Tashas is Disappointing in a way i don't see people talking about

[Amechra]

Yeah. Translating word play between languages you're already fluent in is nearly impossible. Doing it between a con-lang (which yeah, 5+ 9's of DMs don't have) and a real language, in such a way as to preserve the clues and hints you need...yeah. Not gonna happen.

Yeah, conlanging is something you have to love for itself before you try to incorporate it into your world.

I'll admit that I don't actually have conlangs. I just steal bits and phrases of real languages, mutate them so they sound right, and call it good whenever I need an in-language piece. Dwarvish is based on mongolian, for instance. In keeping with tradition, high-elven is welsh and wood-elven is finnish.

Obligatory link to the best elven language.

[samcifer]

Yeah, conlanging is something you have to love for itself before you try to incorporate it into your world.



Obligatory link to the best elven language.

If you *can* do so successfully, I'd like to offer you my conlang-ulations…

(sorry, I had to say it. :) )

[Pex]

I never really understood why the thief couldn't just disarm the puzzle?

"TO PASS YOU MUST ARRANGE THESE GEMS IN THE RIGHT SEQUENCE. MANY HAVE TRIED, NONE HAVE... hey, what are doing? Put that panel cover back in place! You're cheating!"

Moving the panels into the correct place is an elaborate combination lock. Disabling won't open the Thing. In another perspective, solving the puzzle is the disabling.

[Willie the Duck]

I'll acknowledge the satisfaction that comes from system mastery and being able to know the most efficient way of achieving X or why you might actually want to do it this other way and so on. But I believe you can get that without screwing over "bad" players. At the very least you can do so while focusing on trying to make everything you add to the game worthwhile. Apologies if I misunderstood your sentiment, but it was what I read as the implication that trap options are desirable that frustrated me. In my view, piling books with bad options makes them worth less to the overall game.

There's nothing wrong with Powergaming. What's wrong is having fun dependent on other players being The Suck to prove superiority.

With regards to system mastery, powergaming, and what is acceptable/what is best -- what I really want from the system is one where the playgroup that pushes the 'win by careful analysis/internet lookup of the rules and combos' style of play would not morph the entire play experience into something unrecognizable to someone who sat down with their 8-12 y.o. kids and played a game of <said system>. D&D 3e, when optimized (towards the end of the publication run) had best builds which were some conglomeration of 4-5 classes/PrCs (none of which you took all the way through) where by level 20 you got nearly fighterlike # of attacks along with Level 9 spells in 1-2 spellcasting classes, and none of it really mattered because the optimal tactics were scry-and-die or living in hermetically sealed demiplanes while sending ice assassin clones of your enemies out to kill them. Some poor schmoe wandering in from other editions asking, 'so, are two handed swords or weapon-and-shied better in this version?' were just operating on a different level to the point of the two being effectively different games. 5e, regardless of how much powergaming you do, doesn't seem to rise to that level.

[micahaphone]

From anyone who has Tasha's, I'm curious if the puzzles are as bad as this example posted on reddit make it seem. Like, this puzzle seems like a good start that then veers into moon logic, is this one the worst of the bunch or does every puzzle listed have similar wild leaps in logic.

https://old.reddit.com/r/dndnext/com...les_in_tashas/

[EggKookoo]

From anyone who has Tasha's, I'm curious if the puzzles are as bad as this example posted on reddit make it seem. Like, this puzzle seems like a good start that then veers into moon logic, is this one the worst of the bunch or does every puzzle listed have similar wild leaps in logic.

https://old.reddit.com/r/dndnext/com...les_in_tashas/

If the players can't work it out, a DC 10 Investigation check reveals that "The character deduces that the number of creatures in a painting is important and uses that number to determine which letter of the creature’s name they should review." A DC 10 Perception check reveals that "When looking at the dedication, the words “count on” alert the character that they should count the creatures."

All of the puzzles have check-based hints that can help stuck players.

[micahaphone]

If the players can't work it out, a DC 10 Investigation check reveals that "The character deduces that the number of creatures in a painting is important and uses that number to determine which letter of the creature’s name they should review." A DC 10 Perception check reveals that "When looking at the dedication, the words “count on” alert the character that they should count the creatures."

All of the puzzles have check-based hints that can help stuck players.

I find the original puzzle way too convoluted, but then a DC 10 investigation check gives you 95% of the solution. The type of creature and the number of them is obviously important, I'm sure my players would get that, but the second step of "use that number on the creatures name to get a single letter from each painting" seems very specific and that there's nothing pointing to that other than this investigation check. The perception check doesn't tell you anything new, but the investigation check turns it into a word scramble.

[PhoenixPhyre]

If the players can't work it out, a DC 10 Investigation check reveals that "The character deduces that the number of creatures in a painting is important and uses that number to determine which letter of the creature’s name they should review." A DC 10 Perception check reveals that "When looking at the dedication, the words “count on” alert the character that they should count the creatures."

All of the puzzles have check-based hints that can help stuck players.

And this is exactly the sort of real-world-language-based puzzle that I find so obnoxious. Because it assumes that game-language (and all of them) has the same letters in the same order, that the game languages are just straight up letter-by-letter transcriptions of English. Ugh. Hate. Hate. Hate.

...

I may have a problem with over-thinking worldbuilding things.

[Chaosmancer]

Yeah, all of these puzzles are bonkers. Like this one:

You find a box, a lock on each of the four sides. Each lock has an image on it: A bat, a snake, a wolf and a spider.

Nearby are four keys with a different number of teeth: six, four, five and three.

Here is the starting clue

The spells on these locks are all the same
Though each possesses a different name
Count your answers to unlock the way
But use the wrong key to your dismay.


And, assuming you get the DC ten checks you know this

"Natural" knowledge of bats, snakes, spiders, and wolves in general wont' help here

The key's skull-shaped heads are all the same and likely have no bearing on the puzzle's solution.





But that is an easy one. How about this.

Here is the clue

Four Elementals trapped in stone,
Their elements ordered to lock their home.
Even patterns against all odd,
a tile misplaced awakens its god.
In proper order safely seal these four,
or best one of each to open the door

It is fairly easy to investigate and figure this part out by checking out nearby murals with a lot of deatails, but it is also one of your two extra clues

△ -> Fire
▽ -> Water
◮ -> Air
⧩ -> Earth

Here is the pattern you have

△ ⧩ ▽ ▽ △ ◮ ▽ △ △ ⧩

And you have these four tiles to place by the end to continue the pattern ( ◮ / △ / △ / ▽)


Easy right?
Oh right, the last clue. The words even and odd are important.

[EggKookoo]

And this is exactly the sort of real-world-language-based puzzle that I find so obnoxious. Because it assumes that game-language (and all of them) has the same letters in the same order, that the game languages are just straight up letter-by-letter transcriptions of English. Ugh. Hate. Hate. Hate.

My games exist in a kind of quantum-mechanics-like realm of uncertainty. The players don't have 100% clear fidelity into what's going on in the fiction. It's all "translated" in some way. So if a puzzle requires you to count the four gnolls in a painting and pick the corresponding letter in the Common word "gnoll" so you end up with L, it's not a given that the characters in the fiction literally saw "4" or "gnoll" or "L." They saw some equivalent.

But the problem of logic leaps can be handled with some proper context. If you prime the players by showing them the significance of word counts and letter order earlier in the dungeon or location, it's easier for them the make the connection when faced with the puzzle. It becomes a kind of theme that builds on itself. That's what I was talking about earlier when I say I struggle with contextualizing puzzles -- they need to feel integrated into the setting, rather than just "ok, you crawl through the dungeon and now you're faced with something out of a Nintendo game."

[micahaphone]

All these puzzles feel like they have a good base or root, like I could take this setup (portraits of monsters, 4 keys and 4 locks, elemental glyph patterns) and make a good puzzle myself, but the direction they went with feels like an old point and click adventure game. Having hints that just tell you what to do isn't a fix for weird puzzle design.

I actually quite like the alchemy symbol pattern one, and that it has the explicitly stated caveat of "if you just wanna fight all the elementals summoned by wrong answers, that'll also open the door". The fact that you need two separate patterns (hinted at by the evens and odds) really makes it hard but there's no logical gaps here.

And it doesn't run into the problem of other languages (real or fictional) having different spellings, as the puzzle room defines the symbols explicitly as a part of the setup. The murals (assumedly) defining what the symbols are makes it feel contextual to the world, and this would be easy to slot into some elemental or summoner themed dungeon

At first the "even and odd" part of the starting riddle made me think it was another "count the letters in a word" puzzle, with fire being even and the rest being odd, but the given information quickly shows that's not the case.

[Willie the Duck]

And this is exactly the sort of real-world-language-based puzzle that I find so obnoxious. Because it assumes that game-language (and all of them) has the same letters in the same order, that the game languages are just straight up letter-by-letter transcriptions of English. Ugh. Hate. Hate. Hate.
...
I may have a problem with over-thinking worldbuilding things.

My games exist in a kind of quantum-mechanics-like realm of uncertainty. The players don't have 100% clear fidelity into what's going on in the fiction. It's all "translated" in some way. So if a puzzle requires you to count the four gnolls in a painting and pick the corresponding letter in the Common word "gnoll" so you end up with L, it's not a given that the characters in the fiction literally saw "4" or "gnoll" or "L." They saw some equivalent.

But the problem of logic leaps can be handled with some proper context. If you prime the players by showing them the significance of word counts and letter order earlier in the dungeon or location, it's easier for them the make the connection when faced with the puzzle. It becomes a kind of theme that builds on itself. That's what I was talking about earlier when I say I struggle with contextualizing puzzles -- they need to feel integrated into the setting, rather than just "ok, you crawl through the dungeon and now you're faced with something out of a Nintendo game."

It's a common trope that obviously the characters aren't using the English language, but they are using something analogous which would have its own equivalent language puzzles.

The alternative is creating a fictive language and creating word games to play in that language (which probably would make your players roll their eyes at you so hard they'd do permanent damage), or not get to use any kind of word puzzles/puns/etc. (which would be too bad).

[PhoenixPhyre]

or not get to use any kind of word puzzles/puns/etc. (which would be too bad).

Not in my mind (the would be too bad part). I'm fine with translation convention, but not for puzzles. Because that ends up being something that challenges only the player side, OOC. And that would either be trivial for the character or impossible. And that makes me not like it.

I use plenty of puns. They're just not in-character puzzles.

[Chaosmancer]

All these puzzles feel like they have a good base or root, like I could take this setup (portraits of monsters, 4 keys and 4 locks, elemental glyph patterns) and make a good puzzle myself, but the direction they went with feels like an old point and click adventure game. Having hints that just tell you what to do isn't a fix for weird puzzle design.

I actually quite like the alchemy symbol pattern one, and that it has the explicitly stated caveat of "if you just wanna fight all the elementals summoned by wrong answers, that'll also open the door". The fact that you need two separate patterns (hinted at by the evens and odds) really makes it hard but there's no logical gaps here.

And it doesn't run into the problem of other languages (real or fictional) having different spellings, as the puzzle room defines the symbols explicitly as a part of the setup. The murals (assumedly) defining what the symbols are makes it feel contextual to the world, and this would be easy to slot into some elemental or summoner themed dungeon

At first the "even and odd" part of the starting riddle made me think it was another "count the letters in a word" puzzle, with fire being even and the rest being odd, but the given information quickly shows that's not the case.

Honestly, even seeing the solution didn't make much sense to me. I had to explicitly read the breakdown of the pattern to even have a hope of following it.

And no player at the table I have is going to figure it out.

[micahaphone]

Honestly, even seeing the solution didn't make much sense to me. I had to explicitly read the breakdown of the pattern to even have a hope of following it.

And no player at the table I have is going to figure it out.

Oh I agree, mixing two different patterns together makes this incredibly difficult, and those two patterns aren't simple either. But I feel like it's at least giving you all the tools you need to figure it out. Should a DM want to put in a difficult puzzle to potentially skip a series of tough fights, this would fit the bill.

And this one is definitely the easiest to retool into an easier puzzle - change the pattern, or reduce the number of tiles you need to put back in place, or both.

Also, thanks for bothering to grab the alchemy symbols and copying that all out. That must've taken a bit of time.

[MaxWilson]

It's a common trope that obviously the characters aren't using the English language, but they are using something analogous which would have its own equivalent language puzzles.

The alternative is creating a fictive language and creating word games to play in that language (which probably would make your players roll their eyes at you so hard they'd do permanent damage), or not get to use any kind of word puzzles/puns/etc. (which would be too bad).

The other alternative is simply declaring that through some fluke of fantasy linguistics, the language in which the riddle is given just happens to correspond precisely to English (or whatever other language is spoken by everyone at the game table).

[PhoenixPhyre]

The other alternative is simply declaring that through some fluke of fantasy linguistics, the language in which the riddle is given just happens to correspond precisely to English (or whatever other language is spoken by everyone at the game table).

Using the color conventions from your signature

This is me-as-worldbuilder speaking here, but . A DM doing that in anything but a complete "silly-romp" game (one where verisimilitude is already set aside from the beginning) would drop me permanently out of immersion and make me utterly lose all respect for that world. YMMV, but yeah. That's a hill I'm willing to die on. Translation conventions are fine (within reason), but forcing all riddles to be in <real-world language> (when they're actually all in different in-universe languages that don't even share a language family) is just...no. I can't make myself do it.

If there's a riddle in an ancient aelvar ruin, it's in an ancestor to gwerin (high-elven). If it's in a dwarven ruin, it's in dwarven. If it's in an old-human-empire ruin, it's in Old Imperial. None of which are even the translation-convention-mapping-partner for english--that's Common. And Common's only been around for a few hundred years in one small part of the world. And, most importantly, isn't English, even though it gets mapped onto that for aesthetics.

/rant

[Pex]

Using the color conventions from your signature

This is me-as-worldbuilder speaking here, but . A DM doing that in anything but a complete "silly-romp" game (one where verisimilitude is already set aside from the beginning) would drop me permanently out of immersion and make me utterly lose all respect for that world. YMMV, but yeah. That's a hill I'm willing to die on. Translation conventions are fine (within reason), but forcing all riddles to be in <real-world language> (when they're actually all in different in-universe languages that don't even share a language family) is just...no. I can't make myself do it.

If there's a riddle in an ancient aelvar ruin, it's in an ancestor to gwerin (high-elven). If it's in a dwarven ruin, it's in dwarven. If it's in an old-human-empire ruin, it's in Old Imperial. None of which are even the translation-convention-mapping-partner for english--that's Common. And Common's only been around for a few hundred years in one small part of the world. And, most importantly, isn't English, even though it gets mapped onto that for aesthetics.

/rant

Speak, friend, and enter.

Riddles are for player fun, so it needs to be in a language the players understand. If no PC knows the language then you need to translate first, but the puzzle itself if it uses letters/words the players need to know it. Otherwise it's symbols even it represents letters in some ancient language, but in that case the symbols represent a pattern which is a different type of puzzle if similar.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Speak, friend, and enter.

Riddles are for player fun, so it needs to be in a language the players understand. If no PC knows the language then you need to translate first, but the puzzle itself if it uses letters/words the players need to know it. Otherwise it's symbols even it represents letters in some ancient language, but in that case the symbols represent a pattern which is a different type of puzzle if similar.

I just don't use word puzzles. I've never found one that actually works both in-game and as a game element at the same time. Symbol/pattern ones are ok, but I prefer them to not be a major thing.

I said I've only used a few puzzles in 5+ years now:

1) the first was in my first campaign. It was a "turn the statues to clear the way" type--a room full of statues that emitted directional walls of force. You could rotate them, and you had to do so to get through the room. They were on a time limit though, so no brute forcing it. Pretty simple. Happened in the abandoned temple of a goddess of tricks though.

2) the second was a pure OOC symbol puzzle. Konami code, but in rebus form (pup pup crown crown heft wight heft wight banana apple). Used as a comedy break. This one didn't even intend to work as an in-game puzzle.

3) the third was an elemental symbol lock on a chest. Press the elements in the right order, with a (translated) hint. Dead simple, they guessed it on the first try.

4) the last was a devotional puzzle, mainly in-universe. They already had the answers given, they just had to realize that they were the answers. 12 statues, each missing an object. 12 objects. Put the right one on the right statue. For someone coming in the right way, this one would have been only trial and error (with escalating penalties). Because it was designed as a memory aid/devotional act for people who already knew the answers. Not a puzzle per se. But they came in the back way (by design), into the temple chamber with the murals that explained the significance of each figure (ancient emperors in an emperor-worshiping cult). So really, it wasn't supposed to be a puzzle for the characters at all. But it took them a while to realize that it was that simple.

I've had some in other games that I played in. They sucked. All of them. Things that in-universe, a smart character would just know instantly were instead "tests for the player". Sucky ones. My scholar dwarf, knowledge cleric specializing in history, couldn't decipher a riddle in dwarven runes. Why? Because they were actually just transliterations of english characters and the words made sense only in english. That's sucky. Etc.

But that's personal preference.

[micahaphone]

So unless your name is Tolkein, don't ever use anything written in-universe!

[MaxWilson]

Using the color conventions from your signature

This is me-as-worldbuilder speaking here, but . A DM doing that in anything but a complete "silly-romp" game (one where verisimilitude is already set aside from the beginning) would drop me permanently out of immersion and make me utterly lose all respect for that world. YMMV, but yeah. That's a hill I'm willing to die on. Translation conventions are fine (within reason), but forcing all riddles to be in <real-world language> (when they're actually all in different in-universe languages that don't even share a language family) is just...no. I can't make myself do it.

If there's a riddle in an ancient aelvar ruin, it's in an ancestor to gwerin (high-elven). If it's in a dwarven ruin, it's in dwarven. If it's in an old-human-empire ruin, it's in Old Imperial. None of which are even the translation-convention-mapping-partner for english--that's Common. And Common's only been around for a few hundred years in one small part of the world. And, most importantly, isn't English, even though it gets mapped onto that for aesthetics.

/rant

While I respect your purple, for the record I'm interested how that could break your sense of immersion when there's no way for you (at the time) to tell the difference between (1) "fluke of fantasy linguistics" and (2) "everyone on this planet is descended from English-speaking Earthlings". All you know is that somehow the puns and riddles in the game somehow make sense in English, and if you ask the DM he'll tell you that they're literally the same sounds/words. If it were me, the natural conclusion would be #2 (common origin), and only if that were somehow ruled out would it possibly start to affect my suspension of disbelief.

Maybe not even then. In an infinity of possible worlds, every possible coincidence will happen infinitely many times. Games can be expected to take place in worlds with coincidences which make things more convenient for both players and DM, e.g. very few D&D games take place in golden ages where everything is peaceful and safe and every investigative need is already being handled by large police organizations. The game world conveniently arranges itself to make PCs lives interesting but dangerous.

[PhoenixPhyre]

While I respect your purple, for the record I'm interested how that could break your sense of immersion when there's no way for you (at the time) to tell the difference between (1) "fluke of fantasy linguistics" and (2) "everyone on this planet is descended from English-speaking Earthlings". All you know is that somehow the puns and riddles in the game somehow make sense in English, and if you ask the DM he'll tell you that they're literally the same sounds/words. If it were me, the natural conclusion would be #2 (common origin), and only if that were somehow ruled out would it possibly start to affect my suspension of disbelief.

Maybe not even then. In an infinity of possible worlds, every possible coincidence will happen infinitely many times. Games can be expected to take place in worlds with coincidences which make things more convenient for both players and DM, e.g. very few D&D games take place in golden ages where everything is peaceful and safe and every investigative need is already being handled by large police organizations. The game world conveniently arranges itself to make PCs lives interesting but dangerous.

Because D&D and the real world are disjoint. Saying that they're related requires too much suspension of disbelief--it breaks both sets of laws of physics entirely. And even if they were descended from a common ancestor, languages change over millennia. So something being identical to modern english is, for me, a far bridge too far. And there are many languages even on earth--why are the elves and the humans (on two different continents, who have never met) all speaking english?

And yes, there are coincidences. We don't need to manufacture more of them. Especially, since I have yet to see a single good word puzzle even if I take off my worldbuilding hat. They just don't work well IMO. YMMV of course.

[micahaphone]

I do dislike languages being inherently racial and not location based (well pre-tasha's, or default assumption). but even Tolkein assumed that you were reading lotr as a translated work to begin with, and even he didn't feel the need to make the translations rough when reading it.

[Willie the Duck]

The other alternative is simply declaring that through some fluke of fantasy linguistics, the language in which the riddle is given just happens to correspond precisely to English (or whatever other language is spoken by everyone at the game table).

Good point. I had dismissed that option out of hand as not going to live up to PP's desires, but worth bringing up for everyone else.

This is me-as-worldbuilder speaking here, but . A DM doing that in anything but a complete "silly-romp" game (one where verisimilitude is already set aside from the beginning) would drop me permanently out of immersion and make me utterly lose all respect for that world. YMMV, but yeah. That's a hill I'm willing to die on. Translation conventions are fine (within reason), but forcing all riddles to be in <real-world language> (when they're actually all in different in-universe languages that don't even share a language family) is just...no. I can't make myself do it.
/rant

And that's certainly fine. Everyone has their own boundaries. For me, I can make it work by declaring the riddle in question to be an English-language analog to the puzzle the in-universe characters (who are using non-terrestrial languages) are seeing in their own language. Thus (again, for me) the verisimilitude is not broken because they aren't speaking English, solving an English-language puzzle, nor have a language with improbably English-similar words (or letters or whatever is needed to solve the puzzle), that's just what the players see to facilitate gameplay.

I just don't use word puzzles

There is always that option as well.

[samcifer]

Speak, friend, and enter.

"I'm not your friend, Guy"

[Chaosmancer]

Also, thanks for bothering to grab the alchemy symbols and copying that all out. That must've taken a bit of time.

I was trying to find the keyboard shortcuts and got lucky.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Using the color conventions from your signature

This is me-as-worldbuilder speaking here, but . A DM doing that in anything but a complete "silly-romp" game (one where verisimilitude is already set aside from the beginning) would drop me permanently out of immersion and make me utterly lose all respect for that world. YMMV, but yeah. That's a hill I'm willing to die on. Translation conventions are fine (within reason), but forcing all riddles to be in <real-world language> (when they're actually all in different in-universe languages that don't even share a language family) is just...no. I can't make myself do it.

If there's a riddle in an ancient aelvar ruin, it's in an ancestor to gwerin (high-elven). If it's in a dwarven ruin, it's in dwarven. If it's in an old-human-empire ruin, it's in Old Imperial. None of which are even the translation-convention-mapping-partner for english--that's Common. And Common's only been around for a few hundred years in one small part of the world. And, most importantly, isn't English, even though it gets mapped onto that for aesthetics.

/rant

I agree with you friend, but I am lazy and no where near skilled enough to create multiple fantasy languages. It is a sacrifice for ease of play that I simply can't get around.

I just don't use word puzzles. I've never found one that actually works both in-game and as a game element at the same time. Symbol/pattern ones are ok, but I prefer them to not be a major thing.

I said I've only used a few puzzles in 5+ years now:

1) the first was in my first campaign. It was a "turn the statues to clear the way" type--a room full of statues that emitted directional walls of force. You could rotate them, and you had to do so to get through the room. They were on a time limit though, so no brute forcing it. Pretty simple. Happened in the abandoned temple of a goddess of tricks though.

2) the second was a pure OOC symbol puzzle. Konami code, but in rebus form (pup pup crown crown heft wight heft wight banana apple). Used as a comedy break. This one didn't even intend to work as an in-game puzzle.

3) the third was an elemental symbol lock on a chest. Press the elements in the right order, with a (translated) hint. Dead simple, they guessed it on the first try.

4) the last was a devotional puzzle, mainly in-universe. They already had the answers given, they just had to realize that they were the answers. 12 statues, each missing an object. 12 objects. Put the right one on the right statue. For someone coming in the right way, this one would have been only trial and error (with escalating penalties). Because it was designed as a memory aid/devotional act for people who already knew the answers. Not a puzzle per se. But they came in the back way (by design), into the temple chamber with the murals that explained the significance of each figure (ancient emperors in an emperor-worshiping cult). So really, it wasn't supposed to be a puzzle for the characters at all. But it took them a while to realize that it was that simple.

I've had some in other games that I played in. They sucked. All of them. Things that in-universe, a smart character would just know instantly were instead "tests for the player". Sucky ones. My scholar dwarf, knowledge cleric specializing in history, couldn't decipher a riddle in dwarven runes. Why? Because they were actually just transliterations of english characters and the words made sense only in english. That's sucky. Etc.

But that's personal preference.

I agree that most puzzles I've been forced to play were terrible. Like, legitimately hard to stomach. I had a con game once were the GM brought us children's puzzles and dropped them on the table and we had to take the pieces and solve the actual, literal puzzle in real-life to proceed.


That being said, I love your examples from 1 and 4, especially 4 feels like an excellent thing to steal.

....

*yoink*

[PhoenixPhyre]

I agree with you friend, but I am lazy and no where near skilled enough to create multiple fantasy languages. It is a sacrifice for ease of play that I simply can't get around.

Yeah, neither am I. I solve my internal struggles by not using verbal puzzles at all. My response below explains why I don't think that's a loss.

I agree that most puzzles I've been forced to play were terrible. Like, legitimately hard to stomach. I had a con game once were the GM brought us children's puzzles and dropped them on the table and we had to take the pieces and solve the actual, literal puzzle in real-life to proceed.


That being said, I love your examples from 1 and 4, especially 4 feels like an excellent thing to steal.

....

*yoink*

Thanks! #1 would have worked better if I'd have planned it more carefully, but I was new and we were in a hurry (1 hour sessions...in 4e at that point. Ouch).

But yes. Part of my resistance to world-based workarounds is that I haven't found a single published verbal puzzle that was worth the table time to run, even ignoring those language-based issues. They're pretty uniformly crap. Obvious if you know the solution, agonizing if you don't. And entirely challenging the players, with only a fig leaf of in-universe justification.

And as far as Tolkien goes, there are a lot of things you can do in written fiction that you can't get away with well in a game environment. The "speak friend and enter" thing was there to show that the simple answers are usually best, that the "wise" often overthink things. Because Tolkien wanted to talk up the common man (vs the elites). And the hobbits were symbols of the common man and his wisdom. It's a running theme throughout the Lord of the Rings. So less a puzzle than a plot device. And frankly a weak one--changing the punctuation removes the ambiguity entirely. And that's an artifact of the english translation-convention. So Gandalf had to be holding the Idiot Ball there. Which is fine, because fiction. Not fine in a game setting.

Players should make decisions for their characters based on their character's knowledge and traits (or things they could plausibly know). Using OOC knowledge here goes against that. So if you're setting puzzles, you darn well better make it so that those super smart (or super focused) people can basically walk right through them. Because otherwise you're gluing the idiot ball into their hands and forcing purely OOC skill use. At least that's my opinion. And why I use puzzles so very rarely.

Edit: One useful (IMO) type of puzzle is the "reward for cleverness" type. You have a locked door (or some other barrier) with a riddle/puzzle with missing information (when you first encounter it). All the clues/answers are hidden in that dungeon--explore it and you'll eventually work out the answer. Or, if you're clever, you can guess/solve the riddle/puzzle up front, skipping portions of the dungeon. Basically the equivalent of "Guess the phrase" on Wheel of Fortune. This lets clever people "sequence break" without making solving the riddle OOC a necessity to progress. You can take the longer, but certain route or the quicker route.