Long Riddles

Long riddles with answers test your problem solving skills. These lengthy puzzles test your ability to piece together information and find the answer.

Pot of Beans

A pot contains 75 white beans and 150 black ones. Next to the pot is a large pile of black beans.

A somewhat demented cook removes the beans from the pot, one at a time, according to the following strange rule: He removes two beans from the pot at random. If at least one of the beans is black, he places it on the bean-pile and drops the other bean, no matter what color, back in the pot. If both beans are white, on the other hand, he discards both of them and removes one black bean from the pile and drops it in the pot.

At each turn of this procedure, the pot has one less bean in it. Eventually, just one bean is left in the pot. What color is it?

Riddle Answer

Oracle at Temple

A man went to a temple to find an Oracle. When he arrived, he saw that there were two identical people standing in the temple, both wearing the exact same thing.

The two men told the man that if he wanted his future read, he would have to do something first. They told him that only one of them was the real Oracle and that he had to figure out which is which. They also added that one of them only tells lies while the other only tells the truth and the man could only ask them one question.

What question does the man ask?

Riddle Answer

9 Cocktails

You and your 4 best friends have just graduated from university and celebrate by going out for drinks. You head to the local cocktail bar, famous for the following 9 cocktails: Aviation, Bronx, Caipirinha, Grasshopper, Hurricane, Kamikaze, Manhattan, Negroni, and Vesper.

In the spirit of your celebration, the bartender tells you that if you can identify all 9 cocktails after the third round of drinks (one drink each per round), he won’t charge you for the cocktails. The group then proceeds to order 5 drinks per round for 3 rounds. Although none of you know anything about cocktails, with clever ordering and deductive reasoning you find a way to do it. How?

This is not a trick question. The bartender doesn’t tell you which drink is which when he brings them and there are no pictures of the drinks, etc.

Riddle Answer

King Octopus and Servants

King Octopus has servants with six, seven, or eight legs. The servants with seven legs always lie, but the servants with either six or eight legs always say the truth.

One day, 4 servants met:
The blue one says: “Altogether we have 28 legs”;
The green one says: “Altogether we have 27 legs”;
The yellow one says: “Altogether we have 26 legs”;
The red one says: “Altogether we have 25 legs”.

What is the colour of the servant that is speaking the truth?

Riddle Answer

The Reclusive Inventor

There was once a reclusive inventor who became so annoyed with unwanted visitors ringing his doorbell that he decided to discourage them by inventing a new one.

The device consisted of a row of six push buttons mounted on the front door, wired in such a way that only one of the buttons would ring the bell. If an incorrect button was pressed (even simultaneously with the correct one) the bell would be temporarily deactivated.

Only his close friends were told the identity of the correct button. Everyone else had to deduce it from an inscription on the front door which read ‘Exactly one button is somewhere to the left of the one, that is three to the right of the one, that is somewhere to the right of the one, that is next to the one, that is two away from the one that is first mentioned. Ring the only button of the six that is not mentioned above.’

What was the position of the correct button?

Riddle Answer

Long Riddles

Pot of Beans

Oracle at Temple

9 Cocktails

King Octopus and Servants

The Reclusive Inventor

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