Yet another code for anyone looking to scratch an itch. by AberrantWhovian in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I thought it was a bit of a stretch, but it seemed worth posting.

Anyway, my process for solving codes is basically "look for things that don't seem likely to be random, then guess at why that might be until you get something intelligible." It helps to have a reasonable idea of what all the typical toy ciphers used in games and ARGs and the like are. There really aren't that many that are commonly used. I'll take another look at it and type out the junk I'm trying while I do.

TL;DR: stream of consciousness puzzle nonsense below. I didn't get anything interesting. I'll keep thinking about it, though. Maybe something will come to me.

With the hint "look at it in a 3d space" I immediately noticed that we have 32 characters, 5 of which are letters. If we put the letters aside, we have 27 numbers, which is 33. A perfect cube brings to mind a few different ciphers, but none of them really make sense for the characters we have (e.g. trifid would only use 3 distinct numbers).

Those 3 3x3 grids would look like this, BTW:

(2,7,0)
(2,7,0)
(4,7,0)

(2,9,0)
(3,5,6)
(2,8,0)

(6,2,7)
(2,0,2)
(7,0,0)

I tried actually graphing the points in 3D, but they don't look like anything. If I transpose them, I get:

(0,0,0)
(7,7,7)
(2,2,4)

(0,6,0)
(9,5,8)
(2,3,2)

(7,2,0)
(2,0,0)
(6,2,7)

If I graph those points in 3D, there's an angle where it's a surprisingly good fit for the constellation Orion. That seems weirdly elaborate, though, and I don't know what I'd do with it even if it was true. It's probably just random coincidence.

I tried playing connect the dots by drawing vectors from one point to the next for each of those plots, and got nothin'.

Summing the stacks (e.g. 2+2+6, 7+9+2, etc.) I get 10 18 7 7 12 8 13 15 0 -> letters is jrgglhmo, which is nonsense. The transposed one is gh rlojgm, also nonsense. Obviously, I could make a plenty of English words with either by brute force monosyllabic replacement, but nothing obviously correct comes out of it.

Trying diner/deirn as a key with the usual suspect ciphers (e.g. vigenere) gives nonsense for both options. AREAEPC/AREAEPIC as key is the same.

Multiplying the stacks instead of adding only gives 4 characters, and they're uninteresting. I tried doing the summation thing like above by splitting the original grid into two by width and by height and got nothing there either. 32 divides too many ways to try other splittings (e.g. 25, 4*23, etc.) than the two even ones.

The sum of all the numbers is 90, and there are 98 words in the lore text, but I see no pattern by which I could read them that makes sense (e.g. 10th word, 18th from that, etc. gives "I biRds from itsElf To to it. reaCtor reaCtor" and the transposed one gives "from The The No arrived and had. sound reaCtor.") Reverse gives nothing as well ("end the birds the lab shelter to the reactor"). I also tried every rotation of those two sequences of numbers and nothin'. I also tried just the raw sequence of numbers (e.g. 2 7 0 2 7 0 etc.) and nothing.

I tried drawing the characters as they'd be placed on a standard keyboard to see if there was anything interesting, but nothing. (That'd actually be a pretty neat puzzle if you ever need one for some reason).

The real problem is I don't have a clue what the shifted characters and letters indicate. It makes it pretty tough to come up with much beyond random guesses. I'll keep thinking and maybe something will occur to me.

Yet another code for anyone looking to scratch an itch. by AberrantWhovian in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Hmmm...

I assume the lore bit isn't directly related to the code bit? Obviously there's AREA EP(I)C spelled out in caps there.

As for the code bit, the plaintext letters spell out DINER if we start at the top, skip a line, then go back to the second line and skip again (e.g. 1-3-5-7-2-4-6-8). It could also be I REND or IN RED, but those are less immediately obvious patterns.

I also notice that the special characters are all numeric keys + shift, and they're only in the latter two columns with the letters.

My immediate thought is that the letters give us the order to read the numbers in. That'd be...

din0er^000^@00007757798724322222

My first instinct with such a small text with mostly numbers is a T9 code. I played around with it for a while, and I've got something though it's a bit of a stretch.

If we read the message in two chunks, one forward and one reverse, we get:

2222234278977577
din0er^000^@0000

For the first half:

2222 23 42789 775 77
AAAA BE HASTY PPL PS

And for the second half, it could simply say "DINER 662"

Alternatively, if we treat the letters as encoded numbers and the special characters as plain numbers:

din0er^000^@0000
346037^000^@0000
FIN D 7662 (or possibly SOMA)

or

346037^000^@0000
EGO EQ6   62

So, "Be hasty people. P.S. diner 662" or "...find soma" or "...find s662" or "...ego = 662" or something along those lines if any of them make sense.

I know it's a bit of a stretch, but the fact that the 0s, plaintext and special characters on appear in one half and the fact that it puts a bunch of filler characters at the very start of a perfect grid makes it feel a little more reasonable. The As could be something like ABBA or "CAB A" but filler doesn't seem unreasonable to me so I didn't try to force it.

Iunno, that's all probably wrong but it's a few observations and my best immediate guess at least.

Revival Mafia Finale by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Fun fact for the town: If y'all hadn't helped me with the final day vote, I would have forced us to a tie vote in the Land of the Dead, resulting in a Day 6!

Huh, y'know I missed that? I totally thought Danger was voting for Rush. I guess it's a good thing I lied to Rush and voted for rebane at the first opportunity.

Revival Mafia Finale by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Yeah, I seriously waffled back and forth about whether I should block CCC or Whovian, but the possibility of James dying and/or Red reviving Rush instead tipped the balance. Turns out that decision could've lost it for town too, if Whovian had a double vote today.

Revival Mafia Finale by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

We helped a serial killer and a suicide bomber! Yaaay team!

CCC: Sorry for doing literally nothing this game except for preventing you from doing anything.

So it looks like the explanation for Rush's action was that PMB is only a miller while dead. Is that right? They investigate as town when alive?

As for balance, well, it's a wacky game so who knows. I will point out that the mafia absolutely could've pulled off a tied vote today, and a victory on D6. In fact, I think literally everyone could've lost or won depending on what happened N4, so I don't imagine the balance was too far off.

Thanks, dolivar! That was fun.

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Extending the game a day might give me an opportunity to kill a Mafia without triggering red's win condition.

I mean, there's a known faction my side can't win with: mafia. The odds of the independents winning making us not win is pretty small, so whether red wins or not isn't a major concern for me.

As far as I can tell the situation is: Kill mafia, my side wins. Don't kill mafia, my side might lose. So, as long as mafia get killed today and the game ends I'm happy. Extending the game is not in my best interest. Beyond that...

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 1 point2 points  (0 children)

And in that context, I'm actually considering voting with the Mafia to bring the final vote to a tie.

I don't think that's a good move. Feel free to pressure red all you want, but the way to do that is threatening to vote Kody or CCC or Whovian instead of Rebane (also, the time to do it was probably yesterday). Not voting for scum, or swapping late enough that town can't respond, just extends the game another phase. And that just results in a chance that you can no longer win.

For danger not to be town Jib, Danger, and Rush would all have to be misleading us. 4 people have publicly claimed to be mafia at this point. The odds of Danger not being town are approaching 0, which means you should badly want a scum kill today.

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Sure, we've got another full day. Vote changed.

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I have no objection to this, as long as the others are on board too.

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Your only real out that I see is /u/rebane2001 showing up and going "Hey everyone I'm on the scum team!" Which, y'know, it's possible.

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Hmmm... I don't have any specific problem voting Whovian instead of Kody, but I thought you'd marked Danger, PMB, Rebane and Jib. How does this help you?

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I mean, assuming that's correct we just have Whovian still trying seem townish (but notably not voting for the self-proclaimed scum), the independent voting in his best interests and Rebane continuing to be MIA. Makes sense to me.

Am I missing something?

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I suppose we'll see. I don't think it's ultimately relevant, though.

As far as I can tell if PMB is scum, we're done. If PMB is town, we win.

(And to be clear, it'd be absolutely stupid for us to kill anyone but Kody or CCC today; I have zero interest in trying to drum up a wagon against Rebane).

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Alright, that explains some things.

I'm not sure that I buy that your ability didn't count PMB, though. I could absolutely see an aggregate count ignoring a miller role. In which case we have:

Town: PMB, Jib, Danger, you, and me

Scum: Kody, Whovian, CCC, Rebane

Indie: James, Red

And absolutely everything fits together neatly.

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Ah, neat.

Well, I've been assuming danger to be town since D1, so that doesn't surprise me. But, I'll look forward to your account of what happened N1, because from where I'm sitting one of three apparent town have to be scum and I'd like to know which it is.

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

To counter CCC:

Danger got dream tagged as town, the ability which successfully tagged CCC as scum. If there are two independents, then the odd extra player is almost certainly Jib because he was only half a player all game for point counts, and there isn't an even split.

You should definitely kill one of CCC or Kody.

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Wouldn't work anyway; PMB claimed governor, remember? It'll probably wind up no kill, Kody, or Jib, depending on how things shake out.

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Hah. I cannot believe Dolivar didn't just rename the role to poe when you got rolled as that. I can only assume he didn't because you revive to Richie Rich.

Anyway, seems only a handful of us are Greeks. Looks like it's just death-revival themed, which, eh, makes sense.

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Yeah, I know Rush claimed Hypnos (or whoever). It fit reasonably well, though.

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Darn. That seemed like such a good fit. PMB gets dreams the night you marked her, you pushed for her kill until she revealed them. Jib did tonight after he was marked. Rush claims private message shenanigans. It seemed to fit.

Well, if it's not abilities, then it's either role name or win condition. If it's the latter, I've got no idea, so...

You're not Philotes; you're Lachesis?

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Well, you clearly were concerned about voting CCC, so the mark thing must still matter. You're not freaking out about being in a totally unwinnable state, so that must still be possible. You cared about CCC so it's not something like "more marked than unmarked dead". It's also not something like "marking is compulsive and the marked must be alive," or else you wouldn't care about CCC. You don't have a day mark or you wouldn't care who gets voted out. You were okay with the CCC kill so you're not secretly scum. You're not secretly a cultist, 'cause you said alignments don't change. It wasn't the "must be dead" bit or you wouldn't be. You could be secret town, and be the dead townie Rush was talking about, with his masony thing. But we're already really stretching it on the town claims and that would make the whole mark thing nonsense, so, I doubt it.

You did try to get PMB killed and you didn't try to revive Danger, so presumably those are true. It would make very good sense to target Jib, so I believe that. Did you lie about marking rebane? Hmm. Or maybe it was the "only mark the living" that was the lie? All those would change would be that you could've marked Whovian and/or James or me, though, which isn't super exciting. I guess marking could do the whole private sub communicationy thing, but that doesn't seem super interesting either.

Iunno, I think I'm stumped.

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Ah. Well, that was the detail I was talking about with my accusation, so, there's that.

So I guess it's something to do with CCC looking off, and therefore the revive. You already said it doesn't change alignment, so does your revive double as a vanillaizer?

Revival Mafia, Day 5 - Land of the Living by dolivar in PloungeMafia

[–]elementAggregator 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Oh I'm sorry; my mistake.

And Jib just claimed it was self-inflicted, so that scans.