GridWits
Medium tier Technique 5 of 12 Used by Smart Hint

Only Way to Grow

This part-found ship can only continue one way — every ship still in the fleet that could cover it agrees on where it goes.

How it works

  1. 1Suppose every submarine is already placed, so the smallest ship still missing is 2 cells long — which means this lone cell is only part of a ship, not a whole one.
  2. 2Its diagonals are already water, so Diagonal Water has nothing left to say here.
  3. 3It has water above, below and to its left, and a ship can't bend, so whatever covers it must run to the right.
  4. 4The 2-ship and the 3-ship both start it the same way, so the cell to its right is ship whichever one this turns out to be.
  • Ship segment
  • Water
  • Cells that establish the pattern
  • Where the conclusion lands
Next in the ladder Gap Too Small →

No ship still in the fleet can reach these cells in any direction — the gaps around them are too small, so they're water.