The New Sudoku Players' Forum

[Yogi]

.................1..2..3.4........5......42...6..1...7...67......81.....5.9....8.
My Hodoku gives this puzzle a rating in its system as 926 - Hard, but

.342...5.....87....1.........24...3..5....2..6...........3....12.....7..8........
is rated as 972 - Medium difficulty.

Can anyone help elucidate why a larger number is not assigned at least an equal difficulty level?

[P.O.]

hi Yogi,
i guess you know that one puzzle is slightly harder than the other, SudokuCoach gives the first one SE 4.0 HODOKU 1046 and the second one SE 3.4 HODOKU 1016

[denis_berthier]

.................1..2..3.4........5......42...6..1...7...67......81.....5.9....8.
My Hodoku gives this puzzle a rating in its system as 926 - Hard, but
.342...5.....87....1.........24...3..5....2..6...........3....12.....7..8........
is rated as 972 - Medium difficulty.
Can anyone help elucidate why a larger number is not assigned at least an equal difficulty level?

The 2nd puzzle requires Naked and Hidden Pairs. The 1st also requires finned w-wings.

Such questions would better be in the Help section than in General.

[Maxito_Bahiense]

.................1..2..3.4........5......42...6..1...7...67......81.....5.9....8.
My Hodoku gives this puzzle a rating in its system as 926 - Hard, but

.342...5.....87....1.........24...3..5....2..6...........3....12.....7..8........
is rated as 972 - Medium difficulty.

Can anyone help elucidate why a larger number is not assigned at least an equal difficulty level?

The Hodoku rating is based on an cummulative sum of steps. The more difficult the step, the more the technique adds to the sum. So, you may have a smaller rating index for a puzzle that uses fewer but harder steps. Now, for the label Easy/Medium/Hard/Expert, there are two important points to be taken into account: Every technique is assigned a level: for instance, naked singles is usually labelled "easy", while death blossom is normally "unfair".

If you check the summary tab for a puzzle, you'll get how the rating index is built. The collection of techniques used in the solver path is summarised. Here you'll see the techniques used in the solution, tagged by colours according to their respective "hardness" level: white for easy, green for medium, etc. The last item in the summary is the cummulative rating index.

The tag for the puzzle is, in my understanding, based on two different conditions: firstly, there are rating total thresholds for each category: if a puzzle rating steps over the unfair level mark (in my configuration, 1800), it is marked as extreme. Now, the other condition is most difficult technique used: if a puzzle does not step over the threshold level between medium/hard, but the solution uses some hard technique, it is labelled hard. If all techniques used are medium or easy, then the puzzle is marked as medium.

All these aspects are configurable in Hodoku. Edit/Preferences opens the relevant dialog for altering default values. "Level/font" preferences hold thresholds, while "solver" tab holds record of every technique available, allowing for editing of level and solving value.