Aad's Mission Impossible!

*** TODAY'S PUZZLE ***
Tonight sees the return of the great Aad van de Wetering to the channel with his latest sudoku: Mission Impossible. This is a VERY good title for this puzzle... even if you can figure out what's going on, it DOES seem nearly impossible!!

Play the puzzle at the link below:

Rules:
Normal sudoku rules apply. Digits along an arrow must sum to the digit in that arrow's circle. Cells separated by a single knight's move (in chess) cannot contain the same digit.

Thanks to all of you who have helped us achieve the milestone of 600,000 subscribers on YouTube. Below you can find a link to a free puzzle pack we have curated to celebrate :)

*** NEW SUDOKU HUNT BY Scojojobo JUST RELEASED ***
We've launched a brand new competition - a sudoku hunt by Scojo, Jojo and JoBo featuring lots of sudokus with loose connections to clones! Check it out for as little as $2/month here:

There's also a new solve of Jay Dyer's brutal sudoku: Repeat Prescription

Other treats on Patreon include:

- The Lord Of The Rings Sudoku Hunt by Blobz (and Simon's solve videos)
- Simon's solve of Sky-Skyscraper by Phistomefel has just been uploaded for our patrons.
- Mark's latest solve of The Times Club Monthly cryptic crossword
- Mark's latest series of solves of Connections, the daily New York Times puzzle based on the Only Connect wall game.

*** BRAID STREAM ***
You can watch our recent stream at this link:

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▶ Contents Of This Video ◀

0:00 Theme music
0:16 New crossword video & bonus video tomorrow morning
0:40 Puzzle intro
1:56 New Patreon competition incoming
2:24 Happy birthdays etc
6:09 Rules
7:34 Start of Solve: Let's Get Cracking

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[davidrattner]

Aad 's mind and his setting prowess is just extraordinary! We are blessed to get such beautiful puzzles each day here! Simon seeing the break in, solving and constantly giving credit to all the setters is something special. Honored to be part of this channel and community!!

[steve]

34:24 for me. The break-in is much easier if (from the 14:22 mark of the video) you abandon set *equivalence*, and add row 5 to the blue set. Blue's total is now 45 greater than orange's, and after cancellation, you have six blue cells (maximum total: 48) that must have a total 45 greater than three orange cells (minimum total: 3). Not only do you immediately get the three 1s, you also get 789 triples in columns 2 and 8, and can place a 7 immediately by knight's move.

[adriennecmc]

My favourite lesson that Simon has ever taught me, though it was not taught outright, is: as soon as you get a digit, clean pencil marks and check for Sudoku. And if there's arrows or cages, do the maths.

[CapKhoury]

I did my SET a little differently at the start and it went better. Add R5C2 and R5C8 back into each set.

Then blue is at most 7+8+9 in each column, so at most 48.

Orange is a full row plus R4C9 + R5C5 + R6C4, so at least 48.

No degrees of freedom, less pain and suffering to get going

[pokinDave]

Simon is an excellent teacher, because he got me to the point where I am yelling at him for having an off day.

[RoderickEtheria]

27:06, Indeed, you can compare the two rows of bulbs against the two columns on their arrows. After removing the duplicates either by arrow or overlap, you can move r4c3 and r6c7 into box 5. This reveals r159c28 are 789 triples, and r4c9, r5c5 and r6c1 are 1s.

[easternbrown]

I think I stumbled on the way Aad maybe intended the break in to work. Just colour up boxes 4 and 6 for a set summing to 90, swap out the circles for their arrow cells, then remove all of row 5 (the middle cell is still highlighted but only once now). The highlighted set now totals 45. It minimises out for the opening three 1s and 123456 sextuples in both columns 2 and 8 (21+21+1+1+1=45).

[Sternentier]

I'm glad Simon spotted the knight's move ruling out the 4 in box 6 (position 1) fairly quickly. I saw it right away and was yelling at the screen, anticipating 30 more minutes of Simon doing advanced logic only to miss the obvious.

[AhsimNreiziev]

Simon is incredibly good at ignoring his own pencilmarks. Particularly, for this puzzle, the 7s in row 9.

[ronjohnson]

The final part is pretty straight forward pencil mark grinding. Exactly the kind of thing that is his last resort. Really nice logic to get there.

[psiphiorg]

A very fun puzzle, with some good SET that uses the secret to show six cells in columns 2 and 8 have to be 789, for a total of 45+1+1+1. My time today was 18:05, solver number 2608.

Edited to add: My SET used rows 4 and 6 instead of boxes 4 and 6. Then r159c28 were 789 pairs equivalent to all of box 5, plus a repeated digit in the overlap, plus the same extra cells that Simon identified. That made the 45+1+1+1 more apparent.

[titusadduxas]

I think the intended breaking is using rows 4&6 and columns 2&8 for the set. You’re left with 6 digits in box 5 and 4 others, 2 of which are at least 1 more than their equivalents in box 5. Doing this leaves you 789 in the columns and 1 in the middle cell and the two others (R4 C9 and R6C1). It is truly beautiful!

[haniapopowska]

I don't remember any other puzzle in the last year where I was yelling at Simon so loudly 😆
He was torturing me with the 4/8.
I let out a giant sigh of relief when he finally got it.

Still adore you, Simon 😉

[joelstevens]

Fabulous puzzle from Aad as per, the break-in and arrow logic was simply stunning. Great name as well (an all-time TV classic). :)

[chipsounder]

This is a divine puzzle. Aad set this puzzle with the ultimate hidden in plain sight (scotoma).
Absolutely loved it and there was a few moments where i was in a crazy amount of awe.❤

[xerodeus]

85 minute solve on my own! What's wild is that my SET was also different from Simon's and others... I did Column 2 & 8 with Row 4 & 6... remove most of the circles that match the lines. Then you're left with box 5 with the top and bottom row filled in, plus the adjacent circles. You can swap the circles to the middle row, and remove all of box 5, but keep the middle square - because when you swapped the circles you were adding the middle row back in twice. Then you knew that you had to add 45 to one set to get the maximum of the other set left over which was 48 (couldn't go higher), and the lowest you could do is 3 across 3 boxes, having to be 1s. I was so proud I saw that pretty early and immediately... and still took another 75+ minutes to solve :D :D :D

[FrancisFjordCupola]

56:35 "I don't know what it means, but it's quite exciting, " Simon said as he pointed to a 59-pair in box 6. The real beauty is that one of those cells is the circle for the arrow whose contents he figured out about one-and-a-half minute earlier. I love how he can get carried away by the big stuff so much the obvious becomes invisible.

[windybeach]

Yay, a puzzle that worked to my strengths! I was able to use all my Simon Set Skills to find the 789 and 111 sets. Then lots of pencil marking and scanning, but a lovely flow without many roadblocks.

[BozoTheBear]

Simon, you are such a legend. What a pleasure to watch your extraordinary mind at work!

[puritan]

WOW, Aad, you come up with some fiendish puzzles, this was a battle nearly right through to the end and there were several points it took me a while to spot the next breakthrough! Loved it!!