Wichtel 2020 (7): Ärger in der Wichtelwerkstatt
(Published on 15. September 2021, 20:20 by wichtel)
Santa Claus was beside himself. It had been several hours since he started looking for his spectacles, which was especially galling during the Christmas season, when there was so much work to do! He was just digging through his desk drawers for the umpteenth time when a loudly arguing mob of gnomes spilled into his office. "What ever is the matter?" he grumbled moodily, and pointed at the tallest of them. He could easily recognize his head puzzle gnome, Tipsi, even without his glasses, by the gnome's bright red cap. "Go on, explain this hubbub!"
"Well," began Tipsi. "Pipsi and I were in the middle of creating Eva's puzzle when these two troublemakers came in" (he indicated two of the smaller gnomes, whom Santa — blind as he was — could not identify) "and wanted to help. So we sat them down at the extra table with the puzzle. Pipsi and I set the clues on the top and left, and the little ones set the clues at the bottom and right." Santa looked at the page that Tipsi had laid down for him. "And what happened next?" — "Ermm...," Tipsi continued. "It's a grid with the digits 1-9 in every row and column, with two empty cells. Pipsi has also created a roller coaster path on the numbered fields, which incidentally may not touch nor cross itself, much like a closed snake. Our clues (Pipsi's being those of the roller coaster path and mine the other digits) are, in the correct order, the sums of the sections created by the roller coaster path and by the other digit cells. The empty cells also separate these segments. The two little guys were supposed to mark in the first digits seen from the given direction and the corresponding skyscraper clues. And each one undertook one of these tasks."
"Okay, so what next?" asked Santa, who was gradually losing patience. "The two argued so loudly that, for the next step, the cryptification, we had to separate them. Pipsi and I each sat with one of them, and each pair of us was responsible for encoding the digits that pair had written, using letters. When we were done, we put everything on one page and finished it." — "But that's great," Santa grumbled. "Looks quite nice, in fact." Tipsi hemmed and hawed. "The problem is, that each of the two groups came up with their own code for the cryptification, even sometimes using some of the same letters, and we no longer know which clue groups belong to which encoding."
Well, that is certainly a fine mess, thought Santa. "But why were the little ones fighting in the first place?" he asked, while continuing to search for his spectacles. "Each one wanted to write his clues first, and so we also don't know in which order the clues at the bottom and right are supposed to be." — "Is that so," Santa growled, distracted, as he got on hands and knees to peek under his desk. Lo and behold! There were his glasses! But as he stood up again, wiped them off, and had them back on his nose, he looked up — and his office was empty. He glanced back at the diagram with the clues and thought for a moment. One could only hope that, despite the missing information about how the cryptification process had been split up, the puzzle was still solvable.
Solution code: Row 8 and column 3, with X for the empty cells.
Comments
on 25. October 2021, 22:23 by ffricke
Ich kann mich den Vorrednern(rätslern) nur uneingeschränkt anschließen. Ein wahrer Genuss und als der für mich etwas zähe Einstieg geschafft war, lief es langsam aber glatt durch.
on 30. September 2021, 21:38 by Uhu
Endlich habe ich es, nachdem ich Hilfe beim Entwirren meines langandauernden Denkfehlers hatte. Danke für dieses tolle Rätsel!
on 26. September 2021, 23:02 by marcmees
brilliant puzzle. Thanks.
on 21. September 2021, 20:26 by zuzanina
Wunderschön!
Wenn der Einstieg erstmal geschafft ist, löst sich's fast wie von selbst, Schritt für Schritt! :-)
on 19. September 2021, 12:41 by r45
Super schönes Rätsel, man wird eigentlich nur durch die eigenen Denk- und Zuordnungsfehler aufgehalten.
on 19. September 2021, 02:18 by polar
Very enjoyable puzzle thanks! Thanks also to Jesper for the clarification. I had stared at it for a while wondering how to begin prior to this. Super smooth solve once one gets around the rules :)
on 18. September 2021, 18:06 by Mody
Ein Hammer-Rätsel!
Nachdem der Anfang gefunden war, ging es wunderschön flüssig durch.
on 18. September 2021, 15:10 by marcmees
@Jesper: thanks for the clarification.
on 18. September 2021, 15:01 by Jesper
@marcmees: the Roller Coaster clues and the Other Digits clues use different encoding systems. These two clue types are mixed top and left, according to the order they appear in the grid. One of the clue types shares an encoding system with Skyscrapers, and the other one shares its encoding system with "First digit seen" (how they match up is to be determined during the solve).
on 18. September 2021, 14:54 by Jesper
Sehr schön!
Ich habe die Regeln zunächst falsch verstanden. So wie ich Roller Coaster kenne, werden Zeilenhinweisen nur gegeben für waagerechte Abschnitte, und Spaltenhinweisen nur für senkrechte Abschnitte. Das ist aber hier nicht der Fall.
Very nice!
I did not interpret the rules correctly at first. In the Roller Coasters I know, clues for rows are only given for horizontal loop segments, and clues for columns only for vertical loop segments. That is however not the case here.
on 18. September 2021, 10:08 by marcmees
thanks Gabi ... but how come also left and top hints are using 11 letters for encoding?
on 18. September 2021, 01:07 by ibag
The hints on the right and below are, in some order, the first-seen and the skyscraper hints. Both types of clues use different coding.
on 17. September 2021, 23:18 by marcmees
a clue group are all hints that belong to 1 row or 1 column at the same side of the grid? The hints on the same side but different row/column can be coded differently?
on 17. September 2021, 23:13 by Lara Croft
Klasse! Da kriegt man einen Knoten im Gehirn beim Denken. Es fiel mir schwer, einen Anfang zu finden und ich hab erstmal rumprobieren müssen. Aber nachdem das erste Wegstück klar war ergab sich immer wieder eine Stelle, an der es weiter ging.
on 17. September 2021, 14:29 by Mody
@Gabi, danke für die Antwort :)
on 17. September 2021, 13:17 by ibag
Was für ein Rätsel - einfach phantastisch!!!!!
on 17. September 2021, 11:48 by ibag
Ich habs so verstanden, dass die Schlange "dick" ist.
on 17. September 2021, 11:26 by Mody
Deutet die Angabe "wie eine geschlossenen Schlange" darauf hin, dass diese Schlange ein Feld breit ist, oder ist sie dünn wie bei einem Masyu, so dass in zwei Zeilen waagerecht auch zwei Abschnitte parallel laufen können?
on 16. September 2021, 16:55 by wichtel
Next questions, next answers :-) :
1) yes, that's possible
2) single sum
3) yes, just one encoding system
on 16. September 2021, 15:04 by sf2l
I have a few questions.....1) can 2 empty cells touch each other by the side? and 2) if there are two cells unused by the roller coaster next two each other, will these be shown as two different digits or a single digit indicating their sum? finally 3)are the encoding systems used consistent for the rows and the columns?
on 16. September 2021, 11:21 by wichtel
No, here are no leading zeros in 2-digit clues allowed.
on 15. September 2021, 22:06 by Carrick22
Can the encryption have "0X" as a valid 2-digit clue (e.g. 05; 5 with a 0 in front) ?
