Introducing the 4th Season of “Sherlock Holmes and Mahjong” contest

Dear mahjong lovers, MahjongSoft and The Sherlock Holmes Society of Italy (Uno Studio In Holmes) are pleased to announce the start of the 4th season of “Sherlock Holmes and Mahjong” mystery solving contest.
Just to remind everyone, this series has been published at Mahjong News in the years 2011, 2012, 2013, 2015 and 2017. In years 2013, 2015 and 2017 the full-fledged mahjong mystery solving contests took place.
This year contestants will be challenged to solve eight mahjong mysteries. Answers for these eight mysteries will be scored, and their combined scores will determine their final standings. Below are some details about the contest.

Prizes

• 1st place will receive a book "Sir Arthur Conan Doyle - Viaggio in Italia - Italian Journey" (/) and the latest issue of Sherlockian fanzine "The Strand Magazine" (/).
• 2nd place will receive the latest issue of Sherlockian fanzine "The Strand Magazine" (/).
• 3rd place will receive the latest issue of Sherlockian fanzine "The Strand Magazine" (/).
• Best Russian-speaking contestant will receive a book “Sherlock Holmes and Mahjong” () signed by authour.

Prizes are generously provided by The Sherlock Holmes Society of Italy (Uno Studio In Holmes) and Vitaly Novikov.

Schedule

The first mystery kicks off on May 22, 2021 at 13:00 London time. This date is a tribute to Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle, the author of "Sherlock Holmes" series, who was born at this day in 1859.
Every new mystery will be published each following Saturday at the same time.
“Sherlock Holmes and Mahjong” contest results will be published no later than on July 20, 2021.
Please, refer to "Rules" page to see the detailed schedule.

Scoring

Each typical mystery can bring 2 so-called "Sherlock points" () for the correct, complete and timely solution. Incomplete or partly correct solution may be scored for the partial score of 1 "Sherlock point" ().
It is given 6 days (144 hours) to submit your solution via the chosen communication channel (see "Communication" paragraph).
In addition, it is possible to receive an extra 1 "Sherlock point" () for complete solution sent within 3 days (72 hours) from its publication.
A summary table with the contestants' results will be published on "Summary" page.
All scores except prize winners will be published in a "shared-score" manner, for instance, place "5-12" means that 8 contestants have the same score, higher than 13th place and lower than 4th place.
Only to break ties in top three positions for the prize winners, so-called "time stamp" procedure will be applied. It basically takes into account the time when the correct and complete solution among the tiers was available for each mystery.

Communication

To submit your proposed solution, you can have several options:

• write to Vitaly Novikov to e-mail address, vitaly.novikov@mail.ru
• write to Vitaly Novikov at Facebook, Vitaly Novikov

We recommend to write a test message prior to the contest to prove that communication for the selected option works.

Personal data

Disclaimer: only contestant himself/herself chooses the level of personal data details revealed through the contest communication.

Contestant identification used in publication, hence, will be based either on explicit signature under the solution(s), or on implicit name tags provided by e-mail program.
Only for the prize winners: full name and mail address is needed to send prizes by regular mail.

Language support

Official language of the contest is ENGLISH.
All mysteries texts and solutions will be provided on 7 (seven) languages, supported by MahjongSoft: English, Russian, Dutch, French, Italian, Chinese and Japanese.
For five of the listed languages (except English and Russian) the author will predominantly use special tools like "Google.Translate".
Thus, if a contestant has an opportunity to communicate in English, please, use English, otherwise, use your native language.
Any minor corrections to the published text may be done only after the text has been published, so "language officers" are welcome to propose vital corrections right after the publication.

How to train yourself?

If you are new to the mahjong mysteries solving contest the best is to get acquainted yourself with the range of possible mysteries. Old years mysteries one can find at the current site under Sherlock Holmes book page which is available at five languages.
Russian, English, Italian — 47 mysteries, Japanese — 27 mysteries, Chinese — 5 mysteries.

Teaser

Just to get some brain train please try to solve the following anagram (it will not be scored). You may send its solution to test the chosen communication channel.