THE VAULT

THE VAULT
Active since 2018-10-31
Doc created a game ... The first hero to beat it will get to loot his private VAULT valued at $10,000 real dollars. 10,000 BONES. 10,000 BIG BOIS.
Type	Unofficial
Creator	Stash
Discovered	2018-10-31

Main Page > List of Investigations > THE VAULT

The Vault is an online Alternate Reality Game involving code-breaking, real-world exploration, cryptography, and collaboration among solvers. It involves a fictional cast of characters, including the villainous Doc and helpful Dampé. The game began on October 31, 2018 and gameplay has centered around the discord server located here: https://discord.gg/vault. Stash, the creator of the ARG, is an active participant in the Discord Chat and occasionally posts hints, clues, feedback to direct the fellowship.

The first Vault ran from late 2017-spring 2018 and awarded a $5,000 grand prize to the person that solved the final puzzle.

Plot

Our friend Dampé needs our help. His ship was attacked and crashed into the surface of Io, Jupiter's fourth-largest moon. We need to land and investigate, but the moon is enveloped by a force shield created by our nemesis Doc. Doc is currently campaigning to be Galactic Mayor and is attempting to rig the election by getting 100,000,000 votes. The number of votes is tied to lowering the shield.

More detailed information regarding progress to date can be found at the working summary here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1mZMp7aTngtYUYOCtBX4riEagNnRAaR9T1e4NQHMjkOE/edit#

We will continue to try to port over as much information as possible from that master document to this site as time allows. For now, please review the summary above and join the discord server to participate.

Riddles

Chapter One

GPS Coordinates

On Oct. 31, 2018, the Heroes received the following transmission from Doc in Discord, announcing his campaign for Galactic Mayor:

Greetings Earthlings... I am Doc! Yes, yes. The one and only. The time has come to campaign for me for Galactic Mayor in the upcoming election. I know you’re eager to work your tail off. So let’s get to work. Get out there and grab your campaign materials… Say you're there for “Mayor Doc”!
Vote for doc. All for one.

The 23 GPS coordinates in the image corresponded to FedEx Offices around the United States. Heroes retrieved online print orders under the name “Mayor Doc” from the FedEx Offices.

Volunteer Center Message

The campaign materials contained two pages with four clues: (1) the Vote for Doc campaign website, (2) the volunteer center number, (3) a phone number on the envelope of the print order, and (4) the “Spread the news” riddle. The Vote for Doc website included the same list of FedEx Office locations, corresponding to the GPS coordinates in the transmission image, but with the addition of a FedEx Office in Bellevue, WA. The website included the following message:

GOT DOC FEVER? VOLUNTEER TODAY!
Zip on over to your nearest Satellite Office (🛰🏢), for your Vote For Doc campaign materials.
Say you’re there for Mayor Doc. Zoom! Express yourself!

Each location contained nearly identical campaign materials. Each were labeled with a unique Volunteer Center number. Heroes retrieved 10 of the packets and were able to call the remaining FedEx Offices, asking them to read off the numbers.

GPS Coordinates	FedEx Location	Center #
33.83407° N, -117.91384° W	130 W Center Street Promenade, Anaheim, CA 92805	H1
33.75684° N, -84.38892° W	100 Peachtree Street, Atlanta, GA 30308	!4
30.37665° N, -97.72618° W	9222 Burnet Rd, Austin, TX 78758	41
45.48707° N, -122.79755° W	11693 SW Beaverton Hillsdale Hwy H, Beaverton, OR 97005	N
MISSING FROM IMAGE	40 Bellevue Way NE, Bellevue, WA 98004	D7
42.34855° N, -71.07636° W	375 Columbus Ave, Boston, MA 02116	43
32.78538° N, -79.93809° W	73 St Philip St, Charleston, SC 29403	1
41.91076° N, -87.67302° W	1800 W North Ave, Chicago, IL 60622	NV
32.78192° N, -96.80497° W	902 Ross Ave, Dallas, TX 75202	17
39.71891° N, -104.95216° W	160 Milwaukee St, Denver, CO 80206	47
46.86106° N, -96.83323° W	3302 13th Ave S, Fargo, ND 58103	10
29.73176° N, -95.41350° W	2200 Southwest Fwy, Houston, TX 77098	N
32.86947° N, -117.23173° W	8849 Villa La Jolla Dr, La Jolla, CA 92037	F
36.11600° N, -115.15487° W	395 Hughes Center Dr, Las Vegas, NV 89169	1N
34.09687° N, -118.32629° W	1440 Vine St, Los Angeles, CA 90028	D
43.05329° N, -87.89221° W	1703 N Farwell Ave, Milwaukee, WI 53202	44
44.94860° N, -93.29913° W	1430 W Lake St, Minneapolis, MN 55408	3
29.94601°N, -90.07152° W	762 St Charles Ave, New Orleans, LA 70130	4
40.75320° N, -73.98932° W	500 7th Ave, New York, NY 10018	31
28.54593° N, -81.37774° W	47 E Robinson St, Orlando, FL 32801	P
30.48252° N, -87.21147° W	1520 Airport Blvd, Pensacola, FL 32504	PL
39.95215° N, -75.16616° W	1500 Market St, Philadelphia, PA 19102	34
35.86263° N, -78.71084° W	6820 Glenwood Ave, Raleigh, NC 27612	S3
37.79400° N, -122.39800° W	100 California St, San Francisco, CA 94111	!

The Volunteer Center numbers, when assembled in the order of the GPS coordinates, spelled out the following list of numbers and letters: H1!441ND7431NV174710NF1ND443431PPL34S3!

Translated as leetspeak, the clue read: Hi! Mind the invitation, find me help please!

“Spread the news” Riddle

The campaign materials also included the following riddle:

Spread the news--tell your friends!
Electing Doc is your ultimate end?
But to play, you must append
The path below with a card for friends.

/docs________

“You must append the path below” referred to adding a path to the URL of the Vote for Doc website using the "/docs_______" and "a card for friends" (also known as an “invitation”). Therefore, the Heroes found: https://votefordoc.com/docsinvitation which contains a video from Doc.

Note: As of Nov. 20, 2018, the FedEx locations moved to https://votefordoc.com/invitation.

The Doc’s Invitation video is a reference to Anorak’s Invitation video from Ready Player One.

001 DocLetter Packet

On Nov. 06, 2018, the Heroes received another transmission from Doc, announcing 28 new FedEx Office locations and more materials at all locations. The new locations were notified to not reveal information over the phone. The transmission was:

Hello once again Earthlings! It's your favorite space doctor and pirate, back again. It's Doc! ARG! 

Your elections may end today, but mine's just getting cranking. The treacle-like outpouring of support has been...treacle-like. But I really love the dedication of the group massing outside the Io shield. I can hear you chanting! DOC! DOC! DOC!

I've sent out 🆕 campaign materials for you. Get out there my campaign heroes, and get me votes from anyone who cares about the galaxy! DOC! DOC! DOC! Details on my super site.

Vote for Doc. All for one.

https://votefordoc.com/

Note: As of Nov. 20, 2018, the FedEx locations moved to https://votefordoc.com/campaignoffices.

The Heroes collected 38 out of the 52 packets (Folder of retrieved 001 DocLetter packets.). The 001 DocLetter packet contained 3 pages. Each packet contained a unique recipe for “Fungus Pulmenti Turtur” on page 2 and one of the four floors of a Roman Maze on page 3.

Recipes

Each recipe for “Fungus Pulmenti Turtur” had different ingredient values, with the fourth step in the instructions either being “Cook” (in English) or “Coquere” (in Latin). Spreadsheet of all the retrieved recipes.

The Heroes followed the recipe instructions of “Trim your mushrooms. Halve your buds. Mix it all together.” to create the following equation: Value = T + W - M + B + D/2 + L, where “Trim your mushrooms” meant subtracting the mushroom amount and “Halve your buds” meant dividing the dionaea muscipula buds amount by two.

These recipe values matched the values of the decimal and roman numerals found in the Roman Maze path.

Path of the Roman Maze

Each third page of the 001 DocLetter packet contained one of the four floors of a Roman Maze. The floor was determined by the icon in the top right corner of the page. Each were connected with up and down staircases throughout the maze. The Heroes found the path from the entrance on Floor 1 (bottom) to the exit on Floor 4 (top). Digital version of the Roman Maze in a spreadsheet.

The path contained a mixture of binary, decimal, and Roman numerals (from Bottom to Top):

1000111CXLVII0010CLIII0110CCLXXVI0101CCVIII0110LXXVIII1101620110LXXXVI0101CX01101691101CDLXXIV0110DXXXII00101210110CXXIII0101CLX01111690010CDLXXIV0101DXX1111CXVIII0111LXXVII0011LXVII0110LXXXII10001240110CIII0001CDXL01113510010LXXIV0110CCXL1001DCCCXLVII0110CLVII1110LXXXI0110660111LXXXVIII0101LXXVIII1111770110XCIII1001CXIX01111060011750101LXXXIX1111CXII0110CXLII0011XCVI0110LXXVII0001900111CXXVII0010LXXVIII0110LXXVIII10011340110LXXIX1110LXIX0110LXXIX0111

100 0111 CXLVII 0010 CLIII 0110 CCLXXVI 0101 CCVIII 0110 LXXVIII 1101 62 0110 LXXXVI 0101 CX 0110 169 1101 CDLXXIV 0110 DXXXII 0010 121 0110 CXXIII 0101 CLX 0111 169 0010 CDLXXIV 0101 DXX 1111 CXVIII 0111 LXXVII 0011 LXVII 0110 LXXXII 1000 124 0110 CIII 0001 CDXL 0111 351 0010 LXXIV 0110 CCXL 1001 DCCCXLVII 0110 CLVII 1110 LXXXI 0110 66 0111 LXXXVIII 0101 LXXVIII 1111 77 0110 XCIII 1001 CXIX 0111 106 0011 75 0101 LXXXIX 1111 CXII 0110 CXLII 0011 XCVI 0110 LXXVII 0001 90 0111 CXXVII 0010 LXXVIII 0110 LXXVIII 1001 134 0110 LXXIX 1110 LXIX 0110 LXXIX 0111

Dampé Webmaster

Using Clue: 380775826821002000, the Heroes found the hint that “MAZES FOLLOW THE PATH”. The Heroes added the full path of the Roman Maze as the URL path to the Vote for Doc website and it resulted in: https://votefordoc.com/1000111CXLVII0010CLIII0110CCLXXVI0101CCVIII0110LXXVIII1101620110LXXXVI0101CX01101691101CDLXXIV0110DXXXII00101210110CXXIII0101CLX01111690010CDLXXIV0101DXX1111CXVIII0111LXXVII0011LXVII0110LXXXII10001240110CIII0001CDXL01113510010LXXIV0110CCXL1001DCCCXLVII0110CLVII1110LXXXI0110660111LXXXVIII0101LXXVIII1111770110XCIII1001CXIX01111060011750101LXXXIX1111CXII0110CXLII0011XCVI0110LXXVII0001900111CXXVII0010LXXVIII0110LXXVIII10011340110LXXIX1110LXIX0110LXXIX0111

You’ve found my lost page. Doc is hard to shake. He is forcing me to help rig the election. I’m a good guy. Help. Find the instructions that don’t match the maze. Then you can find my letters. Ask for me by name.
-Dampé Webmaster
Thank you Heroes.

This message from Dampé meant that he sent online print orders at the FedEx locations where the English/Latin word of “Cook”/“Coquere” of the fourth step of the recipe did not match with how the number was expressed in the Roman Maze path (in decimal or Roman numerals). This assumed that “Cook” (English) matched with decimal numbers and “Coquere” (Latin) matched with Roman numerals.

The Heroes collected seven of the ten letters and found four more clues, as seen in the table below. Scans of Dampé Webmaster letters.

Location	Message	#
Anaheim, CA	“I SENT 5 LETTERS TO 10 LOCATIONS IN CASE OF WATCHFUL EYES. UNTO YOU IS CHARGED THE GREAT TASK OF KEEPING THE PURITY OF TIME.”	N/A
Beaverton, OR	“ONE IS THE ROMAN CONFLICT RESOLVED”	1
Boston, MA	“ONE IS THE CODE CRUNCHED IN BE-TWEEN”	0
Madison, WI	“ONE IS THE INGREDI-ENTS COOKED TO PER-FECTION”	5
Pensacola, FL
Phoenix, AZ	“I SENT 5 LETTERS TO 10 LOCA-TIONS IN CASE OF WATCHFUL EYES. UNTO YOU IS CHARGED THE GREAT TASK OF KEEPING THE PURITY OF TIME.”	N/A
Providence, RI
Raleigh, NC
San Francisco, CA	“ONE IS THE CODE SLIMMED TO MAKE SENSE”	7
San Jose, CA	“ONE IS THE INGREDI-ENTS COOKED TO PER-FECTION”	5

Each clue pointed to new URL paths which contained pieces of a new Roman Maze. “THE CODE CRUNCHED IN BETWEEN” pointed to isolating the binary from the Roman Maze. “THE ROMAN CONFLICT” pointed to fixing the mismatched values from the 10 locations using the correct number system based on the fourth step of the recipe. (The Heroes were missing some of the 001 DocLetter packet but were able to backwards solve and brute force the missing locations.) “INGREDIENTS COOKED TO PERFECTION” pointed to using the corrected decimal and Roman numbers from THE ROMAN CONFLICT and adding back the binary in their original order. “CODE SLIMMED DOWN” pointed to isolating the binary and converting it to ASCII.

bless_up Maze

The corrected decimal and Roman numbers with the binary: https://votefordoc.com/10001111470010CLIII0110CCLXXVI0101CCVIII0110LXXVIII1101LXII0110LXXXVI010111001101691101CDLXXIV0110DXXXII00101210110CXXIII0101CLX01111690010CDLXXIV0101DXX1111CXVIII0111LXXVII0011LXVII0110LXXXII10001240110CIII0001CDXL01113510010740110CCXL1001DCCCXLVII0110CLVII1110LXXXI0110660111LXXXVIII0101LXXVIII1111770110XCIII100111901111060011LXXV0101LXXXIX111111201101420011XCVI0110LXXVII00019001111270010780110LXXVIII10011340110LXXIX1110LXIX0110LXXIX0111 which led to bless_up_WON (1/4).

The isolated binary: https://votefordoc.com/0111001001100101011011010110010101101101011000100110010101110010010111110111001101101000011000010111001001101001011011100110011101011111011010010111001101011111011000110110000101110010011010010110111001100111 which led to bless_up_TOO (2/4).

The corrected decimal and Roman numbers without the binary: https://votefordoc.com/100147CLIIICCLXXVICCVIIILXXVIIILXIILXXXVI110169CDLXXIVDXXXII121CXXIIICLX169CDLXXIVDXXCXVIIILXXVIILXVIILXXXII124CIIICDXL35174CCXLDCCCXLVIICLVIILXXXI66LXXXVIIILXXVIII77XCIII119106LXXVLXXXIX112142XCVILXXVII9012778LXXVIII134LXXIXLXIX79 which led to bless_up_TREE (3/4).

The translated binary to ASCII: https://votefordoc.com/remember_sharing_is_caring which led to bless_up_FUR (4/4).

Digital version of the bless_up Maze in a spreadsheet.

The Heroes used the same methodology to solve these new Roman Mazes and picked out the capital letters in the path (disregarding the start of sentences).

Floor	Path	Message
1/4	“Unto you is charged the great taSk of keeping the puriTy of timE. Know that thAre is only one true timeL	STEAL
2/4	ine, though there are those who woulD have it Otherwise. You must proteCt it. Without the truth of time a	DOC
3/4	s it iS meant to unfold, more will be lost than you can Possibly imAgine. The fabric of reality will unra	SPA
4/4	vel. It iS a heavy taSk--the base of all tasks of this WORlD, for nothing can transpire without time.”	SSWORD

This following path was a reference to a World of Warcraft as a quote from Blessing of the Bronze Aspect by Aman'Thul:

“Unto you is charged the great taSk of keeping the puriTy of timE. Know that thAre is only one true timeLine, though there are those who woulD have it Otherwise. You must proteCt it. Without the truth of time as it iS meant to unfold, more will be lost than you can Possibly imAgine. The fabric of reality will unravel. It iS a heavy taSk--the base of all tasks of this WORlD, for nothing can transpire without time.”

The capital letters (shown in bold) led the Heroes to https://votefordoc.com/STEALDOCSPASSWORD which gave them access to Doc’s email address: [email protected].

Hacking the Shields with Terminals

On Nov. 17, 2018, the Vote for Doc website was hacked by his competitor Robert Baron. The original method of collective jamming to increase the vote counter was no longer an option. The Heroes voted for FURY to switch power over from the radar system to the tactical system. This gave the Heroes the ability to hack the shield using terminals.

FURY posted in #transmissions:

Your tactical system is now online. Use !hack to access your terminal. From there you can execute hacks and discover new terminals! Every terminal and hack has different requirements... Let's hack the shield and get those votes Heroes!

The Heroes used the !hack command in #ship_commands. MEE6 showed the way to the first terminal: https://votefordoc.com/terminal10_000001_1

Terminal 10

The link led to an open Terminal. The Power number increased with the number of heroes simultaneously viewing the page.

With ten Heroes on the website at the same time, the popup message !hack000 unlocked appeared. The source file of the message originated from: https://votefordoc.com/hacks4heroes.json.

Using the !hack000 command in #ship_commands returned the following response from [LANTERN]:

1,000 votes added [one-time-use]! Build next hack... https://votefordoc.com/hack000_ksdbfsjbr984jelje4930234_1

First “Hack the Shield!” Game

The link (https://votefordoc.com/hack000_ksdbfsjbr984jelje4930234_1) led to a box-pushing puzzle game called “Hack the Shield!”. The controls were “X” to select and the arrow keys to move.

Level 1	Level 2	Level 3	Level 4
Lx12, D, L, D, Rx12	L, Dx2, R, Ux2, L, U, Rx8, U, R, D, L, D, Rx2, L, Ux2, Rx2, Dx2, L, D, R	D, L, U, Rx3, D, L, U, Lx2, Dx2, R, U, L, U, R, Ux2, L, D, R, Dx2, Rx2, U, L, D, L, Ux2	(Multiple solutions) U, Rx3, Lx2, U, Rx2
################ ################ #.............P# #.*############# #.............O# ################ ####@@..@@..#### ################	################ #....#.......#.# #..........#...# #.P..#..#....#.# #.*..#...#...O.# #....#......#..# ################ ####@@.@.@.@#### ################	################ #.@..#.O#......# #....#..###..@.# #....#@P..#....# #.@..#..*.#....# #....#..###@...# ################ ####@@..@.@@#### ################	################ #.......######## #.*.*.O.##....## #..*..O.###.#.## #.P.*.*.####.### #.......##...### ################ ####@@..@@@.#### ################
00110011	00101010	00110100	00110001

Beating the game led to the following screen. “X” restarted the game.

Terminal 50

The link on the Success screen (https://votefordoc.com/terminal50_89w37098ydidbsdfb991_1/) led to a closed terminal. Looking in the source code, the terminal was only open between 01:00 to 03:00 UTC. With 50 Heroes on the website at the same time, the popup message New !hack built! appeared. The source file of the message originated from: https://votefordoc.com/hacking4heroes.json.

The boxes at the bottom of each level in the first “Hack the Shield!” game translated in binary to 00110011 00101010 00110100 00110001, which was 3*41 in ASCII.

The new hack command was the recipe total for Location 3 (Anchorage, AK) multiplied by the recipe total for Location 41 (Providence, RI). So 153 * 112 = 17136 built !hack17136.

Using the !hack17136 command in #ship_commands returned the following response from [LANTERN]:

10,000 votes added [one-time-use]! Build next hack: https://votefordoc.com/hack17136_ioyrwre0wer0rewinf24_1

Second “Hack the Shield!” Game

The link (https://votefordoc.com/hack17136_ioyrwre0wer0rewinf24_1) led to another box-pushing puzzle game.

Level 1	Level 2	Level 3	Level 4
Lx4, U, Lx2, D, Rx5, U, R, Dx2, U, Lx9, U, Lx2, D, Rx9, Lx11, Dx2, R, U, L, U, Rx2, U, Rx2, D, Lx3	L, Dx2, R, Ux3, Dx2, L, D, R, Ux3, Lx3	D, L, U, Rx3, D, L, U, Lx2, Dx2, R, U, L, U, R, Ux2, L, D, R, D, L, D, Rx3, D, U, L, D, L, Ux2	L, Ux3, Rx2, D, Rx7, U, R, Dx2, U, Lx4, Dx3, Rx2, U, Rx2, D, R, U, L, U, R, L, U, Lx8, U, Lx2, D, Rx9, U, R, Dx2, U, Lx4, Dx3, Rx2, U, Rx2, U, R, Dx2, U, Lx3, D, Lx4, U, R, D, R, Ux2, D, Lx2, Ux2, Rx5, Lx3, Dx3, Rx2, U, Rx2, Ux2, L, U, Rx2, Lx2, D, Lx5, Dx3, L, Ux2, R, Ux2, Lx2, D, Rx7, U, R, Dx2, R, D, Lx2, R, Ux2, Lx9, D, R, L, Dx2, Rx2, Ux2, L, U, Rx7, U, R, Dx2, R, Dx2, L, Ux3, Lx7, Dx3, L, Ux2, L, U, Rx3
################ ###...##...##..# #O..*....*...OP# #.*###########.# #.......#.....O# ################ ####@@.@.@.@#### ################	################ #.O..#..O*...#.# #.......#..#.P.# #.P..#..#....#.# #.*..#.P.#..*O.# #....#......#..# ################ ####@@...@@.#### ################	################ #O*..#.O#......# #.P..#..###..@.# #...##@P..#..P.# #.*PO#..*.#.P..# #....#..###@...# ################ ####@@.@.@.@#### ################	################ #.......##.O.O## #.*.*.O.....#.## #..*..@.###..O## #.P**.*.#O...### #.........#..### ############O### ####@@..@...#### ################
00101010	00111001	00101010	00110111

Beating the game led to the following screen. “X” restarted the game.

Terminal 100

The link on the Success screen (https://www.votefordoc.com/terminal100_ljhbfisd87477848ds878_1/) led to another terminal which only opened between 01:00 to 03:00 UTC. With 50 Heroes on the website at the same time, the popup message Two hacks out of six powered. Now !hack on Heroes! appeared. The source file of the message originated from: https://votefordoc.com/hacking4heroez.json.

The boxes at the bottom of each level in the second “Hack the Shield!” game translated in binary to 00101010 00111001 00101010 00110111, which was *9*7 in ASCII.

The first hack was the previous hack (17136) multiplied by 9 and by 7. So 17136 * 9 * 7 = 1079568 built !hack1079568. The second hack was the previous hack (17136) multiplied by 111001 and 110111 (which were 9 and 7 in binary, but were treated as decimal), so 17136 * 111001 * 110111 = 209443579518096 built !hack209443579518096.

Using the !hack1079568 and !hack209443579518096command in #ship_commands returned the following response from [LANTERN]:

1,000,000 votes added [one-time-use]!

Chapter Two

On Nov. 30, 2018, Doc broadcasted the following transmission:

Holiday Howdy Campaign Heroes!

Chapter 1 of this election is over. Time for Chapter 2.

While you all sit around your fireplaces and celebrate, I'm out here working. Doing doctor work. Working like you should be to get me votes. Now I've got about 27 million, which is better than 0.

But you know how many millions that isn't? Forty. Tsshib!

Nor is it 50 million. Nor 60 million. I need 100 million. Do the math.

That's a lot more millions –seventy three. Qqobgi!

I wish I could meet you all in person. Instead, use some new campaign materials to help. You can find them at my new cool offices: https://www.votefordoc.com/offices/

~Doc~

P.S. I took an hour at 3 pm to review that game Friday the 14th

Ongoing Investigations

100 Million Votes

Doc’s Invitation video and the Vote for Doc website both said that Doc needed 100,000,000 votes in order to win the election for Galactic Mayor. There was a voting button that served as Doc’s vote counter on the Vote for Doc website. The Heroes knew the shield on Io would be lowered when Doc reached 100 million votes.

[STILL UNDER CONSTRUCTION]