With a "zoo" I mean a collection of "animals" (sudoku puzzles), where
each animal represents a solving method, so that this puzzle can only
be solved using that method. I know that:
a) strictly speaking this is impossible, as T&E solves every puzzle, or
APE solves every XYZ-Wing, ...
b) this has been done before
There are some good attempts, the best of which is the benchmark list
posted by ruud. Some of the "animals" therein are true representant of
their method, most notably the hidden quad, which is seldom seen in
wildlife
But some of the puzzles can be solved by other methods (e.g. the
"Finned Swordfish digit 9", which can be solved by APE).
As almost every puzzle needs some other methods to solve (even the
legitimate hidden quad mentioned above needs hidden singles, pairs and
tripples), we will have to fight with "Method Hierarchy", but that
is right now happening in another thread.
Bare with me if this topic is trivial or already discussed to death in
another thread; I am quite new to this forum.
So what are the best animals you can donate to our zoo? Perhaps
a little fish, which is only accompanied by hidden singles (which
is the best we can expect anyway)?