BTK word puzzle analysis

September 29, 2013 · by · in Uncategorized

Below is contributor Chris Klein’s interesting analysis of the BTK word puzzle. He breaks down the overall puzzle into three smaller puzzles that are suggested by the appearance of clean breaks between major words and the placements of the letter “X”.

Puzzle 1:


Notes:

  • This puzzle lacks numbers.
  • The locations of the red X‘s suggest puzzle boundaries.

Puzzle 2:


Notes:

  • The locations of the red X‘s suggest puzzle boundaries.
  • In row 1 column 7 there appears to be a missing number. The letters R, A and D are near this missing number.

Puzzle 3:


Notes:

  • The locations of the red X‘s suggest puzzle boundaries.
  • In row 11 column 3 there appears to be a missing number. The letters E and R are near this missing number.
  • This puzzle lacks numbers.
  • Very many of this puzzle’s letters are used in words.

I believe that the X‘s are some type of directions for the orientation of the three puzzles.

Notes about each puzzle and final summary.

Summary:

Each of the puzzles has its own theme with regard to the hidden words within. The theme of each puzzle is as follows:

  • Puzzle 1 ‐ Recon
  • Puzzle 2 ‐ Location
  • Puzzle 3 ‐ Method of operation
  • Puzzle 4 ‐ Identity?

In each puzzle I did the following:

  • Isolate all obvious words by color (yellow).
  • Isolate all sequential and repetitive keystrokes that were not part of an obvious word by color (green).
  • Isolate all “X”s that were non‐sequential by color (red). (I was drawn to isolate the “X”s separately because of the somewhat uniform location of the “X”s throughout the puzzles.
  • Isolate all remaining, apparently random, keystrokes by color(purple).
  • Isolate all numbers by color (blue). (I took some liberty here. In the “original” document that I worked from, the numbers were oddly spaced so that they were near adjacent alphabetic keystrokes. I noticed that for every oddly placed number there was a blank space to its left. I shifted the numbers to the blank spaces to the left. After doing this I noticed there were 2 blank spaces left on the chart. Interestingly the blank space in puzzle 2 is surrounded by the letters R, A, D. The blank space in puzzle 3 is preceded by E, R.
  • In looking at the progression of the 3 puzzles it seems as if the creator became more efficient as he completed each puzzle. Puzzle 1 seems to have a lot of non‐sequential letters that don’t appear to be part of any hidden words whereas puzzle 3 has very few non‐sequential letters that aren’t part of any obvious words. One question I would ask is why the creator didn’t use sequential letters in puzzle 3 in certain places. Maybe there is no reason but there are only (5) non‐ sequential letters that aren’t part of any obvious word and it seems it would have been easy enough to replace those with some other letter.
  • I did not go into the meanings of the different numbers on the chart.

    • Puzzle 1 ‐ Recon

    This puzzle contains no numbers and seems to be pretty uncomplicated.

    Puzzle 2 ‐ Location

    This puzzle seems to be uncomplicated at first but unlike the previous puzzle it contains sets of numbers. It also contains 3 “X”s on or near the same locations as puzzle 1. This puzzle also contains a blank space adjacent to the letters R,A,D.

    Puzzle 3 ‐ Method of operation

    This puzzle appears to be the most detailed of the 3 puzzles. Unlike the previous puzzle there are no numbers but there is a blank space again. This blank space is preceded by the letters E, R. It also contains 3 “X”s on or near the same locations as puzzles 1 and 2.

    Puzzle 4 ‐ Identity?

    Not sure if one would say that all of these puzzles are just parts on 1 main puzzle but I like to consider them separately. That said, I believe the RADER name is announced by the blank space in puzzle 2 and the blank space in puzzle 3. If that were true then I would consider the grouping of puzzles 2&3 to be a separate puzzle and have labeled it as such.
    Anyhow, thats what I have.

Thanks, Chris!