Lucky Clover
(Published on 10. August 2026, 21:32 by egubachu)
Rules
- Sudoku: Place the digits 1 to 9 once each in every row, column, and box.
- Counting circles: A digit in a colored circle indicates the number of circles containing that digit. The different shades of green are purely cosmetic.
- Quads: A digit on a black circle at the corner of four cells must occur in the surrounding four cells.
Solution code: Row 5
Comments
on 16. August 2026, 15:11 by egglet
really had to rack my brain for this one. took me slightly an hour but super rewarding when i finally figured it out. challenging all the way through
on 15. August 2026, 06:19 by Allagem
Much better, thank you egubachu! Now this puzzle is equal parts beautiful and brilliant throughout the entire solve! (and don't worry, the puzzle is plenty interesting and challenging enough as is! :D)
on 15. August 2026, 04:18 by egubachu
Revisions to the puzzle after the comments of Allagem.
on 15. August 2026, 01:41 by Allagem
Wow, the opening half (2/3?) of this puzzle is absolutely brilliant, and then the finale is one of the most brutal brick walls I think I have ever slammed into. My final solution path was about a triple-stacked bifurcation and I am not convinced an easier path exists. Did you have a specific solution path in mind for disambiguating the last 5 digits or did you use software to conclude that the solution was unique and left it at that?
Edit: I originally had a wall of text suggestion different endings to the puzzle, but egubachu has edited the puzzle to a use a much cleaner ending. It turned out one of my suggestions was the original puzzle before some clues were removed for an extra challenge. However there was an oversight that removing those clues opened up more possibilities than egubachu realized, making the ending harder than intended. As the ending no longer needs adjustment, I removed my discussion about the alternate endings. The puzzle now has an excellent ending - still quite challenging, but a fair and worthy ending to compliment the brilliant beginning! :)
~~~
Hi! Thank you so much for your very thoughtful reply, and for kindly taking the time to write it all up! That's so kind of you, and I thank you very much.
So, I was going to write a comment on the intended ending, and to make sure that I got it right, I did the puzzle again. And to my great embarrassment, I made a huge blunder when I made my final adjustments of the puzzle.
I am now actually quite surprised that the puzzle still solves. Indeed, the ending is much harder now than I intended (although I kind of like it, because it involves my favorite technique which is coloring).
So, you are completely right! And you are very much deserving of my appreciation for pointing it out so thoughtfully!
I am going to comment in a hidden comment on what went wrong in my the final design choices I made, and why that made the puzzle much more easily solvable. Indeed, you shouldn't have to chase five colors around the puzzle and find rather tricky deductions, to reach the end of the puzzle.
