UK Puzzle League Division D 2023-2024

[pinkagape]

Hi everyone

Here is the schedule for the 2023/24 season

28th/29th October - Beginners Slitherlink
18th/19th November - Beginners Dot to Dot
16th/17th December - Beginners Four Winds
20th/21st January - Beginners Akari
2nd/3rd March - Beginners Nurikabe
23rd/24th March - Beginners TomTom

The first round, in a month or so, will be a round of standard Slitherlink puzzles, the rules and examples for which will be on the Puzzle Rules board next week.

If you are competing in Division D this year, you will need to download and print the puzzles, then time yourself to see how long it takes you to complete each puzzle. If you make a mistake and want to start again, you should not restart the clock.

I hope that competitors will be able to find the time to complete all puzzles over Friday 27th October to Monday 30th October, but if competitors are only able to complete some of the puzzles, this will still allow them to score points towards the Division D standings.

Puzzlers who are not in Division D will also be able to download the puzzles and submit their times (for a separate leaderboard).

Upon completion of the puzzles, you will be asked to email the times and an answer key for each puzzle, but more details for this will be given when the puzzle booklet is ready.

A reminder that anyone interested in taking a place in the UK Puzzle League should email their interest to adam@ukpuzzles.org. New players can join Division D at any time up until Round 1 finishes.

Edited to amend dates of Round 5 and 6

[pinkagape]

Hello

Here is Round 1 of Division D of the 2023-2024 UK Puzzle League.

Please download and print the puzzles. You can complete them in any order at any point between now and Tuesday 31st October.

For each puzzle, remember to time yourself honestly as to how long it takes.

When you are finished all of the puzzles, or as many as you are able to, please email adam@ukpuzzles.org your times for each puzzle and the answer key for each puzzle (to ensure that you have understood how each solution is supposed to look).

If you have not yet signed up for a place in the UK Puzzle League, you may do so in the same email, giving your name and UKPA username. If you are not in Division D, your times will be entered onto an all-comers scoreboard, which will not score points in the UK Puzzle League. If you are in Division D, the solver with the most points will receive 10 credits, the second will receive 9 credits and so on. If two or more solvers score the same number of points, then the fastest total time (spent on completed puzzles) will score the higher number of credits.

If you have any questions, please ask via email (adam@ukpuzzles.org)

Please do not discuss the puzzles in the forum until the competition is declared closed.

Have fun!

[pinkagape]

Round 1 is complete. Apologies for the non unique puzzle in Round 6. However, it didn't seem to throw people too far as nine people submitted fully correct sets. In the end, some blistering times from Alex proved a great debut for her, but Liane was the overall champion.

As usual, red names are those in Division D.

Liane Robinson - 3m59
Alex Robinson - 4m52
Eva Myers - 10m17
Jack Lawrence - 11m16
Emma Kingston - 14m06
Hunter Brennan - 18m37
Desirée Wilson - 22m29
Calum Mailer - 25m34
Zoe Ashford - 41m0

Lots of players in Division D, with Alex taking an early lead ahead of 2022-23 runner up Hunter.

Round 2 will take place in a couple of weeks and will be Dot to Dot puzzles, as in the classic children's puzzle (e.g. https://www.dottodots.net/) Therefore it will be a bit of a sprint round where every second will count.

[puzzlemad]

For those that are new to slitherlink puzzles, this guide from Bram de Laat is great. (I know it's too late for this round, had I been thinking I'd have shared it earlier).

https://puzzleparasite.blogspot.com/201 ... de_23.html

[pinkagape]

Here is Round 2 of Division D of the 2023-2024 UK Puzzle League.

These are standard dot to dot puzzles. Puzzle 10 is not intended to make a picture of any kind.

Please download and print the puzzles. You can complete them in any order at any point between now and Tuesday 21st November.

For each puzzle, remember to time yourself honestly as to how long it takes. It is anticipated that these might be quite quick times for this set.

When you are finished all of the puzzles, or as many as you are able to, please email adam@ukpuzzles.org your times for each puzzle and the answer key for each puzzle (to ensure that you have understood how each solution is supposed to look).

If you have not yet signed up for a place in the UK Puzzle League, you may do so in the same email, giving your name and UKPA username. If you are not in Division D, your times will be entered onto an all-comers scoreboard, which will not score points in the UK Puzzle League. If you are in Division D, the solver with the most points will receive 10 credits, the second will receive 9 credits and so on. If two or more solvers score the same number of points, then the fastest total time (spent on completed puzzles) will score the higher number of credits.

If you have any questions, please ask via email (adam@ukpuzzles.org)

Please do not discuss the puzzles in the forum until the competition is declared closed.

Have fun!

Edited to update Puzzle file

[pinkagape]

Annoyingly I made a mess of pasting Puzzle 9 into the document so I have updated the file to correct the image.

[pinkagape]

Round 2 is over! I was delighted to see so many entrants and it was a real race to the finish, won by Alex Robinson, just ahead of Hunter.

Alex Robinson - 3m24
Hunter Brennan - 3m47
Liane Robinson - 5m00
Eva Myers - 5m04
Desirée Wilson - 6m05
Zoe Ashford - 6m37
Arabella Bissett - 9m05
Calum Mailer - 10m12

Alex has extended her lead at the top of the table, but consistency from Hunter and Desirée means they're not too far behind.



Round 3 is Four Winds, which is a puzzle type we've done before, so there's the past set in the Library (https://ukpuzzles.org/ukpl/library.php), as well as a Puzzle Guide and examples in the Rules and Tips forum (viewtopic.php?t=2258).

[pinkagape]

Here is Round 3 of Division D of the 2023-2024 UK Puzzle League.

These are standard Four Winds puzzles. All cells are used in all puzzles, like the 2021 set.

Please download and print the puzzles. You can complete them in any order at any point between now and Tuesday 19th December.

For each puzzle, remember to time yourself honestly as to how long it takes. It is anticipated that these might be quite quick times for this set.

When you are finished all of the puzzles, or as many as you are able to, please email adam@ukpuzzles.org your times for each puzzle and the answer key for each puzzle (to ensure that you have understood how each solution is supposed to look).

If you have not yet signed up for a place in the UK Puzzle League, you may do so in the same email, giving your name and UKPA username. If you are not in Division D, your times will be entered onto an all-comers scoreboard, which will not score points in the UK Puzzle League. If you are in Division D, the solver with the most points will receive 10 credits, the second will receive 9 credits and so on. If two or more solvers score the same number of points, then the fastest total time (spent on completed puzzles) will score the higher number of credits.

If you have any questions, please ask via email (adam@ukpuzzles.org)

Please do not discuss the puzzles in the forum until the competition is declared closed.

Have fun!

[pinkagape]

Round 3 is now complete. It was a very competitive round which all solvers completed, and congratulations go to Desirée and Alex with excellent times, but Alex ended up making it three out of three so far.

Alex Robinson - 11m17
Desirée Wilson - 11m52
Liane Robinson - 17m09
Zoe Ashford - 17m27
Eva Myers - 17m29
Calum Mailer - 20m48
Hunter Brennan - 28m34

Desirée has now jumped to second place but it'll be a tough ask to catch Alex if she continues the season as well as she's started it.



Round 4 is some beginner Akari puzzles, which will be on the weekend of 20th and 21st January.

[pinkagape]

Happy New Year! It's Round 4!

These are standard Akari puzzles. They're on the easier side of things, it should be a bit of a sprint.

Please download and print the puzzles. You can complete them in any order at any point between now and Tuesday 23rd January.

For each puzzle, remember to time yourself honestly as to how long it takes. It is anticipated that these might be quite quick times for this set.

When you are finished all of the puzzles, or as many as you are able to, please email adam@ukpuzzles.org your times for each puzzle and the answer key for each puzzle (to ensure that you have understood how each solution is supposed to look).

If you have not yet signed up for a place in the UK Puzzle League, you may do so in the same email, giving your name and UKPA username. If you are not in Division D, your times will be entered onto an all-comers scoreboard, which will not score points in the UK Puzzle League. If you are in Division D, the solver with the most points will receive 10 credits, the second will receive 9 credits and so on. If two or more solvers score the same number of points, then the fastest total time (spent on completed puzzles) will score the higher number of credits.

If you have any questions, please ask via email (adam@ukpuzzles.org)

Please do not discuss the puzzles in the forum until the competition is declared closed.

Have fun!

[pinkagape]

Good work everyone! That's the end of Round 4, and it's a win for Desirée! Most people had one or two puzzles that they stumbled on, but Desirée was consistently fast with no stumbles to pick up the full 10 credits.

Desirée Wilson - 6m42
Alex Robinson - 8m47
Eva Myers - 11m13
Liane Robinson - 12m29
Hunter Brennan - 12m30
Calum Mailer - 13m03
Zoe Ashford - 29m37

Alex is top of the table but Desirée can still catch her.



Round 5 is after the UK Open, during the first weekend of March and will be a round of Nurikabe.

[puzzlemad]

Well done everyone. It would be great to meet some of you at the Open - there are still spaces available and I'm sure you'll enjoy yourselves. We're a friendly bunch.

[pinkagape]

It's now time for Round 5

These are standard Nurikabe puzzles.

Please download and print the puzzles. You can complete them in any order at any point between now and Tuesday 5th March.

For each puzzle, remember to time yourself honestly as to how long it takes. It is anticipated that these might be quite quick times for this set.

When you are finished all of the puzzles, or as many as you are able to, please email adam@ukpuzzles.org your times for each puzzle and the answer key for each puzzle (to ensure that you have understood how each solution is supposed to look).

If you have not yet signed up for a place in the UK Puzzle League, you may do so in the same email, giving your name and UKPA username. If you are not in Division D, your times will be entered onto an all-comers scoreboard, which will not score points in the UK Puzzle League. If you are in Division D, the solver with the most points will receive 10 credits, the second will receive 9 credits and so on. If two or more solvers score the same number of points, then the fastest total time (spent on completed puzzles) will score the higher number of credits.

If you have any questions, please ask via email (adam@ukpuzzles.org)

Please do not discuss the puzzles in the forum until the competition is declared closed.

Have fun!

[pinkagape]

That's Round 5 finished!

I was pleased to see that everyone found these puzzles reasonably straightforward and it led to a close contest, edged by just 2 seconds in the end by Alex, and then a second win of the year for Desirée.

Desirée WIlson - 9m26
Alex Robinson - 9m48
Hunter Brennan - 9m50
Liane Robinson - 13m19
Eva Myers - 14m31
Calum Mailer - 14m57
Zoe Ashford - 15m15

Lots riding on Round 6's TomTom puzzles in a few weeks.

(Edited on 7th March to add in Desirée's time)

[pinkagape]

Desirée has now submitted her times and finished in 9m26, so actually took the win! Congratulations!

Here is the updated table.

[pinkagape]

It's now time for Round 6

These are standard TomTom puzzles.

Please download and print the puzzles. You can complete them in any order at any point between now and Tuesday 26th March.

For each puzzle, remember to time yourself honestly as to how long it takes. It is anticipated that these might be quite quick times for this set.

When you are finished all of the puzzles, or as many as you are able to, please email adam@ukpuzzles.org your times for each puzzle and the answer key for each puzzle (to ensure that you have understood how each solution is supposed to look).

If you have not yet signed up for a place in the UK Puzzle League, you may do so in the same email, giving your name and UKPA username. If you are not in Division D, your times will be entered onto an all-comers scoreboard, which will not score points in the UK Puzzle League. If you are in Division D, the solver with the most points will receive 10 credits, the second will receive 9 credits and so on. If two or more solvers score the same number of points, then the fastest total time (spent on completed puzzles) will score the higher number of credits.

If you have any questions, please ask via email (adam@ukpuzzles.org)

Please do not discuss the puzzles in the forum until the competition is declared closed.

Have fun!

[pinkagape]

It's all over!

A tricky set here, but most puzzlers managed to make their way through the set. In the end, it was the times on the tougher puzzles which gave Alex the edge as she scored her fourth win of the year to secure the overall title. Well done Alex!

Alex Robinson - 100 points - 31m59
Eva Myers - 100 points - 35m55
Desirée Wilson - 100 points - 36m51
Calum Mailer - 100 points - 37m09
Liane Robinson - 100 points - 50m28
Hunter Brennan - 59 points - 58m59

Well done to all participants and congratulations to Alex.