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MonkeySage
2016-06-18, 05:29 PM
I'm planning a dungeon in my pathfinder game, which will have a mythic sphinx guarding one of the rooms.

She will challenge the players, and if they fail her challenge, then she'll kill them.

I need ideas for challenges, cause I'm terrible at coming up with riddles.

One idea I had was that she challenge them to a high stakes game of chess, but i worry this will single out one player and I'm not sure how i should go about it.

Malimar
2016-06-18, 06:32 PM
My favored sphinx "riddle" is the classic something along the lines of "If the next words any of you speak are true, I will tear you all apart with my claws and devour you. If your next words are false, I will instead activate the symbol of death hidden somewhere in this room to kill you all." All the party has to do is come up with a statement with no truth value ("you will activate the symbol of death" is the classic, but "this statement is false" or the like also works) and she lets them go.

Traab
2016-06-18, 09:00 PM
Let them challenge her. A sort of, "I am the guardian of this area and so awesome I offer interlopers a chance to survive. Come up with a challenge for yourselves to try against me and if I win, you all die." Obviously you will phrase it better, but thats the gist. Sort of like one of those old archaic duel rules. "You challenged me to a duel, therefore I get to choose the weapons." Or some such thing. That gives the party a chance to be clever and to challenge the sphinx to something they can beat her in. Riddles suck because not everyone is good at riddles and there is a fine balance between easy riddle that everyone knows the answer too "What has 4 legs in the morning, 2 at noon, 3 at the evening, and none at night?" and super hard stumper that they cant figure out and thus will die. "Why is a raven like a writing desk?"

SirBellias
2016-06-18, 09:22 PM
"I'm sooooo bored. Tell me a funny joke I haven't heard before, or I'll kill you all."

What? You never said it had to be difficult. And depending on how many adventurers get in there, it could be very hard indeed.

Traab
2016-06-18, 11:19 PM
"I'm sooooo bored. Tell me a funny joke I haven't heard before, or I'll kill you all."

What? You never said it had to be difficult. And depending on how many adventurers get in there, it could be very hard indeed.

A nun a priest and a rabbi all walk into a bar. The bartender looks at them and goes, "Are you alright? That looked painful." /rimshot

Yora
2016-06-19, 05:34 AM
The bartender looks at them and says "What, is this some kind of joke?"

Why is that sphinx there and what is the task she demands meaning to accomplish?

TheCountAlucard
2016-06-19, 06:25 AM
super hard stumper that they cant figure out and thus will die. "Why is a raven like a writing desk?"That's not actually a stumper; it has so many different viable answers that virtually anyone can answer it and not be wrong (even if it's not the answer the Sphinx was specifically thinking of).

"Poe wrote on both."

"Bills and tales are among their characteristics."

"Both have quills dipped in ink."

"Because it slopes with a flap."

"One has flapping fits and the other fitting flaps."

"Because a writing desk is a rest for pens and a raven is a pest for wrens."

"Because it can produce few notes, tho they are very flat; and it is nevar put with the wrong end in front!"

And so on.

Asmodean_
2016-06-19, 07:54 AM
Related: What vegetable is an insect afraid of? (http://image-descriptions.tumblr.com/post/130058367445/dthemod-yourdndstories-in-the-actual)

Logosloki
2016-06-19, 08:17 AM
Maybe the sphinx is bored and is looking for a good ol' fashion pun off.

As for a riddle, you can't beat a classic

"Alive without breath, as cold as death. Never thirsty, ever drinking. All in mail, never clinking".

MonkeySage
2016-06-19, 01:42 PM
The lower levels of this tomb contain the elven king's chambers, as well as an artifact the king wanted to protect. The king was morally dubious, but he felt that by protecting this object even in death, he'd be preventing a greater evil; the artifact is needed for a ritual to crack open the barrier to a dead magic demiplane. So he had a sphinx guard his chambers in the levels above... From here though, I'm kinda stumped.

Surpriser
2016-06-19, 04:13 PM
The thing with riddles is that they are usually ridiculously easy if you have already heard them and virtually impossible if you haven't.
Even if not, chances are high that at least one of the players (not the characters) gets completely stumped and, consequently, a PC eaten.
This is especially true if you play a version of "Guess what I am thinking" by requiring the players to come up with the one single solution you had in mind.

In my opinion, riddles have their places in an RPG - but NOT as the singular obstacle deciding between success or failure (and even death) of the task.
No matter which challenge you choose, ensure that the PCs have the possibility to say "No thanks" and find another way to succeed.
For your example, this could mean that the sphinx offers them the possibility to retreat (or simply giving them the means to flee) and placing one or, preferably, multiple alternative ways into the lower areas. These could be secret passages, environmental hazards that need to be overcome or simply the possibility to fight the sphinx or lure her away.

In universe thoughts: If it is well known that a sphinx lets people pass who can answer her riddles, why would anyone use such a thing as a guardian, especially in a setting containing divination magic? The classical answer is "as a test of worthiness" - which immediately implies that the elven king actually intended for someone to enter his tomb and find the artifact.
The sphinx's challenge could then be as simple as "get a being of ultimate good/an innocent/the current king/the powers that be to vouch for you" or similar things.

Traab
2016-06-19, 04:25 PM
The thing with riddles is that they are usually ridiculously easy if you have already heard them and virtually impossible if you haven't.
Even if not, chances are high that at least one of the players (not the characters) gets completely stumped and, consequently, a PC eaten.
This is especially true if you play a version of "Guess what I am thinking" by requiring the players to come up with the one single solution you had in mind.

In my opinion, riddles have their places in an RPG - but NOT as the singular obstacle deciding between success or failure (and even death) of the task.
No matter which challenge you choose, ensure that the PCs have the possibility to say "No thanks" and find another way to succeed.
For your example, this could mean that the sphinx offers them the possibility to retreat (or simply giving them the means to flee) and placing one or, preferably, multiple alternative ways into the lower areas. These could be secret passages, environmental hazards that need to be overcome or simply the possibility to fight the sphinx or lure her away.

In universe thoughts: If it is well known that a sphinx lets people pass who can answer her riddles, why would anyone use such a thing as a guardian, especially in a setting containing divination magic? The classical answer is "as a test of worthiness" - which immediately implies that the elven king actually intended for someone to enter his tomb and find the artifact.
The sphinx's challenge could then be as simple as "get a being of ultimate good/an innocent/the current king/the powers that be to vouch for you" or similar things.

I agree with this. It would be one thing if the sphinx was the shortcut to the macguffin room, but if you didnt want to risk it, you could take the longer route with more encounters, traps, and other difficulties to face along the way. Or to use the riddle as an entrance to an optional area like there is a treasure chest behind the sphinx, but you can only loot it if you answer the riddle, or are powerful enough to defeat it in a straight fight. But bottle necking the only way through with a riddle is something that can backfire really easily.

Lvl 2 Expert
2016-06-19, 04:39 PM
Maybe the sphinx never agreed to be there, but is trapped. Either by magic or by being put in there before the walls and the small doors where built. She is bored, hasn't had good food in years and most of all would want to be free. She kills anyone who comes in, after playing a little with her food, but the right service might just be worth more than free hors-d'oeuvres.

The king who put her there just figured: hey, it's so dangerous, that's got to stop at least 3 out of every 4 adventurers right?

SethoMarkus
2016-06-21, 02:19 PM
Riddles in games can be fun, but I think you need to be open to creative thinking on the Players part. Obviously you will never be able to plan for every contingency in every situation, but it helps to have a few backup plans in place. I'm thinking something along thr lines of:

1. Roleplay/Knowledge Based Challenge
This first step is the riddle. The sphinx challenges the PCs to answer a riddle or be attacked. Either the Players can answer the riddle themselves through roleplay, or the PCs can use in-game skills to try to find the answer. These have risks with failure, though. Such as using a Bardic Lore check and failing the DC to know the answer, the PC is given an incorrect answer to try (triggering the sphinx to attack). A successful Skill check would grant the correct answer and allow passage. If the sphinx does attack, it isn't an instant death sentence, it just initiates combat. Hich brings us to...

2. Combat Challenge
Whether through failing to answer the riddle or outright attacking the sphinx, combat should be an option. It can be a difficult combat, but make it well within the ability of the PCs to overcome. The sphinx should just be a guardian; failure to answer a riddle or killing the sphinx shouldn't lock the PCs out of the door being guarded. The riddle is just a means to bypass the combat. Maybe the sphinx deactivates additional traps if the riddle is answered correctly, but those traps remain in place if the sphinx is killed or otherwise bypassed. Which brings us to...

3. Stealth Based Challenge
Depending on the circumstances, thr PCs should have the option of sneaking past the guardian sphinx. This can be very difficult if the sphinx already knows they are there and/or if thr door is locked, but this option should be on the table. If the PCs do manage to sneak by the sphinx, it is entirely possible it was just the first obstacle (see traps above). A good Search check in rooms before the sphinx could also turn up an adventurer's journal with a list of riddle answers. Maybe the riddle the PCs are asked is on the list. Maybe they are correct answers, maybe they are incorrect (afterall, the journal is on this side of the sphinx). Who knows?

4. Even The Best Laid Plans...
Sometimes the PCs will come up with something entirely different. They makes friends with the sphinx, they dig around it, they find a way to teleport through, etc. Don't turn these down out of hand. Come up with obstacles before play begins (maybe the walls are warded against teleportation and incorporealness), but don't create new obstacles just to sabotage creative ideas from the PCs. It's fine to say that your game world doesn't work a certain way, but if they enact a plan that should work based on the world you have presented thus far, it should work for them now. Maybe limit their ability to abuse the same solution in the future, but give it to them this time as a win.

nedz
2016-06-21, 06:56 PM
I need ideas for challenges, cause I'm terrible at coming up with riddles.

Me too - which is why I don't run Sphinxes. Sorry.

Unless you have a PC who, unknowingly, killed his father ?

Bonus points if he was abandoned as an infant; being brought up by shepherds would be the jackpot here.