I've been looking up "clean-hands/ghost" ways to deal with the Torturer at Dunwall Tower. Alas, I only have 3 sleep darts left and there's both his dog and him to knock out with just those three. Suffice to say that, after zapping his dog, my remainng two darts did not send the Torturer into the land of nod.

I then tried zapping his dog and waiting for him to leave the cage and start searching for me, with the intent of blinking behind him and snuffing him out with a choke, but I can't seem to do this. Corvo just swings his sword instead in a "HERE I AM!!!" way (as when trying to choke someone but the aim/angle isn't right). I can't get this to work at all - I'm in creep mode too - but it still won't work for some reason.

I then tried stopping time and blinking across just to grab the rune, but he detected me (end of my no-detections) and the stop-time thingo didn't stop him one bit! Worse, we then had the shrine bit, after which I was dumped back in front of the Torturer - game up!

My last attempt had me follow the maid who was to take him his dinner. I hoped that the Torturer would fetch his food, vacating his guardianship over the rune, but he's not at all hungry and the maid leaving his dinner doesn't seem to do anything other than deposit a tray of bread and graqes on the floor at the top of the stairs.

Is it just better to forget all about that rune if not intent on killing the guy outright - especially with my miniscule 3 sleep darts?! Anyone managed to get this guy on a clean-hands or no-detect run?