User we want a harder game, go balls to the wall

Obviously some crazy magic effect that says "Any damage in excess of maximum hitpoints is nullified"

Everything with HP has a minimum of 1 HP. You can't have zero or negative maximum hitpoints.

Says who?

Look.

This isn't a poorly-coded program. You can't say that having -1 hit points means you can never die, since you'll never hit 0 hit points.

It's been a rule in D&D since 2e.

Here's the 3.5 text.

"If your character has a Constitution penalty and gets a result of 0 or lower after the penalty is applied to the Hit Die roll, ignore the roll and add 1 to your character's hit point total anyway. It is not possible to lose hit points (or not receive any) when gaining a level, even for a character with a rotten Constitution score."

They even made a point of it in 5e's sage advice just to make sure you didn't get confused.
sageadvice.eu/2015/03/26/hit-dice-minimum/

A magic item that prevents you from going past -9 HP and a magic item that prevents you from being OHKO'd by an enemy's attack.

So you effectively are always at -9 HP but cannot be killed by an attack since that would instantly cause you die from the attack.

I'm just spitballing here, you'd have to be a bellend to make something this powerful.

Im getting the sense that your "puzzle" solutions were anywhere near as obvious as your trying to make them sound.

OP here, is right, he wished for the power to fight the strongest beings known to man. Unfortunately this includes things that can annihilate nations in the blink of an eye, so he can fight those but a bunch of street thugs are still the same level of danger.

Nigger that's for rolling hitpoints. Negative levels outright reduce your maximum hitpoints until they're removed.

Negative levels also only last for 24 hours before you either perma lose a level or they vanish. Furthermore, you insta die if neg levels = HD.

So the only way this would work is A- if the guy was encountered within 24 hours of getting the neg levels.
B- he somehow managed to roll average HP/dice including con modifier of less than 5.
C- an extremely specific reading of two separate instances of wording which likely goes against RAI as neg levels are already reducing your max hp so you arent at max max hp so its not a single instance

So, we've got a guy with multiple negative levels, and can only take partial actions if he has the diehard feat, with some reality-warping, 4th-wall breaking ability that requires an interpretation of the game mechanics as game mechanics to exist?

Your players may have said they wanted puzzles to solve, but they wanted problems to solve.

Nobody likes trying to read the GM's mind.

I deliberately limit their options and I run in an episodic style because that's how they like it. I take notes from old point and click adventure games.

I love old point and click adventure games. Even people who like them get annoyed by "lol start over" deaths.

Also, people treat humans different from computers. They think differently when interacting with them. The less obvious the intended solution, the more open you should be to alternative solutions.

>that's how they like it
Weird. The original post gave me the impression they were frustrated.

>Old point and click adventure games

Well, there's the problem. Those things are obtuse as fuck, and trying to adapt them to such an open-ended medium such as tabletop is doomed to fail.

Oh boy, another DM coming onto Veeky Forums to whine about how nobody appreciates his genius in the hopes that someone ITT gives him praise and satisfaction for being "a different type of learner.

Listen OP, none of the encounters you've listed are good, let alone balanced for actual play. If a DM ever showed me an encounter that depended on lateral thinking and esoteric knowledge just to get a foot in the door, I would leave and suggest others to do the same.

Why? Because you're more interested in appearing smart than building an encounter that's actually fun for anyone besides you.

>I only played shitty Sierra games
I took notes from the likes of Waxworks.

>that's how they like it
What's the point of this thread, then, again?

The fact they told me to up the difficulty and bitched when they had to think for once.

The only encounter that you listed that's actually worthy of being called a puzzle was the Aka Manto one; everything else depended on the players knowing the solution of the puzzle before they actually went in.

Like how am I supposed to understand that telling lies is the trigger for the crossbow? How am I supposed to deal with a golem that can regenerate (especially if these are D&D golems that are resistant to magic and hit like a goddamn truck)? How am I supposed to know that I'm supposed to heal a dude before I actually attack them?

Seriously OP, I'd be frustrated too if I had to deal with this bullshit and the reason why I'd be frustrated is because there's a clear difference between a difficult encounter and one that hinges on the players and the DM being on the same page, even when there are equally viable options available that should work, but don't, because the DM doesn't realize that the reason why the puzzle is easy for them is because THEY FUCKING MADE IT!

The DM? This isn't a program, the DM can make things up y'know or say "they work"

The golem one is the only of the examples given where i can see the players figuring a solution out before they die (assuming the GM gives a good description of it, which i somehow doubt.)
>Crossbow
This is just weird. Was the wielder the Champion of the God of Truth or something?
>Aka Mato
What does 'go and tackle it' even mean? Like, they go and investigate the place where the previous attacks happend? What else where they supposed to do?
>Aurorum Golem
Only one I could even see working in theory, as I said. But I'm betting apples to oranges that some information was lost on the way to the players.
>Negative max hitpoints guy
This neither works on a narrative level nor on a rules level, as it's solely based on your weird interpretation of the rules.

Attached: Abstract_Bait.gif (300x153, 68K)

>Like how am I supposed to understand that telling lies is the trigger for the crossbow?
By... noticing he's making outlandish claims while rapid-firing a crossbow?

I remember a homebrew crossbow called the Boaster's Crossbow, he's probably using that. If I recall it was made by a judge to quickly execute liars in court, and he shot himself with it when his wife asked if her ass looked big.

>go and tackle
Means go and attempt to fight
t. Aussie

>If a person is sitting on the toilet (usually the last stall), a mysterious voice will ask them if they want red paper or blue paper. If they answer red paper, they will be sliced apart until their clothes are stained red. If they choose blue paper, they will be strangled until their face turns blue. Any attempt to outsmart Aka Manto by asking for a different color will result in them being dragged to the Netherworld. If you decline to receive any kind of paper, he will depart.

Google man. Though honestly, OP fucked up with the first and last, the latter especially depending on how he sold the guy in universe

+10 Magic Bolt
>Supposed to figure out lying triggers it when the only way to test it is to trial and error and find out which thing makes the next bolt sheer off half your HP

Aka Manto
>Fair enough, they should've asked people around town

Aurorum Golem
>Golems hit like a tank
>Take damage like a tank
>Can regenerate
>Party not immediately running

Negative Max HP
>Nigga what the fuck
>This works on no level
>What the fuck is wrong with you
>What kind of bassackwards bullshit is this
>Were you high when you made this

>How am I supposed to know that I'm supposed to heal a dude before I actually attack them?
Then it wouldn't be cowardly at all would it?

Attached: dorararara.gif (498x292, 2.71M)

So I agree with the confusion on the negative max hitpoints but it sounds like the second two and even arguably the first are fine even by your reading.
The very fact that no one has any idea what an Aka Manto is should suggest it might be a good idea to look into it further before trying to go kill it no?
You either think for five seconds like you said after seeing it pick up its parts or maybe just drag them off somewhere else?

Making the assumption that he has a magic crossbow powered by lies is, in fact, the least logical progression of thought possible in this scenario.

If a guy is making outlandish claims and firing an immensely powerful crossbow, your first assumption is going to be he's a guy who likes boasting who also happens to have a +10 Crossbow. Hell, they don't even need to be big lies either.

"I slew a dragon with this once!" Would apply, as is "I fucked your mother last night!". One seems, at worst, an attempt at intimidating boasting and the other is just a common taunt. Both are untrue. But let's assume that this guy was an idiot.

The guy is screaming "The sky is green!" and "The king is a mule!" You're not going to think "Lie powered crossbow". You're going to be thinking "Some fucking lunatic got a magic crossbow".

My thought process if I were going into this fight
>He's using a magic crossbow
>The enchantment is bullshit powerful
It wouldn't even occur to me that it's an activated ability, much less that it's based off of him telling lies. I mean, if I just ran into this random dude armed with a crossbow somewhere, and the crossbow is capable of firing +10 bolts, who is to say he DIDN'T kill a dragon with a single shot, especially if, for all I know, he's stacking that shit with Sharpshooter (-5 to attack, +10 to damage).

That's what I mean, your "puzzles" depend on the players understanding the nature of the puzzle before they even enter the arena in order for it to work. Without that key bit of information, it just feels like you're arbitrarily ramping up the difficulty out of spite while punishing the players for not being able to read your mind.

Maybe he's just a compulsive liar. Maybe he's just fucking insane and delusional? both of those are way more believable than lie activated crossbow

>expecting players to know what they want
Your first and biggest mistake

So what happens to the crossbow if you say "this is the killshot?"

If you don't kill and it becomes a lie does it suddenly spike up 10 damage? What if it does kill with the 10 damage boost? Then it becomes truthful and retracts the damage?

Attached: 1481742146384.png (600x592, 433K)

The main issue with that one is that it assumes the players have any idea what an Aka Manto even is. More likely than not, hearing it's "causing problems" is really vague and just makes it sound like it's a generic monster that's tearing shit up and can be beaten to death through normal methods.

As far as dumb and half-baked OP's ideas were, the answer to this kind of question is always: it only works with things that are false right here right now, not with statements whose veracity is completely dependent on what's about to happen.

/thread

You need to step up your puzzle game OP.
If you are going puzzles with only one solution, the hints need to actually be noticeable and hard to misconstrue (though not necessarily impossible to).
The magic bolt one is stupidly easy to misconstrue, and the hitpoint one is out of the box even for D&D and requires a proper mention of how their ability works in some manner outside of apparent invincibility.
The Golem is fine if you blatantly said they were going for their own parts for self healing, and the Aka Manto one is the result of your players being retarded so that gets a pass.

If you really want to drop no hints, then you need to drop something with babby tier puzzle boss like the Rainbow Butterfly from Dark Cloud 2

youtube.com/watch?v=xRGrfurZaNQ

So is it true or false right now?

nah, fuck that I choose to believe that the crossbow paradoxes itself and the wielder into the astral plane like pic related

Attached: Annihilation Arrow.jpg (580x420, 80K)

Who the hell has the natural inclination to BUFF YOUR ENEMIES? You want them dead, not harder to fight.

There's a line between challenging content that players can overcome with some clever tactics, versus random bullshit where they have to read the GMs mind or chance into some random win condition. It doesn't matter if they have the skills and equipment they need, or not.

It's the exact same problem with traps and riddles where a GM will become frustrated over the party missing things which are 'obvious'. Getting into the heads of your players and forming a reasonable picture of their perspective can be challenging. It helps if you have some experience as a player with a GM who does puzzles right.

>harder game
>enemies do more damage
>enemies have snowflake secret weaknesses

Shitty DM. Try tactics and ingenuity of tools anyone can use instead of snowflake stat blocks.

/ thread

>I take notes from old point and click adventure games.
Games renowned for convoluted intuitive puzzles that limited your choices to something inane you'd either have to look up in a guide or press every single button to every single object to proceed?

Who kno

>I take notes from old point and click adventure games
Epic meme

I'm so, so sorry that everything has to be dumbed down for you. I'm so sorry you struggle with basic things like this. Don't worry, there are lots of #safespace games where you have infinite hints.

>You can save against beneficial spells, but outright refusing them isn't usually an option.
No, USUALLY they outright cannot target unwilling targets whatsoever. Which is the problem.

You just made that up on the spot.

It's right in the spell descriptions most of the time.

It's literally what "Willing Target" in a spells description means. The made up shit is that you can force a beneficial spell on someone and they can choose to save, when in fact a spell that specifically says only willing targets has no ability to affect non-willing ones. This has literally been explained to the death thanks to Benign Transposition vs. Baleful Transposition.

I'm getting real fucking tired of people clueless about the rules just yelling "No, no, houserule!" at first sight every time when its just their fucking ignorance.

Well since OP specified an aurorum golem (a material in 3e)I assumed 3e which does not specify that things like bear's endurance requires a willing target, only that the spell is harmless which means that it's assumed you choose to fail the saving throw.

Ergo, you can buff unwilling targets but they can save if they want to.

>that solution
Or, you know, just put a huge rock on him or something, drop an anvil on him Wile E. Coyote style and let him die of old age under it.
Point being that's a silly mechanical way to justify an obnoxiously niche solution to something.

Bear's Endurance would work on non-willing, if you succeed the touch attack, resistance and save, yes. If +4 was enough for what OP built, we don't know.

I know 'go and tackle' as meaning (just) going and solving a problem/working on something more generally, with the implication that it's 'hands on'

If OP really meant 'go and fight' with it, then i can *maybe* see OPs point,
but then from the players POV it seems like this enemy is so weak that it has to catch peasants with their pants down to be able to kill them, so there really isn't a reason to dive deeper.

May or may not be. Crossbow can't see the future and has no idea.

Since it's not a confirmed lie, no bolt.

>I have no knowledge of how enigmas should be done in tabletop: the post
I'd tell you to lurk more and learn how to dm but you apparently already have a group ? Congratulation user, you get to learn stuff about a thing you like !

Your campaigns sound cool and im willing to bet your hazardous environments and puzzledungeons are great, but your bosses as interesting as they may be sound like very obscure one trick ponies with a handful of it not only one or two solutions the party may be equipped with.

>give enemy a weakness that makes very little sense
>give players clues as to what it might be
>PCs just get annoyed and leave

Attached: high level encounter.jpg (1920x1080, 124K)

Changing obscure one trick ponies to arrogant shit bosses that may as well have a certain and definite answer where should the party think outside of your niche paradigm they're punished for it. Would not play with but would be inspired by your content to reintroduce concepts in ways that aren't outwardly unfriendly to players for not trying to read what action the DM wants you to do lest you suffer. Your mechanics sound like a railroaded plot but with individual encounters instead.

>ohshitniggerwhatareyoudoing.jpg

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>Shit DM gets #told that his shitty encounters are shitty
>"HURR DURR OBSLY YOU NEED DUMBING DOWN HURR!"
Every time.