GMs are sub-standard dungeon designers

[shadzar]

Mold spores.

Dungeons get damp a musky and breathing becomes harder the more they stay in the dungeon as they slowly suffocate to the colorless, tasteless and odorless thing that is slowly killing them.

Every 5 minutes in the dungeon a save must be made, upon failure a point is lost from STR, DEX, CON.

Leaving the dungeon is the only way to heal as it will come right back after any healing. After half of each of the 3 stats is lost make a save of go unconscious. The character must make this save now every minute until the go unconscious. Only leaving the dungeon will allow them to be healed.

The deeper in the dungeon they go light from a torch will be more likely ignite natural gas will ups, or highly flammable substance that has collected on the walls from just a drifting spark.

Just turn the dungeon into the equivalent of a level 4 CDC biohazard.

 

[Reynard]

Mold spores.

Dungeons get damp a musky and breathing becomes harder the more they stay in the dungeon as they slowly suffocate to the colorless, tasteless and odorless thing that is slowly killing them.

Every 5 minutes in the dungeon a save must be made, upon failure a point is lost from STR, DEX, CON.

Leaving the dungeon is the only way to heal as it will come right back after any healing. After half of each of the 3 stats is lost make a save of go unconscious. The character must make this save now every minute until the go unconscious. Only leaving the dungeon will allow them to be healed.

The deeper in the dungeon they go light from a torch will be more likely ignite natural gas will ups, or highly flammable substance that has collected on the walls from just a drifting spark.

Just turn the dungeon into the equivalent of a level 4 CDC biohazard.

There is a fine line between making something difficult and essentially telling the players you don't want them to do something.

 

[DMZ2112]

Blast! I would have killed at least one of them, but my roup uses Action Points as a wild card: you can re-roll a save, or take an additional Standard Action.

Blast! I would have killed at least one of them, but my roup uses Action Points as a wild card:

Blast! I would have killed at least one of them, but my roup uses Action Points

my roup uses Action Points

Action Points

No pity.

 

[Umbran]

Their wide grins threw me.

It was careful camouflage to draw in the unwary. Crocodiles look like they're smilin', too, but you don't want to smile back...

 

[shadzar]

There is a fine line between making something difficult and essentially telling the players you don't want them to do something.

Oh there are MANY ways to safely get into a dungeon like that. The only question is what are you willing to risk to do it? People, time, money, something inside...

Just because the party isn't going la-de-da-la-de-de as they skip through the halls and passageways without monster incursion, doesn't mean there isn't a threat.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

No, no, no! Some of you guys have got the wrong idea. The goal is not to fool the players (let alone the characters), with hidden dangers or the like--though those can be useful as distractions. What you really want to do is turn otherwise reasonable people into that, "So you are telling me there is a chance?" guy. Then when they hang their characters through their own actions, they know it was their own fault.

That's why you leave one bullet out of the revolver. Then you just put them in the situation where taking a chance that has a 1 in 6 shot seem like a good idea at the time ...

Of course, if you've got several of those people whose famous last words are, "Watch This," then you don't have to go to those extremes. I have normally cautious players.

I haven't killed a PC in years. I think the last time was in 2001. (Owl bears are nastier than I thought, especially when they catch the lone rogue on watch at night.) I have set up situations where the players managed to kill their characters--and a whole lot more where they didn't quite die, but could have and thought they were going to. (That's even more fun. When they get themselves into a situation where they know they are going to die, manage not to, and they think you bailed them out, when all you did was let the chips fall where they may.)

I may not be a rat-bastard DM, but I am certainly a devious DM.

 

[MarkB]

I never did get round to trying out my Reverse Gravity infinite-fall trap. That one's a 50-foot-tall room whose floor and ceiling both slope 45 degrees, and are slick for easy sliding.

Character gets dumped in the room via a chute halfway up the wall, falls to the floor and starts sliding down the slope. When he passes halfway across the room, he enters the reverse-gravity field that covers one half of the room, and falls up to smack against the ceiling. Then he rolls back across the slicked, sloping ceiling until he leaves the reverse gravity field, and falls to the floor.

Repeat until the players think of something creative, or the character falls to his death.

 

[GandalfMithrandir]

I am a rat-bastard GM in face to Face games, otherwise I think I'm a rather nice GM in pbp.

And yes, My f2f players will tell you that I am a very deadly GM