Puzzle #319 - Castle Plumbing (Castle Wall + Pipelink)

It's time for another logic showcase puzzle- this time the requirement was to make a single puzzle that combined two different puzzles into one grid, with defined areas for each genre. My immediate thought was to combine Pipelink with another loop genre to enable some configurations that would normally be impossible in that genre, and settled on Castle Wall to allow for a bit more interaction between sections. Full rules for this puzzle are in the penpa link, and a short summary follows.

The gray cells are Pipelink and must all be used. Some cells are fully filled in for you, and the loop may freely cross on these cells. The rest of the grid is Castle Wall. Black walls must be outside of the loop and white walls must be inside of the loop. Numbered clues give the total lengths of loop segments in that direction.

penpa interface

For the automatic answer check to work, the loop must be drawn with the "normal" mode, except for the half segments coming off of the given segments which must be with "middle". Hopefully in the future, all middle will work.

Puzzles #317 & #318 - Plus or Minus (Pentominous Borders)

Last night, TGE mentioned dreaming up a neat deduction in Pentominous Borders. Neither of these puzzles use that deduction, and instead were the result of me toying around with the type for a bit. Also, if you're here from puzz.link/db, remember to check back tomorrow for a penpa only puzzle.

puzz.link interface      penpa interface

This first puzzle came about from trying to find a minimal border solution for a valid 5x5. It turned out surprisingly interesting for its size and unfinished appearance.

puzz.link interface      penpa interface

Then I wanted to make a larger puzzle to post here at the same time, and spent a while toying with different themes before finally hitting on + signs, with the break-in. However I ran into issues resolving a corner with this restrictive theme and tried to make the rest work with just - signs, and was able to! It can take surprisingly few clues to make this type work- the deductions often have far-reaching consequences.

Puzzles #305 - #316 - Pentomino Puzzle Pack

Yes, you did in fact read that right- this post contains 12 puzzles. I had an idea for a pentomino themed set and yesterday, decided to see if I could get the entire pack together that day. I managed to construct all 12 puzzles and left the testing for today, fixed a few errors I had made, and here it is. I'm extremely proud of this set even without the fact that I put it together in a day.

Get the puzzle pack here!

This post won't have preview images or rules for each puzzle, but I will link them all here. The pack has a penpa link with answer check and rules written in alongside an image, so the pack can be solved physically or digitally without issue. The U puzzle has the variant of unequal lengths.

F  I  L  N  P  T  U  V  W  X  Y  Z

puzz.links for P, W and X can also be used. There was no way to make one for Z, unfortunately. Comments after the break.

Puzzle #304 - Grazing Fields

Recently, the get-to-know-each-other-well in the Puzzlers Club Discord has become active again. I asked a couple people what kind of puzzle I should make, and got back "an Aqre variant", "a Slitherlink for logic-race", and "a 13x14".

puzz.link interface

I think I delivered.

Solve as a standard Slitherlink puzzle. Additionally, no 4 consecutive cells in a line may all be inside or outside the loop. Good luck with this one.