Sat May 13, 2006 9:52 pm
Maybe I should have mentioned this... when I solved it, my last three moves were:
Turn wheel to be crooked,
turn same wheel to be straight again,
turn same wheel to be crooked again,
win.
So, you see, it isn't a matter of going through each combination, because I already achieved the winning state once before without winning, if you understand me.
When I was doing it I just watched where the water was moving about. Has anyone actually shown that when all the switches and wheels are in the same state, the water is always in the same place? Maybe the perfect solution requires you to move things in a particular sequence, not find a particular state for9 all the switches and wheels to end up in.
I don't think it's random, because it seems a bit complicated to be random. I'd much rather believe it wasn't, as it's more fun to discuss that way. The ease with which you can win by doing things at random (and to those of you having trouble, you probably need to try being a bit more chaotic with your actions. Move things twice in a row! Move a wheel, then a lever, then the same wheel again!) is just making it difficult for us to work out a pattern. It's a shame we can't go back and play with it again after solving it. :/
Turn wheel to be crooked,
turn same wheel to be straight again,
turn same wheel to be crooked again,
win.
So, you see, it isn't a matter of going through each combination, because I already achieved the winning state once before without winning, if you understand me.
When I was doing it I just watched where the water was moving about. Has anyone actually shown that when all the switches and wheels are in the same state, the water is always in the same place? Maybe the perfect solution requires you to move things in a particular sequence, not find a particular state for9 all the switches and wheels to end up in.
I don't think it's random, because it seems a bit complicated to be random. I'd much rather believe it wasn't, as it's more fun to discuss that way. The ease with which you can win by doing things at random (and to those of you having trouble, you probably need to try being a bit more chaotic with your actions. Move things twice in a row! Move a wheel, then a lever, then the same wheel again!) is just making it difficult for us to work out a pattern. It's a shame we can't go back and play with it again after solving it. :/
Sat May 13, 2006 9:54 pm
Gondra wrote:I posted this on the last thread but everyone seemed to have gone to bed by then as i live in a different time zone to most and the theory didnt get much respons so I will repost.Someone on the Neoboards said there are 13 possible combinations (I know there are actually way more) that are the CORRECT combinations, and each person randomly gets given one of the 13 as the one they have to find.
This kinda makes sense because if it was completley random then you could possible be stuck there for days and days if not weeks trying to figure it out randomly as there are A LOT of combinations that can be used and u may (without even thinking about it) just be going over the same incorrect ones over and over again (ignoring the possible 13 correct ones)
Also there are 12 heros right? and someone said something about tehre being room for an extra person in the book? and also I assume that altador himself would not steal all the history etc. so there must be another person in the plot.. hence the 13th person.. 13 combinations.. 13th person may have casted a spell to make everyone forget tehy even existed too..
Its just a theory based on what the neoboards person said about there being 13 correct combinations for the water place.
In which case if everyone posted the combinations that worked for them, and the 13 correct combinations is a true theory.. we could then figure out what the 13 combinations are and anyone who has not yet figured it out can just go through the 13 combinations to find out which one is their correct one.
umm.. did that make any sense at all? sorry im real bad at explaining things.
and also as i said .. the"13th person thing is just a theory based on the 13 correct answers for the water pump station theory
Yes, that's what I think! Which would explain why certain combinations work for some people and other combos work for others. It's random which set of combinations you get, but that's the only random factor. It wouldn't make sense if all of it was TOTALLY random, that would be way too much to deal with...this is supposed to be a mini-plot after all...
Also I'm quite certain that in order for a combo to work you need to "reset" your rooms by "flooding" Altador (with the proven combination for flooding), and then try a combination from there...
Sat May 13, 2006 9:58 pm
polomoche wrote:Gondra wrote:I posted this on the last thread but everyone seemed to have gone to bed by then as i live in a different time zone to most and the theory didnt get much respons so I will repost.Someone on the Neoboards said there are 13 possible combinations (I know there are actually way more) that are the CORRECT combinations, and each person randomly gets given one of the 13 as the one they have to find.
This kinda makes sense because if it was completley random then you could possible be stuck there for days and days if not weeks trying to figure it out randomly as there are A LOT of combinations that can be used and u may (without even thinking about it) just be going over the same incorrect ones over and over again (ignoring the possible 13 correct ones)
Also there are 12 heros right? and someone said something about tehre being room for an extra person in the book? and also I assume that altador himself would not steal all the history etc. so there must be another person in the plot.. hence the 13th person.. 13 combinations.. 13th person may have casted a spell to make everyone forget tehy even existed too..
Its just a theory based on what the neoboards person said about there being 13 correct combinations for the water place.
In which case if everyone posted the combinations that worked for them, and the 13 correct combinations is a true theory.. we could then figure out what the 13 combinations are and anyone who has not yet figured it out can just go through the 13 combinations to find out which one is their correct one.
umm.. did that make any sense at all? sorry im real bad at explaining things.
and also as i said .. the"13th person thing is just a theory based on the 13 correct answers for the water pump station theory
Yes, that's what I think! Which would explain why certain combinations work for some people and other combos work for others. It's random which set of combinations you get, but that's the only random factor. It wouldn't make sense if all of it was TOTALLY random, that would be way too much to deal with...this is supposed to be a mini-plot after all...
Also I'm quite certain that in order for a combo to work you need to "reset" your rooms by "flooding" Altador (with the proven combination for flooding), and then try a combination from there...
Yea exactly, I think itd be too much to ahve the whole thing just completley random too, there must be sum sort of sequence and i think the idea of the 13 correct combinations is right, as you always see people post.. Hey your combo worked for me thanks! .. and ... nah that didnt work for me ... but 5 mins down the post another persons combo worked for them!
But alas, im far too lazy to go around collecting details of everyones winning combos to see if there are a true 13
Sat May 13, 2006 9:59 pm
On the subject of the water plant, I noticed that my solution was effectively the same as flooding the city. HOWEVER, one wheel was changed from the flooding.
When it flooded, my wheels/levers looked like this:
SS SSU UUU
When I got the correct solution, it was like this:
SS CSU UUU
I don't know if it's the same for everyone, but that's just me. I think the quickest way to solve the thing would be to flood the city, then change one wheel at a time and see if that works. If that doesn't do it, change another (and revert the other one back to what it was...make sure you do the second change BEFORE undoing the first change).
When it flooded, my wheels/levers looked like this:
SS SSU UUU
When I got the correct solution, it was like this:
SS CSU UUU
I don't know if it's the same for everyone, but that's just me. I think the quickest way to solve the thing would be to flood the city, then change one wheel at a time and see if that works. If that doesn't do it, change another (and revert the other one back to what it was...make sure you do the second change BEFORE undoing the first change).
Sat May 13, 2006 10:02 pm
Gondra wrote:polomoche wrote:Gondra wrote:I posted this on the last thread but everyone seemed to have gone to bed by then as i live in a different time zone to most and the theory didnt get much respons so I will repost.Someone on the Neoboards said there are 13 possible combinations (I know there are actually way more) that are the CORRECT combinations, and each person randomly gets given one of the 13 as the one they have to find.
This kinda makes sense because if it was completley random then you could possible be stuck there for days and days if not weeks trying to figure it out randomly as there are A LOT of combinations that can be used and u may (without even thinking about it) just be going over the same incorrect ones over and over again (ignoring the possible 13 correct ones)
Also there are 12 heros right? and someone said something about tehre being room for an extra person in the book? and also I assume that altador himself would not steal all the history etc. so there must be another person in the plot.. hence the 13th person.. 13 combinations.. 13th person may have casted a spell to make everyone forget tehy even existed too..
Its just a theory based on what the neoboards person said about there being 13 correct combinations for the water place.
In which case if everyone posted the combinations that worked for them, and the 13 correct combinations is a true theory.. we could then figure out what the 13 combinations are and anyone who has not yet figured it out can just go through the 13 combinations to find out which one is their correct one.
umm.. did that make any sense at all? sorry im real bad at explaining things.
and also as i said .. the"13th person thing is just a theory based on the 13 correct answers for the water pump station theory
Yes, that's what I think! Which would explain why certain combinations work for some people and other combos work for others. It's random which set of combinations you get, but that's the only random factor. It wouldn't make sense if all of it was TOTALLY random, that would be way too much to deal with...this is supposed to be a mini-plot after all...
Also I'm quite certain that in order for a combo to work you need to "reset" your rooms by "flooding" Altador (with the proven combination for flooding), and then try a combination from there...
Yea exactly, I think itd be too much to ahve the whole thing just completley random too, there must be sum sort of sequence and i think the idea of the 13 correct combinations is right, as you always see people post.. Hey your combo worked for me thanks! .. and ... nah that didnt work for me ... but 5 mins down the post another persons combo worked for them!
But alas, im far too lazy to go around collecting details of everyones winning combos to see if there are a true 13
we need the pics of the water plant of the people who hasnt fixed it yet. and thats way to complicated...
they would have to try every combination we have been putting here..
Sat May 13, 2006 10:06 pm
polomoche wrote:Yes, that's what I think! Which would explain why certain combinations work for some people and other combos work for others. It's random which set of combinations you get, but that's the only random factor. It wouldn't make sense if all of it was TOTALLY random, that would be way too much to deal with...this is supposed to be a mini-plot after all...
Also I'm quite certain that in order for a combo to work you need to "reset" your rooms by "flooding" Altador (with the proven combination for flooding), and then try a combination from there...
I have to disagree with this. If it were true then people trying every possible combination would always succeed, but I know that I tried every possible combination 3 times without success, but then tried randomly and got it almost straight away. There has to be a random factor in there somewhere.
It was the same in the LDP, the layout of the temple rooms, and the contents of the rooms was mostly random - some lucky people hit the right rooms immediately, other took days to find them
(still fuming at that!).
Sat May 13, 2006 10:07 pm
It took awhile but I finally got it done 
At the beginning I thought I would never find the sequence, that was a little frustrating 
At the beginning I thought I would never find the sequence, that was a little frustrating
Sat May 13, 2006 10:07 pm
Gondra wrote:Yea exactly, I think itd be too much to ahve the whole thing just completley random too, there must be sum sort of sequence and i think the idea of the 13 correct combinations is right, as you always see people post.. Hey your combo worked for me thanks! .. and ... nah that didnt work for me ... but 5 mins down the post another persons combo worked for them!
But alas, im far too lazy to go around collecting details of everyones winning combos to see if there are a true 13
As time goes on and more people post their winning combinations, patterns should emerge and we'll be able to make sense of it eventually, without someone trying to go around collecting all that data...well, I hope so any way
Sat May 13, 2006 10:25 pm
Is anyone collecting the water puzzle data? I happened upon my combination by accident, and on my first real try (the first thing I did was flood the city, just because it sounded funny ).
So my winning combo is ++ ++U UDD. I can't remember what I started with, but I know that I flooded the city, and went back and repeated the exact same thing, except I changed the very last switch to down before finishing, and I got it.
For some reason, I'm thinking that my last set was was set to UUD for flooding, but I've got a bad memory, so I could be wrong.
).
So my winning combo is ++ ++U UDD. I can't remember what I started with, but I know that I flooded the city, and went back and repeated the exact same thing, except I changed the very last switch to down before finishing, and I got it.
For some reason, I'm thinking that my last set was was set to UUD for flooding, but I've got a bad memory, so I could be wrong.
Sat May 13, 2006 10:31 pm
I figured out a pattern! Well actually I'm halfway there but its consistantly working... I also have figured out why when people try all combinations that it doesn't work. I've been taking note of the positions of the water and the valves/levers (which I will refer to with the generic term "switches") and have found a lot of repeats when they're moved in the same place. Unfortunately, now I'm short of time but I'll explain my methology and conclusions so perhaps you guys can continue in my path that has so far proved to be promising.
My method:
1) Take a screenshot of all rooms.
2) Enter a room.
3) I would change the switches systematically in one room, trying every combinations until either something happened or I've exhausted all of the combinations.
4) If something happened I would immediately take a screenshot of all rooms again, compare changes, record them and repeat in a new room. If nothing happen I would move all switches to exactly how they were before I tampered with that room and would repeat this in the next room.
Raw Data (up to this point):
http://esnips.com/doc/52b56475-99d2-47a ... puzzle.zip
How to read my data:
The file name is a description of the room number (that's in the url) as designated by "r#" r1 = room 1 for example.
It will then be followed by 2 or 3 letters which describe the postion of the corresponding valvues/levers. Valves are noted by p for "plus sign" and x for "x position" while levers are noted by u (for up) and d (for down).
The insides some files contain more information. Intially, when I began, I only took screenies of that room and that was all but eventually I began circling changes in each room with red to note changes. Towards the end, I began to take screenies of the other rooms and put a small versions of them in green boxes and noted changes in them too.
Speculations/conclusions thus far:
Some files will have an extra number in the end of the file name. This would be because some switch combos had different water positions; however, even so there were overlaps. When I discovered this I began to put the other rooms in green boxes because it seems as though the variation could be accounted for by influence from the other rooms.
Overall, I consistently found that certain positions of the switches would reroute water a simular way. It seems that the positions designate where water is allowed and if all three rooms allow water in the same spots then water would appear there. That would also explain why sometimes we see no change... because two positions in the same room both allow water to be there so the effect is null or the places of another room block the places in the current room. So the way to solve, after no changes are found, is to change it to exactly how it was before as to eliminate confusion by changing only one room at a time. I so want to solve this but I got to go very soon...
What you can do with my data:
See if the positions would do simular things as the examples I've provided. There are likely many other position combinations that I haven't had time to find yet so keep following atleast for several stepsand say if you observe simular changes.
My method:
1) Take a screenshot of all rooms.
2) Enter a room.
3) I would change the switches systematically in one room, trying every combinations until either something happened or I've exhausted all of the combinations.
4) If something happened I would immediately take a screenshot of all rooms again, compare changes, record them and repeat in a new room. If nothing happen I would move all switches to exactly how they were before I tampered with that room and would repeat this in the next room.
Raw Data (up to this point):
http://esnips.com/doc/52b56475-99d2-47a ... puzzle.zip
How to read my data:
The file name is a description of the room number (that's in the url) as designated by "r#" r1 = room 1 for example.
It will then be followed by 2 or 3 letters which describe the postion of the corresponding valvues/levers. Valves are noted by p for "plus sign" and x for "x position" while levers are noted by u (for up) and d (for down).
The insides some files contain more information. Intially, when I began, I only took screenies of that room and that was all but eventually I began circling changes in each room with red to note changes. Towards the end, I began to take screenies of the other rooms and put a small versions of them in green boxes and noted changes in them too.
Speculations/conclusions thus far:
Some files will have an extra number in the end of the file name. This would be because some switch combos had different water positions; however, even so there were overlaps. When I discovered this I began to put the other rooms in green boxes because it seems as though the variation could be accounted for by influence from the other rooms.
Overall, I consistently found that certain positions of the switches would reroute water a simular way. It seems that the positions designate where water is allowed and if all three rooms allow water in the same spots then water would appear there. That would also explain why sometimes we see no change... because two positions in the same room both allow water to be there so the effect is null or the places of another room block the places in the current room. So the way to solve, after no changes are found, is to change it to exactly how it was before as to eliminate confusion by changing only one room at a time. I so want to solve this but I got to go very soon...
What you can do with my data:
See if the positions would do simular things as the examples I've provided. There are likely many other position combinations that I haven't had time to find yet so keep following atleast for several stepsand say if you observe simular changes.
Last edited by professorelite on Sat May 13, 2006 10:35 pm, edited 2 times in total.
Sat May 13, 2006 10:34 pm
Simple curiosity, I did not flood the city before achieving the right combinaison (and now I did, they wont let me play with it anymore ) What exactly flooding was doing?? did we see tha flooded city? Anyone have a screenie? (it remembers me of a wild theorie back when the plot was just starting, not in this forum, someone speculated that altador was sinking based on the northern part of the city (in upper left corner), where there is a thin blue line at the base of each building (and there's water everywhere in the city, thinking of that )) Well, that's nothing really usefull to the thead, but as I did not do it, I would like to know what all this flooding thing was! (And I'm still OBSESSED with brackets...)
) What exactly flooding was doing?? did we see tha flooded city? Anyone have a screenie? (it remembers me of a wild theorie back when the plot was just starting, not in this forum, someone speculated that altador was sinking based on the northern part of the city (in upper left corner), where there is a thin blue line at the base of each building (and there's water everywhere in the city, thinking of that )) Well, that's nothing really usefull to the thead, but as I did not do it, I would like to know what all this flooding thing was! (And I'm still OBSESSED with brackets...)
Sat May 13, 2006 10:35 pm
for some reason i cant get the door to the water plant to open, i did all the steps, i went to the plant, then the quarry, then the animal thing, then the farm, then the plant and it didnt work... can anyone tell me why?
Sat May 13, 2006 10:36 pm
Fizzy wrote:Is anyone collecting the water puzzle data? I happened upon my combination by accident, and on my first real try (the first thing I did was flood the city, just because it sounded funny
So my winning combo is ++ ++U UDD. I can't remember what I started with, but I know that I flooded the city, and went back and repeated the exact same thing, except I changed the very last switch to down before finishing, and I got it.
For some reason, I'm thinking that my last set was was set to UUD for flooding, but I've got a bad memory, so I could be wrong.
Looking like the winning combo for a lot of people is this: first two rooms are ++, ++U, and the 3rd room is any combination of levers. Looks like we're on to something here...at least for a certain set of people.
Sat May 13, 2006 10:40 pm
squeaky0032 wrote:for some reason i cant get the door to the water plant to open, i did all the steps, i went to the plant, then the quarry, then the animal thing, then the farm, then the plant and it didnt work... can anyone tell me why?
Was the same for me, I finally unlock it simply by refreshing the plant page.
Just noticed I pass the 50 posts line!!! Yeah!!!
Last edited by moihaha on Sat May 13, 2006 10:42 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Sat May 13, 2006 10:40 pm
shapu wrote:On the subject of the water plant, I noticed that my solution was effectively the same as flooding the city. HOWEVER, one wheel was changed from the flooding.
When it flooded, my wheels/levers looked like this:
SS SSU UUU
When I got the correct solution, it was like this:
SS CSU UUU
I don't know if it's the same for everyone, but that's just me. I think the quickest way to solve the thing would be to flood the city, then change one wheel at a time and see if that works. If that doesn't do it, change another (and revert the other one back to what it was...make sure you do the second change BEFORE undoing the first change).
That situation was exactly what happened to me. It could play a part, who knows. I also used SS SSU UUU to flood the city, but changed one of the levers in the third room.