Sunday, 18 February 2024

Lavaloid

Today's ✨ Studying Sunday ✨ is a Masyu with a deduction that I'd like to introduce to you! In this puzzle, you can spot several instances of the following pattern (W = white, B = black):

W W
 B

There is a deduction you can make every time this pattern appears. I highly encourage figuring out the deduction yourself, however the GAPP 101 is still available if you're really stuck.

Rules: Draw a non-intersecting loop through the centers of some cells that passes through every circle. The loop must turn on black circles and travel straight through the cells on either side. The loop must go straight through white circles, and turn in at least one of the cells on either side.

GAPP 101: Every time the given pattern appears, there must be a loop segment going out of the black clue that points away from the two white clues.
Why is this true? For ease of explanation, we will only consider the given orientation. A black clue must have exactly one vertical exit and one horizontal exit. If the vertical exit goes up, then the two white clues must have vertical loop segments going through them, which blocks both horizontal exits of the black clue.

Finish the puzzle in 2:12 or less for a Speedy Sloth 🦥!
Finish the puzzle in 4:24 or less for a Quick Crab 🦀!
Finish with any time at all for a Teacher Tūī 🐦!

Example (puzz.link) by Eric: https://tinyurl.com/37kxaswe
Puzzle (puzz.link): http://tinyurl.com/bddrsydj