This is a Multi- Cache placed as part of a series of cipher caches.
These caches are done in an effort to teach me, and any others, various techniques of cipher encryption and how to solve them. It is not meant to be difficult, as the name of the type of cipher technique is provided, with a brief description .
This cache is meant to exemplify the Scytale Cipher (rhymes with “Italy”). This is a “transposition” cipher which remember means that the encrypted message uses the same letters(or in this case numbers) as in the actual text, they are just scrambled.
The Scytale Cipher technique was used by the Spartans and Greeks during military maneuvers. In this technique a leather strip was wrapped around a rod or stick. The plaintext message was then written on a strip of leather while it was wrapped around the rod . The parchment was then unraveled. To look at the unraveled strip there was just a mixture of letters (or numbers).
The leather strip was then passed onto to the appropriate person to whom the secret message was intended. This person then wound the leather around a rod or stick of the same diameter to reveal what the intended message.
Regardless of who ended up with the leather strip , the message was not easy to decipher. The intended message will not easily reveal itself until it is wound around a stick or rod of the correct diameter. However, just by nature that a strip of leather containing letters/numbers was used, it was usually easy to determine that the Scytale Cipher technique was being used. Sticks of varying diameters could be tried to Brute Force a message but often this was not an easy or quick solution .
The UPDATED coordinates for this cache will lead you to the 1st stage of this multicache. When you reach stage 1 there will be a field puzzle using the technique that you have just learned about to decipher a Scytale Cipher Message.
Stage 1 :- Field Puzzle
You will find a strip of leather conaining an encrypted message. Wind it around the stick provided to find out what the message reveals about the final stage and cache location.
Good luck and have fun!