Skid
Also known as Ice slide sorting and Stack sorting
Tap a tile and swipe, and it skids until it hits the edge, a wall or another tile. Meet one of its own colour whose numbers run on from its own and the two join into a stack; anything else just stops it. Finish when every colour is one stack in order, and try to match the fewest moves known for that exact board.
How it works
- Tap a tile then swipe, or drag a tile, and it skids until it hits the edge, a wall or another tile.
- A tile that meets one of its own colour whose numbers run on from its own — 2 meeting 1, or 1 meeting 2–3 — joins it as a stack. Anything else just stops it.
- Finish when every colour is one stack, 1 to its top number.
- Pip's best is the fewest moves Pip has found for this exact board. Match it or beat it without hints for a Perfect result. Every completed board counts as a win, and Perfect it lets you replay the same board to improve your route.
- Undo takes a move back, and Restart returns the tiles to how they were dealt.
Good if you want…
- Finding the fewest moves possible
- No reading, no arithmetic
- Planning a few moves ahead
How to solve Skid
Ask what will stop it
A tile on the ice never stops halfway. It skids until the edge, a wall or another tile stops it, so the useful question before every move is not where you want the tile to go but what is in its way. Look along all four directions from the tile you are about to move and find what it would hit in each. Usually only one or two of those landings are any use.
Other tiles are the stoppers you can move. A tile of a different colour sitting in the right place is a backstop that halts a slide exactly where you need it, and on the harder boards the walls do the same job without ever moving.
Line pairs up before you join them
Two tiles can only join along a straight line with nothing between them. When a 2 and its 3 share no row and no column, one of them has to move first into a square that shares a line with the other. Those slides join nothing, and they are the moves that take thought. The joins that follow are usually obvious once the tiles are lined up.
The numbers decide the order
A tile joins another of its colour only when the numbers run on: a 1 meets a 2, a stack of 1 and 2 meets a 3, a 3 meets a stack of 1 and 2. A 1 and a 3 will never join directly, so in a colour of three tiles the 2 is the hinge, and it has to reach one of the others first. On Expert each colour has four tiles, and building two pairs, 1 with 2 and 3 with 4, then sliding one pair into the other is often simpler than growing one stack a tile at a time.
Choose which tile moves
When two tiles join, the stack forms on the square of the one that stayed still. That makes the choice of which one to slide a real decision: move the tile whose square you do not need, and keep the one that already sits in line with the next piece. A stack slides as a single piece afterwards, so a finished pair can also serve as a stopper for somebody else.
Solve it first, then chase Pip's best
Every slide counts as one move, however far it goes, and the Pip's Best pill shows the fewest moves Pip, the Winters Puzzles penguin, has found for that exact board. Finish once without worrying about it. Undo and Restart are free, and a second attempt with the route already worked out is where Pip's best is usually matched.
Common mistakes
- Sliding a tile towards its partner with another tile between them. It stops against the tile in the way instead.
- Trying to join a 1 to a 3. The numbers have to run on, so the 2 has to go in between.
- Moving the wrong tile of a pair. The stack forms where the still tile was, which can leave it right in the path of another colour.
- Clearing every stopper out of the way. On an open board a tile skids straight to the edge, and a tile you moved aside is often the one you needed as a backstop.
Skid questions
What is Pip's best?
The fewest moves known for that exact board, found by a search when the board was dealt. On the larger boards the search cannot always prove nothing shorter exists, so now and then a player beats Pip. You win by stacking every colour; Pip's best is only there as a target.
How do the difficulties differ?
Easy is a five-by-five board with three colours of three tiles and no walls. Medium adds a fourth colour and sometimes a wall. Hard moves to a six-by-six board with walls, and Expert gives every colour four tiles. Pip's best grows with them, from about 8 to 11 moves on Easy to about 19 to 25 on Expert.
Can I play with a keyboard?
In a browser, pick a tile and press an arrow key to send it skidding that way.
Skid in Winters Puzzles
Skid is one of 40 puzzles in Winters Puzzles, so it sits alongside Tessera, Ripple, Flow and everything else in the app rather than being a download of its own. It counts towards your stats and streak like any other puzzle. It also has a published board in Pip’s dailies, with earlier dates available in the archive.
Play Skid.
Free on iPhone and iPad, with 39 other puzzles alongside it. Or play it in your browser — no download, nothing to sign up for.
