TruthScape.com - Using the Inspect Feature Wisely

In addition to digging or flagging a hole, you have a third option: you can inspect it, to try to figure out if it contains a seed or not. I was actually rather surprised that Jagex included this option, which is not present in Minesweeper; in fact, many Minesweeper buffs would likely consider it “cheating”. J My guess is that Jagex provided this out of a desire to help people play the game more easily.

There’s a catch, though: inspecting holes comes at the cost of time. It takes a while to inspect a hole, and as I’ll show you, this means it should only be used sparingly.

You can inspect any hole at any time; simply right-click it and choose “Inspect”. You’ll see your character kneel down and appear to poke around at the hole for several seconds; in the top right corner of the game display, the word “Inspecting…” will flash twice (Figure 298). Then you will get a message on the screen indicating the results of the inspection.

**Figure 298: Hole Inspection**
Choose the “Inspect” option and your character will kneel down, poke around at the hole a bit, and try to figure out if it has a seed or not. It doesn’t always work, but it’s always slow...

Obviously, the first means you can safely dig the hole, while the second means you can flag it at will.

Alternately, you may receive one of these more vague messages, which don’t really tell you anything:

If you get one of these, you’ll have to choose “Inspect” again and hope you get one of the first two messages instead. Fortunately, I’ve found that the game tells you if there’s a seed or not on the first try about half the time, and if not, nearly always on the second try.

I’m always seeing players at Vinesweeper who seem to rely on the Inspect feature, using it constantly. They’ll go to a new area of the field and inspect a hole before digging. Then, once they are sure it has no seed they dig it, and move to the next hole and inspect that one. And so forth.

Sure, this is the “safe” approach, and if you are patient you’ll never dig up a seed or flag the wrong hole. But boy, is it ever slow! J It takes around 1.5 seconds to dig a hole, but around 10 seconds to inspect it and then dig it. That may not seem like much of a difference, but it adds up very quickly.

I strongly recommend not using “Inspect” for routine gameplay; instead, just dig and hope for the best. The truth is that the penalty for digging up a seed is really small—10 points is very insignificant compared to the points you can earn in the time you save. So if you are starting play and want to open up an area, don’t waste time inspecting every hole. Just dig in a few random spots until you get a clearing and some numbers, and then go from there.

There are two situations where I believe that using the inspection feature is a good idea. The first is in helping to identify a seed location in an area of the board where there’s no obvious number pattern or it is too complex to easily figure out. The second is to resolve ambiguities that would otherwise require guessing the seed’s location.

The first situation most often arises when you are starting with a fresh slate in an area of the field. You may dig several times and open up a small area, then get stuck. Sometimes, inspecting one hole can give you that extra bit of information you need to then be able to clear a large area (Figure 299). Note that this is really only recommended if you prefer the playing style where you identify many flags at once; if you are just trying to quickly find and flag seeds, when you get stuck you should just take a guess, and if you make a mistake, move somewhere else.

**Figure 299: Inspecting Holes Helps With Complex Setups**
In this situation, I opened up an area and found a rather complex situation, with a “3” and a “4” (left frame). by inspecting two holes, I was able to figure out the locations of four seeds (right) frame—notice that there are exactly four holes left surrounding the “4” at lower right. I then could further explore the area.

The second situation is more rare—so rare, in fact, that I have yet to actually encounter it in Vinesweeper, though it’s seen fairly often in Minesweeper. There are a few patterns of numbers and unknown holes that represent “guessing situations”; one is shown in Figure 300. With Vinesweeper, though, you don’t have to guess; just inspect one of the holes. Again, you do always have the option of moving to a different part of the field (which is not a luxury available to Minesweeper players! J)

**Figure 300: Dealing with Ambiguous Board Patterns**
This is an example of a board region that is truly ambiguous—there’s no way to figure out how to proceed short of guessing, so inspecting is clearly the better option.

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TruthScape Minigame Secrets - Vinesweeper - Using Field Numbers and Field Patterns to Find Seeds

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Last Update: September 28, 2008

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