Why You Need Riddles and Mind Games in your TTRPG - GM Tips
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- Опубліковано 16 лип 2024
- The art of a good riddle not only challenges your players, but also opens up a wreath of storytelling opportunities and possibilities. We look at why and how you need riddles and puzzles / conundrums in your adventures and how best to ensure they are fun and worthwhile in this how to dm guide in our quest on how to be a good dm.
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Thanks for watching - let us know of any great riddles you have used in your adventures in the comments below!
Cruelest puzzle ever:
theangrygm.com/the-infamous-angry-riddle-contest/
not mine but i saw a youtube vid were someone walked about a door the party had to open and long story short it took them hours to realise all you had to do was say please
also this one i found on pinterest (shortend cause i dont want to say it word for word) : you are in a room with 4 doors numbered 6,7,8&9. 2 are fake 1 leads to freedom and 1 has a monster(maybe a big werewolf). the tank of the group says the following:9 is fake cause 7 ate 9, so is 6 cause it was eaten,the monster is in #7 cause it ate its friends. door 8 then opens to safey. (no doubt this was based on the joke:why was 6 afraid of 7)
or one of my fav spinx ridles:"what walks on 4 legs in the morning,2 at noon and 3 at night." (answer is man cause 4 legs as a baby,2 as a grownup and 3 as a old person) (the 3rd leg is a cane)
In a Shadowrun we had to stop some badguys who hid in an out-of-order toy manufactory. After dealing with them we came to a battered but stil locked door. The badguys did not get in.
The mechanism to open the door had a field of LEDs. 6Rows and 7Columns, below 7 buttons. When activated a yellow LED flashed in the top row then moved to the butom where it rested. Whe a button was pressed a red LED flashed in the top row and then moved to the buttom of that column.
Since this factory belonged to MB-Spiele we where playing "VIER GEWINNT" (englisch: Connect Four oder Captain's mistress) to open the door. Great idea!
"What sounds like Greek but is not Greek?"
A Gob's answer... "Creek! Like a small river or stream. It's also a sound, like the creak of wood or a rusty joint."
Apothocareon this was my thought too
I was thinking of the black adder with that one.
Yep, creek sounds like greek to me
Spanish
@@MorgorDre Correct
"Exit to Enter" scribed on the exterior of the cave would have been a great clue to aid in solving the physical riddle of the cave entrance.
I think that was missed, since I'm guessing it was taken from the "Come Back Inn" puzzle
Considering the players rolled ball of string into a cave and it came out as well, walking backwards should really not have worked.
The Epic riddle my old friends still tell stories of was facepamlingly simple. We had an entire group of players who were IT geeks away from the table. The fought their way through the tower of a mad mage and managed to kill the mage before he retreated to his inner sanctum, so when they went to loot the inner sanctum for the items they had been sent to retrieve, they encountered a locked lead lined door with no keyhole to pick. I should note that the party was all gnomes, so most of their conversing was in gnomish.
Engraved on a small metal plaque on the door was the sentence in common "To enter, Say the password." We then had a three day encampment of the party as they tried to puzzle it out, rested to reselect spells that might help and generally tried to figure it out. Dispel was tried, brute force, knock, ect. The rogue and bard tried to hunt the rest of the tower for any names or words that they could try (books, labels under portraits, the familiar's name, coorespondance, ect). The cleric used speak with dead to try to interrogate the mage which went a bit like this:
What is the password? It is the password. Yes I know its a password but what is it? It is a verbal key to the sanctum. How do we unlock the door? Say the password.
Day three for the characters (about 45 min into the puzzle) the rogue finally went back and just read the plaque aloud in common and the door popped open as soon as the words "the password" left his lips. At this point there was a brief out of character convo of, wait, seriously? the password was password? No, it was 'the password'. at which point the entire table cracked up into a fit of laughter and half the map washed away in a tide of spilled mountain dew.
It was mildly anachronistic, but also a puzzle specific to my player base. We were all surprized it took them so long to crack, particularly.
I did streamline a lot of their hunting, particularly the efforts of the rogue and bard where they'd select a room to search for possible passwords, I'd roll a dc for the room on a d20 and a pair of percentage for the number of potential passwords they could find, they'd roll a search and a wisdom or intelligence check and depending on the scores i'd tell them how many things they found in the room that they thought might make for passwords a wizard might use. Then they'd go back to the door and "try all the ones they found" I'd request a roll every 10 'passwords' to see if they cracked it or not then tell them not in that batch. Alternatively they could and did try saying random passwords they could think of or find in their notes.
So none of the players had read LOTR?
@@nickwilliams8302 They all had, which made it all the more hilarious.
@@nondisclosureable
Well, more fool them then.
On the very top of my "things to do if i suddenly get a shitton of money" list is building an escape room just to randomly say to my players "go to the room right through that door and solve the puzzle"
If it helps, I also was on Team "try going in backwards?" and now I feel validated that it was the solution lol
Same lol
I also thought that was the solution. My bigger question is, if he was sitting at the table as a player, why didn't he offer that idea to the party during the half hour of experimentation?
@@douglasbyrd2944 I assume he didn't want to metagame. His character wasn't there, so he didn't want to provide the answer.
@@kyleward3914 Ah, I must have missed him saying that his character wasn't present.
Walking in backwards makes no logical sense as a solution.
I’ve always really enjoyed when my players come up with an unexpected answer to a problem or puzzle. My players are quite clever. I have a tip to help GMs be open minded about the solutions. This is often what I do. It’s rather unconventional, one might even say radical. Make the puzzle without one. Give them a problem you don’t have a pre-created solution for. Without your preconceptions of what the solution should be you can more clearly understand and appreciate just how smart and creative your players are!
My rules for making descent puzzles:
1) Unless your entire campaign revolves around the solving of this puzzle, KEEP THE ANSWER RELATIVELY EASY TO GUESS. If possible, give it to non-gamer friends or family to try with all your clues in front of them: if they can't solve it in 15 minutes or less, it's likely too hard for your players who may pass, misinterpret or ignore said clues and just get bored/frustrated with it. You're making a D&D game, not Myst!
2) If you don't have time to test it, PUT IT AWAY UNTIL YOU CAN; instead, grab either a puzzle you have that's worked in the past or a classic famous puzzle and try and add a few simple twists to it, such as hostiles and/or time factors. Sure, most of us know the answer to the famous Chicken Crossing puzzle (you need to get two groups of animals across a river...) but what if those animals were alive and hostile to us? And Dire-type size? And needed to remain alive the entire time (with permanent Freedom of Movement effect thanks to the Mad Wizard, of course)?
3) If possible, LET THEM LEAVE AND COME BACK. This allows them to look for clues they may have missed, and even allows you to alter future rooms to provide more clues naturally. Of course, sometimes that's not possible, in which case, try and have the puzzle be a multi-stage puzzle; each time they reach a new stage, the puzzle changes to provide new clues to the ultimate answer.
4) HAVE AN OUT IN MIND. Sometimes, even a really good and balanced puzzle will flop, so monitor the mood and step in with an alternative if everyone's getting bored/frustrated. You don't even have to have Orcs kick the door in from the other side if you don't want: the next time they make an educated guess, tell them they've solved it. They'll never know anyway, right?
optional 5: If the come up with something clever which, however, is not the answer, LET THEM HAVE IT. As long as it makes sense, why not?
My DM said "You come across a riddle, inscribed on the door...
... Make a roll, I don't have a riddle prepared."
Why even have that encounter?
The story about the chest I think is what makes a lot of people bad GMs. He didn't give you enough info to tell that there was no chance of winning. I had a DM like this where he's just respond in acknowledgment to our actions in combat and as a result we often found out after the fact that fights were so hard because the enemy was resist to one or more of the damage types we were using.
“It’s a problem dice don’t solve”, me stopping mid wisdom check roll “what?”
We had a 'walk backward' puzzle once - our character with the lowest intelligence figured it out, only because her player played her by choosing whatever first pops into her head without thinking about it. So, being weird, she walks backwards and it works!
But my favorite puzzle was the one I figured out. We needed to input this code into a chest or something, and it wasn't working for some reason. After a short while, getting a bit frustrated, our DM had us roll an intelligence check and my girl was able to remember that the creatures we got this from had 12 fingers instead of 10. That reminded me of something an old boyfriend told be about base 10 and counting using other base numbers. Since the creatures had 12 fingers, they used a counting system of base 12. Once we figured that out, it was just a matter of adjusting the numbers to accommodate the new base. It still to this day amazes me how a throwaway conversation with an old boyfriend helped me solve one of the best D&D puzzles I ever did.
Great advice! I wish I had viewed this years ago, when I used to torture players with crap riddles. Now, when I make a riddle, I scribble a few bullet points in my notes as to how I can move things forward if it is not solved in a few minutes. Another option that works well is to make it solvable in real-time (e.g. 30 seconds) and, if not solved, a consequence occurs that moves things forward.
My best advice for puzzles is not to have them block a path to the main objective, rather to a bonus reward. This allows the players to skip past the challenge if they want and still not feel cheated of guessing the answer. If possible, I also make the puzzle something they can take with them, so whenever they come up with an answer they can try it without feeling like they're wasting time. One non-RPG example of this would be the golden snitch containing the resurrection stone in Harry Potter.
I could not agree more! "Have a open solution" I have been saying this for years! Good to know me and you think alike.
I am sure the Sphynx was asking for a pokemon...
I just want to say that I adore your channel and it's been incredibly useful to me. At some point I felt overwhelmed by some of my players with a more dominating attitude but thanks to you I've managed to tone that down. Keep doing a great job!
7:07 im dying of laughter her. You are so genuine even with small mistakes like this, good content.
Clicked the video because I needed to think of some kind of puzzle before the players fight a nilbog... the backwards cave sounds absolutely wonderful I'm stealing it lol
If I find a puzzle I take my adventurer elsewhere. The last game I did the DM loved puzzles and they were everywhere. We couldn't solve any of them, but because they were essential to move the story along, we'd bumble along until the DM fed us enough hints we could get it. Lather, rinse, repeat. I began dreading game nights.
Love it. The argument that puzzles shouldn't belong in a game is negated when you accept the fact that strategy and tactics are up to the player in the game, not the PC. If we took that away there'd be no combat at all in Dungeons and Dragons, every encounter would be (and by that logic should be) over with a single roll based on the character's tactics and strategy skills.
Probably would make sense, but also makes absolutely no fun.
Puzzles , like combat encounters, should have multiple ways to solve or circumvent if they are detrimental to plot progression. A good puzzle has several hints the PCs should encounter or pickup at (or be available to find) before they encounter the puzzle. THe PCs may find a diary or object that can act as the hint delivery system . They may find that a series of rooms formed a number. As one reader said, read the puzzle, then look at either where it's placed or where you're placing it and see what kind of hints you can filter in before the players get there.
Timers are always great for puzzles. I don't put too many puzzles in my game without a timer, meaning that something bad is going to happen immediately after it goes off. The pcs may even progress after it happens, but they will be worse for the wear.
I basically accept any answer that works. If the answer is Map and you come up with "Compass" for "What points you in the right direction with no hands" than I accept it. As long as the spirit of their answer matches the thought process. I would also accept "a gesture" if they pointed out an armless man could still gesture in the right direction AND it had been awhile.
@@ieatvirgins MY dude, These folks would argue for HOURS on this subject. My players would not let me escape that. lol
"Hey, look over there" *points towards the wall on his left side with a movement of his head
"hmmmm this cave entrance makes no sense, you walk in and it mysteriously makes you walk out. this makes no sense at all! we obviously need a completely logical solution that makes complete sense!"
smh lol
When you described the cave I instantly though of going in backwards.
Loved the sketch at the end. I feel like this video helped me a lot. I am running a one-shot tomorrow where disrupting a ritual component will be required and I wanted to add a riddle that makes it possible to break the spell without having vandalism be the answer. This video was a nice pointer to what to be aware of. Thanks a bunch!
And since none of the players will read this comment I can tell the riddle I want to use. First, a little bit of the scenere. It's winter and snow everywhere. But the obelisk is standing in a big fire and all the snow within roughly 40 feet has been cleared. Roughly 20 feet around the obelisk is covered by a large sheet of different fabrics and 4 drow armed with bow and arrows are surrounding the obelisk. The riddle is written on the obelisk in elven.
The first is the last,
but when the last occurs,
the first appears.
The answer is "icecold" so I'm happy if they cast frost magic on it, throw a snowball or keep the fires out for a minutes. What do you think?
Had a great puzzle recently where the GM made a logic rubric (A can sit next to B but not C or D, etc etc)
Various skill checks and character traits opened up more clues.
Very clever, something for certain characters to work on while not out on a mission.
The riddle of the sphinx was Greek. I think it was Odysseus or Jason who solved it.
Sorry, it was Oedipus.
Yep, it was Oedipus. :) He knew the answer because he himself walked with a staff, having been crippled as an infant.
WELL DONE.
Sometimes when I'm trying to be a schticky DM I'll incorporate other actual games as puzzles. For example, a really good one is the character's have to guess a password; so each player gets to pull a number of scrabble tiles equal to their INT, and then they have to try and make the password. You can also use the game Mastermind, where the player gets a number of Lines to guess equal to their INT. In the old West End D6 system Star Wars game our campaign had to have a Sabaac game in every adventure, because we used Yahtzee rules, where you just roll your skill dice, and then try to make the best Yahtzee hand out of it you can.
I never would have thought to walk in backwards. I did do a similar trick with a location called the inevitable city. If my players walked away from the city it grew closer. The option to avoid the location was to turn and walk towards the city. They eventually did turn and walk towards the cursed city and more they walk toward the cursed city the further it faded in to the distance.
"What sounds like Greek; but is not Greek?"
Hercules.
The Greek name is Herakles, but all media set in ancient Greece use the Latin name. The only part of media I have seen use the Greek name is Asterix and the comic is set in ancient Rome.
Perfect intro!
Great video, Guy...
AND (at least in my games) "There are more ways to kill a cat than choke it to death on strawberries." Bears a certain purpose when in regards to riddles and puzzles I like to sprinkle through different campaigns for different purposes.
Some of the most prized (and most fun) puzzles were glorified combination locks... Because any wizard or guild would know better than to leave something as clearly important or powerful as a gate-drive, or giant portal to astral planes laying around behind a lock-device small and simple enough for a child to operate... "Leave a band of monkeys with a typewriter, and in the fullness of time, they will accidentally write the classics"... in principle.
Think about it. Why would a guild of wizards (as smart as a group would be) leave something THAT powerful behind some lock that literally any single person could start tinkering with???
SO if a guild left the thing, obviously, then it should take a reasonably sized GROUP to resolve it, even if they HAVE the answers... The Players tend to call them "infernal machines"... SO think along the lines of games like Tomb Raider, or Soul Reaver (Legacy of Kain)... or even movies like "13 Ghosts" (with Tony Shallhoub) for the house...
Sometimes I've even made them bigger, so to split the party up, and give them two or even three separate objectives to engage with time constraints... communications... etc... A riddle really CAN be an epic adventure all on its own, without exactly "stimying" any campaign or progress in just so many words or syllables.
One such was an entire valley full of cryptic junk, ruins of buildings, three towering temples, and strange artifacts and heavy clock-works fastened directly into mountainsides and along the ridge. The whole thing was a wind-down from the D&D campaign to date, and with the temples and mechanical works, a direct shift toward spelljammer for when I passed off the GM-position to the next Player, who'd been itching to test his work on a more Sci-fi-Fant' adventure theme...
SO... just to "bump my game up a notch" before passing it off, I ran the whole puzzle-valley labyrinth. The party ended up separated into two or three groups at various times, and consistently returned together either to one of the "temples" or to town for re-supplies, more potions, a healbot (cleric or monk) vist, or some folk-lore related chatter before heading back out to adventure.
In the meantimes, while they dealt with ambushing kobolds and goblins at nearly every turn and the occasionally highly disgruntled dwarven stronghold or outpost, they were engaged in feats of every stat on the block. Even once they'd started figuring out what some component machinery did, they still had to wrestle with it physically to get the thing to do it... AND sometimes it needed repair... so sense had to be made of "what the goal was for this part" and then "how to accomplish it anyway" and IMPROVISE...
One of the temples turned out to be the "ship" for starting the spelljammer storyline... AND the other two were primitive (advanced science, but piss poor quality and technical follow through) refuel/re-energizing systems... with mirrors and mechanics from all around the ridgelines and mountains for Solar power focus, and dammed spring-waters and falls that produced hydro-electric power as well as fuel-cell electrolysis (among other and often more arcane things).
Personally, I like to make two kinds of puzzles. There's the obviously riddly "word play" or "joke" sort of puzzle, and then the "logic" puzzle. In either case, the thing can be presented with every intention of creating good Role Play and/or good GAME Play... Letting a Player create a chain of logic is an interesting experiment that lends you (GM) a certain insight into the way he/she thinks. How this Player makes sense of the world and language around them and even in the game... It also encourages inter-party communication and teamwork, and some of the resulting arguments and complexities go WAY beyond anything I could have (or frankly, WOULD have) made on my own...
It's also worth note (important?) to point out that as a GM, one should LET the Players flail about and over-complicate their own lives (and those of the PC's by rote) at least a little bit. Don't just abandon them for an hour at a time to thrash and swear and bitch about this horribly unfair puzzle as presented, but let them sweat a little. Present it "fiendishly" as only YOU can for your own table... if (or rather WHEN) you find out your "Tell" is a half-smile and a certain tone, work with a mirror SO you can do THAT at will... Then you can present the next puzzle with the same fiendish zeal that suggests something isn't as they see it... AND hopefully, you can learn to present something that isn't as they see it, without that stupid smirk that always "gives it away".
BUT while we let our Players flail about and over complicate their own endeavors, be there to toss a hook or hint, or just a bit of aid once in a while... I prefer the game of subtleties, myself, but I'm not above running a bright pink elephant through the middle of the damn show if I have to. ;o)
One method for creating a puzzle with a solution that the players are guaranteed to arrive at, is to make a puzzle with no actual solution! Put enough pieces and clues around such that something can conceivably be done with them in ways that can be reasoned through, and just let your players try a few things until you find that they've come up with something suitably clever enough. Have clues/items around that can be reasonably determined to be red herrings if their solution doesn't include them (e.g. some stones of varying size, could be integrated into a solution but can also reasonably be just some rubble; recessed spaces in the walls, maybe relics must be placed there... or maybe it's just an old spot for candles).
You can also even have some solution in mind (this is probably wiser), but let something that the players come up with be correct anyway! If they come up with something after a bit that makes enough sense or you can tell that the players deliver with an "Aha! This must be it!" attitude, let them have that satisfaction!
The Poirot references stole my heart
We're almost at the first of my riddles in our campaign! They've discovered the first of my secret magic schools that housed ancient medallions infused with the magic of their represented school. The engraved wall is filled with images and incantations of Enchantment-based spells. In the center is the symbol of Enchantment as well as the inscription "To weave your fabric with the threads of others." The secret door will open to reveal the shrine where the medallion was kept, but is now in the hands of the pirates' enchanter.
I usually provide a list of possible answers if someone needs to lean on their character abilities, and then they can puzzle out which answer is correct.
I've used online anagram sites to help me come up with interesting (to me) encrypted messages. I quickly assessed that, in spite of bringing all the wooden letter tiles from a Scabble game, my players were not interested in decoding unless it was, at most, a single word. Oh, well. It was a fun two hours of planning that note. No biggie.
I love your professional nature, yet you still make mistakes and roll them into the video with jokes. Your GM philosophy seems to be quite similar to your video master philosophy!
The Fat Goblin does it again, another brilliant video.
@Finley Eates Here's a super genius, watching on 2x speed lol
Had a puzzle,
Imaging a stone keyboard with 20 columns, but only 4 rows to each column. Each key had a rune on it.
On the floor in the room engraved into the floor were 4 rings, (think layers of a rainbow)
So four layers, depicting 4 colums of the same runes but only 3 symbols in each column.
-Earlier in the dungeon they searched a corpse and found a shred of paper with two runes on it.
The same runes on the keyboard.
The solution was to press the keys that were missing from the floor depiction.
When they pressed the ruins on the piece of paper they glowed. It didn't matter in which order they were pushed, just that they were the correct ones.
The i offered hints for successful intelligence(investigation) checks.
First hint-
"The key comes from patterns of four"
Second hint-
"Sometimes its not what you CAN see but what you CANT"
Third hint-
"The process of elimination can clear the path ahead"
Used their hints 5 minutes in, took them 45 minutes. The fighter was just soaking up lightning damage repeatedly from pressing the wrong keys trying to brute force it. Was a fun evening.
> Have a bunch of Polyglotic players interested in linguistics
> Have an NPC give them one translated sentence with a number symbol somewhere in it
> Later on, they should find a document in a dungeon, like a list of things, that features the number at the beginning of a line, letting players know that lines of text are numbered
> From there, they should be able to guess that the rest of the starting symbols are the neumerical order and cross-reference it with arabic decimal
> Players find a revolving lock with said symbols on it and a physical clue in the form of a religious carving somewhere, hinting the combination
... And they will still break through it in 5 min knowing them
I had one of these where I just had a golem protecting the king's chambers in a ancient ruins speak this Riddle
White is to Red, as Black is to Blue.
What is Orange equal to?
I presented my party with the Flag of said nation, which had red white woven line. with a black and blue lion and a orange and green field. the solution was green but they just never clued in it was about the flag
What did they think the flag was for?
Random idea for the sphinx riddle set-up (even though i personally can't stand riddles) where there's limited guesses:
First tell them that their only chance to answer the riddles and pass is within the next 24 hours (maybe say it in a cool flowery fantasy way like "by the morrow after your first utterance, your next will fall on deaf ears".. or something actually good) And if they need more guesses, then have it so that they can earn more guesses with a sacrifice (aka HP damage or a given number of daily spells) from the ones guessing.
Maybe I'm in the minority but, as a player, that kind of sacrifice and pressure gauge would make getting it right feel more earned, relieving, satisfying, and memorable to me (especially if there's a possibility for an interesting scar to form).
When it comes to puzzles and riddles, there are definitely right ways and wrong ways to do it. Here's the absolute wrong way to do it: a floor tile puzzle that requires knowledge something in the real world that doesn't exist in the campaign world, or that in any way references spelling a word in a specific real-world language that doesn't exist in the campaign world - especially if the word you have to spell out has nothing to do with the puzzle. I once played in a one-shot where my character kept getting set on fire, that ended with having to spell out the word "quash" in floor tiles. You do not quash a fire, you quash a rebellion; you *quench* a fire. Also there is no conceivable reason why the language of fire elementals would have an equivalent to the letter "q", a letter that is entirely unnecessary in modern English in the first place, since we don't differentiate between aspirated and non-aspirated consonants.
If your big climactic encounter is just another garbage-tier word search that makes no goddamn sense even after forcing me to metagame, I *WILL* throw a shoe at you.
That story of the cave that they enter and then immediately walk out of at the same time, I had almost immediately thought "walk in backwards" as a solution. It's not too big a leap in logic, I don't think.
OMG I WANT THAT CLOAK!!!!
I once had my party go to a ruined and abandoned scientific center once. The vault security system required them to solve 4 of 5 riddles of various kinds and they really loved it. Four of them I found online, but one I made myself.
It had them enter a room with moveable pillars and three pressure pads. The only thing they had to do was to place the pillars in a specific combination onto the pads. Now to make it a bit difficult, I had the pillars numbered. They needed to have all the pillars add up to the same number on all of the pressure pads. And to make it even more difficult, I had the numbers on the pillars written in a base 3 system (humans usually use base 10, computers tend to have a combination of base 2, 8 and 16) and to make it unbelievably difficult, the numbers were unknown symbols that I had made up.
It took them the better part of an hour to figure it out. One player did give up. She just sat there and watched the rest of them solve the thing. The others had a pretty cool discussion and finally got it worked out. I had them throw skill checks for relevant skills (I was very lenient with the relevancy) to give them hints and even made up extra details to generate extra clues.
Thanks, Guy, for the excellent points. The possibility to have multiple solutions to the riddle/puzzle is crucial, simply to enable the players to get on with the story rather than have a frustrating blocker. And the point of having multiple challenge types for the different kinds of player is also very important.
I intend to try a Tower of Hanoi puzzle room where the movement of each disk has side effects, like the spawning of new enemies or something. That will put a time constraint on the puzzlers in the party and give the sword swinging dice rollers something to work on.
Walking in backwards makes sense to me.
In one of my plot points there is a theam based riddle based on there own hero's race so the answer they have known since day 1 it is part of the race's culture
When the DM had that chest you couldn't get into... the thief upon lockpicking attempt would note This chest is locked in a way that is beyond my ability to open. The guildmaster might be able to do it.
Mage casting knock and failing would point to magics above his level.
At that pint (less than 10 min average for a party)... they should have been told to pick it up and haul it to an expert... or leave the damn thing alone.
Telling your PCs what to do is a strong sign of a poor, uncreative DM imho.
Poirot and Hitchhiking? You sir have good taste.
if your players can't figure a riddle out and you don't want them to just make an ability check for it, introduce (before they get to the riddle, prepare it beforehand) a sage NPC that the PC can call for help. If they ask him, he'll give them the solution, but it takes time to go back to him, bring him to the dungeon and back. They trade the solution for time where enemies may escape, regroup or prepare new traps
that poirot reference slapped
I am not sure if this counts, and hopes this makes sense. In one game we were walking down this long hallway. There was also about a foot of water on the floor. As we started down the hallway we started hearing “Mallard” the farther we went down the hall the quicker and louder the voice became. About a halfway down this long corridor it was noticed there was a tar like substance on the wall along with signs of scouring. The voice stopped and a duck flew over are head. We laughed about it. Subsequently as we proceeded a little farther the voice screamed “mallard” again and a loud sound whishing sound. That was when it hit me a mallard is a duck and I yelled drop. Then I dropped into the water just as a fireball came down the hallway and set the tar-like substance on fire as well. We ended up crawling the rest of the way through the water.
Riddles are to table top gaming what physical combat is to LARPing. At some point your own abilities are gonna hinder you.
As for your Riddle, walk in backwards was the first thing I thought of. I was skeptical that it would work but thought it be funny to try.
The "go into the cave backward" puzzle reminds me of something I read in a novel a long time ago. The characters were in some sort of labyrinth or something and came to a fork in the passage. They chose one of the paths and ended up right back where they started. Then they chose the other path and the same thing happened. It wasn't until they thought to go back the way they came from that they actually got where they needed to go. I'm totally thinking about including something like that in a campaign.
I wish my D.M. would do this!
If we tryed to solve this with our minds, she would probly acuse us of meta-gaming.
Expecially if our characters had low inteligence scores.
Throw a link to this video as a "Subtle hint" :)
As a DM I love it when players interact with my campaign and tell me what they liked and what I could do better, so definitely let them know, it'll make everyone's experience more fun!
@@ieatvirgins
Yep.
theangrygm.com/dear-gms-metagaming-is-your-fault/
theangrygm.com/respect-the-metagame/
I mean... yeah. It's the player solving the puzzle, not the character, and that's a very specific sort of gameplay. It's all down to personal likes and dislikes here. Not everyone likes having this in a roleplaying game.
@@Zandalorscat
Pretty much.
If the players like puzzles, give them some. If they don't, give them skill challenges (challenges that can be resolved with attribute checks) instead.
If only some players like puzzles, occasionally the other players are just going to have to put up with the occasional puzzle.
I understood that Poirot reference
*Setting the difficult intensifies*
I find myself in the somewhat unenviable situation where I am very good at riddles, my players not so much. The problem is, when I make a riddle the players get stumped and the whole session grinds to a halt. In my mind it's fairly simple but the players don't see it that way. I've basically decided that riddles and such should be optional such that the party can still progress without solving them but will get something useful if they do.
Making puzzles optional is probably the preferred way to go, unless your players are notably into them.
A good way to go about it would be to have the puzzles be found in places the party visits, but the goal of the adventure doesn't require them to solve them. Instead, the puzzles a barrier in the way of additional treasure or rewards. Like a letter that includes a ciphered clue to finding a cache of gold. Or a riddle whose answer is "a skeleton", and the dungeon happens to have a mounted skeleton with a load of gems hidden in its skull (the skull top is hinged, allowing it to open). Or the puzzle tells the party which of many paintings in a mansion has a safe hidden behind it, which they determine through examining symbolism, and cool stuff is hidden in it (including the deed to the mansion).
You also have to remember that you have all of the information of the Cosmos, while your players, let alone their characters do not. Also the answer is "obvious" to you because you made it
Osmosis Jones I usually draw from the internet to find puzzles and riddles because I can put myself in the position of the players when deciding on a riddle, if I can't figure out the riddle, particularly if it still doesn't make sense after I learn the answer, I won't ever put it in my game.
As I said I mostly use riddles as optional rather than mandatory challenges. So the players can always give up and go around or ignore it, but I've found they usually don't go around even if they don't have to do it. I might just have completionist players who would slam their heads against the puzzle for hours rather than bypassing a minor boon.
^ yes! what (s)he said! I have concluded after decades of running that a riddle or puzzle or this sort of thing needs to lead either to an extra treasure haul (and not a game-critical one), an opportunity for a buff (often a way to overcome missing party roles), or a shortcut through the dungeon past something that's more trouble than it's worth. That way if they want to devote the time to solving it, they feel rewarded; but if they don't, it's entirely optional and they can just go do something else.
I once had a DM that gave us a puzzle in a church. After defeating 3 necromancers we found a wand of secrets that had a charge spent on one of their bodies. I used the wand after positioning myself so intuitively that my character broke the wand on the alter that it showed to be a secret entrance. There was a plaque on it, and one in the back of the room. We spend a literal hour trying to figure out how to open this thing, at one point answer a section on light and dark from the plaque with the blood of our paladin and a vampire who was part of the party. We never did figure out how to open it and were too low of a level to force it open. When we got to the point that the campaign was pretty obviously dying, we tried to go back there to tie the loose end, but we never managed to make it back as our schedules didnt line up for another session until after the dungeon master had moved away.
Email the DM and ask, because now I’m curious too.
My riddles or puzzles are always based on what the characters, not the players, would know. But there should definitely be more than one out if it's a dire circumstance. Or maybe they'll need to explore more ( I might hint ) to get more clues to bypass the problem.
Except that's not what is being discussed here. What you are talking about is a skill challenge, not a riddle or puzzle (and that's not to say you should stop putting those in your game).
A riddle or puzzle depends upon _no_ outside knowledge - whether player or character knowledge - in order to solve: the riddle/puzzle itself contains all the information needed to solve it.
@@nickwilliams8302 If the riddle is relatable to a characters race or class or background knowledge and requires no rolling it's still a riddle or puzzle. My reply was a response to his comment about the players solving it and not the characters. So now they're playing OOC. Pretty sure the video is about riddles and puzzles.
@@nickwilliams8302 I suggest you look up the " types of riddles "
i mainly have no clue HOW to include puzzels in my game. the Spinx of course works, but it doesn't fit into the campaign atm, and i have no idea how else to do it. just writing on the wall with a door that only opens when the answer is said?
Woop woop
I had a gm that decided to make a riddle/puzzle that had 5 options, we had to choose one based on the riddle, and due to the options and the riddle itself, all 5 could technically be correct. I was the one to suggest the object nobody thought about that made the two "obvious" choices fit with the other two objects.
It was based on the numbers II, III, V, IX, and XI, or 2, 3, 5, 9, and 11. We had to figure out which number did not fit with the other 4. I can't remember how the riddle allowed 3 to be an option, might've been the 3rd line not giving a clear hint within it. Obviously, 2 and 11 were the most likely options, but I thought of 9, as it's not a prime number and the word prime was used twice in the riddle. If 9 was the only answer, 2 could've been changed to 13 (or 7 if you wanted to at least allow 11 to be the answer as well), but due to the fact the DM made that puzzle too easy, it feels like we couldn't lose when I think about it. There also was never any other use of roman numerals within the dungeon, with the only other number based room being written in, I believe, dwarven.
Without knowing the riddle/puzzle this seems to make very little sense to me. There is for example nothing obvious about 2 and 11 being the most likely solutions, by just knowing what the possibilities are. I do have to correct you on the nature of 9 though, as it is very much not a prime number (a prime number is only divisable by itsself and 1), in fact 9 is the only non-prime number out of all the ones you mentioned.
@@Slash-XVI Thank you for the correction for accidentally calling 9 a prime number. I did forget to mention the main part being we needed to figure out which number did not fit within the sequence. I have edited the comment to have that info.
My first thought (while trying to figure it out without reading the whole paragraph) was that 5 was the odd one out because it's the only one that didn't have an I in the Roman numeral.
After that, I thought that maybe it was 9, because it's the only one that is not a sum of 2 and the previous number. 2+3=5 and 2+9=11, but 2+5=/=9.
My confusion to the "Backwards Cave" is.. why on earth did the STRING return? It doesn't have a front or a back, it's an inanimate object with no defined sides. By all rights it didn't enter forwards OR backwards, it just entered. No wonder the players were confused, from the evidence provided it seems that perspective doesn't matter, merely the action of entering.
If there was some plaque nearby that maybe mentioned perspective in some format, then that would help clue the players into the intended answer.
I have scales and wings but I am not a dragon, I am made of shadow but I am not of the shadowfell, I am made of plasma but I live underwater, I am mistaken for a god when I manipulate dreams, what am I?
My master spoilered me that on my campaign I will meet an ethical "riddle".
-Humility prove: you are in a corridor.
What should my character do??
I just can't get it out of my head, it seems meaningless but he is a really great gm so I think it has to have a sense!
Help me please!
The "riddle" - as you have written it - is a meaningless string of words. It is not even a sentence, let alone a riddle. Are you sure you have written it correctly?
Did you mean to write:
Humility: Prove you are in a corridor.
In which case it would imply that it is a riddle that requires humility to solve (presumably other riddles test other virtues).
@@nickwilliams8302
My dm only told me that my pg will be in a corridor and will have to prove itself humble in order to survive the test.
I am sorry for my poor English😅
@@gabris1559
No need to apologise for your English. You're using it better than I can use your native language, I'm sure. :)
But does my rewrite seem to match what your DM said?
If so, my guess is that you "solve" the riddle by having the humility to admit you cannot solve it. You cannot prove you are in a corridor.
@@nickwilliams8302 I am literally in a corridor and I have to prove that I am a humble person.
I am italian😅
@@gabris1559
What, exactly, are you being asked in this corridor?
Are there any Canadian players around Ottawa? I have been using table finder and no Canadian players are registered aside from myself lol
Adding riddles to your game is really dangerous. When I was a younger GM, I got my players stuck on riddles for hours. Now I always make sure there is about...uh...5 ways to solve the puzzle before it hit them with it.
You have one player stuck on a puzzle... Split the party!
1:45 LoL ? What was there?
I know that my Wizard, level 32, Int 23, is smarter than I am... so I'll try a couple of ideas than ask for an Int check to see if he can solve it.
When I put in riddles... I use a book of "Dad Jokes"
Generally I understand that people aren’t very bright, and you do have to properly communicate things to them in a way that they will understand.
One = 3 ,two =3 ,four =4 ,five =4. Whats 10+10? Every time they got it wrong they had to roll a 1d6 for the level of monster that came to attack when they got it wrong. The answer was 6. Took them like half an hour and every laughed when they got it.
my first instinct was to say 5 as "10+10" is five characters. Spelling out the sum and then counting the letters might be the next logical step, but it may not be that obvious.
But six=3 doesnt it?
@@krzysztofbandyk168 yes. And three= five and five equals = four and four= four so in full regression, i guess you could say 10+10 is 4
@@doctorskeptical4718 Fun fact in such a chain you always end up on four regardless where you start.
One thing I learned is: Establish very quickly that there are problems the players can not solve where they have to back off.
I always show the players that there are monsters well above their level in the area, missions offered that are suicide and riddles they might not solve because they don't know enough. Once you established that, they might make an attempt on a riddle, but they won't get stuck there forever.
Of course it is frustrating to not find the solution to a riddle. In my opinion this is balanced out by the opportunity for the DM to use riddles that have a very unique solution and the great feeling of accomplishment if the party solved it. If you are "destined" to solve the riddle, there is no accomplishment. The chance to fail is part of what makes a great game. I'll give you one example:
My players entered a room with a chessboard pattern on the ground. There were white marble plates and dark metal plates. At the entrance and the exit there were pedestals. The pedestal at the entrance was on a marble field and held a blue glowing orb. The pedestral at the exit was on a metal field and it was empty. The exit was locked.
The players could explore the room freely, as long as they didn't carry the orb.
If you carry the orb, stepping on a metal plate will shock you.
If you loose grip of the orb, it will return to the pedestal.
There are statues all over the room. If you carry the orb and step into their line of sight, they will shock you.
Now this looks rather simple if you figured out the rules: You have to find a path to the other pedestal only stepping on marble plates and not crossing the line of sight of the statues.
The trick here: Looking at the placement of the statues, there is no way to the other pedestal. All attempts to cheat the riddle by throwing the orb or pulling it on a rope just make the orb fly back to its inital position. The statues can not be moved, so what is the solution here?
You could just break the statues. That would make all statues break and turn into elementals, so you would have a hard fight instead of a riddle. It is a solution that would get you across the room, but what is the real solution?
The solution lies in the following premise: We don't want someone who doesn't know the secret to open the other door. To hide the secret, we make a riddle that has clear rules. People who know stories about riddle rooms will figure out the rules and stick to them, they will not think outside the box once they think they know the rules.
The solution is quite simple: There is a secret passage on one wall that is accessible that allows you to go around the last few statues with the orb. For everyone who knows this, it is easy to open the other door. For someone who sticks to the rules it is impossible. As the riddle enforces its rules, it looks like there is no way to get around the rules.
My players were frustrated with this riddle, it took them the better part of the session to figure it out. I told them to think aloud, so that I can give them a hint when they are on the right path.
The things I was listening for were:
This is impossible / There is no path -> You are right, there is no path
The makers of this room cossed it without breaking stuff -> probably yes, makes no sense otherwise
There has to be something we are missing -> Yes, there probably is
(I really didn't give them more help than that)
In the end, the rogue started to inspect the walls closely and found the hidden door and the passage behind it.
Suddenly the frustration turned into joy. This was a solution they didn't expect and it is so logical once you know the evil premise behind it. It also turns the whole concept of riddle rooms on its head.
It suddenly turns a stupid riddle room (riddles are stupid to protect something) into a genious death trap. Think about it: You allow the room to shock you over and over while figuring out the rules until you run out of potions and healing spells, then you trigger the fight by smashing a statue out of frustration. This room is not meant to test your intelligence as you might think, it is meant to deter intruders and kill them if they don't give up.
(The next thing I do is probably a riddle room with a fake exit and no solution that is only there to kill you, while the real treasure is behind a fake wall in the broom closed next corridor)
Just to get back to the first point:
I had to establish that I am evil enough to give impossible challenges and let the players die in them to get my players to the point where they could solve this. I didn't help much, they solved it on their own. I guess that many parties would be killed in that room, just because they expect riddles to be solvable by following the rules.
Comment is the answer?
You should put them in, but don't act surprised or upset when the players circumvent them. Remember, all problems can be solved through the proper application of explosives. Historical fact. So, you put in a door that has a puzzle lock and the player's objective is on the other side of that door, my first thought would be to blow up the door. You say "oh, it's a magic door it can't be harmed", my next thought is, let's blow up the walls. Then the ceiling. Then burrow under it. If all that fails, I give up and go away. Clearly whoever put the objective behind that door wants it more than I do. Some players like puzzles, some players don't, usually you'll have a mix of the two and at least one player who is "the instigator" and he'll be the one trying to come up with abstract solutions.
You have every right to do that but don't derail everything out of spite because you're not a puzzle guy, if destroying it is impossible atleast try to do the puzzle. When you derail the game the GM has every right to derail you in return. The GM is also a player they have fun being the GM just like you have fun being the character it's a give and take.
@@michaelfapgod4598 When did I say otherwise? I'm just saying, don't try and shut down (or get upset with) players who prefer to cut the Gordian knot.
Yeah? Well as GM, I say a sphinx guarding this temple has an anti-TNT enchantment casted, protecting the entire temple and the only way to bypass the riddle is to kill the riddle-giver. If the players ask the Sphinx for the spell, it'll just tell them "no" in a polite and lore-friendly way.
@@omlo9093 and that makes you a bad dm. there should always be an infinite number of solutions to any given problem. D&D is a game of imagination after all.
@@clericofchaos1
Hahaha, no. I disagree.
As GM, I am a player too and sometimes I want to challenge others with a riddle. GMing is hard work and I deserve to have fun at the table too, disregarding others' usual game-breaking antics.
Solutioning
@6:45 ...umm... wait, so if the answer to a riddle could not possibly exist in the setting where the game takes place, so the riddle is impossible for the characters because it's impossible without metagaming, that means the riddle is poorly designed? *THEN WHY HAS ALMOST EVERYONE I'VE EVER SAID THAT TO SAID I WAS IN THE WRONG?*
One problem with your cave example is that it sounds very much like the GM was very much focused on his one and only solution.
Perhaps whatever magic operating the cave's mechanism would interfere with other magic such that, instead of having the magic just come wanging back out and possibly hitting someone, it reversed it in some way. A fireball thrown in causes an explosion in reverse - when it hits, instead of expanding out, the bead of flame contracts inward leaving a *very small* spot of glass or something where it absolutely obliterated what it hit because its energy went in instead of filling a 20 foot radius with 8d6 worth of fire. Maybe the magic missile flies back into its caster's hand. Etc.
Aside from the hint that it effects physical things and not just people, and is not a portal between 2 identical looking cave entrances, there was very little to give any kind of hint.
I think the cave puzzle was very badly designed. There is no way to logically reason that _facing a different direction_ when passing through the entrance would negate the magic. particularly after it was established that objects _without_ any "face" (like the ball of string) were still affected by the reversal magic.
@@nickwilliams8302 Actually there is. What if the entrance itself only turns the object / magic that enters it by 180 degrees in one direction without the players being able to notice this (maybe it happens so fast that they cannot react at all). If this is the case the riddle makes sense.
@@filipferencak2717
Nope.
You're getting hung up on the direction you're facing and ignoring the direction of travel.
@@nickwilliams8302 *You're getting hung up on the direction you're facing and ignoring the direction of travel.*
It's actually you who's getting hung up on the direction of travel, when that's clearly not what their GM had in mind when creating this puzzle. You don't seem to understand what I meant so let me clarify it for you a bit further.
I'll use an arrow for example.
There is two possibilities that I see.
The first one, the one you describe, acts as a sort of portal that automatically teleports anything that enters through it outside based on it's direction of travel. If you fire an arrow into this type of entrance, you will see it fly out shortly. If this is the case, turning around and walking in backwards is pointless.
The second one, the one I described, is an entrance enchanted with powerful magic that simply turns anything that tries to enter the cave at 180 degrees without affecting it's momentum or being seen by the players. What the players would then see is the arrow flying inside, then the arrow flying outside again. Same thing happens, different cause entirely.
In this scenario, turning around and walking in backwards makes sense, since the cave would then turn you around to face it's exit rather than entrance. As long as you don't move too fast, you shouldn't leave the cave immediately.
I've seen your comments on several threads where you seem to be extremely butthurt over this puzzle for some reason.
Maybe instead of saying that it's impossible because your idea for what this cave does doesn't allow this solution, you should understand that your idea might not be an accurate representation of what the GM described happening.
@@filipferencak2717
The problem is that the magic _quite clearly_ redirects momentum as well as direction, as shown by the experiment conducted by the PCs using a spear. If the magic did not redirect the momentum as well as the direction, the spear would have continued into the cave butt-first. Which did not happen.
No, I am not assuming that the magic teleports things entering the cave, that's inconsistent with the results of the experiment with the ball of string. Quite clearly things are being turned around, not teleported.
By the rules established, walking backwards _into_ the cave should result in you walking backwards _out_ of the cave. Which is why none of the players even tried walking backwards. Why would they? It makes no logical sense.
Look, I'm not saying that its' somehow invalid or "impossible" for the GM to make walking backwards the solution. It's their game, they can make the solution to the challenge any random thing they want. As apparently they did.
What I'm saying is that this challenge is not actually a puzzle because the solution does not logically follow from the facts presented to the players.
What about the issue of a player who has a stupid character who would not be capable of solving a puzzle? And they have to sit out of the puzzle altogether
Great video except for the ending slide which has spindown dice instead of standard dice.
As for that DM situation where it took 2 sessions, thats why I champion letting players know(in a session zero) that some things they wont be ready for but they may still encounter them, meaning they may need to just mark their map and come back to it(like a key/info received 2 sessions further into the story, etc) Allow 10 minutes of interaction before they know (are prompted) to get a move on, essentially a couple of ideas each. It's a seed of mystery that can pay off big later or end up not really mattering..dungeon dressing.
The problem with puzzles and riddles, is that it tends to be player knowledge that solves them, whether the character would have had the answer or not.
Now, if the player doesn't know the answer, the GM can give the character hints for it regarding things that they would know, but it's still the player that puts it all together.
This isn't a major issue most of the time, but if there's a case where a player plays a character that is either significantly more, or less clever than they are irl, their puzzle solving abilities as a player won't match with those their character should possess.
On this very issue, I make a point to account for SOME kind of mechanic that allows a "dicey" generation of puzzle-resolving results...
Up front, I have no problems with "Metagaming" so long as it's not abused in ways other than "purely humorous fluff"... We tend to keep that to a reasonably scarce level, so when it does result in a meta-running-gag... The antics are table-wide HILARIOUS... and usually sign of a well needed "break" of sorts.
BUT there's always treacherous balance when someone tries to play a Character that's either considerably Smarter or considerably Dumber than the Player... SO it's important to have a handy "quick-reference" for employing the higher or lower intell/wisdom mechanics available for just such pertinent occasions.
As you pointed out, it's usually not a big deal... Occasionally, it can even be fun to have the "barbaric grunt" achieve some crudely inspired monologue about the future of nuclear fusion and the power of the stars... BUT it's not destined to be a running gag so much as funny for the big lunk to be able to solve something only a nuclear engineer should've invested time on. ;o)
@@gnarthdarkanen7464 Funny thing, we both bring up metagaming somewhat, but fairly recently, I played in a murder mystery one shot, and it was the fact that I didn't metagame that lead me to the answer.
It was a Pokémon Tabletop united one shot. I was playing a character that was mentally tough, but ignorant on some occult matters. The GM kept dropping clues that lead everyone toward the eldest son of the victim, but when asked questions, he seemed genuine and honest in his replies. He was shocked that all of the witnesses (only Pokémon) told the channeler (through means of showing her the images) saw him do it.
Among those there, was a Zorua, which has the power to create illusions. But, those illusions are not able to speak.
One of the characters most people in the one shot ignored, was the grandson, but something seemed off about him. So, I talked to him, and came up with a completely in character idea that flew in the face of everything I know about the system. You cannot channel with humans, and illusions don't speak... but I asked the channeler to attempt it anyway. Instead, as the "boy" tried to flee from her, which confirmed to me what I was suspecting in character, she used another power to dispel the illusion, revealing the true culprit. A Zoroark with the ability to speak human speech.
Had I stuck with what I knew, we'd have been there all night. Nobody else even thought to suspect the kid.
Really, a puzzle or riddle should contain the information the player needs to solve it. So it's not "player knowledge" that solves it, but player reasoning.
@@mariabaldwin8999
You pulled some basic Sherlock Holmes shit in that adventure:
"When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."
@@mariabaldwin8999, I can only speak for myself... and I am up-front about metagaming most of the time (unless I just overlook it/forget) in general to avoid the nasty (and frankly, stupid) arguments that result from any metagaming involvement NOT mentioned or admitted to... some of the viewer/commenters seem unable to "let it go" when they catch it... and it's unproductive, to be completely honest. There's nothing wrong with metagaming, only stuff wrong with abusing the idea...
ALL that said (whew)... Your approach to the Pokemon mystery was similar to Holmes' famed principle of deduction. "Eliminate the impossible, Watson, and whatever is left, however unlikely MUST be the truth."
Among the oldest "GM's dirty tricks" in the history of RPG's is to "slip in a very rare exception" to the conventional rules of the game... In D&D it's a Mindflayer who can speak common and actually has feelings... OR the Lich who took his place as an immortal force of nature so that someone else wouldn't be forced into mindlessly guarding the damn doorway to one of the 9 Hells (an old fav' I use to throw a morality BEAT DOWN on the party... lolz)... AND in a game like CyberPunk, it could be the elite level Hacker with a REALLY BIG F***ing GUN! OR the Rocker who can't sing a lick, but is phenomenal with anything mechanical... etc...etc...etc...
GM's use these tricks to slip past the party's expectations and linger about an otherwise short and simple "search and destroy the criminal" plot... without a lot of heavy mental lifting and for the fact that most of us GM's aren't Alfred Hitchcock material...
I do think it's kind of cool your GM put that in there, and it worked out for you better for NOT investing much in the meta, but that's part of the thing. Sometimes meta' can help and sometimes... erm... not so much. ;o)
lol using a kids menu maze for 3 year olds will legittamately last for 3+ sesssions its great because you can sprinkle combat encounter and riddle solutions inside to keep them interested
I never had a GM, that put riddles/mind puzzles, in a game, that did not make them a painful slog fest; which is why I still detest them, to this very day, and have sworn to NEVER put them in any campaign of mine. NEVER!
Once the players show they know an acceptable answer, don't make them keep resolving the same puzzle.
DM is making us roll for how many moves per turn we can do in a sliding puzzle, with 4 moves per turn average and expected 64 moves to solve it even though we have even drawn out the plan for how to move the tiles t get to the solution.
and then he's making us take 2 hours REAL TIME AT THE TABLE to take 2 turns...
I tried taking a pick-axe to the puzzle to remove the tiles so we could put them back in the correct order rather than sliding hem for weeks. He said I broke the pick-axe.
If there was anther game, I'd leave.
About 2 months until I have a different place to play and can dump that DM.
The puzzle probably won't be solved yet.
And I hope he sees this and realizes that I am talking about him.
I recall a dungeon that had a cipher. The cipher had a key. The key was something that the NPC that the PCs were stealing from was obsessed with but it was the Latin name for that thing. The characters knew about the use of Latin by the NPC as their were other things written in Latin in his room, his pets were given Latin names and Latin was used by the NPC as a code language with other NPCs, etc. Also, there were symbols in the code. The symbols were coded punctuation marks. These marks had meanings that could be discovered but ONLY by first traversing the dungeon and not by just magically popping in. The deciphered sentence was a jargonish limerick riddle that someone in the NPC’s profession could easily understand and answer but someone outside the profession would find obtuse and therefore impenetrable. Furthermore, without recognizing that the symbols were punctuation symbols and without knowing the meaning of the punctuation symbols, the sentence could be interpreted several ways. Choose incorrectly, and be led astray to a trap! That in my opinion is how it ought to be done. Puzzles, riddles and traps working together. Plenty of clues hanging about right in front of the players, no shortcuts available to the PCs to avoid the work, teamwork and homework a must for any hope of success, and a reward for success but a punishment for failure. If they don’t solve it, they will just have to fail and come back another time when they are better prepared. Just make sure to give them something else to do if they fail so that they will come away with a partial win. If they grumble about their failure to solve the puzzle or riddle or they encounter with a rather nasty trap and suffer the consequences, so be it! They will now know, some things in life are easy, some aren’t. Anything worth doing will require effort on their behalf. Don’t attempt anything worth doing unless you are willing to put forth some effort to obtain it. I don’t run a Monte Hall dungeon. If that’s what you are looking for, find another DM or game. No hard feelings. I’m just that kind of DM. Anyway, for what it’s worth, That’s how I do it. Cheers!
If you ask me, puzzles and other player focused challenges just kill RP. If a player is playing a stupid character and they shout the answer, I'd honestly call that a form of meta-gaming. And if a less than mentally savvy player is playing a high intelligence character, that's gonna leave that player feeling shitty and ultimately useless.
5:37 Uh... Someone Did Best The Sphinx... Also Wasn't The Sphinx With The Riddle From Greece?
The whole problem is that it's the players that are on trial. That's not what I look for in a roleplaying game. Strategy being part of gameplay is fine, because that's both the character and the player being challenged, but challenges specifically designed to challenge me and not my character aren't why I'm there. If I wanted that, I'd play chess.
I'm downvoting because you didn't know that Oedipus solved the Sphinx's riddle and went on to become king. Obviously someone lived to tell the riddle and its answer as the story of Oedipus Rex relates.
I actually *hate* riddles and puzzles. Like, fire of a thousand suns hate. My brain doesn't work that way-- I can understand the answer after I see it but I can't even fathom how someone could guess such a thing! If a DM forces it into a game I'm in, that's a good time to use the loo. Please make sure your players like such a thing before you include it.
Yep.
If none of the players like riddles and puzzles, the GM should just use skill challenges instead.
the answer was gibberish or nonsense. AKA maths.
Players are not their characters. You don't decide dexterity checks by making the player walk a tightrope. You roll dice. You don't determine if the Barbarian can lift something by making the player lift a heavy item. You roll dice. The same should apply to tests of intellect.
As a player I don't need to solve the riddle. The wizard with 20 Intelligence and the Keen Mind feat should roll to receive the answer. Likewise if I am playing a Fighter with 7 Intelligence, I may as a player work out the solution but it makes no sense in game for the character to know.
If you can overcome the challenge with an attribute check, it's not a riddle.
What you are missing is that there are many players who enjoy _actually solving puzzles._
@@nickwilliams8302 If your players enjoy riddles then go for it. For me it breaks the fourth wall. I cannot justify my Lizardfolk who doesn't understand metaphors to suddenly, out of the blue have the answer to a clever word puzzle. It is out of character and breaks immersion.
Likewise I don't want to penalize the dumb player that plays a smart character. Give them the victory and their moment to shine rather than expecting the player to do something there character can, but the player cannot.
@@johnharrison2086
You've put your finger on the central issue: do the players enjoy it?
If yes, put them in.
If no, leave them out.
If some yes and some no, use them sparingly to give the puzzle fans their fun and the others can just deal with the fact that the game's not all about any one player.
As for the "breaking the fourth wall, I don't see it myself. If it's really a problem, the player who thinks their character wouldn't be able to solve the riddle can just pass a message to another character.
Egyptian? The riddle of the sphinx is a GREEK legend, involving either Ares or Hera (depending on which version you're going by), and Oedipus. The ancient greeks were indeed cognizant that they inherited the concept of the mythical creature called the 'sphinx' from what they referred to as "Aethiopia" (an ancient greek term which is in reference to the Nile delta region), but the legend of the riddle is from Greek mythology, not Egyptian. In fact there are no Egyptian myths that could even be argued to be the origin of this later greek myth.