Hello!

I've been playing JA1 this past week for the first time and have intercepted a few of Lucas's messages. All of them are straightforward--either in plain text or simple substitutions--except for one. It reads as follows:

THANK/WE ME/ASKS/IN/
WHAT/HEAR/NO/S

HI/-/AS/ITS/ONCE FOR/
DOOM CREAM/PEST/
BETRAY

STEP/CHUG/ROE OWN
OUNCE OFF TAHOE SOME
/ALL/ILL/EAR

INSULT/A/SNIDES NO/E/
EXIT TWO

ME/I/ONCE LOUD/CLAPS
SLAIN/AT/PIT/NEO

I have a passing familiarity with basic ciphers (substitution, anagram, box, transposition, etc. ... the methods an average person would likely know), but after spending a little bit of time with this one, it really seems like gibberish to me.

So does anyone know what this message is in plain text? At this point, my only guess is that it may be a key of some sort to another encrypted message that I haven't found yet (e.g. 27 17 would substitute to "some cream"), but I know that this little puzzle is going to drive me mad if that isn't the case.

Thank you in advance!

Excellent solution, thank you very much!

It's a bit of a shame they added the unnecessary and seemingly arbitrary solidi throughout; my own efforts at decoding the message relied exclusively on arranging the words based upon their separation by punctuation. If I hadn't been so blinded by that, I may have focused on other patterns.

Again, thank you for helping me put this little mystery to bed (and making me a feel a little dumber in the process :D).

EDIT: In retrospect, the solidi actually exist to artificially separate the words, but are not considered when eliminating nulls, unlike spaces. Also, if "ONCE" was written as "OUNCE," the plaintext would be "H-STONE." :D

Happy to have helped you, but, please, don't feel dumb at all: http://thepit.ja-galaxy-forum.com/index.php?t=msg&th=4098&goto=169000&#msg_169000

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Excellent or inspired work.
I think when they "produced" this they forgot a letter or two.
They used an every other letter message obfuscation.

Crowding all the letters together, no spaces or "/" hashes:
THANKWEMEASKSINWHATHEARNOSMI-
t a k e m a k i w a h a n s i -

ASITSO?NCE FORDOOMCREAMPESTBETRAY
s t on e f r o mc e m e t e r y

STEPCHUGROEOWNOUNCEOFFTAHOESOMEALLILLEAR
s e c u r eo no n eo ft h es m a l l e r

INSULTASNIDESNOEEXITTWOMEIONCE
i s l a n d sn e x tt om i n e

LOUDCLAPSSLAINATPITNEO
l u c a ss a n t i n o

Thanks for the hint.

If you keep spaces, but remove hashes, then the only place they forgot a letter is the first "ONCE" part.

As you put it into Jawiki, how about at least to provide a correct translation there? Newlines there for a reason, they do separate words, just like spaces do; its "take makiwahans h-stone", not " take makiwahansi -".

Also "SPOILER WARNING: This refers to a mid-to-later game event, beyond Day 10 or so. " is ridiculously irrelevant, the time of player getting to plant at S27 could vary, but normally its day 2-5, not 10. Moreother, this note could be found in other sectors (while normally its happens in S27 indeed).

Part about "...and usually is encountered after the morning where Jack briefs the Team (you) about running out of processing space for the sap. I'm not aware of how many particular sectors it might crop up." is purely meaningless and misleading, this note would be on Enemy1 in that sector even if player will attack it on Day1 (thats possible, but not optimal).

OR, spelled out ... ...
TAKE MAKI WAHANSI STONE FROM CEMETERY SECURE ON ONE OF THE SMALLER ISLANDS NEXT TO THE MINE LUCAS SANTINO < Makiwahan is written together, its surname, also second THE is not in actual message

so its actually TAKE MAKIWAHANS H-STONE FROM CEMETERY SECURE ON ONE OF THE SMALLER ISLANDS NEXT TO MINE LUCAS SANTINO

(There are native burial ground to the north, Sector 6, and this involves a quest that comes up after Day 12 or so.)
is also misleading, as Headstone quest triggered by natives placed to S6, and it could happen any day, starting from D2 (while its pretty unlikely to have S6 captured by that time, ofc), while Burial Ground quest (days-based one) on its own is not required to be triggered to make it happen.

On a funny note, Brenda "Not Richards" Garno (Romero) in her book also didnt noticed skipped letter in that message, so im not sure if it intentional error or not (likely not).

Of course Jawiki is hopeless garbage anyway, but adding more misleading info to it will make it only worse.