Mystery TomTom
or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools)
Theme: Guess the author?
Rules: Variation of standard TomTom rules. In these puzzles, the five numbers to enter are not 1-5. In each grid, there are five unknown integers that the solver must determine.
Answer String: Enter the 3rd row from left to right in the left puzzle, followed by a comma, followed by the 3rd row from left to right in the right puzzle.
Time Standards (highlight to view): Grandmaster = 1:00, Master = 1:30, Expert = 3:00
Solution: PDF
**While this was initially not a numbered opus in this author’s work, we are calling it #47 for our site count.
I liked the theme. At first I was wondering why there needed to be two puzzles with such similar solving patterns. Then I remembered that the guest artist does have both a first and a last name…
If I was guessing who wrote it by their past work, this person wouldn’t have been my first guess, because I’m not sure if he’s ever published a TomTom.
How do people solve this in 1 minute? While I understand that this was supposed to be the best time of world class solvers, it took me longer than that to just write down the answer.
Is it me or is his last name “mispelled”?
…just you? Seems right to me. 🙂
oh, now I get it. The “given” boxes from top to bottom spell out the name, not the solution string (the left box’s 3rd row actually spells out “grant” backwards, so I was confused that the right box’s 3rd row spelled out “fikse” backwards).
I guess I’m too used to the MIT Mystery Hunt style where you’d extract that name from your final answer to the sudoku, not from the start state, hence why I thought there was a spelling error. Does that make more sense?
It definitely does. I noticed the TNARG part of the entry string when choosing the rows, but kept the author’s original puzzle presentation when I could find no row/column to get the other part into the answer key.
In the future, maybe the lesson is “don’t overthink Mondays”. MIT level puzzles will be towards the end of the week.
No, but your “mispelled” is misspelled. =)
Now I want some toast.
1:32 left and 1:02 on the right
2:36!
Is the author wei hwa hwang?
Nah. Try converting the digits into letters.
Spotted the author before the solve, but where’s the fun in that 🙂
Nice, easy & elegant puzzle !
I felt like the two puzzles were too similar to each other, but with such a fast solve it wasn’t a big deal to spend the time doing the same thing again.
I spent a while afterwards wondering what the mathematical properties were that led to these sets of numbers, and appreciating the way the corner clues worked, before realizing that the number sets were chosen for a different reason.
As I told you in person a few times, I’m very interested in exploring different sets of numbers and these puzzles even with minimal clues show how you can do unusual things sometimes. But yes, the reason behind this particular set is far from mathematical.