BLF ORPV ERHXRW

OK, who made the mistake of colonising the Viscid world?

DV ZOO ORPV ERHXRW

Oh dear. I think they've started multiplying.

Clearly, we need to take off and nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.

Edit: OK, this is interesting. Every Viscid post across two threads contains the 'words' 'ORPV ERHXRW'. It's not a Caesar cipher, I brute-forced it, but I suspect we're actually dealing with ciphered text in a simple substitution cipher.

Assuming that 'ERHXRW' translates to 'VISCID', we have something to start with. Give me a moment here...

'BLF ORPV ERHXRW'
'DV ZOO ORPV ERHXRW'
'R ORPV ERHXRWH GLL UIRVMW'

OK, so, by assumption 'ERHXRW' is 'VISCID'. 'ORPV' is '_ I _ _', not a lot to go on yet. 'UIRVMW' is '_ _ I _ _ D'.

The last message gives us something a little more promising to work with.

'I (something) VISCIDS (something) (something).' 'ZOO' and 'GLL' are promising, in that they're three letter words with doubled letters. A quick review suggests our best candidates for those are 'ALL', 'SEE', 'OFF', 'TOO', 'ADD', and 'GOO'. We can safely dismiss 'SEE', as we already have the letter that ciphers for S. That gives 'L', 'F', 'D', and 'O' as good candidates for the first letter of 'ORPV'. Assuming for a moment our substitution cipher has no letter substituting for itself, that means 'ORPV' is most likely 'LI _ _', 'FI _ _', or 'DI _ _'. I'm going to assume for a moment 'LIKE' and see how far that can take me.

Our last message becomes... 'I LIKE VISCIDS (_ _ _) (_ _ IE _ D)'... and that last word *could* be 'SHIELD', except that we already know S, and I'm wracking my mind for what else it could be. For now I'm going to wait on an extra text sample.

Gonna bet in this thread it was "WHO LIKE VISCID" "WE ALL LIKE VISCID".

Latest message is "I LIKE VISCID UHH FRIEND"

gaerzi wrote:Gonna bet in this thread it was "WHO LIKE VISCID" "WE ALL LIKE VISCID".

Latest message is "I LIKE VISCID UHH FRIEND"

Yeah, I'm pretty sure you're correct. Good deduction!

ERHXRW OLEVH SZKKB XZNKVIH

Uh oh.

gaerzi wrote:Gonna bet in this thread it was "WHO LIKE VISCID" "WE ALL LIKE VISCID".

Latest message is "I LIKE VISCID UHH FRIEND"

But then both B and D map to W
Also "TOO" would make more sense than "UHH":

I LIKE VISCIDS TOO FRIEND

So BLF is probably not WHO...
?O?

I'm thinking:
I'm also thinking we should see about filling all available population slots as soon as possible - rush-build Androids and buy all the Marauder's stock...

I noticed that S->H and H->S
And if I'm right that BLF=YOU, B->Y... so the second letter is the penultimate letter...

OK, I think it's backwards alphabet: Uhh, I hope not for their taste?

ERHXRW ZWZKG ERHXRW RNKILERHV

CCJ MPM WMDW JGCMCZA VF KBAKKU

"VISCID ADAPT VISCID IMPROVISE"

...and then a new cypher.

Hrm.

Better nix the androids... ships instead.
Enough ships for all non-rebellious population.

ghhux riadq qxeeb cpkbk lhisa