Play Your Cards Right

PUZZLE 031

Puzzle Location: The Saveloy foyer (Mayor Lowonida)

Here we have five playing cards.
A certain number of them are missing a section at the top-right which is the same shape as the ocrner of a playing card.
It's possible to arrange them without fully overlapping them so that none of the missing areas are visible.
Arranged like that, how many cards with missing pieces could there be?
What is the maximum number of cards that could have a missing piece?

Hint 1

Try to figure out a way of placing the cards so that the missing areas can't be seen.
The missing sections are the same shape as the corners on the cards.

Hint 2

If you line up the corner of another card over the missing area, it will look like the bottom card is complete without you needing to cover the entire card.

Hint 3

If you rotate the cards as you place them so that the corners line up, you can use four of them to make a circle.

Super Hint

Continuing on from hint three...
If you have four or more cards, all of them can have a missing section and can be placed so this is not visible.

Answer

The answer is '5'.

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