Comments on: Enigmatic Variations No. 941 – The Sign of Four by Salamanca http://www.fifteensquared.net/2010/11/27/enigmatic-variations-no-941-%e2%80%93-the-sign-of-four-by-kruger/ Never knowingly undersolved. Wed, 19 Jun 2013 10:14:37 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.5.1 By: mc_rapper67 http://www.fifteensquared.net/2010/11/27/enigmatic-variations-no-941-%e2%80%93-the-sign-of-four-by-kruger/#comment-134526 mc_rapper67 Tue, 07 Dec 2010 00:05:44 +0000 http://fifteensquared.net/?p=23291#comment-134526 Just to tidy this up – the official solution had the ‘symbol’ as four plus signs – ‘++++’ – or crosses, as the signatures of the four conspirators? – so bb’s approach of using the number 4 was not quite there, and the correspondents above were correct on the six ‘O’s together being ‘imaginatively pictured’ as Mary Morstan’s pearls.

Onwards and upwards!…

]]> By: mc_rapper67 http://www.fifteensquared.net/2010/11/27/enigmatic-variations-no-941-%e2%80%93-the-sign-of-four-by-kruger/#comment-132390 mc_rapper67 Mon, 29 Nov 2010 17:44:45 +0000 http://fifteensquared.net/?p=23291#comment-132390 Apologies to Kruger and Salamanca – my cut-n-paste error attributed this EV to Kruger, when in fact it was the fiendish work of Salamanca…

]]> By: Kruger http://www.fifteensquared.net/2010/11/27/enigmatic-variations-no-941-%e2%80%93-the-sign-of-four-by-kruger/#comment-132322 Kruger Mon, 29 Nov 2010 10:23:08 +0000 http://fifteensquared.net/?p=23291#comment-132322 Please note this was not my puzzle!

]]> By: mc_rapper67 http://www.fifteensquared.net/2010/11/27/enigmatic-variations-no-941-%e2%80%93-the-sign-of-four-by-kruger/#comment-132234 mc_rapper67 Sun, 28 Nov 2010 23:26:07 +0000 http://fifteensquared.net/?p=23291#comment-132234 Dave/bb – thanks for the updates. Now you mention it, I had wondered if all the ‘O’s in the grid were coins or ‘treasure’ of some sort – but I had not spotted the 6 together (or linked that to pearls/Mary/Sholto), and I had already written far too much in trying to cover for my lack of a solution!.

To me, there seemed to be lots of pairs of Os, either up/down or diagonally, and trying to track them down made my head spin even more…I shall await next Sunday’s official solution with interest!

]]> By: bb http://www.fifteensquared.net/2010/11/27/enigmatic-variations-no-941-%e2%80%93-the-sign-of-four-by-kruger/#comment-131914 bb Sat, 27 Nov 2010 12:06:31 +0000 http://fifteensquared.net/?p=23291#comment-131914 I just wrote in the numeral “4″ whenever “four” appeared in an answer. That may be to simplistic. As for the gifts, there were 6 pearls, which I took to be the 2×3 block of “o”s near the top of the puzzle. As pointed out above, I would have felt better about that had there not been other Os in the grid.

]]> By: Dave Hennings http://www.fifteensquared.net/2010/11/27/enigmatic-variations-no-941-%e2%80%93-the-sign-of-four-by-kruger/#comment-131879 Dave Hennings Sat, 27 Nov 2010 08:55:44 +0000 http://fifteensquared.net/?p=23291#comment-131879 Well, mc_rapper67, congratulations on a fine admission of failure. I suspect it made a more detailed introduction to the clue analysis than if you had succeeded.

All I can say is that I’m glad it wasn’t my turn to blog as I totally failed to solve the final step as well! The only thing extra that I spotted was that there were an awful lot of Os in the puzzle, especially in the 3×2 block in rows 3 and 4. I felt this had something to do with the pearls that were sent to Mary Morstan by Sholto. If they had been the only Os in the puzzle, it would have been obvious, but in the end I, like you, admitted defeat.

Like you, I look forward to further comments which may explain everything!

Dave.

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