The Mystery of the Amulets

LiteS · 2015-05-19 02:15:07

When asked who's the missing demon on said list of 13, one of my into-the-occult friends casually said "Probably Azazel, and Lucifer is not a demon but a fallen angel."
Azazel Sigil
Azazel Demon Wiki

Cobblestone · 2015-05-26 22:33:09

Slightly off topic, but I found this article which mentions the research and digging we've done in this thread!
http://boingboing.net/2015/05/19/cordial-minuet.html

shotgun · 2015-05-26 22:57:16

i'm pretty excited to see what's going on on the back of the amulets!!

Cobblestone · 2015-05-26 23:26:58

Yes! Please share a photo of it!! We have to unravel the mystery of the 13th amulet!

Dan_Dan84 · 2015-05-27 03:43:49

Thanks for sharing that article. It was a nice read.

I wonder what the STEAL REAL MONEY contest had that the WIN REAL GOLD contest didn't have. My guess is it was the controversy around the idea of people building lethal traps to protect their families, while then entering other people's houses and smashing open somebody's virtual wife's head with a crowbar. Some of the game designer's statements on the topic of family defense (and how they were framed in the media) probably also grabbed some people's attention, too.

Then again, gambling is also controversial (especially when framed as something skill-based), but perhaps it doesn't have quite as much of the broad emotional resonance as vicious pit bulls.

.. · 2015-05-27 05:55:06

Nice article. Now I wonder what interesting patterns, sigils or otherwise, that one can derive from the magic squares. (Interactive webpage?)

What didn't it have that Steal Real Money did? Well, going viral is largely a matter of luck. One publication writes about it because they saw it in another. And a small difference of a few percent in the number of people who pass on word of something can easily make a difference between reaching 1000 or one million people. I see there's finally one nice CM video on Youtube (in German). It's a very thorough tutorial for the game and he shows off some bluffing, but doesn't explain his thought process for picking columns at all. Naturally the only person to comment says they don't have a credit card.

Last edited by .. (2015-05-27 08:20:08)

Cobblestone · 2015-05-27 07:05:20

Ya, that was one of the better articles. I was really happy to find it! It's too bad really that it was posted after the contest had already ended.

This may be the subject of discussion for another thread, but to touch on the relative lack of media attention during the contest: what made me aware of the game originally was Kotaku. Unfortunately, I think Nate's story may have stolen the thunder of the launch contest. By the time of the contest, they'd already written two articles about CM. While "Win REAL GOLD!" is an awesome headline, it's definitely not as click-baity as "guy wins $6000 from a millionaire". This might be why Kotaku's "article" on the launch contest amounted to nothing more than a hand wave. From their perspective, they'd already covered the game and its more interesting story.

Anyway, back to ~THE MYSTERY OF THE AMULETS~

.. wrote:

Nice article. Now I wonder what interesting patterns, sigils or otherwise, that one can derive from the magic squares. (Interactive webpage?)

I thought about this too while reading the article! I'm not sure quite how to figure out the order of the numbers since each pair is selected simultaneously, but after that it's a simple matter of converting the numbers to Hebrew and connecting the dots, right?

.. · 2015-05-27 08:38:50

But which magic squares should be used? There seem to be specific magic squares (not just dimension of square) associated with each planet, and I imagine no one knows how they were originally arrived at. Here's an extensive example:
http://omega-magick.blogspot.co.nz/2012 … uares.html
But for sigils of demons and for other purposes, how should the magic square be chosen? There are all kinds of other properties they may have.

Last edited by .. (2015-05-27 08:41:44)

jasonrohrer · 2015-05-27 14:57:33

Yes, it was too bad that $6000 article ran before the game launched.

We got close to as many active players that day as we did during the peak of the contest, and the game wasn't even open to the public yet. In other words, that many people solved the anagram puzzle to get into the game after reading the $6000 Kotaku article!

Imagine if the game had actually been open to the public that day...

Cobblestone · 2015-05-27 17:29:07

.. wrote:

But which magic squares should be used? There seem to be specific magic squares (not just dimension of square) associated with each planet, and I imagine no one knows how they were originally arrived at. Here's an extensive example:
http://omega-magick.blogspot.co.nz/2012 … uares.html
But for sigils of demons and for other purposes, how should the magic square be chosen? There are all kinds of other properties they may have.

That website is a great find! I was only able to skim it right now, but I'll give it a more thorough read when I get a chance.

Choosing a CM magic square to use may seem impossible, but I think you might already know which one to try first...

jasonrohrer wrote:

Yes, it was too bad that $6000 article ran before the game launched.
We got close to as many active players that day as we did during the peak of the contest, and the game wasn't even open to the public yet. In other words, that many people solved the anagram puzzle to get into the game after reading the $6000 Kotaku article!
Imagine if the game had actually been open to the public that day...

I'll admit that I was one of those. I read the first article on the game and told myself to try it out, but it wasn't until the $6000 article where I finally got myself to sit down and give it a shot. Although, the first Google search suggestion for CM is still "Cordial Minuet password" and someone in the comments on the article posted the anagram anyway, so I wouldn't kick yourself too much, since you could've probably considered it pretty close to public by that point!

Last edited by Cobblestone (2015-05-27 17:29:29)

LiteS · 2015-05-27 19:00:30

Cobblestone wrote:

Choosing a CM magic square to use may seem impossible, but I think you might already know which one to try first...

If there is one magic square for us to use to decode something, I'd guess this one.

Cobblestone · 2015-05-27 19:39:14

That is the perfect starting point! Hm, and the file is even called amulet.jpg...

Cobblestone · 2015-06-04 19:51:31

To anyone receiving an amulet, please post a photo of the back to this thread!

shotgun · 2015-06-12 19:22:19

three letters and a symbol
gonna need cooperation from like 9 or 10 more people to get anywhere with this....!

Defiant00 · 2015-06-12 20:35:16

We need pictures, shotgun!

Discordant Mind · 2015-06-14 02:32:29

My amulet arrived in the mail today (thank you, Jason)!

This is the copper amulet from day 2.

I : C
infinity : D

Or something to that effect...

Happy speculating,
immunity car

Last edited by Discordant Mind (2015-06-14 02:46:27)

card · 2015-06-14 04:35:09

So it could just be a simple alphabetic cipher. I wonder what for?

Ink Disparity · 2015-06-14 04:52:17

Discordant, while that looks remarkably like an infinity symbol, the ancient description of infinity is a snake eating itself and as such is almost always pictured with a curvature. The symbol in question looks remarkably like a Nordic rune Dagaz; letter for "d". Hope this helps in any way.

.. · 2015-06-14 17:44:38

Immunity : Car
⋈ind : Discordant

Discordant Mind · 2015-06-14 19:15:54

It does seem likely to be a cipher of sorts; this is the second amulet in the series and it contains the letters C and D, which would be consistent with that idea. Thus, now I think the first symbol is likely a 1, not an I. Of course, if this is only a simple alphabetic cipher, there are only 12 amulets, which would leave us two letters short...

card · 2015-06-15 01:40:05

Discordant Mind wrote:

It does seem likely to be a cipher of sorts; this is the second amulet in the series and it contains the letters C and D, which would be consistent with that idea. Thus, now I think the first symbol is likely a 1, not an I. Of course, if this is only a simple alphabetic cipher, there are only 12 amulets, which would leave us two letters short...

I suspect the silver and/or gold amulets have more than 2 characters. Also maybe the first symbol is just a vertical line, not tied to either I or 1. Any ideas on what the cipher is for?

shotgun · 2015-06-15 05:07:41

.. · 2015-06-15 09:11:51

26 letters are excessive. Many ciphers both recent and more historical use fewer letters for English. For example the Playfair cipher used in WW1 had 25 letters to fit a 5x5 grid. Many historical ciphers both added and removed letters. You can see on that second amulet that J has been omitted, which is normal.
As another example, the cipher used in Book III of Trithemius' Steganographia (supposedly the first book on cryptography; Book III is disguised as a book on magic and demonology), which I was reading about recently, took a 23 letter Latin alphabet, dropped one letter, then added 3 for German sequences like sch, ending at 25 codes.

claspa · 2015-06-15 19:20:04

This .. guy knows how to entertain, or what? Great stuff

AnoHito · 2015-06-15 21:57:06

A simple substitution cypher isn't very hard to break... In cases with a sufficiently long message, you usually don't even need a hint to break it. I wonder if there isn't more to this then meets the eye. In the first place, we don't really have a message to decode yet, do we?

CORDIAL MINUET ENSEMBLE

#26 2015-05-19 02:15:07

Re: The Mystery of the Amulets

#27 2015-05-26 22:33:09

Re: The Mystery of the Amulets

#28 2015-05-26 22:57:16

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#29 2015-05-26 23:26:58

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#30 2015-05-27 03:43:49

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#31 2015-05-27 05:55:06

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#32 2015-05-27 07:05:20

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#33 2015-05-27 08:38:50

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#34 2015-05-27 14:57:33

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#35 2015-05-27 17:29:07

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#36 2015-05-27 19:00:30

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#37 2015-05-27 19:39:14

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#38 2015-06-04 19:51:31

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#39 2015-06-12 19:22:19

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#40 2015-06-12 20:35:16

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#41 2015-06-14 02:32:29

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#42 2015-06-14 04:35:09

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#43 2015-06-14 04:52:17

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#44 2015-06-14 17:44:38

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#45 2015-06-14 19:15:54

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#46 2015-06-15 01:40:05

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#47 2015-06-15 05:07:41

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#48 2015-06-15 09:11:51

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#49 2015-06-15 19:20:04

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#50 2015-06-15 21:57:06

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