Stuck on Chapter 9 (Spoilers!)

[Cap'n Crazy]

Sorry for this worthless wall of filler text! I deemed it necessary to reduce the chance of somebody seeing the text preview and potentially seeing more than they wanted. With that out of the way, here's the deal:

I've got 2/4 panels filled out correctly, but I'm pretty sure I've missed a lie in the constable's notes and that's throwing off my reasoning.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2874780100

Not looking for a solution, but a gentle nudge would be appreciated.

[Cap'n Crazy]

A slight update- I see I missed a step in the middle portion-I missed a symptom. I've fixed that portion but I'm missing something else.

(Having said that- Podrick was still clearly drugged- how the hell did he get black poppy in his system?)

EDIT: Made the critical deduction for the left panel. I still have somebody's position wrong.

[Raymar]

Originally posted by Cap'n Crazy:

A slight update- I see I missed a step in the middle portion-I missed a symptom. I've fixed that portion but I'm missing something else.

(Having said that- Podrick was still clearly drugged- how the hell did he get black poppy in his system?)

EDIT: Made the critical deduction for the left panel. I still have somebody's position wrong.

I'm kinda stumped on deducing the verdict, but there are 2 moments about it:
On position: someone should've been in the victim's room
On 3rd part: witness accounts can clearly contradict with each other

EDIT: I GOT IT, there's a catch on the middle part, the main hint is that there is more than one drug involved in situation

[Enoch]

I've been stuck on this for an hour, can you explain to me the correct phrasing? I know that Dr Turner killed Vallantine, stole a button from Blanchard while he was drugged and planted it on him and i know that Ptoo drugged Gideon Bell and stole a seal from the salon but i really can't get the correct way to put it on the left panel

[bearsbearsbears]

@Enoch, the real answer is that the the frame job and the murder were committed by different people. There's another person who's lying in their testimony

[Enoch]

@bearsbearsbears TYY, finally i did it, there was a small detail i havent noticed about one character's testimony

[Rick Dagless]

This one felt a bit bs imo. Sure there was a definite clue in that Ergin clearly distracted Gideon by pointing to the chess house. But if he was drugged at that moment, why didn't he testify about falling asleep and Ergin being gone when he came to or something? And also there are no real visual clues when inspecting him, unlike with the butler, who I assume finished off the drinks when James sent him to clean up the library.

[Cap'n Crazy]

Originally posted by Rick Dagless:

This one felt a bit bs imo. Sure there was a definite clue in that Ergin clearly distracted Gideon by pointing to the chess house. But if he was drugged at that moment, why didn't he testify about falling asleep and Ergin being gone when he came to or something? And also there are no real visual clues when inspecting him, unlike with the butler, who I assume finished off the drinks when James sent him to clean up the library.

The discrepancy is caused by Ergin using a different poison with different effects. The tell is Gideon's frequent blinking

[Rick Dagless]

Omg, I just went back and checked, and you're 100% right Cap. I take it all back. I checked the poster with the drug effects once and then forgot about it. My bad. This game sure is neat.

[Cap'n Crazy]

I completely missed it too for a while. It's tough to notice!

[Lord Screamo The Giant Pacifier]

Originally posted by Raymar:

Originally posted by Cap'n Crazy:

A slight update- I see I missed a step in the middle portion-I missed a symptom. I've fixed that portion but I'm missing something else.

(Having said that- Podrick was still clearly drugged- how the hell did he get black poppy in his system?)

I'm kinda proud to have figured this one out by myself:
Podrick claimed to have fainted due to a bad heart. However, given the symptoms he shows (the red eyes), it's clear that he may have 'helped himself' to the liquor he was asked to throw away.

[stevo]

This case sort of amplifies the idea that this kind of game wouldn't really work without magic as a gimmick to employ.

I was stuck on the whole Gideon/Ptoo thing because their testimony defied all logic that what happened could really have happened, even though it's clear Ptoo had got away because there's other testimony placing him in the Salon. I'm too used to golden age detective rules that would've used something cleverer than "he used magic" as a diversionary tactic to make the whole narrative stick .

The events are also just kinda dubious. For me this whole scenario actually only works with both Leopold and the Butler being incapacitated, yet it's pretty clear the Butler was just told to join the gardener afterwards. The whole double-play frame up job employed by Turner and Koch could've gone wrong dozens of ways, yet it seemingly worked perfectly because of circumstances they didn't even create lol

[Austin]

I found the game's explanation for Ptoo's movements really clever - how he exploits the drug's effects on time perception to make it seem he has an alibi, and how you figure out what he stole by following the patterns on the seals. I suppose different poisons are a type of magic in this game, but it still makes the player pay careful attention and provides rewarding and surprising solutions.

I disagree that the scenario only works with Leopold and the Butler incapacitated - I assume the murder works fine if Podrick the Butler helps Billiam the gardener as instructed: from the rose bush they would have obstructed view of who comes in and out (the gardener only sees people coming from the fountain, and doesn't see the murderer going in and out). They didn't plan to drug the butler but it worked to their advantage. The butler being knocked out is a neat surprise. The butler defiantly stealing some sherry for himself (and getting poisoned for it) ties into the game's little hints at class consciousness, such as how the earlier chapter's butler secretly has leftist readings under his book that describes aristocrats are parasites,

[jebe]

I love the game but chapter 9 is really the worst for me.
Biggest issue is with the drugs and the buttler with drug eyes.
There's also a very annoying thing with the interrogation being done by someone who can be involved, which is basically saying everything can be a lie. As someone said, also there was no statement about the Lemurian guy leaving the place

[dripgrind]

The reason Gideon doesn't notice Ptoo leaving is that Ptoo drew his attention to the design of the chess-house and he is drugged with something that makes you hyper-focus on one thing and affects perception of time .

Now maybe you could consider that implausible 'magic'; I found it reasonable within the reality of the game given that you're told about it on a poster.

I did take ages to notice the tell-tale symptom though.

[Lavos]

I found that case the most difficult of them all as well. I just didn't acknowledge that Lemurian had anything to do with it. It's also the first case where looking back at the previous cases played a major role, so in that way, I'd say that it worked well in teaching player new game mechanics. I figured how the murder happened, election cartoon was a major hint for that. It showed both murder victim and accused as opposition to Lazarus, and since we saw Lazarus getting anointed by two of the cultists in the previous chapter that are present in this location, It was easy to figure what it was all about. It wasn't hard then to deduce each role in the murder, but then I got completely stuck trying to place the words into the solution. After I went and unlocked all the hints, I finally learned that Ptoo stole seal, but I still didn't know what else to input, as him drugging Gideon didn't enter my mind. I thought that Gideon was either helping him or that Ptoo just sneaked away from him. Weird description of Lemurian poison didn't help as well, and I completely missed Gideon's rapid blinking.