#Feedback on Puzzles and their place in Quests

1 messages · Page 1 of 1 (latest)

rose gorge
#

To preface this feedback, I'm not trying to antagonize anyone involved in the creation or placement of puzzles in quests. I'd like to discuss their role in them overall, and how they've affected my experience as a whole, and if there's anything others have to say about them.

Puzzles often do not add to the experience/actively detract from the story being told.

Quests have trended towards a more intense narrative, breathing more life into the story of Monumenta and it's amazing to see it unfold. That being said, a large majority of players do not engage with puzzles or actively dislike doing puzzles.
I am personally fine with puzzles in quests, but picture this:

  • Quest hooks you with a compelling story
  • Climactic event is about to occur/you become invested in what's happening
  • Encounter a puzzle that does not have a fixed solution, and also requires the average player ages to solve without external assistance.

It's gotten worse in regards to placement of puzzles too, for example AUC ||having a difficult puzzle placed right at the start, where player interest begins to increase||, and other progression quests having a difficult or strange puzzle locking you in for half an hour or more. This ended up breaking the momentum of "I want to find out what happens next in the story" and for me it turns into "Oh god another puzzle why"

It's fine the first few times I do quests and find puzzles, but when there's one in every single modern quest it starts to get insanely tiring, especially in between exposition segments. If there has to be a puzzle involved, I suggest to tie it in to the quest somehow.
For example, if in a quest there's a machine that's broken for example, have a circuit to fix to repair the machine, instead of co-opting an archaic puzzle from a website meant to cater to die-hard puzzle fans. This would help increase the player immersion a little in my opinion.

Puzzles in the mainline shouldn't be that difficult, or should have a good reason to be

Maybe this is a hot take, but for players progressing through the story, you want them to experience the game's story, and you want them to see what Monumenta has to offer. What you don't want them to see is the obtuse puzzle that you have to look for a wiki entry to solve.

I can't speak from experience, but considering just how much QOL is locked behind puzzle-heavy content like the Tesseract puzzles, and just how many are placed along the mainline in total, the average player won't look forward to them unless they're narrative masterpieces like AUC/ASIC and are willing to put up with the puzzles' difficulty.
Puzzles being hard is fine, provided they respect the previous point above and either:

  1. Interact narratively with what's going on, in the puzzle's thematics or directly as an objective
  2. Add something interesting beyond the value the puzzle itself brings. For instance, instead of borrowing from existing puzzles like Sudoku etc., have more interactive segments that still require thinking to solve, but are styled more like minigames than niche puzzles. Minigames are generally more incorporative of what you could make within a game, and developers could make much more interesting encounters that way. If someone wanted to do puzzles, they could pull up whatever websites they wished instead of them being littered along the mainline.

In regards to difficulty, it's also about respecting the players' time that they spend on unlocking content/items through these quests. A lot of the excitement of progression is sullied by the sheer volume of puzzles along the mainline, and many progressing players that I know are dreading progressing through the game.

I'm not suggesting a total rework to quests anytime soon, but perhaps a consideration for if a puzzle would add/detract from the experience of playing the quest.

vocal dune
#

i would thoroughly enjoy challenges like the ones present in unexpected lesson with modern mechs/design in mainline quests over puzzles i cannot lie

#

i enjoyed auc very much but the puzzles alone added a couple of hours in my attempt to get through it and i'm a lore enjoyer

#

there's going to be people who just want to experience it surface level or just for the reward at the end

mighty shadow
#

there is someone thats working on a puzzle solver mod on ONE TIME QUESTS

#

this should not happen in the first place

#

how bad does it have to be

#

theres also the recent python script for the new puzzle

sweet agate
#

its almost like there is content with rooms specifically and exclusively for puzzles

mighty shadow
#

like that actually just should not be a thing you have to do

vocal dune
#

there is very much a place for puzzles in monumenta, skr makes good use of them because there's a reward for the challenge of completing one that is entirely optional

sweet agate
#

i fw the new ouzzles but im also a nerd

mighty shadow
#

to me the ideal interaction between players on a puzzle is "Do it yourself its a good experience and interesting"

#

not "heres a solver"

vocal dune
sweet agate
#

arclight and royal blue is probably the hardest puzzle level i'd put in a mainline quest

vocal dune
#

this issue plagues a lot of r1/r2 but i'm keeping this to r3 for now

sweet agate
#

but maybe thats just me

fringe island
mighty shadow
#

puzzles can be added to the game but it shouldnt be a requirement to solve puzzles that almost require you to look up solutions to

fringe island
#

or sit there for 10-15 minutes with a pad and paper just brute forcing it

mighty shadow
#

well same with parkour

fringe island
#

that's not a puzzle

mighty shadow
#

but parkour is generally easier

#

on quests

mighty shadow
#

that everyone just brute fores lol

amber edge
#

if a solver has to be made for a one time puzzle its cooked i feel

mighty shadow
#

^

fringe island
#

the rune pillar puzzle is math homework. you're making me do math homework.

vocal dune
#

monumenta uses minecraft as its game engine essentially so

#

why are we just lifting puzzles from elsewhere and putting them in the game instead of something that could be entirely unique

stoic obsidian
#

how i feel after enjoying the lore of auc and then being slammed by 2.5 hour long rune puzzle (you have to do it every time you fail secret)

mighty shadow
#

the ideal interaction with puzzles is
"hmm this was a good experience"

"how do i do this puzzle"
"do it yourself its a good experience and fun"

#

sort of like some quests

#

that the community agrees is good

stoic obsidian
#

also 2.5 hour rune puzzle that tanks your fps

fringe island
#

the light beam puzzle in the R2 quest was actually good

vocal dune
#

me when i can't stop calder from claiming green because he slapped a 25x25 magic sudoku board spell on the doorway

fringe island
#

like, honestly one of the best puzzles ive ever done

mighty shadow
hot bluff
#

i was having like 40 there 😭

rose gorge
vocal dune
#

ya

stoic obsidian
vocal dune
#

there's always some convoluted lore reason to justify its existence too

fringe island
vocal dune
#

i really liked this one

fringe island
#

i genuinely enjoyed this puzzle

mighty shadow
#

me when everyone tells me to look up solutions or look at solvers

#

and then they randomize it

vocal dune
#

this is interactive and solveable with critical thinking but doesn't need an extreme amount of effort

mighty shadow
#

so the puzzle jsut becomes a chore of following instructions

#

because its not interesting and u cant even skip it

stoic obsidian
#

Evil puzzle of doom and despair

image.jpg
mighty shadow
stoic obsidian
#

this has done this for like every player ive talked to

stoic obsidian
mighty shadow
#

oh thats frames

stoic obsidian
#

Tick duration spikes every second

#

it pisses me off

#

it goes from normal dura to 40 every 20 ticks

drifting wyvern
#

omg thank you for making this post it makes me so happy to see this sentiment shared ;-;

#

i'm down for puzzles in some side content but it's a serious buzzkill for me and anyone i have try this game to have to play so many in the mainline

fringe island
#

yea i dont mind them here and there

#

but every single mainline quest released in the last year or so has had some puzzle

#

it gets tiring

drifting wyvern
#

i was excited to do AUC, solo'd a max pt reverie for it and everything cuz i needed External Corruption

#

i took a look at people discussing the new quest though, and saw it was yet another puzzle fest 😭

#

i logged on wynn

vocal dune
#

i am a firm believer that a union cross is the best mainline experience in monumenta thus far

#

compiling a lore doc and everything

#

and i'm locked out of doing the secret true ending because i just. literally am not willing to sit down for another 2 hours doing the rune puzzle

#

unique to auc but having to replay them on the reset is weird

drifting wyvern
#

that's really awful 🫂

fickle ibex
#

Clearly we should add the rune puzzle as a skr 🗣️ 🔥

vocal dune
#

it would be a good fit for it

#

unironically

#

just... it's such a momentum killer in mainline

fickle ibex
vocal dune
#

?

fickle ibex
#

Its not fun

drifting wyvern
#

like i know there is a lot of effort put into these puzzles and the lore of the game, but i feel seriously discouraged from paying attention to said story when i gotta sit there doing sudoku or pull out a solver cuz i didn't sign up to play an hour long puzzle every other quest

vocal dune
#

such is the opinion of several others on certain puzzles like the farraday cage

#

enjoyment is subjective but i'm saying it wouldn't be out of place

drifting wyvern
#

now i wanna say something i think wasn't mentioned- which was that i really appreciate having some lighter, more intuitive puzzles sprinkled throughout the game

vocal dune
#

at the very least you could allocate more skr mats as a reward to compensate for its difficulty

#

you literally need the rune puzzle and the 5x5 arrow one to even see the rest of the narrative

storm cloak
#

why is there a puzzle on my way to long skr combat room

drifting wyvern
#

i really wish quests had more combat objectives. I find it fun to go against an actual quest boss or clear, and it helps me feel a little more immersed as I'm directly assisting the story progression by means which are given to us through it

vocal dune
#

^

drifting wyvern
#

and i'm not some fetch girl looking for paper or sitting there on a rubiks cube for some reason

storm cloak
#

idk i think really hard puzzles are fine when in right place

stoic obsidian
storm cloak
#

if quest is a side quest and puzzle is thematic or quest itself is puzzle focused

fringe island
storm cloak
#

yes

#

i wanted to go back to fight stoneborn ascended and try to nohit it

#

but i didnt feel like doing runes again and arrows again

#

vietnam flashbacks literally

stoic obsidian
#

i wanna have puzzle skip

#

once you’ve done it at least once

storm cloak
#

ideally you could skip to subsections after you done auc probably

stoic obsidian
#

yeah but rune is at the start of the subsection needed for lantern

#

so you are forced to do it anyway

halcyon beacon
#

Lowkey I disagree with the anti-puzzle hate but I agree on one point that there shouldn't be any randomized puzzles or stuff that you can't easily find the solution for online

#

I enjoy doing puzzles but I also enjoy being able to skip them if I want, I don't want them straight up removed from future quests

rose gorge
#

I don't hate puzzles. I just hate when they're thrown into the quest with seemingly no reason or interaction

vocal dune
#

this ^

halcyon beacon
#

Fair but the solution would be better integrating them

rose gorge
#

Which has not been done, hence the feedback

halcyon beacon
#

or if the quest is so good it doesn't need a puzzle

rose gorge
#

This too, if AUC itself was good enough and the puzzles dragged it down did it really need them?

feral granite
#

my first experience to monumenta puzzles being white quest around 1-2 years ago, I was legitimately stuck at that mansion puzzle for 30+ minutes and it did got me rather upset (I would say contribute to my "quit" monumenta right after white, back then, with the long quests and long puzzle solving time the experience was horrible), and also another issue on top being that not everybody knows there are answers on internet.....

Before this drift to early game discussion, I would say that quest wise, the amount and length of puzzles are annoying (another example being the sukodu one, I do like sukodu, but I don't like clicking a head 8 times to switch numbers) Quest should at least allow ppl to skip the puzzle part after "few attempts"

halcyon beacon
#

Having puzzles generally being easier but having a more difficult option for fun / small reward could be cool

feral granite
#

Having easier puzzle is fine, but a skip should still be implemented

#

For clarification I haven't done auc, actually haven't done r3 mainline despite doing skt months ago, I simply don't like questing where I run everywhere etc, just expressing my feelings on long puzzle that I encountered before and how I think it impacts "questing"

(And the game locks me from infusing revelation, nice)

arctic dagger
hot bluff
#

yippee

#

i can maybe get the trident then

amber edge
#

i think content like that has a place in monumenta but not in such an intergal piece of story i feel imo

#

maybe more in side quests and other stuff

stoic obsidian
#

It doesnt help that the rune puzzle is literally called “drive ya crazy” and is the hardest variant of this puzzle

arctic dagger
#

That is just straight up coincidence tbh

#

It wasn't taken from the Jaap page

stoic obsidian
arctic dagger
#

Thats the plan, yeah

glass idol
#

fire

arctic dagger
#

Tbh I really just did not expect people to have such strong reactions to the arrow puzzle

#

Personally I just do not find it to be even remotely a difficult puzzle, and I had two seperate people independently tell me during testing "Wow the 3x3 is way too easy, its a good thing it ramps up"

hot bluff
#

two

#

but i'll take the skipping on replay anytime

arctic dagger
#

The rune puzzle is admittedly intentionally hard, which is further why I thought people would believe arrow was a breeze

storm cloak
#

3x3 and 4x4 are a breeze to be fair

fringe island
#

i am not sure why the "intentionally hard" puzzle was placed in such a way in the quest progression

arctic dagger
#

So like... 🤷‍♂️

arctic dagger
fringe island
#

i am very well aware of why it's there
but the pacing of the quest is juuuuust as you're starting to get immersed into the lore/story bit

#

and then you get walled by an intentionally difficult puzzle

#

it is extremely interruptive

arctic dagger
#

I just... don't agree on that point, I'm sorry - at least not in this instance. Its immediately on the cooldown of a combat section and is the final obstacle prior to finishing the subquest, and it continues the going story point (getting past Azacor) in a way that I at least feel makes sense

#

If the arguement is against difficult puzzles in general, then I'll concede the point - I just don't really believe "Puzzle killed the immersion of the moment" is valid in this specific instance

fringe island
# arctic dagger I just... don't agree on that point, I'm sorry - at least not in this instance. ...

if it were any other puzzle i would agree with you
but this specific puzzle is just asininely bad, as you said, intentionally difficult
you are not solving it with the thought of "hey azacor did this and i've gotta get past it" you're solving it with "oh god why is this puzzle so bad"

the Guilding Blocks puzzle was genuinely interesting, it did not interrupt my experience of the quest as it meshed quite well into it
the SKR puzzle was a proper decent puzzle in my honest opinion

this puzzle is just bad

rose gorge
#

I agree with the azacor locking the door part, my argument was more against the arrow part

mighty shadow
#

if someone makes a python script to solve it

#

thats ur sign

arctic dagger
#

Saying "its bad" doesn't tell me anything

#

And fundamentally hard =/= bad

storm bison
mighty shadow
#

hard does equal bad after a certain point

rose gorge
#

I think it might have just been too hard, not a bad puzzle but it was up there in difficulty to cause many people to run into issues with it

mighty shadow
rose gorge
#

Obviously don't take that statement at face value but I think for the position it was in, the arrow puzzle felt overkill for the thing it was trying to do

mighty shadow
storm bison
vocal dune
#

i think the point days is attempting to convey is that the complexity of the puzzles somewhat necessitated the idea of a solver to be made to overcome what would otherwise be a big time investment for being able to simply progress

mighty shadow
#

yes ty

fringe island
#

especially so quickly

storm bison
#

so at least the second point in that message is not anything

rose gorge
#

let's set down the "bad puzzle" discussion i think

#

that's not the point

vocal dune
#

the point of this thread isn't to dogpile on puzzles

halcyon beacon
#

Wait chat what region is the new quest

#

R3 right

hot bluff
#

r3

halcyon beacon
#

PC broken can't play 💔

storm bison
vocal dune
#

noted

storm cloak
#

any good puzzle can be bad in wrong place and at wrong difficulty setting

#

i think people would have much less issues if there were 4 or 5 runes

rose gorge
#

4 or 5 runes, or just cut the 5th arrow puzzle for a diff one

storm cloak
#

nah 5x5 fix is simpler

#

add more fixed numbers

storm bison
#

tbh the runes puzzle kind of breaks together completely when you renove a rune i think

rose gorge
#

it was just also really upsetting that you need to spend so much time doing the quest to do the secret too. my guildmate was really excited to discover it firsthand only to get walled by the difficulty of the quests and got really upset

mighty shadow
storm cloak
#

oh yea fair ig

#

runes do break cuz theres 6 sides

vocal dune
#

we can let the matter of replaying auc specifically rest i think

rose gorge
#

on first playthrough still though it's like

#

doom

hot bluff
#

hasnt some puzzles been made so that when it's done for the first time, it'd have a fixed solution. When you want to do it again, it'd have randomized solution in which case it'd have a reward for solving it.

#

i'd like to see that rather than just spending huge amount of time in puzzle instead of sth im actually interested in like combat and some lore

amber edge
#

also idk sometimes for stuff like this where its extremely hard its kinda hard trying to justify spending so much time, espc with its mainline and some good rewards locked behind it

#

like i got a job and sometimes its hard x3

olive bronze
#

i enjoyed the story of auc, i did not enjoy spending half my time in the quest doing puzzles that i didnt enjoy, it completely killed the momentum of the story

arctic dagger
#

Here's my proposal for the immediate AUC changes:

  • Skip option on replays
  • Lock the top cube of the rune puzzle so that you have a more clearly defined starting point
  • Add a locked 9 to the 5x5 arrow puzzle
storm cloak
#

yea i think thats good

hot bluff
#

i think the points brought up in this thread should be considered when adding future quests as well, not just auc

arctic dagger
#

Sure, but thats the thing in my sights at moment

hot bluff
#

yea just saying

pure fjord
#

I think that the rune and 5x5 arrow puzzles were way too hard, i used a solver for the rune one since i couldnt think of any solutions that wouldnt take a long time, then on the 5x5 arrow puzzle, i spent atleast 3h on and off trying to do it since the solver wasnt working. These puzzles that require you to either spend a long time solving them, or spend a long time trying to figure out how to use a solver significantly subtracted from the experience

arctic dagger
#

"Takes a long time" is not clearly definable nor an objective experience. I can do the 5x5 arrow puzzle (as it currently exists) in about 3-5 minutes depending in randomization

#

And this isn't an instance of "You've done these a lot" - I had literally never done this puzzle type before prior to looking into making it for the quest

rose gorge
#

Sometimes as the creator of things you do end up seeing them in sort of a rose tinted lens

#

Not saying it's what it is but just something I noticed over my time with similar instances

pure fjord
pulsar path
#

I think that the difficulty of the rune puzzle comes from how difficult it is to interface with it and how much manual work you have to do even when you have a strategy.

For reference, I did the puzzle 3 times: once with another player yenz (on release), once on my own using a guide, then (because I didn't click the crown for the secret) again using a solver.

And what I noticed is that it is quite hard to execute a strategy for a solution. Even if you've notice some of the initial symmetry and have partly gotten an strategy in the puzzle you still have to write down every face in pairs, it then takes a hot minute to find the pairs for each cube such that you have 2 of each face (I had to do this when manually solving the puzzle, I just ran the pairs through a brute forcer to find a proper combination of them), and then you have to run through the faces again to find a line of 6 different faces on a pair of sides (hopefully you noticed what the symmetry in the vertical move implies), then run through the faces a final time to get a solution.

What this all adds up to is a lot of busy work even when you have a strategy, in writing the faces and then running through the possible combinations of faces (x3).

I think to alleviate the tedium in writing down the faces, some scaffolding or some stairs in the room would to help look at the cubes would be good, as would spacing the cubes out a little more.

For the tedium of manually solving the pairs of faces, I don't have a better solution than what you've already suggested, which is locking the top cube to have a good starting point.

fickle ibex
#

I think for me the rune puzzle was kinda annoying because most of the time I felt like I didn't make any progress with it

#

maybe its just me being stupid

gleaming harbor
#

I have yet to see AUC in action, but from everything people say it doesn't seem too promising
non the less I agree with this post and I'm glad to see I'm not the only person who noticed this

arctic dagger
#

The duality of man

IMG_9997.png IMG_9996.png
arctic dagger
crude rover
#

I think the dislike is about the [PUZZLE BLAST] specifically

#

which, yeah, the changes should help

heavy whale
pure fjord
#

but pretty much everyone hates the puzzles

crude rover
#

wait how tf are you supposed to see the top cube's top face if it's locked

arctic dagger
#

You don't need it

#

Its in its proper position and thus the top face has no baring on the puzzle

storm bison
#

you can see the bottom and the 4 sides and then its only 1 left really

dim night
#

I think puzzles should be easier, like you think like "okay how do i do this" and then you go "okay what if i do this" and then you've got it

#

like it shouldnt take so long that you get frustrated

stoic obsidian
#

thats how ive been doing it

#

and then taking 3 hearts of damage from the fall

sweet agate
crude rover
#

you need to hire worse quest testers trust

river cobalt
#

gang if i wanted to do puzzles i would go google a puzzle or do a fucking skr

#

to whoever out there made this abomination i assure you there is no need to add a puzzle people will spend 1 hour on in the middle of a story

#

not only did yall ruin the entire immersion time and time again, you also made experiencing an otherwise rather good story completely miserable

#

for a quest with a premise of being a spiritual successor to study in crimson this is utterly disappointing

hasty gale
#

We should just add skip buttons to all puzzles so we dont need to water them down or something. Just like how you can skip mobs and spawners. Hmm maybe not then

fringe island
#

thank you for your helpful constructive input forite

hasty gale
#

I unironically would rather have skips than watered down puzzles

#

Im not gonna go tell people I disagree with that their feedback is useless

#

Wait maybe I do

river cobalt
#

thats a more crude solution to the issue imo but it is a solution so i'd be perfectly fine with it

vocal dune
#

i still think that puzzles do have a place in quests, just that greater consideration could be taken as to whether the difficulty/placement of particular puzzles would be appropriate for specific points in the quest since you’re ideally trying to tell a story first and foremost

#

we can still absolutely have harder puzzles akin to the pre-change rune puzzle elsewhere in the game

#

one where the challenge of solving will be rewarded aptly

river cobalt
#

one where it interrupts nothing and the player goes in expecting to solve puzzles, rather than being forced to do so despite going in with a completely different intent

crude rover
#

having a easier first time puzzle to progress with a harder variant for bonus rewards is also nice

river cobalt
#

it's kinda like garden of yesel and quest parkour

#

say, in kingdom of lies where you || go to nasha ka's bedroom || and parkour there it's pretty average difficulty but if you're looking for a challenge in specifically parkour there's yesel just for you

#

similar approach should be taken with puzzles

#

in fact there already are quests that solely focus on puzzles which is none other than primeval creations

#

quests that focus on story should either have no interceptions at all or ones that are not difficult/time-consuming enough to ruin the story pace for the player

#

because, well, story is the main part about the quests, why should you have to worry about being interrupted by something completely different

#

these puzzles along with a number of other, albeit smaller, issues make this quest a horrible experience to go through despite the fact that looking back at just the story it is quite good

silver drum
#

id say AUC puzzle lines up with uh

#

between hard tesseracts and some skr?

#

considering Holding Space has a similar one (that one has a fixed board hence fixed solution though)

silver drum
#

i think that is one of the reasons they nerfed ||ATR|| by an astonishing 50% health

gleaming harbor
#

ATR was mostly overstated
it also played like a dark souls boss in a region where you can only really crit

silver drum
full basin
#

I think it would be nice if complicated puzzles were treated more like parkour courses are, optional bonus content tucked away you can do for a reward and advancement

main owl
#

The tesseract quests definitely fall into that mainline puzzles too hard, to this day I have not completed like half of them and I'm in r3 endgame. Definitely agree with minigames instead of puzzles like those ones where you push some block to power another but it only moves in one direction until hits a block, those I loved, same with the wiring of cables in brown both were thematic and interactive, but when I'm supposed to connect some bullshit value to another value and then because of that this thing changes and this something happens - that's awful.

storm bison
#

tesseract quests are mainline?

main owl
#

Wait are they not

amber edge
#

they arent mainline

#

but me personally i dont think something so hard should be locking behind so much qol imo

#

every new player and a large chunk of players i know all just used the wiki for these things

river cobalt
#

which is another point speaking of which

#

the puzzles could be non-randomized

#

which is a fancier way of letting people who want to do hard puzzles go and do them while those who just wanna experience the story without much interruption wiki the puzzles

rose gorge
#

#suggestions-discussion message airdrop

small forge
#

maybe we can add a option call pretend u solve it, which appear after x time failed

feral granite