5 Sudoku Concepts EVERY Solver Needs To Know

[@SmartHobbies]

Join the Smartie Party now 🥳to get EXCLUSIVE reward puzzle packs, ad free content, discounts, and so much more👉👉www.buymeacoffee.com/timberlakeB/membership Timestamps 0:00 Intro 00:18 It’s Solving Time 00:21 Concept #1 01:42 Puzzle Story 03:38 Concept #2 04:40 Shout Outs Part 1 05:36 Shout Outs Part 2 06:29 Concept #3 11:08 Concept #4 14:21 Concept #5 16:40 Shout Outs Part 3

[@Sg190th]

This felt rewarding. It may have taken 16 minutes, but it's a great lesson on scanning and not just placing a ton of corner marks or center marks. I loved it. Thank you for this.

[@SmartHobbies]

I glad you liked it!

[@JohnRandomness105]

It's a lesson I never learn, at least about centermarking the grid. I try to scan, though.

[@phillipsinger1617]

Thanks!

[@SmartHobbies]

Thank you so much for the Super Thanks, Philip! That is kind of you. I appreciate your support! Look for a shout out on my 31 Jan video! 😁

[@anaayoung9142]

12:07 thank you for this puzzle. I was delight for being able to solve this and find everything that you pointed! Super happy to end the year with this sudoku!!! Thanks for this year and see you next year 😉 Happy New Year Timberlake!!! 🎉🎉🎉 All happiness for you 🤗

[@SmartHobbies]

Happy New Year, Ana! You too!

[@paulakeay4317]

This is an excellent puzzle- so beautifully crafted with a great flow. I do agree it’s tougher than the rating suggests, which is because those hidden techniques were not located where I’d always initially look after a Snyder run through. These are the handmade sudoku that you see hours of crafting and testing in- well done Richard, and thanks for featuring it Timberlake. I watched the CTC version a couple of years back, in awe and thinking it was too hard for me, but today it took 12.55. 😊

[@SmartHobbies]

Lovely comments, Paula. Happy to hear that you enjoyed it and solved it quite easily. 😀

[@DougRansom1]

What app do you recommend for making notes during a solve?

[@SmartHobbies]

Hi Doug. For a more complicated solve, I recommend Hodoku for the desktop. There is a section where you can make notes as you go through more complicated solve. Or possibly a Word document. For my solving videos, I just make a bullet list of solves as I go and write down questions when I get stuck. Hope that helps.

[@NewStreamLine]

Thank you very much for this video. I like Sudoku, but I always solve it by heart and without writing down the auxiliary markers. However, since I am not able to memorize all possible combinations, I cannot solve some difficult Sudoku. However, I hope this video will help me advance at least a little further.

[@SmartHobbies]

Thank you for sharing. I love discovering a new strategy or way of solving a puzzle. I wish you the best on your Sudoku journey.

[@BradJames878]

I wasn't able to finish this puzzle without looking at the video, and even then it took 56 minutes. My puzzle was so bogged down with so many potential candidates filled in that the pointing pair of 1's I had in block 6 didn't stand out enough. Once the video reminded me of that, I was able to finish the puzzle. I don't know who grades these puzzles, but I would move the needle up closer towards "hard."

[@AnonimityAssured]

A lovely puzzle that was quite a challenge, even with notation. I did it a second time without notation, but with the benefit of hindsight. I can't believe how lucky I've been with developing variations on this. There are only 23 of them, but eight have a HoDoKu score of over 10,000, including three with a score of over 20,000. No previous series has ever come close to that. My very first variation had a score of 12,202. Here's a selection, covering a fair range of difficulty: 000400007003050800020600090107000000080060040000000305010002060008010700700008000 Hard (982) (23 givens; no medium techniques; a bit below the lower bound I'd set myself, but close enough.) ========== 000400007003050800020600090107000000080070040000000305040002060008010700700008000 Hard (1482) (23 givens.) ========== 000400007003050800020600090107000000080000040000000305010002060009010700500008000 Hard (1596) (22 givens; same layout as the original.) ========== 000400007003050800020600090107000000080070040000000305090002060008010700700008000 ========== Unfair (1542) (23 givens.) 000400008001050600020300070304006000050000040000200305070003020006040100800005000 Unfair (1768) (24 givens.) ========== 000400007003050800020600090107000000080070040000000305050002060008010700700008000 Extreme (1962) (23 givens; no extreme techniques.) ========== 000400007003050900020600080107000000080060040000000305090003010008040200700005000 Extreme (2812) (23 givens.) ========== 000400008001050600020300070304002000050000040000900305070003020006040100800005000 Extreme (3710) (24 givens.) ========== 000400008001050600020300070304007000050000040000200305070003010006040200800005000 Extreme (4128) (24 givens; no extreme techniques.) ========== 000400007003050900020600080107000000080070040000000305090002060008010700700008000 Extreme (4412) (23 givens; excellent order; no extreme techniques.) ========== Then a few beasts: 000400001003050400020600090107000000080000040000000305010002060009010700600008000 Extreme (12202) (22 givens; same layout as the original, but with more order.) ========== 100400008020050700000300060403007000050000040000900305060003000007040020800005001 Extreme (20684) (24 givens; good order.) 100400008020050600000300070304009000050000040000200305070003000006040020800005001 Extreme (21694) (24 givens; good order; probably my hardest puzzle to date.)

[@SmartHobbies]

Wow, Julian. These are some monster puzzles. I'll have to check them out. Thank you for posting.

[@aliaart2264]

👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾🙏🙏🙏

[@ke9tv]

Same as you up to 12:26. Then I failed to see the pointing triple. So I did an ugly amount of centermarking,. My path: 25 naked pair in column 4 places a 2 in R4C5. Pointing pair of 9's in block 5 places a 9 in R4C2, and 5 finishes the block. 9 is forced in R7C3, leaving a claiming pair of 67 in block 7, 8 in R8C1, 1 in R9C3, 5, in R9C2. Pair of 25s in column 4 is now disambiguated. Column 3 is a full house, 8 goes in R1C3. Scanning places a 2 in R7C7. I finally see a pointing pair of 6s in row 5, leaving naked 17's in box 6, and at long last placing the 9 that you got from the naked triple. From there on it's just cleanup. Nothing advanced here, just stuff that's hard to see right off the rip.

[@davec3689]

Thank you for donating a portion of your earnings. FYI, the accent, in Greek, is on the first syllable of the word agape, so it should be pronounced AH-gah-pay. God bless you and thank you for helping solve sudokus easier. Agape is the Greek word for God's love.

[@SmartHobbies]

I wanted to use this channel to do more good, and AIM is a great organization. Thank you for helping me with my Greek 😀

[@phillipsinger1617]

Any participant in a Sudoku contest who thinks this puzzle is unfair doesn't belong in a contest. I know I am not contest material, and I would consider this puzzle a fair puzzle (one included about 1/3 of the way in a book of medium puzzles.

[@JohnRandomness105]

Too hard for the world Sudoku championship? Yet rated "Medium"? Finned X-wings are in these puzzle are clearly accidental and usually superfluous. In this case, as far as I know it allowed me to cornermark three 4s in block 5. It was, as expected, superfluous in that later on, a 469 triple would have dealt with the 4 in question. The puzzle was nice enough to reveal the occasional pair and triple when I began to feel stuck. 9:40 I found column 6's 17 pair the same way. But I didn't know to zero in on the top cell of that column. Instead, I seemed to be out of heavy houses, and decided on a four-digit house, column 6. Why column 6? I don't really remember. I think the 17 pair attracted me. I flooded the remaining cells with five digits, and whittled them down to the 9 and 2 in the top two cells. 11:30 I try to follow up placing a digit or two with checking the effects. It's a lot harder after placing a run of digits. 12:00 That 378 triple is an embarrassment. I found it -- eventually, but not until after I did a lot of other things, including centermarking the grid -- all the time with that triple sitting there staring at me.

[@rogerweir1772]

I can see a 17 hidden pair in rows 3/6 Col 6....

[@JWilliams-sd1cl]

I keep forgetting pointing pairs

[@SmartHobbies]

They come with practice. Do you solve with app or paper and pencil?

[@JWilliams-sd1cl]

@SmartHobbies i discovered your smart hobbies and following your posts and using the app. Its great practice. If i may, sometimes you explain techniques too fast for me but i just re-watch. KEEP ON SOLVING AND SHARING thanks

[@SmartHobbies]

@ Awesome. Thank you for the feedback. I do appreciate it.

[@jcebo1572]

I do not see any Puzzles for me to Solve.

[@SmartHobbies]

You should see a link in the video description for the puzzle after the first paragraph, and you can solve it on desktop or mobile. Did you find it?