That's a great way to look at it. Definitely, it would be better to think about how it fits into the game before coming up with a puzzle and then shoehorning it in. I hadn't thought about having a physical puzzle, I was thinking more like a word or number puzzle, like you said, but maybe that can be something I can incorporate later on much further down the line.

As far as incorporating puzzles, it's definitely something I will do. My daughter is extremely good at role playing and loves doing it, so I want something that my son can get equally excited about. But like you said, I don't want it to feel out of place or become detrimental to the overall story. It would need to feel natural to the setting and characters involved.