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Dec-15-2005 23:09

Let's say I'm on a hard to impossible case, where I know there should be 3-4 pieces of evidence. But when I search the crime scene, I only find 2.
My question is, am I guaranteed that 1 of the physical pieces of evidence will definitely belong to the guilty person? Or could I possibly have found 2 pieces of physical evidence, neither of which belongs to the guilty person?
I'm guessing it's the latter, but I just thought I'd double-check.

Dec-15-2005 23:13

Sorry. No guarantee that either will belong to the guilty.

Dec-16-2005 04:48

No guarantee, but wearing smart outfit when searching crime scene will help minimazing the chance you'll be in this situation.

Dec-16-2005 07:05

However, all the smarts gear in the world won't help you if you don't have basic thread and hair analysis - without those two skills you will not be able to find any hairs or threads at the crime scene, and if you do have these skills you will always find hairs and threads regardless of how little smarts equipment you're wearing. Smarts gear is only relevant when you have the advanced smarts skills that will allow you to identify whether f.ex. a hair is curly or straight :)

Dec-16-2005 13:22

Wow, I learned something today. I didn't know that you will always find all pieces of evidence if you have the advanced skills. I always thought there was a chance not to find anything.

Thanks!!!

Dec-16-2005 23:27

Case in point:
1) I do have both basic hair and thread analysis skills (neither is advanced).
2) I'm currently on a hard case.
3) I searched the crime scene, and only found 2 pieces of evidence (a hair and a thread).
Am I missing something?
Why didn't I find the 3rd piece of evidence?
Was it:
a) not enough smarts gear
b) not enough skills (need advanced)
c) something else

I think I have to disagree, Greyling. I think it's a), that I didn't have enough smarts gear. I'm guessing a 2nd hair or 2nd thread was there that I didn't have the smarts to see.
But, I could be way off. Any thoughts?

Dec-17-2005 04:09

I'm sure it's because of a)...you don't have any smart gear, and you should have at least 5 to find every PE, and about 20 to identify each...

Dec-17-2005 13:20

No, if you have all the four basic evidence skills, you will always find all the evidence at the crime scene (unless something has changed) regardless of what you're wearing.

At the moment I can't come up with a logical explanation as to why you didn't find all of it except maybe that you acquired either basic hair or thread analysis after you had already been to the crime scene? Which 2 types of evidence did you find?

Dec-17-2005 15:33

I think part of the issue is that you will sometimes just only get 2 bits of evidence (or less). I know I only get 3 on an AI case and I should find all evidence at the scene.

Dec-17-2005 20:46

I think what the thing about it, is that the game is random. I have advanced footprint analysis and I've found NO EVIDENCE at all on an Almost Impossible. Even though I don't have any smarts gear on and only have 1 point for that adjustment, I've found about 3 to 4 pieces of evidence with -6 smarts adjustment. So I think it's a random thing.

I've also tried using at least 14 points smarts from stuff in our locker at the agency and didn't find much more than I'd usually find. It's random, random, random.

Dec-17-2005 22:59

I've had all the basic skills for several cases now, so it didn't have anything to do with getting the skills in the middle of a case.
The 2 pieces were 1 hair and 1 thread. I was thinking maybe my low smarts level caused me to miss a hair or thread.
Does experience get factored in there anywhere? I'm fairly new, but I've worked up to trying a few hard cases.
At this point, I'm willing to agree that it's random and/or maybe there wasn't a 3rd piece of evidence to find, so I didn't miss anything.
Or maybe something has changed. I don't know.
I know some of the randomness/fuzziness about exact numbers exists on purpose (to keep the game interesting), but I was just curious about what aspects of the game are random and which are definitely fixed.
Thanks, everyone, for the input.