Difficulty Revisited

Rethinking Difficulties ! an unconcluded topic.

There must be a consistent way to *calculate / systematize difficulties.

To make things comparabe, lets use the one and only puzzle really EVERYONE knows & (most) love.

Here a clearly NOT mathematical approach, but more a conceptual one :

The rubiks cube :

  • Shape : it's 3D - around a corned. You can't visually see whats happening on the other side as you make a move.
    How much can you NOT see ?
  • Global Overlap  : One move changes pieces on other planes lets call them rotators, to be consistent with trinagon .
    * How many other rotators of the whole are influenced by the one turn ?
    * How many pieces of each other rotator are switched / moved ?
    * And maybe : How many pieces of the whole are NOT influenced by a single move ?
  • Local Overlap : How many of the neighbouring rotators pieces are moved ? 
    neighbouring rotators are those that share pieces.
    How many pieces are overlapping between shared rotators should maybe also enter the calculation ?
  • Restability & Interchangeability : These two seem to be good concepts derived from the 'Overlaps'.  
    Restability is a global affair : How many pieces can be left alone while the others are manipulated ? 
    Interchangeability is local but in measured relation : How many pieces can be exchanged between two neighbouring rotators while still resting the others.
  • Group considerations :
    How many single piece 'states' (orientation) exist dependent or independent ?
    In other words : How many orientation can each piece have on a certain spot & are they all available or interdependent ?
    And how many different types / groups of triangles are in the puzzle. Do they maybe even look the same, but aren't (Only used in advanced puzzles).
    Cube specific : The 3x3 cube is actually two puzzles wrapped into one.  The edges & the corners. The 2x2 cube is a corner-only and much simpler puzzle. 

This is still a work in progress...

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