Advanced Love Ladder: 3 Hints for Long Rows (Stage 256)
Love Ladder The JoyPlus Soft Planning Team
When three or four pieces sit in one row, animals bounce from one piece into the next and the pair rules alone stop being enough. This guide solves Stage 256, a board with a row of three pieces on top and a pair at the bottom, and adds three hints for long rows. One of them is trying a piece in your head, which most players only ever do by pressing GO. The middle order and the pair rules come from the beginner and intermediate guides.
The goal: the Shiba Inu stays on line 1, the Shih Tzu on line 3 and the pug on line 5. The grey kitten goes from line 2 to line 4, and the cream cat from line 4 to line 2.
Warm-up: the middle order
The bottom row touches only lines 3 to 5, so the Shiba and the cream cat must already be on lines 1 and 2 when they leave the top row. The top row never touches line 5, so the pug arrives there unchanged. The bottom pair then has to keep the pug on line 5, and since a pair never leaves everyone in place, it swaps lines 3 and 4. The Shih Tzu has to finish on line 3, so it sits on line 4 in the middle, and the grey kitten on line 3.
Hint 1: In a long row, find the piece that rests
The top row has to keep the Shiba on line 1 while the cream cat moves from line 4 to line 2 and the grey kitten and the Shih Tzu each step one line right. Start next to the Shiba. Whatever goes in that slot must rest: a double bar, or a single bar if a cross sits right beside it. Once that piece rests, the other two slots are just a pair, and a pair that sends the right end to the left end is a diagonal down with a partner, a cross or a single bar (Hint 3 of the intermediate guide).
So a long row is not a new puzzle. Peel off the piece that rests and read what is left as a pair.
Hint 2: Read the bottom pair the same way
The bottom pair must swap lines 3 and 4 and leave the pug alone, so its right slot rests and its left slot swaps. A double bar rests next to anything but a single bar, while a single bar rests only next to a cross. That leaves three ways: cross with a single bar, cross with a double bar, or diagonal down with a double bar.
Hint 3: Try a piece in your head
No slot is down to one choice yet, so try one. Put a single bar next to the Shiba. Now the double bar has only one home left, the right slot of the bottom pair, and the second single bar can only go at the end of the top row. The top row would read single bar, something, single bar, and whether the middle is a diagonal down or a cross, the Shiba gets carried off line 1. The single bar does not go next to the Shiba.
That is the whole trick: place a piece in your head, fill in whatever it forces, and look for an animal that can no longer reach its place. If one exists, the piece was wrong.
With the double bar placed, the bottom right slot can only take a single bar. That leaves one single bar, and the only slot that still accepts it is the end of the top row.
The top row now reads double bar, something, single bar. From Hint 1 the middle must be the diagonal down: the double bar rests, and the diagonal down with the single bar sends the cream cat from line 4 to line 2. A cross there would only swap lines 2 and 3.
How often you need to try
We ran these hints on all 1,000 stages with the game's own rules. The middle order, what each group of pieces has to do and the last-piece rule settle 566 boards on their own. Adding two more steps, crossing out pieces that cannot do any of the jobs still possible and trying one piece in your head, settles 980. Of the other 20, five early stages have two correct answers, and 15 need a deeper search than one piece at a time.
Habits that help
- In a row of three or four, find the piece that rests and read the rest as a pair.
- Remember who rests where: a double bar next to anything but a single bar, a single bar only next to a cross.
- Before trying, list what each slot can still hold. Short lists make good places to try.
- When you try a piece, follow what it forces all the way, including where the leftover pieces must go.
- If a try fails, the other choice is certain. Write it in and carry on with the easy hints.
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