Quite a fun puzzle! My time today was 38:33, solver number 54.

I thought early on about coloring the three sets of renban lines. That helped me spot which center digit (258) was which along the other set of digits, which in turn led me to a few places that saw all three of the 258 options, reducing possibilities in those places. After limiting some of the digits along the region sum lines, I turned my attention there, iterating through all the possible sums and missing digits. For me, this took up a lot of time. I like your more analytical approach of finding where the even digits could go, which could have saved me a lot of time here. My time was 47:23, solver number 170.

I started the puzzle before watching the video, and didn't read the instructions. That led me to believe that the big rectangle was a set of between lines, rather than double arrows. I got about ten minutes in before recognizing that something was wrong and double-checking the rules, then restarted. I used what I learned the first time through regarding the middle column. I did pause after a few minutes, to take care of something away from the computer. So I watched the start of the video from across the room, and was fascinated to hear about your process for making videos. A lot of work goes into that! I was still away from the computer when you explained that the solid black dot isn't a normal kropki dot, but a 7-difference dot. So I started over again, carrying a bit of what I'd learned about the double arrow lines but completely disregarding what I'd learned about the center column. The third time through, I actually completed the puzzle, with a time of 11:40, solver number 244. My total time of all three attempts, though, was somewhere in the 25 to 30-minute range.

Not sure my exact time as I had several interruptions and didn't stop the clock on some of them, but the clock showed right at 2 hours. It was slow going for me. I did a little coloring, but didn't see any useful coloring beyond the ren/rab lines. I did like that bit of logic. It was interesting rules that the groupings couldn't repeat. Other than that, it did feel a little like bifurcation in ruling out the possibilities for the sum lines. The dots were the least useful until towards the end. Now to see what I missed.

40 some minutes (after your got that 5 in the circle in middle of col7, Slueth). A nice look into your workings. (Music and thumbnail and all) Good job 😅

What a genius puzzle. I fell sleep trying it the first time. Woke up, did things, remembered the puzzle and decided to watch the video. When I saw the title and Sleuth considerations about the puzzle, I thought "hummm maybe I am not dumb, maybe this puzzle demands some tricks". So I decided to try it again and solved it!!! Pure satisfaction.

I love your channel! Happy anniversary Sleuth - here's to many more :)

First: Congratulations for the first aniversary of your channel! I am super happy to had find it!! Having your company every day is such a joy!!! 🎉🎉🎉 Second: you are very smart person! Doing all this stuff is unbelivable. Especially about the music, that is fantastic. It is something that I can't do so it was interesting to hear you talking about it! 🎶 Third: thank you for showing some of the behind the scenes! It was very entertaining! 🤓 Sudoku: it was fun! But I had to do all the pencilmarks possible to find the solution because I could not find the right pairs! 😅 See you tomorrow!! Thank you for another day! 🤗

What a puzzle! I got it easy at the start, the logic about the renbans ans the nabners were easy to me (123, 456 and 789 were standard, and we need 258 in the both mids). The sum line were harder but doable ( I usually colour some cells of the grid with a bright colour - like pink - and the digits there are the ones that I am thinking, like a memoir). The white dots were much harder. But the 9 at 1:03:41 was something that I should've spoted on my own solve 😅 Thanks for the solve!!

I used the black dot as a 2:1 ratio and got a different final solution but it also worked!

00:30:53

Maybe one day I'll have the stamina for this type of puzzle, but certainly not today. I just watch and try to learn.

Another great puzzle. Thanks for a fantastic year !!!!!!

I thought the black dot was a kropki dot as I couldn't see any number on it. Once, I watched the beginning of your solve and heard you say "it is a difference of 7", well that changed everything.

Well, thank you for a fabulous year of sudokus!

30:41 :) Congrats on your anniversary. Your channel has become my go to for sudoku in recent months.

21:28 solving time for me. right column where you had middle circle 345 was possible very quickly to understand it must be 5 as 3 is too small and 4 is too close teoretically minimum so this is going to break things. Teoretical minimum i mean 6 digits to sum up 23 and we cant use digit 4. Now there is aready 37 more solves.

at 33:16, where are you getting this ‘difference of 7’ . I’m confused. Isn’t black dot a 2:1 ratio?

20:32 ... really enjoyed it

Fascinating! Do you have musical training? (I'm guessing "yes". Lydian Mode is not something that drops easily into most conversations.) Did you compose the outro theme? I've been trying to place it. Keep up the inspired work!

Very nice puzzle and solve , not as difficult as it looked at first glance really , made a mess of it to start off though by mistaking the black dot for a kropki.

This was very interesting, especially music and thumbnail creation. I hope you remain a Sudoku detective for a long time!

I'm glad you are succeeding, Sleuth. You are an inspiration to me for opening my own channel somewhere in the future.

The link to play takes you to yesterdays puzzle.

You have the wrong puzzle in the description.

29:26 good puzzle

00:56:05 Loved this puzzle

This video is boring and a waste of my time. Not gonna bother . If you ever watch Unshackling Sudoku, on some harder puzzles they have already solved the thing before filming, and act as a guide thru the tough puzzle.

With every attempt with the 1-2 pair, you entered the same digit in r2c4 and r8c6, without 'noticing' it.. Which would have brought you the 258 in box 5, row5, and the 3-6 kropki in box 5

Wow!!! This was a monster! Stunning construction but so difficult! Great persistence for the solve. We wound up colouring the 258s sooner than you did, which gave some insights on how they pair up on the diamonds. That let us restrict the kropki in b3, rule 5 out of one colour, place the 36 on the kropki in box 4. The next chunk of logic for us was realizing that all of the evens had to appear somewhere on the RSLs, so colouring the possible locations of r2c2 and r8c6 on the RSLs, together with parity, let us determine that the kropki in b8 had to be 48. It didn't exactly collapse after that, and we did a LOT of checking our progress to reassure ourselves of the deductions. A live solve with chat help would be super fun sometime, though!

When a rule is standard, constructors should stop trying to think up cute wordings.

My word, ' Sleuth - The Movie'......... this was one difficult solve well done Sleuth.

40:50 the way to see that would have been to understand that all even numbers including blue and yellow have to go on one of the blue lines. placing them sorts them out. I dont quite see, why you are suddenly in a hurry to replace your colors with numbers.

12:00 instead of casing it. it would be more interesting to calculate it. so if you assume that all blue segments add up to the same number that means the missing number must be 1 mod 4 (i.a. 1,5 or 9) because 45 is 1 mod 4. with r3c2 is a 4th of the sum of the digits on blue.

finished in 12 mins. Great puzzle! Jk didn’t even bother trying. This puzzle is evil

I got time 67:16 but i taken one digit to blue line as i feeled otherways i will just stare more than hour with few pencil markings and no digits

Amazing to watch this Sleuth! This appears to be a very hard puzzle and your logic to ascertain the limited numbers on the renban/nabner was bang on. Well done indeed! 👏👏👏

@5:47 I think you're right, wondering about those blue lines. I think they're the same, Slueth, but it's hard to tell.? I'll be solving along, though. I have a feeling, Slueth, that at some point you're going to say: "Okay, let's make them the same, and see what happens?" Solving along, though, Slueth . 😅

Real fast puzzle using the Sven calculator. Very fun, thanks!

Wow! Solver 1000 with a time of 16 minutes and 16 seconds! The logic was quick and smooth like putting butter on hot toast! Speaking of, time for breakfast...cookies and milk. Not the healthiest, but they do look delicious on the counter here...

30:47 slow but no real problems

Please have a very good laugh on me. I took just over 40 minutes. Maybe it had to do with the fact that I marked some of the dots with 1248 and for about 20 minutes couldn't see how to reduce them because if 8 was allowed, then it left two possibilities that could not be disambiguated in any form or fashion due to the fog hiding other clues. Once I slapped myself silly and removed the 8s the puzzle resolved rather quickly during the last 20 minutes. Cheers!

Took me a half hour. I kept mentally putting black dots where there aren't any.

Thanks for a great puzzle

A nice leisurely 58 minutes. Didn't really feel like I was "Circling the Drain", though. Maybe I missed a bit of logic that would have made it flow smoother? I did have sound logic at each point and I did wrap around the board a few times, but it was more bouncing like a stick was stuck in the flow knocking me about...Anyway, it was fun, still.

10:44 really fun puzzle along my morning coffee

Clearly I missed the basic trick that you and others saw because it took me so long and I felt very proud of myself for getting it out ha ha!! I really enjoyed this puzzle (Like all Will Power ones!) so thanks so much for posting it!

Great puzzle. It took me a bit to realize the title gives a hint on where to begin. My total solve time 20:39