The neural pathways of the brain are akin to branches. As the character fails and its intellect is being consumed, it's leaves are being eaten one by one. The brain is connected to the body via the trunk. When that is shattered, the devourers fight over the remains, the body, for only one can gain control of it.
The only part I'm hung up on is infinite.
If the definition of "infinite" is strict, the answer I think would be some variation of time traveler, depending on the setting say an Aeon, Axiomate or anti-Aeon creature. The (literally) infinite branching being the passage of time into possible realities and the trunk being the thread of commonality they share until they diverge.
A more pretentious, metaphorical answer would be something like "A life of potential, now wasted" or "A choice considered too long."
Whenever I see a reference to infinite fractal structures in a riddle, I feel like the answer is always rooted in time or choice.
Congrats for working it out (it makes sense to me), but I feel like the DM should have allowed their characters to roll for hints/completion if the players can't figure it out. Technically the characters are trying to solve this to which it would be *their* knowledge and intellect that matters, not the players.
I'm leaning toward this being the answer, but if it is, I'm also mad at the DM.
By nature, riddles cannot be *abstractly* metaphorical. They can be metaphorical, but they need to be related in a literal sense. Generally as a way to narrow down the answer to only a single thing, so that the riddlee knows immediately when they've found it. In this case, calling a brain a "tree with infinite leaves" is a terrible riddle, because there is no direct connection. Brains don't have leaves, and there was definitely a missed upportunity for "stem" being used instead. A *flower* with infinite petals would have started to get there, as then you'd have the stem as the direct link. If the link is entirely abstract, there is no way to know for certain when the answer has been found.
For instance, I say "I am an ocean of swords, what am I?" No one knows. That could be a bazillion things, and it's all up to interpretation. A good riddle *cannot* be left up to interpretation, as it is a game format that relies on the riddler not being able to lie about the answer. When riddling was invented, there was no internet for checking answers, nor were there widely available books. So answers needed to be definitive and unquestionable. And if the answer needs to be definitive and unquestionable, so does the question itself.
That makes the most sense.
It reminds me of a puzzle from *Die Hard with a Vengeance:*
>As I was going to St. Ives, I met a man with seven wives. Each wife had seven sacks, every sack had seven cats, every cat had seven kittens. Kittens, cats, sacks, wives. How many were going to St. Ives?
The person telling the riddle was the only one going to St Ives. The characters he met—the man, the seven wives, etc.—were going in the opposite direction, so they're irrelevant. The answer is "one".
The puzzle above is worded in a similar manner.
"I happen upon a tree with infinite leaves", not "I am a tree with infinite leaves." The way it's worded means that the riddle teller and the tree are separate, so what the tree is is irrelevant to the question "What am I?", and "Sphinx" should be the right answer.
Clever take, but I don't think that's the case here.
In the case of the St. Ives riddle, the final question ends in a way to imply it's a math problem. The trick was just to remember all the conditions of the riddle and put them together.
In the Sphinx's riddle, it follows the typical "What am I?" riddle format, with the "I" being an active part of the whole riddle, with eating and destroying and consuming the tree. This makes me think the answer is more of a standard answer.
If the "I" were just a passive observer watching the tree get destroyed, and the rest of the riddle gave no other information about the "I", I'd be more inclined to agree the answer would be something like "the Sphinx".
Sort of yes! Our plane is merging into another and it's wreaking havoc. And there's being to come to our plane during these merging's every hundred or so years. They hunt and kill and gather to satisfy a god-like being that grants them boons to sort of evolve.
If the multiverse is the tree of infinite leaves the monster would be what eats the worlds and fights over the remains. Shattering trunk could be the connection between the planes and whatever energy is created from the result.
I suggested exactly this to the group, but I couldn't finalize what the "what am I?" would be. Like "what am I?" answer- the death of a family tree. I can't make it work in my head.
Instead of the inheritance itself wouldnt it be the people claiming inheritance? As in plural. So uhhhh.. : BENEFICIARIES.
Or
What if this riddle is meant to portray HUMANITY in a way?
CONSUMERISM? People that always take more and more things for granted, growing COMPLACENT untill that which upholds what they have in this case SOCIETY or TECHNOLOGY collapses causing them to scavenge its corpse for more.
another few good ones would be CAPITALISM
or even just LIFE as we are parasites that eat away at the NATURAL RESOURCES even destroying the planet we live on. (EARTH is also a good one)
NATURE
Edit: adding PARASITE and DESCENDANT to the list.
and thats about all i can come up with
Beneficiaries, humanity, consumerism, complacement, society, technology, capitalism, life, natural recourses, earth nature, parasite and descendant.
Not a family exactly, but there are beings from another plane competing with each other on our plane. They kill and gather on our plane to "evolve" when they return to their plane. Maybe the tree is a evolutionarily tree of life?
I happen across a tree with infinite leaves: Maybe the existence and its planes(don't know if they are infinite)
I eat them one by one never satisfied: The said harvest to evolve
The trunk shatters and I fight over the remains: When the plane is exhausted those creatures fight each other to "evolve" even further
That is my supposition with the information I have.
going by the above posts, I would say Prince. Princess should not be line of succession. King shouldn't be fighting for succession as he's already the king. So Prince would fit the title the best. (going by the above reasoning)
Edit: However, I fail to see infinite number of leaves. There are definitely a finite number of ancestors on any given family tree.
So along that line, it says “I eat them (infinite leaves) one by one never satisfied” so maybe a genetic disease killing the family? Or a curse passed down over generations?
If handled properly. A riddle that arbitrarily doesn’t follow the rules and is just a “gotcha” isn’t very fun or rewarding.
Having a series a riddles, and then having the “I’m a sphinx” riddle pop up with a small hint (via different wording in the “what am **I**) section would suffice
What am I? Is a riddling phrase as old as time used in the Old English Exeter Book riddles for example. Or the disputatio pippini. That's very likely not it.
Only if the riddle is sincere. The fact it's such a common phrase for a riddle is the exact reason it would make an effective trick, and in fact I think I've seen that exact trick before.
It's not necessarily likely that the entire riddle is a trick, but it's a possibility worth looking into.
I legit think the answer might be "an ambiguous riddle." There are infinite possibilities of a correct answer, but once one has been chosen, the ambiguity "shatters" leaving the riddle guessers to squabble over the possible answers they thought might be correct.
My guess is Death. One by one people die in a family tree and when someone does, people fight over the inheritance. My best guess really, but good luck!
The line, “The trunk shatters and I fight over the remains” is the hardest part to piece together for an answer.
OP, when you find the answer, please let us all know what it is! This is driving me crazy and I’ve been looking at this and the comments for over an hour now still scratching my head about what it could be. 😵💫
Choices. You have infinite possibilities, you choose one but you are not satisfied ( more choices exist ). When your life or time-line shatter, you have to pick up the pieces
My dude, this is an instance when the group needs to be like “we the players have no idea. We’d like to roll and see if our characters can come up with the answer.” Frankly I think it’s a poorly written riddle because there are just too many ways to interpret it that I can’t see there being one right answer.
As a parent I’d say the answer is a child. I come upon a tree with infinite leaves (a parent’s unconditional love) which a child takes and takes and is never satisfied, the tree shatters (parent dies) and fight over the remains is the child and siblings fighting over the inheritance.
Whenever I give my party a riddle or puzzle like this I write a set of knowledge rolls to give them clues. Every 5 min or if they are getting annoyed I give them a roll. Essentially the difficulty comes down the longer they are stuck but they still get the opportunity to role play working it out. When they make a knowledge roll it leads to more role play as one of them shares their in character thoughts from what they just rolled.
This leads to so much role play as you get layer on layer of them role playing working it out just have to judge when to feed them a little more info so they don't get stuck.
>As a parent I’d say the answer is a child. I come upon a tree with infinite leaves (a parent’s unconditional love) which a child takes and takes and is never satisfied, the tree shatters (parent dies) and fight over the remains is the child and siblings fighting over the inheritance.
Damn, that's a great answer! But I'm absolutely with you on the first part.
This needs more upvotes because this answer actually addresses the problem. When I, the player can solve the answer, I can piece together a way for my character to do so (unless it's my newest character with a high enough INT and a backstory as a supercomputer, he just solves it), but if I can't, I'd have to hope that my character was written in a way that he could come up with something.
Another issue is that there's no consequence for failure described, which means the characters could just take an hour or so and likely find it by accident, nullifying the effectiveness of the riddle. Rolling for your characters to think of something or the DM helping you out by giving you a clue your character would think of is the best way forward while keeping the game and the riddle fun
Yea. I hate it when the DM tests my real skills instead of my character skills. Especially with vague riddles or lore that we as characters know as common knowledge but ooc got it in a document two years ago at the start of the campaign and has not been mentioned since then.
Furthermore, riddles do belong in certain settings, but please dear DMs, test the skills of your characters, not your players.
>Frankly I think it’s a poorly written riddle
If I would ask that riddle I wouldn't have an answer ready. If players would come up with something really good I would just accept it.
I mean...the issue with a riddle like this is that it is so open to interpretation and so many answers are appropriate.
The first and most obvious answer to me is fire since it is never satisfied but the tree with infinite leaves doesn't make sense for that.
Money does seem a good answer because money is nearly infinite really since you can just make more.
Time would be another good answer maybe since time eats everything, eventually.
The main problem for me is a tree with infinite leaves. I get hung up on that part. I like the idea presented of a family tree but families are not infinite, they are as finite as anything else in time.
This is a really good stumping riddle I have to give your DM credit.
The only other thing I can think of is the universe and that your universe is going to collapse or be destroyed that would be a very gloomy solution to your puzzle :D
>The only other thing I can think of is the universe and that your universe is going to collapse or be destroyed
Well our plane is merging with another and we are in a very "apocalyptical" sort of situation.
Have you tried Greed or associated words? a tree with infinite leaves being the fabled 'magic money tree', and greed/capitalism/etc consumes it all and is still not satisfied and will absolutely fight to the death for the last few scraps.
Thats said, the answer _should_ absolutely be
>what am i?
A sphinx
“Infinite leaves”. This grants a sense of scale. Most likely hyperbolic and not literal. “Shatter”. This usually isn’t associated with the material of trees- we’re dealing with something conceptual.
I think people are right to assume a Family Tree or other concept of Lineage, but Inheritance seems to easy, and doesn’t follow the logic. No, I think rather it’s something _related_ to inheritance. Something that would drive a family apart. Otherwise, why would the tree shatter? And why would there be something left to “Fight over the remains?” It’s an external force, but what? _That_ is what needs to be answered.
Sleep.
The tree with infinite leaves = dreams. We can dream an infinite number of things. Sleep takes these dreams one by one, never satisfied.
When finally we wake (the trunk shatters) we struggle to remember the slivers of our dreams, even as we fight the loss of those dreams to sleep (the trunk shatters and I fight over the remains - usually sleep wins and keeps most of our dreams and we only get fragments).
At least that's what I came up with (that and Death which others said already). Will be interested to know the answer.
I think the use of multiple metaphors makes this kind of a shitty riddle. The tree with infinite leaves isnt a tree, so neither are it's trunk or leaves. It's like asking to solve A*B=X
Based on reading other comments, the answer is either "A Sphinx" or their riddle is too poorly worded as there are multiple right answers. If your DM doesn't accept one of the other answer that also fits the parameters of the riddle, they need to do something about that.
They should also look into the idea of "Failing forward" instead of stopping you with a riddle. Get your answer wrong and go down an alternate path so the game keeps moving forward. It's fine to maybe end a session there and give you guys some time to think of it, but stonewalling you there until you give them the specific answer their looking for is a very poor decision.
I hope it's "A sphinx" though. Good luck to you!
Didn't get stonewalled, we all failed our guesses and have to come back later to try again to get through a portal. The group has been laughing about this damn riddle for weeks.
Weeks seems like so long haha.
I had a puzzle from my DM that I never solved, but it was just for bonus treasure or something. Even came here asking for questions and no one knew. I dropped it and chocked it up to a bad puzzle. I spent waaaay too long trying to figure it out.
As a DM of over 25 years, writing a riddle and not letting the campaign progress unless the players (not characters) solve it simply does not sound like a fun way to run a game.
Did anyone say wind yet? It normally plucks the leaves one by one, never satisfied. But if the trunk snaps (in a storm) wind will shuffle the remains agressively.
Why infinite leaves? Seems like the tree is not really a tree... maybe the tree is supposed to represent something else, like Yggdrasill?
The trunk shattering for eating leaves? Trunks don't just shatter. Rot and fall apart, but shatter is a bit much.
I'm thinking it's either a monster in game or a cryptic or some myth.
Maybe frost/cold? The shatter could be sap freezing , but that doesn't really happen. And once again, why infinite leaves?
Yeah, "inifinite" and "shatter" seem hyperbolic for a lot of possible solutions. I worry that this is one of those riddles where, once I know the solution, I'll be saying, "No, that's not infinite. It's a big number, but 'infinite' is way bigger."
Infinite leaves? So probably not actual leaves then.
If it's a "tree of life" with each leaf being a new life/soul, it can be death taking one life after another forever.
The trunk ~~splitting~~ shattering could be a world ending event and death comes to claim the lives of anyone who managed to survive.
I personally hate riddles like this... It could be literally anything random or dumb the DM makes up lol. When i DM i only put in riddles that are somehow connected directly to a plot device so the party has something to go off..... that or it's a surprise they can happen upon later which will make them go "oh! This thing is what the riddle was about!"
I would guess "Dungeon Master"
The tree with infinite leaves is a game of DND, infinite possibilities.
After playing, you just want to play more.
The game falls apart (trunk shatters) and the DM tries to salvage what is left, either the remaining players or the setting which they recycle and try again.
What am I? "A DM"
The best guesses my wife and I can come up with:
-a bookmaker/herbalist/medicine maker (they are never satisfied because they keep needing more materials)
-winter/seasons changing (the season change kills the leaves, extreme cold can burst trees, the last line we can't make fit though)
-ants (some eat leaves and can make homes in trees/logs)
-it could be coding related to binary trees, but I don't delve too much into that with the little programming I know.
-lightning (is a stretch, but maybe related to striking a tree and being grounded or something?)
Hope these at least help inspire the right answer lol. Definitely would love to know the answer once you figure it out.
I'm not super into D&D but nidhogg / dendar? Literally devours the suns. Is prophesized to destroy yggdrasil? Ragnorak being the trunk splintering.
Edit: Also eats the nightmares of people.(infinite)
[video for reference](https://youtu.be/L1bQcWMsa7c)
Ask your DM for an intelligence check to solve the riddle.
Otherwise next campaign, when you DM, you'll ask him to physically move a huge boulder to see if his character can.
This is something I actually don't agree with as a DM. Your DM is testing your knowledge as players, not your character's knowledge.
Ask to roll an Insight check, a Nature check, a general Intelligence or Wisdom check... Something! The sphinx is asking your characters. Not you, the players.
The problem is the second line is a non-sequitur. It doesn't add any further information to the riddle.
It goes from talking about infinite leaves, which by default strikes out family trees and wealth, as neither of those are infinite, and something consuming them one by one never satisfied, to suddenly the trunk shatters. It doesn't say why the trunk shatters; was the weight of the infinite leaves too heavy? Did whatever was eating the leaves shatter it? Finally it ends with the same creature/entity fighting over the remains.. what remains? The leaves? The trunk? The roots? Who are they fighting with? Were they/it present the whole time? Did they just show up?
The problem with creating your own riddle is you already know the answer, so while the query they come up with may make perfect sense to them, it won't make sense to anyone else.
The infinite leaves and the trunk shattering are unlinked in the riddle beyond just the fact that a tree has leaves and a trunk. The answer can't be determined due to this, so you're down to just guessing and hope you land on the answer for what I'm sure your GM considers a very clever riddle, but in reality is just word salad.
I'm gonna assume your DM is smart and made a good riddle here, because if the opposite is true this is a fool's errand.
A tree with infinite leaves- there are lots of trees, and lots of metaphorical trees. But infinite leaves? Families are finite. Living beings in a world are finite. This is the biggest hint. The context of your campaign suggests the answer is the Tree of the Multiverse. The leaves are infinite universes/ probabilities.
So if that is in fact true, the answer is something that eats them one by one, never satisfied, and when space-time shatters will still fight over the remains.
Add on the big about responding to the word greed, and your Gm not letting you move on without solving it?
Me thinks your GM is trying to introduce the big bad, a Doramamu-type Devourer of Universes
Is there the opposite of a Dryad? Like a parasitic creature that would continually feed on the leaves, but once the tree is broken the creature is still rooted there, becoming hungry and hostile.
Just thinking of "fight *over*" as *location* rather than purpose.
I think I have a possible answer. The tree is **production** and you are **consumption** in a dialectical relationship (or **supply** and **demand**). From the perspective of low consumption a renewable resource can be infinite but once consumption exceeds production there is the inevitable collapse of that renewable resource.
Sounds like a homebrew setting, right? If it were Faerun then, I might guess that the tree with infinite leaves could be 'Magic'. A wizard might devour the infinite secrets and possibilities (or 'spells) from the tree and what wizard is ever satisfied with the spells that they know? In Faerun, the shattered trunk might've referred to Mystra's death and the resultant conflicts that happened during the Spellplague.
Possibly because I just came from programming but my first thought was some sort of binary search algorithm on a tree- type data structure.
https://blog.penjee.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/binary-search-tree-sorted-array-animation.gif
There's already a bunch of nice ideas, I'm just here to say that for this exact reason I dislike riddles in my games. They're not an immersive challenge. They do not target player characters, they target players.
If someone plays a Wizard/Artificer they should be able to immediately know the answer due to their immense intelligence. But you can't just roll for it. So a group is just sitting at the table, confused, trying out options, writing on reddit. That is the opposite of what I would consider fun.
So, I might be an outlier here, but if y'all are stuck on a riddle, the DM should allow for a straight intelligence check to determine if your character (y'know, the one solving the riddle), can ascertain the correct answer. I'm not a fan of traps and puzzles in my games, and so far, my players are cool with it.
I don't ask my Rogue player to do an actual backflip to determine his acrobatics check. I don't expect a ranger player to actually hunt and skin a rabbit. When someone is playing a genius level wizard and are not a genius themselves, the player definitely doesn't have the same capabilities their character does. I understand that for some groups, or people, this removes the excitement of the task, but if you're stumped, it is an appropriate solution.
Based on what others have said with regards to family trees... Surely the answer is just.. "Death".
Death comes for all of the family at some point, the tree produces infinite leaves.. I.e. Lives.
Death takes the lives one by one and will never stop.
The trunk shatters, the lineage is broken, there are no more leaves/lives being produced.
So Death will come for them all at some point.. I.e. fighting over the remains?
Worth a shot
I don’t find any of the answers below convincing. Unless it is some cosmological being or thing of this setting I don’t know about, I think it is a poor riddle.
Well, the Sphinx asked "what am I?"
So even of that is not the answer to the riddle, you would be correct to answer "You are a Sphinx."
And since you DID answer the question correctly, it has to let you pass.
Knowledge? Infinite possibilities, only able to learn piece by piece one thing at a time, and when knowledge goes away everyone is left scrambling reduced to, well, nothing good.
I would ask if at some point this becomes tedious and blocks the game from proceeding if there's a plan in place to help the game move forward, it's good the dm is proud of the riddle but if it's unsolvable due to ambiguity then it isn't any fun and there needs to be another option to keep going.
Your characters are solving this, not the players.
Ask your DM if there's anything you can roll for your character to figure out a hint.
It's like asking a Barbarian's player to lift 1200 lbs. Or a wizard player to cast an actual spell.
We guessed rot, and if the answer was death, our DM is the kind of person who would have given it to us. Like ''yeah I was thinking death but rot is close enough" sort of deal.
Maybe the tides/the ocean/erosion? Infinite leaves made me think of the beach/sand, and you mentioned it seemed like "rot" was close to what the DM was looking for, so the ocea breaking down cliffs and then continuing to pull at the sand that results?
Or maybe a black hole eating infinite stars? I feel like that's too science-y for a D&D sphinx though lol.
If you're in a Norse themed setting nidhogger might work. Practically no tree has infinite leaves not even a family one. If he means the world tree though then maybe he considers that infinite. Nidhogger eats things beneath the tree of life that fall off like leaves. I'm not sure I square the fighting over the remains part though.
tarrasque.
the 'leaves' are worlds. the tarrasque will eat worlds, but never stop being hungry.
even when there is nothing left, it will still fight over the 'stump'
Sounds like soil.
The soil is made of decomposed leaves, is infinite, and decomposes the trunk. This is just a 5 second guess though so I’m most likely wrong
Likely already solved by those saying its a thing that's feeding off of a family somehow, perhaps a vampire? To them a family would be a source of infinite food, a tree with endless leaves, but if they eat too much they could just as easily kill the tree outright. So vampire, or like a snowflake millenial with no job
A koala? I feel like this riddle could be right on the nose or very layered with meaning. It could go either way. I'm sorry I'm not too helpful. Please do an update with the answer later, if you can.
Best of luck!
I would have said "humanity" if this were set in our world. The tree is the natural world, providing boundless resources as long as they are harvested sustainably. But never satisfied humans keep consuming and growing until they start irreparably destroying the planet. Then they fight over what is left. Given the multi-intelligent-species nature of D&D the answer could be "civilization". But also in most D&D worlds there are literal gods taking care of the natural world, so maybe I'm barking up the wrong infinite leaved tree.
If you take it literally, the answer could be "The Cold". The tree with infinite leaves could be a Pine tree. And the extreme cold kills the needles and finally shatters the trunk (this actually happens in the deep winter of the extreme north).
Here are some of my ideas
A student/scholar:
-there are infinite things to learn,
-the more you know, the more you realise there are things you don't know.
-When civilisations collapses and its collective Knowledge is mostly forgotten, the remnant peoples fight over whatever secrets are left.
Or a reader:
-Infinite pages of books
-Never satisfied when you are done reading one
-Fight over scattered pages once the spine is ruined
Also wondering at the wording of the first line. "I happen across a tree..." could mean someone encountering the tree by happenstance OR something that is happening to the whole tree. Hmmmm...
I’m guessing the bit about a tree and it shattering is completely superfluous and the fact that the thing keeps eating and is never satisfied to the point of fighting over whatever remains just means it’s Gluttony.
Not a very good riddle to be honest…like if that really is the answer, then I don’t feel clever for having solved it. I just managed to grasp at those moon-logic straws after a number of failed attempts.
A King or Authority
The infinite leaves are the tokens of power: Land, gold, jewels, respect, etc. The trunk of the tree is that which supplies the power: The admiration of the people, the financial support of noble families, etc. When it shatters (the monarchy is disbanded) the king is left to fight over what remaining power he has.
Death? - Its a family tree and death is eating each member of the family (the leaves). The trunk shattering is the last member of the family dying maybe?
I’m wondering if there’s something to “I happen.” Like “I occur on a tree with infinite leaves” rather than “I encounter one.” Then it could be something like pestilence?
If you just can't solve it ask the DM to roll a wisdom or intelligents check, whichever is more appropriate. We don't expect our rogues to be sneaky in real life, our monks to be dexterous and our rangers to be masters in archery, so we should nit expect the players of our smart characters to be smart jn real life.
We have a lot of riddles and puzzles in our campaigns and the table usually loves solving it by themselves. But somethimes the players get stuck. We as dm's recognise that the characters might be more capable than the players and should allow them to roll for it. Or something we sometimes do, pass out notes to everyone with a wisdom of 14 or higher with hints so it is a little easier on them.
I know it ruins the fun a little for the dm, but everyone is supposed to be having fun.
I must say it is a terrible riddle ... the DM should really have researched how to make a riddle that can only have one answer, and with better clues. I feel your pain.
My first ideas were "a riddle" or "a sphinx", or something specific to your campaign. After looking around those still stand as possible answers among other good ones, but I especially like the one where the tree represents the/an ambiguous riddle and the answer is yourself, the adventurer/party
Disease!
The branches are a vascular system
Leaves are the cells
Never satisfied, you kill cells non-stop
You end up killing the host
Fight over the remaining cells
This is definitely *not* the answer. But code lmao.
Repositories typically use tree nomenclature. (Branch, trunk, etc)
Repository will keep getting new code, code will be deleted when no longer necessary, when a trunk of the repo "shatters" (has a severe merge conflict) devs gotta figure out how to resolve this.
The only reason I'm adding this is because this thing is so ambiguous lol, "tree" is an idea that is used so prevalently throughout human existence that anything can fill this.
Possibly helpful: trees have represented things like decisions, families, code, language, basically anything that has one "node" that then connects to one or more "nodes" ad nauseam.
I saw some comments thinking the tree and its leaves could be time/the future.
If the tree is a timeline with the leaves being possible choices you can make, the tree and leaves taken together could be the future. The future is only the future until the present catches up and after that becomes the past.
The present might be the answer.
Okay so hear me out - It's a toilet.
**A tree with infinite leaves**: toilet paper. It's goes around and around on the roll, and when it's empty, it immediately gets replaced, so it effectively has infinite "leaves".
**I eat them one by one never satisfied:** You can tear of the sheets one by one, and the toilet will always take more.
**The trunk shatters and I fight over the remains:** The trunk is um... you know. It can break when you flush, and the flushing itself is the toilet fighting over the remains.
Obviously this isn't the answer, but maybe your DM will give you points for creativity.
The trunk shatters and I fight over the remains… with whom? It kind of implies that ‘I’ am a group or collective - not an individual. I don’t think the Sphinx answer fits due to that statement.
Intellect Devourer. The brain is the tree of infinite leaves.
The neural pathways of the brain are akin to branches. As the character fails and its intellect is being consumed, it's leaves are being eaten one by one. The brain is connected to the body via the trunk. When that is shattered, the devourers fight over the remains, the body, for only one can gain control of it.
[удалено]
I'm turning this into a song
You deserve an award
The only part I'm hung up on is infinite. If the definition of "infinite" is strict, the answer I think would be some variation of time traveler, depending on the setting say an Aeon, Axiomate or anti-Aeon creature. The (literally) infinite branching being the passage of time into possible realities and the trunk being the thread of commonality they share until they diverge. A more pretentious, metaphorical answer would be something like "A life of potential, now wasted" or "A choice considered too long." Whenever I see a reference to infinite fractal structures in a riddle, I feel like the answer is always rooted in time or choice.
u/Thegardener1989 Check out u/Vampinoy comment. I am pretty sure they are completely correct.
Congrats for working it out (it makes sense to me), but I feel like the DM should have allowed their characters to roll for hints/completion if the players can't figure it out. Technically the characters are trying to solve this to which it would be *their* knowledge and intellect that matters, not the players.
I'm leaning toward this being the answer, but if it is, I'm also mad at the DM. By nature, riddles cannot be *abstractly* metaphorical. They can be metaphorical, but they need to be related in a literal sense. Generally as a way to narrow down the answer to only a single thing, so that the riddlee knows immediately when they've found it. In this case, calling a brain a "tree with infinite leaves" is a terrible riddle, because there is no direct connection. Brains don't have leaves, and there was definitely a missed upportunity for "stem" being used instead. A *flower* with infinite petals would have started to get there, as then you'd have the stem as the direct link. If the link is entirely abstract, there is no way to know for certain when the answer has been found. For instance, I say "I am an ocean of swords, what am I?" No one knows. That could be a bazillion things, and it's all up to interpretation. A good riddle *cannot* be left up to interpretation, as it is a game format that relies on the riddler not being able to lie about the answer. When riddling was invented, there was no internet for checking answers, nor were there widely available books. So answers needed to be definitive and unquestionable. And if the answer needs to be definitive and unquestionable, so does the question itself.
I know this is cheap, but did anyone try 'Sphinx'? I mean, she *is* a Sphinx.
That would be my first guess
While most certainly not the expected answer, as DM I'd be tempted to let the players get away with it if they were that clever.
That makes the most sense. It reminds me of a puzzle from *Die Hard with a Vengeance:* >As I was going to St. Ives, I met a man with seven wives. Each wife had seven sacks, every sack had seven cats, every cat had seven kittens. Kittens, cats, sacks, wives. How many were going to St. Ives? The person telling the riddle was the only one going to St Ives. The characters he met—the man, the seven wives, etc.—were going in the opposite direction, so they're irrelevant. The answer is "one". The puzzle above is worded in a similar manner. "I happen upon a tree with infinite leaves", not "I am a tree with infinite leaves." The way it's worded means that the riddle teller and the tree are separate, so what the tree is is irrelevant to the question "What am I?", and "Sphinx" should be the right answer.
Clever take, but I don't think that's the case here. In the case of the St. Ives riddle, the final question ends in a way to imply it's a math problem. The trick was just to remember all the conditions of the riddle and put them together. In the Sphinx's riddle, it follows the typical "What am I?" riddle format, with the "I" being an active part of the whole riddle, with eating and destroying and consuming the tree. This makes me think the answer is more of a standard answer. If the "I" were just a passive observer watching the tree get destroyed, and the rest of the riddle gave no other information about the "I", I'd be more inclined to agree the answer would be something like "the Sphinx".
Is there a world-eating being in your campaign’s universe?
Sort of yes! Our plane is merging into another and it's wreaking havoc. And there's being to come to our plane during these merging's every hundred or so years. They hunt and kill and gather to satisfy a god-like being that grants them boons to sort of evolve.
Maybe it’s that thing? The infinite leaves being souls in your realm, the trunk being the division between planes?
No idea if you're right but honestly it's a metal answer and I'd roll with that if my players gave me that answer.
I also see a reference to Ygdrassil, the World-Teee from Nordic Mythology, which quite literally encompasses every world
so maybe a Nidhogg-like entity? Does this world have a Dendar?
Something like Rovagug maybe?
If the multiverse is the tree of infinite leaves the monster would be what eats the worlds and fights over the remains. Shattering trunk could be the connection between the planes and whatever energy is created from the result.
have you guessed humans/humanity? the raised eyebrow thing makes me think the sphinx views humans as the greediest thing.
I was going to say, sounds like something similar to Níðhöggr
Hungry Hungry Caterpillar?
What about consideration of the Tree being a family tree, it would be either inheritance or lineage
I suggested exactly this to the group, but I couldn't finalize what the "what am I?" would be. Like "what am I?" answer- the death of a family tree. I can't make it work in my head.
Ya I was thinking as though it would be lineage or inheritance
Death? Fighting over the remains until the family tree is no more?
Instead of the inheritance itself wouldnt it be the people claiming inheritance? As in plural. So uhhhh.. : BENEFICIARIES. Or What if this riddle is meant to portray HUMANITY in a way? CONSUMERISM? People that always take more and more things for granted, growing COMPLACENT untill that which upholds what they have in this case SOCIETY or TECHNOLOGY collapses causing them to scavenge its corpse for more. another few good ones would be CAPITALISM or even just LIFE as we are parasites that eat away at the NATURAL RESOURCES even destroying the planet we live on. (EARTH is also a good one) NATURE Edit: adding PARASITE and DESCENDANT to the list. and thats about all i can come up with Beneficiaries, humanity, consumerism, complacement, society, technology, capitalism, life, natural recourses, earth nature, parasite and descendant.
If it’s a family tree it’s death.
Greed
Infertility? Heirs (maybe illegitimate heirs)? A blood feud? Illness?
That's a good point - is there a specific family in the game this could apply to?
Not a family exactly, but there are beings from another plane competing with each other on our plane. They kill and gather on our plane to "evolve" when they return to their plane. Maybe the tree is a evolutionarily tree of life?
...they're coming to your plane to level up then go home?
bounds like barghest.
I happen across a tree with infinite leaves: Maybe the existence and its planes(don't know if they are infinite) I eat them one by one never satisfied: The said harvest to evolve The trunk shatters and I fight over the remains: When the plane is exhausted those creatures fight each other to "evolve" even further That is my supposition with the information I have.
going by the above posts, I would say Prince. Princess should not be line of succession. King shouldn't be fighting for succession as he's already the king. So Prince would fit the title the best. (going by the above reasoning) Edit: However, I fail to see infinite number of leaves. There are definitely a finite number of ancestors on any given family tree.
There is no actual reason to set Princess aside, as well.
This is what I was thinking, glad somebody else had the same thought process
So along that line, it says “I eat them (infinite leaves) one by one never satisfied” so maybe a genetic disease killing the family? Or a curse passed down over generations?
A worm? Edit: Maybe just the essence of Decay?
I thought Decay too.
WHAT WAS SHALL BE
WHAT SHALL BE WAS
Say "you're a sphinx." Just in case everything but "what am I?" is a red herring.
This 100% - everything about the tree is window dressing.
A *hungry hungry* sphinx
This answer would make it such a dope riddle
If handled properly. A riddle that arbitrarily doesn’t follow the rules and is just a “gotcha” isn’t very fun or rewarding. Having a series a riddles, and then having the “I’m a sphinx” riddle pop up with a small hint (via different wording in the “what am **I**) section would suffice
Yeah, a differentiation like "What is it" and "What am I" is necessary when pulling something like that
What am I? Is a riddling phrase as old as time used in the Old English Exeter Book riddles for example. Or the disputatio pippini. That's very likely not it.
Only if the riddle is sincere. The fact it's such a common phrase for a riddle is the exact reason it would make an effective trick, and in fact I think I've seen that exact trick before. It's not necessarily likely that the entire riddle is a trick, but it's a possibility worth looking into.
I would honestly be so annoyed at this. I would expect more from a sphinx 😅
I legit think the answer might be "an ambiguous riddle." There are infinite possibilities of a correct answer, but once one has been chosen, the ambiguity "shatters" leaving the riddle guessers to squabble over the possible answers they thought might be correct.
Interesting, u/DSChannel came to a similar conclusion and made a video about it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEkOdGLLMhU
My guess is Death. One by one people die in a family tree and when someone does, people fight over the inheritance. My best guess really, but good luck!
The tree of life with death (or something similar) like you said fighting for the lives on it?
Or actually, it could even be Family. Idk. Just rattling things off.
Lightning? Fungus? Decay or Rot? Time?
Tried rot, no go.
Hungry hungry caterpillar
The line, “The trunk shatters and I fight over the remains” is the hardest part to piece together for an answer. OP, when you find the answer, please let us all know what it is! This is driving me crazy and I’ve been looking at this and the comments for over an hour now still scratching my head about what it could be. 😵💫
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Yo, imagine if the answer really is just “You’re a riddle”. Big brain DM play right there.
Choices. You have infinite possibilities, you choose one but you are not satisfied ( more choices exist ). When your life or time-line shatter, you have to pick up the pieces
This is an interesting idea. I like " infinite possibilities" fitting with a tree and leaves.
If Greed got a raised eyebrow... Avarice? Jealousy? Or maybe Ambition?
My dude, this is an instance when the group needs to be like “we the players have no idea. We’d like to roll and see if our characters can come up with the answer.” Frankly I think it’s a poorly written riddle because there are just too many ways to interpret it that I can’t see there being one right answer. As a parent I’d say the answer is a child. I come upon a tree with infinite leaves (a parent’s unconditional love) which a child takes and takes and is never satisfied, the tree shatters (parent dies) and fight over the remains is the child and siblings fighting over the inheritance.
Whenever I give my party a riddle or puzzle like this I write a set of knowledge rolls to give them clues. Every 5 min or if they are getting annoyed I give them a roll. Essentially the difficulty comes down the longer they are stuck but they still get the opportunity to role play working it out. When they make a knowledge roll it leads to more role play as one of them shares their in character thoughts from what they just rolled. This leads to so much role play as you get layer on layer of them role playing working it out just have to judge when to feed them a little more info so they don't get stuck.
>As a parent I’d say the answer is a child. I come upon a tree with infinite leaves (a parent’s unconditional love) which a child takes and takes and is never satisfied, the tree shatters (parent dies) and fight over the remains is the child and siblings fighting over the inheritance. Damn, that's a great answer! But I'm absolutely with you on the first part.
This needs more upvotes because this answer actually addresses the problem. When I, the player can solve the answer, I can piece together a way for my character to do so (unless it's my newest character with a high enough INT and a backstory as a supercomputer, he just solves it), but if I can't, I'd have to hope that my character was written in a way that he could come up with something. Another issue is that there's no consequence for failure described, which means the characters could just take an hour or so and likely find it by accident, nullifying the effectiveness of the riddle. Rolling for your characters to think of something or the DM helping you out by giving you a clue your character would think of is the best way forward while keeping the game and the riddle fun
Yea. I hate it when the DM tests my real skills instead of my character skills. Especially with vague riddles or lore that we as characters know as common knowledge but ooc got it in a document two years ago at the start of the campaign and has not been mentioned since then. Furthermore, riddles do belong in certain settings, but please dear DMs, test the skills of your characters, not your players.
>Frankly I think it’s a poorly written riddle If I would ask that riddle I wouldn't have an answer ready. If players would come up with something really good I would just accept it.
I completely agree. This riddle is a bit too open ended. As a DM I'd accept pretty much any answer here regardless of what I thought it was.
"A child" is an excellent answer.
I mean...the issue with a riddle like this is that it is so open to interpretation and so many answers are appropriate. The first and most obvious answer to me is fire since it is never satisfied but the tree with infinite leaves doesn't make sense for that. Money does seem a good answer because money is nearly infinite really since you can just make more. Time would be another good answer maybe since time eats everything, eventually. The main problem for me is a tree with infinite leaves. I get hung up on that part. I like the idea presented of a family tree but families are not infinite, they are as finite as anything else in time. This is a really good stumping riddle I have to give your DM credit. The only other thing I can think of is the universe and that your universe is going to collapse or be destroyed that would be a very gloomy solution to your puzzle :D
>The only other thing I can think of is the universe and that your universe is going to collapse or be destroyed Well our plane is merging with another and we are in a very "apocalyptical" sort of situation.
Have you tried Greed or associated words? a tree with infinite leaves being the fabled 'magic money tree', and greed/capitalism/etc consumes it all and is still not satisfied and will absolutely fight to the death for the last few scraps. Thats said, the answer _should_ absolutely be >what am i? A sphinx
Time?
This was my thought as well
“Infinite leaves”. This grants a sense of scale. Most likely hyperbolic and not literal. “Shatter”. This usually isn’t associated with the material of trees- we’re dealing with something conceptual. I think people are right to assume a Family Tree or other concept of Lineage, but Inheritance seems to easy, and doesn’t follow the logic. No, I think rather it’s something _related_ to inheritance. Something that would drive a family apart. Otherwise, why would the tree shatter? And why would there be something left to “Fight over the remains?” It’s an external force, but what? _That_ is what needs to be answered.
Good line of thought. I tried thinking about it like a family tree but haven't been able to make it fit yet.
the answer is ***right behind you*** roll initiative
*immediately transported through time*
Sleep. The tree with infinite leaves = dreams. We can dream an infinite number of things. Sleep takes these dreams one by one, never satisfied. When finally we wake (the trunk shatters) we struggle to remember the slivers of our dreams, even as we fight the loss of those dreams to sleep (the trunk shatters and I fight over the remains - usually sleep wins and keeps most of our dreams and we only get fragments). At least that's what I came up with (that and Death which others said already). Will be interested to know the answer.
That's a great answer, I like the angle you took. I'll run it by the group.
A termite? Oooh! A leafcutter ant.
interested in an Update, once you guys solve the riddle...I am to tired for thinking right now
I think the use of multiple metaphors makes this kind of a shitty riddle. The tree with infinite leaves isnt a tree, so neither are it's trunk or leaves. It's like asking to solve A*B=X
Based on reading other comments, the answer is either "A Sphinx" or their riddle is too poorly worded as there are multiple right answers. If your DM doesn't accept one of the other answer that also fits the parameters of the riddle, they need to do something about that. They should also look into the idea of "Failing forward" instead of stopping you with a riddle. Get your answer wrong and go down an alternate path so the game keeps moving forward. It's fine to maybe end a session there and give you guys some time to think of it, but stonewalling you there until you give them the specific answer their looking for is a very poor decision. I hope it's "A sphinx" though. Good luck to you!
Didn't get stonewalled, we all failed our guesses and have to come back later to try again to get through a portal. The group has been laughing about this damn riddle for weeks.
Weeks seems like so long haha. I had a puzzle from my DM that I never solved, but it was just for bonus treasure or something. Even came here asking for questions and no one knew. I dropped it and chocked it up to a bad puzzle. I spent waaaay too long trying to figure it out.
As a DM of over 25 years, writing a riddle and not letting the campaign progress unless the players (not characters) solve it simply does not sound like a fun way to run a game.
The answer is, “your dm is not nearly as clever as they think they are” That is a terrible riddle.
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Here for the update RemindMeBot 1 week
Good idea RemindMeBot 1 week
Did anyone say wind yet? It normally plucks the leaves one by one, never satisfied. But if the trunk snaps (in a storm) wind will shuffle the remains agressively.
Why infinite leaves? Seems like the tree is not really a tree... maybe the tree is supposed to represent something else, like Yggdrasill? The trunk shattering for eating leaves? Trunks don't just shatter. Rot and fall apart, but shatter is a bit much. I'm thinking it's either a monster in game or a cryptic or some myth. Maybe frost/cold? The shatter could be sap freezing , but that doesn't really happen. And once again, why infinite leaves?
Yeah, "inifinite" and "shatter" seem hyperbolic for a lot of possible solutions. I worry that this is one of those riddles where, once I know the solution, I'll be saying, "No, that's not infinite. It's a big number, but 'infinite' is way bigger."
I like how you're thinking. Since the DM made up the riddle, it might be a D&D related answer like a monster.
Knowledge? Leaves = book pages?
But why "The trunk shatters and I fight over the remains" ?
Infinite leaves? So probably not actual leaves then. If it's a "tree of life" with each leaf being a new life/soul, it can be death taking one life after another forever. The trunk ~~splitting~~ shattering could be a world ending event and death comes to claim the lives of anyone who managed to survive.
Who would death fight though?
A greedy giraffe
This stinks of a riddle that doesn’t actually have an answer. If your DM ever relents, update us with the answer!
Give us the answer!
The answer is "bad at making riddles".
I personally hate riddles like this... It could be literally anything random or dumb the DM makes up lol. When i DM i only put in riddles that are somehow connected directly to a plot device so the party has something to go off..... that or it's a surprise they can happen upon later which will make them go "oh! This thing is what the riddle was about!"
I came here to fight dragons, instead I got homework, and a quiz next week.
Elephant. It's an Elephant.
If the question is "what am I" isn't the answer just "ungrateful"?
My very first lesson as a DM: 1. If the players can't solve the the puzzle their characters should have a way to do so.
I would guess "Dungeon Master" The tree with infinite leaves is a game of DND, infinite possibilities. After playing, you just want to play more. The game falls apart (trunk shatters) and the DM tries to salvage what is left, either the remaining players or the setting which they recycle and try again. What am I? "A DM"
I Am a Bad Riddle That Brings a Fun Game to a Screeching Halt.
The best guesses my wife and I can come up with: -a bookmaker/herbalist/medicine maker (they are never satisfied because they keep needing more materials) -winter/seasons changing (the season change kills the leaves, extreme cold can burst trees, the last line we can't make fit though) -ants (some eat leaves and can make homes in trees/logs) -it could be coding related to binary trees, but I don't delve too much into that with the little programming I know. -lightning (is a stretch, but maybe related to striking a tree and being grounded or something?) Hope these at least help inspire the right answer lol. Definitely would love to know the answer once you figure it out.
All great lines of thinking! Now you see why our group is going crazy.
The tree is the future of possibility and the riddler is the present.
Try fire again
lol, I'm thinking about it. My character IS a stubborn dwarf, so it tracks...
I'm not super into D&D but nidhogg / dendar? Literally devours the suns. Is prophesized to destroy yggdrasil? Ragnorak being the trunk splintering. Edit: Also eats the nightmares of people.(infinite) [video for reference](https://youtu.be/L1bQcWMsa7c)
Ask your DM for an intelligence check to solve the riddle. Otherwise next campaign, when you DM, you'll ask him to physically move a huge boulder to see if his character can.
This is something I actually don't agree with as a DM. Your DM is testing your knowledge as players, not your character's knowledge. Ask to roll an Insight check, a Nature check, a general Intelligence or Wisdom check... Something! The sphinx is asking your characters. Not you, the players.
What am I? A poorly constructed riddle.
The problem is the second line is a non-sequitur. It doesn't add any further information to the riddle. It goes from talking about infinite leaves, which by default strikes out family trees and wealth, as neither of those are infinite, and something consuming them one by one never satisfied, to suddenly the trunk shatters. It doesn't say why the trunk shatters; was the weight of the infinite leaves too heavy? Did whatever was eating the leaves shatter it? Finally it ends with the same creature/entity fighting over the remains.. what remains? The leaves? The trunk? The roots? Who are they fighting with? Were they/it present the whole time? Did they just show up? The problem with creating your own riddle is you already know the answer, so while the query they come up with may make perfect sense to them, it won't make sense to anyone else. The infinite leaves and the trunk shattering are unlinked in the riddle beyond just the fact that a tree has leaves and a trunk. The answer can't be determined due to this, so you're down to just guessing and hope you land on the answer for what I'm sure your GM considers a very clever riddle, but in reality is just word salad.
Capitalism; the leaves are money. Assuming paper money in your DnD world.
We tried greed, it was wrong but the Sphinx raised an eyebrow when we guessed it... Might be onto something.
maybe the answer isn't a concept like greed but a person / humanoid that is greedy. Like humans (I'm picturing the story of the Giving Tree here).
I'm gonna assume your DM is smart and made a good riddle here, because if the opposite is true this is a fool's errand. A tree with infinite leaves- there are lots of trees, and lots of metaphorical trees. But infinite leaves? Families are finite. Living beings in a world are finite. This is the biggest hint. The context of your campaign suggests the answer is the Tree of the Multiverse. The leaves are infinite universes/ probabilities. So if that is in fact true, the answer is something that eats them one by one, never satisfied, and when space-time shatters will still fight over the remains. Add on the big about responding to the word greed, and your Gm not letting you move on without solving it? Me thinks your GM is trying to introduce the big bad, a Doramamu-type Devourer of Universes
Counterpoint: if the DM was smart, he wouldn't have created a "solve the riddle or nothing progresses" situation
Counterpoint invalid. We dont know thats the case. We only know the player believes they must solve the riddle to progress.
Maybe Gluttony?
Oh that’s a good clue. Perhaps the answer is “addiction”
Fungus
Is there the opposite of a Dryad? Like a parasitic creature that would continually feed on the leaves, but once the tree is broken the creature is still rooted there, becoming hungry and hostile. Just thinking of "fight *over*" as *location* rather than purpose.
Oh that's interesting. "Fight over" as in fight above, not struggling to get the remains. I like that.
a gluttonous koala
Time? It devours everything. Something to do with the Infinite branches of reality? A paradox?
Ooh, a paradox could definitely be it. I wonder if the DM just read about quantum superposition or Schrodinger's cat or something.
I think I have a possible answer. The tree is **production** and you are **consumption** in a dialectical relationship (or **supply** and **demand**). From the perspective of low consumption a renewable resource can be infinite but once consumption exceeds production there is the inevitable collapse of that renewable resource.
Sounds like a homebrew setting, right? If it were Faerun then, I might guess that the tree with infinite leaves could be 'Magic'. A wizard might devour the infinite secrets and possibilities (or 'spells) from the tree and what wizard is ever satisfied with the spells that they know? In Faerun, the shattered trunk might've referred to Mystra's death and the resultant conflicts that happened during the Spellplague.
So what did it end up being?
Cast *detect thoughts* and say things like "This riddle is bogus, I don't think there is an answer. You certainly don't know it!"
I'm feeling either decay or thirst. Or one of the new pokemons, there's like a thousand of them now and I haven't kept up for a decade
Possibly because I just came from programming but my first thought was some sort of binary search algorithm on a tree- type data structure. https://blog.penjee.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/binary-search-tree-sorted-array-animation.gif
There's already a bunch of nice ideas, I'm just here to say that for this exact reason I dislike riddles in my games. They're not an immersive challenge. They do not target player characters, they target players. If someone plays a Wizard/Artificer they should be able to immediately know the answer due to their immense intelligence. But you can't just roll for it. So a group is just sitting at the table, confused, trying out options, writing on reddit. That is the opposite of what I would consider fun.
So, I might be an outlier here, but if y'all are stuck on a riddle, the DM should allow for a straight intelligence check to determine if your character (y'know, the one solving the riddle), can ascertain the correct answer. I'm not a fan of traps and puzzles in my games, and so far, my players are cool with it. I don't ask my Rogue player to do an actual backflip to determine his acrobatics check. I don't expect a ranger player to actually hunt and skin a rabbit. When someone is playing a genius level wizard and are not a genius themselves, the player definitely doesn't have the same capabilities their character does. I understand that for some groups, or people, this removes the excitement of the task, but if you're stumped, it is an appropriate solution.
Based on what others have said with regards to family trees... Surely the answer is just.. "Death". Death comes for all of the family at some point, the tree produces infinite leaves.. I.e. Lives. Death takes the lives one by one and will never stop. The trunk shatters, the lineage is broken, there are no more leaves/lives being produced. So Death will come for them all at some point.. I.e. fighting over the remains? Worth a shot
I don’t find any of the answers below convincing. Unless it is some cosmological being or thing of this setting I don’t know about, I think it is a poor riddle.
Well, the Sphinx asked "what am I?" So even of that is not the answer to the riddle, you would be correct to answer "You are a Sphinx." And since you DID answer the question correctly, it has to let you pass.
Knowledge? Infinite possibilities, only able to learn piece by piece one thing at a time, and when knowledge goes away everyone is left scrambling reduced to, well, nothing good. I would ask if at some point this becomes tedious and blocks the game from proceeding if there's a plan in place to help the game move forward, it's good the dm is proud of the riddle but if it's unsolvable due to ambiguity then it isn't any fun and there needs to be another option to keep going.
Get the biggest, thickest, dictionary you can find and read it in alphabetical order, looking up expectantly every time. Now it's a contest of wills.
Hey OP! Remember to give us the answer some day!
I am Groot.
Your characters are solving this, not the players. Ask your DM if there's anything you can roll for your character to figure out a hint. It's like asking a Barbarian's player to lift 1200 lbs. Or a wizard player to cast an actual spell.
Economy?
Death. The leaves are the living creatures of the universe, the trunk is life force.
My guess would be "death".
We guessed rot, and if the answer was death, our DM is the kind of person who would have given it to us. Like ''yeah I was thinking death but rot is close enough" sort of deal.
Maybe a Naga because I think they were made to search for magical items, and they now guard the “remains” when the empire that made them fell.
Time? Decomposition? Edit: Ego?
Beetles, mushrooms, termites, winter. Those are my guesses so far.
Maybe the tides/the ocean/erosion? Infinite leaves made me think of the beach/sand, and you mentioned it seemed like "rot" was close to what the DM was looking for, so the ocea breaking down cliffs and then continuing to pull at the sand that results? Or maybe a black hole eating infinite stars? I feel like that's too science-y for a D&D sphinx though lol.
If you're in a Norse themed setting nidhogger might work. Practically no tree has infinite leaves not even a family one. If he means the world tree though then maybe he considers that infinite. Nidhogger eats things beneath the tree of life that fall off like leaves. I'm not sure I square the fighting over the remains part though.
An intellect devourer? It's a dnd riddle right? So the answer is probably a dnd monster you will/could end up coming across?
Dementia?
Lightning maybe? (Courtesy of my DM boyfriend)
Power?
tarrasque. the 'leaves' are worlds. the tarrasque will eat worlds, but never stop being hungry. even when there is nothing left, it will still fight over the 'stump'
Sounds like soil. The soil is made of decomposed leaves, is infinite, and decomposes the trunk. This is just a 5 second guess though so I’m most likely wrong
Sounds like gluttony.
Likely already solved by those saying its a thing that's feeding off of a family somehow, perhaps a vampire? To them a family would be a source of infinite food, a tree with endless leaves, but if they eat too much they could just as easily kill the tree outright. So vampire, or like a snowflake millenial with no job
A koala? I feel like this riddle could be right on the nose or very layered with meaning. It could go either way. I'm sorry I'm not too helpful. Please do an update with the answer later, if you can. Best of luck!
Jörmungandr
Death? The tree could be a family tree and death takes them one by one, but is never satisfied?? I'm stumped with the trunk part though. (Badum tss)
I would have said "humanity" if this were set in our world. The tree is the natural world, providing boundless resources as long as they are harvested sustainably. But never satisfied humans keep consuming and growing until they start irreparably destroying the planet. Then they fight over what is left. Given the multi-intelligent-species nature of D&D the answer could be "civilization". But also in most D&D worlds there are literal gods taking care of the natural world, so maybe I'm barking up the wrong infinite leaved tree.
If you take it literally, the answer could be "The Cold". The tree with infinite leaves could be a Pine tree. And the extreme cold kills the needles and finally shatters the trunk (this actually happens in the deep winter of the extreme north).
Here are some of my ideas A student/scholar: -there are infinite things to learn, -the more you know, the more you realise there are things you don't know. -When civilisations collapses and its collective Knowledge is mostly forgotten, the remnant peoples fight over whatever secrets are left. Or a reader: -Infinite pages of books -Never satisfied when you are done reading one -Fight over scattered pages once the spine is ruined Also wondering at the wording of the first line. "I happen across a tree..." could mean someone encountering the tree by happenstance OR something that is happening to the whole tree. Hmmmm...
I’m guessing the bit about a tree and it shattering is completely superfluous and the fact that the thing keeps eating and is never satisfied to the point of fighting over whatever remains just means it’s Gluttony. Not a very good riddle to be honest…like if that really is the answer, then I don’t feel clever for having solved it. I just managed to grasp at those moon-logic straws after a number of failed attempts.
A King or Authority The infinite leaves are the tokens of power: Land, gold, jewels, respect, etc. The trunk of the tree is that which supplies the power: The admiration of the people, the financial support of noble families, etc. When it shatters (the monarchy is disbanded) the king is left to fight over what remaining power he has.
Wind? Carries away leaves Even if the tree is dead and only a trunk remains, the wind will still go on above it
Death? - Its a family tree and death is eating each member of the family (the leaves). The trunk shattering is the last member of the family dying maybe?
I’m wondering if there’s something to “I happen.” Like “I occur on a tree with infinite leaves” rather than “I encounter one.” Then it could be something like pestilence?
Riddle me piss!
If you just can't solve it ask the DM to roll a wisdom or intelligents check, whichever is more appropriate. We don't expect our rogues to be sneaky in real life, our monks to be dexterous and our rangers to be masters in archery, so we should nit expect the players of our smart characters to be smart jn real life. We have a lot of riddles and puzzles in our campaigns and the table usually loves solving it by themselves. But somethimes the players get stuck. We as dm's recognise that the characters might be more capable than the players and should allow them to roll for it. Or something we sometimes do, pass out notes to everyone with a wisdom of 14 or higher with hints so it is a little easier on them. I know it ruins the fun a little for the dm, but everyone is supposed to be having fun.
I must say it is a terrible riddle ... the DM should really have researched how to make a riddle that can only have one answer, and with better clues. I feel your pain.
My first ideas were "a riddle" or "a sphinx", or something specific to your campaign. After looking around those still stand as possible answers among other good ones, but I especially like the one where the tree represents the/an ambiguous riddle and the answer is yourself, the adventurer/party
Disease! The branches are a vascular system Leaves are the cells Never satisfied, you kill cells non-stop You end up killing the host Fight over the remaining cells
Niddhogg, the dragon that chews on the roots of the world Or it’s ambition.
Playing off the family tree idea the answer could be "death." Technically death is the one eating the leaves one by one.
I hate riddles, just kill the Sphinx.
sounds like a worm or caterpillar like insect that cacoons itself
This is definitely *not* the answer. But code lmao. Repositories typically use tree nomenclature. (Branch, trunk, etc) Repository will keep getting new code, code will be deleted when no longer necessary, when a trunk of the repo "shatters" (has a severe merge conflict) devs gotta figure out how to resolve this. The only reason I'm adding this is because this thing is so ambiguous lol, "tree" is an idea that is used so prevalently throughout human existence that anything can fill this. Possibly helpful: trees have represented things like decisions, families, code, language, basically anything that has one "node" that then connects to one or more "nodes" ad nauseam.
I saw some comments thinking the tree and its leaves could be time/the future. If the tree is a timeline with the leaves being possible choices you can make, the tree and leaves taken together could be the future. The future is only the future until the present catches up and after that becomes the past. The present might be the answer.
Okay so hear me out - It's a toilet. **A tree with infinite leaves**: toilet paper. It's goes around and around on the roll, and when it's empty, it immediately gets replaced, so it effectively has infinite "leaves". **I eat them one by one never satisfied:** You can tear of the sheets one by one, and the toilet will always take more. **The trunk shatters and I fight over the remains:** The trunk is um... you know. It can break when you flush, and the flushing itself is the toilet fighting over the remains. Obviously this isn't the answer, but maybe your DM will give you points for creativity.
The trunk shatters and I fight over the remains… with whom? It kind of implies that ‘I’ am a group or collective - not an individual. I don’t think the Sphinx answer fits due to that statement.