1. Players
Lateral Master [LM] – The player who knows the puzzle and directs the game.
Lateral Puzzlers [LP] – The players who try to solve the puzzle.
2. Material
The LM uses 1 Puzzle Register and 7 Answer Cards.
Every LP uses 1 Player Register and 15 Puzzle Cards.
3. Goal
Try to discover the solution of the lateral puzzles proposed by the LM.
4. Preparation
The LM prepares the puzzle for the game on his Puzzle Register spittling it up in significant bits and assigning a score to every single bit (making sure the overall sum is exactly 100).
Example: in the “Red dame” puzzle, LP have to find out that the Bartholomew the gardner killed the red dame with a yellow rose, which thorns where poisonous, in order to avenge his dead sister.
The LM is going to split the puzzle on his Puzzle Register assigning scores to the bit as it follows:
PART OF THE PUZZLE | SCORE |
Bartholomew is the killer | 40 |
A yellow rose is the murder weapon | 25 |
The thorns have been covered in poison | 20 |
Motive is revenge | 10 |
The avenged person is Bartholomew's dead sister | 5 |
The whole story | 100 |
Every LP receives one Player Register and 15 Puzzle Cards:
4 Tip-off Cards
3 Spoiler Cards
2 Mata Hari Cards
2 Cooperation Cards
1 Sherlock Holmes Card
1 Padlock Card
1 Don Corleone Card
1 Queue Card
5. How to play
The LM reads the puzzle and the order of play is decided by the toss of the dice.
Every LP decides whether to ask a public question to the LM receiving a public answer, or to play one or more of his Puzzle Cards. During the first round of play LP can only as questions and cannot use Puzzle Cards.
For the entirety of the game, no question can be asked twice during the same round.
6. Puzzle Cards
A LP might want to use one or more Puzzle Cards, bearing in mind that if he already aksed a question in that round of play, the use of Puzzle Cards he can play will be limited to one. Puzzle Cards can be played at any time, even on another's player turn. The order in which cards have been played will be determinant.
Here's the effect that every card has on the game.
Spoiler Card
By playing this card the LP has the right to commuincate in private to the LM what he reckons it could be a possible solution for the puzzle. The LM is going to confront the received solution with the actual one as written on his Puzzle Register and will consequently award points to the LP for every parts of the puzzle he guessed correctly.
The Spoiler Card freezes the game: no other action will be taken before the effect of this card is finished.
Tip-off Card
By playing this card the LP has the right to ask a public question for which the LM is going to answer privately using one of his Answer Cards.
Padlock Card
By playing this card the LP has the right to lock a question forever and making it impossibile for all the other players to ask the same question (or questions differently formulated but based on identical content of the locked one) to the LM.
This card can only be played on a question asked by the LP using a Tip-off Card, either before or after receiving the answer from the LM.
Sherlock Holmes Card
By playing this card the LP has the right to ask a private question to which he's going to have a private answer, granting himself complete privacy for his round of play.
LP can earn more Sherlock Holmes Cards as the game goes on: by converting a Spoiler Card (with a maximum limit of two Spoiler Cards) or by seeing their good intuitions rewarded at the LM discretion.
Mata Hari Card
By playing this card the LP has the chance to spy on an other player's private answers.
When the spying action is directed to a private answer gained through a Tip-off Card, there is no defense and the spyed LP has to reveal the requested information (in case the LP had previously locked the question using a Padlock Card, then two Mata Hari Cards will be required to succesfully accomplish the spying task and the Padlock Card will be given back to the spyed player).
When the spying action is directed to a private answer gained through a Sherlock Holmes Card, the spyed player has the chance, if he likes, to defend his privacy by playing the Don Corleone Card.
Don Corleone Card
By playing this card the LP nullifies the effect of a Mata Hari Card that has been played to spy on a private investigation that he conducted.
The powerful Don Corleone Card can be played to defend one and only one question that the LP asked during the game; for the rest of the game that question will be secured against all spying actions.
Cooperation Card
By playing this card the LP decides to swap a private answer he has received during the game with one private answer received by any of the another players (questions protected by a Padlock Card or a Don Corleone Card can't be targeted for swapping).
Note: the Cooperazione Card (just like the Spoiler Card) freezes the action.
No other action can be taken before the effect of the card is finished: this means that it won't be possible for LP to secure “unprotected” private answers at the last moment.
Queue card
By playing this card the LP decides to be moved up or down in the order of play.
The order of play is therefore modified for all the following rounds until the next Queue Card is played by another LP.
7. Answer Cards
The LM has 6 ways to answer to LP questions using his Answer Cards:
Yes, No, Not relevant, False Assumption, Rephrase, No Answer.
- Yes and No are self-explanatory and to be used where there is no room for misunderstanding or confusion.
- Not Relevant is to be used when the questions has no connection with the puzzle and the answer is not going to add any piece of information to the investigation.
- False Assumption is to be used when the question is based on a specific assumption that has not yet been verified (either true or false).
- Rephrase is to be used when for some reason it is not possible to give a precise answer but the question is clearly pertinent and connected to the puzzle.
The LM reserves the right to decide whether letting the LP to ask another question (rephrasing his first attempt) or just moving on with the game.
- No Answer is to be used by the LM only when all other answers fail to be the correct answer for any given reasons.
8. Player Register
Players might want to record all the asked questions and received answers on their Player Register.
9. Spoiler
When the solution of a puzzle (or part of it) is discovered through the use of Spoiler Cards, the LM sums the points related to of all the spoiled bits.
If the amount exceed 90% of the overall score, the game is over, but the LM reserves the option to play some extra rounds.
If the puzzle has been spoiled in its entirety, the game is over.
Should the players reach a situation of permanent stall where no significant breaktrhough towards the solution is in sight, the LM can anticipate the end of the game.
More than one LP could in different rounds guess the same part of the puzzle.
To the first one that spoiles that particular part the LM awards the full correspondent score as reported in his Puzzle Register. To the following spoilers (of the same part) the LM awards the score decreased first by a 10%, then by a 20% and so on.
