Image by Flickr user "sparktography" - used via Creative Commons license.
Congrats to Jeff L. who nets himself a $50 gift certificate from ThinkGeek! Keep reading for his unexpected solution.
Puzzle
Super spy extraordinaire Pedro Vex is in deep trouble. During what was supposed to be a covert operation, he’s just walked into a room full of underpaid henchmen ready to take him down. It’s a set-up! Pedro stands in the doorway and prepares to fight. He quickly takes a mental inventory of the position of the henchmen, their weapons and any visual weaknesses. He also wonders how a spy of his caliber can fall into such a trap. He only has seconds before battle, these are his split second observations. Can you determine the position of each idiot in the room, their weakness and their weapon?
The sleeping henchman is not standing by the file cabinet and he’s not holding a katana.
The henchman sitting at the desk isn’t holding a machine pistol.
The henchman who is clearly drunk isn’t standing at all. And he has a battle axe.
The henchman in front of the window isn’t as cross eyed as the guy standing in the middle of the room.
The flipper armed henchman is not holding a mace or standing next to the file cabinet.
The henchman with the katana is standing by the radiator.
The short henchman is not holding a 2×4, neither is the cross-eyed henchman.
Solution
While the solution can be presented in a basic logic chart (there were enough clues and other points of logic to build the table with the use of keen powers of deduction) Jeff had a completely different, though logically correct solution, which is presented in full below the chart. He also was kind enough to include his own completely geeky illustration of the puzzle solution.
Solution Logic Grid
Jeff’s solution
Okay, quite simply, this puzzle deals with concrete facts and assumptions that are irrelevant. Simply because someone is NOT holding a mace, for example, doesn’t mean a mace IS being held by anyone. It could be a herring, or a dolphin, or any other equally-proficient bludgeoning instrument; all we know is that it is not being held… possibly not present at all! Whoa.
Without further ado, below please find the aesthetically-pleasing graphic illustration that melds all known factors from the eyes of Pedro Vex into one cohesive, accurate solution of the puzzle at hand (explanation follows illustration):
The questions requiring answers and those answers in short, are:
1. Can you determine the position of each idiot in the room? YES.
2. Can you determine said idiot(s)’s weakness? YES, given a degree of assumption.
3. Can you determine their weapon? Of the henchmen, YES, but not that of Pedro Vex.1. The position of each idiot. There are two possibilities, or, everyone is an “idiot”:
a) From the eyes of Pedro Vex, we ASSUME the “idiots” are the two henchmen, although the intellect of the henchmen were never given, suffice to say being drunk and asleep isn’t the best method for ambushing and taking-out a super spy extraordinaire. ASSUMING the idiots are the henchmen, one is asleep in front of the window at the desk under a window, drunk, and the other is standing in the middle of the room by a radiator.
b) From the eyes of the henchmen, clearly the “idiot” is Pedro Vex as he has fallen into such a trap - sprung by a drunkard and a cross-eyed evil-doer, nonetheless. The only conceit is that Pedro is either “standing in a doorway” or “he’s just walked into a room,” which appears to be a logical fallacy. However, for the sake of argument and a potential unreliable narrator we’ll say Pedro has “just walked into (the) room” allowing him to be a potential idiot as he is in the room.
2. Determining the idiot(s)’s weakness. (Following the same rubric established in question one:)
a) From the eyes of Pedro Vex, the chief weakness of the henchman in the center of the room, Jimmay, we’ll call him, is that he is cross-eyed. Timmay, of course, is both drunk and asleep at the desk, thus he is presently combat ineffective. Intellectually, they are idiots since they are but mere underpaid henchmen - opposed to crime bosses or crime lords or something equally savvy.
b) From the eyes of the henchmen, the chief weakness of Pedro Vex is both his ineptitude for falling into traps and wearing a ridiculous costume which would constrict movement, to say nothing of not allowing him to maintain an espionage persona, unless his cover is a Dragon Con attendee.
3. Determine their weapon.
a) Jimmay is holding a katana. Timmay has a battle axe.
b) Pedro: we are not given sufficient information to determine if he is armed.
The meat of the matter.
To substantiate the illustration above, artistic license notwithstanding, we deduce what we know from we do NOT know. Again, simply because someone is not standing by a file cabinet does not mean that someone is standing by a file cabinet. Hell, we can only assume a file cabinet is present at all. This is just fluff, trying to throw us critical thinkers off the scent. For grins, we’ll keep the cabinet but only because the pet headcrab likes to hang-out up there. Take away message: cull the fluff from the substance. What we know for certain is that there are AT LEAST TWO HENCHMEN that are armed at two separate parts of the room. All else is unsubstantiated speculation.
Jimmay, the cross-eyed henchman is standing in the center of the room next to a radiator, holding a katana. His position, disposition, description, etc., are all substantiated by the following numbered bullets (reference below): #1 (he isn’t asleep), #4 (he is cross eyed guy standing in the middle of the room and he is not the henchman in front of a window), #5 (either has a flipper for an arm or is armed with a flipper… unclear, possible… but again, not concrete and allows for a flipper and katana weapon as both can be operated with one arm each, perhaps), #6 (the henchman with the katana standing by the radiator)
Timmay is the drunkard in the chair, fast asleep at the desk which is positioned underneath a window. This claim is substantiated by the following numbered bullets: #1 (sleeping), #1 (not standing), #1 (not holding a katana), #2 (sitting at the desk), #2 (not holding a machine pistol), #3 (clearly drunk, not standing at all, has battle axe), #4 (in front of window, not as cross eyed as guy in middle of room, so there is a guy in the middle of the room), #5 (either has a flipper for an arm or is armed with a flipper… unclear, possible… but again, not concrete and allows for a flipper and battle axe weapon as both can be operated with one arm each, depending on model of the axe… and flipper), #7 (not holding a 2×4… but also isn’t holding the grand canyon or a lightsaber; worthless information aside from the fact that he isn’t the cross-eyed henchman, of course)
Given information:
1. The sleeping henchman is not standing by the file cabinet and he’s not holding a katana
2. The henchman sitting at the desk isn’t holding a machine pistol
3. The henchman who is clearly drunk isn’t standing at all. And he has a battle axe.
4. The henchman in front of the window isn’t as cross eyed as the guy standing in the middle of the room.
5. The flipper armed henchman is not holding a mace or standing next to the file cabinet.
6. The henchman with the katana is standing by the radiator.
7. The short henchman is not holding a 2×4, neither is the cross-eyed henchman.In sum, the logic fits the puzzle and is not speculative. There are only two henchmen for certain in the room.
Stay tuned next week for another fun puzzle!
