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Author Topic: all time favorite roleplaying 'traps'  (Read 3555 times)
Arcadian Del Sol
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on: August 13, 2004, 10:04:14 AM

My all time favorite:

Party or member enters room - iron portcullus of insanely heavy measure slams shut, bottom actually countersinks past floor so it can't be lifted - iron has razored shavings curled around it so attempts to lift it are ... messy.

person(s) in room find no seams, stones, or escape - the room is a semi-round chamber hewn into solid stone. There is a large panel with a red button in the middle opposite the portcullus.

Out of alternatives, person presses button - loud chain rattling clanking noises echo behind the walls and above the button is now a series of carved hashmarks in the standard "four vertical+ one diagonal=five" format - the pair of symbols being a count of ten.

And one by one the hash marks vanish - 9, 8, 7, 6......
in a panic (and they always do), they press the button again. And the count resets to 10....9.....8....7
press it again, and it resets - repeatedly.

There is no escape - ever. The room is sealed all around by magic barrier and heavy solid stone. Player(s) will eventually starve and die...

...unless the count reaches zero - at which point the portcullus slides up slowly.

-------

The DM who presented our party with this room put us through it for over an hour. When we got out, he was nearly stoned alive in a hail of semi clear polyhedrons. He never ran a campaign for us again, but we secretly all admired the trap.

-----

and to me, thats the best trap - one that riddles you, puzzles you, and presents you with dire circumstances, but in the end - doesn't jump out from nowhere, yell "surprise!" and then kill everyone. Bad traps kill good players. Good traps kill bad players.

unbannable
WayAbvPar
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Posts: 19268


Reply #1 on: August 13, 2004, 10:11:21 AM

I wish I could remember the specifics, but there was a trap in the module 'Dark Tower' that sealed the room and started filling with water. One of our party (who was a total dumbass, but showed up to play no matter how much abuse we heaped on him) wandered off by himself and set off the trap. Instead of looking for a solution, he decided to use his helm of brilliance to cast fireball over and over in an attempt to boil off the water. The DM ruled that the resulting steam was eventually fatal...he effectively parboiled himself.

When speaking of the MMOG industry, the glass may be half full, but it's full of urine. HaemishM

Always wear clean underwear because you never know when a Tory Government is going to fuck you.- Ironwood

Libertarians make fun of everyone because they can't see beyond the event horizons of their own assholes Surlyboi
Dark Vengeance
Delinquents
Posts: 1210


Reply #2 on: August 13, 2004, 10:51:57 AM

One of my old DMs did something kind of similar. He put us in a sealed room (one way door), and it began slowly filling with water. There was an etching that talked about the nature of faith, and it said "in serenity is the gateway to tomorrow" (can't remember all of it). Just to note: this particular campaign dealt with fictional deities, and the DM liked to include various morals to the story (both positive and negative) about the nature of religion.

To make a long story short, a few members of our party were furiously scrambling around the room, looking for triggers and secret doors. One of our fighters kept trying to bash down the door, even after sustaining an injury from trying to do so. They panicked.

I was playing as a paladin...the cleric and I decided to spend our time meditating, figuring that given enough time, we could regain our spells, or that perhaps our deities would provide us with aid.

Eventually the water had risen to the point where nobody could touch the floor and still keep their head above water. Those who had been active had tired themselves out, and after a while, they just couldn't tread water any longer. The fighter, in particular, didn't last long.

Just as the water hit the ceiling, it triggered a switch that began draining the water, and opened a passage out of the room. The solution was as indicated in the etching....by being calm and passive, we had conserved our energy...allowing us to last until the switch was triggered. In keeping with the theme of the adventure, we had to place our faith in something other than ourselves in order to survive.

I don't know how that ranks in terms of traps....but as adventures go, it was the most memorable trap of that session, which was a big turning point in the campaign. Knowing the context probably has me looking back on it with rose-colored glasses.

Bring the noise.
Cheers.............
HaemishM
Staff Emeritus
Posts: 42628

the Confederate flag underneath the stone in my class ring


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Reply #3 on: August 13, 2004, 11:46:30 AM

Tomb of Horrors had some good ones. The one I remember playing was a doorway. When you walked through the doorway, you came back as the opposite sex. Of course, I got hit with that one.

Another was a magic portal. Throwing anything through and nothing happened. One person would walk through and they'd be asked to go to another room and wait. Eventually, every person in the party walked through the doorway, at which point the DM told everyone the portal was actually a disintegration spell. ZAP.

One of my favorite bungling character moments was after a long 2nd edition campaign. My monk named Crow, a devout non-materialist, had endured some seriously harrowing adventures. We finally defeat the big bad and get to the treasure room when we are looking over stuff. Everyone is picking their favorite piece when the DM tells me I spy an ornate carpet. I jump on the carpet and yell "FLY!" since that was really the only treasure I felt like would be cool. The goddamn thing starts constricting, eventually choking me to death.

Fucking Aladdin.

WayAbvPar
Moderator
Posts: 19268


Reply #4 on: August 13, 2004, 01:25:49 PM

Tomb of Horrors- yikes! The only trap I remember was the false door- it would kill you before you even got IN the damned place!

When speaking of the MMOG industry, the glass may be half full, but it's full of urine. HaemishM

Always wear clean underwear because you never know when a Tory Government is going to fuck you.- Ironwood

Libertarians make fun of everyone because they can't see beyond the event horizons of their own assholes Surlyboi
TenaciousMike
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Posts: 30


Reply #5 on: August 13, 2004, 02:21:22 PM

The party enters an underground chamber with a foul odor.  The odor causes them to choke and gag.  As they enter, the door behind them gets shut and locked solid.  The floor of the room is all iron grating with small holes.  Standing on the far side of the room, is a golem that stands up and attacks the party.  Around its neck is the key to the door.

As it turns out, the awful odor is actually highly flammable gas.  The golem is made of flint.  Anyone who strikes the golem with an iron weapon will be responsible for the death of everyone in a giant burning explosion.

___

Tenacious Mike
Comstar
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Reply #6 on: August 13, 2004, 07:43:54 PM

I love that first trap.

Most of the others...not so good. ANY DM can kill the party. Those Tomb of Horrors traps are just DM fiat. A truly ingenious trap will make the party kill itself.

Defending the Galaxy, from the Scum of the Universe, with nothing but a flashlight and a tshirt. We need tanks Boo, lots of tanks!
HaemishM
Staff Emeritus
Posts: 42628

the Confederate flag underneath the stone in my class ring


WWW
Reply #7 on: August 16, 2004, 09:03:17 AM

I think it was Gary Gygax who said he made Tomb of Horrors specifically for convention games in which the party of players was made up of the most loot whoring, min-maxing pieces of munchkin flotsam and jetsam on the planet.

Well, he didn't say that specifically, but I got the subtle meaning.

Vespasian
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Reply #8 on: August 21, 2004, 06:09:15 PM

Simple yet oldschool AD&D elegance, usually part of any self-written adventure.  

The 80' long 10' wide hallway with doors only on opposite ends and the inevitable fireball which will come down it at some point if you continue.
Hanzii
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Posts: 729


Reply #9 on: August 22, 2004, 12:52:18 AM

In Castle Greyhawk there's a mudfilled hallway and when the party walks down it, a loud voice calls out 'duck!'.
When the party predictably hit the (muddy) deck a small waterfowl flies overhead.
Some yards further down, the voice is heard again: 'duck!'.
... only this time blades come from the walls at neck height.

I love that book.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
I would like to discuss this more with you, but I'm not allowed to post in Politics anymore.

Bruce
Fargull
Contributor
Posts: 931


Reply #10 on: August 23, 2004, 11:07:02 AM

Hmm..

Not really sure if this is my favorite, but seems the most comical and interesting.  Our party was attacked by a group of dopplegangers, that performed a hit and run.  We followed them back to their dungeon base and entered.  After a few rooms and combat with a few lower level minions, we rounded a corner to what appeared a long hallway.  About thirty feet down the hallway our fighter's continual light shield suddenly went out.  The backup torch in the back showed a dimly lit group of villians vaguely looking like the party infront of them.  We began battle, the warrior and rangerish type charged, the thief got his bow ready, the mage cast magic missles at the first figure and I cast bless.  The warrior charged through the mirror and directly into the forty foot pit, with the ranger leaping over it to the oil slicked otherside and slid into the group of dopplegangers on the otherside.  The mage's magic missles of course targeted the fighter since that was his reflection in the mirror and only the thief and my cleric stood with slack jawed amazement.  We lived, but it was a fun battle.. lost the ranger though..

"I have come to believe that a great teacher is a great artist and that there are as few as there are any other great artists. Teaching might even be the greatest of the arts since the medium is the human mind and spirit." John Steinbeck
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