Puzzle Builder
Build a puzzle without writing code: rune locks, grids and lights-out, plates with a flashlight, tiles and slots, and per-player splits — everyone sees something different and has to talk.
Build a puzzle for the table without writing any code. You pick pieces, fill in a few fields and get a real table app, the same kind you'd write by hand, presented in the same floating window.
It's in two places, and they're the same:
- Creations -> Apps and Puzzles Builder, next to the system, map and adventure builders. You don't need an open game here, and whatever you save goes to your library.
- The table's App tab, Easy button, to build it with the game in front of you. The Expand button gives you the same full screen.
Saved puzzles live in My Library -> Apps and puzzles, with folders like everything else. From there they reopen in the builder, with their pieces.
First thing: the answer doesn't go inside
Everything else follows from this rule. An app's code travels in full to each player's browser, so anything written inside can be read by opening the browser's dev tools. So the answer is written in its own box and stored on the server: the app can only ask whether what they've entered is correct, and gets a yes or a no.
The same goes for the per-player split: the parts don't travel in the code either.
Set an attempt cap. Four dials of six symbols are 1,296 combinations: without a cap, a loop tries them all almost instantly and the puzzle is gone. The cap also lives on the server.
The pieces
The real shortcut: with the pieces in place there's a "Shuffle it, answer and all" button. It generates a different combination every time and writes it right where it goes, in the correct format. That's the step people most often get wrong by hand. It doesn't shuffle content that isn't a combination: a riddle, the parts of a split or where the hidden thing is in your picture. It tells you instead of making it up.
Shortcut: with the canvas empty you get ready-made puzzles: rune lock, keypad, rings, lights-out, repeat the melody, riddle, picture, three-hands panel, everything in its place. Change the answer and it's ready. None of them come with an answer set, or it would be the same at every table.
Add pieces from the top and reorder them by dragging the handle on the left. They appear stacked top to bottom, in that order.
Symbol dial
Wheels that turn among the symbols you give them. Four dials in a row make the classic rune lock.
The answer is the indices, not the symbols: the first in your list is 0. With six symbols ᚠ ᚹ ᚦ ᛗ ᛉ ᛊ and the combination ᚦ ᛊ ᚠ ᛗ, the answer is [2,5,0,3].
Keypad
Keys to enter a code. What's typed can be hidden, like at an ATM. The answer is the code in quotes: "4271".
Rune grid
Cells that get pressed. Two different puzzles depending on what you choose:
- Which ones stay lit: order doesn't matter. The answer is the numbers of the lit cells:
[1,4,7]. They're counted by rows and the first is0. - In what ORDER they're pressed: light the braziers according to the verse. The answer is the list in press order:
[8,0,4].
With the adjacent ones too checked you have the classic lights-out: each cell also toggles its neighbors above, below, left and right. If they all have to end up off, the answer is an empty list: [].
Picture
Turns your art into a puzzle. You choose an image (and can upload it right there).
- What the flashlight reveals: a second image of the same size that's only visible inside a circle that follows the mouse or finger, like black light over a parchment. It starts in the dark, because a flashlight starting in the center would give away half the layer.
- Do they have to click?: divides the image into invisible boxes and they have to hit the right one. The box numbers are drawn over your image in the editor, and clicking them adds them to the answer, so you don't have to count.
Per-player split
Something a PDF can't do: each one sees something different and they have to talk. One has the manual, another sees the pressure gauge, another can reach the lever.
You write the parts. Parts without a name are handed out automatically among the campaign's players, and each player always gets the same part. If you want a part to go to someone specific, put their name.
As the GM, you see all of them, which is your way out when the table gets stuck.
The server does the split, so nobody can read their neighbor's part by looking at the app.
Tokens and slots
Putting each thing in its place: the god with its emblem, the poison in its drawer, the stanzas in order. You click a token to pick it up and a slot to drop it (it works the same with mouse and finger), and clicking a filled slot returns the token.
Tokens are shuffled on opening, because otherwise they'd appear in the order you wrote them, which is usually the answer. The answer is one number per slot, in the order of the slots: the number of the token that goes in each one. The numbers are shown next to each token in the editor.
Rings that align
Concentric rings that turn, the old ancient-door mechanism. Two rules:
- Get them aligned (in any orientation): the answer is always
[0,0,0], because what's sent is how much each ring deviates from the first, not the positions. Turning the whole set still counts as a hit. - Each ring in a specific position: the answer is the positions, counting from the top:
[2,5,0].
Logic grid (sudoku)
Each symbol once per row, per column and per block. 4x4, 6x6 or 9x9. You choose a cell and then a symbol, and the focus jumps automatically to the next empty one.
The answer is what goes in the empty cells, in reading order. Writing it by hand is tedious, so use "Shuffle it", which sets the board and the answer at once and guarantees a solution: it solves a whole board first and then removes cells.
Text field
Typing a word: the true name, the answer to the riddle. The answer goes in quotes: "abracadabra".
Combining pieces
You can add several. When more than one answers, the answer is a list with each one's, in the order they're stacked.
Pieces that don't answer don't count. A picture that's only looked at, or a split, is information; the answer comes from the text field next to it.
If they get stuck
In Settings you can write a hint and the number of seconds before it appears. It shows up in the app automatically, without you having to watch.
If nobody cracks the puzzle even then, the open padlock in At the table opens it for everyone.
Sound
In Settings you can choose a sound for success and another for failure. They play at the effects volume of each viewer, not yours.
The grid also allows one sound per cell: you write the names of your resources in the same order as the cells. Combined with the order rule, that gives you the classic listen-and-repeat melody puzzle. The rings have their own sound when turning.
Easy and Code
What you build in Easy is code generated by the builder. So you can switch to Code and continue by hand whenever you want something the pieces don't offer.
It's a one-way trip. Once you touch the code, the pieces stop being in charge. The builder warns you before you switch. For the same reason, a template or a saved app opens in Code, since they're already code.
Table tips
- A lock with nothing to read isn't a puzzle, just a password someone has to say out loud. Add the verse, the hint, the drawing.
- Make failure say something. Failing without knowing by how much turns deduction into chance.
- Leave an automatic hint. It's better than watching the table stay stuck for twenty minutes.
- Beware of the one-person puzzle. If the table's sharpest player solves it in ten seconds while the rest watch, nobody else got to play. The per-player split fixes this.
- Always have a way out, and you already do. In At the table, every presented app has an open padlock: opening it by hand marks it solved for the whole table. Whoever has it open sees that right away; whoever opens it later finds it open and doesn't spend attempts. If a map zone was waiting on that puzzle, the door opens anyway.
Locking a door with a puzzle
You do this from the map, without coming here. In a zone's panel, the present a puzzle action offers yours from "My apps" and, if you don't have any, the ready-made puzzles: pick one and it comes out shuffled, with its answer set. The door is properly locked, and you don't have to come back here for anything.
(The exceptions are the content-based ones: riddle, three-hands panel and picture. They're created the same way, but you're warned that the answer is missing, because you provide their content.)
The door waits for someone to solve it. If nobody does, the open padlock in "At the table" opens it and the door opens too. See the event zones guide.