It's a TRAP!

[Lalato]

I'm pretty sure this is the statue trap from KotS if you want to look it up in detail. Having DMed it, I remember it as a pretty lame/poorly designed trap - too easy/obvious to avoid the first part, too difficult to detect/avoid the second part. As I recall, pretty much without metagaming its impossible to avoid the 2nd half of the trap (though I am surprised it killed someone -I don't recall it being very difficult to dismantle/destroy it in time to save trapped characters).

Yes, this is, in fact, the trap. If the room was only described by the DM it might be difficult to know where to walk... but looking at the layout from above, it becomes kind of obvious. The second part of the trap would have been very easy to avoid with an Arcana or Knowledge check, but a skill check wasn't given.

So that's why I think it's using metagame knowledge for me as the player to automatically assume *trap* when I see the room layout... and have my character act accordingly. If the room had simply been described as having statues I might have thought there was a trap, but I wouldn't have necessarily walked the correct path.

I don't know if this is the most egregious example of using metagame knowledge, but it's one small example from the same encounter.

 

[jefgorbach]

[MENTION=9171]Lalato[/MENTION]: I disagree to a point. While recognizing it -might- be the trap from a specific module, room# which was solved thusly WOULD be metagaming, .... the blood splatters near the larger statue screams TRAP! (or at least beware of the large animated statue/golem) and would immediately cause anyone so alerted to visually scan the surrounding statues/walls/ceiling for additional bloody spots for possible sources/clues asto what caused them, thus your in-game actions are logical and correctly made.

Regarding the arcane/etc checks, I agree with those feeling it should have been an automatic response for those so inclined simply because thats how a given profession looks at the world around them.

ie someone who plays the stock market is CONSTANTLY aware potential investments even if they aren't actively following a particular company, simply because you never exactly know what will be the next great mover will be ... for instance Popular Science interviewed one of the M1A1 tank crews being dispatched as part of Dessert Storm, with a brief sentence mentioning orders for the tank's ammo had tripled for the pending war. At the time, I was in a college investment course so the article auto-triggered a feeling I should research the company .... revealing it was listed on the stock exchange, was the only company making that ammo, and its price had not yet reacted to the article/earnings jump ... resulting in a hefty fictional profit as the price jumped from around $10 to somewhere in the $100s over the semester.

 

[Lalato]

[MENTION=28278]jefgorbach[/MENTION], I don't disagree with what you're saying, but the blood stains weren't described. We were just shown a map of the room. If my character had walked into the room, the blood stains may not have been noticed at all since my character's perception is super low. And since no skill checks were asked for anyway... well you get my drift. It was only the top down view of the map that made it possible to see the blood stains next to the statue... and that's why I felt like I used metagame knowledge. Granted, it's not something that I'll lose sleep over as it's not as if I had read the module and was using that knowledge to avoid the trap... as you noted.

That said, there are plenty of times that we use metagame knowledge without even thinking about it. For example, if you've read the monster manuals, no standard monster will really ever surprise you. You probably act on what you know of a given monster's weaknesses from what you've read... even if your character hasn't encountered that type of monster yet. But again, that's probably another minor example. The worst is when you've accidentally read the DMs notes or played the module before. That can make avoiding the use of metagame knowledge all the more difficult.