Shamath's riddle -- An entirely Different Approach

It occurs to me that the "atTENd" with care bit only works in English.

Maybe the answer is in the picture, but I doubt it.

Sometimes I wonder if we will ever know?
 
SnowShadow said:
She is evil as has been said before. Perhaps she posed an unsolvable riddle to someone like LW who wouldn't 'know' how many asistants, etc. she has. Ten merely being the correct answer stumbled upon by blind luck. Looked at the text again yesterday just in case I had missed something over the years: 12 Stalagtites, 12 Automatons ('Dozen'), 20 Attendants ('Score') - the last two appear AFTER the riddle. Don't know how many Chegtah she has either. Nothing. Must be broke.
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What have I got in my pocket?
 
Kojiro said:
Ehhh... maaaaybe, but there's nothing that directs you to consider the Random Number Table in the text itself. It just simply declares to study the riddle carefully.

Your theory seems just as much a stretch as the rest.
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Actually, not really.

0=10.

It's used in OTHER books and other portions quite often, the most utilized is combat however.

That's why I point it out. For the obvious, that's why the 0 is at the bottom of the table and you do MAX damage with it like you would if you rolled a 10, rather than at the top of the table before the 1 like a 0 normally would be.

At times it's used both ways, as a 0, and at other times as a 10.

What is required is the leap of logic to realize that there is no 0, but then that 0 as a roll is typically = 10.

Not a stretch at all, but probably caused more problems than what originally thought. It probably seemed simple enough at the writing, but in reality, people found that leap of logic tougher then it seemed prior to publishing.

However, the 0=10 roll or pick, or 0 is the highest number, the number after 9 is utilized throughout the LW series.
 
Hi GreyLord

I see your reasoning about why 0 can equal 10, however, this doesn't make a great deal of sense in the context of the riddle.

If Shamath has 0 guards behind, why does that equal 10? In this instance the dice explanation doesn't make much sense. I think it's a coincidence that the number is 10, and that throwing a 0 often equals 10.

I think we shall have to accept the riddle does not work. Maybe we will get an explanation, or a corrected riddle, one day.
 
Ok so I've just read the riddle again - the riddle itself is a trick question, basically when you double a number, then halve it, you get the same number. This is covered by adding 2, removing 2 and then removing the 1 at the end, but it's basically saying the number of loyal servants is "n" - double this, then halve it, and you get "n" again.

The error occurs in that there is no hint of what number "n" is. I think someone before it should say there are 10 loyal servants at the start, and the aim of the riddle is for you to say somethign other than 10.
 
I don't know why people still try and justify the 0 = 10.

For one thing, if that really was the answer, it would be stupid to reward people who think the answer is '10' with the correct section aswell!
 
GreyLord said:
Kojiro said:
Ehhh... maaaaybe, but there's nothing that directs you to consider the Random Number Table in the text itself. It just simply declares to study the riddle carefully.

Your theory seems just as much a stretch as the rest.
Click to expand...

Actually, not really.

0=10.

It's used in OTHER books and other portions quite often, the most utilized is combat however.

That's why I point it out. For the obvious, that's why the 0 is at the bottom of the table and you do MAX damage with it like you would if you rolled a 10, rather than at the top of the table before the 1 like a 0 normally would be.

At times it's used both ways, as a 0, and at other times as a 10.

What is required is the leap of logic to realize that there is no 0, but then that 0 as a roll is typically = 10.

Not a stretch at all, but probably caused more problems than what originally thought. It probably seemed simple enough at the writing, but in reality, people found that leap of logic tougher then it seemed prior to publishing.

However, the 0=10 roll or pick, or 0 is the highest number, the number after 9 is utilized throughout the LW series.
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Unless you're Joe Dever himself, I like many others (some who have also responded here) have to remain skeptical. Like WritingWolf said, it doesn't make sense in context of the riddle. Now if the text told us to take a gander at the Random Number Table, then yeah, you'd be correct.

But it doesn't, so you aren't.
 
For fairness' sake, I've made it a Random Roll. If I get a 1 - 9, I have to fight. If I roll a 0, I solve the riddle and turn to page 10. I've done that exactly once.
 
johntfs said:
For fairness' sake, I've made it a Random Roll. If I get a 1 - 9, I have to fight. If I roll a 0, I solve the riddle and turn to page 10. I've done that exactly once.
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Oh I see what you are saying - Lone Wolf figures the really hard riddle out for himself. Good idea! Perhaps experience could come into it too: The Difficulty/Solution for the test is 10 so Pick a Random Number (0=10) and add 1 for every GM Discipline ABOVE the first four, perhaps also add 1 if you have Telegnosis as well.

I like your idea!
 
Or, and this is what I've finally decided to do, you can change the text of the first line riddle from this:

'In addition to the loyal servants, there are two Dwellers of the Abyss.'
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To this:

'In addition to the initial ten loyal servants, there are two Dwellers of the Abyss.'
 
We can't be too many months away from the release of this book, so I thought I'd bump this thread up so we can prepare for solving the riddle. Hopefully it will have been corrected in the release!
 
Im pretty sure Dever has confirmed that he mucked up and that the riddle will be corrected - which will make the combat in the book a fair bit easier.

I'm also hoping that he fixes the horrific instant death paragraph in that book (where you pass through a detection machine and have roughly a 40% chance of instance death) and severely clarifies/nerfs the horrors of book 17. From then on its a free ride to victory in book 20 :)
 
Agreed - Book 17 is by far the hardest book of them all, especially if you have the Sommerswerd!

Having said that, the other instant death sections have remained, so it may well be just as hard as ever.
 
It might be expected that Banedon realizes that Lone Wolf can't readily draw and use the Sommerswerd in Ixia and so gives him the Dessi stone anyway.

After all, a weapon that needs to remain in its sheathe is not going to slay the undead horrors Lone Wolf will surely face.

After book 16, Lone Wolf doesn't have access to the Dagger of Vashna or the sword Helshezag any more and the Jewelled Mace doesn't give a set benefit and so doesn't help either. And the grand master books themselves doesn't give access to new powerful weapons either.
 
How about a new paragraph where Banedon infuses the jewelled mace with power and grants it a special bonus?

Or perhaps the crystal star pendant is imbued to provide you with some ability to escape death, like a reroll etc? Either option would add utility to otherwise useless items!
 
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