20 RHYMING RIDDLES FOR FANTASY RPGS

Here are 20 classic rhyming-type riddles suitable for most fantasy games, in that they do not presume scientific knowledge (such as the moon affecting the tides) or technological advances not every RPG setting has (such as gunpowder or pianos). They also avoid many fantasy tropes, though I'm sure that any standard D&D culture would eventually develop riddles based on healing potions or beholders. Some of them are based on classics of the genre (10, 12, 15, & 17), but all of the rhymes and most of the rest are original to me as far as I know. The solutions are given in the first comment section below. By the way, I've tried to make these pretty easy to solve. Players get nervous enough when faced with a riddle contest; since the stakes in such contests are often high, and the players either get them or not, I tried to make them gettable. If your players genuinely resist solving riddles, however, or are truly bad at it, I suggest filling the riddle-contest area with pictures on stones (featuring a ship, the sun, a horse, etc.) so that players can simply look at 15 or 20 picture options and then touch (or offer to their challenger) the one that fits best. Of course, this limits your answers to concrete nouns or abstract concepts that have standard iconography (such as Death or Justice). Some of these won't work that way. Enjoy!

1. For many it is daily fare,

This drink that no man can prepare.

2. The hour displayed

In stone and shade.

3. I’m hung by my crown;

Fleets stop when I drown

4. I dance with ancient sisters three

But none of them is cold as me.

Beneath us mountains rise and fall

But we never change the dance at all.

5. When a bride sees us coming, her joy disappears

But the man in the garden is glad for our tears.

6. I hold you with feet and back

Though arms I sometimes lack.

7. Feathered, I fly

Landing, I die

What strange bird am I?

8. I come by night

To paint things white

But come the sun

My time is done

9. My light casts no shade

And is nightly displayed.

10. Born black as night,

Next red with heat,

Then cold and white,

My life’s complete.

11. A box that everybody needs in time

But no one wants to use it in their prime.

12. The emptier it gets, the more it grows

As every laborer knows.

13. Rings within rings, but no jeweler has made them;

Soldiers and kings have in battle displayed them.

14. A thousand soldiers guard this golden hoard,

Each with a single sword;

There’s just one door, so theft is quite a feat,

But the reward is sweet.

15. No food I cook will ever fill me

And yet one simple drink will kill me

16. A bottle of future and a bottle of past

Are held in a kiss that holds both of them fast.

When one of them takes, then the other one gives

And then they trade places as long as each lives.

17. The instant my name is spoken

I am broken.

18. My name is not the name my face displays.

That name belongs to one you cannot see.

But we are both engraved in different ways:

Yours truly, and the one who’s under me.

19. My skin is rough and brown.

In spring I wear a crown.

And after fall

I have no hair at all.

20. When someone’s solved my name, I know defeat,

Until that moment, though, I have them beat.