Artisanal Sudoku, Volume 181

1. Pelican

• Normal sudoku rules apply (fill each row, column, and 3x3 box with the digits 1-9 once each), and all clues are standard.

• Cages: the sum of the digits inside each cage is equal to the small number in the top left corner, and digits cannot repeat within a cage.

• Quadruple circles: a digit inside a white circle must appear in one of the four cells surrounding that circle.

• Very rough difficulty estimate: 3/10

Play online: SudokuPad | unshaded

New to variant sudoku? Check out these beginner-friendly guides to cages and other popular rulesets.

---

2. Lumber

• Normal sudoku rules apply (fill each row, column, and 3x3 box with the digits 1-9 once each), and all clues are standard.

• Arrows: the sum of the digits along an arrow is equal to the digit in the connected circle, and these digits can repeat if allowed by other rules.

• Renban lines: purple lines contain a non-repeating set of consecutive digits in any order.

• Very rough difficulty estimate: 6/10

Play online: SudokuPad

---

3. Plumage

• Normal sudoku rules apply (fill each row, column, and 3x3 box with the digits 1-9 once each), and all clues are standard.

• Region sum lines: box borders divide each blue line into segments with the same sum.

• Renban lines: purple lines contain a non-repeating set of consecutive digits in any order.

• Digits in cells separated by a black dot have a 1:2 ratio.

• Very rough difficulty estimates: 8/10, 6/10

Play online: SudokuPad

Extra clues: SudokuPad

---

Prime Week Bonus Puzzle(s)!

These puzzles—Overflowing Renban and Too Many Modifiers—were my contributions to Bitty Bites 5, edited by Clover and Gliperal, and featuring puzzles by a number of talented constructors. There are 30 or so in total, all of which are small and most of which are weirder and tougher than these two. If you're a member of the CtC Discord server, you can find the pack here (be forewarned and/or enticed: parts of it are mildly NSFW). If you’re not, just email me (which you can do by replying to this post) and I’ll be happy to send you the pdf 😀

• Normal 4x4 sudoku rules apply (fill each row, column, and 2x2 box with the digits 1-4 once each).

• Purple lines contain a non-repeating set of consecutive digits in any order.

• Clues outside the grid are X-Sums, which give the sum of the first X cells in that direction, where X is the first digit in the adjacent row or column.

• Very rough difficulty estimate: 5/10

Play online: SudokuPad

• Normal 4x4 sudoku rules apply (fill each row, column, and 2x2 box with the digits 1-4 once each).

• Each of these modifiers appears once in each row, column, and box, and changes the value of the digit in its cell (N) in the following way:

  - incrementor, which has a value of N+1

  - doubler, which has a value of N*2

  - tripler, which has a value of N*3

  Each digit from 1-4 is subject to each modifier exactly once, and a single cell cannot contain more than one modifier.

• Along a blue line, each cell has the same value.

• Very rough difficulty estimate: 9/10

Play online: SudokuPad

---

Some other puzzles I enjoyed this week:

• San Francisco Summer, by Michael Lefkowitz

• Clueless Jigsaw Sudoku 1, by Alf Smith

• The Modularity Conjecture, by zetamath

• Meta Unique-ish, by Fenners

Oh, and I forgot to mention this last week, but I was honored to get a Cracking the Cryptic feature for Unveil, a puzzle that had not previously appeared anywhere else.

---

Thanks for subscribing to Artisanal Sudoku! Feedback is always appreciated, just leave a comment, reach out on Bluesky, or reply to this email. If you liked these puzzles, you probably know someone else who’d like them too, so please spread the word. If you’re interested in submitting a puzzle, click here for more information. And if you want to try more of my puzzles—many of which are tougher than the ones you’ll find here—check out my page on Logic Masters Deutschland.

This week’s meta-description:
Starting off a new block of 45 with not one, but two prime week bonus puzzles.

For premium subscribers, hints and two more bonus puzzles are below.