Some Remarks on the Number of Solutions to the Equation f(X1) + … + f(Xn) = 0

Let S, T be finite sets, and let f be a function from S to T. Fix an element t in T, and let c_n denote the number of n-tuples (X₁,…,X_n) satisfying f(X₁) + … + f(X_n) = t here + denotes any binary operation on T. The sequence c₁, c₂,… satisfies a linear recurrence relation of degree at most |T|.