The Sudoku With Only 16 Given Words Of Rules!

[@FlorianWortmann]

Thanks for solving my puzzle! I'm guilty of some Schadenfreude for enjoying you struggle a bit with this one ;-) However, the solve was pretty much along the intended path. Shoutout to Selena for coming up with the wording of the rules!

[@pouletbelette]

Good job Florian and Selena!

[@davidrattner9]

More amazing ness from you Florian!! Just a pleasure to see you constantly set with such beauty!!!

[@joelproko]

How does one even create such a puzzle?

[@joelproko]

No seriously, how did you make this?

[@Anne_Mahoney]

Such a pretty grid -- and then it also turned out to be a pretty puzzle! 😺

[@MrNatetheTeacher]

There are two reasons why I find Simon so brilliant. One, he can break into these puzzles, and I rarely can. Two, he never makes false assumptions. I often think I’ve caught something he’s missed only to realize that I was mistakenly seeing restrictions that weren’t there. Another amazing solve today.

[@Barteks2x]

Note that we only get to see the cases where he ends up actually solving the puzzle, which may make it look a bit better than it actually is

[@bobblebardsley]

Rhyming Rules: Normal rules applied. Box borders divide segments that become equal in their sum. (Also after someone pointed out the 'bard' in my name recently, I can't help but notice 'Wortmann' translates into English as 'Word man'. Yay nominative determinism!)

[@timch5227]

Genius!

[@bobblebardsley]

@@timch5227 One of my absolute favourite things to hear (the other is "you're right") 😇 Thanks!

[@FlorianWortmann]

I love it!

[@bobblebardsley]

@@FlorianWortmann Thank you 😊 Always means so much to hear that from the setter 👏👏🙌

[@bobblebardsley]

(Also after yesterday's puzzle I'm thinking I should probably change my name to Blobble.)

[@馬善萄]

Despite the fact that Simon did miss a little bit of Sudoku today, it won't change the fact that he still is a top-class Sodoku solver in the world!

[@emilywilliams3237]

I saw nothing wrong with this solve, and much to admire and learn from. You (and Mark) are top of the sudoku solving tree in my mind, Simon. And as I have said before, I would far rather see a live solve, with all of the risk that a best path will not be discovered, than a prepared "this is how to do this" sort of walkthrough. Absolutely. Pre-thought-out walkthroughs are OK occasionally if something in particular is being taught, but in terms of solving a puzzle by one of the host of genius setters in the world, I would rather see a real solve without preparation. Thank you for faithfully and rigorously proving everything and giving us these amazing videos every day.

[@longwaytotipperary]

Very well said, Emily!!

[@jadeEpeace]

I agree!!!

[@juanbarbero1252]

I feel cleaning up pencil marks would've made this 100x faster to solve for Simon lol

[@MarkBennet10001]

My experience is that there are genuinely hard puzzles (Jay Dyer's Crux) - but that anything below that depends a lot on the solver and what the solver naturally sees and looks for. Simon has a larger range than most (certainly than I do). The only way we learn is to tackle the puzzles we can't yet solve cleanly and then work out what we are missing. Simon gains another superpower with this one ...

[@steve470]

80:17 for me. I also found the puzzle quite difficult. I think it's almost the opposite of a fog-of-war puzzle. In fog puzzles, you almost always know where to look for the next step. In this one, I found it very difficult to figure out where to look next. The logic was always there, it was never *brutally* difficult, but it kept taking a while to find each step.

[@longwaytotipperary]

You’re the top of the tree for me! Solving puzzles every day on camera is all kinds of wonderful!

[@davidrattner9]

It most certainly is wonderful what Simon does for us on a daily basis!!

[@longwaytotipperary]

@@davidrattner9 that it is, my friend! 😊💕💕

[@scottashcroft7001]

The missing question was., "In a box full of lines where does the nine go?"

[@BryanLu0]

In all three boxes filled with lines, the line with no single cell total passes through

[@jimi02468]

@@BryanLu0 You could still probably do something with that line of reasoning. The thing with the central box is that the digits eight and nine could not both be outside of the "non-single-cell-total-line" (call that NSCTL). Eight and nine can never be in the central box in the line with a one cell total somewhere in it. Even if you put eight in the line which has only two cells in the central box, then you would need to use a one to make it add up to nine, and if you wanted to avoid having eights and nines in the NSCTL, you would have a repeated nine in column six. So at least you could say that there's an eight and a nine in box five in row four.

[@BryanLu0]

@@jimi02468 I'm not sure you can make any deductions that result in anything without considering the logic Simon found

[@RichSmith77]

Answer: Quite a few places. You can put a 9 on the line that starts in r2c1, since its region sum total can be greater than 9.

[@wojciechpietrzak1981]

> Make a series of brilliant logic steps > Get stuck until you see a 14 pair which is available for ages Simon in a nutshell 🙂I love your videos 🙂

[@Paolo_De_Leva]

That's true. The new wording for the definition of the region sum lines is genius. Short and crystal clear. 👏👏👏👏👏👏👏

[@flsal27]

One element that would have ease the resolution: in the boxes that have all cells with lines, where is the 9, when the blue line has a one cell segment in one of the box?

[@elizabethgrosvenor153]

I was wondering about this, it's a pretty quick way to prove that green = purple = 9. It was so intuitive to me as the opener when Simon mentioned the whole boxes being covered. I spent at least half the video thinking about it. Except, I don't think it's quite true? May still have helped to narrow down options, thinking where the 9 goes, but I don't think it ~has~ to go in the 1-cell segments. It could still go in a 2-cell segment next to a 1 or something and have the 1-cell segments be an 8. So the 9 ~probably~ (almost certainly) goes in the 1-cell segments, and in the end it did, but I don't think there's a hard-logic way of proving it ~must~ do that. (Or at least, I couldn't see one.) But either way, I would have liked to see Simon talk about it.

[@RichSmith77]

It allows you to restrict where 9 can go a little, but I don't know if it's all that helpful, unless I'm missing something. There's still great flexibility in where the 9s can go. Edit: Note, at the start, 9 can seemingly go anywhere along the blue line that starts at r2c1, since its region sum total can be greater than 9.

[@davidrattner9]

Thank you Simon for constantly producing quality solves and fascinating puzzles! Your voice, aura and persona is such a pleasure to see daily!!

[@longwaytotipperary]

Absolutely agree!

[@Babinzo]

Another one to note down for a CTC Tutorials playlist - a textbook example of Region Sum Lines

[@chesterfield9682]

Far be it from me to tell you how to solve these, but I really do think you could be more diligent about cleaning up your pencil marks. There are things that become easier to see more quickly, like the 3 in R8C6. But I don't know that it would work magic on the total solve time. But a wonderful solve as always 🙂

[@angelmendez-rivera351]

I agree. The same is true for his coloring.

[@TrollOrFeed]

Why do the cells on 25:49 have to be a 56 pair? I would have said they have to be 5689?

[@ronjohnson6916]

While I couldn't get to the position Simon reached, I was able to just grind things down. I think it rewards heavy pencil marking and that's not where Simon likes to be.

[@Sujisan4]

Simon is easily one of the best solvers in the world, but he usually gets stuck on simple logic. I never would have solved this puzzle.

[@viktorpalsson1672]

(:

[@mrsawiggins]

"I couldn't see the ocean for the trees." 😂🤣😂🤣

[@noxumbra173]

At the 40 minute mark, Simon messed up with the 7 in box 2, you can't place in row 1 because of the 8/9 pair. So, box 1 11 is 5-6.

[@ElaHuguet]

The amount of time he's taken to find that 7 goes in row 3 in box 2...

[@jimi02468]

I noticed something at 30:56 in the video. Where could orange and purple go in box 2: only in R1C4 and R1C5 as a 89 pair!

[@СергейКузнецов-ж6ю2ы]

Both Simon and Mark are excellent counters but not so good painters. Simon colored purple-orange pair in box 2 as wight-purple-orange triple. Actually there was not place for the third color there.

[@tez_lettering]

Thank you for the shout out! ❤ -Suzette

[@windybeach2184]

44:57 I had slightly different logic at this point, but same outcome. I looked at my pencil marks in row 5 and deduced that there weren’t two different ways to make 8 using 12356, so purple must be 9.

[@RichSmith77]

This was a hard puzzle! I've rarely had to consult the video so often, looking for help finding the next step. I managed to get that grey was orange by myself, but missed that 7 was restricted to just two cells in box 9. I had to hear Simon say he knew whuch was 8 and which was 9 before I paused the video again to find out why. (My way was related to Simon's but from a slightly different angle: 8s in r4c6 and r6c7 resulted in four cells in row 5 being from only three digits 1,2,5.) I needed prompting again to see that r4c2-3 could only make 9 one way. In the end, I was encouraged that Simon found it a slog too. 🙂

[@Domancave]

Simon always favouriting the puzzle is amazing. It’s such a small thing that I always make sure to do, and I love when he does it!

[@vanciervancier]

Love the One Foot In The Grave reference.

[@OleksiyZdor]

Oh boy, was I shouting today

[@iambicpentakill]

Simon was dedicated to ignoring boxes two and three today (still way better than me though, obviously)

[@emmkestrel442]

quite frankly I really hope more people start using this wording for explaining region sums

[@TheJuicyTangerine]

I found a much more straightforward way to find whether orange or purple is 8 or 9. Simon miscolorred r1c45 in that they can't be white, and they're a purple orange pair. Then you can ask yourself where 7 goes in box 2. They can only be in r3c45 and can only be 127. This forces 7 in box one to be in r1c23 (because 7 cannot be on a 3 cell line that adds up to 8 or 9) and must also be from 127 but different from the 127 in box 2. Then logic of where 1s and 2s go in box 1 and 2 can lead to disambiguating the 8s and 9s

[@RichSmith77]

Simon's way is *far* more straightforward. You haven't even attempted to explain how you use 1's and 2's in your final step.

[@mihaelamihalache3227]

Never came so early for a video! Thank you so much for bringing joy at the end of my day!🤗🤗🤗

[@iarmycombo5659]

Haha im too dirty minded

[@keviomoorio8051]

I turned this on then fell asleep. My dream had me in school Simon was teaching how to solve and make sudoku.

[@viktorpalsson1672]

(: (: (: (:

[@viktorpalsson1672]

:D

[@robinbrown6530]

While I was faster in parts I was stumped an equal number of times in other places. So if you're slow on this one Simon, then so am I.

[@Michaelzehr]

I labelled the region sum lines as A,B,C,D,E starting from the top, then comparing boxes 1 and 4 saw that A+B+C+D = B+C+D+E = 45 which resolves some of the coloring of single-cell regions. It also put an upper and lower limit on the sum for C. Remembering that limit makes progress in box 6 after placing the 4 in r5c7. But I missed some of the things Simon saw and failed at some of the Sudoku parts of the puzzle.

[@greetingcardboy]

This solve drove me nuts because from the very beginning, I thought, "Well, where does 9 go in the center box?" and the only thing I could see was the upper right. And then I thought, "Maybe the way into this puzzle is to rule out where all the 9s go in boxes 1, 5, and 6." But Simon didn't go anywhere near this approach, and I'm worried that there's some grave flaw in my thinking that I'm not seeing.

[@G4EpicGaming]

The symmetry of this puzzle is appealing lol

[@Kitt262]

Love your videos ❤ thank you for making them :)

[@chocolateboy300]

I finished in 290 minutes. This was such a difficult puzzle for me. I had to give up on it and do other puzzles to retrieve some semblance of success. I came back to it after a while and started to do these mini SET tricks to try to equate the puzzle. To my surprise, it actually started working. Moving along the lines, since they have the same value, was pretty cool to play around with in this puzzle. It was slow, but it felt good making progress. I was so happy finally getting most of the 89s in the grid paired. I broke through and it felt so good. I felt like I finally figured out this puzzle by the end, but holy crap it was hard. Great Puzzle!

[@Raven-Creations]

@ 27:25 - you've "absolutely stalled" - purple can't be in R9C3, so it's either the same as yellow, or it's in R7C3. If it's the latter, then it must be 8, with 9 in R8C4, but that would mean orange was 9, and you already have an orange in box 8. Therefore purple=yellow. You put orange in the same domino as purple in box 2, but you left the white in there and seemed oblivious to it being an 89 pair. That made 7 in the box have to go in R3C4/5 along with a 1 or 2. That meant that the domino in R3C2/3 must be 56. It also meant that the purple and orange lines in box 2 were 12347, so R1/2C6 was a 56 pair. This was a bit tricky in places, especially early on, but not at the points where you struggled. Thankfully, when I have an off day, I'm not on camera. Not recognising that a purple/orange domino was an 89 pair was just a classic Simon moment, not paying attention when marking. That cost you thirteen minutes. As well as you not paying attention, I think you let this puzzle get to you, unsettling your thoughts. From early on you were saying "come on brain", and I don't think the negative vibes were your friend. The early part of this was particularly good fun, requiring careful sleuthing to eliminate possibilities and deducing that two colours were definitely the same or definitely different. If a puzzle is going to collapse at the end, it's always fun when there's a ping pong session to resolve a chain of doubles.

[@bait6652]

Another one u don't need the given ...for unique soln but wondering if u can solve it without branching. U can prove 6 doesn't go on main sums and the 3main sums 2 are equal. Then u work w diff of 11. But which 11 {47,56} goes on the large sum was difficult to dissolve but require lotta branching(wonder if they'd be able to reduce the logic. The B4B8sum broke alot of the branches. And the B7b8 sum

[@LithmusEarth]

I haven't watched an episode of CTC in a few months, I've fallen off, instead of watching 1-2 a day sudoku I now watch 1-2 a day of risk from Kill Pete, I've sorted changed what I fill my puzzle strategy part of my brain with.

[@ianagol]

Rather than showing orange can’t be 9 (at minute 46:00), I showed that pink can’t be 8. The pencil marking would mean that 8 is made of 125 in boxes 5 and 6, leaving only three digits for four spaces on the blue line in row 5 and boxes 5 and 6. This is the complement of your argument.

[@PeterFreese]

This was a very challenging puzzle. I usually pause after Simon reads the rules and have a go, and occasionally let Simon catch up if I've gotten stuck to see what clever insight I'm missing. I had to let Simon "catch up" a *lot* on this puzzle. I don't think I would have solved this on my own even given a great deal more time.

[@glum_hippo]

What a beautiful and elegant construction

[@zaclewis1869]

A challenging puzzle that I would have failed to solve. I think the only issue Simon had was that he was less efficient using rather simple sudoku than he normally is when solving these puzzles. At times, he wasn't cleaning up some of his pencil marks when digits were eliminated from contention. I think that would have allowed him to see his options a little more clearly. He also could have filled in possibilities more often that might have revealed where digits were forced to go.

[@Dareau74]

Simon's biggest hurdle was when he missed seeing the 89 pair, formed at 37:50 , in box 2. It's still an amazing solve. I needed Simon's help twice to solve this one.

[@przemekmajewski1]

if simon would just remove that white flash in row 1 and realize that he really found an 89 pair... bobbins xD this would have saved some good 15 minutes

[@emagrant1485]

Times like this I enjoy making a spot before Simon - Maths on box5/6 showed that original orange was original grey...

[@vjay4297]

Simon made this puzzle as hard as he liked it.. I'm sure he could have shaved half an hour off the solve if he wanted... 1:06:25

[@vincent7520]

Thank you for your effort but I will stick to my method of loosing an unfinished sudoku puzzle!

[@thescrewfly]

Prioritising a golf game over a crossword solve - is that a token of your esteem (or even morally permissible)?

[@F1r1at]

Wow, that thing is hard. Took me almost 3 hours. And I already see some 30 minutes times in the comments...

[@Nonkosherian]

I wonder how much faster he would have solved it if he asked "where is 9 n boxes 1,5 and 6" early on.

[@VeritasUnae]

I think the primary deduction that I missed for about… almost 4 hours of thinking judging from the timer (and then some because I restarted somewhere earlier on…) was succinctly brought up at 24:04. And with this thought in tow, I would like to see how I go!

[@VeritasUnae]

Had to come back for another deduction, this puzzle surely trumped me. Understanding how the restrictions on the 9 sums worked with row 5 definitely exploded the puzzle wide open though. So kudos, Simon - I can’t promise that I’ll see it in the future but at the very least I’ll try and keep it in the back of my mind, haha.

[@PathOfShrines]

Extremely rough solve for me, but I enjoyed it anyway. 119:12

[@holliambria9870]

This one was tricky! I really think it rewards pencil marking. There was one point where I had half the puzzle fully pencil marked and just started running options. The fact that Simon sees it without fully putting in all the marks is impressive.

[@angelmendez-rivera351]

Simon was not careful with his own pencil marking, and there were multiple instances during his solve where, if he had actually been rigorous with his pencil marks and did not ignore them, then he would have been able to make progress much more quickly. The same is true for the coloring. Simon excels when it comes to the logic, but it hurts his solves when him ignoring his pencil marks and coloring (really, ignoring sudoku in general) makes him get stuck for 30 minutes.

[@agitatorjr]

The part where he was stuck for a long time after figuring out 8 and 9 could have been made much quicker if he just penciled in the line in R4 box 4. Would have instantly seen that it had to be 2 7.

[@Swisswavey]

Fun puzzle, thanks for sharing it

[@martysears]

Great puzzle! I completely agree that that is fantastic wording for the region sum rule, and can't think why I've never seen it worded like that before. The usual way is so much more clunky. I'll be wording it like this in future :)

[@joethornton5321]

I solved this in 1330:07 according to the app.

[@WimmekeVL]

If purple sits in the middle of the box with 2 extentions of its line in either direction. It's not 7 because it sees the given 7. But what can go in the two extentions of that line ? It's at least 1 and 2. So purple can't be 8 or 9 either. So purple is 6 ?

[@WimmekeVL]

Ah no, that sum can go above 9 I see now. Which it probably does.

[@anaayoung9142]

Waves of a beautiful sea! 🌊

[@xChikyx]

46:08 I cant believe he got the 9s that way... come on...

[@stevesebzda570]

I wish I could add, I had a 1,3 in r3c9. There's a way to get down to these 56s , and 489 triples down cols4&5, but I forget. I think the 7s align in boxes1&4 (putting the 7 in the corner of box7) and the 2s aligned likewise (putting the 2 in col1row8). Wish I could add though , I thought I had a huge deadly pattern in the grid (the "489s" and the "56s"). All the while my "1,3" in r3c9 (reference 1:00:50) was never a 1. Jeez. You were tired tonight, Simon. You were doing something last night or today. Couldn't do it without ya Thanks.

[@ffets-SEP]

40:00 The top center block has an 8+9 pair on top, and the 5 squares below on the lines add up to 17, which leaves 45-17-17=11 for the two rightmost squares, which can't be 4+7, so they must be a 5+6 pair.

[@Quantris]

wow, took me nearly 2 hours with 2/3 of that being stuck with a bunch of 8/9 pairs (once I finally resolved those the rest fell pretty quick, esp. since I had already worked out a bunch of other sets to 2 possible cases depending on the 8s/9s). Haven't watched the video yet but I'm pretty sure I must have overlooked a simpler way to resolve the 8/9...my way relied on a LOT of pencil work very pretty and fun puzzle :)

[@RecreationallyCynical]

This took me 4 hours. and I think I enjoyed every minute of it (I don't actually remember, it was so long since I started it). My nomination for Cell of the Day is the 4 in r5c7. That was my first digit and took me 3 hours to fill in, but I had a ton of pencilmarks and colors around the grid that it did a ton of work.

[@ericpraline1302]

I think Simon did well with this puzzle, as he always does - it was quite difficult. I thought my brain might have become rather sodden from over-colouring, but then I did a spot more and that broke open the puzzle for me. My path differed from Simon's much more than usual. Classy puzzle, thanks.

[@arturocaissut1071]

Curious to see the path Simon followed. Personally I had a good run, it cracked open with one of those "Wait, this thing has been there to see since forever" moments that make me feel smart and stupid at the same time. Very elegant.

[@nakorbluerider]

This puzzle certainly seemed like a challenging one to me. I had no idea how to break into it at all. Admittedly, I'm not particularly strong with region sum lines in general, but even following the logic, I hardly spotted anything that Simon was up to until he explained it. My one small claim of pride is that I did manage to spot the trick Simon used to disambiguate red from green near the end, but other than that this puzzle certainly had my number. It's a lovely construction though, glad I could watch the feature.

[@erikharaldsson2416]

It felt like Simon was struggling more than me, despite me needing the same time as him. This is definitely not normal. I found it really helpful at the start to color the single cell sums in say a dark green, and all the region sums that were equal to that cell in say a light green. That made it quick to find that gray was equal to purple.

[@eclectichoosier5474]

I don't know about same length videos, but Mark did solve one that had 3 in two different corners and 3 in the spotlight in the center of the grid. Video length: 33:33

[@MWSin1]

This one made me work and work, and I hadn't even noticed I cracked it until suddenly everything just started falling in.

[@masu33]

Well, this was hard... :D But fun.

[@srwapo]

79:05, slow time, but I am in now way upset about it. This puzzle was hard for me and I'm happy I was able to get to the end without any cheating.

[@quinterbeck]

The evening blue light filter on my screen makes purple and orange completely indistinguishable... but you're still a joy to watch, Simon

[@FirHydrntsRFirEaters]

You know it's gonna be a good puzzle when Simon props himself up by his hand in his chair. I bet the puzzle quality is directly proportional to how many times he does this per video

[@homewort-gf2ni]

I found this very tricky, but eventually got there (111 minutes). Thanks @FlorianWortmann, fab puzzle!

[@gregwilliamson1498]

screaming at 26:30 to do math in box 9:)

[@Kinada]

I got really stuck in the middle/end of that. Amazing finish to the puzzle though once you get it.

[@wanderlustwarrior]

48:04 for me, that was a fun challenge!

[@stumbling]

206 minutes for me! My longest ever solve but worth it.

[@andrewcook4873]

I struggled even more than Simon with this one. So many times when I got really stuck.

[@-xomen]

33:56 "So this is a 4 Orange pair"

[@susanollington5257]

Should’ve been called “7 Seas”

[@AndreAy1975]

Solved it with help from the video.

[@thenatundi9009]

Don't worry, I still took longer

[@imblackmagic1209]

don't beat yourself up man, you're a master at this, don't let anyone tell you otherwise

[@Yamayamauchiman]

I thought there was enough alacrity here, Simon.

[@BobShowalter]

43:16 I beat Simon! Working more on 7’s would have helped him…

[@MrBluemoon74]

49:58 use the Force Simon...

[@chrysoarr5237]

54:26 this is where I lost my shit. Funniest thing ive seen in any of those videos.

[@林老師-i5d]

88 minutes for me,nice puzzle I'm glad that I can finish it.

[@RealCadde]

12:46 Not really sure yet but if a color goes on a line that has tree cells in its box, which also has a single cell elsewhere, then that color has no other choice than to be a 6. Think about green in box 5, where does green go in box 1? It doesn't go on its own line. R1C1, R2C2 and R2C3. If it goes in R1C2 or R1C3 it shares a line with gray so then gray is supposed to be green plus gray which would be at least 6+6 and you aren't playing with 12 digits. Green therefore goes in R2C1 or R3C1 or R3C2 or R3C3. Either green IS purple, in which case it's not 7. Or green isn't purple, and if it goes in row 2 it's not 7 and it COULD be grey. Otherwise green goes in row three, isn't purple and isn't grey. On a final note, the given 7 in the grid is also one of the colors and it's not purple or gray.

[@RichSmith77]

"If it [green] goes in r1c2 or r1c3 it shares a line with gray so then gray is supposed to be green plus gray". Sorry, I'm not following this step. All we would know is gray = green + (something), surely?

[@RichSmith77]

Also, 7 ends up not being one of the colours in the grid. The four colours (orange, purple, yellow, grey) all represent the two digits 8 and 9.

[@henk-ottolimburg7947]

Now that was a toffee....!

[@RealCadde]

15:38 What it really means though is that R3C7 and R4C6 are not the same digit. To add up to 15, you need one even and one odd. So green is not grey or orange. Green is either yellow or purple. And so it's not green.

[@RichSmith77]

15 was only the *minimum* the two cells could add to. They could have summed to anything between 15 and 18 at this stage.

[@RealCadde]

@@RichSmith77 Yeah i realized i should stop trying when i felt how tired i was.

[@veggiet2009]

How do I get my birthday on the list?

[@bobblebardsley]

Their email address is near the bottom of the video description (you'll need to click 'More' to see the full description). I think people usually email a day or two in advance to give Simon chance to see the email in time before he records the video for that date.

[@stupidas9466]

Step one is to be born. After that, not sure. Hope this helps!😊

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

34:134 for me.

[@juliadefranco1130]

This was a really fun one to watch, thank you!

[@rufus729]

Excited as always, first time being this early 🎉🎉