Puzzles and Traps

[NCSUCodeMonkey]

Mentioning Puzzles is like a summoning spell for me, apparently. First time I browse ENWorld this week and BOOM, here's this thread . Here's my spiel on puzzles:

Puzzles can be a wonderful addition to a game or a horrible, four hour fest of frustration. I've seen both cases and I've inflicted both cases on my players. I think the most important thing to realize about puzzles in a traditional DnD setting is that they're encounters to be overcome just like everything else. Character's skills, abilities, and spells should be useful in overcoming the encounter just as much as the player's skill. Also, I consider a puzzle anything that isn't a trap or a combat. I've had puzzles where PCs had to tell a story or build a machine (with k'nex!). Perform checks and Knowledge (Eng) checks can provide extra props or parts that make the task easier. In the worst case, you should always have an escape plan that allows the players to resolve the encounter based on dice alone. Puzzles are not fun if it takes 2 hours to finish them.

It's also important to understand that different people excel at solving different puzzles. If you're going to put one in your normal game, it's incredibly important to know your players. I had a physics major in one of my games who was great at literature and math, and I put in a puzzle just for him once. He solved it in five minutes (like I knew he would) and felt really cool about the whole thing. If everyone in your group hates math, don't do a math puzzle!

If you're putting together a game with puzzles for a group that you don't know, this power point presentation on puzzle design can be really insightful (http://www.scottkim.com/thinkinggames/GDC00/gdc2000.ppt). It explains the different types of puzzles and the personalities of the folks who tend to solve them well. When I design my Underoo Avengers game, I make a real effort to include a puzzle from each category. Also important for groups that you don't know: keep everything super simple. Test the puzzle on 3-4 people. I've found that it's good to plan on your players taking 2-3 times as long to solve the puzzle as your playtesters.

Oh, and as Maverick indicated: props can make everything better. Giving the players something physical to manipulate and discuss can go a long way towards making a puzzle fun. At the very least, it gives them something to keep them busy while they come to a solution rather than sitting still and wracking their brains over a four line rhyme.

Things that make good puzzles:

• Mazes - props make this easier
• Storytelling
• Acting/Improv
• Construction - build a machine to solve a problem
• Mini Games - pretty much any game that you can pick up in a game store that takes 5 minutes or so to play, e.g. http://www.thinkfun.com/tipover/ and http://www.khet.com/. Working these in can be tricky, but playing Zelda for about 10 minutes usually brings inspiration, e.g. Position these mirrors to reflect light just-so to open the door of an anchient temple.
• Riddles - but ONLY when the answers are common and broad (war, wind, money, etc.) or, and this is even better, the answer has something to do with the context of the puzzle. Nothing is more frustrating than an ancient evil wizard who guards his temple with a riddle whose answer is "trout" or some other such random drivel.

Here are some pics from my puzzle heavy Underoo Avengers game, to give you an idea of the kind of stuff that I use: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ncsucodemonkey/tags/rpg/

 

[Imagicka]

Greetings...

Well, I am a big fan of Riddles and Puzzles. Huge. If I'm playing, and there aren’t at least one or two puzzles in the entire dungeon... or a dungeon-crawl... then I'm disappointed. After all, there isn’t a lot to do in a dungeon other than explore, kill things, and hopefully… solve a few puzzles, and avoid/disarm a few traps. To me, puzzles and riddles and complex traps are when players really get to sit down and work as a team and puzzle something out...

Now granted, not a lot of people like puzzles or riddles, and if you have a group of players who don't like such things. Well then... don't bother using them. Simple as that. But the way I see it, those people who complain about puzzles/riddles being too mega-game aren't thinking too much about the enjoyment of their fellow players.

The things that always bothered me, and it seems other too... was the fact that in most dungeons, especially those old D&D modules, that the puzzles and riddles didn't fit. They were placed arbitrarily around the dungeon like most of those rooms… haphazardly, and randomly placed like a bunch of dwarves hopped up on LSD and speed. ”Hey! Give me some more of those mushrooms! You know what? I think we should have to hallway turn 90 degrees here, and then we’ll build another room! Hey, didn’t you say that your brother could get a chimera cheap? Why don’t we get one and put it in one of these rooms!? Hell, let’s populate the entire place with monsters! Whoever stumbles upon this place is going to have a blast!”

No rhyme or reason. That’s what bothered me the most while first playing RPGs. I’m sitting playing the game, wondering why anyone would want to build an underground structure the way it’s designed, and the GM saying….”Oh! It’s just random. Don’t worry about it!” Suspension of disbelief can only go so far. If I have to ignore factors like… the GM doesn’t know who built the place or why… why are there monsters here? Then that just leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. I’d rather spend the time looking for a nice map, or drawing up my own, than trying to explain to my players that randomly placed rooms isn’t just some cultural architectural fade by ancient races.

 

[RangerWickett]

Best puzzle I ever saw:

It's the old "one of us always lies, one of us always tells the truth, and you can ask us one question" puzzle, this time presented by giant talking portals with teeth. If normal logic ruled, you could just ask, "What portal would the other door say is the safe one?" and you're bound to get the wrong answer.

But why the hell would a wizard put that riddle in his dungeon and let you get through safely? When the PCs asked that question, they got the answer they expected, and proceeded to go through the door they thought was safe. It attacked them, gnawed on them, and they had to retreat. Then, figuring they screwed up the first time, they tried the other door. It too attacked them.

It was a great trap. It disguised a trap as a puzzle, which changed the gears in the PCs' minds so they assumed if they solved it they were safe.


Second best puzzle ever:

"You're walking down the dungeon hallway when, up ahead, you see water, twenty feet across, filling the hallway to a depth of maybe a half-foot. Roll for initiative."

The players assumed it was a monster or some sort of time dependent trap, and so they immediately went into tactical combat mode, staying on total defense while they waited for the water to attack them. Finally, after two minutes worth of combat rounds where the PCs made listen checks to notice invisible attackers and cast bull's strength on themselves to help them jump across the water, they decided to just bite the bullet and touch the water.

"Okay," the GM says. "It feels like water."

Way to play on player paranoia.

 

[delericho]

Best puzzle I ever saw:

It's the old "one of us always lies, one of us always tells the truth, and you can ask us one question" puzzle, this time presented by giant talking portals with teeth. If normal logic ruled, you could just ask, "What portal would the other door say is the safe one?" and you're bound to get the wrong answer.

But why the hell would a wizard put that riddle in his dungeon and let you get through safely? When the PCs asked that question, they got the answer they expected, and proceeded to go through the door they thought was safe. It attacked them, gnawed on them, and they had to retreat. Then, figuring they screwed up the first time, they tried the other door. It too attacked them.

It was a great trap. It disguised a trap as a puzzle, which changed the gears in the PCs' minds so they assumed if they solved it they were safe.

Yeah, I've seen (and been caught out by) that one, in one of the pre-gen Exalted adventures. Although in that case, the 'wrong' path was safe. That was fun... for a certain value of fun.

Second best puzzle ever:

"You're walking down the dungeon hallway when, up ahead, you see water, twenty feet across, filling the hallway to a depth of maybe a half-foot. Roll for initiative."

The players assumed it was a monster or some sort of time dependent trap, and so they immediately went into tactical combat mode, staying on total defense while they waited for the water to attack them. Finally, after two minutes worth of combat rounds where the PCs made listen checks to notice invisible attackers and cast bull's strength on themselves to help them jump across the water, they decided to just bite the bullet and touch the water.

"Okay," the GM says. "It feels like water."

Way to play on player paranoia.

On the other hand, I'm definately not a fan of the "roll for initiative" effect. Here, it was relatively benign, but many times I've seen two groups meet, the DM say "roll for initiative", and the PCs immediately switching to 'fight mode' without considering other options. As a result, I've taken to having my players roll for initiative at the start of the session, and then rerolling at the end of each encounter. That way, I have the numbers when I need them, but don't encourage that sort of mental shift.

Sorry for the tangent.

 

[Mishihari Lord]

I think whether they work or not depends mainly on your players. One of the best puzzles I've seen was in Sagiro's story hour where the players needed to figure out the password to get into a tower based on information they'd managed to gather nearby with capture thoughts or somesuch. I won't spoil it, but apparently they players took over an hour to figure it out, and they enjoyed it. Some people would have been gnawing on the carpet after 15 minutes. You've just got to know what your players enjoy.

Personally, I like puzzles, but they have to make sense in context, and there has to be something else to do if you can't or don't want to solve the puzzle. Frex, if if you can't solve the puzzle to get into the treasure vault, you should be able to look for alternate ways in, collapse the room underneath to break it open, or speak with dead with something long or recently dead to try to get the answer.

There have been other threads on this in the past, some of which I thought were quite good. If you're interested in this topic, they're worth searching for.

 

[Mishihari Lord]

To add to my previous post, because somehow I can't find the edit button - must be getting old, if you can't solve the puzzle there should be something else fun to do that is entirely different. Can't get into the treasure vault? Tough. Let's go kill those ogres and take their stuff.