LG Game 1 Setup, by LSATHacks
Game Setup
Time on second attempt: 3:31
See “repeating games” at bottom of section
——————-
This is a sequencing game, and a fairly standard one. Sequencing games are one of the most learnable types of logic game, so if you found this hard, you should redo it until it’s second nature. You can flip this from being a hard game type to routine.
The key to standard sequencing games is that all the rules can fit together. So, you should start by drawing the first rule and then adding the rest. S is before O:
Then, R, V and Z are all after S:
Then, Z is before L, and T is before L and M:
The most common point of confusion with these diagrams is that people try to read them left to right and ignore the lines. That’s a mistake – the lines are what make the diagram.
So T, for example, has no line to its left. That means that T could be last. This is true, even though O appears to the left of T on the diagram. This doesn’t matter, as there are no lines connecting T and O.
So, on this diagram, S or T could be first. R, V, L or M could be last. And M, for example, could be as early as second, or as late as last.
If this is confusing, play around with the rules and the diagram a bit. Make some examples, and follow the lines with your finger.
That’s pretty much all there is to the setup. The bulk of this game type is simply learning to read that diagram quickly and correctly.
——————-
Repeating Games
I’ve written elsewhere about the benefits of repeating games, to solidify your intuition for deductions. Note that the purpose of repeating games is to prove the answers right, so it doesn’t matter if you remember the right answer.
I repeated this game about three days after I first saw it, by which time I had forgotten the answers. I’ve written how long it took me on the second attempt. That time, or a couple minutes above it, is roughly the standard you should be aspiring to — a lot of people take 8-9 minutes on a repeat attempt, get everything right, and pat themselves on the back. But that’s too slow. The faster you go when repeating, the faster you’ll learn to go the first time you see a game.
(I say “a couple minutes above” my time because, after years of teaching the LSAT, I’m really, really fast. You should be almost as fast as me, but you don’t exactly need to match my pace to score -0.)
Leave a Reply