Something that has always bothered me with the “one of us tells the truth, the other one lies” conundrums is couldn’t you just ask a simple question with a known answer to check who’s who? Something like “what’s 1+1” or even a logic question like “if A is true and B is true, is the condition of A AND B true or false?”
Either of their proposed questions should still immediately tell you which door is which, though.
What would be really fun is determining which door tells the truth, then coming back periodically and asking it questions about how the setting’s metaphysics work, or where an important NPC is at the moment, or what the BBEG’s weakness is.
Either of their proposed questions should still immediately tell you which door is which, though.
No it doesn’t.
There are two doors. One door leads to death, One door leads to salvation. You have one question to ask. “What is 1+1?” You ask the guard on the left. The guard replies “Three!”. The guard on the left is clearly the liar, but you’re out of questions. You have no idea which door to go through.
Knowing which soldier is telling the truth doesn’t tell you which door is which. You’d need a second question for that to help.
Yes, that would let you know if the one you asked tells the truth or lies. But IIRC those riddles are usually constructed such that that is not enough to solve them. For example, sometimes there are more than two people that you need to identify. Or you need to find the correct door amongst multiple. All with a single question to one of the people.
Something that has always bothered me with the “one of us tells the truth, the other one lies” conundrums is couldn’t you just ask a simple question with a known answer to check who’s who? Something like “what’s 1+1” or even a logic question like “if A is true and B is true, is the condition of A AND B true or false?”
The full riddle limits you to one question.
Either of their proposed questions should still immediately tell you which door is which, though.
What would be really fun is determining which door tells the truth, then coming back periodically and asking it questions about how the setting’s metaphysics work, or where an important NPC is at the moment, or what the BBEG’s weakness is.
No it doesn’t.
There are two doors. One door leads to death, One door leads to salvation. You have one question to ask. “What is 1+1?” You ask the guard on the left. The guard replies “Three!”. The guard on the left is clearly the liar, but you’re out of questions. You have no idea which door to go through.
Knowing which soldier is telling the truth doesn’t tell you which door is which. You’d need a second question for that to help.
The truth telling guard doesn’t have to be in front of the safe door.
“I don’t know” can be a truthful statement. Why would door guy be omniscient?
Yeh but non answers are usually not allowed because use of them can easily make the riddle completely unsolvable.
with a lot of these riddles you don’t get to ask a question, you can only listen to their statements to determine who is telling the truth.
Yes, that would let you know if the one you asked tells the truth or lies. But IIRC those riddles are usually constructed such that that is not enough to solve them. For example, sometimes there are more than two people that you need to identify. Or you need to find the correct door amongst multiple. All with a single question to one of the people.
Tim, the third guard who stabs people who ask tricky questions.
Then you’ve used up your quota and can’t ask any more useful questions.