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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8188451" data-attributes="member: 42582">I don't know of any game that is build with the intent to deceive. Which would mean that there are no games with "trap" options!But the concept of "trap" options is a thing, from which we should probably infer that deceit isn't at the core of it. What's at the core of a "trap" option is the game presenting things as effective on their face which, in the cold light of play, turn out not to be.The most common form of such presentation is including the option on a list with other options which are, by the build rules of the game, substitutable and exclusive options: ie you can spend this slot to buy A or B but not both. That might be putting a card into a deck in M:tG, or putting a feat onto your PC sheet in 3E D&D. It is compounded by presenting the option as a discrete "thing" without explaining its place in the broader build or play environment.For instance, in M:tG high-cost high-stat monsters, especially if Rare, present themselves as fun options for stomping your opponent. They don't come with a label that says in typical play sequences by the time you have enough mana to play this creature the game will be mostly decided. The player has to work that out for him-/herself. So it is the surface-level enticing-ness in conjunction with the system-determined lack of effectiveness that creates the "trap". This doesn't depend on any "intent to deceive" - but it is a consequence of an intent to design the game such that there is room for skill in build as well as in play choices.In this thread we have Monte Cook telling us that 3D &D was designed with the same intent - to reward skill in build as well as in play choices. And it works the same way - build options that, through name and surface-level content look like they will enable your PC to do X or to be Y, in fact turn out not to deliver that X-ness or Y-ness in the typical run of play.With Skill Focus (Intimidate), the complaint is that at the surface level it seems like a choice that will make the character a good Intimidator, but in fact it turns out not to: even with the feat the character's Intimidation is pretty mediocre. This isn't because the feat "lied" - it granted the +3 bonus just as it said it would - but because the feat doesn't come with a commentary that explains what a +3 bonus does or doesn't imply (especially when earned at the cost of a feat) in the overall context of 3E build and play. [USER=16814]@Ovinomancer[/USER] had to find that out the hard way.With Endurance, the complaint would seem to be the same. It looks like a feat meant to make the character hardy in relation to travel and the environment. But on my reading of it seems to mostly interact with rules for taking non-lethal damage, and so I'm going to guess that other aspects of PC build - eg hit points, recovery abilities etc - largely or even completely dominate the effect that Endurance has on the ability to survive environmental rigours. Thus if I want a hardy character I should build to those things, not look at Endurance.What I've described in the preceding couple of paragraphs is exactly what is meant by calling a build option a "trap".</blockquote>

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