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same its pretty impossible to attempt any of these puzzles if you have no prior knowledge of puzzle background. Its like telling someone to solve this box of table with numbers (without telling them its sudoku) or telling them the rules or how it works so you can't even look it up. Wish someone would post about all the basic puzzle types and how it can be solve on a discussion thread :( Free bump though :)
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Give me a logic or word puzzle any day, over hex/binary/ascii conversion or guess the cipher puzzle. That's just me, though.
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Q6-8 are more about treasures. Only well known series. I may drop another hint later. Uncle Google knows all t answers if you know the right questions.
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I guess I don't know the right questions. I don't even know what type of "series" these questions are dealing with (game, TV, movie, etc.)
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nah its bloodsail corsair https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2--Pq9WdHrE
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Seems like only one(?) person made it into the train, yet. I sure hope you are going to explain how to apply concealment cipher for your puzzle once it's over...
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3 pirates made it to the treasure, and few more ships were seen on the way to the island
With an extra week for solving the puzzle I'm quite sure you'll be able to solve it, try reading all the hints one more time. Good luck!
There will be a solution posted for those who don't made it to the end, but I don't think many people will need it. The puzzle isn't long so there's plenty of time for trying different things out.
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I have found that nasty island,
But the treasure's hidden well.
And my parrot's strangely silent.
I need a treasure-finding spell!
A pirate i was meant to be!
Trim the sails and roam the sea!
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We're sure to avoid scurvy if we all eat an orange.
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I think I know what to do for the first step...but nothing's working. :P
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A teaser about the main prize:
The list of the loot from last expedition contains a mysterious acronym: ToZ
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Sailed the first sea and found some islands...
But stuck on the rough waves that so far only one person has made it thru...
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A treasure must be well hidden, otherwise there would be no fun in treasure hunting.
A pirate can't give up such easily. Winds will turn.
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I'm a pretty dumb pirate...
Can only get Q10 right... :(
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You know a pirate's favorite letter, right?
It's not "R" like you might think.
It's the "C".
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I like rum and I like pirates, but I have no idea what I'm doing here
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The mist has rolled away! I can finally see the island!
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Nice to meet you all in another puzzle of mine!
Unskilled I may be, but I still decided to take another attempt at puzzle making.
This time the main theme will be pirates and treasures
To be honest I'm not sure why I've chosen such a topic.
Sometimes the first though is simply the best choice if you're lacking ideas
With that said it's high time for the puzzle
Preferred way of solving it is solo, but any pirate themed hint will be allowed
Good luck!
LNLNLLNL
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