So, for context, this is to be part of my "edge of tomorrow" style dungeon where the players are expected to die and have to restart (handwaving their way through completed rooms), and have a finite number of lives. So the rooms are supposed to be deadly if they are solved incorrectly.
The room is accessed through a door with a picture of a flower on it. As you enter, you see a circular walled garden filled with fat bumblebees drifting sedately in the air. The walls are coated in a creeper with large, yellow flowers. the middle of the room is dominated by a large tree covered in pink blossoms which stretches out across the ceiling. The pools around the room contain large blue lily flowers and the bushes that grow between them are covered in long, drooping white flowers. The air smells intoxicatingly beautiful.
The door out of the room is locked, and features a large, blank coin on its surface. The coin has a strange attractive force which gently pulls anything organic placed against it onto itself, causing organic matter to lightly stick to it. Above the door is the inscription "Life is on the other side".
The pools, when investigated, have a number of silver coins in them. these coins have plants on both sides of them, and a successful nature (15) check identifies that all of the coins have a healing plant on one side and a poisonous plant on the other. Lower rolls reveal this to be true for some coins but leaves others unidentified.
the flowers have a variety of effects, which can be determined either by sniffing them or by observing the bees. observing the bees is the safe way.
The White flowers cause the bees to fall asleep. There is a small pile of bees beneath the flowers, and bees can be seen to be waking up & drifting away as you watch. The Blossoms cause addiction & jealousy. The bees on the blossoms do not leave the tree, and attack any other bees which come close to their flowers. The yellow flowers cause a charmed condition towards the flowers, and bees which land on these flowers are the only ones to go to the purple flowers. The purple flowers cause death. Bees crawl on them saefly but any which enter the flower (which points downward) fall out and onto the lily pad, which is a dish full of enzymes, and are digested.
for the players, the flowers will (when actively sniffed):
the white flowers cause sleep on a failed constitution (15) throw. the blossoms cause the bees to attack, and that will probably be fatal. If it somehow isn't then the player will also have to break their addiction to leave. the yellow flowers cause them to want to sniff all of the flowers. This will probably also be fatal. the purple flower causes a huge amount of necrotic damage. this too, will probably be fatal.
A successful nature check can also identify the flowers and their properties; 10 for the white flowers, 15 for the blossoms and yellow flowers, 20 for the purple flowers. (check will identify all flowers below as well, so an 18 identifies all but purple).
An investigation check (15) notices that things can be placed on the coin on the door, and that it is the same style of coin as those in the pools. A high enough roll will associate the phrase "life is on the other side" with the coin, and realise that this side should be the side for death.
Meanwhile, to make it "win or die" (which it has to be for the plot to work) I will have them make periodic constitution saves or suffer levels of exhaustion from the flowers. This effect will only last whilst they are in the room and will be lifted as they leave the room and breathe fresh air. There will be skeletons and corpses around the room to emphasise the danger, but they will all look very happy, almost euphoric, in death.
The solution (have a look at this once you think you know how to get through the door!):
I am hoping that this is enough to get the players to place a death flower on the coin on the door. This will cause the door to open. But will they work that out? is there enough information here to work with? did anyone get it without opening this?
Please let me know what you think and any suggestions you might have for improvements!
I was slightly confused by the attractive force of the large coin on the door, which I assumed to mean it was magnetic, which made me assume I'd have to stick a coin or an altered coin onto it. You could replace it with a vase or a plant pot to signify that a flower needs to be placed there, but that may just be me being stupid.
One other issue might be the fact that your solution involves picking a flower, that causes huge amounts of necrotic damage when sniffed and appears to instantly kill bee's that land on them. A player who observes this might decide that going anywhere near that flower is certain death and needs to be avoided, or even if they do figure out the solution, they have to figure out how to actually pick the flower without taking the necrotic damage themselves.
Other than that, I think provided they notice the different sides of the coins, they should be able to figure it out.
Initially I have tweaked the flower descriptions to better reflect my intent - the players will have to actively sniff the flower (or have their head pushed into them, I guess) to trigger the effects. I will have the bees clearly unaffected unless they go inside the flower, to emphasise this to the players.
I originally had planned on a shelf to put things on in front of the coin but preferred a more magical solution. I will make sure that I emphasise that it's anything that sticks, not just metals.
I will also adjust the coins in the fountains to have plants on each side, and in every case whoever rolls highest for nature recognizes that the flowers on one side of the coin are healing plants, and on the other side are deadly poisons, emphasizing that it's the flowers they need to use to work it out.
edit - wrote this whilst you were posting Lyxen! Thanks for the complement, you're welcome to use it and I hope it works well for you and your players! I've changed the door check to investigation, and will now tweak it to avoid being apparent magnetism, and clarify the purple flower's effects on the bees!
Hey, I know this was posted a while ago but I figured I’d add my input anyhow
I actually thought the solution to the puzzle was to flip the coin on the door, considering the coins in the fountain had flowers with healing/poison effects on either side and the phrase "life is on the other side” I figured oh well if this room is deadly and dangerous if we flip the coin on the door it would make the room flip in a sense
idk it made sense in my head lol
anyway if you see this comment I’d like to hear about how the puzzle went ;P
Hey, I know this was posted a while ago but I figured I’d add my input anyhow
I actually thought the solution to the puzzle was to flip the coin on the door, considering the coins in the fountain had flowers with healing/poison effects on either side and the phrase "life is on the other side” I figured oh well if this room is deadly and dangerous if we flip the coin on the door it would make the room flip in a sense
idk it made sense in my head lol
anyway if you see this comment I’d like to hear about how the puzzle went ;P
Thanks for the feedback!
I ran this puzzle in the DM Training thread we created in the forum games, it went down quite well - took players a little while of thinking to get the answer, but they got it - and nobody died!
looking forward to running this as an in-person puzzle at some point!
So, for context, this is to be part of my "edge of tomorrow" style dungeon where the players are expected to die and have to restart (handwaving their way through completed rooms), and have a finite number of lives. So the rooms are supposed to be deadly if they are solved incorrectly.
The room is accessed through a door with a picture of a flower on it. As you enter, you see a circular walled garden filled with fat bumblebees drifting sedately in the air. The walls are coated in a creeper with large, yellow flowers. the middle of the room is dominated by a large tree covered in pink blossoms which stretches out across the ceiling. The pools around the room contain large blue lily flowers and the bushes that grow between them are covered in long, drooping white flowers. The air smells intoxicatingly beautiful.
The door out of the room is locked, and features a large, blank coin on its surface. The coin has a strange attractive force which gently pulls anything organic placed against it onto itself, causing organic matter to lightly stick to it. Above the door is the inscription "Life is on the other side".
The pools, when investigated, have a number of silver coins in them. these coins have plants on both sides of them, and a successful nature (15) check identifies that all of the coins have a healing plant on one side and a poisonous plant on the other. Lower rolls reveal this to be true for some coins but leaves others unidentified.
the flowers have a variety of effects, which can be determined either by sniffing them or by observing the bees. observing the bees is the safe way.
The White flowers cause the bees to fall asleep. There is a small pile of bees beneath the flowers, and bees can be seen to be waking up & drifting away as you watch.
The Blossoms cause addiction & jealousy. The bees on the blossoms do not leave the tree, and attack any other bees which come close to their flowers.
The yellow flowers cause a charmed condition towards the flowers, and bees which land on these flowers are the only ones to go to the purple flowers.
The purple flowers cause death. Bees crawl on them saefly but any which enter the flower (which points downward) fall out and onto the lily pad, which is a dish full of enzymes, and are digested.
for the players, the flowers will (when actively sniffed):
the white flowers cause sleep on a failed constitution (15) throw.
the blossoms cause the bees to attack, and that will probably be fatal. If it somehow isn't then the player will also have to break their addiction to leave.
the yellow flowers cause them to want to sniff all of the flowers. This will probably also be fatal.
the purple flower causes a huge amount of necrotic damage. this too, will probably be fatal.
A successful nature check can also identify the flowers and their properties; 10 for the white flowers, 15 for the blossoms and yellow flowers, 20 for the purple flowers. (check will identify all flowers below as well, so an 18 identifies all but purple).
An investigation check (15) notices that things can be placed on the coin on the door, and that it is the same style of coin as those in the pools. A high enough roll will associate the phrase "life is on the other side" with the coin, and realise that this side should be the side for death.
Meanwhile, to make it "win or die" (which it has to be for the plot to work) I will have them make periodic constitution saves or suffer levels of exhaustion from the flowers. This effect will only last whilst they are in the room and will be lifted as they leave the room and breathe fresh air. There will be skeletons and corpses around the room to emphasise the danger, but they will all look very happy, almost euphoric, in death.
The solution (have a look at this once you think you know how to get through the door!):
I am hoping that this is enough to get the players to place a death flower on the coin on the door. This will cause the door to open. But will they work that out? is there enough information here to work with? did anyone get it without opening this?
Please let me know what you think and any suggestions you might have for improvements!
Make your Artificer work with any other class with 174 Multiclassing Feats for your Artificer Multiclass Character!
DM's Guild Releases on This Thread Or check them all out on DMs Guild!
DrivethruRPG Releases on This Thread - latest release: My Character is a Werewolf: balanced rules for Lycanthropy!
I have started discussing/reviewing 3rd party D&D content on Substack - stay tuned for semi-regular posts!
I would reduce the damage a bit, but it looks interesting!
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I was slightly confused by the attractive force of the large coin on the door, which I assumed to mean it was magnetic, which made me assume I'd have to stick a coin or an altered coin onto it. You could replace it with a vase or a plant pot to signify that a flower needs to be placed there, but that may just be me being stupid.
One other issue might be the fact that your solution involves picking a flower, that causes huge amounts of necrotic damage when sniffed and appears to instantly kill bee's that land on them. A player who observes this might decide that going anywhere near that flower is certain death and needs to be avoided, or even if they do figure out the solution, they have to figure out how to actually pick the flower without taking the necrotic damage themselves.
Other than that, I think provided they notice the different sides of the coins, they should be able to figure it out.
Thankyou both for the feedback!
Initially I have tweaked the flower descriptions to better reflect my intent - the players will have to actively sniff the flower (or have their head pushed into them, I guess) to trigger the effects. I will have the bees clearly unaffected unless they go inside the flower, to emphasise this to the players.
I originally had planned on a shelf to put things on in front of the coin but preferred a more magical solution. I will make sure that I emphasise that it's anything that sticks, not just metals.
I will also adjust the coins in the fountains to have plants on each side, and in every case whoever rolls highest for nature recognizes that the flowers on one side of the coin are healing plants, and on the other side are deadly poisons, emphasizing that it's the flowers they need to use to work it out.
edit - wrote this whilst you were posting Lyxen! Thanks for the complement, you're welcome to use it and I hope it works well for you and your players! I've changed the door check to investigation, and will now tweak it to avoid being apparent magnetism, and clarify the purple flower's effects on the bees!
Make your Artificer work with any other class with 174 Multiclassing Feats for your Artificer Multiclass Character!
DM's Guild Releases on This Thread Or check them all out on DMs Guild!
DrivethruRPG Releases on This Thread - latest release: My Character is a Werewolf: balanced rules for Lycanthropy!
I have started discussing/reviewing 3rd party D&D content on Substack - stay tuned for semi-regular posts!
Hey, I know this was posted a while ago but I figured I’d add my input anyhow
I actually thought the solution to the puzzle was to flip the coin on the door, considering the coins in the fountain had flowers with healing/poison effects on either side and the phrase "life is on the other side” I figured oh well if this room is deadly and dangerous if we flip the coin on the door it would make the room flip in a sense
idk it made sense in my head lol
anyway if you see this comment I’d like to hear about how the puzzle went ;P
Thanks for the feedback!
I ran this puzzle in the DM Training thread we created in the forum games, it went down quite well - took players a little while of thinking to get the answer, but they got it - and nobody died!
looking forward to running this as an in-person puzzle at some point!
Make your Artificer work with any other class with 174 Multiclassing Feats for your Artificer Multiclass Character!
DM's Guild Releases on This Thread Or check them all out on DMs Guild!
DrivethruRPG Releases on This Thread - latest release: My Character is a Werewolf: balanced rules for Lycanthropy!
I have started discussing/reviewing 3rd party D&D content on Substack - stay tuned for semi-regular posts!