Questions tagged [strategy]
A puzzle whose solution is a methodological plan of action for realizing a specific goal.
547
questions
7
votes
2answers
229 views
1000 gold coins to share with the knight
Note: This riddle is similar to this riddle: 1000 gold coins to share with the king, except now YOU are the king, and the rules are switched up a bit. And the situation is wackier...
You are the King ...
2
votes
1answer
132 views
Spies in Puzzlevania
What I am about to tell you doesn't leave this room. For the past year, we've grown concerned by occurrences in the nation of Puzzlevania. We believe a major attack may be imminent. However, the ...
25
votes
4answers
3k views
1000 gold coins to share with the king
You are the knight of a great kingdom in an unknown world. Your king sent you to a dungeon and you killed the dragon and got 1000 gold coins from the dragon’s lair. Normally, you are supposed to give ...
0
votes
0answers
88 views
How to know which head belongs to which tail in a bunch of wires? [duplicate]
I saw a puzzle in a contest in Iran held by an association called "Rahneshan" and the original text of the contest is uploaded HERE and of course both website and text are in Persian.
...
7
votes
2answers
122 views
A harder robot-control puzzle
The goal is to find a sequence (a "program") of max 5 commands that will move the triangle (the "robot") through the grid and make it visit all the squares marked with a star.
Two ...
1
vote
1answer
91 views
Minimise battle time in Monster's Den
So there is this excellent flash game, Monster's Den. In order to make a high score, I must complete many battles..this question is about battles with the Legendary Monsters.
The target is to reduce ...
14
votes
6answers
1k views
A nice robot-control puzzle
The goal is to find a sequence (a "program") of max 6 commands that will move the triangle (the "robot") through the grid and make it visit all the squares marked with a star.
Two ...
17
votes
1answer
485 views
Lap Theory Optimal Betting Game
Three prisoners are seated at a table. Each of them has a mobile phone on their lap, and they are not allowed to look at anyone else’s phone (and obviously no other form of communication is allowed).
...
2
votes
1answer
149 views
19 balls and a scale
You are given 19 identical-looking balls and a two-sided scale. One of the balls is different, either lighter or heavier than the others. Using 4 weighings of the scale, how can you determine which ...
9
votes
2answers
337 views
Three way duel, which guns to choose?
Alice, Bob and Carole are involved in a game of three way duel. They take turns to shoot in the order of Alice-Bob-Carole-Alice-... until only one surviver is left standing. The rule is very simple: ...
10
votes
5answers
941 views
Two player Monty Hall variation
Alice and Bob are going on a game show as partners. In this game, there are three doors, which contain a car, the car keys, and a goat, which are arranged randomly and secretly behind the doors. Alice ...
7
votes
1answer
232 views
A mix of 2048 and Match 3
I was playing a game and thought of this problem:
Rules
There are 4 distinct tiles on a $6\times6$ grid. The game starts out with one block on the board.
You can shift all the tiles in one of the ...
3
votes
1answer
89 views
Quarter Rolling Die
Quarter rolling a die means triping it on any of the 4 sides adjacent to its base or face in contact with the flat surface. Using the assembled die and quarter chessboard:
You can place and align the ...
8
votes
2answers
415 views
Modifying the puzzle: Cooperative hat-guessing, no mistakes, 3+ colors
Following Guess your hat color, but you don't have to and it's interpretation via Covering codes I tried to create a puzzle with more hat variativity, i.g. 3 types of hats.
4 hats are put on 4 ...
2
votes
0answers
142 views
How do you force a win in 4x4x4 TicTacToe
I have read in the wikipedia page of TicTacToe that it is possible for the first player to force a win in a 4x4x4 board. I tried to find a strategy on how to do it online but failed. So, how do you ...
10
votes
1answer
487 views
Mathematics in adolescence
When I start to teach probabilities, I challenge my students with the following:
Thelma is 16 years old and can only go out at night if one of her parents gives her permission. She knows her father ...
16
votes
2answers
624 views
Topological Nim
You and your friend's new favorite game is "topological nim": You take your favorite compact metric space $X$ and a radius $r$. Each player removes an open disk of radius $r$ from the space ...
13
votes
2answers
797 views
A tournament, and a tight personal schedule
A 64-player binary tournament bracket is about to start. You plan to free up your schedule in advance to watch some of the matchups (meaning, you can plan to watch the second semifinal, for example, ...
1
vote
1answer
189 views
How can they attack?
There are four soldier squads planning to attack a town from the north, south, east, and west at the same time.
They are in their positions; now they just need to know when to attack. One of the ...
6
votes
2answers
356 views
A game of 101 stones—win at (not quite) all costs
In the land of Humilia, a tournament game is played between two players with 101 stones in a pot between them. On each turn, a player may take up to five stones from the pot (and must take at least ...
6
votes
1answer
234 views
Crosswords: Maximum number of words in an n×n grid
What is the maximum number of "words spaces" that can be in an n×n crossword, based on the placement of the shaded squares.
Some limitations
No word can be less than 3 spaces in length
...
3
votes
1answer
549 views
What is this puzzle and what is this solving strategy? [duplicate]
This puzzle is a mini game in an app I recently downloaded. In the game it is referred to as a Mobius Puzzle(after some searching I found referenced as a TwoBik Puzzle). But I cant find any other ...
7
votes
3answers
499 views
Balance the nails
Someone I know handed me this puzzle, I have seen a couple of solutions for it that follow the instructions and don’t involve bending the nails, etc.
Can you figure out how to balance the 6 nails on ...
9
votes
2answers
266 views
Bicoloured 2048
I made a new puzzle game that you can play here. It is a variant of 2048 where there are tiles of two colours. You need to merge tiles of the same colour and value to increase your score. In more ...
7
votes
3answers
364 views
The 15 Pebbles Game
This is a game for 2 players - Each player uses a different coloured marker or pencil, there are 15 pebbles in total.
Players take turns to colour 1, 2 or 3 pebbles (player chooses how many). When all ...
3
votes
2answers
438 views
A Puzzle about “Codeforces Subsequences”
I'm quite intrigued by an "easy" problem in recent Codeforces contest: Codeforces Subsequences.
In this problem, you have to create a string $T$ as shortest as possible such that $S = $ &...
10
votes
3answers
279 views
Find a good strategy to survive the multiplayer duel
Alice is involved in a duel with $N$ other opponents. She can choose a gun for herself with any hit probability as she wishes. She also prepares guns for her opponents, whose hit probabilities she can ...
-2
votes
2answers
261 views
Battleship puzzle with no clues
Suppose I have a standard Battleship Puzzle, but with no clues (no square uncovered) at the start. Then I'm given 5 "fires" that uncover a square, what would be the best strategy to chose a square to ...
2
votes
1answer
191 views
Based on 9-trains puzzle
Based on this problem, we have got some algorithms that can sort the 9 train cars in a given specific arrangement. But say if the 9 train cars are given in any-arrangement?
Say
ABC
ABC
ABC
...
5
votes
3answers
366 views
Playing the Square Chess
On an ordinary chess board (8x8) without any pieces on it as a starting position, two players will alternately place a pawn on any square (unoccupied) so that the first player that form a square (...
5
votes
2answers
208 views
Simple game of dice - what is the optimal strategy?
The game is pretty simple, whoever reaches 50 first wins, but there are a few important details:
2 players, one die. Players take turns.
Rolled values are simply added up
If you roll a 6, however, ...
49
votes
5answers
6k views
There are 2,001 doors leading to 2,001 hallways. How quickly can you find the way out?
Once again, you have angered the Emperor, and she has imprisoned you in a special prison.
“I do have a bit of good news for you,” the Emperor has told you. “You're only two doors away from freedom, ...
2
votes
1answer
70 views
Is there a strategy for the “2 paths, 1 liar 1 truthful” riddle given an N number of paths, rather than just 2?
I hope this question falls into the correct category. I'm sure the 2 paths , 1 liar and 1 truthful is common, however, is there a general strategy given:
There are N-number of doors/paths/or ...
0
votes
0answers
90 views
Haircut in an imaginary town [duplicate]
An imaginary town has 2 barbers
one of them has a great haircut
the other one has a bad haircut
whom should you get a haircut from ?
8
votes
1answer
204 views
A rubik's cube that fights back
After the incidents of Skyfall, 007 remembered a quote Q had said when he was accessing Silva's Omega site :
It's like solving a Rubiks cube that's fighting back.
007, intrigued by this statement, ...
9
votes
5answers
336 views
Find the optimal strategy for this dice game
You are playing a game: You have $6$ standard 6-sided dice that are all rolled at the start of the game. The sum of dice values is your score. Each turn, you can take any (or none) dice and reroll ...
6
votes
7answers
1k views
Five minutes puzzle: Multiway switches
Here's an easy puzzle that should take you only five minutes to solve, inspired by my hallway. Most intuitive answer get the mark:
Six switches control the same light bulb in a multiway switching ...
1
vote
0answers
83 views
TestGameExamination [duplicate]
You are given 10 sets of papers with 10 questions each. Answer to each question is from 1 to 4. You somehow get your hands on the answer sheets and able to memorize each answer (Answer sheets only ...
-1
votes
1answer
6k views
Can you guess the lock's passcode? [duplicate]
A lock's passcode is composed of three digits. Five incorrect passcodes are given below, each with a hint to the correct passcode.
2-0-6:
Two of the digits are correct but are in the wrong places.
6-...
19
votes
3answers
4k views
Is there any easy way to solve this lock puzzle?
https://js13kgames.com/games/lock-puzzle/index.html
The link provides an online puzzle game of $16$ tiles in the form of a $4 \times 4$ matrix of which some entries are in the form of vertical tiles ...
6
votes
1answer
495 views
Playing blindfolded 2048
Suppose you are playing many 2048 games, all blindfolded. As usual you can press left, right, down, or up to move the tiles. When there are no more moves the game terminates and you are told your ...
1
vote
3answers
141 views
playing “Coins on a table” against a distracted friend [duplicate]
This puzzle is a follow-up of Coins on a table (warning: the link contains the answer to the original question).
You are playing a game against your friend Alice:
first Alice places one coin on a ...
18
votes
2answers
2k views
Playing with one Queen on a chessboard
Alice and Bob play a special chess game with alternate moves. Alics starts with an empty chessboard and puts a Queen at a field in the first row (A8-H8) or the right column (H1-H8). Now Bob is moving ...
2
votes
1answer
151 views
Four unfair dice
On a table there are four standard six-sided dice with faces numbered 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 each.
Alice starts and chooses a die. Then Bob chooses a die and both throw the dice.
The winner is the person ...
13
votes
8answers
3k views
How could Larry get his friends on a plane without knowing their weights? [duplicate]
This riddle was inspired when I watched the latest (as of this post) episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm (S10E4), in which Larry is faced with a dilemma that he never really solved. The dilemma is as ...
12
votes
3answers
1k views
The Troll, the dwarves and the gloves
A group of $N$ dwarves are caught by an evil Troll. As usual the Troll gives the dwarves a chance to escape if they solve a puzzle he created just for the occasion.
Tomorrow morning each dwarf will ...
20
votes
1answer
852 views
Unbalanced weight of boxes
You are given a traditional balance scale with two pans (no reading) and 6 boxes with the following properties:
1) the weight of each box is a positive integer number
2) if you put any number of boxes ...
10
votes
1answer
401 views
Is Oh Tetris Oh! always a draw?
Alice and Bob were playing Oh-Tetris-Oh!, when they decided that every game must be a draw (played intelligently).
Can you prove this?
(Oh yes, the rules: A $10\times10$ grid, you can pick any ...
10
votes
3answers
394 views
Wizard's Labyrinth
A thief has snuck his way into the wizard's castle. After traversing a plethora of magical traps and illusory walls, he finally spies the wizard's hidden stash of gems beyond the end of a long ...
1
vote
3answers
1k views
The missing number
The integer numbers from 1-30 are mutually communicated to you one by one in a random order (one number about every 5 seconds).
However exactly one of those numbers is not communicated.
What is a ...
