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Forums » Epic Week 2018 » Oceanic code/language translation and discussion!

Ilmarinen Moderator

[update] We have a potential translation! I don't yet know if this is accurate--let's be sure to test EVERYTHING and see if it holds up!

0JWL8Bb.jpg

And numbers!
fCAHJQQ.png


Okay! Here we go! This topic is for deciphering the new code--we can see a little bit of it in the opening video:
Mxgai5Q.jpg

There are also these riddle symbols! The tango symbol specifically looks like a letter in the new script, but I bet the alpha and beta symbols are relevant also--they look like part of the new script, anyway, if not a whole letter.
25nhPdA.png
HnLUYWK.png
ZwzotdA.png

I would be willing to bet that this script will be more difficult to figure out. So I don't think the alpha symbol is necessarily A, or the tango symbol necessarily T. Also, "alpha" and "beta" aren't in the NATO phonetic alphabet, whereas "tango" is. Maybe the tango symbol is a full letter, while alpha and beta symbols are PIECES of letters?

[edit] The last clue for the Puzzle6 riddle is in code!
alphasealclue.png
IF the code is simple, and alpha and beta represent A and B, then it would be: *ab_*a, where * is an unknown, but the SAME unknown, ydig? So it might be Rablra, or Habpha, but not Yabjka. Again, that's just wild speculation--I'm thinking the code is more complicated than that.

OR ... perhaps the extra complexity will come from the fact that the code isn't sequential. The alien code had an internal structure/order to it, with the pips! If alpha symbol is A and beta symbol is B, then we could be looking at a code that has no structure--or a very different structure.

Also: the first three "characters" in the clue are the same as the first three in the tablet. Coincidence? Common triad? Or could the three characters represent a single letter or sound?

Last year's alien code.
dTAj9my.jpg


Here's the translations from our starter video, under the "find the gate" text:
Darths Fortre ...
Kudos Mou ...
Kims Pa ...
Repos ...

These are, of course, locations on our world map! Darth's Fortress, Kudos Mountain, Kim's Palace, and ... well, I can't find the map, so I'm not sure about the last one. This might be important!

Also, the script in the book of alien languages says:
icvo
rbono
ano

I can't remember if this is something from last year or not--but regardless, here it is written down for posterity!
I HAVE A MAP.
It's at my apartment but as soon as I can I'll take a look at it and apply that knowledge to the clues :D
Ilmarinen Topic Starter Moderator

Great!! If you can take a picture of it and post it here also, that would be super amazing!
Where could we find the map?
Ilmarinen Topic Starter Moderator

I can't find a copy of it :P Celestina has a copy somewhere that she can get to us. And if anyone else sees this and has it saved, please do post it!
And here is better place to put this. Lazy copy/paste ftw.

So, no idea what symbol it might potentially relate to, but I want to reiterate that the in video posted to tease EW coming up, a rock around :30 has script of some sort on it. I think similar script was on the back of the rock with the alien code when shown in the video with the princess and the hero, and I'm pretty sure one of the pages in their book in that video also showed it.

And it looks like some of our symbols to solve for.
Unfortuantely, I won't have access to it until about 5:15 EST, because I'm at work. If someone can get a picture of theirs up sooner, go for it! Otherwise I will take a picture of it when I get home and put it up :D

EDIT: I think this will help our 'a trio of islands' riddle too!
Ilmarinen Topic Starter Moderator

Updated the main post to include that Puzzle6 clue, which is in our new code!
Okay I'm lost. You said alpha, beta, and tango symbols. How do you know that's what these symbols are called? I have Googled alpha symbol, beta symbol, etc. and see nothing of relevance. What am I missing?
Ilmarinen Topic Starter Moderator

Check it out (if there are no goblins in the way): https://www.rprepository.com/events/epicweek2018/puzzles.php?p=redship
That's where the alpha, beta, and tango symbols are from. They look A LOT like part of the ocean script, so I'm assuming they're relevant to it.

I am willing to bet that the nothing and singular symbols are clues to the ocean's numbering system.
Aye, thank you! I missed that page!
Dragonfire (played by Dragonfire)

Hum hum hummm!

So the "Book of Alien Languages" also contains some writing that is not alien - some of it seems to be snips of the island lingo, and some is a more 'standard' language system. I think the authors may have decided that morse code is much easier to write with claws? ;)

Anyways. The first snippet of morse translates to "iksn ar hkpr", which is less than helpful, then there's a page of the alien language ("icvo rbono ano"), and finally a second morse snippet, which is a little more readable - "but use only"!

Those two unreadable snippets are surely under a cipher of some sort. I've already ruled out ROT# for both.
Ilmarinen Topic Starter Moderator

It's a bit sneaky!

Okay, for the numbering--we have two potential clues, the singular symbol (one) and the nothing symbol (zero). These symbols have a zigzag shape with room for 5 dots. My hypothesis is that the way the zigzag faces represents even/odd, and the number of pips hones down the number.

A VERY THEORETICAL FIRST DRAFT. I don't have much to go on here other than my gut feeling.
eAKi1cm.png


Dragonfire, great! Thanks for doing those! It's puzzling indeed. I gotta go now but I'll think about it for sure!!
Dragonfire (played by Dragonfire)

I went through and took screenshots of what I could find with our new language (minusing the one bit of it that shows up in the "Alien Languages Vol 1", because that's only a single glyph) - if anyone else wants a copy of them, feel free to browse through!
That could be really close. I mean the symbol is the Nothing symbol after all and nothing is usually referred as zero.
Ilmarinen Topic Starter Moderator

DF: Good catch! My eyes weren't good enough to spot that first text underwater!

Here is a verrrry interesting detail. The mermaid holding the tablet appears in 2 spots: the comic itself and the preview image. But the tablets say DIFFERENT THINGS. :O

Sybil: I am like 70% sure that 0 and 1 are right--but I'm not that sure about the rest of the numbers. Heck, maybe all numbers will appear in binary! ;)
Dragonfire (played by Dragonfire)

I would say that your guesses are spot on for the two values that we know of, Heimdall! But, yeah, without further data it's hard to say for sure.

I was working on putting things together while Server was being operated on, and I'm not really any further. I'm pretty sure we're not looking at something like Chinese where one glyph = one word, since that would be nigh impossible to figure out or transpose to English. I'm also thinking that we don't have enough 'bits' of glyphs to have a sort of Hangul-like system going on.

There do seem to be five basic components that can be combined, however - although, it's sort of hard to see where the )-like symbol combines with the others. It does not appear to go on top of the wavy or long horizontal line, if it combines with the other components - instead, it looks like it might go to the right. Every component can appear on its own, however, from all of the things we've seen so far.
The Dragon (played by Ilmarinen) Topic Starter

Yeah, I was considering some kinda syllabic deal wherein the top marks represent vowel sounds and bottom ones represent adjoined consonants, but I'm just not sure. When I'm done my work for the day, I may try to write down all the distinctive glyphs we have and just see if anything jumps out at me.

(Look, we can be supersleuthing dragonbuddies-whose-usernames-and-characternames-are-the-same)
The Dragon (played by Ilmarinen) Topic Starter

Name updated to be a little clearer!
Dragonfire (played by Dragonfire)

(Hahahaha oh god that's too cute. They do say dragons are oft connected with languages...)

I've got kind of a listing so far of what we've seen, and there's 12 specific groupings that I can almost say for are distinct glyphs, all of them consisting of the diacritic-like marks and the lines. I can theorize the existence of three more glyphs, as well, but they're not written on anything we've seen yet.

The curved bracket is definitely hard to fit in; there's places where it looks like it is part of a sound or letter, but I'm just not entirely sure.

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