The HxF Mole 4 - Task 13: The Mole's Dossier
This is a new task for HxF Mole 4!
The prize for this task is the Mole’s Dossier. Inside the dossier is one simple sentence, this sentence will help you on your quest to identify the Mole. The sentence will narrow down the possible candidates for who the Mole could be.
Now – how to get your hands on it. Well, you will all be competing against each other in a bit of a puzzle. But it’s not as simple as that.
The winner of the task will be presented with a choice. They can either open the dossier and read the information contained in the dossier for themselves, or they can choose to change the information in the dossier.
If they read the information within the dossier, the task is over.
However, if they choose to change the information in the dossier they do not get to read what is currently in the dossier. They can choose it to whatever they wish providing it narrows down the choice of who could be the Mole, so for example, it could be changed to ‘The Mole is over the age of 20’ – whether this is true or not is now unknown but if it were true it would narrow down the possibilities of who the Mole could be.
Now, if the winner of the task chooses to change the information the person who finished 2nd in the task will now be presented with the choice of reading or changing the dossier – however, this player will not know that they finished 2nd – in fact no player will know what place they finished. So when the choice is presented, no player knows for sure whether the information inside the dossier has been changed to something that may not be true.
If the 2nd place contestant chooses to change the information, the 3rd place player will be given the choice and so on until the last place player if needs be.
At the end of the task you will not be told what places you all finished and you will not be told who read the dossier. You will simply be told that the task is over.
Now – before we can get onto the dossier, we need a task that will decide who will get the dossier choice first.
The task will be a puzzle. Each contestant will get different puzzles but they will all be the same size and difficulty, at least initially. Contestants will be ranked on how quick they solve the puzzle. So the faster you solve it – the better.
Now, to twist things up a bit you will be able to alter each other’s puzzles before they are dished out. This means you can make them more difficult for your opponents and hopefully that means you’ll be able to solve yours quickest.
Each player is given 10 tokens and you can use these tokens to purchase things that will either hinder your opponents or help yourself. You can buy as many of these as you like provided that you don’t spend more than 10 tokens and you can use them on whichever players you wish – that means you could spread out your purchases or use them all on one player.
You will make your purchases via PM and they will not be revealed. These choices are irreversible.
Now, here’s the list of things you can purchase:
4 tokens – Turn an opponent’s puzzle black and white – All colour will be removed from the puzzle pieces making it harder to piece together.
3 tokens – Difficulty increase – Your initial image will be divided into more initial pieces making it take longer to piece together.
2 tokens – Fake piece removal – You will remove a fake puzzle piece from the initial pieces. (You use this one on yourself!)
1 token – Fake piece – You will add a fake puzzle piece to the initial pieces making it harder to piece together.
Every time you purchase an item you need to state who you are using it on.
Now, the black and white purchase is not toggleable. Meaning if one person buys it for a contestant, say Alan – then his image will turn to black and white. If another person buys it for Alan, his image will still remain black and white – the second purchase is essentially wasted.
The difficulty increases DO stack – so if you buy two difficulty increases and use it on the same person, their puzzle will be harder than if you used only one difficulty increase.
The fake pieces are pretty simple - the piece will be added to the starting selection of pieces but does not fit anywhere in the final puzzle.
Now, for each player that uses all 10 tokens, the group will win 2 days of group VIP and for each token a player doesn't use they will win a day of Individual VIP for themselves - however this Individual VIP is only awarded if a player sends a PM and states how many tokens they don't want to use. (E.g a PM saying I spend 6 tokens on X and Y and choose not to spend 4 tokens would give that player 4 days of Individual VIP).
You have until 8pm BST (so when the task should usually end) to send me your purchases via PM. At that time, or earlier if everyone gets their purchases in, I will post in the thread when the next part of the task will begin.
Good luck.
