Creative Traps

[Ziggurat]

Hi, I'm a role-playing DM who's trying his hand at roll-playing a traditional dungeon-crawl, and due to my lack of experience I'm having difficulty thinking of some genuinely interesting and creative traps for them.

Quick background: my PCs (five x 7th level) are inexperienced at dealing with traps, although they are a wily bunch. They're currently working their way through an ancient and dilapidated underground city-fortress towards a treasure-trove.

What they don't know is that the area around the trove has become inhabited by a small svirfneblin tribe which has trapped the surrounding area. They've got technical know-how and an illusionist capable of permanent illusions.

So far the PCs have lost strength due to a huge monstrous scorpion, some weapons and armor from a 10HD rust-monster, and by the time they get this far they will have encountered the big baddun (a very nasty psionic troll with Inertial Barrier and Energy Conversion), so I'm not looking for anything too lethal.

Instead, I'm after ideas for interesting, weird, demoralising but not fatal, possibly debilitating traps that I can throw at them. Any ideas?

 

[Barendd Nobeard]

Instead, I'm after ideas for interesting, weird, demoralising but not fatal, possibly debilitating traps that I can throw at them. Any ideas?

A lot of the 1st edition modules had traps that were either very lethal or scary but ultimately harmless.

Examples:

In S1-Tomb of Horrors, there was a black portal. It was really a sphere of annihilation, so anyone who touched it was permanently dead. You won't be doing this. You probably want to try something like:

In C2-Ghost Tower of Inverness, there is a hallway which dead-ended with 5 cubicles--each with a human-size indentation. When a pc steps into a cubicle, metal bands spring out, instantly pinning the pc's hands and ankles. The stone cubicle pivots and anyone watching just sees the pc disappear. All this trap does is move someone to the next room, so it's scary ("what will happen?!"), but non-lethal. And it's all mechanical.

The next room is a chessboard. Any pc who stepped into a cubicle is now standing on a starting space which is glowing brightly. The pc must move like the appropriate chess piece, or take very minor damage (in the module, it's 5 points). Whenever a pc takes damage, that square becomes their new starting square. Simple, and the damage could be even small (a 1d2 electrical charge). In the module, the chessboard is several colors. Half the board is gray, but the other ones blue, green, or yellow. This just throws off the obvious pattern ("it's a chess board!") a bit.

At the end of the room, is a statue with a hand raised--but is it in greeting or warning? The only way to open a secret compartment in the statue is to grip the hand. No bad effects at all, but players will spend a lot of time discussing what to do, especially if they find the secret compartment but can't open it.


Just three ideas from an old module. Hope this helps!

 

[Xarlen]

All right.

Hazard traps. A pressure plate releases caltrops from hidden places in the ceiling. This is especially good when they're crawling in the darkness. For greater effect, add Incorperal or flying creatures.

Big People Trap: This trap used by Kobolds (But usable by any short race) has a blade that runs on two grooves, down a short hallway. Its hight is about 4' high. When set, elastic bands pull it back, and fire. It's easier for short characters to dodge, harder the bigger you are.

Surface Dweller trap: This is incase you have a problem with humans. Set into the ceiling of a low ceilinged tunnel is a hole cut in the roof. In this hole is lots of oil, stored by a sealed canvas, and painted to look like the rest of the ceiling. When someone passes under it with a torch, the torch lights the oiled canvas, and thus ignithing the oil above their head, sening a rain of flaming liquid down ontop of them.

Green Slime Jets. Need I say more?

Murder holes. Easy, simple, very nasty.

Animated Dead traps. Just little closets, pits, trap doors, etc, that if opened, an animated skeleton pops out and attacks whoever's there. Since you can easily fold up a skeleton, they can fit in tight places, like chests.

Here's a trick I played on my players: Animated mice skeletons. Tie a caltrop onto their back. Poison if neccessary. Their command, run under anyone's feet. They have a touch attack of +6, due to their size. They're turned and destroyed easily. This could be used by putting movable slats along the bottom of the walls, and freeing the mice, or grooves in stairs.

Another skeleton trick: Firetrap on their shut skull. Order them to charge intruders and open their mouth when they get close. Very mean when you use animal skeletons, for that matter.