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Post by landau on Nov 28, 2016 20:34:04 GMT -5
Clever. I like it. My son and I worked out this: Corner of a park in Chicago? And yes, the clock removes some ambiguity with decimal vs HHMMSS.
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Post by MrKairo on Nov 28, 2016 20:56:29 GMT -5
Clever. I like it. My son and I worked out this: Northwest corner of Horner Park in Chicago. Greek letters indicate order, the rest is latitude and longitude in HH:MM:SS format from the numbers in the pictures, noting that the negative image is GHWBush, the 41st president of the US. The clock in the revised clue does resolve the ambiguity for the format of the lat/long pair.
41:57:39 North Latitude. 87:41:53 West Longitude. We wondered about South Latitude, and East Longitude, but the middle ocean or northern China seemed out. Spot on, sir. You and a few other diligent puzzlers got this. Do you have any critiques for me? Was this too easy, too hard, just right? Should I try to address the directionality or do you think that the process of elimination is enough? I am currently working on one of the later puzzles and I hope to post it soon.
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Post by landau on Nov 29, 2016 13:12:17 GMT -5
As long as you are certain your friend is at least aware of lat/long, and HHMMSS, vs decimal degrees. , then I guess it would be fine. I noodled it around in my head for an hour or so, before I came up with the idea of how to solve it. Also, you spell out the greek letters form some clues, and use the actual character for others, in addition to mixing lower and upper case. Perhaps just pick one way to specify the greek letters? Probably doesn't matter, but it makes the puzzle, er, more thematic.
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Post by pinktiger on Nov 29, 2016 16:26:13 GMT -5
the second picture did work for me but it actually took me some time to figure out the last picture its number For that one: I first choose 3, because he did read a book upside down once, and a zero. only half an hour later the obvious came to mind... So for someone like me it is just right. (guessing you don't won't it too hard because the plan is to get it solved in a reasonable time.
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Post by MrKairo on Feb 1, 2017 19:05:53 GMT -5
So, I'd like your opinions on two things: In my initial plan, I was going to try to go the full MPC with this treasure hunt and have each clue include a message telling a story and directions to the next clue. But the problem is that my puzzles are starting to get a little crazy in terms of deciphering time (not to mention ciphering time, whew!) My hope was that my friend and I would be able to do the whole thing in a few hours (longer and I would worry that she would want to pause the search). In your opinion, would it be a letdown if I just had the first clue say something like "Follow the clues. Find the treasure." Then all the clues would lead to places? Is that lame?
Next, I wanted suggestions for puzzles. I currently have: Morse code Steganography (which is the above puzzle) A book cipher The Houdini code (yes, I am going to reuse the handcuff key) A crossword puzzle that leads to a what3words address
If I am going to cutdown on the length of the messages, I would like 1 or 2 more. So what would you guys use?
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Post by jackoat on Feb 2, 2017 0:04:25 GMT -5
So, I'd like your opinions on two things: In my initial plan, I was going to try to go the full MPC with this treasure hunt and have each clue include a message telling a story and directions to the next clue. But the problem is that my puzzles are starting to get a little crazy in terms of deciphering time (not to mention ciphering time, whew!) My hope was that my friend and I would be able to do the whole thing in a few hours (longer and I would worry that she would want to pause the search). In your opinion, would it be a letdown if I just had the first clue say something like "Follow the clues. Find the treasure." Then all the clues would lead to places? Is that lame? Next, I wanted suggestions for puzzles. I currently have: Morse code Steganography (which is the above puzzle) A book cipher The Houdini code (yes, I am going to reuse the handcuff key) A crossword puzzle that leads to a what3words address If I am going to cutdown on the length of the messages, I would like 1 or 2 more. So what would you guys use? How interested is your friend in solving puzzles and what ability level?
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Post by MrKairo on Feb 2, 2017 2:21:03 GMT -5
How interested is your friend in solving puzzles and what ability level? She is extremely enthusiastic, but only so-so at it.
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Post by jackoat on Feb 2, 2017 9:34:01 GMT -5
How interested is your friend in solving puzzles and what ability level? She is extremely enthusiastic, but only so-so at it. Currently you have 5 puzzles and you're planning for 2 more. Morse code: If she recognizes that it is Morse code this could take 15-20 minutes, longer if she spins her wheels trying to determine that it is Morse code and not something else. Stenography: Landau is a member of the UFo and thus should be reasonably good at puzzling but it took he and his son "an hour or so" to come up with the idea of how to solve it. Book cipher: If she is not familiar this too could take a long time to decide the type, determine the book and then figure out what the puzzle means. The Houdini code: This wasn't an easy puzzle in C&C Crossword puzzle: Typically, depending on the size, these take a bit of time to solve all the clues, then if she doesn't realize there is a 2nd layer she might miss the 3 words and if she hasn't heard of the what3words site it could take a long time. Are you planning to provide her with a "Membership" type book that has examples of Morse, Binary, Braille, Book, Houdini, Greek letters, decimal, etc so she has a reference to fall back on?
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Post by MrKairo on Feb 2, 2017 10:07:17 GMT -5
She is extremely enthusiastic, but only so-so at it. Currently you have 5 puzzles and you're planning for 2 more. Morse code: If she recognizes that it is Morse code this could take 15-20 minutes, longer if she spins her wheels trying to determine that it is Morse code and not something else. Stenography: Landau is a member of the UFo and thus should be reasonably good at puzzling but it took he and his son "an hour or so" to come up with the idea of how to solve it. Book cipher: If she is not familiar this too could take a long time to decide the type, determine the book and then figure out what the puzzle means. The Houdini code: This wasn't an easy puzzle in C&C Crossword puzzle: Typically, depending on the size, these take a bit of time to solve all the clues, then if she doesn't realize there is a 2nd layer she might miss the 3 words and if she hasn't heard of the what3words site it could take a long time. Are you planning to provide her with a "Membership" type book that has examples of Morse, Binary, Braille, Book, Houdini, Greek letters, decimal, etc so she has a reference to fall back on? Actually, I was planning on not letting her know that I created it and doing it alongside her to nudge her along. I AM THE MEMBERSHIP BOOK.
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Post by centaurofattn on Feb 2, 2017 11:44:38 GMT -5
LOL. Is she a social media kind of person? I created a Facebook page for an experience I'm running at my college right now that is sort of fun. With Pages, it doesn't show who runs the page if you don't want it to, so when people find it, they don't know I'm behind it. I too have recycled MPC-style puzzles into my experiences (they are great, why reinvent the wheel right?). Creating the story seems to be the challenging part. But damn it, making fake news articles is one of my new favorite past times (actually fake, not... well... you know). Anyway, if she IS a social media person (or even if not), here is an example of how I am recruiting "players" for my experience on campus (feel free to figure it out and join from afar...maybe that would give some added fun haha): Totally recycled Crossword Puzzle Clue Thing
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Post by MrKairo on Feb 2, 2017 12:17:17 GMT -5
LOL. Is she a social media kind of person? I created a Facebook page for an experience I'm running at my college right now that is sort of fun. With Pages, it doesn't show who runs the page if you don't want it to, so when people find it, they don't know I'm behind it. I too have recycled MPC-style puzzles into my experiences (they are great, why reinvent the wheel right?). Creating the story seems to be the challenging part. But damn it, making fake news articles is one of my new favorite past times (actually fake, not... well... you know). Anyway, if she IS a social media person (or even if not), here is an example of how I am recruiting "players" for my experience on campus (feel free to figure it out and join from afar...maybe that would give some added fun haha): Totally recycled Crossword Puzzle Clue ThingNot a bad notion. Making an anonymous Facebook group could be an interesting delivery method for one of the puzzles. I'm already doing one where an email account auto-replies a clue.
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Post by centaurofattn on Feb 2, 2017 12:26:11 GMT -5
And if she "likes" the page, you can put updates there. Use it for hints on puzzles when needed, etc. For my purposes, it's also to provide a space that's a little more obvious for people to talk about the experience and also clue them in that it's a group effort. Not as necessary for a single recipient experience, but still fun for a quick use.
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Post by craigrj on Feb 5, 2017 4:19:27 GMT -5
LOL. Is she a social media kind of person? I created a Facebook page for an experience I'm running at my college right now that is sort of fun. With Pages, it doesn't show who runs the page if you don't want it to, so when people find it, they don't know I'm behind it. I too have recycled MPC-style puzzles into my experiences (they are great, why reinvent the wheel right?). Creating the story seems to be the challenging part. But damn it, making fake news articles is one of my new favorite past times (actually fake, not... well... you know). Anyway, if she IS a social media person (or even if not), here is an example of how I am recruiting "players" for my experience on campus (feel free to figure it out and join from afar...maybe that would give some added fun haha): Totally recycled Crossword Puzzle Clue ThingChallenge accepted - I've joined up.
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Post by Geodus on Feb 17, 2017 4:24:18 GMT -5
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Post by centaurofattn on Feb 17, 2017 8:32:49 GMT -5
Craigrj and Geodus Thanks! I will include you as best I can. You can probably be helpful in getting the students to share out info they find. They're a little quite. If asked, you were mailed a crossword... creepy haha For being good sports, I will try and make extra copies of things that the "home" players only receive one of and can mail them out later Slight update: Apparently when you know things like email addresses of the participants, but they don't know who you are, people can get freaked out. I had to do some crisis management a la Weeping Book freakout today haha
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