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Number: Puzzle #1709
Genre: Sudoku
Author: Helen
Appeared at: February 1, 2010

This was a very nice solve, especially at the beginning. I love the way the diagonals were forced in early.

Number: Puzzle #1689
Genre: Arrows
Author: Rebus
Appeared at: January 13, 2010

There are at least two solutions to this puzzle. Instead of the arrow 1 space south of the 3 pointing NE at the 5 and the arrow 2 spaces south of the 5 pointing NW at the 2, I have the arrow 1 space south of the 3 pointing NW at the 2 and the arrow 2 spaces south of the 5 pointing N at the 5.

Number: Puzzle #250
Genre: Archipelago
Author: Maarten
Appeared at: June 15, 2007

I am absolutely perplexed at how to go about this puzzle. I've filled in the bridges around the edges, a few short segments on the inside that no other bridges could block, and two horizontal bridges in the bottom right where a vertical bridge would cause an impossible layout.

I haven't really had any trouble with the other Archipelago puzzles, but none of the usual attacks are working on this one. I'm thinking it has something to do with what I like to call "boxing", which is where a subset of islands can only be connected to each other with only a few possible connections to the rest of the group, which generally forces a specific bridge as an "exit". However, the subsets I can see (in the checkerboard pattern in the center) have too many exits to check simultaneously.

Any help would be greatly appreciated, but if the break-in makes the rest of the puzzle a piece of cake, a gentle nudge in the right direction would be preferable.

On a more positive note, I'm really enjoying this type of puzzle, despite my usual avoidance of the type of logic it relies on

connect4, thanks for the tips, but those are the ones that aren't working XD.

You should try some of the battleships puzzles on this site, some of them require pretty devious logic

Thanks, Bram. That actually helped immensely. I wasn't thinking about the problem that way, but it made the puzzle very enjoyable once I did. I'm hoping I can use that kind of logic in other puzzles with other types of ships.

Interestingly enough, I solved your other 16-sub puzzle with no problem using similar logic, but I didn't realize it at the time.

Also, I didn't quite touch on it in my first post, but I've been having a lot of trouble with some of the other puzzles with standard fleets. However, if I have any more specific questions, I'll be sure to post them in the right place.

Forgive me if this is in the wrong section, but as far as I can tell, the puzzle help section is for specific puzzles.

I'm a long-time fan of battleships puzzles, and can easily solve the ones published in GAMES magazine, but a majority of the puzzles presented on this site have me completely stumped. I've even had to develop some new techniques (at least new to me) to solve some of them, including counting how many segments are in unclued rows and columns and using those as extra clues.

Having said that, I just feel like I'm still missing something, as even some of the 1-star puzzles on this site gave me some trouble. So, I'm asking the masters out there, especially the site admins (who seem to make a lot of the puzzles I get stuck on):

Is there any expert advice you have that goes beyond basic logic that could help me solve these? For example, what techniques do you use to test-solve your own puzzles?

I want to avoid guess-and-check solutions as much as possible, but I feel that sometimes it's the only way to make progress. I don't mind guessing between two or three positions for a ship or ship segment, but when your fleet consists of 16 submarines and you only have 6 number clues in your puzzle, logic can only take you so far.