I've run several games with puzzle-like sections; the first major dungeon in the new campaign we just started will feature a few. I find the key is to come up with puzzles where several things can be tried and the penalty for trying the wrong thing is not too severe.
I'm reminded of True Dungeon, where attempting a wrong solution to the puzzle causes characters to take damage, and where failing to solve the puzzle altogether in the time allotted simply deals damage to the whole party but still allows them to progress to the next chamber.
One standing rule I have on puzzles:
Players should feel free to use their full intellect on puzzles, character abilities notwithstanding. If this breaks verisimilitude, assume that the better ideas among the players are coming from the smarter characters.
In other words, I don't penalize a puzzle-savvy player just because they chose to play Gorkus McSmashington in my compaign.
|
Up to party taste, but my perspective is the puzzles need to be very well-written. Done right, your party will ask for more. I tend to avoid riddles however, as there's little teamwork in those.
I highly endorse, and recently ran, one of Dungeon Magazine's Challenge of Champions (set of 10 scenario "puzzles" in a competition against 15 other teams) and the group loved it even though they didn't win the entire Challenge. I can see them coming back next year to compete.
These puzzles were well written, though, and immersed heavily in fantasy magic and items so that you didn't think it was a math or logic puzzle (kinda like putting marshmallows in cereal). Teamwork was huge.
Although there was a suggested solution, there was no "right" solution, and that was part of the fun, to figure out some unique way around things (and they did). Only once did folks get frustrated by the puzzles, and I then allowed INT checks for "hints".
The rest had such things as figuring out how to get past a marilith statue that would animate if one stepped on her island with only the chains and ropes provided as equipment or even escaping a room by turning one of your party members to stone.
Anyhow, in-game half the city turned out to watch the competition, and besides making friends with some other adventuring parties, the group got noticed by others with some quests that needed questing. Really worked out well.
Players should feel free to use their full intellect on puzzles, character abilities notwithstanding. If this breaks verisimilitude, assume that the better ideas among the players are coming from the smarter characters.
I agree with that. In the game I mentioned earlier, most of the time the players would discuss the puzzles OOC and then roleplay the result, meaning that the selfish fighter acted like he couldn´t care less about the writings on the wall, while the bard/sorcerer was all intrigued about the story behind it.
I prefer to allow the PC to do whatever he is mentally capable of, rather than substituting the player's mental abilities. This means that smart, wise or well-spoken players either need to roleplay their PC's deficiencies, or I play out the scenes as though they do. The opposite is true for PCs with higher mental ability than their players. This includes any puzzle-type elements. But I really don't include puzzles/riddles in my games, so kind of a moot point.
I have always felt that puzzles and riddles can be a fun diversion or substitute from the mainstay of combat in a typical D&D game. In my personal experience, a lot of my players aren't all that interested in combat and would prefer "thinking challenges" so I am always trying to figure out the best way to include them.
A lot of the previous posters have listed examples of the "wrong" way to use puzzles - railroading and logjams can really turn a group off from them.. and I don't think many people use the classic "riddle contest" ala The Hobbit any more.
One trick that I use to help keep puzzles about the character's intelligence rather than the player's is to give a head start to the player of the smart character.
For example, if it is a 6 step logic problem, I'll give them the first and second step right away. Or, perhaps I'll give them a copy or partial copy of the puzzle in advance (provided it can be done without too many spoilers).
In one epic campaign I led, the wizard had an Int score of 35. So sometimes I would give her player copies of the puzzles whole games in advance.
I put in puzzles on a regular basis. But, the puzzles are usually either optional, or there's a way to bang your way through. You might take a lot of damage, but you can do it without doing the puzzle.
Recently I gave the group a box of 25 tiles, and a symbol in the shape of a cross, just right for 5 of the tiles.
They worked on the tiles about 30 minutes every hour or two throughout the game, and eventually found a way for all 25 tiles to go together, each 5 that matched snicked and made one bigger tile. Then those five tiles snicked and formed an artifact.
They really liked the artifact, and had some fun working out the combinations.
Personally I love riddles and enjoy when they come up in game.
I remember years back my DM had a pyramid with four sphinxes, one of each type, one on each side. They each posed the same challenge: Answer their riddle, or stump them with a riddle then give them the answer so they could enrich their store of riddles. I went for "Stump the Sphinx" four times and stumped the DM.
One of the other players complained that we should just do it on die rolls because a sphinx should be better than our DM (I was playing the illusionist with the 19 INT so there was no trouble with me posing the hard riddles) and my response was, "If we're just going to go with what the die rolls say, my next riddle is going to be 'Why did the chicken cross the road?' because there's bragging rights if I manage to stump the sphinx with that."
Another game, there was the encounter with a sphinx who asked an embarrassingly easy riddle then attacked anyway after it was answered. She was then captured and I had to explain to the party that we had found the greatest treasure imaginable: a sphinx that asks embarrassingly easy riddles. Some jaded noble would pay fortune to have her for his menagerie because no one else would have one.
Riddles are also the reason why I don't allow "Use Magic Device" to bypass every encryption sequence. It's a severe letdown to just have Fonzie kicking the arcane artifact until it works, at least if it's something that was deliberately encrypted, as opposed to something that just has an easy albeit forgotten password.
My GM has catered the puzzles to the players, and not to the characters. This is because we are the ones playing, and the characters are not. We also made the thematic decision that not a single character score would fall below 11, allowing us to use our own knowledge for everyday situations, and to be suitably Heroic. We've gotten tired of Big Dumb Fighters. They should at least be *average*.
So....!
Our first puzzle was an engineering puzzle. Fitting, because we all attend university for various things (mostly engineering). It was the classic 'build a bridge from only one side'. Tough, but not impossible.
We hacked at it for a bit, kept watching wooden structures fall into the gap, and then I (or rather, my character Cailte) got fed up. He is a very strong barbarian-bard with STR 20, but also WIS 12 and INT 11.
Sighing, he stood up, roped the two halflings together along some basic building supplies, and threw them overhand, across the ravine. They landed on the far side, taking 1d6 damage, and then had a screaming match with Cailte, who went and had a beer. I had one as well.
We built our bridge very easily after that.
Our second puzzle, a few weeks later, was a colour-creation puzzle using base pigments. It was mostly trial and error, but the addition of both translucent and matte solvents to the paint made it a little more interesting. Our Illustration and Design major helped with that one.
We've also had to do survival challenges, where players/characters with higher survival scores get a little print-sheet of wilderness survival instruction, and have to help everyone else.
It's been fun!
I once.. had a bard trap. I.E. A trap, made by a bard.
The trap, or puzzle as it were. Was five hallways. With four walls between them. People walk down the hallways. They get teleported back to the beginning of the hallway.
You had to walk through the forth wall, to get through the puzzle.
Entire party was stumped until someone just said.
"I walk through the fourth wall."
I stared at him in amazement, and clapped.
If anyone has had experience with puzzles and riddles working well in their games, awesome... but in my experience they're a bad idea. What do you all think?
I hate puzzles and riddles. They were my least favorite part of 1e. Whenever I open a door and see a big chess set, I turn to the GM and say "Hey man f*ck you."
An "engineering puzzle" doesn't count under this... Just magical sudoko BS.
Players should feel free to use their full intellect on puzzles, character abilities notwithstanding. If this breaks verisimilitude, assume that the better ideas among the players are coming from the smarter characters.I agree with that. In the game I mentioned earlier, most of the time the players would discuss the puzzles OOC and then roleplay the result, meaning that the selfish fighter acted like he couldn´t care less about the writings on the wall, while the bard/sorcerer was all intrigued about the story behind it.
I'm back and forth on it.
If Mcsmashington specifically dumped his character's intelligence to gain more points for something else relying on the player's ability to solve the puzzle I don't like it. Much like I don't like the eloquent guy who dumps his character's CHA knowing the GM won't make him roll the dice for diplomacy because the player gives a great speech.
HOWEVER:
I also don't want to simply reduce it to dice rolling, as that can remove some (much) of the enjoyment from the game. So generally if the character hasn't completely dumped his mental stats I'm good with him giving out the solution -- after all everyone can have a brilliant idea every now and then. However if it's the same guy each time and his character is laboring under an Int of 5 and Wis of 7 I'm going to probably call him out on it out of game.
Not doing so is rewarding his gaming of the system and punishes the other players for not dumping points in the same fashion knowing that their personal skills will make up for their character's lack of ability.
As I mentioned in the other thread, I find it strange - and funny - that we're perfectly fine with the stereotypically out of shape D&D player being able to roleplay out his fantasy of being a big beefcake jock type...but if he wants to be an intelligent character, he has to be able to "prove" he's intelligent in real life, and if he wants to be social or charismatic, he's more or less mocked or made fun of.
I mean, come on guys. Stop making these jokes about nerds for me.
DM: Ahead of you there is a pile of bones rising out of the ankle-deep watery muck. Sitting on this dry island of bones is an old and tattered looking creature with the body of a lion, the torso and head of a woman, and the wings of an eagle. She looks at you and says, "To pass me, you must answer my riddle:
"Round she is, yet flat as a board. Altar of the Lupine Lords. Jewel on black velvet, pearl in the sea. Unchanged but e'erchanging, eternally. What am I?"
Player: My wizard with a 24 INT rolls an Intelligence check. I got a 21.
DM: That's high enough to know the answer.
Player: Good. I tell the creature the answer.
DM: The sphinx bows her head and says "You've solved the riddle of the sphinx. You may pass".
Yeah, that's a whole lot of fun. Sign me up for that.
Let's look at the other side.
DM: Ahead of you there is a pile of bones rising out of the ankle-deep watery muck. Sitting on this dry island of bones is an old and tattered looking creature with the body of a lion, the torso and head of a woman, and the wings of an eagle. She looks at you and says, "To pass me, you must answer my riddle:
"Round she is, yet flat as a board. Altar of the Lupine Lords. Jewel on black velvet, pearl in the sea. Unchanged but e'erchanging, eternally. What am I?"
Player 1: God, I don't know
Player 2: Beats me
Player 3: Christ another one of these? We've yet to solve one.
Player 4: I'm going to go play something else, let me know when the adventure actually goes on and the DM stops making stupid riddles we can't solve.
This is one of those tricky places where the wedge Challenge the Player vs. Challenge the Character gets driven in. An antidote (not an answer) to this wedge is in the Monte Cook article in the newest Kobold Quarterly.
Player 1: God, I don't know
Player 2: Beats me
Player 3: Christ another one of these? We've yet to solve one.
Player 4: I'm going to go play something else, let me know when the adventure actually goes on and the DM stops making stupid riddles...
Player 5: My character turns away from the sphinx and drops trou.
DM: Well, yeah, "moon" is the answer, but...um...
What you say makes absolute perfect sense, but I hate it.
I don't know why, but rolling for the answer to "alive without breath....as cold as death....yaddayadda..." just seems so anteclimactic.
Now I'll go hunt a male lion with a spear and a shield to level my karma.
You better be strong man, because in order to do that you're going to have to beat me up in real life.
Wait, why are you getting your dice out?
That's so anticlimactic.
Riddles sre like secret doors. I use them sparingly, and there are always other ways around them. Like, for instance, my players characters can pick a DC 30 lock to open a door or the players themselves can solve the riddle written on its face to immediately open it.
I'm lucky, most people cannot solve even the easiest riddles, but one of my players is a natural at it and it gives him a chance to really shine. Everybody else is amazed when he solves them, and "amazed" is just another word for "having fun".
I say try a few riddles here and there, but if it looks like your players are opting to skip them then just quit using them altogether.
Another cool way to use puzzles is to deeply incorporate them into an adventure. For instance you could set up a situation where a PC needs to transport a rust monster, a golden statue, and a hungry python across a subterranian river when they only have one folding boat.
They could solve this in many ways, but some are more memorable than others.
Puzzles tend to not work that well, I will agree, though one of the best sessions was with a puzzle room.
The party monk was scouting ahead and went into the room alone and set off the trap. She would step on a square and a number would appear, and step on another and another number would appear, then step on one and a fireball would go off. The funniest thing was, both the character and the player were exactly the right thing for the room. The monk had amazing reflexes and suffer almost no damage, and the player ...
When it comes to riddles I always remeber this old proverb:
"Your friends are not as clever as you think they are."
Let's look at the other side.
DM: Ahead of you there is a pile of bones rising out of the ankle-deep watery muck. Sitting on this dry island of bones is an old and tattered looking creature with the body of a lion, the torso and head of a woman, and the wings of an eagle. She looks at you and says, "To pass me, you must answer my riddle:
"Round she is, yet flat as a board. Altar of the Lupine Lords. Jewel on black velvet, pearl in the sea. Unchanged but e'erchanging, eternally. What am I?"
Player 1: God, I don't know
Player 2: Beats me
Player 3: Christ another one of these? We've yet to solve one.
Player 4: I'm going to go play something else, let me know when the adventure actually goes on and the DM stops making stupid riddles...
DM: (considers beating his head against the table or berating the players for being obtuse, but thinks better of it, since these players will also likely complain about him using words like "berate" and "obtuse" in front of them too) Okay, you can make a Knowledge checks to see if you recognize any clues from the riddle. Knowledge History DC 25 will give you the riddle itself because it's historically important but obscure. Ditto with Bardic Knowledge or Knowledge Literature.
Player 3: We don't have any bards or historians in the party. I'm playing a wizard, so what about Knowledge Arcana?
Player 2: Or Knowledge Religion for my cleric? The lupine lords must be something religious if they have an altar?
Player 1: Or Knowledge Nature? I've got a druid here.
Player 4: Knowledge Nobility and Royalty? That's my paladin's only knowledge.
DM: Okay, roll those four and tell me what you got.
Player 1: I got a 23 on knowledge nature.
DM: You know that "the lupine lords" is a polite way to refer to werewolves.
Player 2: I got a 17. That give me anything? What sort of altar do werewolves have?
DM: Werewolves have all sorts of altars, since they can be of be of various faiths, but unsurprisingly there are some werewolf cults of the goddess Belladonna.
Player 2: That's the one with the portfolio of Beauty, the Moon, Poison, and Prophecy, right?
DM: Yes.
Player 3: I got a 27 on knowledge arcana. What does that give me?
DM: The business about "jewel on black velvet" rings a bell. You know that the oracles of Belladonna practice margaritomancy.
Player 3: Divination by margaritas? Sign me up for that cult!
Player 4: (begins singing "Wasting away in Margaritaville" tunelessly until DM shushes him.)
All: (laughter)
DM: Okay, no, seriously, nothing that fun. Margaritomancy is "divination by pearls." The oracles cast a handful of pearls onto a black velvet cloth and interpret the patterns.
Player 3: Why pearls?
DM: Because they roll well, and because pearls are the jewel symbolic of the moon, as you also know from your Knowledge Arcana check.
Player 4: Does a 14 on Knowledge Nobility and Royalty give me anything?
DM: Well, the only thing "lupine lords" means to you is the fact that Baron Rulfgar is rumored to have lycanthropy in his family, though it may just be because his family arms are a howling wolf sinister azure on a plate argent.
Player 4: So you mean a blue wolf pointing left on a round white shield?
DM: Yes.
Player 1: And a round white shield also looks a lot like the moon, doesn't it?
DM: That it does.
Player 4: Well, I'm the party face. Here goes... "Prithee, good sphinx. The answer to your riddle can be none other than the moon Herself which doth shine on high."
DM: The sphinx roars in torment. "Accursed be thou, adventurer! Thou hast solved my riddle!" She then flies up and around, screaming in anguish, until going into a power dive straight into the ground, snapping her old and frail neck.
Player 2: She committed suicide because we answered her riddle? That's weak.
DM: It's what sphinxes do. Happened with the first sphinx with Oedipus.
Player 1: Who's Oedipus?
Player 2: Ask your mom.
Player 4: Yeah, okay, literary allusions are fun and all, but we were kind of wanting a fight here.
DM: Don't worry. Everyone roll initiative.
Player 1: Versus a dead sphinx?
DM: No, versus a live one. (checks notes) Roaring with grief, a huge androsphinx bounds forward, much younger and more healthy than the frail old gynosphynx. You don't know whether he was the old cougar's son or paramour or in some truly twisted Oedipal bit of irony, both, since right now the only riddle he seems to be asking is "How many bites does it take to get to the center of four adventurers?"
|
How about giving hints based on how well characters roll on a Int or Wis check? That way, characters mental abilities are taken into account, but the riddle isn't reduced to simply success/failure based on a dice roll.
Regarding a "Riddle Contest" a la The Hobbitt...it would be horribly unfair to characters. The GM knows that such a riddle contest is coming, and therefore has almost certainly prepared at least a few riddles. Players, on the other hand, suddenly find themselves in a situation where they have to try to think of a bunch of riddles. Akin to the situation in The Hobbit, yes, but very unfair.
|
|
How about giving hints based on how well characters roll on a Int or Wis check? That way, characters mental abilities are taken into account, but the riddle isn't reduced to simply success/failure based on a dice roll.
Regarding a "Riddle Contest" a la The Hobbitt...it would be horribly unfair to characters. The GM knows that such a riddle contest is coming, and therefore has almost certainly prepared at least a few riddles. Players, on the other hand, suddenly find themselves in a situation where they have to try to think of a bunch of riddles. Akin to the situation in The Hobbit, yes, but very unfair.
There's one GM and 4+ players usually. So I'd call that a wash, plus the GM's riddler NPC need not be smarter than a PC.
|
|
There's one GM and 4+ players usually. So I'd call that a wash, plus the GM's riddler NPC need not be smarter than a PC.
Just a question. With absolutely no preparation, how many decent riddles can you come up with off the top of your head? Multiply that by four. Now X out a few, because some of the players invariably would come up with the same riddles.
Compare that number to even a minimal bit of research that a decent GM would do if he planned to impliment the "riddle contest" concept.
I doubt the PC number will be much higher, if it's even higher at all.
Going by what the books states as puzzles is that it's something exterior to the game or a puzzle of words (example: find the corresponding word in a mass of bla bla). So I'm not entirely sure if that's what people think of when they talk about 'puzzles' in this thread.
Instead of that I like to take my examples from videogames and try to make puzzles that are more a result of the environment than scribblings on walls (not to say that those puzzles do not have aplace in my games, I just use them rarely)
In a dungeon a good few months ago my players were running around a powerful magicians lair, and the entire place is built to screw with your mind. The very first room is a square little room with four statues an a teeny-tiny hole in the middle. Thing is as soon as you enter the room a magic trap is triggered that if you fail your save shrinks you, the floor becomes concave and water flushes the characters down into a sewer like area that takes them back to the city square.
The other rooms were more mind-trippy with impossible stairs and stuff. They had to walk through corridors a given number of times to make doors appear (but only for those who did it, which was kind of funny "what're y'all looking at?") or a circular corridor with four doors which all lead back into the same corridor. There they had to find four letters (all from different languages) which spelled 'TRUE' and follow the letters through the doors. The whole place was weird like that, including my favourite room, the Chessboard room! =D
Currently, my players are in an underground fortification where they have to lower a platform to get to the other side. Fairly normal spatial problem solving. Don't wanna say any more because I know they're lurking in the forums *shifts eyes left to right*
Best of all is if you can incorporate spatial problem solving with combat, which is difficult because the normal mantra of the adventurer is "kill the monster first, then fix the thingy". but there are ways around that too. =P
But the GM should be skewing the riddle contest so that the PCs win, because it's a GMs job to lose.
I don't really agree. Because if all the DM is there for is to lose. Then why should the characters try to win? The DM is there to provide a challenging, fun and fair experience. However, if the group is not all that good at riddles or puzzle solving that should either be avoided or not too difficult.
Skills such as perception and knowledge throws (or whatever fits) should be allowed I believe, because sometimes the players will just get stuck, even if they are normally awesome puzzle solvers. But I don't think that a skill throw should completely decide the outcome of a puzzle encounter. Instead I'd say that a skill throw will give the player a partial or substantial clue or hint, depending on the outcome of the throw of course (maybe even a completely wrong borderline dangerous hint if they roll a 1). Then they can solve figure out the puzzle themselves, but still use skills if they get stuck.
The gm is not there to lose, he or she is there to ensure everyone has a good time.
There's a great podcast on this exact topic (and how to avoid what befell the OP's group) at .
... and sometimes the tone is enhanced by making sure that 47 is the answer.You mispelled 42.
Douglas Adams vs. Star Trek - Fight!
...
Player 1: God, I don't know
Player 2: Beats me
Player 3: Christ another one of these? We've yet to solve one.
Player 4: I'm going to go play something else, let me know when the adventure actually goes on and the DM stops making stupid riddles...
I do know players like this. I also know players who would be overjoyed at more riddles in a game. It all depends on your group. As a DM, its your job to know what your players want and will enjoy. If your group is not having fun with the first couple riddles, you need to change it up, even if that ruins your plans for the adventure. And Kevin Murphy's response is also a great way to handle riddles in a group that is not good with them.
Riddles are also the reason why I don't allow "Use Magic Device" to bypass every encryption sequence. It's a severe letdown to just have Fonzie kicking the arcane artifact until it works, at least if it's something that was deliberately encrypted, as opposed to something that just has an easy albeit forgotten password.
Bad things usually happen if you fail UMD by too much, which is why you have to roll.
|
What you say makes absolute perfect sense, but I hate it.
I don't know why, but rolling for the answer to "alive without breath....as cold as death....yaddayadda..." just seems so anteclimactic.
Now I'll go hunt a male lion with a spear and a shield to level my karma.You better be strong man, because in order to do that you're going to have to beat me up in real life.
Wait, why are you getting your dice out?
That's so anticlimactic.
I love riddles!!!
HEEHEEHEE!!!
HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
HOO HOO HOO!!!
|
The 4e campaign I play in has had several puzzles/riddles in the past, every one of which we players thoroughly enjoyed.
This is, first and foremost, because the GM wasn't trying to show off or anything. If failure to solve a puzzle leads to the GM ridiculing the players, there's a lot more wrong with your group dynamic or your GM than just the fact he/she used a puzzle.
Second, a full stop in an adventure, no matter the reason, is always the GMs fault. Keeping the game going is your main responsibility as a GM. So how do you do this with a puzzle? Several ways:
a) Clues. Make sure that the players can find enough clues to solve the puzzle.
b) Cheat. Make the puzzle easier or include clues you didn't originally intend to bring in when you see they simply don't have the right idea.
c) Let 'em roll. We roll for everything else, so let them make die rolls, either for additional hints/clues or to solve it outright. Keep the game going!
Jared A. Sorensen had a few great things to say to that in his wonderfully whacky octaNe roleplaying game: As in improv-theater, a "No" is usually bad. Try to go for a "No, but..." or a "No, and..." instead. He specifially lists the "Puzzle Room Problem" and offers two example solutions for the GM whose group is stuck in the room and can't get out:
First, why not have a tough monster smash through the door they failed to open? They could have avoided that dangerous encounter and perhaps earned extra xp/rewards had they solved the puzzle, but if they don't, the action doesn't stop!
Second, why not have there be a consequence for failure? Get the puzzle right and the door to the safe route opens. Get it wrong and a trapdoor opens, sending the players to a more dangerous part of the dungeon!
octaNe is loads of fun and gave me a new perspective on RPGs and GMing. Recommended read!
Also, the GameMastery Guide has some more information on Puzzles and other game elements, too, by the way.
Mixing your game up with puzzles and other non-combat/non-skillcheck encounters and minigames can get a lot of fresh air into your game. Just don't let it stop the action!
Two thoughts about the sphinx issue.
1) If you just did a roll and said, "Your character answer correctly, and the group moves on." I can only imagine that at least one of the players is going to ask, "So what was the answer." To which the DM can respond, "Ask your character, they know the answer." And the players are still going to work on it, even if just unconsciously because people natural want to know the "answers".
2) If the sphinx is there just as a barrier, I can image some groups are going to respond like, "Here is my answer, FIREBALL!" If the sphinx is just going to kill itself if the answer is right, why not just help it on its way.
But the GM should be skewing the riddle contest so that the PCs win, because it's a GMs job to lose.
There are many DMs who think exactly the opposite... that their job is to "win" against the players in an adversarial role.
i agree, nothing but puzzles can be very bland and well just not the best thing to keep the player happy having fun. though i do think they hold value in certian areas. as a DM i have thrown in a puzzle from time to time that is usually a little more longer lasting and interactive than coming to an organ and falling floors, trying to play the right keys. none the less agree but think if done right they can hold a nice value to the game session.
Puzzles work when they have a lot of different answers, and one of the main answers is "If my players make up something awesome, I'm totally rolling with it"
Puzzles tend to bring out the dark side of DMs - the ones who want to teach something or prove a point, or want to show how clever they are by making this challenging riddle with one answer and wait with baited breath to see if they get it (they won't. They never will.)
Puzzles coincidentally can also sometimes bring out the best side of DMs - the ones that watch as their players jury rig something bizarre and horrifying with an immobile rod, rope, two ten foot poles, and a live chicken, and then just nod and go "Wow, that works. It works awesomely."
My first rule of thumb for DMing: if the player makes a good idea or theory that you didn't think of, run with it. It makes you look awesome because, hey, it's a really cool idea! It makes the player feel cool because, oh man, you totally got it! And it makes the game as a whole more fun, because the players are more willing to think outside the box.
The downside is, most puzzles aren't presented in an organic, "multiple answers" sort of way. We've all been in that dungeon. We walk into the room and the wizards' booming voice echoes "You have entered my LABYRINTH OF CONUNDROMS! Only the wisest may pass!" They're then subjected to a series of "puzzles" that have only one answer, make no sense, and either nobody gets it, or one player gets it every time (this will usually be a player with low intelligence - watch as the DM punishes them for getting the right answer).
I love puzzles and riddles, but it DEPENDS on how they are implemented!
Well designed puzzles have:
1) More than one way to figure the problem out.
2) Hints if the players aren't getting the answer after 10 minutes (hints though PC skills, PC Int/Wis, NPCs)
3) Alternate ways to continue the adventure if the PCs are stuck.
4) The puzzle isn't a roadblock. In other words, if they can figure it out, it's a bonus, not a requirement for the adventure.
For example, the video game "Dragon Age:Origins" as an example, they have lots of puzzles and riddles in the game. They are designed well though, so that IF you can't figure out the puzzle or riddle, it makes things (on the combat side), much more difficult. In other words, there are multiple solutions to the same problem. You're not completely stuck if you can't figure out the problem.
In a zombie LARP, we had a puzzle which killed the engineer who got the answer wrong. But it wasn't bad because we got to continue playing the game, as a zombie!
An example of a poorly designed puzzle (in my opinion) are the challenges in NASCRAG at Gencon last year. Seriously, I was bored to tears and left with a headache. If I wanted to do difficult logic problems, I'd be sitting at home doing them, not at Gencon looking for some heroic roleplay. We had 2 engineers, 1 computer programmer, and a PhD at our table and still couldn't figure out one of the problems (we were close). So... yeah, not good, not fun imo when you spend 4 hours just doing puzzles. If that was my only puzzle experience, I would hate puzzles too.
And yes, your DM should have given you guys hints if you had a guy with 18 Int in the party.
Puzzles are fun if implemented the right way, super bad if they are implemented horribly.
I personally enjoy solving puzzles and riddles, but in the game, I don't usually like how they're used. IMO, the worst puzzles are English-dependent. I recall one dungeon that had a 3x3 checkerboard on the floor of the dungeon, and an inscription on the wall:
Too many have gone before
It makes me sick
Those who fail are usually eaten
The DM was mad that I knocked it out without having to think about it. I told him it was a darn good thing the creator of this dungeon spoke English, because I probably never would have figured it out in "Common."
The only thing that ever saves my character is that someone else at the table loves to do puzzles and so while I go off to get another drink they sort out the soduku pattern in the floor or whatever it happens to be.
SODUKU!!!! That's what NASCRAG had at the last Gencon and we couldn't figure it out (because I'd never seen one before). We figured out 4 out of 5 of those puzzles and... it sucked and gave me a headache.
This is why puzzles have a bad name and yeah... puzzles like that don't belong in my games.
I told him it was a darn good thing the creator of this dungeon spoke English, because I probably never would have figured it out in "Common."
How do you know Common isn't English?