Boarding Party
Owner:
Solution:
VICTIMIZED
GC Notes:
GC to update day-of-game.
Presentation:
Teams discover that a lot of crap has been hidden in their van.
Logistical note: The stuff will be hidden when the teams arrive at Boundary Bay, but they won't necessarily be told to start the puzzle at that point. GC will unlock the puzzle manually at some point later in the weekend, so this could show up anywhere from Sunday morning to the end of the event.
Walkthrough
When teams start this puzzle, they are given a rebus image that they should decode to "Look under passenger seat"
Once there, they find an Audio CD with tracks of me speaking these lines. Each line has a hidden nato letter, which decodes to UNSCREW BACK PLATE.
Unscrewing the back plate gets them a piece of paper that has a series of before and afters (i.e. Dirty Harry Potter). The starting letters of the middle words spells "HOLD PAGE OVER FLAME". Once they use their lighter to heat the page, all but one letter of each word disappears. This tells them to "GO TAKE A LOOK INSIDE LEFT REAR WHEEL WELL".
Inside there is a magnetic key fob. Inside the fob is a USB cable mangled and cut. If they plug it in the drive will enumerate on their machine, and on the drive is an image. This image is a series of words that can have a single letter removed to make another valid word (except where necessary...like AXLE -> ALE...but that can also be AXLE -> AXE...just didn't have a better way to get the X). They are told to save the image and rename the file extension to .RAR.
Once they rename the file extension, the RAR contains a final image (FINAL.JPG), which through a rebus tells them to spray water on their back window. Once they do, they will see a message that spells out "VICTIMIZED", which they should submit.
Hinting:
If they can't find the key fob in their left rear wheel well, I probably couldn't find a metal surface, so I've contacted GC to let them know about an alternative location I stashed the fob. Check notes around GC. If there isn't an update, it means it fell off somewhere...too bad, just tell them what they should have gotten, and then instruct them to spray their back window.
If they are not finding the message on their rear window, I will try and spray inside their passenger side rear window so tell them to focus there. If it has gotten smudged, and/or unreadable, feel free to let them know the answer, and let them know I wish it had gone more smoothly.
Data:
Audio CD:
| H | U | UNIFORM | COMMUNE A FORMAL | Having reserved the venue, a religious commune, a formal announcement will be sent to all the guests |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| I | N | NOVEMBER | NO OF EMBER | Instead of travelling home this November, I’m going to have Thanksgiving in my own house |
| D | S | SIERRA | SEE IRRIGATION | Ditches allow you to see irrigation in action |
| E | C | CHARLIE | CHAR LEADS TO | Every backyard bar-b-quer knows, a good char leads to the best flavors |
| S | R | ROMEO | ROOMIE OPINES | Secretly, I roll my eyes every time my roomie opines about some half-baked conspiracy |
| N | E | ECHO | A COOPERATIVE GAME | Never play a cooperative game with him, he's greedy |
| A | W | WHISKEY | CHEEZ WHIZ KEEPS | All of my cheez-whiz keeps disappearing, and I think it's my stupid roomie |
| T | B | BRAVO | ALGEBRA VOCABULARY | Today in class we had cursive, algebra, vocabulary, and social studies |
| O | A | ALPHA | ALPHABETICALLY | Often, I catch myself singing along with my daughter every time she sings the alphabet song |
| L | C | CHARLIE | STAR CHAR LEAKING | Luckily, my C++ data structure uses char, leading to a huge perf improvement |
| E | K | KILO | USB KEY LOCATOR | Even I could use a car key locator, from time to time. |
| T | P | PAPA | PAPUA NEW GUINEA | The capital of Papua New Guinea is Port Moresby |
| T | L | LIMA | REALLY MACHO | Taking your shirt off in 30 degree weather isn't really macho, just dumb |
| E | A | ALPHA | GANDALF AGAINST | Everybody loves the fight scene in Lord of the Rings with Gandalf against the Balrog |
| R | T | TANGO | TANG ORINGINATED | Researchers in the US space program discovered tang, originally for the Mercury test missions |
| S | E | ECHO | ECOLOGICALLY | Sometimes even a chemical plant can be ecologically beneficial |
Before and Afters:
| GIFT | HORSE | FLY | H | G | L |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SOAP | OPERA | HOUSE | O | O | E |
| PICKET | LINE | FEED | L | T | F |
| RAIN | DANCE | STEP | D | A | T |
| BLACK | PEPPER | SPRAY | P | K | R |
| ROTTEN | APPLE | SAUCE | A | E | E |
| BALL | GAME | PLAN | G | A | A |
| POTENTIAL | ENERGY | DRINK | E | L | R |
| BLOOD | ORANGE | BOWL | O | O | W |
| CROWN | VICTORIA | BECKHAM | V | O | H |
| STOCK | EXCHANGE | STUDENT | E | K | E |
| RUSSIAN | ROULETTE | WHEEL | R | I | E |
| NUCLEAR | FAMILY | VALUES | F | N | L |
| STUART | LITTLE | WOMEN | L | S | W |
| NATIVE | AMERICAN | PIE | A | I | E |
| DEN | MOTHER | LODE | M | D | L |
| WHITE | ELEPHANT | SEAL | E | E | L |
Image file:
| R | S | REVERSE | | | MACE | M | E | | - | - | --------- | | | --------- | - | - | | E | A | ENDEAR | | | AXLE | A | X | | M | V | MAVIN | | | KISTS | K | T | | O | E | ORPHEAN | | | ESTATE | E | E | | V | I | VESTIMENT | | | SALTERN | S | N | | E | M | EARTHMEN | | | VERSIFIED | V | S | | O | A | ORCA | | | ANTI | A | I | | N | G | NUDGE | | | LOITER | L | O | | E | E | ELATE | | | IMPENDED | I | N | | L | C | LUCRE | | | DANGLE | D | D | | E | H | ENCASHED | | | WOADED | W | O | | T | A | TAINTED | | | OVERTLY | O | T | | T | N | TURNKEY | | | RACE | R | R | | E | G | EMIGRATE | | | DENATURE | D | A | | R | E | REALLY | | | STRING | S | R |