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I've been working on some upcoming challenges of mine, one of them a Traffic Light Simulator , the other a Mafia .

There are certain elements I can include that makes the challenge significantly harder. In my Traffic Light Simulator, I can either make the roads all be the same length (easier), or a different length (harder). In my Mafia challenge, I can only include the standard 4 roles in a 7 player game, or allow variations of roles (including role-changers) and variable number of players.

I want the best of both worlds: Make it easy to participate, but also give a challenge for those so inclined. In both of these cases, a submission to the more difficult challenge is competitive in the easier challenge (ignoring any differences in input).

What am I allowed to do?

Can I have multiple competitions in the same post (Two different scoreboards)?

Can I post the easier challenge, and then the more difficult challenge (even though the easier one is a duplicate of the difficult one, but not vice versa)?

Or, do I simply have to pick one of the variants?

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  • \$\begingroup\$ I asked a vaguely related (non-duplicate) meta question previously, and the comments suggested a new expanded question would result in the original being closed as a duplicate. I'm not sure if opinion has changed since then, or if this situation is sufficiently similar to that one for the same to apply here. \$\endgroup\$
    – trichoplax is on Codidact now
    Feb 24, 2016 at 23:39
  • \$\begingroup\$ I think everyone @ PPCG wants PPCG to also be attractive for novices, so please post the easier one too! (Following @Roujo's answer of course) \$\endgroup\$
    – Insane
    Mar 6, 2016 at 16:32
  • \$\begingroup\$ I think KOTHs are inherently difficult. I only feel like I can participate if it's relatively simple. And then I don't expect to win, because other users have a better grasp of AI programming. \$\endgroup\$
    – mbomb007
    Mar 7, 2016 at 22:30

2 Answers 2

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Pick one. To be specific, pick the harder one. The proportion of meaty challenges to ones which are won by a <20 char solution is strongly biased against the meaty challenges.

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    \$\begingroup\$ The harder one makes sense for a code-challenge, but for KoTHs, lots of competition makes the challenge harder, so the easier challenge may actually be harder. \$\endgroup\$
    – Nathan Merrill
    Feb 24, 2016 at 17:15
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    \$\begingroup\$ @NathanMerrill In many KotHs, lots of competition makes it more variable/random, not necessarily harder. Unless it's run to oblivion to steady out the averages, that often ruins all the fun of it. \$\endgroup\$
    – Geobits
    Feb 25, 2016 at 3:39
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Can I have multiple competitions in the same post (Two different scoreboards)?

I don't think that's a good idea - you'd end up with questions answering either/both of the challenges, which would make it harder to navigate and see who you're playing against.

Can I post the easier challenge, and then the more difficult challenge (even though the easier one is a duplicate of the difficult one, but not vice versa)?

I think you could. If the difference in difficulty is significant, I wouldn't see them as duplicates - just variants of the same problem, which we already see from time to time. At least it would be clear that they are two different competitions, as opposed to two challenges in one post.

Whether or not you should is another matter. Posting both might reduce the time people put on the challenges since you're dividing the effort between two similar questions and contestants might or might not want to duplicate their efforts.

In the end, you could ask in the Sandbox/in chat to see which of the variants sounds more interesting and post that one. If both are interesting, I'd wait until the first one has died down and then post the other one.

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