Codex

Codex is a team that participates in the MIT Mystery Hunt. The team was founded in 2002 as an off-site team in Harvard, and hunted onsite starting in 2003. Codex won the 2011 MIT Mystery Hunt and thereafter ran the 2012 hunt. The team generally chooses a different historical codex to name themselves after each year. A group of Codex members additionally ran the QoDE Puzzle Hunt in 2021, and this group also does other online hunts together.

History

In 2004, Codex got an influx of members from ACME, which had disbanded after running their 2003 hunt. The team also has a strong presence in the Wikimedia Foundation, and was one of the first teams to build their own hunting framework website, the Codex Blackboard, which initially had a wiki-like interface and later had managed spreadsheets. The team was also one of the first to bring computers for every hunter. As a result, the team is known for having strong support for remote solving.[1] When Pturnips disbanded in 2007, most remote members joined Codex (with on-site members typically joining Central Services).[2] In 2018, the team split up into two teams as a result of the new soft team cap, Codex Ogg and Codex Vorbis (a play on the audio codec Ogg Vorbis), though the team remerged the year after.

Team Names

Codex team names are generally historical codices, with some exceptions (such as Ogg and Vorbis in 2018, as well as CDEOX-21 in 2021). The two characters in Codex's 2012 hunt renamed their surnames Bialystock and Bloom (in the musical The Producers) to Borbonicus and Bodley, two additional historical codices. In 2020, the team was named after Codex Argenteus. The team name in the 2022 hunt run by Palindrome, Codex Vindobonensis 751, is notable for including a mysterious (and as of currently unsolved) palindrome, "METROHOCANGISSITISSIGNACOHORTEM".

Hunt performances

MIT Mystery Hunt

Date Hunt Rank Notes
2022-01-14 MIT Mystery Hunt 2022 19 as Codex Vindobonensis 751
2021-01-15 MIT Mystery Hunt 2021 7 as CODEX-21
2020-01-17 MIT Mystery Hunt 2020 8 as Codex Argenteus
2019-01-18 MIT Mystery Hunt 2019 8 as CODEX VOYNICH
2018-01-12 MIT Mystery Hunt 2018 8 as Codex Vorbis
2018-01-12 MIT Mystery Hunt 2018 26 as Codex Ogg
2017-01-13 MIT Mystery Hunt 2017 6 as Codex Grolier
2016-01-15 MIT Mystery Hunt 2016 5 as Codex Rotundus
2015-01-16 MIT Mystery Hunt 2015 9 as Codex Atlanticus
2014-01-10 MIT Mystery Hunt 2014 4 as Codex Gigas
2013-01-11 MIT Mystery Hunt 2013 7 as Codex Zouche-Nuttall
2012-01-13 MIT Mystery Hunt 2012 Host
2011-01-14 MIT Mystery Hunt 2011 1 as Codex Alimentarius


Other hunts

Date Hunt Rank Notes
2022-06-18 Huntinality 2022 20 as Creative Operations & Design Executives
2021-10-01 Teammate Hunt 2021 21 as Send In the Qlowns
2021-09-10 QoDE Puzzle Hunt Host
2019-03-15 Galactic Puzzle Hunt 2019 23 as Bifolium, Son of Codex


References