delericho said:
You’ve cleared out the dungeon and found the McGuffin you were seeking. Then you come to a room located in the back corner of the dungeon. In the room is only a large lever sticking up out of the floor. You search the room and find a secret door in one wall. You can’t find a way to open the door.
The rogue searches the door and lever for traps, and finds that both are somehow connected to a trap. He's also sure that the trap is well beyond his ability to disarm, and is of extreme lethality.
The party Wizard casts Detect Magic, but no magic is detected.
At this point, the party elects to leave. The Monk is in the front of the marching order. As he leaves the room, he has to make a saving throw – he rolls a 19 on the die, adds in his mods, and fails the save. He turns into a pile of fine dust on the floor.
It turns out that the trap was on the doorway into the room - anyone who tried to leave through either door triggered the trap. Pulling the level would have disarmed the trap.
I thought about this trap while I was at lunch (which probably says something about me, but that's another thread...) and decided that I like it, and very well may use a variation of it someday. I agree with the other response (Ourph?) that this trap is
significantly more difficult than the OP's trap because 1) the party has no choice but to disarm it in order to survive/continue, and 2) the party triggers it without realizing they've done so (and thus there's nothing to arouse their caution or suspicion). Neither of these make the trap "unfair," but they do make it very difficult (much moreso than the OP trap), and any DM who uses it should do so fully aware that it's likely to cause PC fatalities.
Here's how I'd react to this trap were I a player in this game. First off, an otherwise empty room with no apparent exits and a lever in the middle of the floor, way in the back/bottom of the dungeon (assumed because the room was discovered after the macguffin had been recovered), after we've already got the macguffin. This whole setup smells like a trap to me. Therefore, I'd probably never enter the room in the first place, and would suggest my party-mates not do so either. Even if they did enter the room, I probably wouldn't follow them -- I'd stand in the doorway, observe, and shout advice to them. Seriously, I do stuff like this all the time. Yeah, the other players make fun of me for being a coward, but their characters die and mine doesn't. But, for the sake of argument, we'll assume that the DM or the other players were somehow able to trick or cajole me into entering the room.
We search the room and find a secret door but no way to open it. We search the door and lever for traps and are told that both are somehow connected to a trap, and that the trap is well beyond his ability to disarm and is of extreme lethality. Stop right there: I wouldn't accept that answer, and would want more detail. How are the lever and door "somehow connected" to a trap? In what way? What makes him think the trap is beyond his ability to disarm? What makes him think it's of extreme lethality? I wouldn't accept this vague explanation and would try to get as much detailed and specific info about the nature of the trap as possible. Depending on how much magic I had available I might even consider attempting to
commune,
contact higher plane or similar magic to try to gain more info about the nature of the trap.
But, assuming that for whatever reason I was unable to gain any more specific info, the party wizard casts
detect magic and no magic is detected. Why is that? Clearly this trap is magical, and both the lever and
both exits should detect as magical (and, likewise, any magical means of trap detection such as a
find traps spell or
wand of secret door and trap detection should've also shown
both exits as being trapped). This is the one element of the trap that strikes me as unfair (unless the
detect magic spell somehow works differently in 3E than in the versions I know/play (OD&D and 1E AD&D).
But, assuming for whatever reason that the detect magic doesn't work, yeah, at this point I'd probably decide it was time to leave. ZAP -- the monk gets hit by the force-field and dies. Now is where things get interesting, because we have 2 vital new pieces of information: 1) what the trap actually does, and 2) that it's blocking our retreat (and, possibly, 3) that the monk failed his save even with a rolled 19, meaning that running through and hoping for a lucky roll isn't a realistic strategy). This is where I sit forward in my chair, put the bag of chips down, and start really paying attention.
First course of action is going to be to determine if the force field is still there or if it was a one-time effect. Throw a pebble through the doorway and see if it gets zapped. If not, throw something larger, etc. Have the thief check for traps again (and
detect magic again) to see if the trap still seems to be there, etc. Assuming that I am somehow able to determine that the trap is still there (perhaps even by losing another party member), attention turns to how to get back into the hall without passing through the force-field.
Passwall,
dimension door,
teleport,
plane shift, etc. If I have one available (not bloody likely in 3E, much moreso in OD&D or 1E) I might even burn a
wish to get the party safely outside of the room (much to the chagrin of the dead player(s), who were hoping that
wish would be used to resurrect them, no doubt). I don't care about trying to get past the secret door at this point because I don't know what lies beyond it and don't want to use up resources possibly getting myself from the frying pan into the fire (and possibly still not having any means of escape, assuming there's not an exit beyond the secret door), but I keep it in mind for a future expedition, after we've gotten out of this trap, because whatever's behind that door, being guarded by this trap, is very likely to be something interesting or worthwhile.
The DM by this point, depending on how good a poker face he has, is likely laughing his ass off at all the elaborate means I'm trying to avoid this trap and how little success I'm having. If I see this, I realize that the solution is probably simpler than what I've been trying (and this is the
first action of everything I've done that is actual metagaming; everything else, as far as I'm concerned, has been completely in-character appropriate). So I do another thorough search of the room looking for any additional clues (hidden keyholes or inscriptions or such). Not finding any I
for the first time consider pulling the lever (which is, to my mind, still an obvious trap and sucker-killer, but if the DM's smiling too much then I suspect that the too-obvious solution may in fact be the correct one).
But, assuming I don't have any means of escape and the DM isn't giving anything away with his body language, I stop and consider my situation, what I know, and my options. At this point I probably conduct another search looking for additional clues as described above. Once all other options are exhausted (as, given the situation described, they eventually will be) I begin to consider the lever. I still don't trust it, I still think it's too-obvious and intended as a sucker-killer, but I have no other choice. If possible, I perform an
augury (or
divination,
commune, etc.) to try to learn as much as I can about the consequences of pulling the lever, and whether they're likely to be good or bad. (Another trick I try at this point, if not earlier, is to draw a wandering monster into the room, to see if the force-field works both ways, or only for people trying to
leave the room -- not that knowing this would necessarily help me, but I want to have all the information possible at my disposal.)
Finally, assuming I'm not able to gain any definitive info about the consequences of pulling the lever, I still don't pull it myself -- I use an
unseen servant, or a rope (and stand in the most remote possible part of the room before pulling it), or try to talk one of the other surviving PCs (if there are any) into doing it.
Even after pulling the lever, I don't automatically assume the trap is disarmed, and follow the same sort of testing procedure described earlier -- throwing pebbles, having the thief search again, casting
detect magic again, etc. -- and only when I'm totally sure the trap is no longer operative do I hurry through, gather up the remains of my companions, go home and either try to get them resurrected or seek out replacements, and begin planning a return expedition to find out what lies beyond that secret door.
Oh, and incidentally, I would've had a
really fun time at this session, and would congratulate the DM on coming up with such a good trap and ask him how he expected we'd deal with the trap and laugh about all the hoops I jumped through when the solution was literally in plain sight the entire time. This is the kind of stuff I enjoy. This is why I play this game.
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