(Note: puzzles during this bonus week are harder than usual; the four puzzles from Monday-Thursday are all about Thursday or Friday level difficulty.)

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools).

Theme: Anchor

Author/Opus: This is the 42nd puzzle from our contributing puzzlemaster John Bulten.

Rules: Shade some white cells black so that one of the grid’s clues in each contiguous white or black region indicates the clued region’s area. (Each contiguous region must therefore have at least one clue.) Any other clue in the region must indicate how many of the clued cell’s immediate neighbors are white (up to 9, including itself).

Also see this example:

Answer String: Enter the length in cells of each of the black segments from left to right for the marked rows. Separate each row’s entry from the next with a comma.

Time Standards (highlight to view): Grandmaster = 3:45, Master = 6:15, Expert = 12:30

Solution: Answers for this week in this PDF.

Note: Turf is a shading puzzle created by John Bulten. We will have several more Turf puzzles from John in a few months when we start a new “Puzzlemasters’ Workshop” book series.

(Note: puzzles during this bonus week are harder than usual; the four puzzles from Monday-Thursday are all about Thursday or Friday level difficulty.)

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools; use tab to shift between shading mode and the linex mode where left click+drag draws lines and right click marks X’s)

Theme: Pi

Author/Opus: This is the 41st puzzle from our contributing puzzlemaster John Bulten.

Rules: Shade some white cells black so that the grid is divided into white and black regions. Cells with numbers cannot be shaded. Each white region must contain exactly one number and have the same area in cells as that number. Two white or two black regions may only touch diagonally. Each black region must be exactly specified by one shape graph given below the grid, where graph edges represent one-cell-wide straight paths with variable lengths, and graph nodes represent ends, turns, and branch points. Graphs can be rotated and reflected, and, if multiple graphs are given, not all need be used.

Also see this example:

Answer String: Enter the length in cells of each of the black segments from left to right for the marked rows. Separate each row’s entry from the next with a comma.

Time Standards (highlight to view): Grandmaster = 3:45, Master = 6:00, Expert = 12:00

Solution: Answers for this week in this PDF.

Note: Surf is a shading/object placement puzzle created by Izak Bulten, which draws on elements from other shading puzzles like Nurikabe. We will have several more Surf puzzles from Izak and John Bulten in a few months when we start a new “Puzzlemasters’ Workshop” book series.

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools; use tab to alternate between a composite mode for line/edge drawing and a letter entry mode.)

Theme: Clock Trisection

Author/Opus: This is the 40th puzzle from our contributing puzzlemaster John Bulten.

Rules: Standard Pentominous rules.

Answer String: Enter the letter associated with the pentomino occupying each cell in the marked rows from left to right and in the marked columns from top to bottom, separating the groups with a comma. Use CAPITAL LETTERS!

Time Standards (highlight to view): Grandmaster = 6:30, Master = 10:00, Expert = 20:00

Solution: PDF

Note: Follow this link for other Pentominous puzzles. If you are new to this puzzle type, here are our easiest Pentominous to get started on. More Pentominous puzzles can be found in Plenty o’ Pentominous by Grant Fikes and Murat Can Tonta.

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools; use tab to alternate between a composite mode for line/edge drawing and a letter entry mode.)

Theme: Puzzlin’ One

Author/Opus: This is the 39th puzzle from our contributing puzzlemaster John Bulten.

Rules: Standard Pentominous rules.

Answer String: Enter the letter associated with the pentomino occupying each cell in the marked rows from left to right and in the marked columns from top to bottom, separating the groups with a comma. Use CAPITAL LETTERS!

Time Standards (highlight to view): Grandmaster = 2:30, Master = 3:30, Expert = 7:00

Solution: PDF

Note: Follow this link for other Pentominous puzzles. If you are new to this puzzle type, here are our easiest Pentominous to get started on. More Pentominous puzzles can be found in Plenty o’ Pentominous by Grant Fikes and Murat Can Tonta.

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools)

Theme: Pi All Round

Author/Opus: This is the 38th puzzle from our contributing puzzlemaster John Bulten.

Rules: Same as LITS, except that each region must contain two shaded tetrominoes. These two tetrominoes within a region cannot touch each other, and can be the same or different shapes.

Answer String: Enter the length in cells of each of the shaded segments from left to right for the marked rows, starting at the top. Separate each row’s entry from the next with a comma.

Time Standards (highlight to view): Grandmaster = 4:00, Master = 5:15, Expert = 10:30

Solution: PDF; a solution video is also available here.

Note: Follow this link for more variations of LITS and this link for classic LITS. If you are new to this puzzle type, here are our easiest LITS to get started on. More LITS puzzles can be found in LOTS O’ LITS by Grant Fikes and Prasanna Seshadri and in The Art of Puzzles 2.

(view directly for a larger image)

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools; use tab to alternate between Sudoku entry modes and a shading mode to mark off clues.)

Theme: 69 Slices of Pi

Author/Opus: This is the 37th puzzle from our contributing puzzlemaster John Bulten.

Rules: Standard Outside Sudoku rules. (Some digit clues are repeated but these behave no differently than single clues; 0’s can be ignored.)

Answer String: Enter the 3rd row from left to right, followed by a comma, followed by the 5th column from top to bottom.

Time Standards (highlight to view): Grandmaster = 2:45, Master = 3:30, Expert = 7:00

Solution: PDF

Note: Follow this link for more Outside Sudoku puzzles. More Outside Sudoku puzzles can be found in Masterpiece Sudoku Mix 4.

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools; use tab to shift between shading mode and the composite Yajilin mode where left click marks cells, right click marks dots in cells or X’s on edges, left click+drag draws lines.)

Theme: Connect-I-Cut

Author/Opus: This is the 36th puzzle from our contributing puzzlemaster John Bulten.

Rules: Standard Tapa rules.

Answer String: Enter the length in cells of each of the shaded segments from left to right for the marked rows, starting at the top. Separate each row’s entry from the next with a comma.

Time Standards (highlight to view): Grandmaster = 1:00, Master = 1:20, Expert = 2:40

Solution: PDF

Note: Follow this link for other Tapa variations and this link for classic Tapa. If you are new to this puzzle type, here are our easiest Tapa puzzles to get started on. More Tapa puzzles can be found in The Art of Puzzles and in Tapa and Variations, both by Serkan Yürekli.

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools; use tab to alternate between a composite mode for line/edge drawing and a number entry mode.)

Theme: A Novelty Against the French Defense

Author/Opus: This is the 35th puzzle from our contributing puzzlemaster John Bulten.

Rules: Standard Fillomino rules. Also, each letter represents a different positive integer.

Answer String: For each cell in the marked rows/columns, enter the area of the polyomino it belongs to. Enter just the last digit for any two-digit number. Start with the 5th row, followed by a comma, followed by the 7th row. (For this puzzle, use the integer values of the area, not the encoded letters.)

Time Standards (highlight to view): Grandmaster = 4:30, Master = 7:15, Expert = 14:30

Solution: PDF

Note: Follow this link for other classic Fillomino and this link for more variations on Fillomino puzzles. If you are new to this puzzle type, here are our easiest Fillomino puzzles to get started on. More Fillomino puzzles can be found in The Art of Puzzles and in Fill o’ Fillomino by Grant Fikes.

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools)

Theme: Octopus

Author/Opus: This is the 34th puzzle from our contributing puzzlemaster John Bulten.

Rules: Standard Star Battle rules. Two stars per row, column, and region.

Answer String: For each row from top to bottom, enter the number of the first column from the left where a star appears. Enter these numbers as a single string with no separators.

Time Standards (highlight to view): Grandmaster = 2:15, Master = 3:15, Expert = 6:30

Solution: PDF

Note: Follow this link for other classic Star Battles. If you are new to this puzzle type, here are our easiest Star Battles to get started on. More Star Battle puzzles can be found in The Art of Puzzles.

Our master+ subscribers receive access to two bonus puzzles each week in addition to other rewards. We make these posts so those supporters have a space to comment on these puzzles, mark as FAVES, or log their solving. If you are interested in subscribing and seeing these bonus puzzles, click here for more info.

Theme: Hexing

Author/Opus: This is the 33rd puzzle from guest contributor John Bulten.

Rules: Standard Star Battle rules. Two stars per row, column, and region.

Answer String: For each row from top to bottom, enter the number of the first column from the left where a star appears. Enter these numbers as a single string with no separators.

Time Standards (highlight to view): Grandmaster = 1:45, Master = 2:15, Expert = 4:30

Note: Follow this link for other classic Star Battles. If you are new to this puzzle type, here are our easiest Star Battles to get started on. More Star Battle puzzles can be found in The Art of Puzzles.