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DragonBaneDM
2017-04-07, 08:12 AM
Hey guys!

I picked up a bunch of blank dice on a whim the other day because I'm certain that I can build a puzzle of some kind with them.

I've got a couple ideas for it. Here's the main one:

There's this dungeon coming up that's has a powerful, malevolent fey within, and to kill her and end her influence, I was thinking they might have to solve a cypher left behind a mage who put up walls to prevent easy access to this evil overlord. Only beings of intellect would be able to enter, so this is the test he left behind.

I'd draw 26 different runes on the dice. When two dice are rolled together, two symbols light up that correlate to two different letters in Common, which also light up on a page of text the wizard wrote. Players will have to put their heads together, and eventually figure out the cypher that way, and then use their key to solve a riddle or question of some kind that the wizard left behind.

It's clumsy, and I could see my players getting bored rolling that many dice, but cyphers and logic puzzles have never been my strong point as a DM. I know that I want to avoid anything stupidly meta, like having each character have to be holding their Hit Dice or anything like that.

Any pointers? What would you do?

Firest Kathon
2017-04-07, 09:25 AM
Is this a puzzle for the players or for the characters? And if the former, are you sure that your players will enjoy it? I personally like these puzzles, but I know other players do not. Also, what happens when you have a smart player playing a stupit character, or a not-so-smart player playing a smart character who should be able to solve this puzzle in-game, but the player does not?

icefractal
2017-04-07, 02:06 PM
Unless there's some limit, they could simply roll the dice until all letters were revealed, couldn't they? Maybe something dangerous happens every X times the dice are rolled, like some kind of guardian monster being summoned?