Codebusters C

[DragonsVmom]

Our teams first year doing Codebusters. Trying to practice on the toebus site, but none of the Baconian decryptions are giving a score above 0 even though the answer is correct. They are entering all the A's and B's correctly, entering the deciphered letter under the group of 5 in the middle, then writing the entire quote in the box under the puzzle. What are they not doing correct? I can't figure it out.

[genahoward]

Does anyone have tips on how to start a Patristocrat? My team is doing well on the Aristocrats but we are having trouble making the jump to Patristocrats. Thanks!

[agneg05]

I would start with the hinted ones like given letters, K1, and K2 since those are easier to get first before jumping straight to unhinted. Other than that, it's mostly just frequency bashing and hoping that you can guess a word/using the hints given to your advantage.

[sciolyperson1]

Hi all!

We're running Codebusters for this month's SMEC! To learn more, head over to our forums thread and register at the google form here!

[Fyren]

I'm thinking about doing Codebusters next year so where should I get started for preparing for it? Should I just learn the ciphers in the rules and how to recognize them and then just do a bunch of practice problems?

[RasmitDevkota]

I'm thinking about doing Codebusters next year so where should I get started for preparing for it? Should I just learn the ciphers in the rules and how to recognize them and then just do a bunch of practice problems?

Yep this is pretty much all there is to it, learn the concepts and then keep practicing until you get your solve times low enough that you can solve every question on the test. The Scioly Wiki is probably the best place to do it for most of the ciphers, you should definitely work out the sample problems it has or find a practice test and try it yourself while learning.

Also, you don't really need to learn how to recognize them since the tests will most likely specify, though I've seen a couple that don't (this is probably more common at tougher competitions). Anyways, recognizing the questions is usually easy since most ciphers have special defining features, like the Hill cipher (which will have a matrix) or the Morse ciphers (which will have lists of numbers instead of letters), so it isn't something you need to worry about.

[Umaroth]

I'm thinking about doing Codebusters next year so where should I get started for preparing for it? Should I just learn the ciphers in the rules and how to recognize them and then just do a bunch of practice problems?

Yep this is pretty much all there is to it, learn the concepts and then keep practicing until you get your solve times low enough that you can solve every question on the test. The Scioly Wiki is probably the best place to do it for most of the ciphers, you should definitely work out the sample problems it has or find a practice test and try it yourself while learning.

Also, you don't really need to learn how to recognize them since the tests will most likely specify, though I've seen a couple that don't (this is probably more common at tougher competitions). Anyways, recognizing the questions is usually easy since most ciphers have special defining features, like the Hill cipher (which will have a matrix) or the Morse ciphers (which will have lists of numbers instead of letters), so it isn't something you need to worry about.

Tests are required to identify cipher type, it's not common unless the writer sucks

[Klebb]

Hello Science Olympiad community!

Presenting…

How to Write a Codebusters Test (v.1)
Written mostly by me, Klebb!

I’ve been working on this since around April 2021, and it is finally here! This is a resource for current and aspiring event supervisors, test authors, and, by extension, tournament directors of Codebusters B/C to get a good idea on what makes a good test for the event.

In v.1, I go over each of the ciphers in the 2020-2021 rules, detailing how to write good questions and balance out the test. I plan to expand this in v.2 to new ciphers and other possible rule changes once the 2022 rules are released.

With that said, here is the document! https://drive.google.com/file/d/1pa-Cwp ... p=sharing

Happy codebusting!
-Klebb

Acknowledgements:
This project would not have been possible without the following people. The following acknowledgements are taken from the paper itself, with names replaced with scioly.org usernames, as appropriate.

The following people contributed sections to this guide: Umaroth, Chris Ge. Thank you both for helping me write up ciphers I’m not as familiar with, and for being involved in the editing process.

The following people helped with editing the guide and adding examples; they caught typos, clarified wording, and added ideas to make the guide more complete: builderguy135, Name, kh.aotic, sciolyperson1, and will0416. Thank you all for your contributions.

Thank you to the competitions that released their tests that I used as examples in this guide. Without them writing this would have been much harder.

Thank you to califORNIa, The Cult of Intelligent Avians, the BirdSO Event Supervisors, and Droptogrambustics for your support over the past year and helping facilitate my growth both here and elsewhere. This guide wouldn’t exist without all of you.

And one final special thank you to Dylan Yu in the competitive math community, who designed the LaTeX package that formats the entire guide!