Defeated by puzzle - campaign over: Here is the offending puzzle!

[Roman]

You and D+1 have blinded me with science. I voted impossible, because my hunch is that the GM didn't have a solution and the whole thing was a snipe hunt to buy time ... but I'm probably wrong. I'm probably unfairly projecting the tactics of a certain bad GM I know onto this guy.

By impossible, I obviously mean impossible within reasonable expectations. I assume the puzzle does have a solution.

 

[darkelfo]

I did ask for the solution after the campaign ended, but the DM was not forthcoming. He did, however, acquiesce to give me the puzzle to post on the net, so I am sure he will tell me if a solution from any of you is correct.

A miser to the end. Heck, a miser beyond the end.

 

[Torm]

I did ask for the solution after the campaign ended, but the DM was not forthcoming. He did, however, acquiesce to give me the puzzle to post on the net, so I am sure he will tell me if a solution from any of you is correct.

Well, that settles it then. I give up until you tell me you have a working solution in YOUR hands. I'm not going to accuse your DM of not actually having a solution at all, as some have done, but I will suggest that I've seen too many puzzles that were improperly administered somehow or were so removed from context as to be next to impossible.

Let us know.

 

[Abraxas]

I did ask for the solution after the campaign ended, but the DM was not forthcoming. He did, however, acquiesce to give me the puzzle to post on the net, so I am sure he will tell me if a solution from any of you is correct.

Did you try a simple substitution of the letters in the phrase "Fill in the proper symbols into the blanks" into the blanks?
in one of the following patterns
left to right or right to left from the top down
left to right or right to left from the bottom up
top to bottom or bottom to top from left to right
top to bottom or bottom to top from right to left

If not ask if any of those are the solution.

 

[Mark]

By impossible, I obviously mean impossible within reasonable expectations.

How is that obvious? This might be part of the problem here. I think you might have given us only partial information (for whatever reason) and for some reason think it's good enough. There's an accuracy that is inhernetly required between a puzzle, its presentation, and the solution that I am not sure you understand.

In any event, as I posted earlier, there's no real way to gage the difficulty level of the puzzle without knowing the answer, so the poll is a waste of time.

I assume the puzzle does have a solution.

I wouldn't and that's the flip side of the first part of my post. There are any number of reasons why, after the campaign has been forsaken, the DM would not be "forthcoming" (as you put it, for I don't know what reason). Most of the reasons that I can come up with do not suggest that the DM actually had a straightforward answer to the puzzle, whether he did from the start or not.


I won't be satisfied that there is an actual answer, nor one that could be gleaned from the presentation, until you post it here. Despite your posting that you actually want to know the answer to this puzzle yourself, you haven't convinced me that there is one.

 

[RithTheAwakener]

The answer is 42

but what is the question....

 

[Abraxas]

but what is the question....

"What is 6 x 9?" of course

 

[Torm]

"What is 6 x 9?" of course

Nonsense. No one makes jokes in base 13.

 

[Nyeshet]

I'm baffled. But the suggestions from Tuzenbach and Algolei seem to be on the right track. Personally I was thinking that perhaps the letters represented symbols, and you enter in the resulting pattern of symbols (the former sentence) to determine the answer.

Perhaps,

Triangle: A, K, L (?), M, N, T, Y
Crossed Circle: B, O, P, R, S (?)
<-> : E, F, H, I, L (?), S (?),

Hmm, that results in 10 (or 14) triangles, 9 (or 12) crossed circles, and 9 (or 12, or 13, or 16) <->. That doesn't seem to be an answer either . . . .

 

[ColonelHardisson]

I did ask for the solution after the campaign ended, but the DM was not forthcoming.

Maybe he plans on using it again...?