Changelog

Two puzzles you flagged, both fixed rather than struck, plus the bench being less annoying to test with.

CUT TETHER COULD NOT BE WON ON A LOT OF SEEDS

You were right, and it was worst at the EASIEST rung. Measured over twenty seeds a difficulty:

difficulty 1: 9 boards in 20 had NO solution at all difficulty 3: 3 with none, and 7 more solvable only by a pair cut difficulty 5: none unsolvable, but 9 in 20 needed a pair

Unsolvable boards were dealt anyway. And the "pair" ones were arguably worse, because they looked fine: the generator proved those by cutting two ropes AT THE SAME INSTANT, which hands cannot do. You cut one, the rig swings, and the second cut happens in a different world.

The cause was doing it backwards - roll a random target port, then go hunting for a cut that reaches it. It now simulates each cut, sees where the payload actually lands, and makes one of those the target. Every board is solvable by construction, always with ONE cut. 150 seeds across all five difficulties, zero failures.

Two-tether boards are gone as well. With two ropes the only cut that releases the payload is cutting both, which is the "slash everything" answer this puzzle exists to refuse. Two tethers was not an easy version of it, it was a broken one.

APPROACH WAS UNREADABLE RATHER THAN HARD

Each node you could step to showed "-26 +40". Two numbers, no units, and nothing on screen saying which was the cost and which the gain - while that pair IS the whole decision. The node's kind was a single initial in its own colour on a dark disc, which read as a smudge, and nothing said what winning was.

Now the numbers are labelled, every legible node names its kind in the colour of its meter in the WATCHING row, and the goal is stated. At difficulty 3 the trade-off reads at a glance: CORE at 26 noise for +40 progress, against RELAY at 6 for +6. That was always the puzzle. None of it was reaching you.

Still tell me if it earns its place. That part is a play call and I have only made it legible, not proved it is fun.

BACKLOG SHOWS THE NEXT BLOCK

Without it a falling-block well is a reaction test - you cannot decide where THIS piece goes without knowing what follows it.

MINEFIELD TILES ARE SQUARE

At every board size. They were being stretched to fill a fixed rectangle, worst at the low difficulties.

THE BENCH IS LESS TEDIOUS

• Every row starts on its own seed instead of all of them on 1.
• RND re-rolls on launch and writes the seed it used back into the box, so a board worth reporting can still be reproduced.
• ? on each row opens HOW TO PLAY for that puzzle without leaving the bench.

WHAT WOULD HELP MOST

1. Cut Tether and Approach, since both were yours. Cut Tether should now always be winnable with a single slash - if you find one that is not, the seed is in the bench box and that is the whole bug report.
2. Bench puzzles at difficulty 4 and 5. Measured, not played.
3. Badge Swipe, Packet Hop and Sweep - their difficulty is speeds, and no screenshot can check a speed.
4. Patch Panel at difficulty 5: 81 holes, 7 cables, 60 seconds. I suspect that is wrong but would rather have your answer than my guess.