One arrow comes to the rescue (Anti-Knight Shading)
(Published on 2. December 2025, 20:03 by galium_odoratum)
Normal Sudoku rules apply.
Shading: In the completed grid, cells containing values exactly one greater than an immediate neighbour (diagonally or orthogonally) within their box are shaded.
Anti-Knight: Cells a knight's move apart cannot contain the same digit.
Arrows: Values in cells with arrows indicate the number of shaded cells in the given direction. All possible arrows are given! For example a valid box can look like this:
Play on SudokuPad
Solution code: Shaded cells in row 2.
Comments
on 11. January 2026, 16:25 by Bankey
Fun puzzle. Thanks, @ galium_odoratum :).
on 21. December 2025, 20:07 by annaeinachin
Great puzzle! It definitly helped to solve the other linked one first to understand the ruleset. Even though it took me about 2 hours it was an approachable 4 star puzzle for me. Thanks for setting :)
on 19. December 2025, 09:14 by JoeyJoeJoe
08:57:19 for me - thanks for setting. took me a few attempts to get it :-O
on 7. December 2025, 18:24 by philolologue
Took me two (very fun!) hours as it was my first time with this ruleset and as Galium mentioned, it takes a while to understand the quirks, but did I mention how much fun it was? Hint: the 'all possible arrows are given' is KEY.
on 5. December 2025, 01:23 by philolologue
Thanks for the follow-up, a half-hour in I've realized I need another clarification lol, do arrows indicate the number of -consecutive- cells in the direction, where unshaded cells block vision, or the total number of cells in that direction skipping over unshaded cells?
It is the total number of shaded cells in that direction skipping over unshaded cells :) -galium_odoratum
on 3. December 2025, 23:28 by galium_odoratum
Added example to the rules.
on 3. December 2025, 18:19 by Exigus
Very nice but quite hard mid game. I think I forgot about the negative constraint for most of the solve which probably didn't help. Thanks for the puzzle!
on 3. December 2025, 15:57 by philolologue
Quick question for clarification before attempting - does a number in a cell with multiple arrows indicate the total number of shaded cells in all directions combined, or the number of shaded cells in each of the directions pointed to individually?
The number of shaded cells in each of the directions pointed to individually (also added example to clarify things) - galium_odoratum
on 3. December 2025, 05:00 by sahi1l
A very nice twist on AtK's shading rules. Thank you!
on 3. December 2025, 01:49 by LordBidoof
Thank you for the puzzle.Does the number of shaded cells include the cell itself?
No, only the number of shaded cells in the given direction, not including itself. -galium_odoratum
