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Traps!
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Traps!
#1Obviously there's a market for them in game worlds - creatures aren't the only thing you can rely on to keep those pesky adventurers from looting your tomb.
There's even a series of books called Grimtooth's Traps which deals with the subject, ranging from a lethality rating of 1, for traps that merely inconvenience adventurers to a rating of 5 for nearly certain doom.
So what traps have you all devised, to provoke, torment, and chase off your party?
My own personal favorite is the one which gets used on the player who utterly refuses to take part in the game, acting precisely the way to destroy whatever mood the rest of the group wants.
It consists of a perfectly round room, surrounded on the outside by a layer of nearly frictionless slime between the room and the external sphere in the stone. The player wishing o disrupt things is often delivered into it by a chute of some sort, which expels the player with sufficient force to make the sphere begin to turn...
...Taking the hapless player into the Reverse Gravity field on the far half of the sphere. Gravity, now reversed, takes hold and causes the playe to impact on the other side, turning it a bit faster as thy cross back over to the normal side. It repeats, the room spinning faster each time, until a terminal velocity with an acceleration force roughly equal to, say, fifty Gs is attained, leaving the errant player smeared into a thin film across the inside of the sphere. It works wonderfully for removing munchkins from the game.
On a less lethal note, I tend to favor traps combined with paralytic poisons, in order to get players taken hostage and forcing them to either roleplay out of the situation or battle against stacked odds to recover their gear and escape... -
Traps!
#2That's just cruel!
Ettercaps (the spindly evil woodfolk) are always good for traps: their pine woods are so dense it's difficult to see what's a trap, what's a branch and what's an ettercap...
Needlefall: The unfortunate character trips over a hidden wire and sends reams of pine needles cascading down over himself and the party. Well, pine needles interspersed with real, sharp ones dipped with spider-venom. Such traps take a long time to set up, and are not very useful: it takes ages to pull the needles out of a carcass for eating. It's mainly a sadistic streak in the Ettercaps which makes them use device like this.
Groinpiercer: This unpleasant ettercap trap is a simple long, sharpened branch tied to string which runs over another branch and then down onto a concealed trigger (a snare under some leaves or something similar). The character steps on the snare which then lifts the branch swiftly into place, with the horrifying eponymous results...
Pool of Fetor: A combination which at first appears harmless, but after a little while you realise the appalling cunning of the Fetor trap. A small boggy area is concealed under leaves, like a clagged-up pool. When a player puts her foot in it it releases an awful stench which clings to her clothes and feet. All very amusing no doubt. But the Ettercaps have spiked this natural pool with Fetor, their fear-induced secretion (like sweat), which naturally attracts Hazurgi, the vicious wolf-like inhabitants of that part of the forest. They will come looking for terrified Ettercaps, but finding puny humans will be just as appetising... -
Traps!
#3By the way, check out which of us are natural DMs by keeping an eye on this thread. The most sadistic traps are a sure sign... -
Traps!
#4I haven't used this one on my players yet, and I'm dying to:
The Rain of Toads- The unwitting players are travelling through a swampy forest, but unknown to them, it is owned by a vicious swamp tribe. They have set up a huge net of hemp above the characters heads. The characters have been stepping on snapping twigs. Every time a twig snaps, the string connected to it also breaks. When enough strings snap, the net falls, dropping huge clouds of poisonous toads upon them. If the players somehow survive the deadly tree-toad poison, the smell of the toad-flesh attracts the swamp's vicious Trogodons (Alligator-Centaurs). -
Traps!
#5As traps, obviously there are the standard protection glyphs which engulf you in fire or freeze you when you try to open locks. And then there are the non-standard ones...
Hand-melt: As your hand nears the lock it goes limp and sags, the closer you reach, the more fluid and droopy your hand becomes. At very close range, globules of flesh start dripping onto the floor where they slowly solidify back into fingers and knuckles.
Animated mechanism: You insert the key in the lock, when you hear a crunching noise. You look down. You're holding a key-hilt, and the lock is grinning back at you with an array of evil-looking teeth. Thank goodness you didn't try to get close and pick that lock...
Chinese finger trap: The glyph's magic keeps you held tightly (even tighter if you try and pull away) which is not good if you can hear approaching footsteps. Amputation is often the best way... -
Traps!
#6If we're going for door traps...
The door to the upstairs of an important person's residence is an elaborate work of artistry, detailed down to the nostrils and mouths of the peasants upon it. Now, the real door is hidden behind a tapestry some five paces distant; this door actually is hollow, filled half with a dry substance and the other half with a liquid, seperated by a thin revolving plate. Disturbing the door upsets the plate, and lets the two mix - resulting in the production of a fair-sized dose of sleeping gas, powerful enough to lay out even a sturdy dwarf for a couple of days... -
Traps!
#7There was one, that was simple, but made ye feel SO stupid...
Ideal to instal in a giants lair, or some other great creature. It is a door. There are other doors like this, great and massive, hard to open for little folks we are. This one is a bit diferent:
As other doors, it has a single handle to open and close, no lock. But its hinges are on the BOTTOM side of the door...
If you manage tu push it, it falls with a crash. If you pull it, it opens... right on you. The door is made of stone of iron and extremely heavy. Ouch. -
Traps!
#8On a spellbook:
An odd glyph among those dusty runes on the cover; to anyone untrained in the arts, it simply issues a commanding impulse to return the book to where it was found. To one of the magical arts, however, the glyph is much more danerous. Any spellcaster that the original owner of the book did not name as being allowed to handle the book will suffer an excrutiatingly painful shock, and if they drop the book (75% chance), the glyph is enchanted to select the single most powerful spell that won't damage the book and cast it against the offending mage. -
*Bump*
#9Another amusing trap, for a more scientific setting...
An infrared "eye" beam crossing the corridor at various levels; break the beam, you trigger the trap - in this case, a gravity trap that starts amplifying gravity - if you try to make it down the hall you'll be paste, even if you're the Flash - but you can make it out readily enough. Stubborn people are likely to be found later on as a thin, gooey mess spread across the floor. -
Damn, I love traps.
#10Here are a few of my favorites:
:evil: In Case of Emergency Break Glass - It all starts with a room, the room is seperated into halves by a thin glass wall. The side with the only door (where the PCs must enter) has 2 torches mounted on the wall. Across the room, on the other side of the glass, a treasure chest can be seen but everything of the other side of the glass looks a little "foggy". The PCs with almost always break the glass, causing a mass amout of Combustible Gas to rush towards the PCs and ignite on contact with the torches, i assume this must hurt. It can all be avoided by simply putting out the torches though.
:evil: Watch Out for that... ouch... - (as far as i know i came up with this) The PCs come to a hallway, about 15ft wide and 100ft long. On the right side of the hall there are 10 doors, evenly spaced apart. The area in front of each door to accross the hall is rigged with pressure sensitive floor panels, if over 50lbs is applied to the area in front of a door or the door is opened, a log will be launched through the door and crush anyone directly in front of the door. The logs are launched with great speed and force and about the size of telephone poles, saves and such are at the DMs discretion.
~ :D Enjoy -
Traps!
#11I would also look at the Traps books by WotC. I got them for xmas. Loads of ideas, hundreds of pages!
Problem is: most are designed to kill your players. Now I like pestering or maiming traps, but I'm not out to deliberately kill my players... -
Traps!
#12Thinking about a tombs of monarchs, and others, that have the ugly tendency to get looted, I came up with this:
A relatively cheap "trap" could be a simple corpse. Not just any corpse, mind you, but one that has died from some highly infective disease. Simply include the body(bodies) in some entry hallway, or where thieves are likely to enter/break in. Optionally equip it with some treasure, to make them search it and contract the disease. Don't forget the death curse, it looks much better!
While infected corpses in the very own grave may conflict a bit with afterlife or personal preferences, they should mostly work:
- germs can stay active for a long time (though people may not know about it :roll: )
- diseases that were overcome (or survived...) centuries or millenia ago may be still dangerous to the people. Even if the hardy adventurers survive, or simply cast that Cure Disease spell (sic!), they may carry the "Black Pest" with them... talk of a major campaign modifier. And don't forget to pursue madly the culprits that unleashed the curse of Rhudolf the Vengeful...
- maybe all that live now are descendants of those that survived the pest, and are immune. Just think of the minor flu one character develops, and it turns lethal for some people/race that arrived after the plague was overcome!
For some monarchs, I imagine this trap to be very fitting. Installation is problematic, but who cares. -
Traps!
#13Lazy Susan Trap - This trap is a cunning one. A key passage had a cul-de-sac built onto it during the initial construction. Once it was completed, the resident arch-mage cast a powerful enchantment over the intersection of the cul-de-sac, and the main passage. It was a simple, yet effective illusion that caused the party to deviate into the cul-de-sac. The illusion gave the impression of an endlessly long passage that could not be escaped by returning by the way they came. In essence, the party would be left to run itself to exhaustion, or even death as there was no escape from the powerful illusions.
The Key:Fifty steps from the eorlingas/guided by that which is sinister/Through dreaming eyes
What it means: The junction of the passage is marked by a painting of an unknown and obscure man. He was once an eorl of a lost kingdom. There are other paintings along the wall. Fifty steps is the length of the intersection of the two passages. The Arch-mage who created the schematics for the trap was left handed, and sinister refers to the left hand and dexter refers to the right hand, thus ambidexterity literally means both right hands. Placing the left hand on the wall as a guide keeps the PC on the right path. Dreaming eyes are closed.
Close your eyes, left hand on the wall, count 50 steps. you are past the trap. -
Traps!
#14Amulet Trap-Within a great temple are a couple of hundred Beetle Amulets each half the size of a person's hand, scattered on the golden altars. Should anybody try and steal anything, they all come to life and attack the perp.And their bites cause gangrene unless a healing potion or healing spell is used quickly.It is the number of these animated amulets that make them a real problem. -
Shameless Bump PAGE 1 TRANSFERED
#15Maybe we do need the Dungeon section sooner than later. I am leafing through some really old threads and discovering dungeon stuff.
Manfred are you up to it? Can you cull some good sources and give us enough traps and such to help fill out the section?
Do we need a dungeon category? Do we need a dungeon category? Do we need a dungeon category? Do we need a dungeon category? Do we need a dungeon category? Do we need a dungeon category? Do we need a dungeon category? Do we need a dungeon category? Do we need a dungeon category? Do we need a dungeon category? Do we need a dungeon category? Do we need a dungeon category? Do we need a dungeon category? -
Traps!
#16Yes. Create a dungeon category. Good idea. -
Traps!
#17Too little traps? OK. :twisted:
Accidentaly, my pack of Traps is not yet empty... I've to sort all the things randomly saved.
Take THIS: -
Traps!
#18// Please note that NONE of these things were created by myself. I only repost something from dead webpage. Credits go to their true creators.
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How A Trap Should Really Be Put Into An Adventure
by Lloyd Majeau
Traps are supposed to be deadly and incredibly mean. Traps weren't designed to be playthings, they were designed to kill. Just because a trap is supposed to be deadly, does not mean that it will have unlimited resources dumped into it. Cheap traps can be as effective as expensive traps. Here are some tips to consider when making new traps. Following the tips are some cheap, deadly traps.
The first thing to consider when designing a trap is, "Why does it exist?" Why would someone want to design this trap? The 'Gold Null Magic' room for example. This is the one with the glowing 5 lb. thing, the thick stone slab, the magical runes and the thin gold walls that the characters can beat through. Now ask yourself one question, Why was this room created? It is entirely made of gold so it must have cost a pretty penny, it is a one time event (considering the characters beat their way through the wall), and you can escape so simply! If any intelligent person spent so much money on a gold room, I think they would have made sure it did the job in killing the fools who walked into it.
Another thing you need to think of is, "How was the trap made?" Now there are multiple traps in there that would have taken years of work and toil to make. Like digging a 1/2 mile through earth (Chutes and Wedgies), or keeping any number of creatures alive while they are involved in the trap (any number of the traps had something with a monster chained to the wall. Doesn't it need to eat?). Even that one trap with the rings of spell turning on the walls (don't those rings have charges?). Most of these things would have had to have been built by gods in order to work, and if they were made by gods, then why are they so easy to escape? When designing a trap, one must think like the person that would be building the trap. First, the person would probably try to make the trap fatal or inescapable. Why would someone want to build a trap that can even POSSIBLY be escaped from the inside? It is pointless (now at this point, you're probably saying so that it will save the PC's lives. But now think to yourself on the intelligence of PCs: they usually head right into danger without a thought. Well, if they do that, then kill or imprison them). So, I worked up the following list of things that the trap builder would have to consider...
* Is it easily escapable? If it is, what's the point?
* Is it fatal? If it isn't, what's the point?
* Is it publicly accessible? If it is open to the public, any local Joe can trigger it, maybe even a loved one of the uilder. Traps only belong in an area where it is culturally taboo, publicly known (and therefore a trap to outsiders), or strictly private (in one's private study would be nice because he would know about it, but no one else and no one else is allowed in there).
* Are the materials required cheap or expensive? Available or not? Again, the gold room. How much did that thing cost? And availability, how much water is there in a desert? Very little, and what is, is greatly valued, so having some water weird trap in the only water hole for miles is stupid.
* Is it easily visible? An open pit. Hmm, I'll walk onto it (although visibility is perfect for reverse psychology, and even reverse-reverse psychology).
* Is it believable? Try to follow the laws of physics, or at least the most basic principles since magic warps the laws of physics. Shooting an arrow into a teleporter that teleports the arrow behind the archer won't work because the arrow will still fall while it is in motion.
* If an animal is involved, is it maintained? The many 'chained to the wall' monsters for example. Who feeds the beast? Why is it still alive if no one is in the dungeon to feed it?
The point? Think something through before using it. Now, my examples of traps to make adventures fun or educational.
Don't Touch. (Lloyd Majeau)
This trap is best placed before a treasure room or behind some altar or something. The thing is simple. An alcove about 1 foot deep is in the wall. Set in the alcove is a sword held up on supports (which are actually pressure plates). When the sword is raised off the pressure plates, blades swing down and chop off the hand (using a simple system of counterweights, the blades could travel really fast). This is a trap that is so obvious, that when it goes off you ask the player if he drools when he ties his shoes. It is best if the sword is worthless. Careful examination would show the slits in the walls where the blades would come from.
Let Them Rot. (Kevin Majeau)
This trap is best used in Egyptian pyramids or other places made with big stone blocks. Basically, there is a long corridor that has a visible corner or turn. This will grab player's attention as they wonder what lies past that corner. So, they journey down the hall and probably step on one of the many pressure plates dotted along the hall. When they hit one of the pressure plates, a huge stone slab falls down closing off their entrance (and air supply). When the players check the corner, they find a dead end. I'm sure that this will probably kill off the entire party, so it is best used as GM muscle when the characters start acting irrational (raiding taboo temples for fun).
Don't Look. (Kevin Majeau)
This trap is best used in some astrologer's study or something. In one room a telescope is sitting pointing to the wall (perhaps as an even greater clue, you could have no windows in the room). Anyway, when a force is pressed against the eye of the telescope, a spike shoots out into the eye. Mean as hell, but hey, it's an effective trap.
Traps set by stupid people. (Kevin Majeau)
This is actually something that could be thrown into an adventure involving a really stupid race for fun. The inhabitants of the dungeon love to set traps, but they're not too bright. So, the result is a bunch of nonfunctional traps (a starved to death scorpion in a locked treasure room, a rope and log trap with the ropes too long or too weak, a trap that jams, a pit trap that has a bunch of dead, previously poisonous snakes, etc. etc. Good for a laugh I'm sure.)
Reverse Psychology. (Lloyd Majeau)
I mentioned this trap before. Along a narrow hallway, a visible pit can be seen. It is actually an illusion of a pit that is not really there. Since the characters probably don't know that, they'll jump over it onto the illusionary floor hiding the real pit (right after the fake one). To make it effective, put big spikes at the bottom of the real pit.
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Kevin Sullivan
I once designed a door trap consisting of a very large, very heavy door with the doorknob right in the center. It looked like the door was boarded shut;
actually, the boards were not secure. Had anyone thought to check, they would have found that the door was hinged on the bottom. Instead, they just
got the two strongest people to grab the handle and pull...and were crushed by the falling door.
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Banana Peel Suprise
Thantikur
This is a nice, simple trap that can be put in any corridor.
Two pits, spaced 10-ft. apart, bar the PCs' way. However, the pits themselves are only 6-8 feet across, and look like they can be crossed with a decent jump. What the PCs don't know of course, is that the 10 feet of corridor between pits is extremely slippery (oil, grease spell, zero-friction magic, etc.). Upon landing from the "easy" leap, the PC will slide right off into the second pit. The slippery "middle ground" will also increase the difficulty in getting to/retrieving the victim. How deep, or what's at the bottom of the pits, is left to the GM's imagination.
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The Ceiling Is Falling:
The PCs enter a very large, round room that is approximately 200' in diameter. The floor is covered with tiles and many of the tiles have runes on them. The runes are fake, but if detect magic is cast the runes will radiate slight magic. If the PCs attempt to read the runes they just barely fail their roles. The tiles that don't have runes appear to be a path to the door on the opposite side. The path is slightly difficult to walk on without stepping on a rune tile.
While the PCs are trying to figure out the tiles the room is slowly spinning. Magic within the room prevents the PCs from being able to detect the spinning. At the same time the 50' high ceiling is lowering 5' every round.
The ceiling is actually an illusion. As the "ceiling" lowers a rope ladder is lowering at the same rate and is 1' above the "ceiling".
Give the PCs extra XP if they discover the rope ladder before leaving by the door.
Contributed by {Robert A. Phillips}
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When Is A Pit Really A Pit:
In the middle of a 20' wide corridor is a 10' wide pit. The pit is about 100' deep and several dark shapes can be seen moving around the bottom. On either side of the pit is a 5' wide walkway. When the PCs try to cross the walkway they discover that it's an illusion. The walkways are actually 50' deep pits. The walls of the pits are lined with poisoned spikes and acid is at the bottom of the pits. The original pit is an illusion that is safe to cross.
Contributed by {Robert A. Phillips}
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Let Sleeping Spiders Lie:
A wooden bridge spans a large pit. The first two or three PCs can safely cross the bridge without any problem. The next PC gets halfway across before hearing a scuttling sound. Two giant spiders, awaken by the footsteps of those who safely crossed the bridge, climb up and stand on either side of the bridge; cutting off any form of retreat. If any spells are cast at the spiders (i.e. fireball, lightning) there's a good chance the bridge will be destroyed, causing the trapped PC to fall into the pit of acid.
Contributed by {Matthew Thomas Kerwin}
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Pulsating Stone:
The setting can be in any long cavern or hallway. On the wall is a small opening, just large enough for a hand to fit through. Inside the hole is a pulsation blue stone. When the PC tries to get the stone out he finds that he can't get his hand back out while holding the stone. What happens is up to the DM. An example might be the floor and ceiling dropping down like an elevator with your hand stuck in the door.
Contributed by {@CiDpHrIeK}
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Flour Floor:
The floor of a room is two feet below the level of the doors. Filling that space is flour, packed fairly tightly. As the party moves about, flour gets kicked up and floats about. The effect increases as movement increases.
(1) Visibility is shot.
(2) There is a small chance of a PC suffocating (asthma?)
(3) Any large amount of airborne particulate is flammable (as in grain elevators). If the party has any source of flame (torch, lantern, pipe), the air will ignite in an explosion that makes Fireballs look like matches.
Contributed by {Pietro A. Semifero}
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Gelatinous Cube Hall:
An area of the dungeon is sealed off and a gelatinous cube roams the halls. The hall is dimly lit (if lit at all), making the cube nearly invisible. As the characters enter the room and proceed down the hall - an illusion starts behind them of hundreds of poisonous snakes (or whatever) pouring out of a trap door in the ceiling and coming in their direction. The players high tail it away from the snakes, only to splat into the gelatinous cube, who almost surely has surprised them.
Contributed by {Steve Bartell}
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Blatantly Obvious Trap
Talis
This wont work too often but seems to work very well once if you place it right.
I placed a note on the ground that stated "THIS IS A TRAP" in front of a small chest. For flavor I dropped a decapitated body on one side of the chest as if the hapless adventurer had been opening the chest.
Of course, the note itself is the trap and the chest is just an empty chest.
In my case, I had the note sitting on top of a magical glyph that teleported the poor victim into the middle of several waiting monsters. Even assuming it was an obvious deception, they felt compelled to make sure they weren't leaving something behind. The note doesn't have to be magical in nature, it could easily be covering a trigger plate or spring-based trap in the floor. Or it could be coated in a contact poison. There are a lot of variations.
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Obv...er...Not so obvious trap.
Greg Nikitow
I usually use this trap in a dungeon crawl. It goes like this. The PCs are walking down a corridoor (sp?). They come to a door at the end of the hallway with a button next to it. An engraved plaque above the door says, "Push me". Now, most PCs will either push the button or sit there thinking what it does. By no means can it be picked or magically opened. How do you pass it?
If the button is pushed, have something nasty (of your choice) happen to them. I never put down damage in my traps b/c I want to leave it up to the DM. This trap can be used for all character levels.
SOLUTION: The answer is easy. Don't push the button. Instead, push the plaque which plainly tells you to do so. The plaque will depress into the wall and the door will open. However, the button resets and the door then closes after 10 minutes of being open. The PCs are then faced with another dilema. How do we get back out? Let them figure that out for themselves. Propping the door open is a simple solution. Or you could put the door near a room/hallway which has an alternate route out of the dungeon.
Enjoy!!!
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Eternal Geas
Kid
The trap for this room is deceptively easy. The room is a perfect ovid shape, with no sharp corners (reason below). In the center of the room is a large ruby, worth alot of money. The entrance to the room is a chute entering from above, with rounded edges. Here's the catch. The ruby is enchanted with a Geas spell. Anyone who touches the ruby may take no other action other than to find a corner in this room, and then the Geas is broken and the Ruby can be taken. Hence the ovid room. No corners to be found. For atmosphere, add a couple of bones, and perhaps a person or two who have been cought in the Geas for a bit...
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Feats of Humiliation
Talis
I run a live action group and this was a particularly devious one that had everyone guessing until it was too late. Several of the players later told me they particularly enjoyed it.
Setup: A hallway entering into a dead-end room worked best.
The hallway had an ample dusting of a powdered contact poison along the floor. The poison can be as weak or strong as you want.
The room on the far end contained a magical glyph that would trigger a spell that destroyed the footwear of everyone within 10 feet.
Party walks through the hall, may or may not notice the poison. They are likely to investigate the room beyond anyhow since their skin is conveniently protected from the contact poison on the floor. They will probably explore the room beyond and, with one or more people inside, will trigger the glyph destroying their footwear. Most are annoyed by this but not highly alarmed. Its not until they find nothing of use and leave back through the hallway that they contract the poison and, not until they start to feel its effects do they realize something is truly amiss. Well armored fighters and powerful magic-weilders then fall victim to a trap that seems more a humiliation at first than a serious threat.
How I used this: I used a tunnel coming joining two outside areas so it was conveniently dim. It was more than light enough for the party to see that no creatures were in there and had no need for magical or torch light. They could see clear through to the other side. In this way, they quickly determined that any threat would be to either side of the door or concealed in the room and only did a cursory examination for trip wires or traps on the floor but could not readily see the powder mixed in with the sandy floor.
The party sent three people in to examine the room on the far side and I placed a bit of debris in there for them to explore so they didn't feel the room was overtly empty and, thus, a trick of some sort. When someone finally hit the glyph, destroying everyone's boots, they assumed it was simply to demean them and prevent them from outrunning someone in the area.
It took them 15 minutes before the first person started feeling really ill after coming out of the hallway before they saw how much trouble they were really in. I was kind enough to make it a weak poison that had a continual damage as it coursed through their system. Since they didn't have any antidotes with them it had the desired effect of slowly syphoning away their healers healing invocations without being an all at once death trap. The party walked away somewhat chastened and slightly humiliated for lack of decent footwear.
I particularly like that it didn't take super-powerful magics to accomplish. The poison was an herbal-based one that could have lasted for a while out in the open air. While it did take a fairly decent spell to destroy all the footwear in a radius, it makes more sense that destroying all footwear in a range, or even just the target if you're feeling generous, was an easier spell than destroying everything they owened or simply creating a lethal ball of fire that killed everyone in the room. If you wanted to make it simpler, you could even make it a small cantrip that simply unravels the seam in a leather boot causing the sole to fall out.
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maids mistake
DM Omren
The party has just entered a large caveran/room that is dark in it's far reaches. The ceiling can not be seen. When the party nears the center of the room, a character steps on a trigger plate. Allow them to hear a "click" and then a few seconds later a soft 'rustle' comming from the dark ceiling above. Suddenly several sealed clay jugs shatter on the floor. There is a clear liquid that sprays from them. Tell your players that the liquids funmes stings both thier eyes and lungs, but not enough to cause them any harm or hindrance. Evidently the chemical has grown old and innefective as a weapon. Actually this chemical is Amonia. After the party see's that they are indeed alright, they should proceed across the chamber. Shorty there after, while still near the center, they will set off another trigger that drops more clay jugs. These jugs land next to the first ones and shatter in the same way, spraying a clear liquid. (chlorine (bleach)) When these liquids mix, a thick cloud instantly erupts. This happens at about 6 places in the cavern, essentially surrounding the party. These vapors will cause 6d6 damage (save vs. breath weapon for half) for every round. Now it sounds easy to get out in one round, but figure into the mix that these billowing clouds not only obscure vision, but also causes temporary blindness (1d12 turns) and will hinder the escape.
It is up to you to decide their chances of escape. Personally, I don't like killing off my players...just severly maiming them
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Relief Valve
Thantikur
Set up:
10x10 (or larger) room with (tigh fitting) entrance and exit doors at opposite ends. Make sure the doors swing 'into' the room.
If both doors are shut, triggers in the center portion of the room are activated. Should a PC step on one, the ceiling drops rather quickly, but stops about 4-ft from the floor. The PCs' ears will "pop" as the air pressure builds up quickly (optionally causing damage/deafness) in the sealed room. The lowered ceiling partially covers the doors, blocking them from swinging open.
After a few turns (maybe an hour) the ceiling rises again and resets. However, those impatient PCs who decide to break the "still accessible" portion of the door, will create a 'releif valve' for all that air pressure (which is all that's holding up the ceiling at this point). Any hole will pretty much burst the door as the air escapes with great force.
If you want to be merciful, allow PC's adjacent to the door to be "blown out" with the air (before the, now unsupported, ceiling falls to the floor). Of course, being launched through a door and against a (corridor?) wall outside the room has its own hazards. Sadistic GM's could always have a retracting/concealed spike-wall positioned for just such an occasion.
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Trap for the gullible and cheap.
Mikhail
This is a nasty little trick to play on someone. Simple, yet effective on a gullible or cheap party.
As part of a standard treasure, put a half dozen potions in the chest/sack/whatever. Label them all, but be sure to include at least two that are labelled "Cure Serious Wounds".
The potions should be labelled correctly, with one exception. One of the Cure Serious Wounds is actually Inflict Serious Wounds.
Now, if the party is careful, they will do a detect magic on the potions, or an identify to confirm that the labels are correct. If they aren't, well, needless to say the poor guy who gets the Inflict Serious Wounds is in for a bad time. Odds are he will use it during combat when he is short on hit points. It will probably kill him in that case.
In my game, the player in question used it after the battle. He made his saving throw, but fell to -9 as a result. :)
Enjoy.
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The party finds a door to room that they know they must go through. The door is not locked and when someone turns the knob or handle, a clearly audible 'click' in heard in the walls. Nothing appears to happen. When the door is opened, only a small part of the room can be seen. A large metal cage stands open. The door of the cage is attached to a rope that runs into the ceiling. The click was the sound of the mechanism pulling the rope and opening the cage. Whatever was in the cage is up to the DM, but there is something in that room they have to have, so they have to deal with the monster.
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Ghost Dice
Erica Strife
The party walks into a room and finds two goblins playing with dice. These dice are actually hp dice that raise the goblin's HPs. The longer the party sits and watches the goblins the higher their HPs become. So you can have each goblin have 20,30 + HPs. I find this great at higher levels when the party has really big egos. They come in and think that the monster is a real pushover, surprise. If the party defeats the goblins and tries to retrieve the dice, which is most likely, use your imagination on what you can do to make these dice a living nightmare for them.
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Lich With A Sense Of Humor
David M. Johnston
A lich who spent a good deal of his spare time hassling the PCs had a particular taste for using cursed and unusual magic items. Some examples:
1. A pitfall, 20 feet deep. Center a Prismatic Sphere on the bottom. Cast a Permanency on the Sphere.
2. One PC found an item which made him immune to metal; anything made of metal would be insubtantial to him. The lich filled a 15-foot cube with solid steel set into the floor of a hallway. Every one else walked right over it with no problem. He fell in. No air, no spellcasting, no way to get a rope to him.
3. A wand is left on a table in a room with an earthen floor. When the party gets within 10', a Magic Mouth activates a Rock-to-Mud spell. (It is a Wand of Earth Alteration.) The party drops down into instant quicksand. If they do not remove the wand from the table in the same round, in the next, another Magic Mouth will activate the reverse-spell, Mud-to-Rock.
4. Stepping on the wrong spot in a hallway causes a brick to fall down from the ceiling. Attached to the brick by a wire designed to tear it open is a packet of Dust of Sneezing and Choking.
5. The group finds a Ring of Haste. The second time it is used, it will speed up time for the wearer at a 3600-1 ratio; he will experience an hour for every real second. It will also refuse to come off. The others will see him vanish. Everything around him seems as solid as steel, including friends, foes, and food. Doors are impossible to open. Unless he can cast a Remove Curse on himself, or arrange for someone else to cast one on him, he will die of thirst and starvation within 5 minutes (=300 hours).
6. The group finds an artifact, which renders one of them Anti-Magical. No magic works within 5' of him. Please NO MAGIC! It seems great (imagine bouncing Beholders like basketballs, etc.) until the PC is in need of Curing, magical Flight, or tries to go through a magic Portal. The funniest thing is, this Curse cannot be removed by normal means, since Remove Curse won't work either. If he's a front-line fighter, spell-casters are going to hate being behind him, since ALL magic spells and effects cease to function near him.
7. A Rope of Entanglement. The second time it is used, it ties up the user and his group.
You can see the trend here. This lich booby-traps items so that they seem useful, but boomerang on the PCs after a short while.
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Sean Campbell
The PCs come down stone stairs to hallway that continues on for 15 ft and ends with a lever next to the end on right hand side of wall. My PCs know me and realized that this was a trap (but they did not know what type or how to disarm it). But one of them thought, "Perhaps it opens up a secret door..."
One brave soul (the mind mage) decided to stay down stairs and pull the lever. After checking all three walls and around the ceiling and floor he moved away from the lever. Standing next to the stairs he used his mental powers to lift the lever and sprung the trap.
Lever cuts rope, rope releases pin, pin frees spring board (like a diving board,) slapping 20 arrows and sending them out in a rush. They shot out of the small circular holes in the stairs hitting the mind mage square in the back d20 hit at random for d6 damage apiece.
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Fun with Invisibility
pciccol
The way this trap is constructed is that it starts as a normal corridor, then a wall is built in the middle of it and stones are taken out of the floor in the general area of the wall. (I.e. if the wall weren't there, it would be a pit trap. It should look like this-
____________________________________________________________
_________________________ | ________________________________
Then a mage casts invisibility on the wall. All the PCs will see is an easily jumpable pit, but when they try, they're going to hit that wall and slide (comically) down into the pit.
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Hollow Bricks
Michael Anson
This is a simple trap. This trap is composed of a section of floor, which contains hollow bricks. When the party reaches the center (a maximum load of 1000 lbs.), the trap triggers, having the floor disintegrate under the party. The best part is that the trap is completely undetectable by any means, as it looks like ordinary floor and is not magical! The same thing can be applied to the ceiling and walls, concealing a passage or unleashing a large load of stone when the party moves around too much or probes the walls or ceiling. This is useful in sealing off the party so they can't escape. Note that once one trap is sprung, all others in a 50 foot radius are also sprung.
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Cheese Grater
DZook1
A simple pit trap in the hall drops the character twenty feet onto an angled plate, which is forty feet long, constructed along the same principles as a cheese grater. It can be constructed of simple sharpened steel (for those leather clad thieves), or possibly some sort of enchanted tougher-than-steel design (for the plate-mail clad fighter). Since the "grater" is angled, the hapless victim tends to build up some horizontal momentum as they are sliced up. I usually put spikes on the opposite wall of a vertical shaft into which the character is launched into. Lastly, at the bottom of the vertical shaft ... salt water. Acid works too, but I think the salt adds an especially mean twist.
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Swinging Axes
Jeremy Slater
This trap starts out with the characters walking into a long passage maybe 100+ feet by about 10 feet. The PCs see four holes in the ceiling of the (Keep) with beams of light coming down through the holes. The first thing that they think is that breaking the beams sets off the trap. My adventurers threw a rock down the hall w/ a rope attached and dragged it back on the floor to break the light and press any unnoticed pressure plates, However this does nothing. (Note the holes are about 5' wide). So when the characters cannot think of any ideas so they cross the first beam of light, just walk on through. Whoever steps in the beam hears a crashing and a huge axe blade swings through a thin section on the side wall right into the character. Dex check to take half damage. I choose 1d10 but anything is fine. So the characters think they get smart and decide to use a very shiny shield to reflect the light. The next guy walks through the light and -- BAM! -- is hit just as the first axe. Now my adventurers were upset, so 2 of 4 bolted the rest of the room, luckily nothing happened. The other 2 did not want to risk it and levitated as to not touch the floor. As they levitated past the third light beam the axe swung through and hit the floating person. Now this is when they got pissed. The monk pulls out a short sword and throws it up through one of the holes in the ceiling just for the hell of it. There is a scream and in drops a Goblin with the sword in his chest from the hole in the ceiling. It seemed that there were Goblins manning switches on the roof of the keep and were looking through the holes to see the characters. Boy did they feel stupid. But they loved it!
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Room of Dancing Colors
Timo Ikonen
This room has walls painted full of different colored and different sized balls (basic color of the walls is white). When at least two PCs enter the room, the door clangs shut and the colors begin to change... slowly at first, then faster and faster. All those who don't cover their eyes must resist or become hypnotized. Those who fail are under your control for a while. How long depends on the amount the roll was failed by. A few rounds should be enough. Note: those who covered their eyes will be surprised if those under your control attack them.
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Gold anyone?
James Perkins
Basically the trap is simple... adventurer steps on hidden switch, switch activates trapdoor over adventurer's head, and the contents of a 10x10ft. room buries puny mortal. The catch is this: the 10x10 room is filled with gold coins and gold dust. If the weight of that much gold doesn't kill them, then the smothering effect of the gold dust will. Don't forget, the character probably won't be able to move... woe to the mage. This might cure greedy players, even if it doesn't kill their character.
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Mark Morrison
This trap is basically a bowling alley. Have your party enter a room or cave with a long, polished wooden floor, a set of wooden "clubs" at the far end of the floor...in short, describe it well but don't actually say "bowling alley". The players will, of course, know what it is, and will hopefully be delighted to test their bowling skill. A number of balls will be available for their use, but one of them is cursed: When the player sticks his thumb in the thumb hole, it instantly shrinks on him so that he can't get it out. Strength and grease won't help, and of course the ball itself is impervious to physical damage; you need to somehow remove the curse to get the ball off. (Chances are the PC will use his/her weapon hand to bowl with. Can you say "serious combat disadvantage?")
Whether or not the trolls arrive at this point is up to you.
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Invisible Bridge
Mephistopheles
The PC's come to a large chasm. There is a single bridge connecting the two sides, and somewhere nearby (on a wall or something) there are 2 levers. The first lever makes the bridge disappear, making it invisible. The other lever makes an illusionary bridge appear nearby. The result is the PC's assuming the second illusionary bridge is the real one. For added realism you might want to have an illusion of a creature or something appear to fall through the real bridge and another illusion of another creature walking across the illusionary bridge.
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Ghost Busters
Mephistopheles
This trap is actually fairly simple. Throughout the dungeon, place various programmed illusions of a ghost. Do this several times until the players are confident that the next one isn't a ghost. Of course, they don't need to know that this time it really is...
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PowderburnHarpel
A glowing green cube appears around a victim or group, it can be as big or small as the DM needs. The cube is like a cell or cage. The more force exerted on the walls, floor, and ceiling the stronger the cage gets. It starts with a mere 10 hps but it increases with the number of damage done to it. There are only two ways out of this trap, for someone on the outside to reach in and pull someone out or to attack and destroy the square from the outside. For added fun you can have the walls shrinking to get them to attack the walls.
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Shadowgold
A short corridor leads to a mirror positioned at 45 degrees, pointed at a hole in the ceiling. It thus appears that the passage leads out of the dungeon. When a PC walks into the mirror attempting to leave the dungeon, the mirror collapses, causing the PC to fall a DM-decided number of feet into a chamber of sinister bats, ice toads, or whatever is the most suitable for the occasion. There's generally no way out except by climbing, or the PC's adventuring companions to drop him down a rope.
OR...
The mirror drops the PC directly into one of the "All fall down. And down... and down..." traps.
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NOSEBLEED
Daniel Olson
The PCs encounter a normal door styled to the dungeon. The door is not locked but if the knob or whatever means of opening is used the door swings rapidly open until it hits something then closes just as fast. If it hits a PC's head or body it causes 1D4 damage and immobilizes them for one turn. a variant is that the real hinges to the door are on the same side as the knob. The result: the PC is sandwiched between the door and wall. -
Traps!
#19EEEK
Eventually I am going to have to cut this post into a number of bite sized posts in the trap section:
Dungeon
-Location
--see setting locations
-Elements
--Doors/ entrances/ secret doors/ locks
--Ecology- See dungeon ecology posts, but inhabitants mostly
--Puzzles
--Rooms/ Halls: Descriptions for them
--Style - Types/ styles of dungeons
--Trap -
Traps!
#20Although I can't really keep up with the astounding amount of traps in the last post, here are a few traps that I've made for my next dungeon...
Forceplanes:
The final trap in most dungeons, the Forceplane field has, unlike most traps, no straight way through it. No puzzle can be solved to get through the curving planes of death, and only raw skill can navigate through it.
A Forceplane is a one dimensional line with infinite gravity, bound in place by several overlapping wards. Because it is one dimensional, its gravity is only useful when the plane is touched. When that happens, an infitely thin line slices through everything it touches, down to far smaller than an atomic level.
Because of the act of the planes cutting through the air, they appear as grey wisps to the naked eye. There are several such planes in this chamber, and the only way through them is to simply tumble and run.
Marble Tiles:
Simple black and white marble tiles line the floor of this room. The trap is simple- black tiles, when stepped on, reverse the gravity on that specific tile. White tiles use normal gravity.
The trouble comes when the PC suddenly has one leg resting ten feet above the other, resulting in severe groinal stretching.
Gold?:
Depending on a certain dondition (made by the GM), this gold can be either regular gold, psychoreactive glass, or an enormous elemental with flowing coins for skin.
Psychoreactive glass reacts to strong emotion- prolonged feelings of hatred or anger result in it turning into a hatewraith, which proceeds to murder its creator. In the presence of happiness, it disipates.
Psychoreactive glass looks like gold, but is lighter. -
Traps!
#21Corridor of Ageing
This trap seems like a normal corridor but a potent magical spell has been placed on it which speeds up the ageing process massively. Hair will grow white and fall out, teeth might well fall out, the person will wrinkle and grow weak.If those caught try and run through the corridor their weakened hearts will give them a heart attack and they will die.
If they walk too slowly they will also die.
The trick is to walk at the right speed.When they reach the end of the trap they will go back to normal, except that if they are bald their hair will have to grow again.They must reach the end of the trap to reverse the aging process. -
Request for Help
#22*cue Indiana Jones Theme*
So where are the normal traps? Rolling boulders. Collapsing Floors over spikey pits. Collect the several puzzle pieces around the tomb to open the main doorway.
Can we have some clockwork traps or traps that require cunning and puzzle solving abilities to solve, rather than traps of magic? Some magic trapping is fun, but some good old fashioned traps are always fun. -
Traps!
#23Ask and ye shall receive.
I don't really use many traps. I've found that the threat of traps is often just as effective. This is a mechanical trap that I employed some time ago.
The trap was really a combination deterrent and means of easing transportation. A large chasm separated the two entrances (one well hidden, one not so much) in a cave complex from each other and from the werewolves' den. A sliding platform was placed at "floor" level, which slid back and forth between two hallways. The separating wall and the platform (remember that this is all constructed over a big chasm) were covered in resin to resemble the surrounding stone. The motive power was gravity-fed, where a large weight on a rope would pull the "floor" to the next hallway. A swivelling ratchet & pulley system allowed the back-and-forth motion of the floor. When a tripwire was depressed, the ratchet would release, and the floor would slide. An unawares intruder would have the floor pulled out from under them (resulting in a long drop), and intentionally setting off the "trap" enabled the werewolves who lived there to bring the floor back so that they could easily cross the chasm.
The problem for the pc's in-game arose when they spotted the tripwire and disabled it. They gummed-up the holes where the wire ran through, and cut it. This meant that the floor would now not move, and cut off their way that they came in, as well as the way to the werewolves' den. Instead, they now had to make their way down to the bottom of the chasm & back up on the other side. The players didn't find out that the floor was even supposed to move until I revealed this after the adventure was over... They had heard the odd sound from the floor moving (the werewolves moving about), but didn't discover what caused it until I told them after the game. -
Traps!
#24A simple floor trap where the tiles are wafer thin and below them is a six foot drop into a pit full of spikes.Those who know about the trap take the long way around the edge of the room. -
The Pool of Pain
#25Diamonds, the treasure of a kingdom, within a shoulder deep pool of what seems to be water but is in fact acid strong enough to burn human skin and flesh very badly.Simple but deadly. -
My favorite trap
#26It is in a long hallway or set of hallways. The floor is stone or tile. Underneith a few tiles are mechanisms that "click" when you step upon them.
So people are walking along, and they hear a somewhat audible "click". They then panic and dodge. This happens a couple of times as they go down the hall. After they walk along for a bit, they can see at the far end of the hall there is an open "pit" where the floor swung open. It does not move when the clicks occur. They assume that it is a broken trap. The last click just before they reach the edge of the pit causes the floor underneith them to half drop to an angle, sliding them into a set of angled spikes or a water trap. -
Traps!
#27These are some of the other ideas I've used.
Unintentional Trap: In a very large and very old city (Citadel, Formour), the inhabitants have built additional layers, so that what was once ground-level streets are now subterranean sections. The pc's are slogging through the darkness and making a wide turn through what was once a curved road. They had a recent encounter, so only one person was carrying a torch, with the rest armed and ready. As they rounded the bend, they saw a glimmer of torchlight ahead and heard accompanying noises. They quickly dropped the torch, ducked into an alcove (what was once the opening to a shop), and noticed that the other torchbearer did likewise. Peering carefully around the corner, they could barely make out in the dimness the gleaming of metal from the other group, armed and ready for battle. After arguing about what to do and failing to come to a mutually satisfying plan, one of the guild rushed out--seeing a member of the opposing team running to meet him--and fired his crossbow... Crash! Shattering glass rained down with a deafening noise. There was no opposing group. The pc's were afraid of their own reflection from an old large pane of glass left in an abandoned storefront. The torch and gleaming metal of weapons were their own, and the noise was just echoes. Their own paranoia was the trap.
Classic Open Pit: This one has been done numerous times, but bears repeating. There is an obvious pit in a corridor. It can seem bottomless, be spiked, have a waiting monster, whatever--it's an ordinary open pit in a dungeon. The pit is a bit too large to safely jump, especially given the ceiling height, but there is a small ledge one one side. If they are careful, the pc's can scoot along this ledge to the other side--scary but doable. However, once the group is starting across (especially if they don't go one at a time), the ledge falls (simple weight-activated sliding bar) or crumbles, dropping them into the pit. Even if they only go across singly, you can still have one or more people on either side, with someone trapped and possibly dying down in the pit.
Running Nowhere Trap: This is an idea I used many many moons ago, when I was rather a novice GM. It works best if the pc's are running from an encounter, or have other reason not to notice small sounds or an odd floor. Prior to this trap, the flooring consists of rubber mats over gravel, uneven sections, and the like. Once the players start to get bored of this as "flavour text dungeon dressing" you spring the trap. The hallway opens up so that the floor is all that they can see in their light radius, and it makes a wide corner so that they cannot see very far either in front or behind. In a fantasy setting, you can have an air shaft blow out their torches to further cast them into darkness. Inside this section of hallway is a large and well-oiled treadmill, tilted slightly upwards. The player-characters have already become accustomed to odd walking surfaces, and the air shaft or chasing monsters will hide whatever small noises the treadmill makes--as will the pc's own noises. The troupe can potentially walk for hours without gaining any ground, and the area is frequently checked by local dungeon dwellers who know of this trap & how to get the tasty treats it holds... -
My Second Favorite Trap
#28This trap must be later in the dungeon where my favorite trap has been sprung. (http://www.strolen.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=33301#33301 ) If not sprung twice (once for spikes once for water). Down the hall, if you shine the light, there will be a pit. When you walk forward, there will be a click.
Okay same drill as before... so the characters get bored and since they know the score for this trap, they are pretty careless. This time, about halfway down the hallway, the click triggers extending spears. Either way you move down the hall, once the center click has been activated... the extending spears will shoot out of the left and right walls (at varying heights) as you move up or down the corridor. -
Ghoul Trap
#29Ghoul Trap by Steven Clower
A set of stairs leading to a mansion door would be a nice setting.
The trap is laid by having a section of floor cut out. A support beam, or several beams, holds this section of floor upright in its place from a burrowed out cave below, or even a set of tunnels. A small section of floor should be selected, perhaps 3' in diameter.
When the victim steps up on the cut out platform a ghoul pulls the beam out from the supported floor piece, thus causing the PC to fall to their doom. The fall itself may only be 6' or so and not even cause any damage. The 6 ghouls that wait below is another matter. Once again this one is not technically a trap, its just a support beam. Its not the floor's fault, someone pulled the beam. -
Traps!
#30Inspired by game.
Alarm Trap - When triggered by enemy creatures, this little number will alert your nearby minions to their presence. This is often a step plate and a gong embedded in the wall. However, if you want to make it magical, it is a small stone glyph covered plyon with a blue and red swirling glass orb on the top.
Barricade - This trap is set up by the "intelligent" monsters in your dungeon. It is a bunch of refuses, timber, and rocks four feet tall. This will slow down invading heroes for a short time, and allows their long-range fighters to wear them down a bit. Note that once a barricade has been set up, no one, not even your own creatures, can travel through it easily.
Delusion Trap - The trap itself is a small stone glyph covered plyon with a purple and green swirling glass orb on the top. If someone crosses a predefined boundry, it sends out a powerful burst of magical energy. It appears to do nothing. In a few moments, usually when they are down the hallway, the players will begin to see an illusionary monster.
Draw Trap: The trap itself appears to be a "standard trap", a small stone glyph covered pylone with an orb of swirling color on the top. After a while, many players will start shooting and breaking trap orbs with crossbows and such. This does work, it creates a small explosion of the correct type plus some concussion. However, like Fake Out traps, these are scattered about. They only go off when you break them. The explode with a greater range than a normal trap burst. There are Tetragoren appearing versions of this trap.
Dummy Trap I - - In side a small room there is a hanging cage with the remains of a fellow adventurer. It has a dummy, prepared (magicked possibly) with mechanics to appear alive. As the adventurers rush to his aid, an appropriate floor trap is activated.
Fake Out trap: The trap itself is a small stone glyph covered plyon with a swirling glass orb on the top. The orbs could be odd colors or colored like an actual fire/ lightning/ cold traps. The players will see one then proceed cautiously for no real reason.
Fake Out Trap II: Most of the magical barriers are enchanted by carving/ inlaying, or painting, mystical glyphs along the ground or wall. So similar glyphs and letterings are painted along the walls and floors, just to make the characters worry. Careful study of glyphs can tell if they are active or just false. A few are active glyphs, but there is no trap yet attatched to them.
Fear Trap - Much like Dummy trap I, in side a small room there is a hanging cage with the remains of a fellow adventurer. It is not as magiced to appear lifelike. However, it is magicked to emits powerful images of pain and death. The adventuring types open the door and see the guy hanging there all gorey and probably dead. Then the enchantment kicks in. Any creature that triggers one of these things will back away to collect itself. Of course there is a trap on the wall behind the door which they will accidently set off.
Fireburst - The trap itself is a small stone glyph covered plyon with a red glassy orb on the top. If someone crosses a predefined boundry, it sends out a powerful burst of magical energy over that radius. Any creature caught in the blast radius will be in a world of hurt.
Freeze Trap - The trap itself is a small stone glyph covered plyon with a blue and white swirling glass orb on the top. If someone crosses a predefined boundry, it sends out a powerful burst of magical energy over a that radius. In addition to the damage, some will be trapped in small blockes of ice (easy to free them from the outside). If this follows up a water trap or a wet/ waterfall crossing, the damage is increased.
Glyph Lines - Most of the magical barriers are enchanted by carving/ inlaying, or painting, mystical glyphs along the ground or wall. So similar glyphs and letterings are painted along the walls and floors, just to make the characters worry. Glyph lines are often in celtic weave patterns or patterns that can be jumped across and avoided. Glyph lines can be there for decorations or attached to a trap.
Jack-in-the-Box Trap - The advancing person sets off a Jack in the Box like thing set in the floor. This will usually startle characters. If the trap is alligned with slick floors or narrow walkways, falls will occur.
Lightning Trap - The trap itself is a small stone glyph covered plyon with a purple and yellow swirling glass orb on the top. Sends a bolt of electricity to any enemy creatures in range. Just like dropping the hair-dryer in the bathtub, it holds a special surprise for any enemies standing in water.
Manna Generator - This handy item is a large brass sphere with many flanges and glyphs attached to it. It is large and nearly immobile object is normally installed and a room is built around it. These empower many of the magical traps in the dungeon area.
Monster Generator - Tetragoren - The item is a phone booth sized pylon (2 meters by .9m by .9m). One side is open or has a shutter which opens and closes. Aboved this shutter door is a monsterous face and a colored orb. This item is enchanted to constantly summon small monster from other realms. They will produce one every minute or two, until the local population of monsters reaches a certain number. Thus imps, goblins, gorts, and so on, will constantly refill to harrass invaders.
Spike Trap - One of my personal favorites, This nasty little surprise will provide some extra ventilation in the armor of unsuspecting heroes. Touch the wrong section of floor or wall and out from a nearby area slides a number of spikes.
To make your players wary, have entire corridors have spaced spear sized holes in the wall. Unless the players stand right in front of them, with a torch or lamp, they will unsure if they are just holes inthe wall or possible extending spears.
Stasis Trap -Tetrajar- It is like a monster generator, but it stores some large/ powerful monster in stasis until the activation condition is met (usually crossing a boundry). The monster emerges. Sometime within the next moon, the TetraJar will summon another creature to replace that one.
08/14/05 Continued http://www.strolen.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=35384#35384
These traps work really well with the Dungeon Master NPC
http://www.rpgcitadel.com/guild/index.php?topic=750.0
Remember to think of combinations. Traps can be more than, kill the characters. They can become puzzles which must be resolved, disarmed, or out throught.
There is a number of netbooks with traps
http://www.mortality.net/modules.php?op=modload&name=Files&file=index&do=showgall&gid=4
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Traps!
#31More Traps Continued from
http://www.strolen.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=35010#35010
Cornucopia - Related to Tetragoren, it is a box sized pylon covered with odd glyphs and a red and white swirling glass orb on the top. If something crosses its boundry, it will summon some edible, but less than tasty food stuffs. This is mostly used to keep monsters fed while adventurers are scarce.
Fuse Trap - Most of the magical barriers are enchanted by carving/ inlaying, or painting, mystical glyphs along the ground or wall. The walls are filled with false glyphs just to cause players to worry. Fuse traps are active glyphs that are not attached to a trap. Once tripped, part of the glyphs glow magically. Then after a moment, another set of glyphs of the series will glow. These normally come in series that are three to five sets long. After the last of the set begins to glow, it sets of a POWERFUL fire/ ice/ electrical/ push burst. A three set series puts out a burst slightly more powerful than a standard burst. A five set is double. Sets can be larger than five, creating a timed trapped.
Glyph Lines - Most of the magical barriers are enchanted by carving/ inlaying, or painting, mystical glyphs along the ground or wall. So similar glyphs and letterings are painted along the walls and floors, just to make the characters worry. Glyph lines are often in celtic weave patterns or patterns that can be jumped across and avoided. Glyph lines can be there for decorations or attached to a trap.
Poison trap - Cornucopia II- Related to Tetragoren, it is a box sized pylon covered with odd glyphs and a white and red swirling glass orb on the top. If something crosses its boundry, it will summon some edible, but less than tasty food stuffs. This food is either poisonous or illness causing. This is mostly in place to trick adventurers.
Monster-in-the-Box Trap - The advancing person sets off a Jack in the Box like thing set in the floor. This will usually startle characters. Inthis case, the bobbing figure is actually a golem or undead thing attached to the spring. They can attack and are hard to hit. If the trap is alligned with slick floors or narrow walkways, falls and damage will occur.
Push Trap I - The trap itself is a small stone glyph covered plyon with a blue and green slowly swirling glass orb on the top. If someone crosses a predefined boundry, it sends out a powerful burst of magical energy over the standard radius. This will "push" an average armored man sized target to the end of the radius (pushing a non armored or smaller figure farther, a heavily armored or heavy figure a bit less). When used with cliff sides, pits, walls of spikes, etc., the trap becomes more than an annoyance.
Push Trap II - The trap itself is a small stone glyph covered plyon with a blue and green even slower swirling glass orb on the top. If someone crosses a predefined boundry, it will slowly push people and things away from it until it reaches it maximum radius. When used with cliff sides, pits, walls of spikes, or other trap sets, the slow push trap becomes more than an annoyance. The advantage of these traps is that it gives people a chance to avoid the effects.
Push Trap III - Pull Traps - The trap itself is a small stone glyph covered plyon with a green and blue slowly swirling glass orb on the top. If someone crosses a predefined boundry, it sends out a powerful burst of magical energy over the standard radius. This will "pull" an average armored man sized target to the plyon (pullinga non armored or smaller figure right to it, a heavily armored or heavy figure a bit away). This is good to draw people into mine fields of activation glyphs. It can also be used to pull people up levels by installing them in ceilings of the level above.
Remember to think of combinations.
A room with a far door has a fuse trap. The door at the far end has a push trap. So characters run the length of the room, open the door and find themselves in the middle of the fused room.
Fuse traps can create timed traps that the players must succeed at some task before the trap goes off. -
Sleeping Princess Trap
#32A bed containing what appears to be a princess enchanted in a magical sleep. In fact, said *princess* is a Ghoul or other Undead in a magical sleep, made to look like a princess by an illiousion spell. If kissed, the kisser will be put in an enchanted sleep and made to look like the princess and the Undead (who should be fairly dangerous by itself) will attack the other PC's. To wake the enchanted PC permenantly, he/she must be carried out of the castle/maze/dungeon/tomb that the adventure is taking place in.There are other ways...he/she can be kissed and woken but that will put another PC in the same situation.Or he/she can be kissed, after the Undead is despatched, with the dead lips of the despatched Undead. -
Hot Wire Trap
#33A series of metal strands across a corridor that are flexible and easy to push through. Half way along they suddenly, be it through magic or through steampunk tech, glow red hot. Any exposed skin will be horribly burnt, normal clothes will burn in 5 to 10 seconds, leather armour in 30 to 60 seconds, wet leather armour within two minites. Chainmail and plate armour takes five minites to heat to dangerous levels and the strands can be chopped quite easily. -
Traps!
#34This trap will get your PCs on both ways. Being that you'd use it when they would have to come back this way later, maybe a dead end or something.
You have a illusion spell that is partially faded on the floor, it is easily jumped over. As the foolhardy pc jumps over it he/she breaks a "string" that was next to impossible to see, think spider silk type stuff. He get hit while some poisoned darts because he triggered the first part of the trap, and gets knocked over backwards when he lands on the ground by a quarterstaff that shoots out of the wall at chest level. When he falls over he doesn't fall into the pit but land on the ground. Oh wow I guess there was no pit there. The rest of the party walks over it with no problem. The trigger the senond part of the trap later. So they leave and once they're out of hearing range they trigger another trap, a plate on the floor. Nothing happens so they go on their merry way thinking that it was a broken trap. later when they come back and the first person tries to walk over the pit they fall in. When they land a door shuts behind them and they are trapped in the pit.
The door to the pit is wooden, so any party that then goes to disbelieve the illusion will see that. If any others try to jump they find that the string was magically mended while they were gone. -
Traps!
#35Papercut
This trap is used by paranoid keepers of ancient libraries, sorcerors jealous of their knowledge, and other book lovers everywhere.
An very simple trap, it involves distributing various volumes throughout the library, or in regions of very sensitive books which the trapper believes are important. These trap books appear to be a regular book in every way, but their pages usually contain nothing but gibberish, and they are poorly bound. Hidden amongst the pages of these books are flexible leaves of razor-sharp metal- when the libral trespasser innocently takes hold of the book, flipping through it's pages, said trespasser finds their fingers and hands quite hideously damaged.
Of course, this trap functions almost purely by chance- an innocent chooser may be just as likely to take hold of a true book as one of these trap books. But many have found them to be excellent, especially in the tracing by blood-trail, if not the killing, of book thieves. -
Traps!
#36This is more of an ambush situation than a true trap: a large stone is set in the center of the road. This is an obvious new addition (tracks & ruts lead right up to it), and it may not have been there the last time the troupe passed that road. The stone is large enough for a person (or several) to hide behind, and fills the lane, so that you must go off the road around it, climb over it, or somehow remove it.
The stone is just to delay and distract, it need not even be an acutal rock, just a clever imitation. The real trap is the brigands hiding under camouflage just off of the road. While the group is discussing their options, the brigands can attack. Anyone climbing the rock is easy prey, and anyone leaving the road to go around will be close enough to be grabbed from cover. -
Books of Death
#37This trap is used by paranoid keepers of ancient libraries, sorcerors jealous of their knowledge, and other book lovers everywhere. (re:Papercut)
This works for books that are hand scribed and of stiff paper. Many of these books have "scripting" in the upper or lower corners, perhaps inking along the very outer page edge. The ink of certain books include a deadly poison.
How this works: People who read often lick their fingers to get a good grip on the paper when they turn the page. The ink transfers to the finger. The finger transfers to the mouth. The reader slowly poisons himself as he turns the pages.
If you know it is a "dangerous book" you just take care not to lick your fingers - using something else to move the pages.
Thank you CP for dislodging this idea from my brain -
Traps!
#38The players are in a very small room, containing a pedastal with a jewel on it. (real or fake, depending.) The player walks towards it. about halfway through they hear a clicking noise (blades lining up, but outwardly nothing happens.) No matter how the player searches, they find nothing strange. upon picking up the jewel, two blades quickly swing out from the sides, slicing their tendons. they have just enough time to look up, from the floor, as a great battle axe drops from the ceiling, severing their spinal chord. ( upon picking the jewel up, a miniscule string, like fishing line, comes up with it. even the slightest tug on said string triggers the trap.) If the player somehow survives the axe, they probably can't do anything else for a long, long time.
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