Answers and Explanations to the 2024 Easter Egg Hunt
Hi everyone, thanks to everyone for participating in this year's Egg Hunt, I know this year some of the clues were particularly difficult and cryptic, so I have decided to create this post which should clear everything up! Firstly, here are the winners:
1st Place - Green_Giant, Chipped_Cherry (3 hours 55 minutes)
2nd Place - NelmanBlack, Daik1220 (4 hours)
3rd Place - Shirrgo (5 hours 15 minutes)
4th Place - JustRocket
5th Place - aylalya, Archimdes
6th Place - Serlance3000, 14_2
7th Place - Maximator, Easy_Silas
Honorary mentions - TheStephen for getting everybody out of Dol Amroth.
Shirrgo for doing it solo and solving the word by hand.
Manyayeet for working together with Serlance and 14_2.
Solutions to the Clues:
Clue 1: Map of Ithilien
The map shows a picture of Ithilien, next to Osgiliath which could be easily identified by seeing Osgiliath’s wall in the map.
Clue 2: Into the ship, he stepped, But unknowingly the white lady slept, However, a wild storm crept, And into the waters, he leaped
This is a reference to the tragedy of Amroth and Nimrodel where Amroth and Nimrodel go south to Edhellond to depart for Valinor, but Nimrodel falls into a slumber. Amroth waits on his ship with fellow Elves, but a storm blows them into the sea, so Amroth jumps into the water in a fatal attempt to swim back to shore for Nimrodel.
Clue 3: Ten years ago, it was wiped out as foretold, only the smartest can uncover this treasure of old
This is a reference to the MCME Forums, which was wiped out ten years ago in 2014 in the Great Forums Crash. The hint on the forums tells you to look for a specific profile on the forums, which you could narrow down to either Greetly’s or Mars’ forums accounts (as we wrote the clues). Coordinates could be found on Mars’ account, which led you to the ocean where the egg laid.
Clue 4: Fvb hyl pu aol ovbzl vm Lsyvuk. Huk pa pz alu v'jsvjr pu aol tvyupun, vu Vjavily aol adluaf-mvbyao, pm fvb dhua av ruvd.
Using Caeser's cipher, it should translate to “You are in the house of Elrond. And it is ten o'clock in the morning, on October the twenty-fourth, if you want to know.” This should lead you to Rivendell.
Clue 5: In Construction: 1588 - 1591
Rialto Bridge was under construction in these years, and this features on the server in Pelargir.
Clue 6: Hear ye! Hear ye! Hazard a guess at this dubious clue.
“Hear Ye!” is meant to lead you to finding out that you need to be looking for somewhere with a town crier or a town master (someone who can give announcements to a town). “Hazard” is 1 letter off from “Hazad”, who was a man of Agar. “This dubious clue” the word dubious is key here, and a weak synonym for dubious is “moot”, hence this clue should lead to you Moot hill in the centre of Agar.
Clue 7: hvvp kzizwrhv, yfg wlm’g tl gsilfts gsv gslimh.
A simple case of using the atbash cypher (where A is Z and so on) to give you the following: “Seek Paradise, but don’t go through the thorns”. “Paradise” in New Zealand is where they shot the exterior scenes for Beorn’s halls. The reference to thorns is that Beorn’s home was surrounded by a large inner thorny hedge. To enter, you have to go through the large wooden door, so this clue is implying you to look for other methods of entry.
Clue 8: Isolated, it stands, waiting, until the time is right. Silently, it commands a watchful peace.
Amon Din is the eastern most of the beacon hills of Gondor. “It stands, waiting” until the call for aid is sent out, which is witnessed by Gandalf and Pippen. Amon Din is Sindarin, meaning “Silent rock”. The rest of the clue is left deliberately vague.
Clue 9: Flailing around in the dark, limbs flying everywhere! Shy away, shy away…
The whole clue is implied to make you think about the watcher in the water. It is designed to make you think about the scene where the watcher attempts to capture the fellowship when they enter Moria. “Shy away” is a play on words - Oin, who was taken by the watcher, means shy. So shy away should be taken as “Oin being taken away [by the watcher]”.
Clue 10: Most popular, 1:42
This question requires you to fill in the gap of “Most popular…” and the answer is MCME YouTube video! The 1.42 is a timestamp, which leads you to the old forest fellowship path.
Clue 11: 47 72 65 65 6E 20 68 61 6D 20 61 6E 64 20 65 67 67 73
Calembel is a Sindarin name. It means "Greenham". The “and eggs” part is a red herring which throws you off to go looking in the book “Green eggs and ham”.
Clue 12: Owned by royalty: Do not shoot.
There are some royal animals - notably swans and kingfishers. Anborn thought he saw a kingfisher in the pool at Henneth Annun, but turned out to be gollum. He was forbade to shoot it by Faramir.
Clue 13: Study clues gone by to find the darn thing. Don’t let this one elude you, happy hunting! - G
This involved you to go back to my previous ring hunt event where I hid the egg under the Brandywine bridge. I used similar language in this clue as I did the posts for the ring such as “the darn thing” and “Happy Hunting!”. The “-G” was to signify that it was something from me (Greetly).
Clue 14: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OiouG6EIY30
The YouTube link takes you to DJ Khaled who says “Let's go golfing!”. In Middle Earth, golf was invented during the Battle of Greenfields, so the egg could be found there.
Clue 15: The sailor docked, unbeknownst of what was to come. The island flipped over, and the sailor never again saw the sun.
This clue is a reference to Fastitocalon, the last of the great turtle-fish mentioned by Tolkien in the Adventures of Tom Bombadil. In the poem, Fastitocalon is mentioned to have pretended to been an island and then killed sailors who docked on his shell by flipping over. The egg could be found at Turtle Rock.
Clue 16: The final hurdle, will you succeed? 2670 works for me.
The first line is a ruse, all you needed on this clue was the date “2670” which is when Toblod Hornblower plants pipe weed in the Southfarthing, so you could find the egg in Longbottom (one of two towns found there).
I hope everyone enjoyed the hunt, hopefully see you all in the Summer!
- Greetly
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