Come up with a problem, puzzle or trap for your players

>come up with a problem, puzzle or trap for your players
>realize that you designed it so well that you have no fucking idea on how they are going to solve it
>hope that the players are more clever than you in coming up with a solution
has this happened to anyone else?

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The first part yes

The second part no, because presenting an unsolvable situation to your players is shitty GMing.

You should have a few potential solutions in mind, plus be open to the players surprising you with their own solution.

I have given up all hope with the players on anything more complex than putting square peg in square hole.

it is happening to me with a session I have tomorrow, let me tell you

>Not!D&D homebrew game
>party is infiltrating the castle of a bad lich guy (more grey than evil, the party characters are assholes)
>one of the encounters is another party of adventures waiting inside
>these guys are there because one of them is a vampire who has the lich as his master and they are also getting paid a fuckton
the problem is that my playes are the kind who would, no doubt, try to use diplomacy on this other party and I would love to save them the encounter if they find a good way to convince the other party, but no matter what I can't think of a way they would have to convince the adventurers not to fight

Maybe they can't. Some fights you can't win, some encounters you can't diplomacy away.
But give them some advantage for doing good in Diplomacy, perhaps one of enemy hangs back and doesn't attack.

its just that precisely by doing a "ah, shucks, some encounters you can't diplomacy away!" I would be seen as a bad GM

>some advantage for doing good diplomacy
I'll keep that in mind, although one of the enemies hanging back doesn't sit well with me, since the encounter works with the enemy party having pretty good synergy between them, do you have any other suggestion?

Have them reveal solve useful information about the lich before fighting. If the PCs doesn't know the lich has vampire servants, mentioning that one of their party is one would give the PCs a chance to prepare better for future encounters.

gotcha, I'll think of similar stuff

Well, let the party try and see what they come up with. Just respond in character for the NPCs, if they aren't convinced, they aren't convinced.

exactly what I said in the OP

> Any other suggestions

Maybe instead of individuals being binary 1/0 diplomacy'd or hostile, make it so good diplomacy hampers them in fight. If they're doubting whether they want to kill the players, they'll not be on top of their game. Another interesting option is if the players instead of diplo-ing the NPCs to favour them diplo the NPCs into either turning on the Lich or each other. That would require the players having relevant info on them though.

I see your point, but its still a bit weird because I've yet to see players who, upon already entering a fight and rolling initiative, wouldn't give their all

The idea of the encounter is a "hey, you are righting another party of players" but oh well, I guess some integrity must be sacrificed

Whenever I make up something clever, they solve it immediately.

Whenever I make up something dumb and easy, they spend hours trying to solve it or die trying.

It's spiritually exhausting.

Wouldn't players try to go non-lethal (and therefore hold back on their strongest attacks) if you implied their enemies had things in common with them?

would your players?

>GM decides to give the party a challenge in a riddle/puzzle dungeon
>WAAAH THIS IS TO HARD
>GM decides to give them something easy yet rewarding in the form of a group of bandits with a large trove
>spends 3 hours checking for traps on the loot when the GM is essentially crying and begging them to just stop so they can continue the campaign

so basically you can't win?

As a player, I would.

But then again I guess I understand how to actually roleplay a human being and not a murderhobo.

i first encountered this as a teenager GMing a module, and pretty much expected you had a player that fucking memorized arcane lore.

i've since always provided a minimum of two solutions for every puzzle obstacle, and usually spread out several clues in different locations.

i was pleasantly surprised the last time i did it: a rather prominent pointy part in a bas relief sculpture needed just a single drop of blood (i.e. prick your finger) to activate a door. they kind of got it and decided to hack meat off of a body and just hang the chunk on the thing. i figured fuck it, close enough.

>You should have a few potential solutions in mind,
Nah.

goblinpunch.blogspot.com/2016/03/1d135-osr-style-challenges.html

So far I've been having a problem making something challenging. mostly because I keep underestimating my players skill and creativity and they have a much better grastp of d20 systems then I do.

I'm going to try throwing enemies closer to their strength at them net time major combat happens.

Do it all the time, just to make them squirm and see what they come up with

PS: best this ever got was my players becoming convinced the only way through a puzzle was via one of them being turned into a vampire. They then got into a fight over who should be turned into the vampire that resulted in four dead and two crippled, because the CE rogue *wanted* to be turned into a vamp for power, and the Palladian refused to let it happen to anyone but especially to the rogue, and the rest of the party took sides. The lunch who had set up the puzzle was very confused.

Lich, not lunch. And Paladin, not Palladian.

finding someone who can help them solve it might be a sidequest onto itself

how does that disagree with him

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