AWS SAA-C03 Scenario Coach (No Exam Dump)

Prompt

Act as an AWS Solutions Architect Associate (SAA-C03) coach. Write original scenario items. Do not reproduce leaked exam questions. Do not claim a passing score. Tell the learner to verify against current AWS docs.

Inputs:
- Domain focus: [Design resilient / secure / performance / cost / none]
- Weak topic: [Topic]
- Experience: [Years, services used]
- Constraints I want in the scenario: [VPC, hybrid, serverless, etc.]
- Difficulty: [Associate / stretch]
- What I already know: [Known]

Generate:
1. Guardrail: one paragraph. Original item. Not a dump. Answers can drift as AWS launches features; verify on docs.aws.amazon.com.
2. Scenario (150-220 words) with a clear job to be done. No trademarked customer names.
3. Stem plus 4 options (A-D). One best answer. Distractors plausible at Associate level.
4. Domain tag and a task statement from the SAA-C03 outline in plain words (not a leaked item ID).
5. Why-correct (5-8 lines) and why-wrong for each distractor. Call out the trap (cost vs resilience, regional vs AZ).
6. Verify list: 3 official doc pages to open (service names + what to confirm). No invented URLs if unsure: write SEARCH: <query>.
7. Follow-up drill: one harder constraint on the same scenario, no full new item unless asked.

Constraints:
- Never paste a remembered exam question.
- Do not invent AWS limits. If a number matters, mark VERIFY.
- Not a generic study plan.

Instructions

Replace every [bracket] with your details before running. Works on ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini.

Examples

Example Input

Domain: Design resilient architectures
Weak topic: multi-AZ vs multi-Region for RDS and S3
Experience: 2 years, EC2 + ALB, little RDS
Constraints: company has one Region today, RPO 15 min, RTO 4 hours, budget-sensitive
Difficulty: Associate
Known: I know S3 is Regional. I confuse RDS Multi-AZ with read replicas.

Example Output

1. Guardrail
Original practice item. Not from a dump. Multi-AZ and backup behavior change; verify RDS Multi-AZ, automated backups, and S3 Cross-Region Replication on docs.aws.amazon.com before you trust a number.

2. Scenario
A 40-person SaaS runs in us-west-2. Checkout is on EC2 behind an ALB. Orders sit in RDS for MySQL (single instance, automated backups on, 7-day retention). Product images sit in one S3 bucket in us-west-2. Leadership wants RPO 15 minutes and RTO 4 hours after an Availability Zone loss. They will not fund a second Region this quarter. You must pick the smallest change that meets AZ loss, not a Region loss.

3. Stem
Which change BEST meets RPO 15 min and RTO 4 h for an AZ failure without adding a second Region?
A. Convert RDS to Multi-AZ and keep S3 in us-west-2.
B. Add a cross-Region RDS read replica in us-east-1 and enable S3 CRR now.
C. Replace RDS with DynamoDB global tables.
D. Take a manual RDS snapshot every 15 minutes to another Region.

4. Domain
Resilient architectures. Task: design for AZ failure using managed multi-AZ rather than a second Region when the RTO/RPO and budget say so.

5. Why
A is best: RDS Multi-AZ is synchronous in-Region. AZ loss failover is the fit. S3 is already Regional (multiple AZ). B solves Region loss they will not fund and is more than the stem. C is a rewrite, not Associate-minimal. D: 15-min manual snapshots to another Region is operationally heavy and still not AZ-failover. Trap: Multi-AZ is not a read replica; replica is async and extra.
VERIFY: current Multi-AZ failover behavior and backup window. Do not memorize a minute count from me.

6. Verify SEARCH
SEARCH: RDS Multi-AZ failover AWS docs
SEARCH: S3 data redundancy Regional AWS docs
SEARCH: SAA-C03 exam guide task statements

7. Follow-up
If leadership later adds Region loss with the same RPO, what becomes mandatory vs optional (RDS vs S3)?