What does Veeky Forums think of having actual puzzles and riddles for players to solve instead of roll checks?

>ends up with one player trying to solve it while the rest cut their losses
I'm the one player, guilty.

that puzzle is actually driving me nuts

The answer is A.

I'm just a tiny bit bothered by the way putting one of the circles below in the circular negative space on the puzzle would leave the square in the circle out of formation with the other squares.

I actually solved this exact problem a few years back. It's part of an IQ test called Raven's Progressive Matrices iirc.
Shit's a fucking LOT more complicated than it looks.

Easiest way to see the pattern is by doing some substitution.
Sub out each character for a number ranging from 0-2 (IE, Hearts=2, Spades=1, and Diamonds=0).
Then organize the graphs as you would a book (left to right and top to bottom).
Now, going from box 1 (top left) to box two (top middle), you first add 2 to every number, wrapping around back to 0 instead of going forward to 3 (ie, 0 becomes 2, 1 becomes 0, and 2 becomes 1 (in essence, Hearts become Diamonds, Diamonds become Spades, and Spades become Hearts).
But you aren't done yet. Inside the box, you have to move the column on the left all the way to the right (so that Column 1 becomes 3, 3 becomes 2, and 2 becomes 1).
Now that you've moved the column over, you have to manipulate it a little. The number on the bottom becomes the number in the middle, the number in the middle becomes the number on top, and the number on top becomes the number on the bottom.
That explains the pattern(s) present in the transitions between boxes that are in in the same row.

However, there also exists a completely unique pattern of change when going from a box in one row to one in a separate row. Simply put, the entire box is rotated counter-clockwise 90 degrees. In short, the left column becomes the bottom row, bottom row becomes the right column, right column becomes the top row, and the top row becomes the left column,

So, with these patterns in mind, we can safely say that box 9 will go (left to right, top to bottom): 2 0 1, 0 1 0, then finally 2 2 1. Translating this sequence back into symbols (as explained earlier, 2=Heart, 1=Spade, and 0=Diamond) gives us answer A

You should post something harder next time, like the Monty Hall Problem.

It is supposed to be a measure of your character's puzzle solving abilities and not your own

There are no spades in the image.

inb4 thread devolves into whether OOG word choice/speaking skills should influence IG persuasion rolls

Shit, fourth parenthesis in the fourth spoilered line should read
>in essence, Hearts become Spades, Spades become Diamonds, and Diamonds become Hearts
and NOT
>in essence, Hearts become Diamonds, Diamonds become Spades, and Spades become Hearts

Somehow I fucking wrote the whole thing backwards.

The monty hall problem becomes a lot easier to understand when you have more doors.

Shit, I meant Clubs instead of Spades too.
I'm good at math problems, not card games.

Monty Hall Problem becomes even simpler when you have only two doors: the one you chose and the open one with the goat.
Makes the problem really easy.

depends what your group is into really.

I guess it could be a nice change of pace if done sparingly.

>Spotted the noob casual who only wants a power fantasy
>Spotted the butthurt hurt who was told that minmaxing diplomacy doesn't get him blowjobs.
>Monster Truck Sarcasm Rally

You're all missing the point and failing as people. The question here is "Is it fun to sit at the table with your friends and do math homework for 20 minutes."

If the puzzle you're offering is entertaining and not too heavy, preferably with some tactile or visual elements, you can present it as it is. It's even better if can be resolved in multiple ways, or it intersects with the characters' skills or personalities. For example, a clue that relies on the Dwarf's knowledge of architecture, then needs the Ranger to shoot the capstone from the arch or whatever.

A puzzle as difficult as OP's example is only going to halt the game and frustrate people, UNLESS maybe it's something they can take with them and work at over time, like a magic sword that gains an extra bonus if the player figures out which tile to set in the pommel.

A puzzle that blocks all progress until solved is right fucking out.

Nah, at that point the odds that you picked the right door initially start at 50%, which means the odds that he's offering you the wrong door just out of custom are equal, at 50%.
It's when there's 3 or more doors that the one he offers you is more likely to be the right one than the one you initially picked. With 3 doors you have a 1-in-3 chance of getting the right door, which means a 2-in-3 chance that you got the wrong one, and he can offer you the right one.

Our GM did this for Scion. It was actually fantastic. The more 'intelligent' characters basically got partially completed puzzles or more clues/hints than the other players depending on their rolls.

They still had to solve the rest of it themselves though.

I had a dungeon once that relied around a central puzzle. The players could beat some of the rooms to get more hints, which would make the puzzle trivially easy if they were to clear everything, but every time they did, they would see a part of the treasure pile that it was protecting disappear.

Why would I want to encourage autism at the table?

user I was making a joke about how if there's only two doors total, and you CAN SEE the goat is behind the door you didn't initially choose, it would be simple to know whether you'd switch or not.

But what if the car is inside the goat that you were just shown?

Huh, apparently I can't read English tonight.

The puzzle has to be solvable but difficult. This is only possible if you're both good at puzzles and significantly smarter than all your players working together.

If you're their intellectual equal, or their superior by a small margin, then you can't do a good job of it.

>This is only possible if you're both good at puzzles and significantly smarter than all your players working together.

I am the DM, I fill out that requirement by default.

make puzzles, but all of them are based on rhyming riddles. At the end put a jester with a big sign that says "What'd you expect, money?"

My friend and I argued violently about the Monty Hall problem for like an hour. But that was because he improperly--or at least incompletely--explained it to me. The way I understood it was that I would pick a door and then he would open a random door, which could've even been the door the prize was behind. Under those conditions, I'd be as good sticking with my initial pick as trading out for the other door. Armed with the proper facts, however, the problem seems pretty straightforward to me, at least once you think about it.

Why?

that is mine to know and yours to find out.l

universal advice applies here.

ask your players if they would enjoy such a thing at all.

Nice idea in theory, but in practice brain teasers don't work well when you have a set amount of time to play. Also, they tend to be solo activities, and if anything group interaction only slows things down further. And logic problems (like the OP pic) tend to only have one solution, so there's no room for creative problem solving, you either get it right or you don't, which isn't all that different from rolling an ability check for resolution. In my experience, rolling a check is usually what ends up happening after the table has been sitting around for a half hour stumped on a visual puzzle that was described to them verbally.

If you're still going to do it, you should understand that players who spend their time coming up with ways to circumvent the obstacle, cut the Gordian knot, or otherwise subvert the original riddle, are still trying to solve the problem. If their approach is clever enough, it should be considered a valid solution.

allow them to, if thy get stuck, roll for INT, the better their roll the better the clue you give them

sometimes an idiot can scooby doo his way to solving a puzzle, the player making his low INT character solve a "stack the cans" puzzle could simply be him ordering them to look pretty, unaware that there was a pattern to figure out