Eliminating the leaderboard might help. By measuring it as a race, it becomes a race, and now the goal is the metric.
Maybe just have a cool advent calendar thingy like a digital tree that gains an ornament for each day you complete. Each ornament can be themed for each puzzle.
Of course I hope it goes without saying that the creator(s) can do it however they want and we’re nothing but richer for it existing.
That 'digital tree' idea is similar to how AoC has always worked. There's a theme-appropriate ASCII graphic on the problem page that gains color and effects as you complete problems. It's not always a tree, but it was in 2015 (the first year), and in several other years at least one tree is visible. https://adventofcode.com/2015
I've ignored the leaderboard for its entire existence, as the puzzles release at something like 4AM-5AM in my timezone; there's no point getting up 4 hours early, or staying awake 4 hours after bedtime, for some points on the internet.
Instead, getting gold stars for solving the puzzles is incentive enough, and can be done as a relaxing thing in the morning.
No matter what you do, as the puzzles get harder, you won't solve them in a day (or even a lifetime) if you don't come up with good algorithms/methods/heuristics.
I disagree. Having a leaderboard also leaks into the puzzle design. So the experience is different, even if you choose to ignore the leaderboard as a participant.
That’s also completely true and something I often say about gaming. You don’t like achievements? Just don’t do them. Your enjoyment shouldn’t be a function of how others interact with the product.
I never, in all the years of participating in AoC did take a look at the global leaderboard.
Even before LLMs I knew it was filled with with results faster then you can blink.
So some of us, from gut feeling the vast majority, it was always just for fun. Usually I spent at least until March to finish as much as I did in every year.
I stopped staying up until midnight for the new problem set to be released and instead would do them in the afternoon. Even though I could compare my time to the leaderboard, simply not having the possibility of being on the board removed most of the comparison anxiety.
Oh, i’m quite sure it does. In fact, it’s a central thing in so much of psychology. The only difference is how you get there. Some people can just ignore and others take more effort.
Maybe just have a cool advent calendar thingy like a digital tree that gains an ornament for each day you complete. Each ornament can be themed for each puzzle.
Of course I hope it goes without saying that the creator(s) can do it however they want and we’re nothing but richer for it existing.