Balance

I will be joining Shenkuu, as always. (There seems to be something wrong with the poll, though.)

I got some dust in my eye when I was watching today's animation.

Yes, it went unexpectedly dark, so to speak, both the animation and the prizes. (Puns aside, it was surprisingly touching. I have to wonder if it will confuse newer players, though.)

I'm concerned that my faerie quest fortune cookie isn't finished yet. I spent neocash on that. Will it be compensated???

The announcement says:

For NC or Premium users, any lost time or items affected will be compensated in some way after the site returns. More information will be posted when it is available.

It seems likely that they would include time left on your fortune cookie. I would expect them to be very careful about NC items and err on the side of customer satisfaction, since this would be a very bad time to give a bad impression of their handling of items that cost real cash.

I've been trying on Standard, and I've gotten a couple of bounces. Finally got an item today.

Standard - Rainbow Faerie Tales

Wish I was smart enough to figure out logic puzzles like these. I'm sure my answers are wrong.

 

Only one answer? I thought we were answering all the thefts.....

Well, it's nice to work out all the answers, because it will usually show you if you've contradicted yourself somewhere, but we only have to answer one of them.

Solving this style of puzzle is something you can get better at with practice. There are patterns you learn to look for, and being told about them only helps so much--you need to see them a few times to recognize them in other puzzles. If you want to be prepared the next time a game springs one of these on you, look for a puzzle book or site full of them and practice, and it will come more easily to you in the future.

They also take patience, though. You have to go over and over the clues, like I said in my previous post. You fill out the obvious, direct stuff first, then look at how other clues interact with that and with each other. Starting on it really late is a reliable route to frustration.

There are advantages to laying out the grid in a spreadsheet. I color-coded mine, switching colors each time I reached a major deduction or when I drew a conclusion I wasn't 100% sure about, so that it would be easy to backtrack. It's also easy to copy the whole grid to another sheet to pursue different chains of logic.

Oh god, I wasn't smart enough to deduce the answer, so I actually had to write code to process all hints to discover the answer...

resulting in 4 possible solutions (yes more than one)

Luckily the question at hand was the same in each solution, but still...

 

I hope others got other clues than me, because for me the Grand Speech Scroll, the Magical Blue Amulet, and the Pocket chess have 2 possible solutions each...

I don't think it was possible to miss any clues--you could get several in a row if you missed days--and there are enough clues to lock down every detail. You have to approach it iteratively--go over the clues, fill in the things they directly say in the grid, make what deductions you can from that, then go over the clues again and apply them to your deductions, then repeat. One of the most important things to note in this approach is the "before X" and "after X" clues; when you eliminate a time for event X, you often eliminate times for other events.

Example, assuming the same times as in the puzzle:

1. Z happens after X.
2. Y happens one hour after X.

Obviously, on our first pass of the clues, we know that neither Y nor Z could have happened at 12:00, and that X couldn't have happened at 5:00. Filling those in, we make another pass.

Second pass:

• Z had to happen after Y, and the earliest Y could happen is 1:00, so we can rule out 1:00 for Z.
• Knowing that two events happen after X means that we can also rule out 4:00 for X.

Examining the sequence was critical for me in working out the last two facts.

 

Hmmm, I'm not sure if number 3 can be deduced out of said clue :mellow: It's like I'm talking about, say, a Yellow Uni, and I say "The neopet is not red, nor a Nimmo". Indeed the neopet is not red, and the neopet is not a Nimmo, but there can be a Red Nimmo.

It's part of the customary structure for this sort of puzzle. Usually, it comes up when someone got a little careless in phrasing the clue, and meant to make it more clear. If a clue states that X is neither Y nor Z, it generally means that Y and Z are also mutually exclusive. It's not guaranteed, so the one time it came up in this puzzle was marked with a color code, but if you get stuck, it's the way to bet.

If Sandrea's stats had reduced or her level went back to 1, I would be beyond angry, cause her level is over 150 and the rest of her stats are extremely high. The other two pets I have, I wouldn't care, they're low levels anyway. That's my only gripe about this "daily" except for the inflation of course.

If it's like the Lab Ray, the level will only be reduced to 1 if it's already pretty low. (Though I forget the exact cutoff.) A high-level pet may lose a level or two, but not all of them, to the Lab Ray.

That's still an "if", though--don't rely on it being the same.

"You hear the Turmaculus roaring over the ship's comm system. Scintilly trembles in fear."

Well, at least I didn't lose any stats. Expensive as training is for my pet at this point, I'm wary of making this one of my daily activities. Might have to gather stats for a while to see if it's worth it.

So, our mad scientist needs supplies, and would like us to get them for him. He'll give us details after we use the portal in his lab to teleport to his ship, which implies that we'll be able to get back the same way. The question arises, then--why hasn't the scientist used the portal to come down and get his stuff, or to communicate his needs directly, rather than relying on a distorted broadcast and the random meddling of strangers? Even if we assume he has no nefarious intent, I still have to wonder why he's stuck where he is.

The phrasing of the message--"anyone down there" and "my ship"--suggest that he's in either an airship or spaceship of some kind. To build recklessly on the Lutari Island speculation, perhaps his machine is a weather control device, and is connected with the perpetual storm shrouding the island? (Either by causing it, or by holding in check somehow.)

I got the petpet. I did 120 floors, I think, and every flower arrangement the day it went up. I didn't max out cheering/booing every day, but I did some every day.

Maybe it has to do with who you chose to cheer for? Those of you who did a lot of plot stuff without getting the petpet, did you cheer for Scarlet or one of the others?

So... the Halloween plot isn't done on Halloween. Not cool, Neopets. Not cool.

Eh, I did a forum Halloween story some years back that was spread out over 13 days, leading up to Halloween--but the real ending was on November 1st. It's a last-minute scare thing. "Just when you thought it was safe...."

I'm not saying that's what TNT is doing with this plot, just that spooky stories don't necessarily have to wrap up on Halloween. (In fact, I'm working on a rather spooky story that wraps up on Christmas--or Yule, at any rate.)

Yes, I lured it into the elaborate trap, of course. (Then played the melody.)

Funny thing, the bit where Kell says, "You should have seen your face a moment ago!"--what face? My pet is invisible. He was speaking to an empty frame. :P

Oh, and now might be a good time to thoroughly explore the floor you're on, since you keep everything you have when you catch the monster.

There is a way to get thru the level without having a HUGE fatigue count down. There are correct answers to the clues so you don't get cursed! Go to http://www.jellyneo.net/?go=spooky_food_eating_contest&id=perilous_catacombs and it will give you the answers!!! Makes getting thru levels much quicker. I got thru 20 levels yesterday alone. Now I'm starting up for the day on level 76

Even having all the answers isn't a guarantee. Some of the clues are connected to two or more possible encounters, which require different answers. For example, banjo music can lead either to indifferent cultists (humming) or to doppelgangers (banjo duel). The only way to know which answer to use is Foresight...which you won't have if you've been successfully avoiding curses up to that point. At some point, you still have to guess--though knowing the possible correct answers does improve your odds of guessing correctly.

Is everybody still opening all the doors before exiting a floor? I'm thinking it might save time to just exit as soon as you find the exit, but not sure whether that is a good idea.

If I still have an active Fatigue curse, I will continue opening doors until it runs out, or until I run out of doors, then take the exit. Otherwise, I will exit immediately. In terms of items found, I think that works out the same whether you exit as soon as you find the exit or fully explore the floor--you still open about the same number of doors per unit time, so if your answers are consistent, you find about the same amount of treasure regardless of which floor you're on. Where it gets complicated is the percentage of the treasure you get to keep, since it varies with the number of items you found.

If you find only 3 items on a floor, for example, you get to keep 33% of the treasure, but if you find 4, you only get 25%. When the number you keep jumps from 1 to 2, that ratio moves back in your favor, but I haven't checked to see when the jumps occur. As far as I know, though, the "keep" number caps at 3, so if you fully explore a floor and find 15 items, you only get to keep 20% of the treasure. That means you'd be worse off in terms of items obtained per door opened than if you'd rushed through with only 3 or 4 items.

If you have Fatigue, of course, that changes things, because the time spent opening more doors on the current level could not be used on doors on the next level. Also, every now and then, I will open a few extra "safe" doors, if I have them on the current level, to expire some of the more annoying curses.

A small triumph:

On floor 91, I made it through without taking a Curse of Fatigue at all; that's the first floor I've gotten through without one. (I triggered one, but it was the only curse I hit on the whole floor, and I was carrying an Apathy that blocked it.)

As I said last night: "I'm thinking these catacombs are indeed indefinite. :/ They go on through Moltara until they reach the other side of Neopia."

Assume the ceiling height in each floor is 10 feet. (Given that there are dragons living down there, that seems rather cramped, but let's go with it.) Further assume ~2 feet of stonework between floors, since they can evidently support considerable weight. (Again, dragons.) We know that it reaches a depth of at least 102 floors, so that's 1224 feet deep, or just under a quarter of a mile. Well below the depth of most mines on Earth, though there are a few that goes as far as 2000 ft. You could still breathe down on the 100th floor, but it would likely be getting hot, and it would require quite a ventilation system to support all those cultists (and dragons!).

The question is, when will the inevitable betrayal occur.

Suddenly, of course.

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50 with an hour wait means you'll probably have caught up to us by the time we get a go at it again :P

Alas, there was a doppelganger behind the very first door on the next level who had a 6-hour curse with my name (and presumably face) on it. I deliberately hit every curse I could for the rest of the level, on the off-chance of getting a Cleansing, but no dice.

What prizes are most valuable/sought after?

 

I already got 2 ghost kerchiefs keeping those, got 3 sporkle syrup and just donated them but looking at quick guide I think I made a mistake

It's hard to say at this point. The items from the catacombs are currently flooding the market, so the prices are dropping. In the long-term, consumable items will probably go back up more than durable items. That's why people tend to grab books as event prizes--the idea is that eventually, most of the books from the event will be used up, and prices will go back up.

I'm a little behind you guys, having just finished floor 50, but at least I've got a shorter wait--just a bit over an hour. Unrelated, but I also found a caprior on floor 50; it's not worth much, but it's the first new item I've seen in the treasure list for quite a while, so at least it broke up the monotony a bit.

I've caught glimpses of the monster on exiting 18 and 19. Now I'm waiting out the last couple of hours of a 6-hour Fatigue. I've noticed an increasing number of doppelgangers cropping up in previously safe choices, too. That seems to be the go-to for breaking a treasure encounter; I wonder if there's any significance to it. (Of course, I've recently starting bumping into tourists who break some of the safe choices, but not as many as the doppelgangers.)

I'll suppose I'll go with the Order this time; I have the avatars for the other two, though I'm not particularly obsessive about avatars.

Anyway, I think the way at how this time Tippens was in the background was probably because we might (or not, it's very unlikely)have to say who was 'staring' at us in order? So 1st is Kell and 2nd is Tippens.

 

I think it's the same order for everyone--at any rate, I have the same order as you. I have a sneaking suspicion that at some point, it will be Scarlet, but it's probably just because that's something I'd do.

As an original Scarlet supporter, I was seriously hoping that someone had just tampered with the food and it made her a monster because she ate more than the others, but it does currently have the appearance that she was a monster the whole time. :O

I suspect that what we're looking at is a use of "magician's choice", which is a misdirection technique that provides an illusion of choice for the audience. The classic example is for a magician to let a volunteer pick one of two cards. If the volunteer picks the one the magician wants them to have, he says, "Good, hold onto that one." If the volunteer picks the "wrong" card, the magician says, "Okay, we'll discard that one." So, no matter which card gets picked, the trick proceeds with the card the magician wanted.

In this case--assuming we collectively influenced the outcome with our cheering and booing, rather than the outcome being predetermined--it's possible that the winner didn't just happen to be the monster; Scarlet may have turned out to be the monster because she won.

I got the Seeker stuff last time, and I already had the Sway loot, so I guess I'll be going Brutes. I'm dubious about the Seekers' chances this time, anyway--they just won recently, and generally haven't been very popular outside of that.

Seekers--my original faction. It's looking favorable, but the leanings of the boards and forums reflect a fairly limited sample of the user base, so I'm making no assumptions.