The Begging Man - A Sudoku Masterpiece

** TODAY'S PUZZLE **
A special sudoku today to celebrate the constructor's birthday! It's Lizzy01's day to have chocolate cake and we try her sudoku The Begging Man - which has the simplest ruleset we've tried for a while. This is such a gorgeous sudoku too - try and have a go at it if you have time.
Play the puzzle at the link below:
app.crackingthecryptic.com/su...
Rules:
Normal sudoku rules apply. Along thermometers, digits increase from the bulb end.
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[@neil2796]

The lack of highlighting of the bulb in c7 bothered me.

[@DWestheim]

I appreciate how well the X-wing was phoned in. Even I could see it! =)

[@MarianaRusso]

Thank you, Simon, for the Happy birthday wishes! You helped make my day extra special. And thanks Isabel for your love and friendship all these years 🥰🎉

[@ukdavepianoman]

Stunning puzzle. After the wonderful logic of the opening, it's fascinating how the puzzle more or less collapses.

[@amoswittenbergsmusings]

I am on top of the world! I saw the break-in almost immediately. A year ago I would have struggled to see any X-wing without writing oodles of useless pencil marks. Two years ago I did not know what an X-wing even was. Now I saw not only the 1s but the conditional 2s and 3s after three minutes of careful examination of the two critical columns which were clearly telegraphed by the conspicuous bulb arrangement. From there on it was a breeze. Apparently my brain is in working condition. My habit of updating pencil marks immediately after a deduction really helped. Simon should try it once ;-) Friends, allow this old geezer a little bragging - I am pleased with myself with an 18:07 score. Now off to watch Simon. [added in edit:] Simon's path is virtually identical to my own. I have attained a sort of sudoku satori 😁

[@longwaytotipperary]

Congratulations!!

[@amoswittenbergsmusings]

@@longwaytotipperary 🙏

[@Anne_Mahoney]

Well done! We all remember when X-wings were an advanced technique --- you've gained that plateau and can now look down to the Plains of GAS and up to the empyrean realms of 5/5 on LMD!

[@Gonzalo_Garcia_]

16:13 for me. Omg I spent so long thinking the break-in would involve SET until I realized it was a lot easier than that. Anyways, fantastic puzzle!!

[@markbennet9058]

The Ancient Wall video is really good ...

[@piarittersporn]

Fantastic puzzle. The X-wing is the key that turns a supposedly difficult puzzle into a very fluid one, where everything quickly becomes apparent.

[@shadeblackwolf1508]

The "wierd 2-thing" is a virtual x-wing caused by the projections of 3 locations onto their thermos. he can't name it but he certainly understands it.

[@ServantOfSatania]

34:45 Always good to see the old friend rear its round self on the grid, though highlighting it may have distracted me from obvious sudoku here and there

[@russellpaez7625]

Lovely puzzle. Solved in 14:59 I normally do not solve these faster than Simon or Mark, but I saw the trick right away.

[@th.nd.r]

Absolutely incredible puzzle! The fact that there’s still so much beauty that can be discovered in such simple, classic rulesets is wonderful. Well set and well solved!

[@longwaytotipperary]

Happy birthday Lizzy01! Lovely puzzle!

[@balkthor]

I know this is silly but I'm super proud right now. I was able to solve this in 20:39, beating Simon's time for just the second time in 3 years. There is NO WAY I could do this without years of learning on this channel, and I'm aware my brain is the size of a hockey puck compared to these setters. But yeah, I'm pretty proud of myself for spotting the X-wing so quickly, which thanks to some epic Goodliffe'ing let me rebound 2's, 3's, 4's, and up to quickly proliferate a couple rows and columns.

[@TomMalufe]

Having to explain your reasoning out loud will always slow you down a bit when solving a puzzle, but a 20 minutes solve is still really impressive to me (the 40 min solve in the video is already impressive to me). Great job!

[@GabeWeymouth]

The *best* puzzles are the ones with a simple ruleset but a very clever design! This one was great, and I really enjoyed "chasing" the constrained 1s,2s,3s... in those rows and bulbs.

[@DarrenNakamura]

Finished in 41:01. What a cool break-in!

[@rey3101]

Amazing puzzle, can't believe I've never seen this idea before. 15:40 today.

[@ruminator2943]

Thrilled to have learned so much on the channel that I could find my way through this one (without help!) in 39:37. Thank you Simon and Mark! And thank you, Lizzy01 for the delightful experience. Happy birthday!

[@praematura]

17:31 for me; wow, that was interesting. It was cool how each small deduction combined at the beginning for an amazing break-in.

[@Coyotek4]

I spent 48 minutes on this one before remembering that the thermo in cells r6c3 and r6c4 was a thermo and NOT an arrow (I kept thinking those cells had the same digit); not the first time I've made that mistake, admittedly. Fortunately, after backtracking almost all the way to the beginning, it didn't take long to correct my error and solve; I ended finishing in just over an hour (1:00:58). Nice puzzle!

[@tbi1161]

That got me too, glad I'm not the only one.

[@wesselstrijkstra7700]

How lovely to see a puzzle with such a ruleset featured. Reminds one of the good ol’ days🥹 Congrats Lizzy!

[@wibblywobblyidiotvision]

Wonderful puzzle. I totally fouled up box 7, and had to backtrack a long way before I saw it.

[@srwapo]

24:23, was shocked at how much work the break in was, though the logic was super impressive once I figured it out.

[@alienrenders]

20:41 is my time. I've watched Mark do too many thermos like so this, so was fairly easy to see how this one worked. Love thermo puzzles. Mark would probably finish this under 10 minutes. Sorry Simon :)

[@Zer0ji]

Happy belated birthday Lizzy! That was a quite elegant yet approachable puzzle, solved in 17:25 😊

[@markp7262]

17:51 finish. Such fun on a simple set of rules! Bringing back the roots of the channel, very nice!

[@coreydixon9713]

This felt like cracking a safe one click at a time. Then the door flies open. Loved it!

[@lunardancer6047]

Nice to have a straightforward puzzle every so often. This one only took me half an hour. I almost never beat Simon or Mark's times, so even though I have the advantage of not having to explain my logic to an audience, I'll still take it as a rare win!

[@akshaykhatri1531]

Same for me I did this one in just under 30 minutes Although I know if Simon wasn't explaining this much he would have beaten my time.

[@deszeldra]

Same!

[@michaelmatter1222]

52:16 such a delightful puzzle

[@francissager3133]

36:48 for me. I usually find it harder to think of the lower digits in these thermo puzzles, and this was a good puzzle to get me thinking about them.

[@cathybryant5119]

What a lovely puzzle. Such interesting logic, but not so brutally hard to be frustrating. It took me about 45 minutes.

[@LavenderGooms]

Took me a bit to find that x-wing but after that it was just a lovely progression. Very good puzzle, and happy birthday Lizzy01

[@Rach881101]

29:04 for me. Stunning puzzle!

[@apiyo_puzzles]

Awesome thumbnail art!

[@inspiringsand123]

Rules: 04:26 Let's Get Cracking: 05:00 Simon's time: 32m22s Puzzle Solved: 37:22 What about this video's Top Tier Simarkisms?! Three In the Corner: 1x (35:43) Phistomefel: 1x (01:57) And how about this video's Simarkisms?! Ah: 11x (09:58, 11:11, 12:55, 14:39, 21:51, 24:57, 24:57, 27:04, 27:04, 30:06, 34:36) Pencil Mark/mark: 7x (05:24, 10:20, 10:31, 24:37, 30:25, 32:46, 33:19) Deadly Pattern: 5x (15:00, 15:09, 15:40, 16:18, 19:02) Brilliant: 4x (00:25, 26:28, 26:29, 37:49) What Does This Mean?: 4x (07:28, 20:05, 21:28, 25:45) By Sudoku: 3x (28:17, 33:42, 34:54) Hang On: 3x (14:27, 20:02, 20:02) Stunning: 3x (27:22, 27:24, 37:46) Obviously: 3x (01:28, 12:10, 19:06) Sorry: 2x (20:48, 35:21) The Answer is: 2x (08:56, 25:15) Clever: 2x (13:38, 37:34) Stuck: 2x (02:06, 02:08) Beautiful: 2x (27:37, 37:29) I've Got It!: 2x (25:49) In Fact: 2x (16:37, 31:28) Goodness: 1x (31:31) Horrible Feeling: 1x (20:17) Break the Puzzle: 1x (18:48) Gorgeous: 1x (37:22) Take a Bow: 1x (37:26) Come on Simon: 1x (20:02) Shouting: 1x (01:18) Facetious: 1x (08:41) Masterpiece: 1x (01:59) Internal Logic: 1x (15:53) Progress: 1x (29:42) Wow: 1x (37:22) Nature: 1x (16:12) Cake!: 1x (03:25) Genuflection: 1x (00:48) Symmetry: 1x (30:43) Most popular number(>9), digit and colour this video: Ten (4 mentions) Two (93 mentions) Purple (9 mentions) Antithesis Battles: Low (2) - High (1) Even (2) - Odd (0) Higher (3) - Lower (3) Row (41) - Column (19) FAQ: Q1: You missed something! A1: That could very well be the case! Human speech can be hard to understand for computers like me! Point out the ones that I missed and maybe I'll learn! Q2: Can you do this for another channel? A2: I've been thinking about that and wrote some code to make that possible. Let me know which channel you think would be a good fit!

[@user-xw1lh7zt7n]

You're doing the lord's work with this one

[@vpr0]

Can you add functionality that will do 4:51 - Nice?

[@Stratelier]

My solve time for this one was approximately 44:44. I spotted the X-Wing on 1's, but it took a bit more effort to crack the rest. (My time was actually 44:45, but that just doesn't sound as cool)

[@bertbergers9171]

I was too tired to find anything after the initial x-wing. With help from Simon to find the restart (and the re-re-start aswell) i came into a zone where i could do sudoku and i cruised through to the end. I was thinking about how engineered the columns where, but could not put the finger on it where to find the clue. It was a nice puzzle @Lizzy vv thank you!

[@PeterZaitcev]

30:00 for me for today. I agree that this puzzle is a masterpiece.

[@myeon4866]

Another time when the credit tittle was not correct. Still love this channel, and every hardwork it take to give us daily supply

[@Yttria]

30:05! Smooth sailing after the initial break in.

[@emilywilliams3237]

Lovely puzzle and video, Simon. It is like meeting an old friend to have just thermos - but an old friend who has learned a few foreign languages since you last saw her and has been to Brazil and discovered a rare parrot ... I did give this puzzle a try, with the anticipation that I would be able to pick up where my old friend the thermo and I left off, but I am glad that you did the video because, though I could just make out that there was something special going on with 1s and 2s, I could not quite believe my eyes when my friend who used to be a vegetarian ordered a surf and turf with truffle oil! Thanks as always, Simon.

[@lizzyvv447]

🤣

[@kamilporadzinski2018]

29:20 I stucked a bit at finding 13 pair in higher part of the x-wing. Very nice puzzle.

[@SirBradiator]

Stunning Puzzle, haven't done a pure thermo for a while, like meeting an old friend.

[@Raven-Creations]

An x-wing and a finned x-wing in a vanilla thermo sudoku? It's just like old times. You were premature pencil-marking the begging man. If you'd only hung on for a tad longer, all degrees of freedom disappeared, and you could have just written in the values. This was a beautifully constructed, and approachable thermo puzzle. The x-wings, and the subtle interaction between rows 3 and 7 were very nice. You nearly escaped without any shouting today, but then you had to let yourself down by pencil-marking a 38 in box 6, which already contained an 8 (which you never spotted). You also nearly put a 6 in a cell right next to a 6, the only thing that stopped you was the 6 three cells above it. Not shoutworthy, but you didn't seem to notice you had a finned x-wing on 2, so you were a bit slow picking up on how it impacted the solution. Although you eventually did do the logic you would have automatically done for a finned x-wing, you lost a bit of time getting round to it.

[@feliomichaels]

18:12! The chocolate cake helped me today :D

[@BozoTheBear]

Ooooh, very nice puzzle, thanks Lizzy! Well done for making simple thermos fit together so intricately!

[@amysteele2488]

@cracking the cryptic, the title wrongly attributes this puzzle to Serkan Yurekli, yesterday's setter

[@TheFrogfather1]

I was wondering about that 🤔

[@CrackingTheCryptic]

Oh this is an infuriating bug in Movavi that keeps happening. I'm sorry about this Lizzy01... Gaaaahhhhh.

[@Kinada]

Ahh 29min, that felt good after failing to solve yesterdays puzzle.

[@MarkWiseTechno]

That arrangement of possible positions for 2 that you found in columns 3 and 7 is just a finned X-wing with the fin in r8c3.

[@Sybilara]

I think we should call the jiggery-pokery in this puzzle a T-wing

[@Birchbayaromatics]

THOROUGHLY ENJOYEDIT! THANK YOU!

[@dmdeemer]

19:10 for me. I love simple rule sets.

[@markbennet9058]

Jay Dyer's hunt contains a puzzle with "negative" modifiers and thermos - I think Simon is inviting more variety @6min (or not ...)

[@markbennet9058]

What a stunning puzzle ... Lizzy01 has some genius ideas - puzzles always worth noting

[@tonyawright6020]

Love this one!

[@neilramsey1368]

Happy birthday Lizzy

[@theashen]

22:59 - very nice idea!

[@JohnRandomness105]

The X-wing in 1s was one of the first things that I noticed. But I needed some help with the next few steps. I think that I was able to finish on my own starting about the time of the 3 pair in column 3.

[@grahamrskelly6042]

Which is respectable, our Simon when he started the channel would not have been so quick to see the consequence of 'where does 3 go?' keep practicing and enjoying your solving path.

[@JohnRandomness105]

@@grahamrskelly6042 Thank you!

[@superrabbit224]

This one was really fun to solve

[@sealed2mybff]

I feel like I've done this one before, but it wasn't in the app when I switched over to that. So hmm. But I spotted the crooked 123 X-wing right away, and I finished the puzzle before Simon! Which is a first for me after I think at least 3 years of playing along! Crazy! But a fun game!

[@Ardalambdion]

What I realized Simon and Mark do when they get thermos is that they almost constantly attack the low numbers first, leaving the high ones at last. Why not take a look at high when you're stuck at lows?

[@stevieinselby]

Very clever ... I got the x-wing on 1s, realised that it couldn't be an x-wing on 1-2s, placed the first 2 and the 1, _thought_ that row 3 must be a 1-3 pair but couldn't quite see how to be sure.

[@jackieenois]

One of the rare times I got a puzzle faster then Simon, 25 minutes for me. Got the idea really fast! Very happy with myself. Found it to be really beautiful, very well done Lizzy

[@cgstreet08]

A bit of logic easier to visualize than the 1,2 deadly pattern. In row 7, 3 can only go in c2,c4 and c8. If r7c7 is a 2, then r7c3 and r3c7 are 1 (x-wing), forcing the thermometer in r6c7 starts with 3, so the 3 in r7 is in c2 or c4, which requires a 2 in r6c3 or r8c3. On the other hand, if r7c7 is a 1 (and r3c2 by x-wing), then r7c3 is a 2, forcing thermos in r6c3 and r8c3 to be at least 3, so the 3 in r7 is in c8, requiring a 2 in r6c7. Hence the thermos in box 1 and 3 cannot start with 1 or 2, forcing the 2 in row 3 to c6

[@MesaperProductions]

It's a nice laddering logic chain

[@Tepalus]

30minutes for me, but half the time I struggled with the break-in. Not gonna lie, had to watch the first few minutes. Great one though.❤

[@Tepalus]

@@writemeontele_gramcrackingthec And that people is how they try to scam you.

[@Swisswavey]

It only took me 8 minutes but it was a really fun puzzle. Really nicely crafted. Thanks for sharing it.

[@zoranocokoljic8927]

27:26 Basiclly the same way: 1 x-wing, 12 pair in r7, no 12 pair in r3 ergo r3c6=2 ang r4c6=1, 3 in r7 etc

[@Parmenion87]

I was looking forward to finally hearing my name for the first complete puzzle hunt i've solved all the way through. Havnt heard it in the last 3 videos after solving and submitting on the 11th!

[@grahamrskelly6042]

Congratulations 🎉👏🎉 Cameron! I struggle with the hunts partially as there is only so much time I can put into solving them.. so I haven't finished it and your ahead of me

[@Parmenion87]

@@grahamrskelly6042 often when they have two levels, the prize and the shout out level, I reach the prize one but again run out of time to do the remaining puzzles for the shout out level. This one was tough, a week of very quiet work days helped. .

[@BramCohen]

19:37 here, first time I've ever crushed Simon's time,. Usually I'm about double.

[@Autoskip]

...wait, how did I win this race? I did it in 32:02, starting as quickly as I could after hitting play on this video, and Simon just never caught up! I don't think that's ever happened to me.

[@WhoStoleMyAlias]

27 minutes for me. Exact same path though granted I did start with goodliffing the longer thermos which didn't get me anywhere. Noticing the X-wing on 1s, the 12 pair in row 7, how the placement of 3 in row 7 forced 2s in the lower half of the grid for columns 3 and 7 and as a result made 2 a naked single in row 3. The complexity of the puzzle was really in that third step, the rest was pretty much GAS.

[@AngrySanta]

Finally a puzzle I solved. 40:13

[@alexandrebellanger9646]

13:28 for me. Nice puzzle !

[@fulltimeslackerii8229]

24:10, i would like to patent the name “a half X wing”. you can rule out the columns in this case, but not the rows.

[@hydra147147]

Given that in rows 3 and 7 as well as columns 3 and 7 all the thermos increase by exactly one and all the free digits in the columns are as high sa possible, there must be some SET min-max logic that solves a huge chunk of the puzzle

[@adrianhead6272]

Completed in 14m46s.

[@wanderlustwarrior]

28:00 even for me, including going back to the start hen I realized a wrong assumption I made made placing a 3 in row 7 impossible.

[@RoderickEtheria]

16:41. Once you get started, it's the same trick repeating again and again. 7:38, yeah, this isn't a simple x-wing, which I noticed pretty soon.

[@amysteele2488]

I would call that a 'finned x-wing'

[@RoderickEtheria]

@@amysteele2488 I would call it an iterative finned x-wing.

[@josemontesa1]

Hello! How can you tell that r7c7 can't be a 2 in 16:43?

[@AndreAy1975]

Solved it withhelp from the video.

[@megaminxpll]

Easy peasy 9:45

[@penningmeestercgkdelft9159]

Maybe we could call all these interesting constructions on 1's, 2's and 3's a "finned" X-wing, although I suppose that only a swordfish has fins in reality whereas an X-wing (whatever that animal may look like) has not ;-)

[@PriffyViole]

Got it after 24:34.

[@adimeirman2082]

00:44:27

[@RealCadde]

When i opened the puzzle i saw early on the 4 blank cells in rows 3 and 7 and i was quick to deduct that row 7 had the 12 pair. But then i got severely stuck and i couldn't be bothered to look for possibilities. What i did notice though is, thanks to phistomephel ring, there would have to be at least two 1's and one 1 in the corners of the grid. And so i suspected that box 3 would have a 12 pair in the end. And box 7 would then have a one in R8C1 or R9C2. But like i said, i couldn't be bothered to find proof of that. I am not saying this puzzle is bad, but it didn't invite me to do the logic. So i don't like it.

[@linforcer]

I made a little mistake I cheated on to check what I did wrong... in the bottom left, I knew I could not put an 8 and 9 on the last to places of the corner thermo, but that made me accidentally dismiss any 9 at the end, not realizing 7 and 9 would work.

[@erickehr4475]

Some interesting logic, I thought. 21:13 for me

[@johnosullivan675]

R6C7 is triggering my ocd! YELLOW IT!

[@robertcousins2274]

13:36

[@KODIAK---J]

*intro slide says by serkan

[@TurquoizeGoldscraper]

35:50 for me.

[@RADZIO895]

57:09 for me

[@theredstoneengineer6934]

14:42 for me

[@mudscuffer]

42:14 for me

[@andreasbrey6277]

discussing over advantages of X-wings? We should absolutely have a European Sudoku-party! I wonder how many strange people, like us, will come ...

[@carstenkruse8527]

Thought you refrained from using deadly pattern as a solution to a puzzle.

[@sonalita_]

He didn’t. He clearly explained that it WASN’T a deadly pattern

[@RichSmith77]

...and even if it was a deadly pattern (he explained why it wasn't), he didn't use it to solve the puzzle anyway. At least, not in the way uniqueness arguments use deadly patterns to make deductions.

[@_-_-Sipita-_-_]

8:37 for me. speedrun time

[@purpleli4760]

Damn. I thought 19:22 was good

[@mikepictor]

half an hour for me.

[@Pritchie45]

46 minutes