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        riddles >> what happened >> need help answering this one
        
(Message started by: sid_shady on Mar 20^th, 2003, 7:59pm)

Title: need help answering this one
Post by sid_shady on Mar 20^th, 2003, 7:59pm

This one has had me stumped for a a week now. It came from the Mind Trap game as far as I know, but I don't own the game so I can't check the answer. I just know its one of those black diamond cards. Anyway her's how the question goes:
Shadow flipped the tent flap open and surveyed the scene. On the floor, in the center of the tent, a man lay dead from self-inflicted gunshot wounds. In the corner of the tent was a small cot. A package of cigarettes and an empty whiskey bottle lay on the bedside table next to a kerosene lamp. Shadow combed the tent for additional clues to the possible motive. Other than the articles mentioned, the only things Shadow found were a half dozen small circular wooden discs under the cot, the man's personal effects and a variety of scrapbooks and news clippings. Shadow found the last articles particularly strange since it was learned the suicide victim was completely illiterate. What was the reason for the apparent suicide?
Thanks in advance if you know/figure out the answer to this one!

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by BNC on Mar 21^st, 2003, 1:01am

1. This belongs in "what happend"
2. Hints: where do you find tents regularly? And why was the cot "small"?

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by sid_shady on Mar 21^st, 2003, 3:30pm

1. Yeah, I was thinking that also after I posted it. It's still a hard riddle though, so close enough :P
2. You can find tents anywhere that's why people use them. In the mountains I guess. The cot was small because he was ummmmm, a midget? ;D
3. I need an answer ASAP. I'm the kind of person that can't sleep if there is an unanswered question in the air cuz I'm obsesive compulsive. Thanks again

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by Wacky on Mar 22^nd, 2003, 1:58am

If the man died of self-inflicted gunshot wounds, where happened to the gun?

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by BNC on Mar 22^nd, 2003, 2:11am

on 03/21/03 at 15:30:41, sid_shady wrote:

The cot was small because he was ummmmm, a midget? ;D

Right!
Now, on to the paper clippings. What would most people (even if completely illiterate) recognize on the newspaper??

Another hint: the "half dozen small circular wooden discs under the cot" are the key. Where did they come from???

BTW: I know this one from long ago. Not a big fan of "what happend" riddles myself, I must say this one is not better than the rest.

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by sid shady on Mar 22^nd, 2003, 8:37am

The gun was also bothering me I don't know what happened to it. Was there really a gun involved? And I was just kidding about the midget part. What does that have to do with anything though? I already thought about the news clippings. He would have been able to look at the pictures. What's bothering me though is what he saw. The wooden discs have been bothering me since the start! I have no idea where to even begin thinking about where they came from.
>:( >:( >:( >:(

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by cho on Mar 22^nd, 2003, 10:32am

I think I may have it figured out: [hide] The guy's a midget, so the tent is obviously a circus tent and the self-inflicted gun shot was not with a handgun, he shot himself out of the cannon. The wooden disks are old poker chips. Combine gambling with the whiskey bottle and you've got the recipe for a very foolish bet. He bet the regular human cannonball that he could do that guy's stunt. But since he's so small, he didn't need a net to catch him, just his little cot. He miscalculated. I guess he just wasn't the same caliber. That just leaves the newspaper clippings. Maybe they were comic strips and he was using Superman as a pictorial user's manual on how to fly. [/hide] Did I get it right?

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by sid_shady on Mar 22^nd, 2003, 6:00pm

No, that's not right. I don't know what the real answer is though, I just know that's not right. You are right about the tent though, it was a circus tent. And I also know that a real gun was involved, but I still don't know how. I need an answer ASAP. If anyone knows can you please tell me? Thanks a bunch

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by BNC on Mar 23^rd, 2003, 6:38am

OK, two more hints:

1. A big hint: [hide]the paper clippings are about the (now dead) midget.[/hide]
2. A huge hint:[hide]The cot is standing on 6 legs.[/hide]

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by sid_shady on Mar 23^rd, 2003, 2:33pm

Do the news clippings really play a large role in this riddle? It doesn't seem like it. Ok, so the wooden discs came from the legs on the cot. But what was the midget doing that produced discs from the cot?

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by BNC on Mar 23^rd, 2003, 11:56pm

The news clippings simply hint to a property of the midget, that (how? That’s the question!) caused him to take his own life.

The midget didn’t “produce” the discs. They were (hidden) [hide] sawed off from the bottom of the cot legs[/hide]. Now, think what a drunk / hangover person might think when discovering the result of that….

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by Icarus on Mar 24^th, 2003, 3:56pm

Is this it? [hide] The midget is "the world's shortest human". An enemy has gotten him drunk and shortened the legs of his cot to make him think he has grown bigger. When he discovers this, he figures his career is over and takes his own life in despair![/hide]

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by BNC on Mar 25^th, 2003, 6:39am

You da man, Icarus!

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by bobcat on Mar 31^st, 2003, 10:16pm

I agree with Icarus' answer, but wouldn't you end up with cylinders rather than disks in that instance? I guess I was thinking more along the lines of something like a coin. Also, how are the newspaper clippings relevant to that scenario?

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by towr on Mar 31^st, 2003, 10:27pm

If you want to get technical, a coin is also a cylinder..
You might even go as far as saying a disc only exists in 2-D, but that depends on what you consider a disc..

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by Allaran on Apr 8^th, 2003, 8:26am

I had heard this one before with an even more cryptic offering. The entire riddle was as follows:

"If he had seen the sawdust, he wouldn't have killed himself."

In this case, the sawdust was from his cane rather than the cot.

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by redPEPPER on Apr 9^th, 2003, 5:40am

The solution I knew mentions more details, like that his ennemy is the second shortest midget on earth. The cane (or cot legs) was reduced of a few millimeters each day, giving the illusion of a progressive growth, which explains why the cylinders are disk-like.

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by Boody on Apr 15^th, 2003, 4:45am

on 04/08/03 at 08:26:25, Allaran wrote:

Yes I knew the same story.

The title is awful and boring.
Perhaps sid_shady should reword the title with the good idea:
If he had seen the sawdust, he wouldn't have killed himself

Title: Re: need help answering this one
Post by Chewdogscp on Apr 15^th, 2003, 11:47am

But how does the Newspaper pictures incorperate itself into any of the answer we've come up with so far. I think that the enemy probably inplanted a newspaper, that along with the illusion of making him think he was growing taller, had some other sort of picture that would make the midget want to kill himself. I'm lost on this puzzle, can someone please get in here and figure it out once and for all?