Desert Diplomacy was an event that started on the 8th of August, 2014 (Year 16). It lasted until the 25th of August, and was a logic puzzle event with a clue gathering aspect prior to guessing.
The story began with Princess Amira holding a diplomatic summit in Sakhmet to discuss new trade routes with fellow rulers. She invited the leaders of five different lands. King Hagan attended to represent Brightvale, King Skarl for Meridell, and King Altador for Altador. The Emperor of Shenkuu declined his invite, instead sending his daughter, Princess Lunara in the hopes she would gain diplomatic experience. King Jazan of Qasala similarly decided to stay away, citing a possible frosty reception from Amira due to their past experiences. Instead, he sent his wife, Queen Nabile.
After the first day of the summit, the guests retired for the night, only to make a horrible discovery the following morning. Each of the guests, and the Princess herself, had been stolen from. Amira was missing her Grand Speech Scroll, Altador his Royal Telescope, Nabile her Wedding Ring, Lunara her Magical Blue Amulet, Skarl his Illuminated Menuscript, and Hagan his Pocket Chess. The hunt was on to find the thieves. Amira mobilised her entire network of informants, while recruiting a new chief inspector for the case.
Information quickly flooded in, with the Food Stall Shopkeeper, being an expert on food, giving his impressions of how the Menuscript could have been stolen. Soon after, Lady Osiri came forwards to state that she had heard members of the Oasis Runners bragging about a theft from the palace. It quickly became clear, however, that the Runners had not been the only group taking items from the palace - Tomos used his contacts to discover that the Sun Chasers had stolen one of the items.
Near the Colouring Pages at the base of the palaces walls, a used grappling hook was discovered, confirming one of the routes the thieves had used to commit the theft. Meanwhile the Sakhmet Solitaire Chomby came forwards to state that they believed some of the palace guards had been bribed, and that he had unknowingly let one of the responsible parties, the Pyramid Prowlers, use the back of his tent.
More clues came in from Remnok, while Eyrieki claimed that the Desert Scarabs were also involved, after they stole his bag of sand. Meanwhile, a dagger left at the Scarab 21 tend confirmed that the Dagger Clan were also somehow involved. Brucey B later provided more evidence on the condition of anonymity.
The Lutari running the Paint Brush Stall eventually revealed he had seen one of the groups escaping while working during the night, while Amarna claimed to have seen the Pyramid Prowlers with the Illuminated Menuscript out in the desert. A discarded, outdated guard's uniform was found at the Scratchcard Koisk, suggesting that it had been used as a disguise in the thefts, while it was revealed the Hand of the Anubis was the final group involved.
Enarka revealed that he had been archiving scrolls early in the morning of the theft, and had unknowingly seen two of the groups. Finally, the Kau from the Fruit Machine revealed that he had seen people entering the sewers while on his way back from dinner at the palace. With all the evidence collected, the chief inspector cross-referenced the clues and informed Amira of the culprits.
It was the Hand of the Anubis that had stolen the Grand Speech Scroll, the Sun Chasers who had taken the Magical Blue Amulet, the Oasis Runners took the Royal Telescope, the Pyramid Prowlers stole the Menuscript, and the Desert Scarabs stole the Pocket Chess. Amira hastily sent her guards to arrest them, recovering the items in the process. The Dagger Clan handed themselves in for the theft of Nabile's Wedding Ring, fearing retribution from King Jazan.
Users participated in this event by visiting marked Sakhmet links each day to collect evidence from informants. This took the form of selecting dialogue choices or clicking images on the page. This allowed users to gather a piece of evidence for each day. When all evidence had been gathered, users were asked to stale who had stolen one of the items, when they did it, and how (the item was randomly decided). The eventual solution was:
In exchange for finding each day's evidence, users were awarded with parchment pieces which could be unlocked using Hieroglyphic Dictionaries from the NC Mall.
Numerous awards were handed out for those who participated:
Revisiting the Desert Diplomacy page allowed users to claim item prizes. A correct guess was only required for one bonus prize, the rest were awarded based on how soon users submitted their guess.
No trophies, avatars, or site themes were awarded for this event.
The order of events in this event could be quite hard to follow. Here's how it happened:
This page was written by Herdy and last updated on October 4, 2018.
