Cryptos

[kuang]

I think the real company was actually the basis for locating that level's URL - we used a postcode and address and referenced a real 'yellow pages' type site to get there.

I know of that type of packet, but I've never heard it called that before - they're pretty rare now with stateful packet inspection firewalls and easily updateable IDSs, and I don't think that the information you get back from one (if any) would be of any use outside a hacking course.

My feeling is that googling is the context in which the wireless is used - everything else assumes too much (that the door is controlled by the network, that it can be hacked and how, etc).

[Jase]

I still think that it somehow has to do with manipulating the words / letters that we have .... just have to find the right ones!

[fred]

My remark about googling was aimed at the notion that everything we needed was in the words of the clues, not in their content. My first reading of the clues was that some googling would be necessary, hence my efforts to find the answer in the TV show X-Files, since the clues seemed to be from INT, an X-Files outfit. If you just use the letters of the clues, you shouldn't need to google. I still think that amiddle initial is a letter that starts a name and that an atomic number is one that lies between 1 and 118. Fpollowiong that logic, our answer is a letter and 3 numbers, but I have no idea how to relate that to anything in our present vaulted context.

[kuang]

You might need to google if the result you got wasn't actually the URL, but a hint about what needed to be done - Googling might tell you how to go about it

I'll have a think about your angle though, hadn't really considered that yet.

[fred]

L35 Ing

Looking more closely, ING appears to be a part of The X-Files The Game, and not of the TV show itself. Interestingly, it is just the sort of gizmo we could use about now.

[Jase]

I still have no ideas and any l;etter substitution that i try or even anagramming comes up with nothing ... this is the track that I am on after cryptos told me twice that I was over thinking things

[kuang]

That [smear] bit is too much of a wildcard - if we're considering an additional letter in an anagram it raises the bar a long way.

[fred]

Someone mentioned this earlier: The term 'odd' occurs twice in the description, as does the word 'potent'. My literal reading of the description says that the (magnetically sealed) door opens "as you (we) finish." I still feel as though there is some kind of 'open sesame' command involved here. Perhaps we should be focusing on the odd clues (Christmas tree, Lithium and Thermonuclear [smear]. I really do hate to give up on content altogether. Does Santa Claus have a middle initial?

[fred]

Level 35

April 1, 2008. Got it!!

April fool!! Actually, I have no idea. Someone is gonna stumble across this one by chance. Good luck to us all.

[kuang]

You rotten sod

I'm stumped so far. My last line of thinking was this:

I was assuming an anagram of the capital letters, plus maybe one or two more from the [smear]. I also considered that the colons may give structure and the - implied a suffix. This would give

?? ???? *ing

where ? is a single letter and * is any number of letters greater than 3 (the number of remaining capitals). There are only so many valid two letter words to start with, and substitutions based on the initial letters of words that might follow thermonuclear (bomb, war, reactor, etc) have met with no success.

I'm still hung up over being able to make the word magnet(ic) from the available letters, but I'm also in agreement with Fred in that previous levels have left some form of cryptic clue as to the approach. 'Potent' is the one thing that stands out, but no idea if that's it or, if so, how to use it.

[fred]

Sorry. Couldn't resist, since I am one myself. I've followed your example with anagrams, but I've tried to restrict things to commands of some sort. I don't t hink we're looking for a destiination, since we're told that we go into the next room. Some exhortation to negate the magnetic fields in play or some such. On the content side, I still like Douglas (kind of Christmas tree) and Smith (father of economics) but a middle initial fails me, since the X-Files connection was overblown (by me, I'm afraid). I can get

nobelium (102)

but that's about it. And so it goes.....

[fred]

Good grief! Now I read in Wikopedia that the christmas tree was a symbol in The X-Files. Can I not rid myself of that damnable show?

[Jase]

iMy heart had actually skipped a beat there Fred *PHEW* ... but I am still playing with the anagrams to no avail either ... someone will crack it and we will all smack our selves silly due to overlooking the answer staring us in the face

[fred]

G'day, Jase. Perhaps so. I think this is one that is so open ended as to defy deduction. Stay with the anagrams (magnetic anagrams to magic net). I'll keep googling for initials and atomic numbers. It's April 2, and I still feel the fool.

[kuang]

I suppose the middle initial 'A' is already under consideration?

As in Edgar Allen Poe - writer of the Cask of Amontillado, in which a man was buried alive in a cellar as a result of lusting after 'treasure' of a sort. We've already had a Gold Bug level, so can I presume that the author is a fan?