Ackanomic Cyclopedia of Knowledge Volume 1 issue 9 August ??, 1998 ========================================================================== Treasure Special Extravaganza ----------------------------- by /dev/joe I put all my knowledge about a number of Acka's treasure maps here in one place, in the hopes that (a) people will find some treasures, (b) more people will be interested in treasures after reading this, and (c) maybe somebody who has another bit of a solution to one of these, which I have missed, but who still can't find the treasure, will work together with me to find it. Treasure 121 (buried by Red Barn on January 27, 1997; contains the trinket Sceptre of Penguin Power worth A$75). The only clue is a long sequence (about 1000) hexadecimal digits with a smattering of X's interspersed. I examined it several times and threw all my common tools at it, but I could not make any sense out of the hex digits, the X's, or the thing as a whole. Here is the clue: 200029D3BEC1C7CE41433220B4BD571B4AD65756X1B176EB741286470A2F57F1618 DCE6DEED6B84EA1B4F903A5C4A4CE1D743E07A0A19F6F563F090BCCD5B0771253FD 8E43D6DA970E48A1CF5E84C31A916D7E82075B3F0C0D3BE49E12019C6B7C175EC18 1912DC97477DEX55C6229560XB8541EFD7BEDX0FE57C68223FD233B433A4AAED7F4 2CBD25BC8186B6CDCB3F00835CA0D894A726DA096E02AA947E21FB7007A21FDD11E C5BF44B1F4969B05EEA16967EE3D4A694FE6DF8EF3C532XE30F9C610314EC8412D1 C42X3527BCD5270C8A566173A28C3E38B91DXA42BE935D0806A7079B4FEBB5831A2 4EXB276EB291C5452E786F2AB6E5E8365CFD1AF05178AFC6A21B5CFE288D19B778C 1A8C82FAE80D457C9BA2D79B1XEB97615D29B44D004A8XE7D31F9XDFBBF34906415 07CXE13B31B00334E0EAE08B350DCD54C08C64XB9CB6A2971BFF06331A50937F00D 37A4C95DXFDB9AX66BAX97656FA0089CEE54076B8B4F5C87E207E06X60994E0612A X2DE415AA9317A9FA97B7EBACC5E297DF6AF59EF72576479C7ECCXC22F512F45197 D6778EEEE0304E5F36B4B247B3299AB6038E706ECF63AC392611DX545E969267F99 D07EAFC1D7A3DAB83032755F50E34B21975173C36FEC672A5567E2EX8420548B585 40EDA1E9B91E7A55092585C367C8F2E6DEFFE816FE7B7EA09E0C97B736EA941EFA5 Treasure 135 (buried by Calvin N Hobbes on March 14, 1997; contains the trinket Alien Shaking Ball worth A$20). The clue for this one is a long sequence of numbers, separated by (-) and (+) signs in parentheses as they are shown here. The numbers are certainly not random; though they vary in magnitude from 0 to over 13 billion, there is a lot of repetition and a lot of common factors, i.e., most of the numbers have 11 as a factor, many have 101 as well, and some have other interesting factors in the same vein (i.e., 3*37 = 111, and 41*271 = 11111). Here is the clue: 1332243(-)831105(+)9509148(+)0(-)17928207(+)1(-)1(+)1332243(+)2(-)4(+)1(-)1( +)8(-)9509148(+)4444(-)8888(+)88211178(-)8888(-)154(+)17928207(-)88211178(+) 17776(-)8888(+)2222(-)77(+)855547(-)17928207(+)1111(+)4444(-)88211178(+)1(-) 1(+)4(+)831105(-)1111(+)8(-)605(-)16(+)88211178(-)16(-)831105(+)88211178(-)1 7928207(+)4444(-)1(-)4444(+)1111(+)16(-)855547(+)1(-)1(+)1332243(+)16(-)1792 8207(+)2222(-)4(-)77(-)4(+)8(+)4444(+)4(+)4(-)605(-)17776(+)1(+)1(+)855547(+ )77(-)1(-)88211178(+)1332243(+)16(-)17928207(+)2222(-)4(-)77(+)1111(+)17776( -)13634115363(+)175322466(-)154(-)4(+)4(+)1(+)605(-)839546037(+)1(+)2222(-)1 54(-)16(+)88211178(-)8888(+)1(+)16(-)154(+)8888(-)17928207 And here is a hint given soon afterward: There was once a treasure buried With a map to it both silly and rabid, That without Robert Sevin's webpage, And fourteen squared that's not an age From almighty one we must start With lonely zero on his own, apart, Perhaps the lucky one will see Differences in numbers to his glee One of Robert Sevin's web pages is at http://ccwf.cc.utexas.edu/~mitcharf/ but it is not the page that he had when this treasure was buried. In case anybody can make anything out of these numbers, here are the factorizations: 0 1 (appears 15 times) 2 4 = 2^2 (appears 8 times) 8 = 2^3 (appears 3 times) 16 = 2^4 (appears 7 times) 77 = 7 * 11 (appears 4 times) 154 = 2 * 7 * 11 (appears 4 times) 605 = 5 * 11^2 (appears 3 times) 1111 = 11 * 101 (appears 4 times) 2222 = 2 * 11 * 101 (appears 4 times) 4444 = 2^2 * 11 * 101 (appears 5 times) 8888 = 2^3 * 11 * 101 (appears 5 times) 17776 = 2^4 * 11 * 101 (appears 3 times) 831105 = 3^2 * 5 * 11 * 23 * 73 (appears 3 times) 855547 = 7 * 11 * 41 * 271 (appears 3 times) 1332243 = 3^2 * 11 * 13457 (appears 4 times) 9509148 = 2^2 * 3^2 * 11^2 * 37 * 59 (appears twice) 17928207 = 3^2 * 11^2 * 101 * 163 (appears 7 times) 88211178 = 2 * 3^2 * 11^2 * 101 * 401 (appears 7 times) 175322466 = 2 * 3^2 * 11^2 * 101 * 797 839546037 = 3^2 * 11^2 * 17 * 101 * 449 13634115363 = 3^2 * 11 * 31 * 4442527 Treasure 147 (buried by Habeous Corpus on May 7, 1997; contains the trinket Wouf Houng, worth A$1). The clue for this one is a long sequence of zeroes, ones, and twos, which I have not been able to decode. Here is the clue: 1200002022001020020102000212201102010020121011202010221211121220 1201002010022120000202210102000020120102012101021202010200022001 0201021112112201021112101021012101122000021112010201021112010220 1102002101021200120102022000200002111201122002102202112120000202 0102201220110201021112011021112000201201002211120102012101021012 0121021112112002101022000200121000211020121120220002000020100201 0022001020021021002212000020220112111200120010220000211120012102 1102212000020221102111200120010220000211120012102110221120121011 2210002022010202100202021120210022001021112010212000020220102021 1201200210210020201022111200100220110200102000020121000202001200 022002102200002101020002201102111200020002020002000200211121022 This one is quite confounding, as there are exactly 703 digits in the list, a number which does not factor into anything normal. If you break it into triples, and assign them as 000=A, 001=B, etc. you can get a 1-1 assignment into letters, and 222 is the only triple which does not occur when they are split that way, but there is an extra 2 left over at the end, and I have made no sense of the resulting mess. Treasure 169 (buried by Alfvaen on June 18, 1997; contains two trinkets worth a total of A$55). The clue for this one is a string of 132 hex digits. Again I have no idea what these mean, but recent messages by Alfvaen suggest they may be somewhat Vigenere-encoded. I went through his remaining prayers for deliverance after solving the Lucky Ball and Chain treasure recently, and didn't find any hints for this one. Here is the clue and the burial message: Having buried the Exquisite Dead Guy, and finished the Tagline Attribution Quiz, I am now burying the H****t [ed. - I can't seem to get my terminal to enter this word correctly :-) ] Feathers and the Five Hundred Misplaced Ackadollars--just cause I got another treasure map idea. I am revealing the following portion of the map: 9D2FAEE4F353B636932019656968F69FE17EB295D007 A68FAEE67C947AC3E5E6DADFBFE089582EDC8E85F127 36BDB4B3D8BBF30EAECA958602ED481195E25D2786C9 Here is the recent hint: 2: Okay, so what about the other one? 1: Well, it's a bunch of hexadecimal digits, right? But they're too scattered and varied for letters from any character set. I'm sure there's all sorts of encoding schemes that could have been done. 2: The Fibonacci thing was hard enough. 1: But there's some clues there, too. I mean, when Alfvaen originally buried the Treasure, e mistyped "Ackadollars" for "Ackapennies", and insisted that the text be left to stand as it was. So that implies that that text is important in some way to decoding the map, doesn't it? Treasure 178 (buried by two-star on July 19, 1997; contains the trinket Curious Clock of Uesticlox, worth A$65, and A$2, for a total value of A$67). The clue for this treasure is the following graphic: *G *e*L*OCo CA clcNAECf*T CHCiAS*c*tAo*Eba*HAy *E*c*f*tAEBDBhcI*NAE*E *rbE*o*GaE*nce*D*T*W *TCR*iad*rASAc*c aoaSBs*rbubNCECB *t*uBIcQce*r*k aH*N*aAA*ebLaLaT aA*tBAAE bw*U*V BUBg CACi $ _ Even before two-star gave clues to this effect, I realized that half the columns in this structure consist of nothing but *'s and tromino go symbols. Separating these results in the following pair of grids: * G ***C eLOo C ccAC* A lNEfT CCA**A*b*A HiSctoEaHy ****ABBc*A* EcftEDhINEE *b**a*c*** rEoGEneDTW *C*a*AA* TRidrScc aaB*bbCC oSsruNEB **Bcc** tuIQerk a**A*baa HNaAeLLT a*BA b** AtAE wUV BB CC Ug Ai $_ I assumed that the puzzle was to reconstruct the tromino go game, and the play of the game determined how the letters in the other grid were to be read (either in the order pieces were played, or sorted by what letter was on the corresponding tromino go space, etc.) However, the info provided did not seem to be enough to uniquely fill in the grid, and the fills I finished did not lead to any obvious meaning in the other grid. I have since lost this grid to wilma's crash, but I will reconstruct what I can here. Note the tromino go rules require that each piece be played adjacent to at least two units of edge, at least one unit of edge of an opponent's piece, and not adjacent to any edge of the same letter, except the first four pieces, where the first obvious has no adjacency requirement, the second must be adjacent to it, and the third and fourth must be adjacent to the previous piece without touching that player's own previous piece. The fourth piece, an 'a', could touch the first piece, an 'A', and this is the only way that could happen. Pieces are played in the sequence A, b, C, a, B, c, repeating until 30 pieces are played (the game has not reached that number yet -- there are 84 spaces used or 28 pieces in the grid, so we expect to find 4 c's, 4 B's, and 5 of each other piece, if there have been no passes). It is unlikely but possible (especially in a specially-constructed puzzle) for a player to have no legal play on some turn, and thus pass, skipping that piece in the sequence. A round ends when a piece or connected group of pieces belonging to one player has no connection to the outside edge. It is possible that the game has ended, but if there are multiple enclosed segments, they must all have been enclosed by a single piece, the last play made. So first, we notice the piece which extends farthest to the left must fill those three *'s that are farthest left, and must be an A or a because it touches a b and a C. However, there are already parts of 5 distinct A's in the grid, so it must be an a, unless there have been enough passes to already create 6 A's -- 3 passes, which is implausible. The next * right of this piece touches a complete C, a complete a or A, and a single b, so it can only be another b. * G ***C eLOo C ccAC* A lNEfT CCA**A*b*A HiSctoEaHy aab*ABBc*A* EcftEDhINEE ab**a*c*** rEoGEneDTW *C*a*AA* TRidrScc aaB*bbCC oSsruNEB **Bcc** tuIQerk a**A*baa HNaAeLLT a*BA b** AtAE wUV BB CC Ug Ai The a piece at the lower left must be completed with the one of the two adjacent *'s. If the upper one is used, the other * cannot be filled in. I assume that all the *'s are meant to be filled in with tromino pieces, since the letter grid has a letter for each of them. Also, a pair of A's just right of center can only be completed by one nearby *, so I have filled that in. Also, a pair of B's below and left of center can only be completed on one *, out of 2 adjacent ones, because the other is next to a b. * G ***C eLOo C ccAC* A lNEfT CCA**A*b*A HiSctoEaHy aab*ABBc*A* EcftEDhINEE ab**a*cA** rEoGEneDTW *C*a*AA* TRidrScc aaB*bbCC oSsruNEB *BBcc** tuIQerk a**A*baa HNaAeLLT aaBA b** AtAE wUV BB CC Ug Ai Now, the three *'s to the left and below the B tromino we just completed must be a complete tromino - there is no other way to fill the lower-left- most of these. It must be a c or C, and as there are already parts of 5 other C's, it is a c. This leaves only one way to complete the a and A trominoes adjacent to this one, which leaves only one way to complete the b adjacent to that A, and the C at the bottom, and the c above the A. * G ***C eLOo C ccAC* A lNEfT CCA**A*b*A HiSctoEaHy aab*ABBc*A* EcftEDhINEE ab**a*cA** rEoGEneDTW aC*a*AA* TRidrScc aaBcbbCC oSsruNEB cBBcc** tuIQerk accAAbaa HNaAeLLT aaBA bbC AtAE wUV BB CC Ug Ai Now, the pair of b's next to the piece we marked x can be completed with either of two *'s adjacent to it. If we fill it using the lower one, we get a chain-reaction forcing everything to be filled as follows: B G BBCC eLOo C ccACb A lNEfT CCAcBAAbbA HiSctoEaHy aabAABBccAA EcftEDhINEE abbCaacAbb rEoGEneDTW aCCabAAb TRidrScc aaBcbbCC oSsruNEB cBBccaC tuIQerk accAAbaa HNaAeLLT aaBA bbC AtAE wUV BB CC Ug Ai If we fill it with the top *, we get: B G cBBC eLOo C ccACC A lNEfT CCAABAAbbA HiSctoEaHy aabbABBcbAA EcftEDhINEE abCCaccAbb rEoGEneDTW aCaabAAb TRidrScc aaBcbbCC oSsruNEB cBBccaC tuIQerk accAAbaa HNaAeLLT aaBA bbC AtAE wUV BB CC Ug Ai In one of his clues, two-star says the description of the clock is important. That description reads "An ornate antique clock with a brass casing, the Curious Clock's main claim to curiosity is that while the short hour hand proceeds clockwise as normal, the larger minute hand moves counter-clockwise. It does not have a millenium hand or an eon hand. It does however have a small grotz counter which allows it to detect if it has been buried; while it is buried, it is frozen showing a time that has something to do with the map according to which it is buried. While it is not buried it keeps perfect Ackanomic time." JT, Alfvaen, and Vynd all have received trinkets which are supposed to be accompanied by private clues to this treasure, but I have not seen any of them. Probably one of those combined with my above analysis is sufficient to decode the map, seeing as two-star claimed they were individually enough to find the map :-). Treasure 207 (buried by Attila the Pun on April 5th, 1998; contains the trinket "The Mu-Cow" worth A$100). Except for those who joined more recently than this, there is hardly anybody in Acka who hasn't figured out the gist of this map by now, even if they haven't figured out the code. The clue reads "di,noy s [tp[sds; ejovj trvorbrd mp URD bpyrd smf fprd mpy gso; wipti, yp gomf yjr