Balance Loop (Star Battle) by Serkan Yürekli
This is a free “warm-up” puzzle; Season 4 subscribers will see today’s main puzzle in the same style posted at 9:05 AM PT.
or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools in linex mode where left click+drag draws lines and right click marks X’s)
Theme: Square Number
Author/Opus: This is the 497th puzzle from our managing editor Serkan Yürekli.
Rules: Standard Balance Loop rules. Also, each row and column must contain exactly one star. Stars cannot be placed in adjacent cells that share an edge or corner, and all stars must be on empty cells not used by the loop.
Difficulty: 1.5 stars
Time Standards (highlight to view): Grandmaster = 1:00, Master = 1:30, Expert = 3:00
Solution: PDF and solving animation.
Note: Follow this link for other Balance Loop puzzles. If you are new to this puzzle type, here are our easiest Balance Loop Puzzles to get started on. More Balance Loops can be found in our beginner-friendly collection Intro to GMPuzzles by Serkan Yürekli and in Balance Loop by Prasanna Seshadri and Murat Can Tonta.
Note 2: Comments on the blog are great! For a more interactive discussion, please also consider using our Week 7 Discussion post on the GMPuzzles Discord.
The rules in the Penpa-Edit version say that two stars must be placed for column, which seems.. challenging.
There is a typo in the Penpa Edit version; it should have been “one star.” We’ll fix this.
I guess there is typo in the rules on penpa stating 2 stars instead of 1
We should probably stay with “the indicated number” of stars in the instructions since these small bits sometimes get missed. The puzzle always had a one star mark to the upper-right which is what is meant to be the definitive mark. Also, no grid under 8×8 can have 2 stars in it so that is another protip to check if something doesn’t make sense, and a reasonable puzzle needs to be 9×9+ to be a 2 star star battle.