@auroux, please check your PM.

Hi,

when I wanted to submit my answers suddenly the website was not reachable. After I tried to refresh it, I could not see anything anymore. Since my home network worked well, I went to logic masters Germany and submitted my answers to Yureklis by personal message (Serkan Yürekli). Since I had only my roughly timed music, I am not sure if I was on time. (But maybe you are generous since I also lost some minutes trying to submit answers in the answer form).

Now the site is back working, so I came here to post this message. The timer says it is over (which is correct since also my music is over ).

Greetings, Nola

PS: I take part regularly on your site, and this never happend before. Hopefully, it was the last time, since I like beeing here.

Hi Nola, we have accepted your answers. You can now check the score page at http://logicmastersindia.com/2013/06S/score.asp

Hi again, thank you very much!!! I liked the sudoku variants very much, since there were really new and nice ideas!

It was a little difficult to get an overview on the points, a table would have been nice (in the PB) or puzzles sorted by point value. Normally I am not able to solve all puzzles but choose the ones I like most, which have mean point value. (I have an idea about why it was done, but still would be thankful about the point information - and not distributed on 21 pages.)

How balanced do you think the puzzle types of this test were?	Fairly balanced
What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles?	A bit hard
What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test?	Very nice
How did you feel about the length / time limit for this test?	Way too many puzzles (too little time)
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did their point values reflect the difficulty/time spent?	Most puzzles were worth the right amount
What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing?	Too many pages / too large grids

Yes, I had the same problem where I had solves one with 2 minutes to spare, but it wouldn't allow me to submit in those last few minutes ... it kept saying I had unsubmitted puzzles, but clicking on submit only showed a little clock for the mouse-cursor. This was around 3:30pm Eastern Time.

Oh well, I was doing very badly anyway

I also had a submitting problem at the end, but reloading the page let me submit *just* before time expired.

I thought this was a very hard test, and making a few mistakes along the way didn't help. Some of the puzzles were really pretty though! I look forward to finding the time to solve the rest of them.

I felt sure that the logidoku led to a contradiction; I really want to figure out what was going on there! I'm very confused right now. I also somehow managed to cause myself problems in the snapshot and didn't have time to go back and try to fix.

How balanced do you think the puzzle types of this test were?	Very skewed
What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles?	A bit hard
What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test?	Very nice
How did you feel about the length / time limit for this test?	Way too many puzzles (too little time)
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did their point values reflect the difficulty/time spent?	Many puzzles were worth too much or too little
What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing?	Just right

The Irregular Bands was very fast for me compared with the point value, but then maybe I guessed a little lucky about which band should go where. The islands also seemed a lot easier than Tripod and Psycho, and I feel like I'm pretty much of a killer specialist anyway. The A or B also felt a little overvalued ... or maybe it's just that the Tripod and Psycho were undervalued.

Quite a lot of hard puzzles, but they certainly look beautiful and had some lovely steps in finding the solutions!

How balanced do you think the puzzle types of this test were?	Fairly balanced
What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles?	A bit hard
What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test?	Very nice
How did you feel about the length / time limit for this test?	A bit too many puzzles
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did their point values reflect the difficulty/time spent?	Most puzzles were worth the right amount
What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing?	I have a different complaint

While not a major complaint and put a contest together is difficult, using consistent formatting - grid size, font type/size, etc. - would be preferred. But think for the effort and the interesting puzzle types.

How balanced do you think the puzzle types of this test were?	A bit skewed
What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles?	A bit hard
What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test?	Average
How did you feel about the length / time limit for this test?	A bit too many puzzles
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did their point values reflect the difficulty/time spent?	All puzzles were worth the right amount
What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing?	I have a different complaint

All puzzles in the booklet should be in the same form (e.g. same size, same font)

Edited by An LMI player 2013-06-24 3:18 PM

How balanced do you think the puzzle types of this test were?	A bit skewed
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
How did you feel about the length / time limit for this test?	A bit too many puzzles
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did their point values reflect the difficulty/time spent?	Many puzzles were worth too much or too little

How balanced do you think the puzzle types of this test were?	Fairly balanced
What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles?	A bit hard
What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test?	Very nice
How did you feel about the length / time limit for this test?	Just right
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did their point values reflect the difficulty/time spent?	All puzzles were worth the right amount
What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing?	Too many pages / too large grids

How balanced do you think the puzzle types of this test were?	A bit skewed
What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles?	A bit hard
What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test?	Average
How did you feel about the length / time limit for this test?	A bit too many puzzles
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did their point values reflect the difficulty/time spent?	Most puzzles were worth the right amount
What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing?	Too many pages / too large grids

I already had the opinion when reading the Instruction Booklet that it would be fairly puzzly. And it was a bit like I expected. I think that just because a latin square has regions, doesn't make it a Sudoku. That's why I would call certain puzzle Regional Skyscraper and Regional Easy as ABC and not Skyscraper Sudoku and Easy as ABC Sudoku.
I have not much a problem with the scores not being known in advance, but if that is the case I feel there should at least be a cover page which has all scores mentioned, so you can find easier/harder puzzles at the moment you want to solve them.
I felt the same as Joshua on the scores for Islands and Bands, while some others took far more effort for their value.
I dropped doing any classics after the first one and realised all of them were weirdly formatted. Honestly, it made me afraid the whole test would be in the first Sudoku's font and I almost stopped solving because of that, as that really didn't work for me and I spend far too much time because I kept not seeing the digits correctly.
I also hope I'll get my points for the half squares sudoku as I hadn't noticed the 0's for empty half squares were supposed to be put in and I don't exactly understand why we would have to. My numbers are in the right squares, so my solution is clearly matching the intended solution.

I do think that all puzzles I solved were really nice to solve, but maybe not all for a Sudoku competition. Half the puzzles I've written for the Daily League I would never suggest putting in a Sudoku competition, but for one time they should still be fun to solve.

How balanced do you think the puzzle types of this test were?	Fairly balanced
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
How did you feel about the length / time limit for this test?	Way too many puzzles (too little time)
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did their point values reflect the difficulty/time spent?	Most puzzles were worth the right amount
What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing?	Too many pages / too large grids

How balanced do you think the puzzle types of this test were?	A bit skewed
What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles?	A bit hard
What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test?	Average
How did you feel about the length / time limit for this test?	Way too many puzzles (too little time)
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did their point values reflect the difficulty/time spent?	Most puzzles were worth the right amount

How balanced do you think the puzzle types of this test were?	A bit skewed
What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles?	Just right
What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test?	Fairly Nice
How did you feel about the length / time limit for this test?	A bit too many puzzles
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did their point values reflect the difficulty/time spent?	Most puzzles were worth the right amount
What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing?	I have a different complaint

Fun fact: when you make your mouse go over a player's timing in the results list, this player's global ranking is displayed. As usual.

Just, it is not the sudoku ranking that is displayed, but the puzzle ranking.

Edited by Ours brun 2013-06-24 8:37 PM

How balanced do you think the puzzle types of this test were?	Fairly balanced
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
How did you feel about the length / time limit for this test?	Way too many puzzles (too little time)
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did their point values reflect the difficulty/time spent?	Most puzzles were worth the right amount
What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing?	Just right

How balanced do you think the puzzle types of this test were?	A bit skewed
What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles?	A bit hard
What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test?	Very nice
How did you feel about the length / time limit for this test?	A bit too many puzzles
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did their point values reflect the difficulty/time spent?	Most puzzles were worth the right amount
What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing?	Too many pages / too large grids

Many points about this test have been discussed, I'll try to post my opinions on each of them.

First, the points not being released. I generally don't do strategy well. Ok, I'm downright horrible. :P So from my perspective this was actually a good thing, because I didn't have to think about what puzzles to solve, and basically just went on what I feel like doing at that moment of the test. I definitely had a better test choice-wise than usual. However, I do believe the average solvers get affected badly by the lack of a points table. Its not good when you have just 3-4 favourites and need to pick the rest and don't know your picks pre-test.

Next, the Classics. I agree this was a bit problematic, but I do believe that, more than the changing font, the problem that should be addressed is the clarity of givens. Changing the font and size is fine as a surprise/adaptability tester, but the basic clarity should be there for the solver to have no problems. I personally had no clarity issues though, so again, from my side at least, I have no problems with this part of the test. Also, I trust that the author team had a good reason for doing this and I'd like to hear that reason before commenting further.

Then, the puzzly variations. Like I said before, over the course of the 8 GPs, I believe it evens out. However, this one as a stand-alone, was definitely dependent on non-Sudoku logic a bit more than usual. I think, it depends on the construction of variants too. The Logidoku for instance, I believe, can become an acceptable Sudoku variation for everyone if it has some givens and say just 5-6 operations. Don't get me wrong, the variants were all beautifully constructed, with some nice logic to them, and were indeed some of my personal favourites, but what I suggest is simply a way to make it more suited for a test targeted at a large Sudoku-loving audience.

Lastly, the Snapshot Sudoku's rotation surprise. I like surprises. I even expressed my support for a surprise in a previous GP. Also, I have no frustration related to this Sudoku because I solved it at leisure and enjoyed it (on the 2nd try anyway). Still, I'm quite certain I'd have been frustrated if I'd done it during the competition. The main reason being, me, and maybe a lot of other people, would've used the "obvious" 9-6 snapshot to start the Sudoku. While in a competition mindset, it certainly would look obvious to most people. Once you place that at the start, you still need the placement of the 2 big snapshots among others to reach a contradiction. So you're basically starting with "oh cool, this is so easy" and then you reach a contradiction, where you either think back, or just leave it. If you think back, you've basically done some unintentional guesswork, and if you leave it, you've lost out on the points here, neither being a desirable result. I really believe that releasing in the rules "Rotation of pieces is allowed" wouldn't have reduced the fun value of this puzzle at all, and would've kept away all criticism, because using the 2 big snapshots is a pretty nice start.

Also, it is important to consider the target audience here. Experimentation and puzzle-like variations are, I think, better to try with an audience that is mostly just people who have been at a WSC/WPC and had a lot of puzzling experience before. But these GPs have attracted many newcomers, and have been planned to attract solvers who are new to this level. Most of these are general thoughts, because within the duration alloted, I actually had fun on this test, which probably had a lot to do with avoiding the Snapshot and not having any clarity issues on the Classics, but still, I had fun. Thanks to the authors for that.

I tried reloading the page, but that had no effect. For those keeping score: I lost 11 points for the Odd Lab.

A great test with great puzzles.
I think it is necessary to have points-distribution before hand, if not, at least have it at a front cover
since I, and likely others, use it as a checklist to see which puzzle should be done next.

How balanced do you think the puzzle types of this test were?	Fairly balanced
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
How did you feel about the length / time limit for this test?	A bit too many puzzles
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did their point values reflect the difficulty/time spent?	Most puzzles were worth the right amount
What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing?	Too many pages / too large grids

How balanced do you think the puzzle types of this test were?	A bit skewed
What was your opinion of the distribution of easy/hard puzzles?	A bit hard
What did you think about the puzzle quality of the test?	Fairly Nice
How did you feel about the length / time limit for this test?	Way too many puzzles (too little time)
Of the puzzles you solved/attempted, how well did their point values reflect the difficulty/time spent?	Many puzzles were worth too much or too little
What was your opinion of the booklet formatting and printing?	I have a different complaint

When I was little, after completing a painful test, my mother used to tell me "Don't worry, if it is hard for you, then it is hard for everyone" :)

First, I want to say that all these points that have been criticized were our personal choice, we wanted to do something different, but it was not appreciated. I'm sorry for that. I have been preparing puzzles for many years and I've often tried to make some innovative efforts in order to enrich the puzzle culture. These different efforts are generally criticized at first, but some of them are eventually accepted.

Months before, when the date of our GP was set, I had already made my mind that it would be something different and I mentioned those to Deb. So the types were selected according to that. We could build the set with many familiar types that everyone would be satisfied, but we chose not to.

About the fonts: Our starting point was the "check the puzzles" round in WSC 2011. Sudokus were built with many different fonts and the purpose was to challenge the visual perception. We used different fonts in classic Sudokus, based on this purpose. There are two points of view here: Solver's point of view and designer's point of view. The solver dislikes any feature that makes solving harder for them. The designer wants to do something different. That round in WSC 2011 was hard for me, I'm not a good solver and those fonts made everyting harder. I did not like that round as a solver. But when I put on my designer hat, I think it's a great idea. So in this test, we thought as a designer and personally I don't regret this choice.

Overall, in this test, there were many features that were deliberately put in order to deform the usual structure. I suppose too many of them came together and that caused so many reactions. Maybe we should not put them altogether, we're sorry for that.

Thanks for your comments,

Serkan

I agree with most of the criticisms that have been said here but at the same time I want to support Serkan, proven innovator in the world of logic. I suppose he and his team member Salih wanted to bring something new again. Good job!

I'm doing fine in logic sudoku variants. When I saw different fonts in first few grids, I thought the whole test is with such crazy fonts. I told myself, "get used to it!" Once I came out of the classics, the font has become normal . Then I quickly flew to see the point distribution and decided to solve in order, as usual. I am personally very happy that I was able to solve snapshot sudoku in the last 10 minutes of the test, which is not in my case with such tricky puzzles. Last week I failed on duello. Zero was completely out of my mind and author's obvious intention was not to show it in the example. The question for discussion is should samples clearly demonstrate all aspects of the rules of the puzzle? Of course, this reduces the author's maneuver for surprising factor, but I think there is still a lot of "legal" ways for good surprise.

And it seems we have 7 different GP winners. That will be a great final round in Beijing!

Nikola

Edited by Nikola 2013-06-25 3:13 AM