Share the love: puzzle edition!

[arscott]

My Character speaks common, elven, draconic and orc. He does not speak english
My Character can play three dagger gambit, elven battlegems, and seventeen bones. He can't play chess. He can't even play checkers.

I like puzzles and riddles quite a bit. I'm good at them. But I don't like it when a DM or module author forgets about the world that the puzzle is in. If it doesn't make some kind of sense in the context of the game world, then It ruins the suspension of disbelief and destroys the sense of fun.

Alternately, If a puzzle doesn't make sense in the context of the real world, even if it does make sense in the context of the game world, it's unsolvable. If a puzzle requires me to know what a troll is, or that it can be damaged by fire or acid, that's cool. But if a puzzle requires me to know how many hp a troll has, or which energy resistances a Marilith Tanari has, I'm not going to get it.

The best puzzles to use in D&D are riddles that don't involve the pronunciation or spelling of a word, or abstract logic puzzles that don't require any real world OR in game knowledge.

For example: the chess game above, where the peices would attack if you stepped into a square where the peice could capture you isn't that bad, but I'd feel kind of dishonest getting through that because by elven rogue doesn't play chess.
If instead it was a game of elven battlegems, and you couldn't step in the triangles covered by your opponent's rubies or by either side's emeralds, then my rogue couldn't get through the puzzle because I just made the game up to illustrate a point. But if instead there were obelisks that indicated which squares were to be avoided by their orientation and markings, but without any added dimention of game, The puzzle wouldn't be any harder to solve, but there wouldn't be that element of dishonesty that the chess peices add.

Of course, that's assuming you're not in a world that speaks english, or has chess. If that's not the case, then the rules change somewhat. But never have a metagame solution to an in-game riddle, and never have a game-only solution that the players are incapable of discovering.

 

[XCorvis]

arscott, I disagree with you on one point - I think it's fine for a puzzle to require in-game knowledge, but only if it's something the PCs potentially have access to. If chess is obscure in your world, perhaps the maker of the puzzle needed to write himself a cheat sheet that indicated how pieces move. Or maybe the PCs can go back to town and speak with the old men at the bar, who used to be traders in far-off lands and learned all manner of strange games. Or if they're pressed for time, an Int check or bardic knowledge check to remember the rules of an obscure game.

But if chess doesn't exist and the characters have no way to get any clues about it, yes, that would be a poor puzzle choice.

 

[genshou]

The Book of Challenges has a "grid" trap similar to a chessboard. It's called "Warding of the Dead" and it's on page 53. In this one, it's a 7x7 grid, and each grid is covered by a glyph of warding. PCs must make Knowledge: Arcana checks to interpret each glyph. There is no way to traverse the grid without triggering the glyphs, but there is a path through the grid that only triggers glyphs with low level undead (skeletons and zombies). Of course, if someone tries to cross a glyph that lets loose a lich or vampire, well, good luck.

I like it because it can't really be bypassed. But a smart party can find a "easy" path and get by pretty easily.

There's also a chessboard puzzle in 1st edition module C2-Ghost Tower of Inverness.

I once ran a group through every encounter in the Book of Challenges in a single campaign. They hated Warding of the Dead.

 

[genshou]

I like puzzles and riddles quite a bit. I'm good at them. But I don't like it when a DM or module author forgets about the world that the puzzle is in. If it doesn't make some kind of sense in the context of the game world, then It ruins the suspension of disbelief and destroys the sense of fun.

Chess is a commonly played game in the Realms, and as the most well-known board game in our own world, I would assume that it would exist in most D&D games as well. The Arms & Equipment Guide lists a board game as a piece of purchasable equipment.

Now all I'm trying to figure out is how to adjucate skill at playing chess. So far I've been using Knowledge (War) simply because that's what Evendur in my Story Hour already has access to it, due to his tactician training.