Round 6 had puzzles that were all combinations of different types of puzzles. There were some interesting ideas, but I doubt many of these will be seen more often again in future puzzle sets.
There's a few puzzles in here that I'm pretty happy with. The Starwacky puzzle is a nice solve. Snail on Snake worked out pretty well because it didn't need any extra given numbers, except for the head and tail. Galaxies and Tetrominoes is my favourite in the set, because it really forces the two types to work together.
The other puzzles should also be nice to solve.
Showing posts with label Pentomino. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Pentomino. Show all posts
Saturday, 24 November 2018
Tuesday, 19 April 2016
Polish Puzzle Championship 2016
Last weekend were the Polish Sudoku and Puzzle Championships. Jan Mrozowski won the Sudoku event and Przemysław Dębiak won the Puzzle event. You can find all the puzzles in the following links: Sudoku and Puzzle. My puzzles are round 2.
I provided one of the rounds for the puzzle championships. I've kept the same structure that I've used for the last two year with a smaller, easier and a larger harder puzzle of each type. I think it works well for these championships. I've been trying to run through different genres each year. So this year I again used nine different genres. I think it resulted in a good mix of different types.
Puzzles can be found below.
I provided one of the rounds for the puzzle championships. I've kept the same structure that I've used for the last two year with a smaller, easier and a larger harder puzzle of each type. I think it works well for these championships. I've been trying to run through different genres each year. So this year I again used nine different genres. I think it resulted in a good mix of different types.
Puzzles can be found below.
Thursday, 18 February 2016
Puzzle #184: Pentominous
This is the twelfth practise puzzle for this year's UKPA Open.
This was the simplest choice for the pentomino division. I like these puzzles. I wrote a few for the Dutch puzzle association, tow of which have appeared on the site so far. Most these were tricky though, so I tried to keep the puzzles a bit easier. There's a few little insights needed to solve this puzzle, but I think it solves nicely though.
Rules:
Divide the grid into pentominos, so that no two pentominos of the same shape share an edge. Rotations and reflections are considered the same shape. Letters in the grid indicate that this cell is part of a pentomino of that shape. Pentominos may contain multiple letters or no letter at all.
This was the simplest choice for the pentomino division. I like these puzzles. I wrote a few for the Dutch puzzle association, tow of which have appeared on the site so far. Most these were tricky though, so I tried to keep the puzzles a bit easier. There's a few little insights needed to solve this puzzle, but I think it solves nicely though.
Rules:
Divide the grid into pentominos, so that no two pentominos of the same shape share an edge. Rotations and reflections are considered the same shape. Letters in the grid indicate that this cell is part of a pentomino of that shape. Pentominos may contain multiple letters or no letter at all.
Example
Puzzle
Thursday, 11 February 2016
Puzzle #180: Slitherlink; Filled Loop
This is the eighth practise puzzle for this year's UKPA Open.
This is what I feel is another inherently hard type. So I tried to at least create a few openings that were all based on purely Slitherlink logic. there is a point in the end usually where you aren't as free in choosing your Slitherlink clues as you still need to fit in all pentominos. I think in the end this one gets a bit harder, but if you take into account the "no three can meet" rule, you should still be able to work through.
Rules for Slitherlink
In this Slitherlink the loop has to be completely filled with the given pentominos. Each pentomino must be used exactly once. They may be rotated and reflected. Pentominos may only touch each other by a single edgNowhere do three or more pentominos meet at a point.
This is what I feel is another inherently hard type. So I tried to at least create a few openings that were all based on purely Slitherlink logic. there is a point in the end usually where you aren't as free in choosing your Slitherlink clues as you still need to fit in all pentominos. I think in the end this one gets a bit harder, but if you take into account the "no three can meet" rule, you should still be able to work through.
Rules for Slitherlink
In this Slitherlink the loop has to be completely filled with the given pentominos. Each pentomino must be used exactly once. They may be rotated and reflected. Pentominos may only touch each other by a single edgNowhere do three or more pentominos meet at a point.
Example
Puzzle
Thursday, 4 February 2016
Puzzle #176: Pentomino In A Box
This is the fourth practise puzzle for this year's UKPA Open.
Originally this was going to be Pentomino Areas. But when I remembered this type, I had the option to push that down to Tetromino Areas. The first puzzles of this type I've seen are form Richard Stolk. I always find them a bit tricky. I was a bit afraid including this type as I thought they might turn out too hard. I wrote a number of these puzzles and selected the two I thought were easiest. This is the hardest of the two because it has a bit narrower a path. It also felt a bit different than I normally encounter in this type. I thought this was actually easier than normal.
Rules:
Place the given pentominos in the grid so they don't touch each other, not even diagonally. Pentominos can be rotated and reflected. Each black-bordered region must contain three coloured cells that belong to two different pentominos.
Originally this was going to be Pentomino Areas. But when I remembered this type, I had the option to push that down to Tetromino Areas. The first puzzles of this type I've seen are form Richard Stolk. I always find them a bit tricky. I was a bit afraid including this type as I thought they might turn out too hard. I wrote a number of these puzzles and selected the two I thought were easiest. This is the hardest of the two because it has a bit narrower a path. It also felt a bit different than I normally encounter in this type. I thought this was actually easier than normal.
Rules:
Place the given pentominos in the grid so they don't touch each other, not even diagonally. Pentominos can be rotated and reflected. Each black-bordered region must contain three coloured cells that belong to two different pentominos.
Example
Puzzle
Wednesday, 16 April 2014
Polish Puzzle Championships 2014: Team Round
This post will contain the puzzles I provided for the Team Round of the Polish Puzzle Championships. It wasn't an official round but a fun thing to do during the evening. Zoltan Horvath had contacted me if I had time to help working on a team round. as I had just finished my individual round, I figured I could. Zoltan came up with the idea of a Puzzle Labyrinth, where you needed to find your way through the labyrinth by solving puzzles and getting a clue to which would be a next puzzle. Eventually this evolved into a labyrinth where the puzzles were missing from the labyrinth and you had to place them back in the labyrinth. We decided to split the puzzles up into four categories, which would be marked in the empty labyrinth.
On Zoltan's suggestion we gave eachother 8 puzzle types, 2 per category, to write and we could choose one puzzle type ourselves. I gave Zoltan Tapa, Yajilin, Thermometers, Haido, LITS, Regional Akari, Yin Yang and Crossing Loop to write. He chose Lighthouses, First Seen Corral, Loop Extra and L-Dissection to write. He gave me Cave/Corral, Number Sea, Grades, Catloop, Retrograde Battleships, Star Battle, Masyu and Penta Blokus to write. I chose to write Kurotto, Laser, Tetromino Areas and Finnish Snake. Most puzzles had no restrictions, except that they shouldn't be too hard. Only the Circles puzzles had the restriction of being monocoloured. This was only a problem for Yin Yang and Masyu as those normally have multiple coloured circles. The Masyu worked pretty well, but Zoltan's Yin Yang topped that way more in difficulty to create. I was impressed with his puzzle. It was fun to solve. He wrote another harder one too.
When the puzzles were done we had to create a labyrinth. I first wrote one where each puzzle gives you one clue. But that labyrinth turned out too hard, so Zoltan rewrote the labyrinth with two clues per puzzle. This way it was easier to solve.
During competition most teams managed to solve the whole labyrinth, with the quickest doing it within 30 minutes.
You can find the Team Round in the following link.
Besides the Team Round, I will be also adding my harder labyrinth for those who like the challenge. You will have 3 options.
You can choose to solve this first file. [Edit: File updated 19-04-12014 5:25am blog time] It contains all puzzles with correct and incorrect clues. You'll need to solve the puzzles to figure out the correct clues and then use those correct clues to place all the puzzles in the grid.
You can choose to solve this second file. It contains all the correct clues only and no puzzles. It also contains a logical opening on page 3 and the solution on page 4. You can also use this after you get stuck on the first file or to check I didn't make a mistake when setting up the first file.
Lastly you can choose to ignore this challenge and just solve the puzzles or maybe solve the original Team Round with the easier clues.
It's up to you.
Puzzles can be found below. Sorry about the arrows, but didn't feel like redrawing the images for the blog.
On Zoltan's suggestion we gave eachother 8 puzzle types, 2 per category, to write and we could choose one puzzle type ourselves. I gave Zoltan Tapa, Yajilin, Thermometers, Haido, LITS, Regional Akari, Yin Yang and Crossing Loop to write. He chose Lighthouses, First Seen Corral, Loop Extra and L-Dissection to write. He gave me Cave/Corral, Number Sea, Grades, Catloop, Retrograde Battleships, Star Battle, Masyu and Penta Blokus to write. I chose to write Kurotto, Laser, Tetromino Areas and Finnish Snake. Most puzzles had no restrictions, except that they shouldn't be too hard. Only the Circles puzzles had the restriction of being monocoloured. This was only a problem for Yin Yang and Masyu as those normally have multiple coloured circles. The Masyu worked pretty well, but Zoltan's Yin Yang topped that way more in difficulty to create. I was impressed with his puzzle. It was fun to solve. He wrote another harder one too.
When the puzzles were done we had to create a labyrinth. I first wrote one where each puzzle gives you one clue. But that labyrinth turned out too hard, so Zoltan rewrote the labyrinth with two clues per puzzle. This way it was easier to solve.
During competition most teams managed to solve the whole labyrinth, with the quickest doing it within 30 minutes.
You can find the Team Round in the following link.
Besides the Team Round, I will be also adding my harder labyrinth for those who like the challenge. You will have 3 options.
You can choose to solve this first file. [Edit: File updated 19-04-12014 5:25am blog time] It contains all puzzles with correct and incorrect clues. You'll need to solve the puzzles to figure out the correct clues and then use those correct clues to place all the puzzles in the grid.
You can choose to solve this second file. It contains all the correct clues only and no puzzles. It also contains a logical opening on page 3 and the solution on page 4. You can also use this after you get stuck on the first file or to check I didn't make a mistake when setting up the first file.
Lastly you can choose to ignore this challenge and just solve the puzzles or maybe solve the original Team Round with the easier clues.
It's up to you.
Puzzles can be found below. Sorry about the arrows, but didn't feel like redrawing the images for the blog.
Saturday, 5 April 2014
14th 24 Hour Puzzle Championship
This year I wrote a set of puzzles together with Hns Eendebak. I was a bit tight on time with a holiday and other championships that I wasn't sure if I'd be able to write everything in time. I still ran a bit late getting everything together but it was in time for the championship.
This year's championship was won by Peter Hudak. Nikola Zivanovic and Zoltan Horvath finished second and third.
There were 30 competitors total in this year's championship, of which 29 did our set. The set was a bit on the long side this year with the Michael Mosshammer from Austria being the top scorer with 695 points. It would have been better if the top scorer had about 100-150 points more. The set contained 24 puzzles in total, so I should have probably cut 2 puzzles in the end.
In this post I will be adding all the puzzles I wrote. You can find the complete set and all other sets here. If you need to see the instruction booklets for any of the set you can find them in this forum post.
Puzzles can be found below.
This year's championship was won by Peter Hudak. Nikola Zivanovic and Zoltan Horvath finished second and third.
There were 30 competitors total in this year's championship, of which 29 did our set. The set was a bit on the long side this year with the Michael Mosshammer from Austria being the top scorer with 695 points. It would have been better if the top scorer had about 100-150 points more. The set contained 24 puzzles in total, so I should have probably cut 2 puzzles in the end.
In this post I will be adding all the puzzles I wrote. You can find the complete set and all other sets here. If you need to see the instruction booklets for any of the set you can find them in this forum post.
Puzzles can be found below.
Tuesday, 17 September 2013
Czech Team Puzzle Championship
In the weekend of 7-8 September, the Czech Sudoku and Puzzle Teams Championships were held. The championship was held in Brno. The teams competed in a number of team and individual rounds over the weekend. The Sudoku event was won by the team of Michaela Bieliková, Matúš Demiger, Zuzana Hromcová and Jakub Ondroušek. The puzzle event was won by the Hungarian team of Zoltan Horvath, Pal Madarassy, Major Boglár and Zoltan Nemeth. Full results can be found here.
All Sudokus and puzzles of the championship can be found here. I also provided some of the Sudokus and puzzles for that event. This post will contain all my puzzles.
All my puzzles featured in a single round, together with 2 other puzzles. I hadn't written these puzzles to be a complete round and just wrote a number of different puzzles. It was Karel's idea to use them all together. I chose to write a number of common puzzle types, a number of uncommon and a number of variants of common types. So it's a good mix of puzzles to be featured in a single round. They are mostly puzzle types I had written before, so I knew what to do with them. I'm happy how they turned out and think it was a good mix of easy and hard puzzle.
Puzzles can be found below.
All Sudokus and puzzles of the championship can be found here. I also provided some of the Sudokus and puzzles for that event. This post will contain all my puzzles.
All my puzzles featured in a single round, together with 2 other puzzles. I hadn't written these puzzles to be a complete round and just wrote a number of different puzzles. It was Karel's idea to use them all together. I chose to write a number of common puzzle types, a number of uncommon and a number of variants of common types. So it's a good mix of puzzles to be featured in a single round. They are mostly puzzle types I had written before, so I knew what to do with them. I'm happy how they turned out and think it was a good mix of easy and hard puzzle.
Puzzles can be found below.
Monday, 31 December 2012
Puzzle #148: Tapa; Make Room for Pentapa
Happy New Years Samoa and New Zealand.
The number 5 again had to be a pentomino puzzle for me. Last year's comined it with Nurikabe, where this puzzle combines it with Tapa. Other variants like Pentapa and Tapa Pentapool didn't really lend itself well for all 5 clues, but the added region constraint for Pentapa made it easier. I think it worked out well in the end and fits in well with the 5 theme this way.
This puzzle is again medium/hard. There's 2 important steps in the design, although the genre is pretty restrictive, so there might be other ways to the solution.
Rules for Tapa
Follow normal Tapa rules. Additionally, the Tapa wall is made up of 11 of the 12 pentominos (as the P-pentomino breaks a Tapa rule). Each blackbordered region contains exactly one pentomino.
The number 5 again had to be a pentomino puzzle for me. Last year's comined it with Nurikabe, where this puzzle combines it with Tapa. Other variants like Pentapa and Tapa Pentapool didn't really lend itself well for all 5 clues, but the added region constraint for Pentapa made it easier. I think it worked out well in the end and fits in well with the 5 theme this way.
This puzzle is again medium/hard. There's 2 important steps in the design, although the genre is pretty restrictive, so there might be other ways to the solution.
Rules for Tapa
Follow normal Tapa rules. Additionally, the Tapa wall is made up of 11 of the 12 pentominos (as the P-pentomino breaks a Tapa rule). Each blackbordered region contains exactly one pentomino.
Tuesday, 20 November 2012
Puzzle #140: Broken Sudoku
At first I had tried to find a subset of 10 different pentominoes to create two 5x5 squares, but I wasn't able to do it. I'm not sure if it is even possible. It wouldn't be the first time I've tried to do something which wasn't possible at all. I think though that repeated shapes make it a bit more interesting as that gives more options for the 2 puzzles. The puzzle isn't too hard, but you have to remember that shapes can be rotated and mirrored, so you can't be sure of the placement of some numbers as certain pieces have symmetry. For 5x5 Sudokus I think they're pretty nice this way.
Rules for Sudoku
Fit the 10 pentomino pieces in the two 5x5 grids without overlapping. Pieces can be mirrored and rotated. Then solve the resulting Jigsaw Sudokus.
Rules for Sudoku
Fit the 10 pentomino pieces in the two 5x5 grids without overlapping. Pieces can be mirrored and rotated. Then solve the resulting Jigsaw Sudokus.
Tuesday, 13 November 2012
13th 24 Hour Puzzle Championship
The 13th 24 Hour Puzzle Championship was held last weekend. Nikola Zivanovic was the winner, with a close margin over Florian Kirch in second place. Peter Hudak completed the podium finishing third. Full results can be seen here.
I think this set worked out better than last year's. The topscorer in my set was Florian Kirch with 845/1000 points and everyone solving scored at least 100 points.
Opposed to last year, I will release my entire set in a single post. Last year I was still trying to keep up one post a day, but I've let that go for a while now. The post will not contain any examples, but you can see examples of each genre in the instruction booklet. My set is the 12th set, so you'll have to scroll down a bit. The puzzles have their value listed and are valued at about 10 points per minute.
Puzzles can be found below.
I think this set worked out better than last year's. The topscorer in my set was Florian Kirch with 845/1000 points and everyone solving scored at least 100 points.
Opposed to last year, I will release my entire set in a single post. Last year I was still trying to keep up one post a day, but I've let that go for a while now. The post will not contain any examples, but you can see examples of each genre in the instruction booklet. My set is the 12th set, so you'll have to scroll down a bit. The puzzles have their value listed and are valued at about 10 points per minute.
Puzzles can be found below.
Thursday, 4 October 2012
World Puzzle Championship 2012: Round 5 Black and White
This is the last individual round of the day, which is 90 minute round. The round is based around binary determination. A cell is either coloured or empty, a cell is either black or white. There's a few common puzzle types, a few new ideas and a few small variants on common puzzle types. I'm not really sure how this round will go for me as there are many types where the contrustion of the puzzle can really make a difference.
I prepared 3 new types and 2 more common types as practise puzzles. The White Pentamino puzzle is nothing spectacular but I think it's a fun solve. The no mirroring rule is not technically necessary for my puzzle. It still has the standard somewhat innate difficulty pentomino puzzles generally have. The Paint-by variants worked out really nicely in my opinion. It helped me a lot in seeing how these types work. The Tapa and Corral aren't anything spectacular. They were being very stubborn in construction and in the end I decided to just go for something simple.
Hope they are enjoyable.
Puzzles can befound below.
I prepared 3 new types and 2 more common types as practise puzzles. The White Pentamino puzzle is nothing spectacular but I think it's a fun solve. The no mirroring rule is not technically necessary for my puzzle. It still has the standard somewhat innate difficulty pentomino puzzles generally have. The Paint-by variants worked out really nicely in my opinion. It helped me a lot in seeing how these types work. The Tapa and Corral aren't anything spectacular. They were being very stubborn in construction and in the end I decided to just go for something simple.
Hope they are enjoyable.
Puzzles can befound below.
Tuesday, 11 September 2012
Puzzle #130: Pentomino Areas
Pentomino puzzles I have slowly grown into. When I first started puzzling, I always had a lot of trouble solving them. In my early Breinbrekers issues, pentomino were the ones that were most often left unsolved. I prefer the placement type pentomino puzzles over the packing type. I've never been very good at packing problems. I've gotten more proficient at pentomino puzzles over time and now usually enjoy them.
Pentomino puzzles were the first type I regularly contributed to Breinbrekers, where I would write 18x18 Battleship-like puzzles, which used all Pentominos twice. I haven't written them in a while though. They take a while to get unique and solvable.
This pentomino type will appear in the upcoming LMI-test Borders & Beyond written by Prasanna Seshadri, which I was a test solver for. The type can sometimes get me stuck badly. The last time that happened was at the Dutch Puzzle Championship in '06, when it was featured in the semifinals and I couldn't get it done and ended up guessing my way through. Luckily I could catch up on the second puzzle and still qualify for the finals then.
This puzzle has a feature I like to use in puzzle types as all areas are the same size, which isn't common in this puzzle type. I have done the same in LITS as well, although there it was only on an 7x7 and 8x8 size.
Rules:
Place all 12 pentominos once in the grid so they don't touch eachother, not even diagonally. Each blackbordered area contains one pentomino.
Pentomino puzzles were the first type I regularly contributed to Breinbrekers, where I would write 18x18 Battleship-like puzzles, which used all Pentominos twice. I haven't written them in a while though. They take a while to get unique and solvable.
This pentomino type will appear in the upcoming LMI-test Borders & Beyond written by Prasanna Seshadri, which I was a test solver for. The type can sometimes get me stuck badly. The last time that happened was at the Dutch Puzzle Championship in '06, when it was featured in the semifinals and I couldn't get it done and ended up guessing my way through. Luckily I could catch up on the second puzzle and still qualify for the finals then.
This puzzle has a feature I like to use in puzzle types as all areas are the same size, which isn't common in this puzzle type. I have done the same in LITS as well, although there it was only on an 7x7 and 8x8 size.
Rules:
Place all 12 pentominos once in the grid so they don't touch eachother, not even diagonally. Each blackbordered area contains one pentomino.
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| Click to enlarge |
Sunday, 25 March 2012
Puzzle #102: Penta Sight
This pentomino variant is a bit like a mix between Pentopia and Kurodoku puzzles. It currently leans a bit more towards Pentopia, because it implements a no touching rule. I could also make it lean a bit more to Kurodoku and allow diagonal touching and have all white cells form a single contiguous area. But I'll leave that for another try. I might make a seperate rules page if I try this again. Just like to see how people like it now.
Place a number of different pentomino pieces in the grid. Rotations and reflections are considered the same piece. The pieces aren't allowed to touch eachother, not even diagonally. The numbers in the grid indicate how many white cells can be seen from that cell in all horizontal and vertical directions, including the cell itself. Pentomino pieces block their sight.
Rules:
Place a number of different pentomino pieces in the grid. Rotations and reflections are considered the same piece. The pieces aren't allowed to touch eachother, not even diagonally. The numbers in the grid indicate how many white cells can be seen from that cell in all horizontal and vertical directions, including the cell itself. Pentomino pieces block their sight.
Thursday, 1 December 2011
Puzzle #65: Penta Sum
This is one of those standard genres for people who solve the Dutch magazine Breinbrekers. I always like them. And as it added come arithmetic to the puzzle set. I had never actually designed any before. I wanted to make it so there were no equal adjacent digits in the grid, in which I succeeded. Obviously I went for a sum of 24 for this puzzle. I though the grid layout made the place to start obvious, but I don't know you all will agree.
Penta Sum
Divide the grid into the 12 pentominos. The 5 digits in the pentomino must add up to 24. (The example uses tetrominos and the sum is 10.
Penta Sum
Divide the grid into the 12 pentominos. The 5 digits in the pentomino must add up to 24. (The example uses tetrominos and the sum is 10.
Monday, 21 November 2011
Puzzle #55: Penta Pair and Penta Line
I'm posting 2 puzzles today. This is partly because I feel that posting only the Penta Pair puzzle would be a bit silly. They are both Pentomino puzzles. I had a few puzzle ideas ready for a test I was thinking of making, but that never really got off the ground. I might try that again next year as the theme is great. I put in some of the ideas in this test as I thought they were fun and it provided a few shape based puzzles.
The Penta Pair puzzle is a somewhat silly variant on the Pentomino Puddles puzzles. I have never been a fan of Pentomino Puddles puzzles, but I did like this twist on it though. I figured it would be a quick easy points, which you could get if you needed a short break or had a bit of time left at the end. I made a bunch of these puzzles and I think this was a really nice looking shape.
The Penta Line puzzle is just a simple pentomino grid variant. I hadn´t really ever seen the puzzles like this when I made it but have come across a few of them since I made it. This idea was the first draft for my LMI test, but I ended up going with a more traditional Pentomino puzzle type. I figured I could used it for this one now. I rated this puzzle a bit higher as the logic felt trickier to me than other puzzles.
Penta Pair
Determine which 2 pentomino pieces can´t both be placed in the grid without overlapping. Rotating and reflecting is allowed.
I´ve added an example that uses tetrominos.
Penta Line
Place all 12 pentominos in the grid. Rotating and reflecting is allowed. The pieces aren´t allowed to touch eachother, not even diagonally. Certain parts have already been placed.
I´ve added an example with tetrominos.
The Penta Pair puzzle is a somewhat silly variant on the Pentomino Puddles puzzles. I have never been a fan of Pentomino Puddles puzzles, but I did like this twist on it though. I figured it would be a quick easy points, which you could get if you needed a short break or had a bit of time left at the end. I made a bunch of these puzzles and I think this was a really nice looking shape.
The Penta Line puzzle is just a simple pentomino grid variant. I hadn´t really ever seen the puzzles like this when I made it but have come across a few of them since I made it. This idea was the first draft for my LMI test, but I ended up going with a more traditional Pentomino puzzle type. I figured I could used it for this one now. I rated this puzzle a bit higher as the logic felt trickier to me than other puzzles.
Penta Pair
Determine which 2 pentomino pieces can´t both be placed in the grid without overlapping. Rotating and reflecting is allowed.
I´ve added an example that uses tetrominos.
Penta Line
Place all 12 pentominos in the grid. Rotating and reflecting is allowed. The pieces aren´t allowed to touch eachother, not even diagonally. Certain parts have already been placed.
I´ve added an example with tetrominos.
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