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mikeylyk
Posts: 16
Country : United States | any practice puzzles? also, i checked every link and couldn't find a tutorial, i'm horrible at snake, help? |
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Administrator
Country : India |
Logic Masters India announces Snakes - episode 5 of Puzzle Ramayan 2015-16
Dates : 26 th - 28 th December
Instruction Booklet & Submission : Link
Points table will be published soon.
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Administrator
Country : India | mikeylyk - 2015-12-17 2:34 PM
any practice puzzles? also, i checked every link and couldn't find a tutorial, i'm horrible at snake, help? We have listed some practice materials at the end of Instructions booklet. |
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prasanna16391
Posts: 1779
Country : India | Administrator - 2015-12-20 7:38 AM
mikeylyk - 2015-12-17 2:34 PM
any practice puzzles? also, i checked every link and couldn't find a tutorial, i'm horrible at snake, help? We have listed some practice materials at the end of Instructions booklet.
You can try the practice material and ask here if you need help with any particular puzzle. I can't immediately think of any site with a tutorial. The general tip for snake is to visualize the rough path forced by the clues and then tweak the finer points. Its more of an intuitive type than a fully logical one. |
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mikeylyk
Posts: 16
Country : United States | yes, my weakest style of puzzle...any way to generally improve that intuitive aspect, i'd welcome any suggestions on book or video to help improve intuitive thinking, does everyone have to go through a 6-10 year learning curve to excel?
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Para
Posts: 315
Country : The Netherlands | Para posted @ 2015-12-21 3:45 PM prasanna16391 - 2015-12-20 9:51 AM
Its more of an intuitive type than a fully logical one.
For some maybe ; ). It really doesn't have to be. |
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prasanna16391
Posts: 1779
Country : India | Para - 2015-12-21 3:45 PM
prasanna16391 - 2015-12-20 9:51 AM
Its more of an intuitive type than a fully logical one.
For some maybe ; ). It really doesn't have to be.
Yea, should've said that's how I generally approach it. |
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prasanna16391
Posts: 1779
Country : India | mikeylyk - 2015-12-21 3:11 PM
yes, my weakest style of puzzle...any way to generally improve that intuitive aspect, i'd welcome any suggestions on book or video to help improve intuitive thinking, does everyone have to go through a 6-10 year learning curve to excel?
I haven't gone through 6-10 year learning curves (only been solving for 5 years in total ), so maybe its just about solving more such puzzles. When I was starting out, I would avoid my weakest puzzle for multiple contests and it just stays a weakness. |
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Administrator
Country : India | Points TableInstruction Booklet is re-uploaded with points table. Here it is for your quick reference.
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rob
Posts: 170
Country : Germany | rob posted @ 2015-12-22 1:24 AM For Multiple Snakes, is it really "multiple snakes of different lengths", not "multiple snakes of possibly different lengths"? |
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mikeylyk
Posts: 16
Country : United States | i wanted to mention that your article on slitherlink patterns is awesome
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Swagatam
Posts: 45
Country : India | Could anyone please suggest me how to start and proceed for 'Horse snake' and 'Summed snake'?
In the given example of 'Horse snake' on IB I only can find the positions of the Knight capturing cells. Can't proceed after that. And, can the numbered cells be a part of a snake? |
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ashaash11ash
Posts: 55
Country : India | Swagatam - 2015-12-22 7:55 PM
Could anyone please suggest me how to start and proceed for 'Horse snake' and 'Summed snake'?
In the given example of 'Horse snake' on IB I only can find the positions of the Knight capturing cells. Can't proceed after that. And, can the numbered cells be a part of a snake?
horse snake i have attached a PDF for you to proceed. and for the sum snake. the numbers inside the grid is head and tail of the snake. 1 is the starting point and 21 is the end point indicating the length. the numbers outside indicates the total sum of the snake cells for the particular row it indicates if you draw from 1-21 in the grid. Attachments ----------------  snake.pdf (27KB - 31 downloads) |
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ashaash11ash
Posts: 55
Country : India | rob - 2015-12-22 1:24 AM
For Multiple Snakes, is it really "multiple snakes of different lengths", not "multiple snakes of possibly different lengths"?
it is possibly different lengths. |
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rakesh_rai
Posts: 774
Country : India | ashaash11ash - 2015-12-22 9:16 PM
rob - 2015-12-22 1:24 AM
For Multiple Snakes, is it really "multiple snakes of different lengths", not "multiple snakes of possibly different lengths"?
it is possibly different lengths.
Does that mean there could be more than two snakes with some having equal lengths? |
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ashaash11ash
Posts: 55
Country : India | rakesh_rai - 2015-12-23 8:43 PM
ashaash11ash - 2015-12-22 9:16 PM
rob - 2015-12-22 1:24 AM
For Multiple Snakes, is it really "multiple snakes of different lengths", not "multiple snakes of possibly different lengths"?
it is possibly different lengths.
Does that mean there could be more than two snakes with some having equal lengths?
Ya there can be more than 2 snakes with same length |
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Administrator
Country : India | Updated IB - Rule for Multiple Snakes removes the statement about lengths of the altogether
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? Apply Snake rules; however multiple snakes are there in the grid.
? Head and tail of all snakes are given.
? Different snakes do not touch each other, even diagonally.
>>
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mikeylyk
Posts: 16
Country : United States | i'm at 2 years solving, and still not consistent... i try to practice puzzles as events dictate, but there are always new ones, which i like, but still a lot to learn, i admire you guys so much for your abilities.. normal people have no idea what you guys know and do, amazing... anyway, i will keep practicing, thanks for all you guys do; |
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An LMI player
| An LMI player posted @ 2015-12-26 1:05 AM | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Just right | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Very nice | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Horse Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
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Grizix
Posts: 30
Country : France | Grizix posted @ 2015-12-26 1:20 AM In graffiti snake, can there be 2x2 squares of black cells ? |
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rob
Posts: 170
Country : Germany | rob posted @ 2015-12-26 1:21 AM | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Just right | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Toroidal Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
Thanks! I had a bit of trouble getting started, and struggled with two or three puzzles (the large standard snake in particular; I had something very close to the solution quickly, but had to get there again slowly ). Now to wait and see how much faster other solvers can go. |
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Administrator
Country : India | Grizix - 2015-12-26 1:20 AM
In graffiti snake, can there be 2x2 squares of black cells ? Yes. (Note in Graffiti Snake, black cells refer to non-snake parts. The white cells refer to snake parts, so 2X2 squares of white cells are not allowed )
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achan1058
Posts: 80
Country : Canada | | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Just right | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Very nice | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Graffiti Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
I suck at snakes, though I do think I did better this time around then I do on average. |
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Grizix
Posts: 30
Country : France | Grizix posted @ 2015-12-26 6:27 AM | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Just right | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Average | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Graffiti Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
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chaotic_iak
Posts: 241
Country : Indonesia | | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Just right | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Very nice | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Summed Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
I'm personally not sure why Snakes is a theme by itself (and isn't considered a subtheme of shading or something ), but eh. I'm not very sure either whether the variations represented the theme, but considering I can't think up of decent Snakes variations myself, I'll just say it's good. The puzzles themselves are great. I think some of them have superfluous clues, but then this is aimed to beginners so I'm okay with that. Scoring I'm not very confident, but I think they are roughly correctly scored. Some 1-2 pointers took slightly more time than 3-4 pointers, but not big enough to say it's wrong. I'd probably give the Multiple Snake a bit more points though; it's easily the one that took the most time for me (10 minutes; the other big pointers are 5-6 minutes ). I made stupid mistakes on the first Summed Snake. The first mistake was genuine (note to self: 3+4+5+6 is as 18 as 5+6+7 ); the following four mistakes are silly typoes from reading the wrong columns. That might mean the answer key markers can possibly be larger... or it might just mean that I suck. |
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debmohanty
Country : India | chaotic_iak - 2015-12-26 11:00 AM
I'm personally not sure why Snakes is a theme by itself (and isn't considered a subtheme of shading or something), but eh. Good question. |
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Pratyu2812
Posts: 5
Country : India | | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Too many medium difficult puzzles | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Very nice | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Standard Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
I enjoyed solving even though am quite a beginner : ) Just found it a little hard. Expected considering its a qualifier round for IPC. Was wondering how everyone else solves these puzzles. Would love to know about it! Thanks! |
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Swagatam
Posts: 45
Country : India | | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Just right | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Very nice | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | |
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vopani
Posts: 739
Country : India | vopani posted @ 2015-12-26 7:10 PM | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Too many hard puzzles | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Very nice | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Horse Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
Don't like Snakes in general, but I found this hard. Couldn't get any of the Toroidal ones going. I think the puzzles are excellent, top-notch quality, but not suitable for beginners. Thanks Ashish! |
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vopani
Posts: 739
Country : India | vopani posted @ 2015-12-26 8:02 PM debmohanty - 2015-12-26 11:14 AM
chaotic_iak - 2015-12-26 11:00 AM
I'm personally not sure why Snakes is a theme by itself (and isn't considered a subtheme of shading or something), but eh. Good question.
I agree. Snake can definitely be part of Classics or Evergreens, since it is a single puzzle type.
Initially, we had Word Puzzles as a round, but decided to keep that aside for some reason I don't remember. Maybe next year it might be a good idea to introduce Word Puzzles and fit Snake elsewhere.
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prasanna16391
Posts: 1779
Country : India | We basically felt that we should have one round with a specific but prominent type. While Snake is largely shading based while solving, I think there are certain logical characteristics which differentiate it from other shading puzzles and pull it more towards path puzzles done with shading. Anyway, next year we are most likely to continue the model of having one round for a specific type which is prominently appearing in contests, but has a little bit of a unique feel of its own. |
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prasanna16391
Posts: 1779
Country : India | Pratyu2812 - 2015-12-26 3:11 PM
I enjoyed solving even though am quite a beginner :) Just found it a little hard. Expected considering its a qualifier round for IPC.
Was wondering how everyone else solves these puzzles. Would love to know about it!
Thanks!
I suggest you ask for specific puzzles. Its difficult to give one broad explanation for all of them, but if we explain one or two you may start getting the approach for the rest too. |
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chaotic_iak
Posts: 241
Country : Indonesia | prasanna16391 - 2015-12-26 11:14 PM
We basically felt that we should have one round with a specific but prominent type. While Snake is largely shading based while solving, I think there are certain logical characteristics which differentiate it from other shading puzzles and pull it more towards path puzzles done with shading. Anyway, next year we are most likely to continue the model of having one round for a specific type which is prominently appearing in contests, but has a little bit of a unique feel of its own.
Oh, right, there are also loop/path puzzles. Yes, Snakes belong to either of them. If the reason is "we need a round where there's only one type", then I can't argue with that, okay.
Also, calling that type to be Tapa (for the sole fact that it's the one that I can recall that has many variations ). |
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prasanna16391
Posts: 1779
Country : India | Tapa is definitely an option in future years along with a few others we have in mind :) |
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rakesh_rai
Posts: 774
Country : India | | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Too many medium difficult puzzles | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Very nice | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Horse Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
Solved logically rather than intuitively, and it took a lot more time perhaps than it should have taken. I was too slow and could not even lay hands on any of the toroidals or exploratory ones. But I liked all the puzzles I solved. Somehow my expecatations before the test were high for this test, and I was expecting 80+ points but fell short by a lot in the end. The test turned out a little tougher than expected. |
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swaroop2011
Posts: 668
Country : India | | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Too many medium difficult puzzles | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Very nice | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Summed Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
Another beautiful set of Puzzles. That's surprising that, I am ahead of others in Indian contingent. Thought Rohan would be way ahead. Personally, I don't like snakes and I am very bad at those. But somehow these puzzles i went logically and fluently. Especially I liked the Summed Snake (ALL 4 , didn't had to do lot of calculations and it was more intuitive how the path should go ). Only part where I guessed was the classic SNAKE big one. This test itself was on harder side, but was expected after last easy round. I second Rohan that, I couldn't even do any toroidal (not even smaller ones ). But lets see, will try soon and see if I can still get it. Horse Snake,while practicing i found a nice notation technique for myself (don't know how other solve usually ), which helped a lot and that worked out well during contest too. So horse snake i did pretty smoothly. Graffiti were easy, that was reflected in points as well. Even the variant was small in size so pretty easy. Multiple Snakes, not even got a chance to touch it. Overall wonderful test. Thanks Ashish for the contest. I thought I would do bad, but seems I did pretty well. Let's see how others do. |
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thesubro
Posts: 23
Country : United States | | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Just right | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Very nice | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Toroidal Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
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ghirsch
Posts: 102
Country : United States | ghirsch posted @ 2015-12-27 11:56 AM | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Just right | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Very nice | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Summed Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
Definitely a tougher test for me, but still lots of fun. I broke a lot of the puzzles from trying to go too quickly, but the ones that I did finish I really enjoyed and I'm looking forward to sitting down with them and going through more carefully. I especially liked the summed snakes, and the horse snakes. Those toroidal snakes were brutal though. |
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chaotic_iak
Posts: 241
Country : Indonesia | It's interesting that many people find this test to be tough, since for me I find it pretty easy. (Finished all puzzles in 70 minutes, comparable to last test's 60 minutes.) |
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vopani
Posts: 739
Country : India | vopani posted @ 2015-12-27 4:50 PM chaotic_iak - 2015-12-27 4:39 PM
It's interesting that many people find this test to be tough, since for me I find it pretty easy. (Finished all puzzles in 70 minutes, comparable to last test's 60 minutes.)
I think players have strong and weak areas. I could blaze through the Regions round in 47-minutes whereas I scored just 57 points here after 90-minutes :-|
Also, being a single puzzle type, it widens the points gap between the players.
Besides, you did quite well in SVC 2015 too!
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Administrator
Country : India |
We are facing some unexpected problems with the LMI server. Although the web site is accessible now, some of the features do not seem to be working.
We will post here, when things are back to normal.
All the issues are fixed now, and it is back to normal.
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Administrator
Country : India | Site issues
All the site issues are fixed now, and site is back to normal.
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chaotic_iak
Posts: 241
Country : Indonesia | Rohan Rao - 2015-12-27 7:50 PM
chaotic_iak - 2015-12-27 4:39 PM
It's interesting that many people find this test to be tough, since for me I find it pretty easy. (Finished all puzzles in 70 minutes, comparable to last test's 60 minutes.)
I think players have strong and weak areas. I could blaze through the Regions round in 47-minutes whereas I scored just 57 points here after 90-minutes :-|
Also, being a single puzzle type, it widens the points gap between the players.
Besides, you did quite well in SVC 2015 too!
Oh right, there is SVC just 1.5 months ago. Yes, it might just because I'm stronger in Snakes, although then again I finished SVC in 56 out of 60 minutes and this one in 71 out of 90 minutes, meaning this should be slightly easier than SVC. But I already forgot how difficult SVC was. Oh well. Still a good test regardless of difficulty. |
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greenhorn
Posts: 164
Country : Slovakia | Administrator - 2015-12-27 7:33 PM
We are facing some unexpected problems with the LMI server. Although the web site is accessible now, some of the features do not seem to be working.
We will post here, when things are back to normal.
All the issues are fixed now, and it is back to normal.
I have started the competition around 15:30 GMT+2, few minutes before the breakdown, so I could not submit my solutions. It is not important now, I just want to mention that I still cannot read the comments and observe the results. |
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ghirsch
Posts: 102
Country : United States | ghirsch posted @ 2015-12-28 8:27 AM chaotic_iak - 2015-12-26 5:39 PM
It's interesting that many people find this test to be tough, since for me I find it pretty easy. (Finished all puzzles in 70 minutes, comparable to last test's 60 minutes.)
One thing I personally find difficult about snakes is that it often leads me to trying intuitive solves, and I'm still not great with that during competitions. If everything goes well then great, it's fast, but if not I have to decide how much time to spend trying to tweak the solution, or scrapping portions of it, or just moving on to other puzzles, and I sometimes end up wasting a lot of time. That's more of just a personal thing though that I need to fix, not anything inherently difficult about the type. After looking through the puzzles again though I agree with you that most of them weren't too difficult (though I still think that some of those toroidal snakes were pretty tricky ). |
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AndreyBogdanov
Posts: 44
Country : Russia | What is the duration of the test? Sorry for silly question, but I couldn't find this in the instruction booklet. |
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wgryciuk
Posts: 24
Country : Poland | | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Too many hard puzzles | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Very nice | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Toroidal Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
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vopani
Posts: 739
Country : India | vopani posted @ 2015-12-28 3:38 PM AndreyBogdanov - 2015-12-28 2:26 PM
What is the duration of the test? Sorry for silly question, but I couldn't find this in the instruction booklet.
Thanks for pointing it out. The duration is 90-minutes.
Timings are mentioned on the submission page too: http://logicmastersindia.com/PR/201512/
The line about timings seems to have got deleted from the IB. It is present in the previous PR rounds.
It will be added from the next round again.
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rajeshk
Posts: 542
Country : India | rajeshk posted @ 2015-12-28 6:09 PM | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Too many medium difficult puzzles | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Very nice | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Graffiti Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
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Administrator
Country : India | Contest extended
Due to the issues with the site, the contest has been extended by 48 hours.
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shankarsudhir
Posts: 6
Country : India | Just wanted to confirm if the deadline for the test has been extended by an extra two days ? |
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AndreyBogdanov
Posts: 44
Country : Russia | | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Too many easy puzzles | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Fairly Nice | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Summed Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Many puzzles were worth too much or too little | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
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AndreyBogdanov
Posts: 44
Country : Russia |
Thank you. Sorry, I didn't understand, that I can click on the "Timing" word. Edited by AndreyBogdanov 2015-12-28 9:02 PM
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Administrator
Country : India | shankarsudhir - 2015-12-28 8:20 PM
Just wanted to confirm if the deadline for the test has been extended by an extra two days ? That is right. |
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bob
Posts: 59
Country : United States | bob posted @ 2015-12-28 10:43 PM | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Too many hard puzzles | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Fairly Nice | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Graffiti Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth too much or too little | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
Well, that was annoying. I'll be honest, I have never cared much for snake puzzles--too much intuition (=bifurcation for me ). I solved all of the grafitti snake puzzles, which seem the most logical. I did the first three regular snakes. I wasted about 30 minutes on the last one but never got the right combination of turns. I then wasted about 30 minutes on the first "easy" toroidal snake and got nowhere. Summed snake--all the "fun" of trial and error combined with lots of arithmetic? No thanks, and there was no time anyway. Ugh, thoroughly frustrating and now I dislike snake puzzles more than ever. To those that can magically do these, kudos to you! |
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AndreyBogdanov
Posts: 44
Country : Russia | Summed snake--all the "fun" of trial and error combined with lots of arithmetic? For my opinion summed was most logical puzzles in this contest. |
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BohemianCoast
Posts: 16
Country : United Kingdom | I'm feeling a tiny bit hard done by because I started the contest, the site crashed almost immediately (as I was entering my first answer) and didn't come back until long after my 90 minutes were up. No worries really; I'm rubbish at Snake puzzles anyway. |
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Bram28
Posts: 35
Country : The Netherlands | Bram28 posted @ 2015-12-29 2:49 AM Not a good time for my printer to refuse printing ... had to do them all by hand. Oh well! Nice puzzles anyway!! |
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prasanna16391
Posts: 1779
Country : India | Bram28 - 2015-12-29 2:49 AM
Not a good time for my printer to refuse printing ... had to do them all by hand. Oh well! Nice puzzles anyway!!
Interesting. If my printer had issues I'd just do this on MS Paint. In fact, I was debating with myself about solving this round on paint because I actually thought I'd be faster, but then I thought solving on paper will help me more with offline competitions and went with that. Still, I personally think Snake is a puzzle which can be done with the fill option on paint. The only variant from the contest for which I'd say its better on paper is Summed Snake. Our notations while solving the puzzle probably differ though. |
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Pratyu2812
Posts: 5
Country : India | Taking basic snakes puzzle , when there are numbers outside the box, say 5 , what I generally do is find combinations : 2+3/ 3+2, 4+1/1+4 and find similar combinations with other rows/columns and with trial and error fit it in.
Is there any other logical way to work around? Maybe knowing this will help me with other puzzles too. |
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swaroop2011
Posts: 668
Country : India | Pratyu2812 - 2015-12-29 8:28 AM
Taking basic snakes puzzle , when there are numbers outside the box, say 5 , what I generally do is find combinations : 2+3/ 3+2, 4+1/1+4 and find similar combinations with other rows/columns and with trial and error fit it in.
Is there any other logical way to work around? Maybe knowing this will help me with other puzzles too.
Yes, there are quite a few ways or few places to look for.
For classic snakes,
1 ) Look where the head of snake can move
2 ) Look where the tail of snake can move
3 ) Look for Big number clues
4 ) Look for group of clues together in adjacent rows.
Of course most of solvers , visualize an rough sketch of path as well. But for this contest at least, you don't need that, it moves logically all puzzles.
But in generally knowing these techniques is not enough, but applying it. So in particular if you face any issues for any puzzle, post that and puzzlers here will help you through solving it. |
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anithra
Posts: 5
Country : India | anithra posted @ 2015-12-29 2:31 PM First timer . Will the solutions be posted?. |
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swaroop2011
Posts: 668
Country : India | anithra - 2015-12-29 2:31 PM
First timer . Will the solutions be posted?.
yes , after the test is over. |
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Hotel
Posts: 11
Country : Japan | Hotel posted @ 2015-12-29 2:42 PM | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Just right | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Very nice | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Graffiti Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
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anithra
Posts: 5
Country : India | anithra posted @ 2015-12-29 2:52 PM Great!. Thank you. |
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Hotel
Posts: 11
Country : Japan | Hotel posted @ 2015-12-29 5:01 PM In this test, I think toroidal snake is most difficult. In particular I couldn't find even the first step of two puzzles on page 6. Anyone knows how to start? |
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debmohanty
Country : India | Hotel - 2015-12-29 5:01 PM
In this test, I think toroidal snake is most difficult. In particular I couldn't find even the first step of two puzzles on page 6. Anyone knows how to start?
We are planning to document steps for as many puzzles in this contest, but that will take a while.
In the mean time, here are the steps for Toroidal - 3 (9X9 )
(Logic and images from Prasanna )
| Step 1 : The snake can not turn left from R2C2 because of the 7 clue of column 3. |  | | Step 2 : Since column 2 acts like a border, column 1 will have 5 contiguous cells. We can mark 4 of them. |  | | Step 3 : Column 9 has 2 snake cells. They can not be any of rows 1,2,3 |  | | Step 4 : Considering the 2 clue of Row4 and 2 clue of column 9, the snake can not go to R4C1 from R5C1. Instead it must turn and go to R5C9, and then further to R5C8. |  | Step 5 : The snake must go to R9C9 from R9C1, and then further to R9C8.
Also, only one of R1C3 and R3C3 can be a snake cell. There will be remaining 5 snake cells in column 3. Since column 2 acts as a border, these 5 cells have to be contiguous |  | | Step 6 : No more snake cells in row 7. Only one way to put the remaining 2 cells in row 6. |  | | Step 7 : Minor book-keeping should lead to the final solution. |  |
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Hotel
Posts: 11
Country : Japan | Hotel posted @ 2015-12-29 7:56 PM debmohanty - 2015-12-29 6:47 PM
Hotel - 2015-12-29 5:01 PM
In this test, I think toroidal snake is most difficult. In particular I couldn't find even the first step of two puzzles on page 6. Anyone knows how to start?
We are planning to document steps for as many puzzles in this contest, but that will take a while.
In the mean time, here are the steps for Toroidal - 3 (9X9 )
Thanks a lot! It's really useful for me to learn some techniques.
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puzzlemad
Posts: 28
Country : United Kingdom | Thanks. As always an enjoyable set - and no answer key mistakes from me either |
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kiwijam
Posts: 187
Country : New Zealand | kiwijam posted @ 2015-12-30 3:55 AM prasanna16391 - 2015-12-29 12:10 PM
Interesting. If my printer had issues I'd just do this on MS Paint. In fact, I was debating with myself about solving this round on paint because I actually thought I'd be faster, but then I thought solving on paper will help me more with offline competitions and went with that. Still, I personally think Snake is a puzzle which can be done with the fill option on paint. The only variant from the contest for which I'd say its better on paper is Summed Snake. Our notations while solving the puzzle probably differ though.
I did the first couple of classics in Paint while I waited for the printer to print (which is why I had a wrong submission, I didn't colour in the first tail cell specifically and thought it was empty when entering the answer key...! )
But I think all of Horse, Toroidal and Summed benefit from extra notation (Toroidal especially, I like to replicate the cells on the far sides of the grid to better visualize what the snake is doing ) so decided that paper solving was best. |
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prasanna16391
Posts: 1779
Country : India | kiwijam - 2015-12-30 3:55 AM
prasanna16391 - 2015-12-29 12:10 PM
Interesting. If my printer had issues I'd just do this on MS Paint. In fact, I was debating with myself about solving this round on paint because I actually thought I'd be faster, but then I thought solving on paper will help me more with offline competitions and went with that. Still, I personally think Snake is a puzzle which can be done with the fill option on paint. The only variant from the contest for which I'd say its better on paper is Summed Snake. Our notations while solving the puzzle probably differ though.
I did the first couple of classics in Paint while I waited for the printer to print (which is why I had a wrong submission, I didn't colour in the first tail cell specifically and thought it was empty when entering the answer key...! )
But I think all of Horse, Toroidal and Summed benefit from extra notation (Toroidal especially, I like to replicate the cells on the far sides of the grid to better visualize what the snake is doing ) so decided that paper solving was best.
Ah, I forgot about Toroidal. I'm generally just good with those without replicating the cells, and it was the same here. |
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An LMI player
| An LMI player posted @ 2015-12-30 6:06 PM | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles? | Too many hard puzzles | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Average | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Horse Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
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An LMI player
| An LMI player posted @ 2015-12-31 5:46 AM | How well did the variants represent the theme of the test ? | variations represented the theme well | | | What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test? | Fairly Nice | | | Which set of puzzles did you like the most? | Summed Snake | | | Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did the point values reflect the difficulty? | Most puzzles were worth the right amount | | | What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing? | Just right | |
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Administrator
Country : India | |
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Administrator
Country : India | |
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debmohanty
Country : India | Solutions appended to puzzle booklet. |
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ashaash11ash
Posts: 55
Country : India | Congrats to EKBM, Uvo and Deu for top 3 places. congrats to Prasanna, Amit and Swaroop for top 3 India. Thanx to all 173 participants.
Thanks to deb for giving me the opportunity to conduct the contest. the contest was on a tough side. Toroidal seemed to be the toughest in this contest. there were 22 participants who submitted all the 22 puzzles correctly :)
hoped u all enjoyed the contest. Thanks |
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Administrator
Country : India | Steps for Snake - 1
1. The snake has not go up from R7C5, otherwise the 6 clue of row 6 can not be satisfied.
2. At R6C5, the snake has to turn right.
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Administrator
Country : India | Steps for Snake - 2
If the snake passes through R3C1, that end will meet R2C3. No further snake parts are possible in the right side region, so the 3s of R2/3/4 can not be satisfied.
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Administrator
Country : India | |
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Administrator
Country : India | |
