Sherlock Holmes: the first two Mini Mysteries
- Details
- Created on Thursday, 31 March 2011 21:16
- Last Updated on Wednesday, 28 November 2012 18:00
- Written by Vitaly Novikov
Dear readers! Let's meet Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Watson, Mrs. Hudson, Inspector Lestrade and others while playing game of mahjong and solving cases. The series "Sherlock Holmes and Mahjong" would be consisting of MCR mahjong problems and miniatures mostly ‘all around mahjong’ (‘paramahjong’). Let's start with two miniatures.
The Hound of the Baskervilles
Mrs. Hudson first time ever was invited to watch a game of mahjong. The session was kindly arranged directly at Baker's Street 221-B. The game was played by Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Watson, Inspector Lestrade and very special guest -- Wan Tao, clerk of Chinese embassy, an experienced player.
Just after the game had finished, Mrs. Hudson asked:
"It is very strange. Why the name of such breed of dog was mentioned during the game? If only the hound of the Baskervilles would be of such a breed than sir Charles Baskerville might escape the curse."
- Question: What was the breed of dog Mrs. Hudson has heard during mahjong game?
Hand Structure? It's Elementary
Sherlock Holmes explains to Mrs. Hudson the the simpliest winning hand in mahjong has 14 tiles in 3-3-3-3-2 distribution.
"Holmes! It's rather elementary!"
- Question: What ingenious insight came to Mrs. Hudson?
Hint: She needed just 5 seconds for that.
Solution
Problem is solved! Click here for the solution.
And what about the dog?
Hu!
A?
Hu!
A!
Although I must correct you.
My version is "Chi"+"Hua"+"Hua" where "Hua" stands for FLOWER.
Please check it with "Green Book".
Here are excerpts from it:
"3.4.20 Flower replacement ("Bu Hua")
When you pick a Flower Tile, you may expose it, declaring "flower" ("hua") and take a replacement tile from the back end of the wall, until there are no more Flower tiles in your hand."
"3.6.1 Regulations governing verbal calls during the game
During the progress of game, the player must verbalize all claims for discards, to make a chow, pung, or kong, and when picking a flower or declaring mahjong. ... When taking a Flower replacement (Bu Hua), the player must say "Hua". He should not call out the names of the tiles when discarding, and is forbidden to
discuss, gossip or communicate in his native language or other foreign language."
I hope you have enjoyed solving the very first mysteries of "Sherlock Holmes and Mahjong" series.
Next problem is due one week after the first items.
Please beware that next one would be full-scale mystery, not a mini-one :).
>What fun thanks Mr.V.N.
> S.S. (Sushila Singh)
If omit restriction of non-similarity to hound of the Baskervilles (in size?) we can add one more breed -- "Chow Chow".
Thanks to Sushila Singh!!
It is difficult to judge the difficulty of problems, but some did take me some time to solve.
I especially enjoyed the '32nd of December' and its fourth question.
Thanks to Vitaly for the problems, to Martin for hosting the "venue" and congrats to Sylvain and Scott for their success.
A: two kongs of the same suit (i.e. 8 one-suit tiles) and a kong of wind
So... winds are now suit tiles?
And they are in every suit?
Wow!
Looks like I've misunderstood the question and it was actually an easy one!
Was it because I was the only one to answer the question within the allotted time?
Just curious.
Thanks.
At first, it looks like each player had three pure melded kongs, two of them separated by two numbers (e.g. 1 and 4), and that their left-side neighbour is waiting for these two said kongs with a ryanmen (e.g. _23_).
But it turns out there are not enough tiles for that.
So, here's the trick:
Watson had: melded: 1111m 4444m 5555m, concealed: 23s EE.
Lestrade had: melded: 1111s 4444s 5555s, concealed: 23p SS.
Holmes had: melded: 1111p 4444p 5555p, concealed: 78m WW.
Mrs. Hudson had: melded: 6666m 9999m, concealed: RRRR(concealed kong) 23m NN, and erronously melded as flowers: 2223m.
It certainly "cut off all conceivable scenarios".