Logic Masters Deutschland e.V.

UPDATE: Huge thanks to RoflsALot for persisting with this puzzle across three streams and solving it with the help of chat! They found most of the intended logic, but did find a shortcut past some of it that I had overlooked. As such, I've made a slight tweak - the solution remains exactly the same, but I think the new placement of given digits will steer solvers towards a more beautiful break in. If you wish to attempt the original puzzle with the shortcut available, the link is at the bottom of this page.

This is my response to Scojo's setting prompt a few weeks ago, as redeemed by Dorlir. The idea for this came very quickly, but the execution has driven me slightly mad over the last few weeks! Nevertheless I'm Dorlighted with the outcome!



Normal sudoku rules apply, i.e. fill every cell in the main grid (inside the thick border) with a digit from 1-9 such that no digit repeats in a row, column or 3x3 box.

Toroidal Grid: The grid is a torus. E.g. r6c1 is considered to be orthogonally connected to r6c9, and r1c8 is considered to be orthogonally connected to r9c8. The cells around the edge may be used to help visualise this.

German Whisper Loop: Draw a loop in the grid that may not cross or overlap itself and travels DIAGONALLY only. Adjacent digits on the loop must differ by at least 5. A clue outside the grid shows the sum of all distinct digits that appear on the loop in that row or column.

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Find the original version of the puzzle with the shortcut available here.