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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Charlaquin" data-source="post: 8444237" data-attributes="member: 6779196"><img class="smilie smilie--emoji" alt="👍" src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f44d.png" title="Thumbs up    :thumbsup:" data-shortname=":thumbsup:" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" />Yeah, I get this a lot. I definitely wouldn’t use the skeleton in front of a sprung trap trick every time, but it’s a good example because it demonstrates that I’m not just telegraphing the individual trap, but actually using a combination of telegraphing, tutorializing, and level design to teach the players about traps in the dungeon generally. The sprung trap is just there to teach the players what to expect in the dungeon. Later examples of the trap will be less blatantly telegraphed, and the further into the dungeon you get, the more subtle I can get with the telegraphs. But always with the goal that if you do fall for the trap, you’ll be able to think back to the description of the environment and recognize the clue that you missed that would have given it away. I’m more concerned about creating this sort of gameplay experience than I am with the worldbuilding logic behind the traps and their placement and design.Like I said, the worldbuilding logic of it, for me, is secondary to the gameplay function. The “real” reason, or at least the Doylist one, is that the needle-trapped chests are all iron-banded so that players who pay attention to the description of the environment can pick up on the pattern. But I do put some thought into the in-universe logic of these things, and the Wattsonian reason is that these traps were built by someone, to protect their treasure. Whoever that someone was, they would have wanted to be able to access the treasure the traps were protecting, without being harmed by the traps themselves. So, they included a tell that they would know how to recognize. A sort of note-to-self so they don’t accidentally fall into their own traps. Remember, iron-banded chests need the special key that doesn’t set off the needle trap.Right, which is perfectly fine and reasonable. I would not make that assumption, because I don’t like to make assumptions about the PCs’ actions. Nothing wrong with it if you do, it’s just not to my taste.</blockquote>

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