Is this fair? -- your personal opinion

[Ridley's Cohort]

Why wouldn't the character suspect a trap? I can't imagine why a character would think an obvious lever opens a secret door.

Of course the obvious lever does not open the secret door. Therefore it is foolish to assume any connection between the two.

If we remove the secret door from the scenario, does it change your opinion about pulling the lever?

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

Nah. Generally they take a captive and make it open the door for them.

FOOLS! Opening the door causes a 10x10 pit to open up 10 feet behind the person opening the door! Your plan fails!

Usually they probe ahead with spear-butts.

IDIOTS! The trap goes off 8 seconds after being prodded! Your efforts PRIMED the trap! OMG, what morons!

See where I'm going with this?

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

Even worse are the grimtooth "meta traps" that just exist to give players a damned if you do, damned if you dont feeling, which I thoroughly hate. In one of the "classics", theres an easy to discover trap on the outside of a chest. By disarming it, you enable the trap on the inside of the chest, which goes off when you open it.

That is an awesome trap. Very twisted. Will see use in one of my games.

 

[PapersAndPaychecks]

The logical conclusion, given that information, is that the DM didn't want that trap to be able to be avoided except by not pulling the lever.

That's an inference I didn't draw. I presumed that the trap was avoidable, but only if you relied on other means than simply rolling d20's.

If the DM specifically doesn't want the trap to be avoidable at all, then I agree, that's an attitude that sucks.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

FOOLS! Opening the door causes a 10x10 pit to open up 10 feet behind the person opening the door! Your plan fails!




IDIOTS! The trap goes off 8 seconds after being prodded! Your efforts PRIMED the trap! OMG, what morons!

See where I'm going with this?

You are just showing off that massive chip you have on your shoulders? Seriously, no matter what anyone says you are going to claim they are lying and really would screw the players no matter what. What did you say when someone suggested using a rope? Something along the lines of "be honest you would have the trap effects travel down the rope so you can get off on your god complex".

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

Levers exist in the real world. How many are trapped? Obviously levers can have many purposes beyond killing the puller. Who would ever expect the purpose of a lever to be to kill the puller? Last time I used a lever, it opened a secret door to the sewers. Why was it a lever? It was an escape measure, and it was used as such. The door was hidden because it was just a trap door in the floor. So, I for one have used a lever to open a secret door.

IMO, thats the most reasonable thing for it to do. Seal off the entrance door, open the secret door. Your perfect escape hatch.

 

[PapersAndPaychecks]

Other inferences in this thread are also going afield from the OP, and imputing motives on the DM which weren't stated.

Incidentally, I think a rope probably doesn't count as a once-a-day resource.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

You are saying a natural 20 is "impossible"? (Not even considering that maybe just another +2 or +1 could have made the natural 19 a successful roll.)

Are you saying that there is a meaningful difference between an effect with "No Save" and an effect with "Save vs. DC 152"?

I am pretty confident that they are at least 95% the same.

 

[ThirdWizard]

It's not metagame thinking if levers in dangerous places like dungeons are often trapped in the PC's world (and in most games I've played in, this is exactly the case, traps abound in dungeons, especially around strange set ups like a lever in the open that potentially opens an otherwise secret door).

I've never used a death trapped lever as a DM. I've never seen a trapped lever as a Player.

Yay for anecdotal evidence!

EDIT: The one lever trap I used did 1 electricity damage, btw. It was there to be funny.

 

[JRRNeiklot]

As stated earlier, I'm not against traps. I'm not against impossible-at-that-level-to-spot traps.

So, traps should suddenly morph into a different form each time a party enters simply depending on their level? That amounts to the Houston Astros taking Roger Clemens out and putting in Joe the hotdog salesman simply because a rookie is coming up to bat.