UAs, Barnacles and other mysteries Thread 8 - The Canonn

[Ozric]

Soo I finally have arrived at Jaques Station and since FD added new sounds to the game yesterday I've checked for some odd ones. Yesterday I've some posts on the forum about weird patterns in station sounds, primally from the comms arrarys in the station inside (The long antenna thingy in front of you when you enter a station.. with the red blinking light.). I started audacity did live spectrum analyser and went inside, guess what I've found.. weird shirps and odd patterns in my spectrum! I listened to it for about 5 minutes and that I had the feeling that the patterns are repeating and went outside and stopped the analyser.

I've heard that UA infected station only have this patterns and I guess Jaques Station was also infected by the UAs. If I'm wrong it's weird and I guess that would also be a new discovery.

Well it's not a revelation but I think that Panzertard would be interested in seeing it. I parked myself up at Obsidian Orbital to see if the markings were different from those Panzertard noticed yesterday, the signal I got back was different to his but containing the same "shapes". It is the same with yours, same shapes, different outputs. The one thing all of the stations I've seen recordings from have in common is that they have all at some time been infected by UAs. What we need is a recording of a station which we know hasn't been! This is obviously tricky as we have no concrete way of knowing if a station has ever been infected, but I have a few I can think of to try.

*disclaimer* this is more than likely just a little easter egg of some sort, I expect the sounds from an uninfected station to be the same.

Sitting on a beach sipping sangria

What are you doing here

 

[ilo]

I thought the 4 quadrants were just 1,2,3,4 but depending on the endianess, each quarter is a clue to the key and there is other info in there we need to decode on order of the quadrants.

But hey, this is all way beyond me. I would never even have had a clue how to decode the sound into an image in the first place.

To be honest, it's quite annoying for me that either this mystery requires genuis levels brainpower to solve, or its going to be something so simple we facepalm when we find out what it is. Whatever, it basically excludes a large part of the community who simply don't understand this stuff and perhaps even more so, those who have little interest in following the forums, and miss out on all this out-of-game stuff. Ideally, this sort of thing should actually be solvable in game.

But i think whoever does solve this, will deserve a PhD in Brooksoligy and a Diploma in Thinking Outside the Box.

I totally disagree with you. there is more things people can do to help solving the puzzle than just "come up with a solution". we don't know how many pieces are we missing, we don't have enough UP for testing, we don't even know the criteria to find barnacles. All these things can be done without any PhD but they require dedication. where is this user base that is "left behind" you mentioned? oh my, when it takes time and dedication this user base is gone.

need a hint? before the UP, this user base didn't even worry about barnacles or the UA, this forum thread just had the regular users. now everyone wants to be the first one solving the UP mistery, but that only can happen when you don't understand the amount of work it requires: it can't be done by a single person, it requires all of us, and that my good sir is just the opposite to leaving a huge amount of users out of the game.

I'm sorry, but it is what it is.

 

[karantza]

It makes a massive difference!!

For example, of the factor was 2, the y-axis would read 2,4,8,16,32 instead of 10,100,1000,10000,100000.
The image would look totally different.

The scale is different, but it's a linear transformation. If you took those 2,4,8... labels, and scaled them up linearly on a log plot, you'd wind up with 10,100, etc. This is why logarithmic graph paper works and doesn't require a base to be specified

Just for clarity's sake, here's the signal with the axes labled: http://imgur.com/a/4vMRc

The bottom of the circular symbol is at around 3 khz. The top of the signals is at around 16 kHz. The middle of the signals is around 6.9 kHz. This will be true no matter what base of the logarithm you chose or what scaling you apply to the image. To see why 6.9 is in the middle of 3 and 16 in any log base, observe:

log_10(3) = 0.48
log_10(16) = 1.2
average(0.48, 1.2) = 0.84
10^0.84 = 6.9 (kHz)

log_2(3) ~= 1.58
log_2(16) = 4
average(1.58, 4) = 2.79
2^2.79 ~= 6.9 (kHz)

The geometry of the image stays exactly the same. (Which is a long winded way of saying, picking a circle is as valid as any other choice, we have no way of determining the author's intent.)

 

[DoctorDanny]

Problem though imo is that most of the activity is outside of the actual game.

Edit: reply to Ilo's post two up.

 

[NewUnit18]

I feel as if the image is representative of the body it points to, 5c. The cross is 0lat 0long and the radian is indicative of a heading. If we get a mob to meet at 0,0 and head out by 140deg in a sweep there are probably surface based POIs we are meant to search for.

 

[CMDR MadRaptor]

Yes, I'm aware that hearing noises is not a popular theory and that our minds are very good and making us hear what we want but I can't shake this feeling that there is something hiding in here. Around the 23 second mark their is a very distinct, almost robotic voice. Its. It static or just noise its something behind the noise and static. The link https://soundcloud.com/timothy-rawlings/mhyre_col70-192khz-wav is for the new audio recorded and again listen carefull at the 23 second mark and it only last a moment but listen closely to the background. On my sound cloud is the original audio and then a couple of my attempts to clean it up https://soundcloud.com/timothy-rawlings/up-voice-2 . Ill put up another link with the whole audio but with my edited version in a few hours when I'm back home.

 

[DustyArne]

I totally disagree with you. there is more things people can do to help solving the puzzle than just "come up with a solution". we don't need how many pieces are we missing, we don't have enough UP for testing, we don't even knoe the criteria to find barnacles. All these things can be done without any PhD but they require dedication. where is this user base that is "left behind" you mentioned? oh my, when it takes time and dedication this user base is gone.

need a hint? before the UP, this user base didn't even worry about barnacles or the UA. now everyone wants to be the first one solving the UP mistery, but that only can happen when you don't understand the amount of work it requires, it can't be done by a single person, it requires all of us, and that my good sir is just the opposite to leaving a huge amount of users out of the game.

I'm sorry, but it is what it is.

Im in the middle with this.

Though we can't deny it is a good idea to make all use full tool we might need in the game available IN the game. Roleplay wise, and gameplay wise.

Imagine flying back to your research lap with all the data you collected to do some tests, or outfit you ship of choice as a research vessel like all those oceanic research ships.

 

[H3lios]

Here you go.

http://i.imgur.com/ioRDNRh.png
http://i.imgur.com/lEiKpHf.jpg

Aw crap. That's the wrong one I think.

EDIT: Its the correct one. I forget Wavelab puts the [decoded] bit in.

nothing significant then. Well damn. Only other thing I can think of is to honk 2 and see if there is a message in stereo.

 

[Belthize]

I thought the 4 quadrants were just 1,2,3,4 but depending on the endianess, each quarter is a clue to the key and there is other info in there we need to decode on order of the quadrants.

But hey, this is all way beyond me. I would never even have had a clue how to decode the sound into an image in the first place.

To be honest, it's quite annoying for me that either this mystery requires genuis levels brainpower to solve, or its going to be something so simple we facepalm when we find out what it is. Whatever, it basically excludes a large part of the community who simply don't understand this stuff and perhaps even more so, those who have little interest in following the forums, and miss out on all this out-of-game stuff. Ideally, this sort of thing should actually be solvable in game.

But i think whoever does solve this, will deserve a PhD in Brooksoligy and a Diploma in Thinking Outside the Box.

I'm trying to tackle what I view as the 3 discrete elements of the image, the pictogram most folks are focusing on being one of them.

I do not believe *a* person will figure this out. I think it's likely that 3 different people will figure out the 3 elements because they're encoded in different ways, and I think a 4th person will figure out how they related and in every case I think those 4 people will do it by lifting ideas from the mass of ideas burbling around in here or by providing data.

Put another way if you gave every person the same information and then blocked all form of communication I think there's an exceedingly high chance that nobody would figure it out.

 

[Gypsy12]

Here you go.

http://i.imgur.com/ioRDNRh.png
http://i.imgur.com/lEiKpHf.jpg

Aw crap. That's the wrong one I think.

EDIT: Its the correct one. I forget Wavelab puts the [decoded] bit in.

What is interesting here is that we see 4 distinct signals. The first at 10Hz, - second at 16/17Hz - third between 22 and 50Hz - and the fourth "Image" one above that.

 

[ilo]

Problem though imo is that most of the activity is outside of the actual game.

Edit: reply to Ilo's post two up.

Power Play planification is done outside of the game.
BGS manipulation is planned outside of the game.
Trading maxing is done outside of the game.
For me this forum and the communication between the players is part of the game itself.
UAs and barnacles have been around and only a few cared about them.

The game will progress regardless we find something in the UP or not.

 

[Darth Ender]

Problem though imo is that most of the activity is outside of the actual game.

that's because it's extra stuff. not needed to actually progress the game. It may be nonsense or it may be a puzzle that reveals a clue, but that clue would have been discoverable within the game using normal in-game mechanics.

 

[Ozric]

I thought the 4 quadrants were just 1,2,3,4 but depending on the endianess, each quarter is a clue to the key and there is other info in there we need to decode on order of the quadrants.

But hey, this is all way beyond me. I would never even have had a clue how to decode the sound into an image in the first place.

To be honest, it's quite annoying for me that either this mystery requires genuis levels brainpower to solve, or its going to be something so simple we facepalm when we find out what it is. Whatever, it basically excludes a large part of the community who simply don't understand this stuff and perhaps even more so, those who have little interest in following the forums, and miss out on all this out-of-game stuff. Ideally, this sort of thing should actually be solvable in game.

But i think whoever does solve this, will deserve a PhD in Brooksoligy and a Diploma in Thinking Outside the Box.

We've been here before and we'll be here again don't worry. The massive upswing of interest and then tirades of anger and abuse has been nothing compared to after the barnacles were found and publicised. There are 2 things I'd like to say one, as ilo says, it doesn't exclude large parts of the community at all it brings lots of us together. I've been playing this game since PB and since Gamma with this commander, my combat rank is Novice. I don't go around saying that PP or combat based CGs, for example, are excluding all the people who play the game like me. The second is very important I think. This mystery has been going on for over a year now all told and it completely passes most people by does it matter if a mystery that, although might in the end determine the fate of many, is partaken by the few. Such is often the case.

*Edit* to add to a few posts since I started writing this Yes it would be nice to have spectrograms and other audio analysing equipment in the game, but we don't. Can you imagine the outcry from the vast majority of the player base if instead of focusing on combat and the constant "balancing" of ships, FD had of actually put that amount of effort into something that would help such a small bunch of us? Ha it's laughable, but not people still want it all.

I believe FD have struck the right balance because they wanted an engaging puzzle/mystery, but they wanted it to work with the story in the early days and devlop as we do. Do you really think this is going to be the only mystery they put into this game over it's lifetime?

I can sympathize with this. I think this whole thing is really cool, but without any progress I'm kind of useless. I don't really have the willpower or knowledge to crack some puzzle that appears to be either really hard, really easy, or not solvable at the moment. My participation is basically reading the thread, having some fun quips, and checking out Merope and looking at points of interest.

Now the second we have firm knowledge that "Hey we need to go check out THIS system, or THIS nebula because it seems awfully likely that's where something significant is hiding" i'll be ready to go. Right now it's just a waiting game and I feel a bit helpless.

There's plenty you can do, you can scour space for free floating UPs

 

[woodhouse]

You all are forgetting that CMDR Delmonte asked it directly to MB, face to face, and he replied:
"They are out there in the wild"

\

That does not mean that we will find them. IIRC Barnacles are supposed to exist both as POIs and hand placed. We never found the POI type did we?

 

[mdias]

Guys, are these normal?

Found it by pure chance when investigating the crater. I don't know what to do with it.

 

[iFred]

Well, so 1000s of players are not able to solve a puzzle within 10 days, don´t want to sum up the hours we spent. I think FD should slowly jump in and place a tip ortwo into the forums or better, into the galnet news. Theres only a small edge between enhusiastic playing and total frustration now.

That´s my opinion of course.

 

[William J Smith]

Hmmm.. spent the afternoon looking at this instead of working (sorry boss)

A few questions wandered through my mind

1. While we're looking at the circle, are we sure we are looking at it the correct way up? is it designed to be read upside down or rotated 90 degrees from the way that its usually pictured?
2. can we clean up the image any more to show the fine detail in the signal around the circle... far too many right angles for that to be just coincidence.
3. Are we sure it refers to Merope? or Maia or any of the stars of the Pliaedes cluster?

Bill

<<about to get fired for not working [woah]

 

[Zatoichie]

Power Play planification is done outside of the game.
BGS manipulation is planned outside of the game.
Trading maxing is done outside of the game.
For me this forum and the communication between the players is part of the game itself.
UAs and barnacles have been around and only a few cared about them.

The game will progress regardless we find something in the UP or not.

agreed. this thread outside of the game to me is part of the game. I look as it as we are all sitting at a station or in a bar discussing things.......more likely a bar

 

[damajoo]

Good evening,

so i'm following this thread(s) as good as i can. I have a question regarding a "feature" of the transmission, which is not even mentioned, or kind of "overlooked".
Maybe i missed it completely, than please excuse me !

(i did not find it on the first page either )

I took the following images (or crops of them) from the first page.

If you look at these two:

I have to ask myself, why that circular feature which is almost dead center in the picture not transfered or looked at ?

Is there a particular reason for it ? And if so, which one ?

Again, if this is already kind of "dismissed" as not important, excuse me for bringing it up again, but than i would like to understand why.
Because almost every post use picture number two as a reference or starting point for visualizing a theory.

However, that circular feature is clearly there, and i'm kind of certain (as far as this is possible), that it is there for a reason.

What if "we" are thinking just too complicated ?

Maybe that picture is just a representation of our view out of the cockipt, and the "sphere" is a planet, with trajectory lines, and that circular feature (almost) in the center is a landmark, or perhaps even a crater or something ?
Yes i know, that would not solve the symbols in the corner, but perhaps the lower two symbols are just markings which act as kind of limiters like "if you fit the view in between the lines of your HUD, and line it up like this - than" .... i don't know

just an idea (and a question on the first part of the posting) ...

 

[woodhouse]

I wonder if 'green key' could refer to some kind of chromakey process (blending objects into an image by using a photo against a green background).