D&D 5E New DMG Excerpt: It's A Trap!

[Beleriphon]

I can buy that reading. Seeing the next few pages should make it pretty clear.

It think it goes both ways on that one. The setback is the same as a deadly to different leveled groups. Essentially if the trap is a setback to a high level group then it is by default going to be absolutely deadly to a low level one. That isn't much different than monsters really, an adult white dragon is at best a setback for a twentieth level group, but its a guaranteed TPK for a group at first level.

 

[DM_]

I am liking the divisions between trap types of setback, dangerous and deadly especially in that deadly traps scale damage to play tier. Additionally enjoying that this is sparking the creative sections of my mind, devious trap ideas abound most of which will make my players scared to touch anything. Definitely excited for the full DMG and the full Complex Traps section.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

I can buy that reading. Seeing the next few pages should make it pretty clear.

The weird thing is that the save DC or attack bonus doesn't scale with level, so a Deadly trap for a level 3 party might be +10 to hit for 4d10 damage, but a setback for a high-level party might be +4 to hit for 4d10. The accuracy and damage, for a given lethality, will only match up for - at most - one tier of play.

 

[Tormyr]

So rereading the types of trap difficulty/deadliness, where it got me thinking there could be different levels of damage for different character levels is that the first table assigns 1 DC to a trap regardless of character level while the second table sets a different damage for ranges of character level. So a Setback trap is always 10-11 for the save DC +3 to +5 for the attack bonus, but it will do 1d10 for low level characters and 10d10 for high level characters. I realize that is not probably what they meant, and seeing some examples of actual traps should make it pretty clear exactly what they meant.

Ninja'd

 

[The Crimson Binome]

So a Setback trap is always 10-11 for the save DC +3 to +5 for the attack bonus, but it will do 1d10 for low level characters and 10d10 for high level characters. I realize that is not probably what they meant, and seeing some examples of actual traps should make it pretty clear exactly what they meant.

It's also possible that you should assign accuracy and damage independently, and then average them. A deadly accurate / deadly damage trap is deadly, but a deadly accurate / setback damage (or setback accurate / deadly damage) trap would be dangerous.

 

[occam]

I find it interesting that this seems to be one place where they moved away from Bounded Accuracy's "Something is always the same whether you are 1st or 20th level. Two characters of vastly different levels would get vastly different damage from the same trap.

Actually, this is the clearest demonstration of bounded accuracy we've ever seen. Save DCs and attack bonuses don't scale with level... much (theoretically), while damage and hit points do.

 

[Korgul79]

I appreciate how they stress that player's actions and strategy can and should matter more (and override) rolls and skills.

 

[ZombieRoboNinja]

The weird thing is that the save DC or attack bonus doesn't scale with level, so a Deadly trap for a level 3 party might be +10 to hit for 4d10 damage, but a setback for a high-level party might be +4 to hit for 4d10. The accuracy and damage, for a given lethality, will only match up for - at most - one tier of play.

No, the accuracy will remain the same for 2/3 of the party on average, because no class gets proficiency to more than one of the three major saves (dex, con, wis) before very high levels. A level 20 fighter will be just as likely to pass that dc10 dexterity save as a level 1 fighter, unless he raised his dex or took a feat for it.

 

[Korgul79]

The only little disappointment it's that it seems that they mainly present trap that do damage. I would have liked if they put some suggestion for trap that do different thing eat hit point, like cripple, blind or, well, trap. (I can't be sure that similar suggestions won't find space in the following pages, but it doesn't seem very likely). Maybe it's because I find easier figure some random damage than an appropriate crippling effect of something similar to a bear trap. Or maybe it's just because I love bear traps.

 

[Mishihari Lord]

I'm surprised there's no comments on the picture yet. I can't believe that guy's sticking his hand in there with all those warning signs! This is what you call evolution in action. A smart adventurer would be using his 10 foot pole.