bakpao's puzzles

    Chained Block has been on my to-set list for a while, but I never got around to trying to write one - until now! I went for deductions a bit different from what I usually see in these puzzles, and I'm quite happy with how it turned out. Difficulty: 2.5/5 (rules from Puzzle Rules ) Shade some cells such that each connected group of shaded cells contains exactly one clue. Clues must be shaded, and indicate the size of their group of shaded cells. Each group of shaded cells must be connected by a corner to at least one other, forming networks. Two shaded groups belonging to the same network may not have the same shape and size, counting rotations and reflections as the same. Play on pzprxs https://pzprxs.vercel.app/p?chainedb/11/11/g3j3h4g2u5j2w4h3s3h6w5j3u4g3h4j4g

   We regularly host speedsetting sessions in the CTC discord. The concept is simple: a host sets a prompt - usually a (pool of) genre(s), a theme or other constraint - to work with, participants then set a puzzle around that prompt in the allotted time, usually one hour. Judges then solve all the puzzles and decide their top three favorites, which are declared the winners! These are always fun events. Not only do they encourage me to set genres or constraints I normally wouldn't, there's also a strategic element involved where you have to make rapid decisions on what genre to go with, grid dimensions, theming - all before and while setting a functional, interesting puzzle. An hour seems like quite some time, but more often than not I find myself battling against the clock. The puzzles that I write during speedsets tend to not be published anywhere other than in Discord, even though they can be quite nice. They're not as refined as my usual puzzles, but that's the charm...

   I was setting Dominion earlier today and thought it might be interesting to combine with Norinori. It's not a new concept - I found mention of the idea over a year ago (but couldn't actually find any puzzles).  The puzzle came out a bit easy and silly, but fun enough. One genre is definitely much more powerful than the other - even more so because of the theme I went with. Maybe I'll explore the combination some more at a later stage. Difficulty: 2/5 Base rules from Puzzle Rules Shade some dominoes of cells to divide the grid into unshaded areas. Every region contains exactly two shaded cells. Shaded dominoes may not touch orthogonally.  Clues cannot be shaded, and each orthogonally connected area of unshaded cells contains exactly one type of clue, and all instances of it. Play on penpa https://tinyurl.com/22cugux4

 Line of Sight is a genre that recently caught my eye thanks to its feature in the 2022 UK Puzzle Championship . I quite enjoy solving the genre and setting this puzzle was tons of fun too. I didn't originally intend to go all the way with the 1234 theme, but after placing the first clues (can you guess which group was first?)  and exploring a bit further, I found they were quite balanced and worked well, so I went with it.   Difficulty: 3/5  (rules from Puzzle Rules ) Connect some pairs of orthogonally adjacent dots to form a single non-intersecting loop. A clue represents the length of the first straight line segment seen in the indicated direction. Play on penpa https://tinyurl.com/2gvobc3t