Forums » Epic Week 2026 » Signal Symbol (SOLVED)

This topic is for discussing clues and potential answers to the Signal Symbol in Epic Week 2026. Please stay on topic. Remember, these riddles are designed to be challenging and require a group of people brainstorming together; don't feel intimidated if you don't know the answer right away. Every little idea can help. Research is not cheating; it is expected!

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In the Lancer-Setting (working of brittle memory), earth sent out colony ships as it was dying to at least provide a future for the best and brightest of humanity.
Only that earth didn't die. It recovered, and society advanced a lot. They finally sent out new ships in hopes of reconnecting with their colonies.

If I remember correctly, some of those new ships even arrived at the colony ships destinations before the colony ships. The FTL-technology on board of those newer ships was just way more developed. Maybe it is something like that?

The third collection of riddles is usually non-fiction focused, so it's likely referring to real world science stuff.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstellar_radio_message
Aricebo's is the earliest on this list and was supposed to take 25,000 light years to arrive at its destination. Gliese 49 is expected to arrive at its destination in 2036 (10 years from now).
Oh, some of those already passed their estimated arrival date, though. 2000, 2021, 2024, etc.
There are several Gliese ones, from the Cosmic Calls. Reading more about those now... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_Call

Hmm, well, the first Cosmic Call was first sent to 16 Cyg A, Cygnus, on May 24, 1999, and the estimated arrival date is the latest of any of the Cosmic Call 1 or 2 ETAs with November 2069. But the one I thought might be relevant (GJ 49 Cassiopeia July 6, 2003 April 2036 Cosmic Call 2) was sent on the same date as several others, with different estimated arrival dates.

"The beginning of both messages is centered on mathematics. There is a simple reason for
that choice. Any civilization capable of building a device to receive radio waves from outer space needs mathematics and physics to accomplish that task. Also any kind of
society needs some form of mathematics for taxes and commerce. So mathematics is a
truly a common language." - From the PDF article linked in the Cosmic Call Wikipedia page, the Dutil-Dumas Message https://www.plover.com/misc/Dumas-Dutil/messages.pdf
I don't know if the answer is about the Cosmic Call project, the DDM, or specifically what was gained/lost in the changes between Cosmic Call 1 and 2, e.g. the error that was fixed ("The DDM incorrectly gave the neutron mass as 1.67392, instead of the known value of 1.67492. This error was corrected in DDM2." - Wikipedia), or the page loss with addition of pixel borders to combat noise-related corruption, or what. Most of my theories have to do with what's in the first 5 pages of the DDM PDF. The second clue would have me believe it's mathematics-related.

Edit: Wikipedia refers to it as the Dutil-Dumas Message, but Dumas' article calls them the Dumas-Dutil messages... That may or may not be relevant, but it's funny...

ima take a wild guess and say some sort of satelite

Maybe it's something to do with how it was sent, since there's so much about the 'sendings', like how many bit/s or something a bit more technical about the signal type? I've been told a bit about lossy programs but I assume space signal noise reduction is a little different.

It definitely has to do with space and the language around world is definitely something to do with math. Since the whole world one way or another understand mathematics. As for the third clue it states "The second version combatted possible loss in one way, but also contained loss in itself with respect to the first version." So maybe we're looking at a satellite or spacecraft that might have two verison or a twin of some short.

So i wonder if its a name of a satellite or spacecraft that had an mathematical error and has a twin or the the satellite/ spacecraft is a copy of an older model. Due to it losing it respect of the first vision.

Hubble telescope had a mathematical error and is replaced by James Web!!

I’ve been flinging Voyager 1/ Golden Record stuff at it as I’ve been able, though that’s less “signals” and more “showing potential far-flung-life common potential scientific discoveries to facilitate communication.” Probably barking up the wrong tree but couldn’t hurt!

This is DEFINITELY about the cosmic calls. all the information lines up, so focus on that. here's some potential guesses for next round:
DDM
DDM2
BM
Braastad Message
AM
ESM
Encounter 2001 staff message
RT-70
Team Encounter
DDM2
ISR
interstellar rosetta stone <--- I really think it's this one
BIG
bilingual image glossary
100 bit/s
400 bit/s
Lincos
Lincos Language <---- also very likely
Neutron mass

Interstellar Rosetta Stone sounds like a good lead
The specifics about mentioning what was gained and lost seemed pointed, but maybe it was just a way of being descriptive and vague enough to be a clue without being an answer. The answer itself does seem to be about the messages themselves or a way they were encoded, not the code itself. Probably.

Extra clue for you: "Some of the information was repurposed elsewhere, but the topic, although charming, would perhaps not be best understood as initially presented."

Oooh.

"
• The information of page 13 and 14 has been dropped. It was too confusing and
did not give much information after all."
Those were:
• More on the Earth-Moon system. Giving information about the dimensions and
distance of Earth and Moon.

•This is some information about the ecosystem on Earth and a brief composition of
air, land and ocean.

info from page 14 was moved to page 10. Its about the composition of earth. land and oceans

I wonder if a Simple Response to an Elemental Message matches the cyclical part
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Simple_Response_to_an_Elemental_Message

*shouts from very far away* phraaaaaaaaasing

YOU GUYS WERE SO CLOSE