The Doppit Almanac · No. 19

Spyit, a daily agent deduction

Deduce each agent, loyal or traitor

What it is

Spyit is a Doppit original, No. 19 in the almanac: a wall of field agents, every one of them loyal or a traitor, and one confirmed contact to start you off. Each agent carries a piece of intel that stays sealed until you identify them, so the evidence arrives card by card, and every verdict buys the next.

The house rule is the whole game: you may only mark an agent the revealed clues already prove. Suspicion is not evidence, and the board will not accept it.

How it plays

The tradecraft manual is thin.

• Every agent is loyal or a traitor. The turned contact is confirmed from the start and hands over the first intel.
• Clear an agent the evidence vindicates with a check; pin one it convicts with a cross.
• An identified agent's own clue unseals and joins the case. Tap a clue to dim it once it has served.
• Mind the grammar: neighbours are all eight bordering cards, beside means only the four straight ways, above or below means anywhere in the same column, and left or right anywhere in the same row.
• No single clue settles anything alone. Combine what you have revealed, and if the trail goes cold, the hint walks you through the next deduction.

The difficulties

Dossiers come in three thicknesses. A practice file stays in the drawer, off the daily post. Easy is a roster of sixteen agents, cleared in thirty seconds to a minute. Medium widens it to twenty and wants one to three minutes of cross-checked intel. Hard keeps the twenty and takes three to six minutes of proper counter-espionage. Expert works the same roster and the same kinds of clue, but every board must carry three verdicts that need a what-if inside a what-if, where hard can get away with none, and a board that falls short is never issued. A new roster is posted every day, and the bureau never sends an invoice.

Nearby in the almanac: Copyit, Duoit and Yinit