Finally got the root flag but was unable to root. I got the root hash from the shadow file as well, but was unable to crack it after a days worth of trying with rockyou and many other wordlists. Can anyone that cracked the hash PM me to let me know what worked for you?
To everyone still trying to get user/root, there is some good advice already throughout the thread. Definitely enumerate a LOT and find out what you can do with your current privileges. As said before, this box does not require overwriting anything in /etc/. I learned some new uses of a certain tool on this one. Good box!