Crossword Help Forum
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How a solver tackles a numerical puzzle is up to them. Some will write computer programs, others will use spreadsheets whilst some will just use paper, pencil and a scientific calculator (PPC).
What sets the numerical puzzle apart is that you need to clear a window of a few hours during which you cannot be disturbed. Woe betide you get a phone call and your train of thought is broken!
With a cryptic crossword you can solve a few clues, put it down and go and do something else, then return and pick up where you left off. You can't really do that with a numerical unless you keep good notes!
The more you practice solving the numerical puzzles the better you become at spotting the way in and the strategies to adopt. In this case it would have taken me longer to type the clues into a spreadsheet than to do it with PPC.
Studying the clues very carefully before you start is the key rather than firing up the silicon!

Quite right Oyler. I used to just plough in and continue until I met an anomaly, and clearly had no idea what was causing it so I had to start again. I now make a note of each decision which helps me back track to resolve my problem. That happened with this one when my choices for "R" had been made by trying to put the result in the wrong entry! A simple lapse of concentration always costs you very dearly with mathematical puzzles.

Given that the endgame is my bête noire for the other 48 weeks of the year the last thing I need is it being added to the Numericals!

I enjoyed completing the grid, but even so, all very annoying.

(Of course I appreciate that for most normal people the endgame is the most fun bit)

Not for me it isn't, unless I see it! My admiration for the subtleties of the end game was destroyed by a hare a few years ago. If it is fair -fine.

I used a spreadsheet but only to produce an 10 by 20 array of letters and numbers so I could cross out impossible equivalences as I identified them.
Not too much of a slog using this approach and I quite enjoyed the process. The end game was enjoyable too.
I am not sure I understand the title though.

I’ve got a full grid and have found the message hidden in three columns. But now I’m puzzled. I was expecting to highlight examples of a particular number, but it’s not in any of the other columns.

Have I gone horribly wrong, or am I missing something obvious?
My number/letter equivalences all work together to fill the grid

Smithsax, try "that's" plus the penultimate word.

cloverjo - have you got the first three letters of the message right?

I’ve got TWO as the first word.

Ok so you should know what you’re looking for then - can you see it in the grid?