Thread - Shading & Loops - 17th to 20th Feb 2017 - Puzzle Ramayan & IPC Qualifier

rob - 2017-02-18 9:31 PM

Apart from the first one, Almost Simple Loop felt more like Outside Yajilin. I thought Bosnian Snake was a bit of an odd choice as a shading puzzle, particularly with Bosnian Road in the second part. Speaking of Bosnian Road, it would have been nice to avoid the differing notions of loop length for the answer code.

Assuming Lake Loop is original (I don't remember seeing it), that one might have been a fun instructionless puzzle, too, though I guess it not being a variant of another of the loop puzzles is an argument against.

The Almost Simple Loop feeling like Outside Yajilin was intended - we wanted to transition from the Simple Loop in last year's PR to something that is like another loop type, but still keeps the link to last year clear.

Last year, when we had a Snake round, some people noted that Snake is also a sub-genre of shading with a mixing in of path constraints. This year we have Pentomino instead of Snake as the specialized round, so it was good to have one snake somewhere and this seemed like a good spot :) Both variants are meant to take something from the other part, Lakes Loop was a step up from Lakes in the Shading side and Bosnian Road was a step up from Bosnian Snake in the Loop side.

Lakes Loop is indeed Nurikabe loop as Tawan pointed out. Since it doesn't have the 2x2 constraint we thought it was ok to name it Lakes loop here, especially to maintain the link to the Lakes type instead of making it feel like bringing in an entirely new type.

These weren't planned beforehand, but after some of Walker's initial submissions it just developed into these ideas.


	@ 2017-02-24 12:28 PM (#22578 - in reply to #22543) (#22578) Top
prasanna16391 Posts: 1801 Country : India	prasanna16391 posted @ 2017-02-24 12:28 PM rob - 2017-02-18 9:31 PM Apart from the first one, Almost Simple Loop felt more like Outside Yajilin. I thought Bosnian Snake was a bit of an odd choice as a shading puzzle, particularly with Bosnian Road in the second part. Speaking of Bosnian Road, it would have been nice to avoid the differing notions of loop length for the answer code. Assuming Lake Loop is original (I don't remember seeing it), that one might have been a fun instructionless puzzle, too, though I guess it not being a variant of another of the loop puzzles is an argument against. The Almost Simple Loop feeling like Outside Yajilin was intended - we wanted to transition from the Simple Loop in last year's PR to something that is like another loop type, but still keeps the link to last year clear. Last year, when we had a Snake round, some people noted that Snake is also a sub-genre of shading with a mixing in of path constraints. This year we have Pentomino instead of Snake as the specialized round, so it was good to have one snake somewhere and this seemed like a good spot :) Both variants are meant to take something from the other part, Lakes Loop was a step up from Lakes in the Shading side and Bosnian Road was a step up from Bosnian Snake in the Loop side. Lakes Loop is indeed Nurikabe loop as Tawan pointed out. Since it doesn't have the 2x2 constraint we thought it was ok to name it Lakes loop here, especially to maintain the link to the Lakes type instead of making it feel like bringing in an entirely new type. These weren't planned beforehand, but after some of Walker's initial submissions it just developed into these ideas.
	@ 2017-02-28 1:30 AM (#22604 - in reply to #22494) (#22604) Top
WA1729 Posts: 65 Country : United States	WA1729 posted @ 2017-02-28 1:30 AM Puzzle Ramayan Shading and Loops has concluded. Congratulations to the top three finishers: Ken Endo, Robert Vollmert, and Hideaki Jo. Also, congrats to the top three finishers from India: Rohan Rao, Swaroop Guggilam, and Rajesh Kumar. Overall, I am happy with how the test went. Thanks to everyone who participated!