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Cascade Bay

Water Guns

by Ian Tullis, Yar Woo
Answer: FAN LETTER

As of the time of this Hunt, there are exactly eight generations of Pokémon. Each generation features a set of Grass, Fire, and Water type "starter" Pokémon, and each of these Pokémon has three evolutions.

This puzzle features some—but not all—of the evolutions of these "starter" Pokémon, with the unevolved, once-evolved, and final forms always appearing on the Type 1, 2, and 3 walls, respectively. The Pokémon on each wall are arranged in alphabetical order by name.

The key hint about what to do is the "Make sure you do it in COLOR!!!" text. The grass, fire, and water starters (and their evolutions) are primarily green, red, and blue, respectively. This, combined with the fact that we have 8 generations, might suggest thinking about the 24-bit RGB color model. Each of the Type walls yields 24 bits of information that form such a color. For example, the eight bits of the red value for the Type 1 wall are given by whether the unevolved fire (red) Pokémon from generations 1 to 8 are present (1) or absent (0), and so on for the other colors. In each case, this yields one of the standard X11 Web colors; the X11 color name starts with one of the 18 Pokémon types.

For example, in Type 1, the bits yield the binary 01010101 01101011 00101111. Converting from binary to decimal (85, 107, 47) or hexadecimal (#556B2F), we can discover that this is one of the standard X11 Web colors: Dark Olive Green. This name begins with DARK, which is one of the 18 Pokémon types.

Type 1

Gen Red There? Green There? Blue There?
1 Charmander 0 Bulbasaur 0 Squirtle 0
2 Cyndaquil 1 Chikorita 1 Totodile 0
3 Torchic 0 Treecko 1 Mudkip 1
4 Chimchar 1 Turtwig 0 Piplup 0
5 Tepig 0 Snivy 1 Oshawott 1
6 Fennekin 1 Chespin 0 Froakie 1
7 Litten 0 Rowlet 1 Popplio 1
8 Scorbunny 1 Grookey 1 Sobble 1

01010101 01101011 00101111 = (85, 107, 47) = #556B2F = Dark Olive Green, so DARK is our first type.

Type 2

Gen Red There? Green There? Blue There?
1 Charmeleon 1 Ivysaur 0 Wartortle 0
2 Quillava 0 Bayleef 0 Croconaw 0
3 Combusken 1 Grovyle 1 Marshtomp 1
4 Monferno 1 Grotle 0 Prinplup 0
5 Pignite 0 Servine 0 Dewott 0
6 Braixen 0 Quilladin 0 Frogadier 0
7 Torracat 1 Dartrix 1 Brionne 1
8 Raboot 0 Thwackey 0 Drizzile 0

10110010 00100010 00100010 = (178, 34, 34) = #B22222 = Firebrick, so FIRE is our second type.

Type 3

Gen Red There? Green There? Blue There?
1 Charizard 0 Venusaur 1 Blastoise 1
2 Typhlosion 1 Meganium 0 Feraligatr 0
3 Blaziken 0 Sceptile 0 Swampert 1
4 Infernape 0 Torterra 0 Empoleon 1
5 Emboar 0 Serperior 0 Samurott 0
6 Delphox 1 Chesnaught 0 Greninja 1
7 Incineroar 1 Decidueye 1 Primarina 0
8 Cinderace 0 Rillaboom 0 Inteleon 0

01000110 10000010 10110100 = (70, 130, 180) = #4682B4 = Steel Blue, so STEEL is our third type.

Omnom the adorable Pokémon

Teams that sent us a drawing of an original DARK, FIRE, and STEEL Pokémon were thanked for their FAN LETTER, which is the answer.