DRX - Mirrored Embers - 0/16

G

That’s the full map for Chapter 2-3.
I think we do one small change in Chapter 4 and add one Weird Thing:tm: for Chapter 5.
As well as the usual thing of updating older rooms.

uh don’t worry much about making room stuff for the castle buildings
we can probably make most of that during the class trial

o7

have you figured out what Miscellaneous Objects (both useful and random) are in the rooms yet, or no

and if so is there a spreadsheet

no but that shouldn’t be too hard
misc objects good though

I’ll probably do that tommorrow, because you know
i probably shouldn’t keep literally sleeping through school due to insomnia

I mean

I can work on that

just, I didn’t want to do it if you already had

sure! the only thing i’d like to say is
i have two rooms on the current map which are storage
Senate Storage should probably contain more stationary-like items
whereas Library Storage should contain more historical items
anyway other than that mostly just put whatever you want in there

if you have any suggestions for a better thing one of those rooms could be i’d love to hear it, because i’m not particularly happy with having just… same name room but in different building

Building F
Rooms:
Waiting Room
Bank
Vault
Office

established puzzles:

additional puzzle

In the vault, you find gold bars stacked around three safes: a black safe, a white safe, and a grey safe.

[upon inspecting the safes] Each safe appears to have a four-digit combination lock, each digit of which is a number from 0 to 9.

[in the office] You find three scraps of paper held together with a paperclip: a white piece of paper with writing in black pen, a grey piece of paper with writing in dark blue pen, and a black piece of paper with writing in silver pen.

The white piece of paper says DEAD on it in blocky letters.

The grey piece of paper reads:

Have you ever thought about the importance of names, Timothy? I certainly have, from the moment I met my wife Waimarie for the first time to the moment we welcomed our son Oberon into the world. The former Prime Minister of Japan, Tsutomu Hata, was given a name meaning industriousness; can it be said, then, that his name predicted his future? Perhaps, but if so, we must also consider Rokusuke Ei to live on in perpetuity, and yet no one disputes that he died in the early 21st century. Would it be perhaps more fitting, then, to name him Ender, as the protagonist of Orson’s famous book? No, perhaps that’s too literal; perhaps something like Nikhil, whole or entire, would be more fitting for Ei. Still, I hope that with the birth of your daughter, you will consider what qualities you want her to emulate; I hear that virtue names are in vogue, and perhaps you might consider Serenity or Integrity for her, or if you wish to use one less obvious in our language, Xenia, for guest-friendship.

The black piece of paper reads:

一、二、三、_

一、一、二、三、五、_

六、二、八、_

六千五百六十一、八十一、九、_

solutions

This set of puzzles is calibrated to be relatively easy (albeit the three also intentionally range in difficulty)

Each piece of paper gives instructions on how to open the matching safe color

The first puzzle is very simple. The paper says DEAD, which corresponds to 4-5-1-4 as the combination.

For the second puzzle, the first letter of every name spells out two three one six (2316)

For the third puzzle, you first have to translate the numbers into Arabic numerals, which gives

1, 2, 3, _
1, 1, 2, 3, 5, _
6, 2, 8, _
6561, 81, 9, _

which translates to 4833


Waiting Room
The waiting room has two couches (one with a pink floral design, the other solid green), facing each other, with a rug in between them. In one corner of the room is a water cooler with a stack of paper cups. On the opposite end of the room is a counter with a clipboard and a small metal call bell.

Public Objects: Couches, rug, water cooler and cups, counter, clipboard, bell

Ringing the bell is necessary to move from the Waiting Room to the Bank. When the bell is rung, the doors to the Bank swing open; if someone tries to go to the Bank without ringing the bell, the doors appear to be locked.

The water cooler dispenses water, both hot and cold. No matter how much water is dispensed, the level of water in the cooler never changes.

If the pink floral couch is cut or ripped open, it contains a hunting knife.

Beneath the rug is a large net (Jane).

Bank

A queue rope and a sign reading PLEASE FORM A SINGLE FILE LINE mark out the area leading to what used to be the main atrium of the bank. The building itself is made from solid marble, a testament to the wealth of its creators. There appear to be three different sections of the counter, presumably so three bank tellers could do their job simultaneously.

Public Objects: Queue Rope

Left bank teller area: Cash register, blank notepad, pen with a flamingo on its cap. Inside the cash register is a screwdriver.

Middle bank teller area: Cash register, puzzle (see above, this is the one with the beads). Cash register is empty.

Right bank teller area: Cash register, blank notepad, pen shaped to look like Marie Curie’s head, seal keychain. Cash register is empty.

Office

A musty smell fills the air as you enter the office. It contains three desks: a larger and more ornate desk at the head of the room, with two smaller desks, identical save for the fact that the left one has a broken leg being propped up by a book. The surface of each desk is covered in various objects, and each desk has a drawer. On the right side of the room is a metal filing cabinet.

Public objects: fancy desk, normal desk (left, broken leg), normal desk (right), filing cabinet

Fancy desk: top of fancy desk contains clues to the vault puzzle, as well as an ornate hourglass. Drawer contains a bowl of peppermints and 50 pens.

Left desk (broken leg): top of desk has several photos of unfamiliar people [these are some of the researchers behind the infinite looping], as well as a framed certificate for extraordinary research achievements written out to someone named “Timoleon Silverheart” and signed in an illegible scrawl. The desk drawer has an unidentified clear liquid (attempts to identify it have Int% chance of succeeding, except by the Toxicologist, who autosucceeds; the liquid is an antidote to several common poisons, however consuming it will reduce your AP to 5 if it was above 5). The book propping up the desk describes a powerful magical text called the Codex Arcanum; however, the author of the book is skeptical that the Codex even exists, and dismisses the possibility as a rumor.

Right desk: The top of the desk has an antique typewriter. Inside the desk drawer is several reams of paper (this can be combined with the typewriter to produce typewritten documents that can’t be traced to any specific player with handwriting analysis)

Filing cabinet: The cabinet itself appears to be locked, and the outside of the cabinet has BLOOD written on it in what appears to be dried blood. Putting anyone’s blood (it doesn’t have to be a lot of blood, and it can be the blood of the person trying to open it) on the lock causes the cabinet to spring open magically. Inside is a typewritten note:

Subject appears to be extremely perseverant, even in the face of bodily risk. Regardless of preceding circumstances, they are often reluctant to give up. Additionally, their powers of [insert power of the first player to find the note, UNLESS that player is the Mastermind, in which case it uses a random players’ powers] can pose an issue, as occurred in the fortie [the remainder of the note is cut off]

note is intended to be a clue to the time loop, I’m not sure if it’s too obvious

Vault

Room description: In the vault, you find gold bars stacked around three safes: a white safe, a grey safe, and a black safe.

Safe answers are listed above

Inside the white safe: Gauntlets that give the wearer +5 strength while they are worn. Since they are an article of clothing, they don’t take up a private item slot.

Inside the grey safe: A suit of chainmail that gives the wearer +5 con while it is worn. Since it is an article of clothing, it doesn’t take up a private item slot.

Inside the black safe: A circlet that gives the wearer +5 luck while it is worn. Since it is an article of clothing, it doesn’t take up a private item slot.

Attempting to wear more than one of the safe items at a time nullifies the effects of all of them.

firstly, all of this is incredible work, but there’s uh one small problem
the vault has a password locked behind another puzzle:

I think the puzzle is really not that hard at all and you don’t even need all the pieces to solve it, but either:

  • we remove this puzzle because I never really liked it and yours are better
  • we make the +stat items give +15 to their stat instead of +5

seems sensible to me. sorry for not informing you of htis change when I made it, I’ve been somewhat out of sorts over the past few days and most of my attention has been occupied by white noise

other than that i have literally no problems all of this is really good

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oh right sorry for totally forgetting about this

what if we kept your puzzle (because it’s really cool), but just moved it to some other room? for instance, we could make your vault puzzle instead be a puzzle required to get into the storage room in the Library, and put some particularly juicy lore details in there

hm
but the final phase tells to look in THE CHAMBERS and the idea is that it points to the Feybrook Chambers of Commerce
i could change it easily though

like it’s not that much of a problem, just change it to something like “In Natural Arts” as the caeser-shifted message and it’s basically the same thing.

thinking with very slight hindsight that’s probably better
i’ll do that tommorrow

Building E

Rooms:

Reception
Hospital Ward
Experiment Room
Observatory

I forget if we have any puzzles for these rooms, if we do I can add them in

Reception

The Reception room is ringed with sixteen plastic chairs, with six chairs on the wall opposite the door to the outside and ten chairs on the wall with no doors. There are three coffee tables surrounding the rows of chairs; each coffee table has a lamp that seems to shine despite no external power source. Near the wall connected to the rest of the building, there is a reception desk. The walls have several motivational posters attached, with messages like “Hang in there!”

Public objects: chairs, coffee tables, desk, posters

If the lamps are inspected, it can be determined that they don’t have a cord, and don’t produce heat.

If the underside of the coffee table between the two rows of chairs is searched, a wooden stake can be found.

A search of the chairs reveals nothing unusual except that one of the chairs has a broken leg. If someone tries to sit on the broken chair, it will break further.

The reception desk has a circular glass mirror, as well as a coffee cup filled with miscellaneous types of pens and pencils.

Hospital Ward

The hospital ward contains eight different bed areas, divided from each other by thick white curtains. Each area has a bed covered in a white blanket, as well as a shelf area. In the back of the room, there is a rack of hospital gowns.

Public items: beds, blankets, hospital gowns [NOTE: the gowns come on metal hangers, which can be used as weapons], shelving, dividing curtains

(not to scale)

Room 1

The shelving unit in room 1 contains a bottle of pills with a label saying IBUPROFEN. As suggested by the label, they are in fact Ibuprofen. They’re basically useless, it’s really hard to OD on Ibuprofin.

Room 2

The shelving unit in room 2 contains a medical chart. The chart reads:

Patient appears to have tendonitis in the elbow as a result of repeated stresses leading to inflammation. Recommend that they reduce draw weight in the future so as to limit this stress.

(this is a soft-clear on the Archer)

The shelving unit in room 3 has a vial containing a clear liquid; it can be identified with an Int% chance roll, or automatically by the toxicologist. The liquid is a poison that kills after 24 hours; symptoms first appear after 16 hours, and after 23 hours the victim becomes unable to move (though if an antidote is force-fed to them they will be able to swallow it),

The shelving unit in room 4 is empty. However, searching underneath the blankets finds a crossbow (with no bolts)

The shelving unit in room 5 contains a straitjacket.

The shelving unit in room 6 contains an empty syringe.

The shelving unit in room 7 contains a bottle of pills. Each pill, if consumed, knocks the person who consumed it unconscious for 1 hour.

The shelving unit in room 8 contains a box of Legos and instructions for how to assemble them into a Lego Parisian Restaurant.

Experiment Room

The experiment room has four lab tables, each of which has a built-in sink and a cabinet underneath. Additionally, there are four cabinets full of different equipment. Each of the tables and cabinets is labelled with a number 1-4.

There is a discarded crossbow on the floor.

Each lab table, when searched, contains a manual balance with several different weights, a 100 mL volumetric flask, a 50 mL graduated cylinder, an evaporating dish, and four beakers of various sizes.

Lab Table 1 additionally contains a case of vials of different kinds of ink (taken by TL). The ink comes in six different colors: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple. Each type of ink has different properties, which can only be determined experimentally.

Red ink: The ink glows as if it were a candle for the next hour after applied.
Orange ink: The ink causes anyone reading it besides the original writer to experience blinding pain, which gives murder attempts against them for the next hour a +20% chance to succeed.
Yellow ink: The ink quickly fades to transparency. It can only be revealed by saying the word “reveal” out loud (when writing a message in the ink, you feel an overwhelming compulsion to say the word “reveal”).
Green ink: If applied to skin, the ink heals minor injuries.
Blue ink: Regardless of what one attempts to write, all words written with this ink will become the word “Repeated.”
Purple ink: When a message written in this ink is read by someone other than the writer, the paper the message is on will catch fire.

Lab table 2: In addition to the normal lab equipment, it contains several different types of dead plants. These can be combined in various ways to be determined to create different forms of potions.

Lab table 3: In addition to the normal lab equipment, it also contains a buret (taken by Trochi, smashed slightly) and a pH meter (taken by Derps).

Lab table 4: In addition to the normal lab equipment, it contains a Bunsen burner (I forget where this is right now but definitely not here) and a lighter (taken by TL).

Cabinet 1: Cabinet 1 contains a bottle with the label “Hydrochloric Elixir” and several racks of test tubes.

(this elixir functions equivalently to Hydrochloric Acid)

Cabinet 2: Cabinet 2 contains a leather belt pouch (Taken by Arctic), a barometer, and a device with the label “animometer.” (Taken by Jane)

The belt pouch gives whoever wears it an extra public item slot.

The animometer is marked with labels from 1 to 10. It can be brought from room to room. Any murder attempts that occurred in a room will increase the number by 1. A successful murder occurring it in a room will instead increase the number by 3. If there is a dead body in a room, it increases the number by 5 (this stacks with the other values). The minimum number is 1 and the maximum number is 10.

None of this information about how the animometer works is public.

Cabinet 3: Cabinet 3 contains the preserved remains of various animals, including frogs, starfish, and mice. It smells faintly of formaldehyde.

Cabinet 4: Cabinet 4 contains sixteen skulls (taken by Dat), each of which appears to have come from a different species of animal.

cat
hedgehog
deer
squirrel

badger
eagle
robin
iguana

snake
chinchilla
salamander
rat

swordfish
gerbil
[unidentifiable]
[unidentifiable]

(I tried to make the experiment room a cross between a kind of sucky chem lab and a room for supernatural experimentation)

Observatory

[not sure if you had anything in mind for this, I don’t want to interfere with your plans]

i don’t have any particular plans, so if you have any ideas go ahead

Observatory

The walls of the observatory are lined with an intricate brass staircase, spiralling up the room like an inverted fire escape. At the top is a dome and a metal grating, with a telescope standing at the center, visible even form the floor. Speaking of the floor, on the floor of the observatory there is a desk with a primitive-looking computer on it, a desk with a tray on it, and matching office chairs for both.

Public Items: None.

Desk (Tray): Tray contains 1000g of dust (In watering can), and is marked “Thaumdust”. Dust glows when it is in direct contact with a magic item. No other items.

Desk (Primitive-Looking Computer): Desk has a Newton’s Cradle on it, next to the computer. Computer’s screen shows the following:

**BLACK BOX**

Please enter password: []

Black Box is completely indestructible, and cannot be opened by any means.

A (strangely) typewritten post-it note attatched to the desk reads:

If you know the test number, enter it in words. If you do not, it will not be useful for you to know what's on that computer - Guardian Angel

Once the test number is entered (found out quite late in the game, this one is mostly meant to make people actually want to figure out lore details not directly concerning the mastermind), the black box instead shows the following information:

**BLACK BOX**

Welcome, researcher. When **BLACK BOX** was last activated [1] test ago, it recorded the following information:

~ Number of Stars: 000 ~
~ Number of Life Signs: 5 ~
~ Local Animetric Readings: 5 ~
~ Net Animetric Readings: 78 ~
~ Expected Test Result: Failure ~

[!] **BLACK BOX** records the following message from [7] tests ago. If this message seems vague, note that **BLACK BOX** has a character limit of 256 for emergency messages placed into it:

helo my name is joe and i am about to die. can you hear me me. if you can't you lost this one as well. that's okay. rules say it cant be them but i know it has to be because im dying and im drinking one last time so no pain and its all ending for everyone.

This is a clear for Josephine Farrierson, but it takes deduction to figure out that she’s talking about her Elixirs here in order to know they’re talking about her and not him, and that the person who killed her is the Mastermind. The test number should be revealed before the time loop, though, since this is also a clue towards that, and I think it’s a really cool one!


Staircase: There is a coat hanger near the bottom of the banister with a lab coat on it.

Telescope Layer: If you look through the telescope during the day, nothing special happens, but at night, receive the following information depending on the Chapter

Chapter 1: You look out and see the stars, glowing and twinkling in glorious fashion.
Chapter 2: You look out and see the stars, yet they seem a bit dimmer than they would normally.
Chapter 3: You look out and see the stars. There are patches where there are no stars and yet there should be.
Chapter 4: You see a sparesely populated sky, clear yet showing very few stars indeed.
Chapter 5: You see a lone star pricking a hole in an uncaring void.
Chapter 6: Where the stars should’ve been, you see nothing.

(This communicates that they exist in a pocket dimension, and is also really menacing)

Breaking apart the Telescope reveals that one of the tripod legs is concealing a sharpened skewer.

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