Master sudoku
Master sudoku brings the bigger patterns: Swordfish, XYZ-Wings, W-Wings and, now and then, quads. Almost every one of its puzzles needs at least one of them.
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What it takes
How often each technique is needed in the game’s Master puzzles, counted over 300 of them:
- Hidden singlesin 100% of them
- Locked candidatesin 98% of them
- W-Wingin 93% of them
- Naked singlesin 81% of them
- Pairsin 77% of them
- Skyscraper and 2-String Kitein 71% of them
- XYZ-Wingin 53% of them
- XY-Wingin 42% of them
- X-Wingin 24% of them
- Triplesin 18% of them
- Swordfishin 17% of them
- Jellyfishin 1% of them
- Quadsrarely
Master puzzles start with 22 to 28 digits given, 25 on average. Every one has exactly one solution, and none needs a guess.
Tips
- W-Wings come up in nearly every Master puzzle: watch for two cells far apart with the same two notes.
- A Swordfish row doesn’t need three notes: two are enough, as long as the three rows share three columns.
- When nothing works, look at the cells with three notes: an XYZ-Wing may be hiding there.
Other levels
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