I've now updated the main thread with hints, solutions and explanations for every piece to Mission Set 2. Piece 9 was certainly a tricky one to find!
Since Dylan is still being lazy, I'll make some hints. Use them, adjust them, whatever. MISSION SET 3 - BUTTERFLY EFFECT Theme for Mission Set 3 Spoiler: BIG SPOILER The Discovery of Neptune Mission 11 Spoiler Spoiler: HINT The answer is written on one of the documents, in a way. Spoiler: SOLUTION Le Verrier Spoiler: EXPLANATION The signature at the bottom of the Spearfish Incident Update document is that of Le Verrier, the person who discovered Neptune. Mission 12 Spoiler Spoiler: HINT The answer is written in plain text on one of the documents. Spoiler: SOLUTION Berlin Obervatory Spoiler: EXPLANATION The Berlin Observatory is one of the donors to the Lorenz Group. It's also the location where Neptune was discovered. Mission 13 Spoiler Spoiler: HINT The answer is encoded and hidden in plain sight in one of the documents. Spoiler: SOLUTION Galle Spoiler: EXPLANATION Convert the numbers in the subject line and the 'OP' number below the break in the CLAM output document, using hexadecimal, to get the answer. Galle also discovered Neptune, but refused to be credited as the discoverer. Mission 14 Spoiler Spoiler: HINT To get this answer, you'll need to do a tiny bit of research. Think to yourself: Which of these documents would be easiest to hide a puzzle piece in? Spoiler: SOLUTION Voyager 2 Spoiler: EXPLANATION Agent Azuro's address is given in a weird format-- specifically, his street address is given as '0820'. Note the extra 0 before the 8. That actually corresponds to a date (August 20th). This happens to also be the date that Voyager 2 was launched, a spacecraft that gave us much of our modern data about Neptune.
I noticed some extra numbers in the data for mission 15 I found Spoiler 120206 I was thinking they could be a date? 12/02/06 Could this be a hint to finding the information piece?
Possibly. pp15 has been found, but only through the graces of bruteforce. Join us in the IRC (#s2pp) if you wanna chat about it without worrying about spoilers.
Spoiler Those numbers in the image opened in text are very weird though, because they don't always show up. First time I didn't have them.. when I looked again I did.. when I redownloaded and opened it in notepad again it was not there
Looks like I'm doing this again. MISSION SET 4 - CHAOS THEORY Theme for mission set 4 Spoiler: BIG SPOILER Rings of Saturn Mission 15 Spoiler Spoiler: HINT This one is tough. You can find it on the website homepage, and it's encoded. Spoiler: SOLUTION Jeffreys Spoiler: EXPLANATION The timetable on the Iglesia San Martin homepage looks a little weird, right? If you express all of those times as hands on a clock, and then interpret that as flag semaphore, it spells out 'Jeffreys' -- and the Jeffreys Gap is a notable feature in the rings of Saturn. Mission 16 Spoiler Spoiler: HINT The answer is written in plain text on a document. Spoiler: SOLUTION Keeler Spoiler: EXPLANATION The Dispatch Agent named in the call transcript with Dr. Higgins is named Keeler -- and the Keeler Gap is another notable feature in the rings of Saturn. Mission 17 Spoiler Spoiler: HINT The answer is written in plain text on a document. Spoiler: SOLUTION 1610 Spoiler: EXPLANATION The message from Yvonne Waechter was sent to Division 79(that's us!) through Field Office 1610. Galileo first observed the rings of Saturn in 1610. Mission 18 Spoiler Spoiler: HINT The answer is not written in plain text on a document, but with a little bit of research into something mentioned in a document you should be able to figure it out. Spoiler: SOLUTION Roche Spoiler: EXPLANATION The Intrusion Device Technical Requirements memo was sent to Div 79(that's us!) by a Professor R. Edouard. Edouard Roche is a noted astronomer, and for whom the Roche Division in the rings of Saturn (and probably less relevantly, the Roche Limit) are named.
Mission 23 (A possible direction, not an actual puzzle piece) Spoiler I was working on the 3rd part of this mission and I copied the contents of the pastebin into LibreOffice Writer, taken the hidden symbols and ran them through Google Translate. It recognised them as Korean and translated them into the words "Oi School Boy". A quick google search revealed that phrase as a quote from Rambo (2008). I tried a few words related to that film but nothing came up. It's a possible starting point though.
I can't quite remember what it is, but as far as I'm aware that's not to do with the puzzle piece (we've already found them all and they're still solar system stuff!) It's certainly interesting though!
I must say that the puzzle pieces for 24-27 are currently beyond me... I replayed the whole mission set tonight and found nothing, Spoiler: prob not a spoiler thought I had some exoplanet stuff , but it did not work...
Okay, I finally got the theme! MidDipper you said I was close... so I kept digging, thank you! edit-ok I got one-don't fully get the theme yet, these are hard... edit of the edit got them-one by dumb luck, 2 by nudges-was already close on one, thanks Zaelong!, one by bruteforce! Made a comment that these were hard... was reminded that they were only hard in comparison to the last two mission sets. The challenges have returned!
