Today’s Nit Pips hints and solutions for Friday, 5. September

Today we have pretty tricky pops on your hands. Even my middle level gave me a little difficulty as I moved it wrong and I had to clean up the board and try again. The hard level is intimidating in shape and size. Let’s dive right!

Looking for Wednesday‘With pips? Read our guide here.

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How to play pips

In PIPS you have a multicolor box network. Any colored area represents a different “state” you need to achieve. You have a number of Domin’s products that you need to spend charging in the network. You must use each domino and to achieve any condition correctly to win. There are easy, medium and heavy layers.

Here is an example of difficulty tier pipes:

An example of PIPS

Screenshot: Erik Cain

As you can see, the network has a bunch of symbols and numbers with each color. On the other hand, three purple squares must not be one of the same equal (hence the equal sign stopped). Two pink squares next to that must be equal to a total of 0. Zig-zeagging blue square must be equal to each other. Click on Domains to rotate them and they will need to rotate to fit where they belong.

Not shown on this network are other conditions, such as “less than” or “higher”. If there are multiple tiles with> or

• = All pips must equal equal to each other in this group.
• = All pips must not equal to each other in this group.
• > PIP in this tile (or tiles) must be higher than the specified number.
• The correct number (like 6) PIP must be equal to the correct number.
• Tiles without conditions cannot be anything.

To win, you must use all your domins by filling out all squares, be sure to fit each state. Play today’s puzzles here.

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Today’s Solution for Pips

Below are solutions for simple and medium plates. After that, I’ll walk you through a difficult puzzle. Spoiler forward.

Light

Today’s Pips

Screenshot: Erik Cain

Middle

Today’s Pips

Screenshot: Erik Cain

Tough

Let’s make complete hallways of today’s heavy pips. It starts like this:

Today’s Pips

Screenshot: Erik Cain

As frightening as this pipper looks, it actually gives us a very solid path and a clear starting point. Since the lower dark blue 18 group can only solve with three 6s, we will start there. I first set up a double 6 domino, and then 6/0 domino inot orange 0 group, because all orange tiles must all be blanks. The next one swelled twice a blank domino, because it is the only one concerning, as well as:

Today’s Pips

Screenshot: Erik Cain

Next, we have a blue = group of five tiles and pink = a group of three tiles. Now it is mostly a matter of checking how many Dominos you have with how many pips on each side. We have a lot of 5 and 3’s. We have a lot of things, but only 5 was enough to fill the blue = state of the group.

We also have a limited number of empty pipes of dominoes, which led me to believe that the pink = group must have 4’s. So I put a diagram in orange and blue, and 0/4 domino in orange and pink. Then I used 5/5 Domino to continue to fill in the blue group and 4/5 in a pink / blue right side.

We only have another pink tile and another blue plate at the moment, and both are near the purple 2 groups. So I put 4/1 domino in a pink / purple and 5/1 group in blue / purple, as well as so:

Today’s Pips

Screenshot: Erik Cain

At this point, half of the plate and changes are performed, and I am pretty sure everything is all the kosher so far. I can’t think about any other way that these tiles can be filled.

It’s still not great what’s going where it is, but there’s a big trace: green 6 tiles must have 6 pip domino and blue 2 must have two dominoes of 1 pipes, because no empty ones left. So I put 6/2 domino into green / dark blue and 2/1 domino into a dark blue / blue. With those fulfilled, the only way to finish orange = the group was our final double domino (3/3). The final 1 PIP had to go to blue, so I put it there, with 3 shedding in purple =.

Finally, 5/2 Domino went to purple = / pink = and 2/3 went right there, as well:

Today’s Pips

Screenshot: Erik Cain

Today’s Pips had the most different conditions of any one we’ve seen in a long time. It is ironic that this makes it easier for it even though it seems to be challenging. Very specific conditions take some of the ambiguities of less complicated puzzles. The recognition of those is crucial for a smooth solution. How did you do today?

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