The 'Deer Antler' Sudoku Trick

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*** Today's Sudoku ***

After yesterday's demonic battle with KNT, Simon requested something more tractable today and was presented with Nine Bent Arrows by Rodrigo Mahu (making a debut on the channel). This is a very clever arrow sudoku and we're not sure how hard the puzzle is... Let us know!

Give it a try at the link below:

Rules:
Normal sudoku rules apply (ie every row, column and 3x3 box must contain all the digitis from 1 to 9). Digits along an arrow sum to the digit in that arrow's circle. Digits may repeat along an arrow if allowed by other rules.

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[rmahu]

Thanks for featuring my puzzle. This isn't exactly my debut as Mark resolved "Equal Color Sums" back on March 7th.

The puzzle was originally created after watching the video "Sudoku: Nothing Else Matters" where "Boomerang 2" by Aad van de Wetering was solved. There Simon solves that puzzle without doing the deduction of the repeated digit which gave me the idea of creating a puzzle where it was fundamental.

Then the solution path was exactly as intended. The antlers repeat 1 or 2, and the inverted antlers have a minimum and maximum of 14. The two X-Wins on 9 and how all remaining arrows are forced.

[pastorbrianediger]

Often I see something, and I'm "look there, right over there!" But then I think to myself, "self, you'd probably still be trying to figure out how to start this puzzle." Happy to watch and learn!

[heart.]

My rule of thumb is to attempt every puzzle with a Video of <40min length. I stared at this one for 15mins with absolutely no Idea where to start - that hasn't happened before! I am thrilled to see what I missed.

[geminimaxxim]

I can't help but appreciate the cleverness of this puzzle's title. Not only is it quite literal in denoting the number of arrows in the puzzle, but it also offers a hint at the power of the X-wings restricting 9 in the grid. Well done

[josephgamal]

29:20 every time he says "Sorry, I was being slow" I die a little bit inside since I am trying to catch up on what he is doing!

[Keldorn]

Digitis - noun, a sudoku-related sickness resulting from not being able to finish a puzzle and getting a fever from it.

[BremSterPuzzles]

Rodrigo does amazing puzzles. I was surprised when you said this was a debut, because his puzzles are ones I have enjoyed for so long.
I am glad he has been finally discovered.

[inspiringsand]

Rules: 03:31
Let's Get Cracking: 04:49
Simon's time: 25m12s
Puzzle Solved: 30:01

What about this video's Top Tier Simarkisms?!
Bobbins: 1x (29:09)
Phistomefel: 1x (01:25)

And how about this video's Simarkisms?!
By Sudoku: 7x (07:06, 23:26, 24:02, 25:29, 26:03, 28:49, 29:47)
Ah: 7x (08:16, 09:15, 13:53, 16:58, 19:27, 26:08, 27:27)
Clever: 4x (12:40, 14:54, 19:21, 19:21)
Lovely: 4x (19:19, 20:39, 21:19, 30:42)
Pencil Mark/mark: 4x (15:10, 15:15, 20:13, 24:49)
The Answer is: 3x (11:19, 20:33, 21:44)
Beautiful: 3x (18:29, 21:23, 30:01)
Obviously: 3x (10:32, 22:12, 30:26)
Sorry: 2x (02:16, 29:19)
Stuck: 2x (26:08, 26:08)
Brilliant: 2x (03:19, 03:19)
Break the Puzzle: 1x (22:25)
Incredible: 1x (01:25)
Shouting: 1x (02:16)
Facetious: 1x (21:37)
Nature: 1x (23:12)
Cake!: 1x (02:31)

Most popular number(>9), digit and colour this video:
Seventeen (6 mentions)
Two (74 mentions)
Red (11 mentions)

Antithesis Battles:
Row (19) - Column (14)

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!

[vacui_dev]

24:55 I'm not a psychologist, but my guess as to the reason is that you spend most of your sudoku solves looking at unfinished squares, so your brain just has much more practice, and is much more accustomed to, looking to rule-out digits through conflicting pencil marks, rather than fully solved squares.

Consider also that all forms of pencil marks use digits of around the same size, which are incongruent with the much larger size of the given digits

See also: the trouble you found that you had with scanning when your microphone forced you to sit closer to your computer monitor

[th.nd.r]

That is an absolute BEAUTY Rodrigo!!! Love the antler pattern, loved Simon’s solve of it too, you explain it so well Simon! We’re certainly on a run of great puzzles here. PS, once again, the 3 in the corner didn’t get its song!!

[Alex_Meadows]

What a lovely break-in! And well done for cycling to the top of Box Hill - my wife and I walk up there quite often and even that's enough of a slog for us (particularly in warm weather). Worth it for the view, though :)

[georgeaman]

Another nice puzzle. Thank you Simon for the trick explanation and Rodrigo Mahu for the puzzle.

[nblhuntr]

This was a very tasty solve. I do enjoy when the trick is breaking in and the rest falls more or less into place. At least, it falls into place when Simon does it.

[RichSmith]

In today's episode of "Richard finds the more complicated break-in" we find him colouring row 3 (it hasn't been confirmed, but it is suspected to sum to 45), transposing the colours from the four circles to the four arrows, and calculating the minimum of the new coloured cells to be 44, giving him just one degree of freedom! 😂

[Adrian_Grey]

Very nice break in on this puzzle. I missed the second X-wing, which tripped me up a lot in the middle, but I got through it in the end. The solve path was much neater than I appreciated.

[rungus]

Wow. There are times when I can see that your solves are faster than I can solve, but at least I can get there eventually. And then there are puzzles like this where I'm just completely left behind by your ability to grasp the implications of what you see, and I'm left even more stunned by the setters who created these puzzles. I was left well behind in this one, and watching your video is impressive to say the least.

[kana]

Kinda wished I had tried this one myself, but I just had my coffee and relaxed instead. Cool puzzle!

[xOscarAx]

simon: does simple math to break in the puzzle
me: uses every single possible combination of 6789s from the arrows in boxes 2 and 8 to see how they break the puzzle.
* dont worry guys i eventually solved it after figuring out the 89 and 79 pairs in each of those boxes. it took me an hour and 40 mins total.... but im still kind of proud of that.

[SvviftDeath]

17:25 I used a slightly different method for the start of the puzzle and that made the rest fall apart a bit faster. So when I had the logic for the antlers figured out I quickly had the 8 placed in row 2 that lead to the puzzle sorting out nicely afterwards.

[DonaldSjervenE]

"Please tell me that ..." Okay. You didn't see the BIG 3 for the same reason you didn't see the BIG 9.