The New Sudoku Players' Forum

[helpmeplease]

:'o( ok i give up. anyone see the next step?

385 291 674
**2 7*8 *39
*** 36* *82

94* *37 215
**3 *** 796
*** **9 843

257 913 468
*3* 576 921
1** 482 357

[stuartn]

look at the column that the 6's occupy in Box 4. You can then make an exclusion from elsewhere in the column.

stuartn

[helpmeplease]

im sorry, i dont see what you mean. could you expand on that?

[stuartn]

The candidate 6's in box 4 are in a single column only. That means that the 6 in that column is in one of the two cells in box 4. It can't be anywhere else. So you can make an exclusion in row 9. Hope this helps.

stuartn

[helpmeplease]

i have 4 possibles for 6 in box 4. how have you narrowed it to two?
thanks

[SteveF]

There is a naked pair in row 6, ie two cells that can only contain 1 or 6. Therefore you can eliminate 1's and 6's from other cells in row 6.

[helpmeplease]

oh no. what a muppet i am. to be fair i have raging dental pain, so i'm claiming that as an excuse! ;)

thankyou

[stuartn]

Muppets assisted at no extra cost. Glad to be of help. Hope the teeth feel better soon.

stuartn