Darkness and Light (Yin-Yang)
(Published yesterday, 02:57 by HalfBakedLunatic)
So here's a tough one to brighten ... or possibly darken ... your day. Maybe it will encourage you to put in some extra time at work, or take a well-deserved break. Looking forward to the upcoming winter, or already missing summer? Eat a hot, spicy, filling meal, or munch on a few celery sticks. You can solve the puzzle at noon, or midnight. Or anytime in between.
The Rules:
• Normal Sudoku Rules Apply.
• Cells separated by a white dot must contain consecutive digits, digits in cells separated by a black dot must be in a 2:1 ratio. ALL POSSIBLE DOTS ARE GIVEN.
• Shade some cells such that all shaded cells are orthogonally connected, all unshaded cells are orthogonally connected, and no 2x2 cluster of cells is entirely shaded or unshaded (Yin Yang rules).
• All orthogonally adjacent cells that separate shaded and unshaded regions must contain digits that differ by at least 3.
• Heavy black lines denote separation between shaded and unshaded regions.
• Digits in cells separated by an X must sum to 10. For each X, BOTH cells are either in the shaded or unshaded region. Not all X's are shown.
Solve Online here (right-click and open in new tab):
Darkness and Light (Yin-Yang) (Sudokupad)
The Sudoku/Kropki is medium difficulty - 3 star maybe. The Yin Yang pattern is a bit more difficult. Even if you solve the Sudoku, the solution code forces you to finish the shading!
Leave a comment and let me know how you like it!
Puzzle by David Workman (aka "HalfBakedLunatic")
To clarify the solution code, the cells in Box 5 are numbered 1 (upper left) to 9 (lower right). Give the cell numbers, in order, of the five cells in the same group.
Solution code: Deciding which cells are 'shaded' vs. 'unshaded' is up to the solver. Enter the the five cell numbers (not the digits in the cells) from box 5 that are in the same group.
Comments
yesterday, 22:18 by Miatc
Lovely puzzle but I agree that even with shading it's no more than 2*
yesterday, 22:13 by HalfBakedLunatic
Clarifying the solution code
yesterday, 22:02 by Stabil
Hello. You should clarify, that one kropki dot type overrules the other, since technically a 1-2 pair should have both a White and Black dot between Them. Either clarify that the pair can have either, or clarify that fx. Black overrules White.
yesterday, 14:55 by anothermember
I found it pretty straight forward to work out the shading compared to most YY puzzles, it's more about kropki logic. A light snack if you're well familiar with both so I'm giving it 2* difficulty overall.
yesterday, 14:37 by GolferBolts
Found this quite difficult (50 mins), loved every minute though. I could hear SA from CtC in my head!!
-- Thank you GolferBolts, great comment! (づ•ᴗ•)
yesterday, 11:39 by mihel111
Lovely puzzle. But if you are familiar with the YY tricks and correctly deduce the meta rules with dots, it's a 1* diff puzzle.
yesterday, 10:10 by WvdWest
Very nice puzzle. Only 2 stars for me.
yesterday, 09:32 by Snookerfan
Lovely! Very smooth and approachable, both the sudoku and the yin-yang, 2 stars for me. Thanks
yesterday, 04:38 by mbrandtwls
Awesome. I agree, the 'Sudoku' is 3 star difficulty, but the Yin Yang is top notch 5 stars and absolutely beautiful.
yesterday, 04:24 by blueberrypug
I think it's more 2.5 to 3 than 4 stars. very nice!!
