I always come up with one answer. Just in case the party is having a brain fart and can’t figure anything out. It’s rarely an easy answer though.
But then I wait for them to come up with something plausible. Or sometimes brute force it, that’s fun too.
You can always have a grumpy looking wizard come through, tap his wrist, cask knock, and then shoot the party an annoyed look and huffs past them.
Why hello Mr. Elminster.
Whois?
I even come up with two or three, but as long as what they come up with works then it works.
There are always n+1 ways to solve my puzzles!
The problem is players are often idiots.
Like, they’ll just forget key facts.
“We think Bob did the murders!”
“You mean Bob, the accountant, who was with you when the first murder happened and has rock solid alibis for the second?”
“…yes”
“ok. How do you explain those two things?”
"… nevermind "
Or like, “we think he’s a shape shifter!”
“So remember in session 0 we established this is a modern day, no magic, realistic setting?”
“…no.”
“Ok, well, we did, and it’s in the setting document pinned in the channel. Shape shifters don’t fall under realistic, modern day, no magic, so they don’t exist in this game.”
“…oh.”
I was wondering for a quick minute there why you’d play in a physical channel before I remembered that not everyone is as privileged and lucky to play in person all the time.
My players once almost killed a cleaner because he had the same first name as the bad guy.
Reminds me of in DM of the Rings, when they thought they won after killing Saruman.
Something like that. They found out the villains first name, which wasn’t exactly uncommon. Asked a guard whether they new anyone by that name, and since they managed to be pretty charming, the guard was like, yeah sure, I know a dude with that first name. Wasn’t even related to the story in any way. Just some dude.
I probably would have had them mention a few people with that name, just to make sure they know you’re not abiding by the One-Steve Limit.
My DM stopped doing this because we kept trying blood sacrifice and necromancy
Name a puzzle that can’t be solved using blood magic
I will never admit to having done this regularly.
But now we know you did
No idea what you’re talking about.
As you get to the last room in the tomb you see a large inscription completely illegible except for the last eight words…
Get to 11 points as fast as possible.
All the information is on the task.
It has been many days but you finally walk into the next room.
Eventually an awkward man comes, and reads from notecard:
Silly little birds, all in their nests, wondering… What’s going to happen next?
I once made a home base for an elusive magic artist that is notorious for making really powerful magical artifacts with shitty side effects. Shield of Biting that bites the user, invisible invisibility cloak, Rhythm Heaven’s Monkey Watch, a dagger that berates the user on misses, one puzzle that I found online that stumped the party for hours. So I made it a base with annoying puzzles. I had solutions for four out of five of them, then decided, “Eh, they’ll come up with something eventually.” They did the other puzzles first though, so they just came up with a solution that fits the theme. It worked.
That’s why I’d they don’t get it after a few minutes you just let them roll for it.
