dailysudoku.com

hughwill · Joined: 05 Apr 2010 Posts: 424 Location: Birmingham UK

After basics

arkietech · Posted: Sat Aug 02, 2014 2:14 pm Post subject:

A skyscraper on 2 will solve the puzzle.

There is only one step to get to heaven! Very Happy

kuskey · Joined: 10 Dec 2008 Posts: 141 Location: Pembroke, NH

hughwill, I can't find an x-wing on 7 in r24; leaving the 37 UH as a one stepper. But my eyes have been known to fool me on occasion.

dongrave · Joined: 06 Mar 2014 Posts: 568

Kusky, Hughwill had a typo. The x wing is actually in row 1 and 4. But I still prefer the 37 UR solution. It's what I consider a 'standard' VH move and it solves it in one step.

kuskey · Joined: 10 Dec 2008 Posts: 141 Location: Pembroke, NH

It's not my face that's red; it's my eyeballs from all that searching at 2 am.
X-wings are my arch enemy. Thanks for getting my mind right hughwill.

Marty R. · Posted: Sat Aug 02, 2014 3:57 pm Post subject:

The UR does solve it on one step, but officially, it's not a standard VH move as defined for purposes of these puzzles.

As to the double XY-Wings that Hugh saw in boxes 12, I couldn't see them there, but I saw them in boxes 123.

dongrave · Joined: 06 Mar 2014 Posts: 568

I didn't know that a UR wasn't considered a standard VH move! Thanks, I'll remember that. After applying Hughwill's X wing (which removes the 7 from r3c3, I see the 2 XYs that he's referring to without involving the 3rd box that you mentioned Marty. The two 278s that I see have pivots at r2c2 (with r3c3 and r2c6) and at r3c3 (with r2c2 and r3c6).

Marty R. · Posted: Sat Aug 02, 2014 8:03 pm Post subject:

I stand corrected on box 3. There's one pivoted in r3c7 which is flightless, i.e., eliminates nothing.

When I first joined the site over eight years ago the only move required to solve the VHs was X-Wing. Not too long thereafter he made some changes to add XY- and XYZ-Wing to the mix. So it's those three that I call standard VH moves since some combination of those wings would solve all VHs.

Since then the only improvement that I can recall was adding the feature to copy the Draw/Play grid so it could be inserted into a forum message box.

dongrave · Joined: 06 Mar 2014 Posts: 568

Oh, I see. Thanks for the background info Marty. Life must have been awful boring back when x wings were the only standard advanced move! Hey! What do you say we take a vote to add URs? I vote to add them (because I tend to find them easily - but I have a heck of a time finding skyscrapers).

Marty R. · Posted: Sun Aug 03, 2014 12:10 am Post subject:

It was EXTREMELY boring with X-Wings only. You got that one right.

hughwill · Joined: 05 Apr 2010 Posts: 424 Location: Birmingham UK

Just caught up with the responses. Sorry to all for the error in the original post.
Hugh

dongrave · Joined: 06 Mar 2014 Posts: 568

Hi Marty, I think I realize now why I thought that URs were one of your standard VH moves. On days that your site doesn't have a VH puzzle, I often prefer to do a VH from your archive or from a different source. Right now one of those sources is a level 3 book by someone named Longo. This book requires at least one VH move (just like your VHs) EXCEPT that some of their puzzles require a UR! After I learned that a UR was not one of your standard VH moves, I went back and examined a couple of theirs and found that they could not be solved using the standard VH moves - which REALLY got me to wondering what you and the other experts on this site think - because to me they seem like a perfect fit! Do you think that URs should be added to your standard VH moves? Or is the idea crazy? Are there any other moves that you think should be added? (I vote to NOT add any moves with 'fish' in their names.) Or do you like it just the way it is now? Thanks, Don.

Marty R. · Posted: Mon Aug 04, 2014 3:06 pm Post subject:

Don,

It's not my site, I'm just a moderator. The site belongs to a guy from the UK named Sam Griffeths. As the years have flown by, players have improved greatly and once-advanced moves are now considered simple and routine.

However, for years, the VH puzzles here are designed to be solved by some combination of X-, XY- and XYZ-Wings, so that's why the definition of VH moves here is limited to those three techniques. One of my idiosyncrasies is that when doing these puzzles I like to limit myself to those three moves.

The name Longo sounds familiar and I'm virtually positive I've had one or more books by him.

Take care,
Marty

rmireland · Joined: 21 Sep 2013 Posts: 33 Location: New Orleans

Hi Marty,
You didn't ask, so I take that as you just want me to volunteer what I think about the whole VH moves controversy.
First, I really hate puzzles that require trial and error. There's no fun there.
Second, I really like that with these VH puzzles, if I look long enough I will eventually find a X, XY or XYZ, or some combination, that will solve it.
And third, I also really like that, especially on days without a single-stepper, someone will offer an advanced technique that solves it, so depending on my time budget, I can look into that more closely.
So, I guess what I am saying is that I like the occasional more advanced techniques being pointed out, but I am glad that I am not required to master them to enjoy the site.
BTW Do you have any statistics on how many times people play online or request printable pages, sorted by the puzzle difficulty? That would be interesting to know.
Thanks to you and the mysterious Brit for this site.
Rick

Marty R. · Posted: Sun Aug 17, 2014 1:26 am Post subject: