The Trap Collection - Volume II
clawrenc at cup.hp.com
clawrenc at cup.hp.com
Thu Oct 9 15:40:15 CEST 1997
http://venus.aros.net/~jseeley/trapcol2.html
THE TRAP COLLECTION
Volume II
With the successful completion of The Trap Collection - Volume I, I
started receiving many more traps per week than I had when I was
actually working on finishing it. So, of course, here is The Trap
Collection - Volume II. Hopefully, someday there will be more volumes.
As long as I'm receiving traps, I'll be releasing more collections.
J.McGuire (73223.664 at compuserve.com)
In the center of an otherwise empty, totally ordinary, middle-sized
room, a gem-encrusted crown floats in a sparkling column of golden
light. Any detection reveals that the entire room radiates magic. But
it's not the magic that's going to harm the hapless adventurers...more
like the lack of it. Sooner or later, someone is probably going to try
to dispel that glowing column to get the crown, since the golden light
appears to be some sort of magical force field. (This works best in a
system like AD&D where "Dispel Magic" is an area-affect spell) As soon
as that spell goes off, the *floor* vanishes. So does the pillar of
light, but nobody is going to be worried about the fact that the crown
is fake; under the floor, of course, is a pit built to your specs. (I
like about a 20' drop to a thicket of spikes, myself) The floor was a
magical wall of stone, deliberately cast to be "magically brittle" and
with no defense against any attempt at dispelling it. It's their own
magic that does them in.
Variation of Chooser Ain't the Loser (Trap Collection v1) Tomas
Weijters (weijters at rulimburg.nl)
If you would like to get your players really pissed off, make that
walls stop if they are about a foot of each other, look out for raging
players!!=20
How Do You Like Your PC: Sliced, or Fried?
James Spector (demise at geocities.com)
First you have your typical trapdoor (or any variation). Once the
party member(s) fall through the trapdoor the fun begins. My favorite
thing to do after that is to have the victim(s) go sliding through a
Blade Barrier, and end up landing in a vat of oil (that just happens
to have a Red Dragon lounging next to it.)
Arno's Sleeping Paradise (NOT)
Tomas Weijters and Arno Janssen (weijters at cs.uniemaas.nl)
You should have a flask of wine standing on a table, with a bed behind
it, and you should let the players get out of desert or some thirsty
thing, without any water or wine. If any of the PC's drink some water,
they'll have a great desire to sleep (on that bed). This bed is
actually nasty trapped: if you lay on it, you'll sink 5 feet down,
into 20 spikes (they can be poisoned or whatever) each of these
nasties dealing 1d8 damage. If any pressure is released on these
spikes, above him there are 10 spikes which will flip out, angled 45
degrees down, so you will only get hurt if coming up, not down. The
one in there will notice that the walls are coming together very
slowly. After 10 minutes of "sleeping" the walls will finally crash
into each other and squish the victim.
Sinking floor
Jonathan Cox (Eacrh at connect.reach.net)
As you are walking through a dungeon you come to a door with a
stalagmite which can be hopped over. When you open the door you see
shelves on the walls which contain gold and platinum ingots and
various large magical items. The shelves are on all sides of the room
except for the door's side. When the greedy PC's step into the room it
sinks 1 inch for every 4 pounds the players are carrying. The same
occurs when the items are removed from the shelf. The walls are
slippery to the touch and not climbable. A dispel magic disintegrates
the floor, but the players will plummet to their death. Solution: Tie
a rope to the stalagmite and pull yourself up, the magic items may be
obtained by flight spells or other whatever.
Tinker Slammer
Azrael (azrael at voyageronline.net)
This trap is best used if designed by a Tinker Gnome, and built by a
dwarf. The trap is constructed by removing a 2' thick 4' wide sheet of
rock from the wall. Then excavate the interior. After placing the
pressure plate in the floor (useful to have a mage cast phantasmal
force over it) and a giant spring in to hole, place the original sheet
of rock back over the opening (again concealed by a spell of
illusionary wall) When triggered, this trap slams across the hall, and
the person triggering it must make a dex check at -7 or take 3D10
points of damage, and must save verses paralyzation -4 or have a limb
broken (1D4 1Rarm 2Larm 3Rleg 4Lleg)
Buy some shoes!
Tomas Weijters (weijters at cs.rulimburg.nl)
The players are walking through a forest, and step into a small pit,
which traps their feet. The only way to get out is by taking off the
shoes. The shoes are stuck, so they'll have to go one barefoot. Later
on, they'll reach a open spot in the forest, and if they step on it,
they crack through into spikes of about 1/2 foot long, into there
feet. Everybody who still wears metal shoes will only get scared, but
the rest are stuck in the spikes.=20
The Spiked Wall of Falling Death
Daniel Sloan of Scarlet Dragon (sloan at vianet.net.au)
The trap appears in a room with a ceiling of any height, but for this
description I will use a roof twenty feet up. In the middle of the
room is another wall of about fifteen feet so it is possible to climb
over the top. The only way the PC's can exit the room is by going
through the exit on the other side of this wall. The wall is flush
against the side walls so the only way past it is over it. The wall
has half foot long spikes sticking out of it on the PC's side.
The PC's climb the wall, but it is only after they reach the top that
the wall falls. It can fall either way, so that the wall crushes them
on the side they started on, or the wall falls the other way.....the
wall stops when it hits the ground, but the PC doesn't, ending up with
half foot long spikes in them again.
The only fault with this trap is that magic can help fly over it, or
teleport around it. The PC's may be clever and know that the wall will
fall on them when they climb it, so describe how there are supports
preventing it from doing this.....of course just don't tell them that
it can fall the other way.
Bones, Bones Everywhere!
martichi (martichi at aol.com)
As the PC's walk down a hall, have walls spring up on all sides. Now
have two panels in the ceiling open and bones drop out in massive
numbers. Have some of the bones become skeletons, not all, though or
it will simply be too much for the PC's to fight off. I find 20 in all
works well to wear them down. If not, make a special regenerating
skeleton appear from all the leftover bones. It is a normal skeleton
except turning it is treated as "special" and it regenerates as
follows: fire and acid have no effect; a solid blow (20) smashes it
into a pile of bones but it reforms! The only way to dispose of it is
blasting it into the next plane. The point is the PC's can't win. Once
they fall over from damage, exhaustion, or whatever, the lich shows up
and he reveals his evil plans (insert demonic plan here.)
At First Glance...
Vovoid: (plucas at ultra.net.au)
This trap is best used in goblin dungeons. The PCs walk down a section
of passage with many small holes in the roof. They may well be
suspicious and may think of using a magical shield above them, but the
holes are not what they seem. In the middle of the section of passage
is a pressure pad, when stepped on, the area of holes divides in two
with previously hidden hinges in the middle. Spikes suddenly appear
from the holes and the, now spiked, slabs swing inwards dealing 14d6
damage to anyone caught between them. However the trap is not yet
done, the slabs are now revealed to have murder holes behind them,
from which any number of things can be dropped upon those poor,
unsuspecting PCs "lucky" enough to be outside the slabs!
Cool off Time
VampD (jballou at inlink.com)
The PCs enter a square room. The entrance and the exit both seal up.
The ceiling is really a glass panel with a horde of water just sitting
on top of it. There is an illusion to make the glass look like the
ceiling. There are tubes in the walls about 1" in diameter and plugged
with stone stoppers. This trap works good if you have done one where
water has poured through similar holes. The PCs trigger a pressure
plate that sends a lead ball from above the glass ceiling down into
the water. Of course the ball drops through the water, breaks the
glass, and water pours out onto the PCs. The walls have to be very
clay like here. The PCs hopefully realize that getting the stoppers
out will allow the water to drain out (the water leaves about 1' at
the top for breathing, air will get lousy but there will be air
because of any reason you want). It works, that is, if the PCs can get
the stoppers out (make it easy). The water drains out to a point (at
the level, what ever it may be) and a layer of clay is washed off the
walls. The PCs can then see a seam around the exit door. They can pry
(with swords that might bend! Or anything else they may have) the door
off and then leave. *** Optional *** Be nasty and have some kind of
monster in the water.
UNLOCK THE DOOR!
Vovoid: (plucas at ultra.net.au)
The PCs enter a passage about 20' long, ending in a dead end. As they
enter, the door locks behind them and the end of the passage suddenly
sprouts spikes and moves towards them at about 5' per round! The door
has a magical lock on it and requires two save rolls to open, one
against magic and one against lock picking.
IT'S NOT OVER YET!
Vovoid: (plucas at ultra.net.au)
This trap should only be pulled if the PCs have just carved their way
through one of your finest adventures with barely a wound to show for
it.
After last big baddie has been killed, the PCs advance into a room
that is absolutely crammed with treasure and magical items. The
players will probably be feeling smug after just decimating the GM's
adventure and also be a little uncautious, thinking it is all over.
When they go for the treasure, have all the weapons of the party
suddenly animate and turn on their wielders, and several statuettes in
the treasure pile grow and turn into powerful creatures and attack.
And if this isn't enough, when (if?) they finally kill their opponents
and leave (probably without touching the treasure) they find that the
big baddie has been restored to life, fully powered up and healed! Oh
yeah, and he's pissed off too.
GO JUMP IN THE LAKE
Vovoid: (plucas at ultra.net.au)
The PCs come to a shallow lake outdoors with a small island in the
middle. The water is very clear and it can be seen that there is
nothing in the water that could possibly harm them... or so they
think. But the white sand on the bottom is actually enchanted and when
stirred up by the PCs wading through the water (assuming they try to
get to the island) it will stick to them. At first this does nothing,
but when the PCs exit the water it hardens within seconds into a
plaster coating harder than stone and impervious to anything except
magic (of course, any forceful spell used will hurt the PC inside as
well) and this would be a good time for some nasty beastie to appear
from the trees on the island. If he/she is feeling generous, and the
PCs manage to get out of this, the GM may reward them with some
treasure hidden in the creature's lair. (This nearly killed off my
players, but luckily a mage was still in the water and he dealt with
the Ogre I threw at him.)
DIP...S#!T
Vovoid: (plucas at ultra.net.au)
If one of the PCs is a thief and he/she tries a little pick-pocketing,
have them steal a silk purse off a wealthy-looking gentleman/lady
fairly easily. When they go to open the purse it starts to shout,
"Help, Help, Thief!" hopefully they manage to get away if they are
still in a crowd, but if they are not it doesn't matter (except maybe
for an angry innkeeper wanting to know what the noise is about) but
still, the only thing in the purse is a scruffy piece of paper with
the words:- 'The curse of [some vengeful god] on you, thief!' And this
is no idle curse either, the reader of the note (not necessarily the
thief) is suddenly stricken with a crippling curse which reduces ALL
their scores and non-mental skills by a number previously set by the
GM! Rich pickings, eh?
OPEN SESAME (sesame-seed hand)
Vovoid: (plucas at ultra.net.au)
The PCs come across an iron-bound door with no handle and a small,
protruding face made of iron on it. The face has an iron ring in its
mouth. If a PC tries to knock with the iron ring, the face spits it
out and lodges some very long and very sharp teeth in their hand! This
causes only 1d6 damage, but the teeth are coated with a nasty poison
which paralyses the hand and slowly spreads throughout the body,
shutting down vital organs as it goes. (Unless otherwise stated,
assume that the hand used was the PC's weapon hand.) This trap should
be used deep into the adventure, far from any herbalist, and so
relying on the PCs' knowledge of medicine to avoid death.
No immune system can resist the poison, but the GM may have provided
some antidote earlier in the adventure. (This is even better if the
players don't know what the antidote is.)
If the PCs manage to get past the door (perhaps by blowing it off it's
hinges with magic or firepowder) they find that all the door was
guarding was an old chest which has already been looted by earlier
adventurers!
On a Pedestal
Jason Cox (coxie at iastate.edu)
first is the summoning trap. This one was originally in a
priest-mage's castle. After making their way into the room they see
the illusion of a treasure chamber, so most of them will rush in. As
soon as they're all in, a trap springs and blocks the entrance. Since
I have such a strong party physically, I used a prismatic wall to
block the wall. In the room are three pedestals. On each one is a gem,
a ruby, a sapphire and a diamond. Only by removing one can the party
escape (I suggest adding a riddle somewhere in the castle for the
answer.) The other two trip the trap, I used one to summon an ta' nari
and the other started replacing the flagstones (floor tiles ) in the
room with stones that have magic runes inscribed on them (death,
destruction, blindness, etc)
Jason Cox (coxie at iastate.edu)
In this illusion trap the party is trapped in a box corridor with only
two ways out, down a trapdoor in the side of the wall, or back the way
they came. The illusion is that there is a large party of trolls
bearing down on the party, complete with sounds, smells, and sight.
Outnumbered five to one by trolls, most people choose to try the trap
door which puts them into the next trap:
Trapped in a room that is apparently sealed (but there is a hidden
secret door) and in a zone of null magic, the party must first find
the door, and decipher the riddle to find the switch in the far corner
ceiling, then work together to reach the fifteen foot ceiling. Then
after they've tripped the switch that unlocks the deadbolts, they need
to then pick the lock and free the door, which leads to a room with a
spiked pit that they need to work to get to the landing across the pit
and to safety.=20
The ceiling must be high enough to force the party to work together
and the pit room must not be too wide that the party couldn't string a
tightrope across. Basically don't make them death traps, though I did
add a sand trap in the room to make them hurry. A room filling up with
sand makes people work faster.
Collapsing Ceiling
???
While the PC's are walking down a 10' x 50' hallway, they see a door
at the end. (This is where the fun begins.) Once the PC's open the
door they see a 100' x 100' x 100' room. The PC's notice that there is
a ledge at the top of the room. In order to get to the ledge they will
have to use unconventional means (ie, magic, ring of flying, ring of
teleportation, etc.). Once the PC's enter the room, start counting.
Once you get to 100 tell the PC's that they can feel the room shaking
and can hear granite scraping against granite. Start counting again.
Once you get to 25 each PC that has not made it to the ledge gets
crushed to death by an invisible granite block. (Nasty!)
Where The **** Is My Leg?
Tomas is een Luldebehanger (vtm at pi.net)
There is a small hole covered up with leaves and branches. When a PC
stands on the hole with both legs he falls through, though he manages
to hold on to a branch or something like that. He is hanging just
above a teleport but his legs are in the teleport and are teleported
away... Now there is a rotating blade coming down on him and all he
has to do is let go of the branch, but most likely he will try to
escape but this doesn't work (he's too slow without legs).....
Spontaneous Kobold Kombustion
Credit duely goes to my friend, nemesis, and favorite DM: James Reaney
Gregg Schoonover (greggs+ at cs.cmu.edu)
So, we're a group of 5 PC's of levels 7 to 9, merrily traipsing
through some tunnel in an underground cavern in pursuit of some
holier-than-thou objective. We come to an opening that reveals a deep
fissure in the cavern, with a wide-and-sturdy stone bridge leading
across to the continuation of our passage.
There are many ( > 20 ) kobolds on the other side, taunting us!! The
leader, we suppose, steps onto the bridge and beckons to our overgrown
barbarian (who's at the head of our march), like he's gonna kick his
ass. We scoff at this and begin to engage. After 1/2 a round, we've
taken out a handful of over-anxious kobolds.
Suddenly, one of the kobolds on the other side pulls something off a
chain around his neck, and throws it at the melee crowd. It seems that
the evil dude we're chasing had given all 20+ kobolds a single bead
from a necklace of missiles. They were instructed to defend their
position; if things looked grim, throw a bead.
This had the obvious domino effect of setting off every bead around
the head of every kobold in melee. A chain reaction of Spontaneously
Kombusting Kobolds. We suffered much fire damage, one of us missed a
dex-check and fell off, suffering falling damage, and those miserable
KamiKazee Kobolds Kicked our Keysters.
Great story though, I just wish I weren't the victim...
Shocking Surprise=20
CullAfulMoshuN... (S703989 at student.gu.edu.au)
Are you familiar with chemical cells (batteries)? If you get two
different types of metal, i.e. copper and zinc, with an electrolytic
solution, i.e. salt water, between them and connect metal plates with
wire to complete circuit, you get a current induced. This trap is of a
set of double doors:
=20
------- =20
/ | \ =20
/ | \ =20
/ | \ =20
| [ | ] | =20
| | | =20
| | | =20
| | | =20
with metal handles on the iron reinforcing of the door. The metal of
either door is NOT touching the other but the metal hinges are
connected to the iron reinforcing and to the metal handrails of the
stairs leading up the door. The other ends of the rails end in two
corroded statues (one zinc, one copper) in the center of a little
crescent pool of salt water. The two pools are connected underground
through a pipe. The trap is sprung when someone grabs one handle in
each hand, with skin or conductor, closing circuit :) They take 2d6
each round till they let go. Catch is that it is electricity (HUGE
battery) so they can't let go, plus anyone else who touches them takes
2d6 dmg and is flung back 10 feet, or if they grab, and stuck to them
and take 2d6 each round too until released. Also anyone touching rails
or statue at time takes dmg too and may also become stuck.
**********DD***********
/--\
___ /----\ ___
\ \/------\/ /=20
| SS SS |
/___/ \___\
Wet Death
Jon R. Johansen (jojo at prosjektdata.no)
Enter a small chamber through a corridor (A). On the other side of the
chamber is a door (C). When someone opens the door, they realize that
it is really a mimic which holds them and attacks them. Behind them, a
hidden portcullis (B) falls down preventing the retreat.
The builders made a tunnel to a subterranean river (D) on the other
side of the mimic door. In time the river has grown and flooded the
tunnel. When the mimic door is opened the water rushes in and fills
the entire chamber and most of the corridor (A) which they came from.
To escape they will have to locate the hidden lever (E) at the other
end of the tunnel and pull it without being swept away by the current
of the river. The lever opens a door (F) in the tunnel by just by the
mimic. The door leads to some stairs (G) which goes up above the water
level.
The party DOES have a chance of getting out alive, but they will have
to act very quickly.
To make things more interesting a sadistic DM may let a water
elemental pass by just as they open the mimic door. It will believe
that it is under attack and will defend itself with every means in
what is it's natural habitat.
If the group manages to parlay with it, it might help them to
survive...
The Mysterious footprints
Vovoid (plucas at ultra.net.au)
The PCs come to an iron-bound door which opens easily. Behind the door
is an armory with many weapons hanging from racks all over the walls
except for one spot directly opposite them. In the thick dust on the
floor, a trail of footprints can be seen to lead to the bare patch on
the wall... but not away from it. The players will obviously suspect a
hidden door, but they couldn't be more wrong... If they step up to the
wall, all the weapons in the room animate and attack them, but they
are rusty and easy to break. However once several of the weapons are
destroyed, a teleport spell is activated and all the animated weapons
appear behind them! Then if a few more are destroyed the same thing
happens again! This continues until the PCs try to escape... running
out the door, straight into the arms of a party of orcs attracted by
the noise! Luckily, the animated weapons fall to the ground once the
PCs leave the room.
Running Water
Kelly Smith (smitty at EagleWeb.net)
The PCs discover a valve (hidden). After turning the valve they can
hear water running in the distance. Tracking the sound of the water
they come to a door(has a clasp handle). The door appears to be water
tight but is damp to the touch. This would lead the PCs to the
conclusion that the room is filling up with water. In actuality the
room is draining. If the PCs grasp the clasp handle a wall shifts from
behind them to reveal a bed of spikes. The door then swings open and
throws the helpless PCs against the bed of spikes. They can save for
half damage.
You Again!
bucaillo at esiee-amiens.fr
A magical networks of rooms, the intentions of which was to test the
trust of the characters in their companions, as well as their general
good intentions...
First separate the party members by a teleportation device (a narrow
portal should do just fine, as they can enter it only one by one).
Have each of them appear at the end of a corridor, with a nice huge
stone eye with a hole for center engraved on the wall behind. It is
not necessary, but it adds a nice touch, I'd say. The corridor runs a
few meters before meeting with a side passage connecting (in an 'H'
shape) with another parallel corridor (supposedly the appearing site
for another PC). Have a clone of another character coming at the same
time from this second corridor, and acting exactly as if it was the
second PC. Then, they have to go on advancing along either corridor
(they should not feel like splitting again after finding themselves
together again). Then have your creature use the very first
opportunity to attack the real PC.
Now it gets tricky for both the DM and the players: have the same
thing happen to the real character impersonated above, and so on with
every couple of PCs. Let's call X the real character and X' the
mimicked one. As the attack goes on, the DM should spend his time
running from one player to the other, as the attack of X on Y' is
exactly the same as X' on Y (after the initial attack made by both X'
and Y' -don't choose a character so disgustingly caring and good that
s/he will let him/herself be beaten to death). The players should feel
something is wrong as they are not allowed to talk to each other (the
clones doesn't talk anymore once combat is engaged), but they will
guess that it really is the other player's attacks that damages him,
so... On the very moment one of the player should die (one of the
clones too), have only the clone die, and then both clones be sucked
up with their possessions by the stone eye (we wouldn't want some
clever-minded party end up with double their items -magical included-
would we?
Now the corridor goes on for a long time (say 100') before meeting a
perpendicular passage, leading to a parallel corridor...you got it
right, the same situation, but this time, it really is the connection
between the two corridors. The two REAL PCs should meet, one next to
death and the other in a bad shape if you thought to balance the
powers... Of course the DM should still talk to the players separately
if they are to believe they face another clone. Good-natured players
will talk first and discover what really happened (but can they really
be sure the other is what he says he is ?), while aggressive players
will either strike or run...
| | | |
| | | |
| |______| |
| |
| (2)_______ (2) |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
------------------------------------------------------------
| | | |
| | | |
| |______| |
| |
| (1)_______ (1) |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| (0) | | (0) |
|__/\__| |__/\__|
_/\_ : stone eye
(0) : arrival site of X and Y
(1) : encounter with the clone
(2) : encounter with the real character
------- : means a great distance (possibly an unremarked
teleportation)
I love this 'trap' for 2 reasons :
It is necessarily non-lethal (unless the players decide
otherwise) In every party there is an ongoing feeling between at
least two characters having to do with which of them could beat
the other in a duel-like fight.
Glue-Time!
bucaillo at esiee-amiens.fr
This is the classical kind of trap, that you can set in front of a
door, or in a corridor, or virtually anywhere you like... Jars of
Universal Glue (for those who don't know it, imagine the ultimate
glue... this is a hundred time worse). Try to prevent a jar from
breaking ON a PC unless that's what you want... You can allow a Saving
Throw, or DEX throw, or whatever you like if you feel in the mood...
Now at least one character should find himself walking bare-footed,
and there are plenty of ways to have fun in this situation (for those
who don't remember the scene in Die Hard with the riffle-shattered
glass panels, I am sure they can get an idea by themselves...) What!
the character was already bare-footed ? My, that's just too bad, isn't
it ? Variants:=20
What about a nice spray of fast-working, sleep inducing gas?
Splash! Of course a powerful, non-lethal dissolver should be made
available within a few days to rescue the fully glued floor-lover(s).
It would be a shame if something dangerous appeared just after (say a
boulder rolling down on them (would it be stopped by the glue?), or a
hungry beast just passing by?
Magic Amulet
Vovoid (plucas at ultra.net.au)
The PCs find a rune-carved amulet which on closer inspection (detect
magic, scrying spells, etc.) is revealed to have magic powers. The
power of the amulet is this: when the person wearing the amulet is in
danger, the amulet heats up and glows. Unfortunately, when a PC puts
the amulet on, it immediately starts to glow! But however much the PCs
look around they can't find the danger. Then the amulet's second power
is revealed; it blows up!
Ability scores R' us
Daniel Yurovsky
This trap is not necessarily deadly but can be. The PCs enter a room
filled with potions. The first player to quaff a potion has one of
their ability scores raised temporarily. (Which ever the DM chooses.)
then after a time chosen by the DM it starts dropping at a much faster
rate.=20
Karim (karim at ambr.com.br)
1) This trap should be used to stop PC's greed.
It should take place in a room with difficult access. In the room,
there will be nothing but a chest. The DM should lead the PCs to think
that it is probably where all the treasure of the dungeon lie. The
chest is locked but will be opened easily with an open doors check.
When opened, it will create an energy capsule containing the character
who opened the chest. Suddenly the capsule will start closing upon the
character. It will completely close upon the PC in 5 rounds, obviously
killing him. If the character touches the capsule, it will inflict
1d10 damage. The only way to cancel the trap is for another character
of the party to close the chest. Inside the chest there will be a
short sword +3 (but how will they get it out?)
2) This trap will challenge the PC's intellect.
While walking through a corridor, all the PCs with some kind of metal
will stick to the wall. The wall contains some sort of magnet that
will stick any piece of metal to it. If carrying some metal there is
no way (even with super str.) to get free. The only way out is by
leaving all metal items on the wall. If PC's are smart, they will
slide the metals out of the corridor.
Jon larsen (kmlarsen at ptialaska.net)
There's a large room about 20'x20' with two doors opposite each other.
The ceiling to this room rises high into darkness and hanging out of
the darkness to the floor are three ropes. As soon as the last PC
enters the room, the door slams shut and magically locks behind them.
Both door are very difficult to force, or pick open as there are no
visible key holes.=20
The object here is to get the PCs to try to climb the ropes. Once a
force greater than fifty pounds is applied, the rope pops free from
the ceiling, dropping the contents of a small secret compartment to
the floor below. One drops a delayed blast fireball, another a
stinking cloud, and the third releases the key to get out of here.
Placing the key near the door will allow it's magic to show the key
hole that earlier was non-existent.
I hope other gamers out there find this one as fun to use as I did. I
used it in a higher level campaign to prevent actually killing the PCs
but to teach them not to yank things that they are clueless to where
they lead!
Elmar Bihler (bihler at mathpool.uni-augsburg.de)
Place: Dungeon, Deserted Castle, whatever,... Party: Low-Level, best
with unexperienced players Aim: Catch/Delay Damage: Low or none The
party is exploring some deserted castle and comes to a side-corridor.
When the last PC has entered, a stone block is triggered and blocks
the way behind them, so their only choice is to go forward. After a
few steps they come into a room that is totally dark. The darkness is
magical, so torches won't help. (If a low-level mage tries some
'kid-stuff'-magic-light, tell him, the spell produced some kind of
short-circuit, so his light spells are burned out for that day...)
The party will then begin to explore the room on their hands and feet,
and discover that the room ends at a sharp edge:
_______
_________/ \
_[]_________ |
Stone | |
Block |____* Lever
10 feet below there is a lever that lifts the stone block and the
floor where the lever is, so the only thing the PCs have to do is to
jump down and pull the lever. (Nice DM: Place treasure chest here !)
The point is, that the party has no way to discover whether beneath
the edge is a 10 feet or a 1000 feet drop, because there are other
spells besides the darkness-spell to prevent them from going on: e.g.
magical silence, so when they throw something down, they won't hear it
when it hits the ground,...
When they finally let someone down on a rope, roll some dice (just for
show), and tell them, the sharp edge just cut the rope, oops... (Be
really nasty here !!!)
Shadow Wall
Brad Collins (dragon at prcn.org)
This one is a great trap for several reasons. You can put it in any
room and no one can resist triggering it! The PCs walk into a well
decorated room, you know, chairs, tables, bookshelves, fireplace. Any
wizard with them can find magical aura in the room and even the most
idiotic newbie at the game can see that one section of one of the
walls is "illusionary". It's a cheap job of illusion, it wavers,
shimmers and ripples, but in no way should the PCs be able to see
beyond it. When the wall is in anyway pierced, touched or looked
through, then a huge spiked slab of stone on the end of the hallway
that the illusionary wall leads to detaches from its springs and
holdings and flies out to pin the guy to the wall (I usually say it
kills 'em instantly). The beauty of this trap is that no one can
resist looking through it. It gets em every time if once in a blue
moon you actually put something good behind it.
Trick o' the Eye
Brad Collins (dragon at prcn.org)
Your PCs walk into a fair sized room. The floor has to have some kind
of pattern and an ambient light zone must exist in this room. About
halfway through the room is a huge hole leading from Left wall to
Right wall. Completely impassible unless by tightrope walking, magic
etc. The thing is that the pattern on the floor goes halfway down the
opposite side of the pit so it looks like there is no pit. The PCs
merrily stride to their doom. It cannot be detected by a detect trap
magic because it's just a Trick o' The Eye.=20
SMILE
Vincent iseenvetteklootzak (weijters at cs.unimaas.nl)
The PCs walk down a long corridor, with in the end a deep hole, that's
completely visible. When they close in on the hole (about 50 feet),
they hear crying. When they reach the edge, they'll see a little baby,
crying in the hole. BUT when they touch the baby, the PCs hands are
stuck on the baby; they simply won't get off. Its a paralytic poison
to, they can't move a muscle anymore. The baby starts laughing and
slowly begins to eat them. (By the way, the baby has got AC 10, (it
doesn't wear a metal diaper or something) but when there are PCs on,
it gains the combined AC of all of them. (100 xp)=20
Ankle Sickle
Richard Lemke (enric at thesurf.com)
The trap is small, about the size of one tile, that when weight is
placed on it descends downward. Optimally this weight will be a foot,
in which place the twin blades extract and slice. The twin blades are
carved similar to a quarter moon, or sickle. The come together around
the ankle and slice the tendons, and everything else to the bone. This
will maim any character, not to mention the process of releasing the
character from the trap. (The blades each take 20 Pts. of damage)
Damage can vary with the armor worn, but the maiming is always the
best part, for any character, to move is their greatest treasure.
AN ICE LITTLE PROBLEM
Allan Ramshaw (david.ramshaw at virgin.net)
The party arrive at a room with what seems like water on the floor. On
touching it they will discover it is a powerful acid causing extreme
damage to the appendage used to sample it. In alcoves in the wall of
the corridor leading to the room there are several bottles containing
various liquids. One of these is poison which will do (not too much to
kill) quite a bit of damage to anyone drinking it. When thrown over
the acid, however it will freeze creating an ice bridge to the door on
the other side.=20
THE THIRD GUY'S F****D
Allan Ramshaw (david.ramshaw at virgin.net)
As the party walk down a corridor they come to a place with several
statues in glass cases in the wall. Shortly after this they come to a
doorway leading to a room full of treasure. On entering this room the
third person entering will be teleported to a glass case in the
previous wall and turned to stone.
The Slide
Peter Joseph Bernacki (bernack at ix.netcom.com)
The players enter a 20x15x10 (length-width-height), or a similar one,
and two etched carvings of knights are a few feet from the walls.
Opposite the door is a spiraling staircase. The players can search the
murals to their hearts content, yet, nothing is apparent.
The steps are touch activated, the first stair sinks ever so slightly
(5% chance of noticing) and remains that way for awhile (see below).
When the fifth step is hit, the murals explode (not too powerful,
within five feet takes 1d6 from the stones), exposing two images of
_____s).
The players will most likely sprint up the stairs, which spiral upward
seemingly endlessly. When a certain stair is picked (make sure the
players are now at least 100 feet up) have the stair fall, tripping
the foremost player. The players will probably tumble over him.
The stairs flip over, exposing a oily, rounded surface, now the fun
starts! The players slide at amazing speeds down the oiled stairs.
Have the stairs fork at certain places. Have two players go one way,
two another, one here, one there, be creative. If the players have a
retainer or hired mercenary, have him be lost forever, all his goods
gone.
This is an excellent way to test the players survival skills alone.
Make it difficult. Put the fighters together, put the spellcasters
together, put the players that have both magic and fighting alone
(elves, paladins).
Where they land is totally up to you. Remember, they have been falling
down a oiled half-pipe, so when they land, they land hard. If you want
some egotistical bastard to die, land him on a bed of five foot
spikes. I guarantee he'll die.
The Chest
Peter Joseph Bernacki (bernack at ix.netcom.com)
The players will smack themselves when they figure this one out. Put a
chest in the middle of a 10 by 10 by 10 room. Make it extremely
suspicious looking. They can search to their hearts content, yet they
find nothing (because nothing is there) on the chest. The walls are
clean, too.
They probably won't open the chest, but if they do, the trap is
ruined. You see, the door is charged with an electrical current as
soon as its opened. When they open the chest, the door is undone.
This is best with a very cautious group.
Andy/Terry Zerger (tzerger at gunnison.com)
This trap will make a PC think twice about snatching any seemingly
magical item they see. The PCs are adventuring, looking for treasure
or something or are just passing through a sort of ruin, when they
come to huge double doors. Upon passing they doors they are greeted by
a tome standing on a pedestal in the middle of the room as well as
seemingly-holy-light gleaming off the book. Way more then likely
either a mage or cleric from the group will run up and grab it,
desperately wanting its spell contents. However, just when the player
has attained the prize, the beam of seemingly-holy-light diverts and
blinds/wounds/whatever whoever it is that grabs the book. I used this
to humble my caster and he always uses summoned creatures to get such
things now.
The Wall
Steve Ingold (whooly at odyssee.net)
It's a wall that throws back whatever you threw at it. In other words,
it somehow provokes the PC's. Maybe a NPC told the PC's to attack it,
or the wall speaks, maybe the wall throws at the characters something
that had been thrown at it before. Whatever it is, when a PC's hits it
physically the wall hit him back with the SAME DAMAGE, maybe by
growing an arm or throwing a brick, if they cast a fireball at it, the
wall throws it right back, DOUBLE DAMAGE (double with magic attacks
only). It behaves like a creature with all the same bonuses as the
attacker. The cool thing is that it can't be destroyed unless a clever
idea is used, like attacking yourself. You see if you attack the wall
it attacks back automatically, if you attack yourself, the wall will
take damage. Get it (double if magic, regular if normal). Another cool
thing is that if they heal themselves they actually heal the wall,
double. If you heal the wall you heal yourself double, etc. Of course
all this only works within a certain range of the wall... say 100ft.
Guy A. Jett (gajett at ix.netcom.com)
The Party comes into a small room about 10ft tall and 10x10ft wide and
long. The doors slam shut and lock behind them. There is a sound of
grinding as the floor slowly moves down. It stops and the ceiling
moves away. Bugs or some small crawly things fall into the room. There
is a gate on the new exposed wall, but if the players move, they are
attacked by the bugs...
The Party comes to a room, 50x50ft and 10ft tall. The floor is covered
with white powder. The door slams and locks. There are two doors, one
is the way out, but the other has a lever, if pulled, the lever
disintegrates the floor and the party falls 40ft down into a pit of
lava, the powder is TNT, BOOM.
As the party comes into the room, they see nothing but a door at the
other side. If the party heads for the door, they pass a fulcrum and
the room spins down a track, and spins, and spins, hitting the PC's.
They fall into the pit trap desired
! !
////////////////.//////////////////
00 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Key:
!=3Ddoor
/=3Dfloor
.=3Dfulcrum
0=3Dwall nearest to the first door
|=3Dtrack
^=3Dpit bottom
Temple of Doom
DS Wilson (The.Wilsons at xtra.co.nz)
Have the PC's enter a temple in a jungle somewhere. on the way in they
get shot at by wall mounted poison crossbows and nearly fall into
collapsing floors, and nearly get skewered by wall spikes etc. Then,
they will arrive in a chamber with a magnificent golden statue covered
in jewels sitting on a pedestal. If the PCs detect magic, none will
radiate (This is a mechanical trap.) Sooner or later one of them will
pick it up. Suddenly the pedestal drops 18 inches and a loud rumbling
is heard. Any PC's with brains will start running, because a large
boulder is about to descend from the wall behind the pedestal and
chase them through the passages, of course setting off al the other
traps on the way out. Or, in English, The Boulder Scene from Raiders
of the Lost Ark. My DM pulled this one on us (at my suggestion) and
all the party except me and one other died in the temple. You can
disable other traps as you see fit, to insure PC survival.
THE LIQUID FLOOR TRAP
Angus Murphy (murphy at biology.ucsc.edu)
Have the characters open a door into a metal corridor with a paneled
floor. There is a cold wind blowing from the end of it, and a bright
light, not unlike sunlight, is emanating from the end. Preferably, the
characters have been in a dungeon for a while and are looking for a
way out. The trap in this room is a pit in the paneled floor. This pit
has a permanent HEAT METAL spell cast on its bottom. This pit is about
8' deep and is filled with molten aluminum. When in its molten form,
aluminum looks just about the same as it usually does with just a hint
of silver. This makes it look no different from the rest of the floor
panels. The wind they feel is actually a NORTH WIND spell (found in
DRAGON MAGAZINE ANNUAL #1) with permanency cast on it. This gives the
illusion of an exit and gets rid of the heat from the pit. The light
is from a LIGHT spell cast on the wall at the end of the corridor.
Falling into the trap usually means instant death, but you can apply
whatever damage you want.
Trick Pit Trap
Philip Wrobel (pwrobel at infini.net)
This trap is works great on thieves and mages. First have the party be
chased by a monster(s) and make them arrive at a pit that cannot be
crossed by a teleport spell (It is dark and they can`t see the
opposite side.) Actually, the pit is an illusion. It is impossible to
levitate because there is an anti-magic barrier. The only way to cross
is to climb the walls. But in the ceiling there are many holes where
crossbowmen can fire bolts at the PCs without being harmed.
Teeter-Totter Room
Ryan Greene (rcgreene at research.att.com)
The players enter a room that is 60'around, with a 40'high domed
ceiling. On the right is a fountain, filled with water, and a few
coins in the pool of water. On the left is a statue with a pile of
gold at the base. Opposite the entry is another door to get out. The
entire floor is a giant teeter-totter, with the center being the
safest place to walk. If the players take any of the gold at either
side, the following occurs simultaneously:=20
1.Rods pop up on the floor at 4'intervals over all of the floor. If
anyone is hit by a rod, they are stunned.
2.The water begins to drain from the fountain, very rapidly.=20
3.Oil begins to pour down on the floor from the ceiling, covering
everything
Next, the floor begins to tilt to the side that the players are not
on, sliding them through the rods that have appeared into one of four
holes at the bottom of the pit. If anyone should manage to hold onto
one of the rods, they will retract once the floor is perpendicular to
the ground.
LRhinoJr at aol.com
As the party walks down a corridor, one member falls down a VERY deep
pit (200-300'). The pit is a cubic curve so that it comes out gently
and the PC doesn't take any damage. But the 'chute' deposits the
character in a room and a stone door closes off the pit. The character
is in a 10' x 10' room with a door on one wall with a 3 position lever
beside it. The current position is in the middle (off). One position
opens the door to a very long ladder, and the other position opens a
valve for water or sand to fill the room, and seals the door.
Well, isnt that cute.
Myrkul (a052802t at bc.seflin.org)
This trap consists of a room (the GM decides how big,) well lit by
thousands of tiny multi-colored lights flitting about the room. The
room is well decorated, as if it were a mage's sitting room. There are
no books, scrolls etc. In one corner of the room, there sits a small
pile of metal objects. If a piece of metal is tossed into the room, it
is immediately swarmed and carried by the lights over to the pile
(alternatively it could be dropped onto a teleport pad, disguised as a
rug, in this case there would be no pile). If anyone enters the room
with even a metal filling, the person is immediately swarmed and
devoured (bone and all) by the lights, the metal being dropped onto
the pile/pad. If a PC is brave enough to enter sans metal (especially
after seeing his companion get eaten), he finds that the swarm does
not devour him, but rather tickles. The remaining PCs can now pass
through, metal and all, safely. The PC who entered sans metal will
find that when he tries to leave, the swarm plasters itself against
the air in the doorway where he/she exits. If the party was nice
enough to bring the PC's equipment along with them, he/she can now
retrieve it from them. The lights cannot exit the room, and if a spell
is cast into the room, the lights flash, blinding the party for an
amount of time equal to the spell's level in minutes.
A Slippery Path
Ben Laffin (gille001 at maroon.tc.umn.edu)
This is a take-off of the classic collapsing corridor trap. The party
is walking down a slippery hall, when, after the party has passed the
midway point in the hall, one PC trips, slips, whatever. To keep from
falling, they grab a torch holder. This triggers the walls to fall
away, leaving a void in either direction. Also, the void is gaining
strength, making the floor ever slimmer. The PCs can see that the
"e;real"e; world is still though the door at the end of the hallway.
They have to tiptoe along the floor, which is still very slippery. If
one of the PCs is unfortunate enough to fall into it, you can make up
whatever you want to happen. Perhaps a teleport to another world?
For those GMs who are feeling especially malevolent, the PCs may be in
a hopeless situation: the door can keep moving away at the same pace
as the party moves towards it, thereby dooming the party.
Healer Man
Angus (thekid at voicenet.com)
The PCs enter the room (Preferably from an area to which they can't
retreat back to) and find a large room. The room has no exits other
than a door on the far side of the room (Locked for now). In the room,
the is a statue of a warrior and bard with a glowing ball of light in
the between the two:=20
----------------
| |exit
| |
| W * B |
| |
| |
----------------
When a character touches the light (which they will do in frustration
of being trapped) the light takes the shape of the PC that touched it.
Basically, this causes great confusion. Everything on the two must be
the same. If someone attacks the "e;Twin"e; then the wounds will
appear on the real PC. If you attack the real PC, the wounds only
appear on the real PC. The only way to kill the "e;twin"e; is to heal
it. This can be by spell, chant, potion, herbs (you get the idea.) It
can take as little as one of these to kill it or more. (The less
needed, the more ticked your PCs will be) Took my PCs about 45
minutes.
William655 at aol.com
The PCs are in a large abandoned castle, and stumble upon the treasure
room. There isn't much treasure, but there is a small corridor in the
back of the room. As the players walk down it, they see a light
shining from a room on the left. There are two rooms, one further
down. When they move into the doorway of the first room, an
invisibility and mute spell is cast on the character in the back.
There is a sudden panic in the group, and then an image of the
"e;missing"e; character is portrayed in a cage on the other side of
the room. As the characters move towards it, a trap door opens that
drops them into a slowly narrowing pit. On all sides are rotating
buzz-saws. The pit ends up only being 6 inches wide at the bottom, but
before the players die, they "e;see"e; what was in the other room... a
full arsenal of +15 weapons and armor! It is best to use this with a
group of players with a good sense of humor.
Angus (thekid at voicenet.com)
Have the PCs see a very likable artifact in a room. When they enter
the room, have the door close. The artifact (which they find to be an
illusion) disappears, and they find themselves trapped. The door
doesn't budge. In the room is a skeleton, and in the skeleton's hand
is a silver dagger. On the door is seen the markings below:
T N E S S F F T T _=20
In order to open the door, they must figure out what goes into the
blank (_). Also, they can only scrape it into the door using the
silver dagger. No other weapon, chisel, or object can even mark the
door. If they take the dagger and scratch in the correct letter with
it, the door opens. The letter that they must scratch in is "O". The
reason is this is that the letters stand for: Ten, Nine, Eight, Seven,
Six, Five, Four, Three, Two, and One.
This took my PCs about half an hour...and that was only because one of
them vaguely remembered it from a puzzle book he had read. So, I judge
it to take a little longer than that for the average group.
FLOOD THE DUNGEON
Nicki Vankoughnett (vankougn at lycos.nbchs.north-battleford.sk.ca)
This trap is very difficult to set up, but great for getting a lot
more time out of a dungeon. When the players are finished with the
final villain of the dungeon, have them find the treasure room. Once
inside, of course they find a very large amount of gold, silver, gems,
etc. The treasure is large enough that just preparing it for transport
out of the dungeon will take about a day. The room is also somewhat
elevated from the rest of the dungeon, say, about 15 - 20 feet above
the lowest point. One of the chest's will be stuck to the floor. When
it is opened, it will set off the trap. Once it is opened, elsewhere
in the dungeon, a floodgate will open, and begin filling the dungeon
with water. At the source, there is a silence spell, to keep the
players from hearing this. What should happen, is that the players
will be focused on the treasure, and have the door to the room closed.
When they go to leave, they will find that a little way down the
stairs or ladder, or whatever, that way down is filled with water.
Getting out of the dungeon will be much more interesting now,
especially if the players have to continually surface for air. Also
make it clear that carrying any significant amount of the treasure
will weigh them down. Also remember that torches do not burn
underwater. If you wish to improve their chances of escaping, allow
the treasure to contain one or two magical items that will allow
survival under water.=20
Scissors Trap
lorie Coleman (dogncat at earthlink.net)
In this trap, if a PC opens a door [It should open away from them and
hit a wall on the other side.] it will trigger a button that will do
two things:=20
1.It will lower a long wooden block with a spike on the end of it.=20
2.Two pairs of blades will come out of the wall on both sides of the
door, at neck level and ankle level. The top blades are equivalent
to vorpal swords, and the lower ones are equivalent to swords of
sharpness. Roll to see if limbs are severed. [Neck twice and both
feet. But only if the scissors hit.]
If a saving throw is failed, they take 4d8 points of damage. If they
make it ask them if they jump through the doorway or backwards. Make
sure you don't tell them about the spike behind them! If they jump
back they impale themselves on the spike [1d10] and get hit by all
four blades! If they jump forward, some GMs might want to be
particularly mean and put a pit just right outside the door. Others
might want to be nice and keep a safe way through it all. If you do
put a pit, you should make a different path leading to that same room.
The Voodoo Trap
Maria Izabel Perini Muniz (estag at npd1.ufes.br)
Imagine the players entering a room, when the old trap of the lances
coming from the walls and the floor. When they think that they are
dead meat, the lances only make a little wound, just the necessary to
get some blood, then they retract. The doors open and they are free.
One hour later, one of then begins to fill as if he has been wounded
by a small lance. Then they find something that explains everything.
The objective of the lances was to get blood to help a wizard to
create voodoo dolls of them and now they have to do something for the
wizard or else he will kill them using the dolls. This can be the
beginning of a new Chapter, don't you think?
The Voodoo Trap, Part 2
Eduardo Perini Muniz (epm at npd1.ufes.br)
When the group enters a small room they find a big golden jar over a
pedestal, if they try to take the jar they fill something pushing
their heads to the ceiling. If the characters take the jar out of the
pedestal they will be decapitated.
The two voodoo dolls were placed with their heads through a hole in
the bottom of the jar, and their necks firmly held by two ropes, one
with the sides attached to the bottom of the trap and the other with
the sides attached to the inside of the pedestal.
David (Crystalthorn at hotmail.com)
A door is opened to a basement setting. It's dark and damp, but the
players have to rush. So they go down the stairs. After a few minutes,
the players should realize they're not getting anywhere. If they turn
around, the door is gone. They are really trapped in a time-teleporter
trap. They can only get out if they walk back up the stairs backwards.
David (Crystalthorn at hotmail.com)
Another trap is a good one for lonely thieves. Place them in a cell on
a ship. Have a group of pirates on deck down the hallway and a bunch
of other dark cages around, making no sounds and the occupants are
unseen. The thief picks the simple lock, and gets out. Fellow
prisoners to take over ship probably comes to mind, but they won't
answer the thief. The thief may free all the cells, but when he opens
the last cell, he turns to find a lot of minotaurs armed and mind
controlled ready to attack him. For added fun, have a giant squid
attack the boat.
Spin-Cycle
Fireball (fireball at the-link.net)
This trap is intended for the greedy party, most likely the thief (of
course). It is a circular room of whatever size you want, two exits
(the one they entered and the exit, both easily opened and used), and
a 5' wide groove around the outside of the room. The entire area has a
very faint aura of magic, ala spell-casters. Whenever the party
enters, the greedy is dragged to the center of the room, lifted off
the ground about 5' and, quite literally, put the spin cycle. EVERY
item on their person, except for the clothes on their back and a
normal weapon, if they have one left, is flung from them towards the
outside wall. This continues until the character is 'cleaned'
completely of their stuff. The trap then drops the character (for
falling damage where you see fit), opens the 5' wide along the wall
into a collection pit, and dumps all the stuff into it. For nice DMs,
you may allow the character to find some of their things later on. I
can assure you, for those characters who figure themselves sneaky and
greedy, having nothing for awhile will humble them to an extent.
Having a Ball
Fehr at djschool.com
The party comes across an obstacle in a 10' wide hallway, with a roof
a few feet higher- a 10' spherical object, grayish-brown in color,
pocked with small bumps, leathery in texture. Slightly springy to the
touch, it blocks the hallway! Fighter-types will probably want to
slice it open, or at least stab it. Striking the object will let the
players know what it is; a giant puffball! Anchored to a small plot of
earth at its base, it will pop quite loudly (50% chance of attracting
a wandering monster or guard) and fill an area 10-15 feet in front and
behind it with spores. The safe way to get around it is climb
carefully over top of it! Extremely heavy characters may pop it
anyway, or it may be accidentally punctured. A small puncture may
release only a jet of spores, which would affect only a single
character. Throwing something like an axe at it from further than 15'
away will avoid the spores, but still get the noise.
Possible spore effects:=20
Coated characters are itchy for 2-8 turns, -2 on attacks and AC.=20
Characters are blinded for 1-6 turns, and smell really bad.=20
Spores are similar to Russet Mold (see Monstrous Compendium).=20
Spores eat into organic material, unless killed by salt, alcohol
or fire. Spores have individual effects like Myconid spores (see
M.C.). Spores are poisonous, like Yellow Mold (see M.C.).
Polymorph gas
Ben Ramey (bramey at clark.edu)
A chest that is always chained shut (with the regular needle traps, so
players don't get suspicious), will release a small puff of gas when
opened. This gas will cause the player to be randomly polymorphed. How
you determine the random effect is left up to the GM's discretion, but
I like to use the summoning tables.
Ben Ramey (bramey at clark.edu)
Any thing that gives poison:=20
A poison that causes the person to change sex if they touch a
magic item. A poison that has a 20% chance of polymorphing the
character every time they are in a stressful situation . Must hit the
20% chance to change back.=20
Curses:=20
Every piece of gold the player touches turns to lead. Every time
the player thinks of a living creature he polymorphs into one.
This will not confer class abilities Thinking of an elf fighter
will just get you an elf.
Hear no evil. See no evil. Speak no evil.
Drew Wood (norseman at voicenet.com)
Within a Labyrinth the PCs will come upon a dead end. On the wall in
front of them they will see three statues of monkeys. One with his
hands covering his ears, one with his hands covering his eyes, and one
with his hands covering his mouth. Underneath each of the statues
there is a lever. Player characters will have to pull these levers in
order to find the way into the next part of the Labyrinth.
When the lever is pulled under the statue: Hear no evil, a creature
that can not be heard will be released into the Labyrinth somewhere
near the group. The group will have to fight this creature when it
arrives, but they will not be expecting it because there will be no
sign that anything has happened when the lever is pulled.
When the lever is pulled under the statue: See no evil, a gas that is
highly flammable will be released through small holes in the ceiling
above the statue. Any contact with flame of any sorts will instantly
ignite the gas causing an explosion that will make the group wish they
had been hit with a fireball instead. Note: Sparks from spurs or
scraping of any metal on the stone walls to a torch that is lit to
magical fire will ignite the gas. PC's will not be able to smell the
gas, unless someone in the group has a very keen sense of smell.
When the lever is pulled under the statue: Speak no evil, a door will
open up next to the statues. The character who pulled the lever will
feel a slight numbness in his head and will become cursed. If he
speaks anything even remotely evil, he will be teleported away from
the party into the lower levels of the Labyrinth, even if he and the
rest of the group has already made it out of the Labyrinth. The curse
will stay with the PC until a Remove Curse spell is cast upon him, and
only a Remove Curse spell will work on the PC.
Note: A Dispel Magic spell will have no effect upon the statues.
Corridor of Chains
Drew Wood (norseman at voicenet.com)
Within the labyrinth is a corridor about 50' long. From the ceiling
hangs chains of differing lengths and sizes. There is no floor, just a
pit of spikes about 20' deep. What the PC's need to do is get across
the pit without falling in. Sounds easy enough, except that a few
chains are attached to triggers. Many different things could happen,
use chart for easiness:
01-20: Chain pulls out of ceiling, make dexterity check to grab
another
21-30: Triggers dart trap.=20
31-40: Chain falls 10', make strength check, spikes raise 5'.=20
41-50: Triggers fireball trap.=20
51-60: Triggers dart trap.=20
61-70: Chain falls 5', make strength check, spikes raise 10'.=20
71-80: Chain is wet(slippery), make dexterity and strength check.
81-90: Triggers fireball trap.=20
91-100: Chain pulls out of ceiling, make dexterity check to grab
another.
The space from the bottom of the pit to the ceiling is 40'. The chains
can hang all the way down to the bottom, so the space from where a PC
is to the top of a spike will have to be left to the DM. Also, when a
chain falls a certain amount of feet, it raises the spikes up as fast
as the PC's weight pulls the chain. So in effect, a PC can impale
himself on a spike because his weight pushed it up as fast as he fell,
and squuuiiishhhhh. OUCH!
Hall of Clones
Drew Wood (norseman at voicenet.com)
This hallway is about 20' wide by 40' long. Now, when a party member
steps into the hallway, everything seems fine. The further he goes he
starts to notice that he is walking beside himself. An exact duplicate
of the PC is made but with only half the hit points and without the
ability to cast spells or use magical items. At the end of the hallway
the clone will attack the PC. The PC is fine until he steps out of the
hallway. Imagine the whole party entering the hallway at the same
time.
Note: Clones can use any ability, skill, talent, etc., that the PC
can. Magical items are not cloned. If a mage or spell user of any type
is cloned, clone can not use spells or spell-like abilities.
Monster Summoning With A Twist
Sean Hickey (smc at mindspring.com)
The PCs are facing a high-level spellcaster, and when they finally get
close to defeating him, he casts a spell unfamiliar to the PCs.
Suddenly, half of them disappear and pop up in front of the mage,
facing the remaining PCs. The bad part is that they act as summoned
monsters. If any of the remaining players are good, they will probably
want to save the others - unless, of course, this gives them a good
excuse to pound on that evil/chaotic neutral character that has their
character pissed off. After however many rounds you want, the summoned
PCs flash back to where they were.
Sean Hickey (smc at mindspring.com)
The PCs reach the end of a large hallway with double doors at the end.
They open them and walk through, and enter a large chamber with a
window in front of it. Past the window is a room about 100' lower than
the PC's room. Inside, they see a huge red dragon chained up, with a
gigantic axe hanging above it. They will also see stairs leading down
out of the room and a doorway leading into the room. Also in the room
is a rope that runs out of the room, and leads up to the axe. They
will, of course, chop the rope, killing the "red dragon". Notice the
quotation marks. The red dragon is actually some sort of beast that
will split up or release more monsters (in AD&D, a Grand Old Master
Neogi). The new monsters run up the stairs and attack the PCs. When/if
the PCs actually go down the stairs, they realize the monster room was
off on a side passageway. This will certainly make them scout ahead
next time.
On Ice
Matthew (mimac at ATCON.COM)
The players have entered a room the floor is slick glass or ice and
the ceiling is low enough so a normal person has to bend a bit. There
is also a null magic zone covering the whole room. The players have to
get across but they can't walk, fly, or magic themselves across. The
obvious solution (but nobody thinks of it at first) is to stand on the
ice/glass and throw a heavy item in the opposite direction of where
you wish to go, you slide right to the wall or door.
It's the PITS, again and again and again...
Stephen (SirDuane at gcip.net)
A pit in the floor of a dead end looks inviting, as a rope hangs down
into it. Looking down in the pit, it seems to be pitch black (A
darkness spell has been cast on a set of spikes on the floor some 110'
below.) A slight smell of gas, pitch-tar or some other flammable
substance should encourage players NOT to drop a torch into the pit.
If a source of magical light is dropped it will pass through the
darkness spell and become hidden by it.
Seeing the rope is knotted for climbing, an adventurous PC might wish
to climb down to take a closer look. Now comes the part of the game
where we find out just HOW much stuff the character is carrying. If a
player has more then 200gp weight not including the player himself,
the rope breaks and activates the trap. The player falls but doesn't
hit the bottom. Instead 1 foot above the spikes is a teleporter that
will send them to the top of the pit 10 feet below the opening where
they fall to the bottom and teleport to the top again. This will
continue to happen until the player can be saved. The sides of the pit
can be either slick with an oily substance on the walls, or it can be
very jagged so if someone tries to catch himself on the walls all they
do is cut themselves up pretty bad.
Damage: Well consider they fall 100'. That's 1d10 per 10 feet. so the
first time, they fall about 100' so its 10d10 damage. The second time
they fall another 100' that's 20d10 then 30d10. Assume they reach
terminal velocity after falling about 700 to 800 feet. Now damage
doesn't matter. If dispel magic is used then the teleporters are
disabled and the player falls at his current relative speed and
distance of falling say 250 feet to the spiked floor below. That's
25d10 points + 1d6 for every spike hit in the floor. The problem of
saving the player is apparent. If you try to catch him at some point
the weight and speed could easily tear an arm off someone. Does not
make for a very fun and friendly family game. Or it could knock
another player into the hole as well. At present I have no solution to
this puzzle unless you can teleport the player somewhere safe.
NOTE: The magical source of light passes through the teleporter
because it has magic on it. Anything magical will pass to the ground
so if they lose the player they might have a nice collection of
magical items to pick from on the floor, even if they have to pick
through their friend. (Extra note. After the 3rd time falling even a
monk could not slow down.)
Candygram!
Ostraka
It is actually a ancient trap that was developed by a Chinese War
Lord. You just need a crevice with an oak tree and over a thousand
bowmen hiding on each side. Then, you carve the message: "Lord Badaud
died under this tree." and wait until dark. By this time Lord Badaud
and his guards walking down the crevice comes by the tree. Curious
about what the message says, he orders a torch to be lit. This is the
signal for the thousand bowmen to open fire on him. Surprise surprise!
Interesting enough, a descendant of this warlord had his own way of
causing confusion in his enemy's ranks. At the start of the battle,
the front row of his warriors would cut their own heads off. The
opposing army would be so stunned that it took awhile for them to
react to being killed. However, if you do this one I suggest you don't
do it all the time as you will diminish the respect of your henchmen
not to mention diminishing the number of your henchmen.
Kavanagh (kavmacwa at iinet.net.au)
One trap I like using is a secret door, which is rather obvious. The
party triggers the door, and the area is filled with magical darkness.
If they move close to the wall, they will all fall into a slide.
However, this slide is very tight, and they can only go in single
order.
The slide actually twists and turns, and at one point, splits into two
passages. Both of these passages join back up later (characters crash
into each other?) The slide then ends in a large room with a swinging
door entrance.
Once in the room, they can see a large monster, or if the DM is rather
nasty, a trap may have been rigged in the slide, blowing it up if they
try to get out. Or a large nasty monster comes sliding down the slide
after them (Giant slug, Metalmaster, etc.)
The only way to get out is via the slide but it cannot be climbed.
Magic will not work. The only way to escape is to dig handholds or
something with a weapon or something.
Descending Ceiling
Yingzhi Zhang (caily at vt.edu)
The players enter a room with a pedestal and probably very valuable
item lying on the pedestal (some powerful monster should probably
guard the item, just to keep them from getting suspicious). The moment
the players touch the item, it activates a Contingency which activates
a Dispel Magic on the 50-ton stone block that looks like the ceiling,
which happens to have (or had, in this case) a Reverse Gravity cast on
it.
A Round Table Trap
Colin Nimsz (Rooster31 at worldnet.att.net)
The PC enter a round room and there in the center of this room is a
round table. On top of the table is a large round cup, or statue or
what ever your PCs are greedy for. Now the wall is not smooth, each
block has a hole in it. This room has a 17' radius and the table has a
7' radius (which keeps the item just out of the reach of the
character.)
What happens is when the character leans on the table he trips the
trap. The table falls about 2" and poisoned darts fly out of the wall
- all flying towards the center of the room. That means that every
person in the room will be hit by several darts. The table is one
solid piece of stone that is 2" thick and weighs over 2000 lbs. After
the trap has been set off, it resets itself and is ready to go again.
The secret to disarming this trap is to turn the table 180 degrees.
The characters may find this out by looking at the markings on the
table. The table is split up into sections, by lines. Each section is
the same except for one. You can make this one section stand out by
any means you wish. I had mine stand out by having a crown carved into
the table and having a king's throne at the seat opposite of the door,
while the section in the table was at the door you entered from.
A PC may try to wedge something into the bottom of the tabletop but
with no avail because of the sheer weight of the table and also
because of the way the table was designed. The table is held up by one
center leg and the center piece comes straight down so there is no way
you could wedge the table top to the center piece of the table.
Water Trap
Tom Holm (dnr at vbe.com)
This trap is found normally in a small room. When a character enters
this magical room he doesn't notice any magical auras or anything.
Though, if he steps on a certain spot on the ground, he will notice
soon enough. When he steps on the spot, he will be magically sent into
the wall. His back is on the wall and he is unable to move even with
magical assistance. Then an invisible hose attaches to his nostrils
and his mouth. Next, water is heavily pumped into him and there is no
way for him to take his mouth away from the hose. The only way to stop
this horrible death is to cut the hose. (The man in the trap can't cut
the hose because he can't move.)
Marcos Monteiro da Cruz (sturm at esquadro.com.br)
In a straight long stairway (long enough that the PCs can not see the
end), somewhere in the middle one player will trigger the trap. Once
triggered, the trap will launch an Ice Storm Spell (the PCs take the
damage from the spell if the GM desires) so that the floor will be
slippery and they will have only 50% of chance to stay where they are.
At the end of the stairway are 6 very long iron spears pointing in the
stairway's direction. Anyone that falls will be hit by 3d2 spears. If
anyone falls on top of the first person, the first victim will take
double damage and the second normal damage. If a third member of the
party falls, the first takes triple damage, the second double damage
and the third normal damage. If all the PCs fall this procedure must
be done up to five times. (Quintuple damage for the first, quadruple
damage to the second, triple to the third, and so on. Very nasty if
you are the first to fall). Another aspect of this trap is if the
first member of the group stands his feet, the second character can
fall taking his balance away. There are only 15% of chance that an
off-balanced PC will not fall.
Sex Appeal
Steven the IMPALER (jmelnych at epsb.edmonton.ab.ca)
The hero(s) walk into, a short hall that is covered in gold. The
hallway is 20' long, 7' high, and 5' across. At the end of the hall is
a cage with a beautiful woman dancing in it. After a minute of
watching, the hero(s) have charm cast upon them, unless they're
undead, female or gay. The hero(s) will try to walk into the cage but
will instead take damage from a pitfall, covered by a carpet with
levitation cast upon it. The hero(s) do not have saving throws on the
charm.
Rushin' Roulette
Steven the IMPALER (jmelnych at epsb.edmonton.ab.ca)
The hero(s) come to an immensely tall free standing tower of about
500'. There is a door at the bottom and about 5 windows every 100'.
The tower is 20' in diameter and circular. When the hero(s) enter the
door, it automatically closes behind them, trapping them inside. They
suddenly hear the sound of rushing water, in five turns a 100x100x100
block of water falls on them. The lock on the door is able to be
picked and the door can be forced open, and if they do get out, put
them up against a Water Elemental when the water comes rushin' out at
them. And when the water comes out the whole tower falls down on the
hero(s) doing 4d20 damage, if they survive make em' find a cursed
amulet of water breathing or something that will really piss them off
next time they're in the water.
Drow Death
Steven the IMPALER (jmelnych at epsb.edmonton.ab.ca)
When the heroes enter a Drow colonies "home", they see a tall 100'
high castle. It emanates a nice steady glowing green color. The castle
is 200' away and as they progress the ceiling gets higher, it has
quite a few jagged edges on it and stalactites hanging down. The walls
also spread apart for about 100' each. The cave they emerged from is
only 5' across and about 10' high. Just before the entrance they will
encounter many bones and small bits of silver lying on the ground.
There will also be quite a deep pit that is totally visible. At the
bottom is a small little door, with a skeleton and some pretty nice
items, weapons, etc. If someone goes down the pit they are instantly
transported into the castle, where they will fight some Drow, not too
hard though, maybe only 60-80 Drow, more than enough to kill them.
Korbett Cockrell (korbett at passage.com)
The party is walking down a 10' x 10' corridor and comes to a very
deep, open pit about 20' The passage continues beyond the pit for
about 30' and ends in an impressive looking door. The bottom of the
pit is 60' down and studded with spikes, and the walls appear greased.
In reality the continuance of the passageway and the impressive door
are merely illusions designed to waste the party's time trying to get
beyond the pit. I had expected an extended climb down and harrowing
climb up the far side to find disappointment only.
What happened was the thief-acrobat in the party suggested to the
barbarian that he could be easily tossed across the pit by someone
with high strength. He would tumble into the passageway beyond and
secure a rope for the rest of the party.
He was tossed into the opposite wall and then plunged to his death in
the pit below.
Falling Block
User (kerrydj at superiway.net)
In have a long corridor of about 50 feet or so, the roof has holes
spaced apart about every 15'. Then place in one a huge square block or
granite so when one player steps on the pressure plate the block drops
on them. The only thing you don't tell the players is that the center
is hollowed out and there is enough room for the PC not to get
squished.
On the underside of the bolder have sheep bladders filled with blood.
That way it appears that the PC which sprung the trap got squished.
Also you say that some wizard cast a spell that muted all sound from
exiting the block so the PC stuck inside can yell and scream all he
wants. This is especially nasty if you want to hurt the party.
Fake Pit
Guy A. Jett (gajett at ix.netcom.com)
The PC's have just entered a corridor through a stone door. The door
slams and locks behind them. They see a pit spanning the width and
most of the length of the corridor. There is a door at the end of the
hall. The PC's are unable to jump, or do anything else to get over it,
besides magic. The wall behind the PC's starts to move towards them,
pushing them into the pit. But the pit is covered with thick glass,
and the PCs are able to walk over one at a time. This is a good waste
of spells, or the PC's might be pushed over onto the glass all
together and break it.
Floor of Rats or Dwarf Slayer
David Ives Mitchell (ogbp at injersey.com)
In one room a player trips a magical trap. With an intelligence check,
the mage of the group may identify it as a very strong summon spell.
The next room is a long, curved, dark corridor ten feet wide. The
walls are featureless and may not be climbed, and the ceiling is only
six feet high, making flight purposeless. Ten feet into the romm, the
floor appears to become rats (1d6 hp). In reality, it is a pit that is
ten feet wide, twenty deep, and 120 long that is full of rat (about
200,000 ranging from 5"to 2-3'. Concealed under the rats, the pit
contains about 5 feet of water as well as bamboo pungee spikes. The
edges of the pit overhang, so nonmagical climbing is impossible.
Upon entry into the room, the party doesn't suspect that the rats are
actually filling a deep, long pit. They also cannot see the other side
of the pit because the corridor curves. One choice is to burn the
rats. If this happens, an intelligence check tells the group that it
will burn for at least 24 hours. If the party sleeps nearby, they are
attacked by hundreds of flaming rats that last 1d4+1 rounds. When they
come back to the room, the ashes and rat corpses still conceal the
water and spikes. It is still almost impossible to climb out.
No character should be allowed to levitate or fly over, and it is
impossible for a character to see to the other side.
The correct way to defeat the trap is to run over the tops of the
rats. If the player declares that they will run over the rats, they
must make a dexterity check, heavy characters with a -1 penalty. If
they pass, they harmlessly run over the rats. If they fail, they sink
through the rats and onto the spikes for 3d6 points of damage. They
also will take 1d12+2 points of damage from rat bites. They DM may
also choose to give them a disease of choice with a con check. Dwarves
also find themselves in water to their dismay! It should be very
difficult to get out. One possible solution is to tie a very heavy
weight to a rope, and hope that the victim can grab on. Players that
declare non-running actions such as standing on the rats must make the
dex check with a -5 or -6 penalty, or even higher if desired. Heavy
characters should have very high penalties. Dwarves should sink like
stones.
This trap may be easily overcome if all characters decide to run. It
does, however, offer humorous responses from dismayed players!
Gust of Death
Steve Callison (swcallis at iname.com)
The trap is several Gust of Wind spells cast through needle-holes in
the wall. Permanency has been cast to keep the Gust of Wind
continuous. The trap essentially creates an air laser with the ability
to cut in half anyone that steps through it. Only a character with
keen hearing or other senses can detect it without actively looking
for it.
The Kobald-Pults
Ben Thomas-Moore (jthomas at moon.dataplusnet.com)
This trap is best either when you have just started an adventure or
with a higher level party. The party enters a LONG corridor (perhaps
300 yards) with an extremely high ceiling (10 yards high). The
corridor is only 10 yards wide, though. At the other end of the
corridor (firing range) are three gnolls manning catapults. When the
party enters the firing range, the door they entered through
disappears and the entire wall glows. Then the gnolls begin firing
kobolds from the catapults at the party. I suggest having 30 kobolds
at the far end to begin with. If the kobold misses whomever it was
fired at, it hits the wall and is teleported back to the gnolls.
However, if the kobold hits the person, he/she takes minor damage (2d4
damage) and the kobold stops where he is. The kobold will rise and
fight normally on the next round. Use the gnoll's normal chance to hit
someone (they fire once every three rounds). If at any time there are
no kobolds down by the gnolls, then they charge to attack. The kobolds
will always wait down by the gnolls, never charging on their own. When
using this trap, watch your players reactions ("They're firing WHAT?!?
at us?").
Notes: A smart party will charge the back wall when they see the first
kobolds teleported back. This will let them stop the gnolls from
firing on them and make the fight more even. Also, a nice DM will make
the catapults collapsable so that the party can carry them with them.
If you do this, place a large room up ahead where they can use it.
(Maybe firing large rocks at some tough monster, or launching a party
member over a high wall.)
A Messy Way To Go
Wolf (auntie at diablo.intergate.bc.ca)
This trap can be used anywhere but it works best in a courtyard of a
castle. Once the PCs get past the main entrance way of the castle the
ground begins to slope. Make it seem normal for this to happen.... say
the castle was built on a hill for better defense. The door that leads
inside the castle is at the bottom of the slope and is slightly
battered. Tell the PCs that this castle had been attacked once and the
occupants had never repaired the door. When they get close to the door
and turn the knob to open it they will hear a rumbling for a few
seconds. Tell them that it is PROBABLY (see if they can guess it is a
trap) just the door opening up. Then the rumbling stops. Little do
they know.. a huge rock was pushed out of a secret chamber in the wall
and came rolling towards them. Because the slope suddenly gets steeper
near the door they had no idea that the rock becomes airborne when it
reaches the steeper part of the slope. So as the PCs start to force
open the door (which is stuck) SPLAT! Try it, very messy though....
BTW the castle needs to be repainted after this trap is sprung!
The Torch of Incineration
(jonmason at mail.island.net)
As the PCs enter the room magical stone doors seal the room making it
air tight, and there is an alcove 1' by 1' and 2' deep in a wall with
flames burning in it and a switch in the back. (now would be a good
time to remind your PCs that fire uses oxygen and people kind of die
without it) Any item weapon, stick, rock, etc. that enters the flame
must save vs. Magical Fire or explode causing 1D8 points of fire
damage to anyone within 2 feet. If a person puts a hand in the flame
it will be slightly warm but not hot enough to hurt them and they can
easily flip the switch and raise the doors. The amount of time it
takes to run out of air depends on the size of the room.
Gumbies
James and Denise Murray (jdmurray at netopia.net)
I created a unique race called gumbies who are an inch tall and are
immune to magic. Everything else varies. A trap you can use is while
walking in a forest, have the players walk into red (Fire! Smart but
primitive) gumby territory and step on their leader! Too bad the
gumbies have grappling hooks and can pull players to the ground and
stab them with their claws! As a reward for thinking a way out of this
one you may give them a friendly gumby of another color to help the
Purple (Sonic sometimes ninjas) for example!
Elton Robb (GLENNROBB at prodigy.net)
This trap involves a pressure plate which is hard to perceive When a
PC steps on the pressure plate, a mechanism under the plate sets a few
gears and stops them from rolling. The minute the PC lifts his foot
off of the plate, the walls begin to move. If he doesn't move his
foot, then trap doors in a few select places will open and skeletons
will spring out.
The Pressure Plate can hold a maximum of 200 lbs. and is very hard to
disarm. This is because the disarmer must find a way down without
fighting the skeletons. The skeletons will voraciously attack the
party.
Ding dong. You're Dead!
Graham Lauderdale (proposal at erols.com)
A long hallway leads into a small room. As soon as all the party
enters, a large iron wall cuts them off. On the other side of the room
is another iron wall. Next to the wall is a door bell. Some witty PC
presses it and the floor falls out from under them (DM chooses what
happens next).
Elton Robb (GLENNROBB at prodigy.net)
This Trap is designed to use the character's personality weaknesses
against them. Inspired by a trap that was shown on the D&D TV show,
this trap breaks up the party into individuals who are ultimately
whimpering and hitting themselves.
The trap is actually a whole building and uses illusions to mislead
the characters into thinking
that they are alone, in trouble, or impotent. here are some
suggestions:=20
If one of your characters is afraid to be alone, then a trap door
will make the character drop into a room that has the illusion of a
strange place and he/she is all alone. Afraid of being to old/to
young: This works with a hall of mirrors, where the affected sees
his/her reflection in the mirror and she is either too old, or a baby.
Is doubtful that one is a Good Priest: The character can be shown his
worst nightmare. The PC is trying to sway a huge crowd of people to
his religion, but they laugh at him and throw things at him. Of
course, an alternative is that one of his healing spells does not
work!=20
This is also a trap that is subject to the GM's creativity and
Knowledge of his characters. It's wonderful!
Richard Wiseman (rwiseman at gte.net)
There is an inclined corridor about 30' long with a treasure in the
back wall. Also there is a row of spikes on the floor at the last 4'
of the corridor. Some force causes an object 5' from the spikes to
trip the PC entering the corridor. If the PC is careful and doesn't
trip, the same force knows and causes a giant boulder to come out of
the beginning 5' of the wall. Because the corridor is inclined the
boulder rolls, crushing the person. The whole time the treasure chest
is an illusion.
You can put a teleporter where the illusion of the chest is as an
escape route(If the PC can jump that far).
Flaming Ball
J. R. Koches (admin555 at nosc.mil)
The trap is rather simple in concept; the characters enter a round
tunnel, slightly curved and running in excess of 240'. The tunnel is
usually 8' in diameter. Along the sides of the wall, spaced every 20'
are steel slats, sticking slightly out of the wall. In addition, a
series of ten small holes are spaced every 10' along the ceiling. At
the end of the corridor is a door with a massive iron ring. When the
party opens the door, a combined strength of 23 is necessary, behind
it they find a large ball set on a high ramp. The ball stop is
mechanically inter-linked to the door opening mechanism, so once a
certain point is reached, the door opens automatically and the ball
begins rolling down the corridor. The characters promptly begin
running away. What is happening along the remainder of the corridor is
very interesting. Oil is dropping out of the ten small holes, while
the ball is striking sparks from the steel inlays.... For added fun,
iron bars can drop out and seal the end of the corridor.
J. R. Koches (admin555 at nosc.mil)
In the center of the room is a small marble pedestal containing a
sealed crystal cube. In the center of the cube is a magic item of your
choice. The cube opens easily to the touch and is not trapped. Upon
the item is cast a spell of avoidance. As the party tries to get close
to this item, which either skitters away or repels them, the real trap
clicks in. I usually use a series of magic mouths or alarm spells to
alert a platoon of guards or nasty major monster to come and clean up.
This one really captures the greedy ones.
The Spiked Door
Scott Vallance (slv at ist.flinders.edu.au)
This trap is a simple one but quite amusing. It will be particularly
effective against gung-ho adventures and moronic fighters. Placed in a
wall or at the end of a corridor is a door. It can be tailored to look
like the rest in your scenario but it has one main difference; all
handles/locks/etc are fake. Upon inspection the door looks quite solid
although if tapped in the right place sounds fairly thin. The reason
for this is simple; when the players go to kick or bash down the door,
behind it is a wall of spikes upon which they will impale themselves.
Here is a diagram:
-> | handle
-> | /
-> |-0
-> |
-> |\
| door
spikes
Make the spikes poisoned if you want. It may also be a good idea to
make sections of the door solid and others thin, so if they tap test
the door it may sound solid.
Smashed Statues
Michael Kenner (flamemaster at hotmail.com)
The players walk into a room and they found lots of statues in the
room. Most of the statues seem normal but around a pile of rubble is a
group of statues that looks like a group of adventurers standing
around a pile of rubble with expressions of surprise and agony on
their faces. The statues of adventurers still have all their
equipment. If any statue is smashed it will release a gas that turns
animate matter to stone. The group of adventurer statues made that
mistake by shattering one. If the players try to take anything from a
statue they will find out that the statues are very poorly balanced.
They have to make a DX check to avoid knocking it over. If they knock
it over, it will shatter.
If the players make it to the other end there's a lever on the far
wall. If they pull the level Boulders will fall from the ceiling
shattering the statues.
Hall of statues
Michael Kenner (flamemaster at hotmail.com)
There's a long wide corridor that the PCs have to cross. Every ten
feet in an alcove is a statue of a warrior (about first level). This
is fine but it ends at a locked door. Should they bash it down or pick
the lock that's also fine but if they cast any spells in this room a
statue comes to life. A mage heavy party (like mine) should just cast
more spells at them bringing more statues to life. Any magic causes
this affect, however the spells/whatever do not have any effect except
bringing statues to life.
Fill the Room With Water
Michael Kenner (flamemaster at hotmail.com)
The PCs come into a room that has two levers in it. One starts filling
the room with water the other drains it of water. The doors lock
behind the players. The only way out is to fill the room with water
(the pressure on the doors almost breaks them open. They can then
smash the door down and all the water comes flooding out. I gave the
party a suitable reward for this trap. The levers were knocked out of
the wall by the retreating water. They were made out of silver (aren't
I a nice DM .....hehehe)
The Four Elements
Michael Kenner (flamemaster at hotmail.com)
Some of you might recognize this from a MacGyver episode but hey it
was full of traps (they were in some ancient temple or some such).
They find four rings each one supporting a bowl. The bottom bowl is
empty, the next is full of oil, the next is full of water and the top
one is also empty. There is a bowl of dirt sitting beside it. They are
locked in the room with a limited supply of air. They must complete
the four elements (if your nice there's a plaque saying that). If they
put dirt in the bottom one, then they have two of the elements (Earth
and water. I know the top one is full of air anyway but that is no
fun.)) If they set the oil on fire they have the third (fire.) The oil
will evaporate the water which will rise up to the top creating the
element of air (well water vapor but it is sort of air) the door will
open and they're out.
Waiting For Weight
Michael Kenner (flamemaster at hotmail.com)
This is from the same episode.. They are also locked in a room again
with not much air. Sitting around is a statue with two hands. On one
is a weight and lying around the room are other weights. They must
find another equal weight and put it in the other hand. If they do the
door will open.
Supernova
Michael Kenner (flamemaster at hotmail.com)
This trap can only be used in very strange circumstances. Mine was
that aliens were trying to take over the world (These aliens used
combination magic/technology). At the end of the adventure they find
the aliens power source which was a 12' ball of bright light. The
players each need to have something to escape gravity at this point.
The sphere is actually a smaller version of a star. They can destroy
it by either casting any spell at it or by throwing in a magic object.
The door to this room is automatic but since they destroyed the star
it has no power to open. The star starts expanding and contracting.
Anyone caught in these takes a lot of damage. The star collapses in on
itself and turns into a black hole. It starts sucking the PCs in (it's
stronger than the antigravity they used to get there). When they reach
the black hole well... See sphere of annihilation in the DMG for
details... (hehehe)
Zach Toups (lord_zerax at geocites.com)
The players walk into a room, it (the room) can be of any size. It has
a continual light spell in effect. The walls are speckled with lots of
holes (about the size of a quarter). The trigger for the trap is a
several infra-red beams that cannot be avoided or seen (infravision is
useless in the light). If darkness is cast, the light will be negated
and the room will return to normal darkness, anyone with infravision
can see the beams. If anything blocks a beam, it causes multiple darts
to fire from the walls, hopefully hitting the PC.
Andreas Iseli (IseliA at BENTLEY.DEVETWA.EDU.AU)
The PC's fall down a chute into a large "checker board" room. You can
have as many tiles as you like. Each "square" is a pressure plate
which has four holes it. At the other end of the room, there is a
lever which opens a door. The problem is, every pressure plate stepped
on causes 4 spikes to shoot from the ground on another tile! For
example, stepping on tile 5 causes spikes to shoot from tile 12. No
pattern is required, just make sure the PC's aren't allowed to stand
on the same tiles. This trap caused the demise of 3 out of 4 PC's in
my last campaign.
Erik Wood (tquest4 at easystreet.com)
There is a small hatch in the floor, big enough for one person to fit
through. The hatch opens to an 8 foot diameter shaft with a metal
ladder on one side which runs from top to bottom (100ft). Once the
player climbs 20 feet down they activate a Glyph of Warding that
inflicts 14d4 points of electrical damage. Any character sustaining
more than 15 points of damage must make a Strength check at -6 or fall
-- sustaining another 8d6 points of damage. Anyone touching the floor
of the pit is affected by a Power Word: Kill spell, which
automatically slays any character with 60 hp or fewer (current, not
maximum). That person is then animated and levitated back out of the
shaft as a zombie which then begins attacking the party.
Blue Box
Seven Seven225 at aol.com)
You see a goblin about 20 feet down a corridor. The goblin keeps
screaming "Don't take my treasure! Don't take my treasure!" When the
characters get close enough the goblin runs off. When the treasure box
is opened a blue force field goes around the opener of the box. There
is a blue knife inside of the box (Which has nothing to do with the
trap.) The blue force keeps getting smaller and smaller. It keeps
closing in on the person until they get crushed. The only way out of
the trap is to close the box. Kind of obvious but in a situation like
that it is hard to think of.
Tim Mott (tmott at awinc.com)
Give the players some sort of strange and cryptic clue (on an old
scroll, whatever) and have it pretty hard to figure out. The "answer"
will be a magical saying to open up a treasure room in some dungeon or
whatever (supposedly). However, when they go to the dungeon and say
the magic words, the room doesn't appear, but instead some monster /
trap / other nasty thing comes and kills / maims / laughs at them.
Pit Guardian
Dragonhawk (plazm at juno.com)
A trap lies hidden in the floor, and it's a relatively small hole,
which lands the PC right on a spot which triggers a Contingency spell
which activates the nearby stone golem (or any other sort of animated
monster(s)), which now perceives the hapless PC as its mortal enemy.
It quickly attacks, but many a party is quick enough to let down a
rope or other way of climbing up. The stone golem simply waits beneath
the hole. This isn't the good part. After going down to the next
level, the PC finds him(or her)self right in front of the golem. You
see, the pit leads down to the next level, so there's the stone golem
(or whatever) after his blood. It will not attack any other players,
unless they stand on the trigger spot, in which case it refocuses its
attacks on that PC. The worst part is that if the monster is
destroyed, the trigger spot grows (DM/GM's discretion towards the
speed of growth and size of the room) until it fills the room.
Stepping on the trigger spot again at ANY time will cause the stone
golem to reform again...and attack.
I am Rubber, You are Glue...
Dragonhawk (plazm at juno.com)
The PCs enter a room which has a gargoyle on a pedestal. It
continually looks at the heroes, jeers at them, and occasionally
swipes (but never hits) one if he or she gets too close. Eventually,
one of the PCs gets fed up with this, and attacks. Now this is the
best part: For every point of damage the hero does, subtract one from
his own total. Neither he nor his compatriots notice the wounds (in
fact, they aren't there... yet!) The gargoyle seems to miss on all its
attacks on the PC. After the hero has done enough damage to bring his
own life total to 0, the statue becomes inanimate, and maybe even
crumbles. After the person leaves the room, however, he or she takes
all the damage immediately, dies, and the gargoyle recompiles and
taunts them even more. There's a particularly nasty variant I've
created on this one: a special taunting spell, that requires a wisdom
check every round (-1 cumulative per round times the number of allies
fallen to this trap) or else the person(s) failing engage in combat,
only to fall to the same trap.
A Reward You Don't Want
Danny Siegmann (HighJudge at aol.com)
A spell is cast on a magical item, most likely a tomb of some sort or
a spellbook with a couple of good spells. When the book is opened
enough to read, everyone in the immediate area is instantly
transported somewhere nasty. They are not harmed by the transport
itself, but being transported to, say, the abyss, possible with lots
of Tannari around, could be very dangerous. The trap only activates
once, though it may be coupled with other traps.
The effect is instantaneous, and impossible to prevent. After the
transport, if any other traps are defeated, the book (or other item)
can be used normally. The players will need all the help they can get.
Note that the players must find their own way out of where they've
been transported to, and can use normal methods (i.e.-astral spell,
teleport, etc.) The location is the DM's choice, and can be varied for
the situation, but should be a very bad place (i.e.-the aforementioned
abyss, a large drow city, in the path of a raging tarrasque, etc.)
Corridor of Sand
Danny Siegmann (HighJudge at aol.com)
This trap is set up in a strange looking room. Directly across the
room from where the PC's enter is a door just like the one they came
through. It is a square room, and the floor is covered in sand, except
for one part. On either side of the two doors are two parallel strips
of stone, about 6 inches wide, which stretch from one end to the
other. (They are actually walls which extend to the real floor.) Note
that the ceiling is made of normal stone, the same type as the floor
strips. Imbedded in the floor strips are wooden rods 2 inches in
diameter, which extend up to (and are also imbedded in) the ceiling.
This forms a narrow corridor running from door to door. If the PC's
test the depth of the sand in the corridor, they find it is only about
a half foot deep. The sand outside the corridor can be of any depth,
but should be more the 10 ft. deep. The floor at the bottom of the
sand in the corridor is seemingly solid.
Here's how the trap works. If the PC's test the floor it seems to be
solid under the sand. However, when enough weight is put on it (a
couple of PC's) the whole floor in the corridor shatters, and the PC's
(and sand and broken bits of floor) fall into a pit (which runs along
the whole corridor. The floor is solid stone. The pit should be deep
(15-20 ft.) but not deep enough to kill the PC's. The stone strips
extend down to form the walls. A moment after the PC's hit the floor,
many holes (about 4 inches in diameter) open up in the wall, and sand
from the rest of the room starts falling into the pit. The DM can
determine the rate the corridor fills up. The room outside the
corridor is automatically refilled. The sand will eventually fill up
the entire pit, hopefully with the PC's trapped inside. Removing the
sand from the corridor doesn't reduce the weight enough to prevent the
floor from collapsing. The bars on the sides of the corridor can be
broken, but there should be nasty creatures living in the sand on
either side. In addition, having a low ceiling with spikes can
discourage flying.
Big Boom!
Chris Webster (d5596w at lex.infi.net)
This takes place in a very pawerful wizards lair. When the party is
pretty strong and think they are just the best, have them face three
weak creatures like goblins. But they are really Gas Spores
polymorphed. When they hit one of the fake creatures, the Gas Spore
will explode and not only hurt the party but cause the other two Gas
Spores to explode doing a lot of damage to the party. Or you could
have a Stirge hit the Gas Spores and do the same thing.
Musical Key
Chris Webster (d5596w at lex.infi.net)
When the players come to a locked door it can only be opened by a key.
There are three keys by the door. There is an A, C, and D key. Now to
make this musical just make the only key to open the door the C key.
The other keys will let out spinning blades to hit the party. The A
key in music would have two sharps so it would let out two spinning
blades while the D key would let out three since it is three sharps.
The C music key has no sharps so that is why it opens the door. I
would say good damage would be 3d6 if they miss a DX check.
Excuse Me Sir, which way is out?
Barrett Day (allmedia at teleport.com)
This is is a good trap to pull on your players because they can't
complain about all the XP they're getting. At the end of a corridor,
there is a door. The door is not a part of the trap, but it's a good
idea to tell that there's a door to your players. Anyway, when they go
through the door they are in a spherical room that has 6 doors and a
mouse hole. Hard DMs could have their players roll a Wisdom Check to
see the mouse hole. The first door has a picture of an eye on it and,
when opened, has a beholder in it (or an argos). If defeated, the door
will explode for 1d2 damage. The second door has a picture of a dagger
on it, and, when opened, will release a horde of gibberlings. It
explodes for 1d4. The third door is blue, and, when opened, releases
1d6 ogre mages. It explodes for 1d6. The fourth door has a picture of
a cube of ice, and, when opened, releases a Remorhaz. The door does
1d8. The fifth door has a picture of a drop of blood and, when opened,
releases an eastern vampire. The door does 1d10. The last door has a
picture of flame. It releases a red dragon. The door does 1d20. The
mouse hole is locked and cannot be opened unless the other creatures
are defeated in order. If they are not, they must be defeated all over
again. If opened, it releases 1d10 shrunken wererats who immediately
form normal size and attack. Once defeated, the mouse hole releases a
cheese of shrinking with just enough for everyone. They can enter the
mouse hole and once on the other side, they get a cheese of growing
which returns them to normal.
Big Headed Adventurer Killer
Chris "Crispy" Caton
Have the adventurers encounter a group of very easy monsters (i.e.
skeletons). One of them has a medallion on. The characters
automatically see this and, thinking it's a bonus, decide to kill the
monsters to get it. When (or if) they kill the monster with the
medallion, the killer and all within 10' get a blast of force which
knocks them off their feet and causes 3d12 points of damage, no save.
If a character tries to rip away the medallion, s/he gets 3d20 points
of damage, no save. In either case, the medallion is destroyed, and
probably the wearer as well. It should only be used against
mid-leveled characters. Low-leveled characters will die (good or
bad?), and high level ones will find a way to remove it without
touching it or ignore the effects, destroying the point of the trap,
which is to lower big-headedness.
Daniel Olson (daniel.olson at shaw.wave.ca)
Have an area that is trapped to the max with a chest visible at the
end. Have the majority of the traps ones that cannot be disarmed.
Include ones that nail only flying objects and include a dimension
loop that blasts teleporters to another dimension. You also have to
make the area LOOK deadly and just above impossible. In the chest have
a note + nothing-2 copper. The note says something to the extent of:
"Stupid idiot! Don't know when to quit!"
Aggressive Angel Of Death
Craig
In front of a door is an angel made of light with a HUGE two-handed
sword. When the characters approach, without a word the angel will
swing at them. It won't talk, won't move (except for the swing!) and
isn't affected by most spells. It is a blade barrier with an illusion
cast on it.
Adventurer Split
Jeff Jones (spuds at ntrnet.net)
This trap can be used as a way to split up any party containing people
who value their lives. The PC's find a trap door in a room. Upon
opening the door, they find a chute which obviously leads down to the
second level. The first person to jump in the chute comes down at the
end of the chute unharmed in a room with no obvious threats. The
second person makes it through with no problem as well. The third
person gets to the other end as well. Make sure the chute is short
enough so that the characters can shout to each other and hear each
other well. The first three characters just trigger a wheel mechanism
which turns one click each time. The third time the wheel turns, it
sets a blade in the middle of the chute. The fourth person to go down
the chute comes out in two halves. Cut from crotch to head.
Immediately, the three characters on the next level will scream to
alert the others at the top. I'd be willing to bet you won't get any
of the others at the top to go next. If people keep coming, every
fourth person will come down split in two. There are all sorts of
other things you can add like monsters at the bottom to add urgency or
someone for them to chase that knows the trap and uses the chute to
get away from them. If this is just too devious and you want to give
the characters a hint. Have sacks of sand at the top and split open
sacks at the bottom.
Gas Spores
bugeater at mail.portup.com
Any PC who has never encountered one of these is likely to attack it
as a beholder. While these are great traps in themselves, a yet more
lethal variant is to teleport them into a room full of them. (Or,
better yet, have them land on one). This causes a chain reaction of
exploding gas spores that does (ohmigod)D(obscene) damage. If the
damage doesn't kill them, the spores will.
Switches
bugeater at mail.portup.com
While searching someone's dungeon/castle/whatever, have the PCs
stumble across a deep hole in the ground. that they cannot see to the
bottom of. Give them something to grapple onto on the surface, so they
can go down. The well is about 150' deep, and the sides are smooth. At
the bottom, they will find several levers that do the following:
1.: Opens/closes a door in the ceiling above the well that goes up
quite some way.
2.: Starts the hole above the well spinning (has countless blades
running across it, players going up will be minced.)
3.: Reverses gravity in well and sends player hurtling upward
through
the spinning blades and spits him out onto the cieling in
another
room. This is always fatal.
There are many variants to this, play with them.
Flint & Steel
bugeater at mail.portup.com
The players enter a long corridor that smells fairly odd, and there is
a liquid coating the floor. It is mostly clear with some rainbow
colors swirling through it. This is gasoline, and the floor is made of
flint. Have a magic mouth command them to drop their weapons, "or
else". If they do not comply, each player is struck by a magic missile
for 1D4+1 and commanded to do the same again. Smart PCs will gently
put their weapons on the floor, others simply dropping them set off
the gas fumes for a whole lot of damage.
Spikes
bugeater at mail.portup.com
In a long corridor, the players find large spikes about half their
height, and spaced evenly. They are far enough apart that the players
can walk right through them without hindrance. At some point, have
them notice the holes in the ceiling that are parallel with the
spikes. Last, have the floor move upward very quickly (or very
slowly), crushing the players.
Teleporters
bugeater at mail.portup.com
Version one: Harmless and Irritating In this trap, a person steps on a
teleport trap that brings him to another that brings him back to the
first (and so on) until he goes nuts.
Version two: Pain and Agony same as above, but both destinations are
10 feet above the teleporters, doing 1D6 falling damage each time.
The Separator Trap
Hugh O'Hara (OHara at netcom.ca)
I use this trap to add to a particularly dangerous setting. (I used it
in the tower of a 50th level Magic User) The leader (the person in
front) hits a trip wire, which makes a hidden wall slam right behind
him. This trap doesn't hurt anyone, but leaves a member stranded. Oh,
and did I forget to mention that the wall is 10' thick and repels
magic?
A New Kind Of Burning
Hugh O'Hara (OHara at netcom.ca)
The party encounters a sword, preferably long, or a suit of full plate
mail (preferred). The item glows a faint green color. Detect Magic
will detect only that it is enchanted but not what it is enchanted by
or with (Glassteel). The fact is, the weapon/armor is made out of
uranium. This means that if the weapon is used, it will inflict an
additional 5d10 damage, but the user must save vs. death every round
or die of radiation burns. The armor is AC1, makes weapons do an
additional 3d10 damage and forces the wearer to save vs. death at -10
every round or die, again of radiation burns. DO NOT tell the PC
anything other than that he feels like he is on fire. This begins one
turn after acquiring the item, preferably the PC will find a new item
(I used a ring of Fire Protection, it doesn't do a thing to save the
PC against radiation) and keeps on going until it is discarded. (I
wiped out 3 PC's with this one, they just kept on picking up the sword
from the dead guy) This should not be used unless you are ether a
VERY, VERY mean GM, or you are very mad at them for beating your best
adventure without a scratch.
Poison Dart Chair
Gary Reinhart (trina.reinhart at sk.sympatico.ca)
What if there's a powerful man coming over for dinner? What do you do?
Rig the chair.
>From the naked eye, there seems to be no trap right? Even a search is
wrong. But there is a tiny pin laced with the poison or drug of your
choice imbedded into the cushion of the chair at the neck area. Some
pressure from the bottom of the chair releases the pin and sticks in
the guys neck. It feels like a mosquito bite and he will scratch. But
not to worry, the pin falls out the second it breaks the skin.
Andrew Fisher (fisher16 at earthlink.net)
If your group of adventurers is dungeon-crawling, don't give them any
traps for a while. They might be cautious at first, but will start to
loosen up (trust me). When you sense they don't have the patience to
keep checking for traps, put this one on an ordinary door. The party
is going down the passage or whatever, when they come upon an metal
door. A latch is in the door near waist-level on the side. When the
party just assumes that this isn't trapped, either, they'll pull the
latch. The latch does nothing, it doesn't even open the door, but does
set off the trap. The trap starts off slow, so the party may even try
to figure out the latch while it starts! Anyway, a rock slab slides
slowly down (extremely quietly, so the party may not even notice it)
and seals the passage. It settles, blowing up a bit of dust which a
party member is sure to notice. Now the party is sealed in the
passage. A quick-thinking mage could get out, but the rest of the
party is trapped. After the slab drops, the floor under them starts to
rumble. The floor rises, and just when the party is about to be
squashed, it stops. Leave 'em hanging for a while, and then crush them
with the suitable descriptions of mangled armor, crushed bones, and
blood.
Blizzarden at aol.com
First, the group enters what they find to be an abandoned town. Have
the group split up. In one house a character finds a treasure chest in
the corner of the living room. It is unlocked but in it is a fairly
large hole (Large enough to fit the character ). If he decides to
reach in the hole he falls in. Now here is where the fun begins. When
the other members try to find him by searching the house he went in,
they see him falling from the ceiling where a portal is, into the hole
and from the portal again. If they measure the depth of the hole, make
it about four to five feet. Afterthought #1: If the player tries to
drop something in to decide the depth and safety, have the item hit
the player in the head and fall in. Afterthought #2: Make it so the it
is a town holiday and they went to a shrine and be back within
minutes. Then watch how quickly the player falls in.
Various Traps
Thor Kell (jmrobert at vanisle.net)
A PC falls into a pit. As the sucker falls, blades come out of the top
of the pit and begin to spin. The blades do not hit the victim but
prevent rescue. The victim is caught in clamps with barbs on them. The
PC then starts to spin. After about 5 rounds of this, a blade of VERY
sharp, VERY hard metal comes out of the floor. This hits the PC and he
is indisposed for a long time. *This trap is a killer and requires a
lot of magic to work. DMs should probably tune it down.*
Try the same as above with a drill.
A room with Flaming Spheres and Prismatic Spheres bouncing around in
it.
A chest made out of every bone in the human body. It cannot be forced
open. If a person breaks a bone then that bone is broken in them. I.E.
a thief attempts to pick the lock (the mouth) he could end up with a
broken jaw bone. Hide the treasure under the chest.
Play off previous traps. If you use pit traps a lot, have an easy to
find pit trap with a slippery floor on the other side and a tripwire
beyond it. The PCs jump, slip and hit the trip wire, which makes a
boulder fall on them. This only works really well with improvised
dungeons.
Make traps that have to be triggered. Like a falling wall trap that
opens a secret door.
Use Walls of Reflecting. These make missile weapons and small magical
effects bounce off them. I caught my group in a loop with a flaming
arrow following them.
Put a Delayed Blast Fireball in a treasure hoard.
Place a lich's philactery in a magical item owned by a PC.
A room with a floor covered in flames(or green slime or whatever), the
PCs can't fly or teleport over. They have to walk over on invisible
platforms. Nasty DMs could make the platforms move or have things
attack the PCs.
Use Walls of Bouncing. These act as trampolines that lift the PC as
high as he fellx2. After 1d10 bounces a person can control his bounce.
People with acrobatics may make a proficiency check to aviod this. One
application of this is to have a room with a false floor and have a
floor of bouncing under it. Place spikes on the ceiling.
Have a pit trap with a floor of bouncing. The top of the pit rotates.
On the bottom of the top of the pit there are 4 blades and a pressure
switch between them. A PC falls, the roof of the pit rotates, and as
the PC bounces he will hit the switch which slam the curved blades in
to his neck.
A wall or door that can be broken down. Behind it is a ballista. The
person who knocks the door down gets impaled on the ballista bolt, and
then the extra weight causes it to fire, nailing who ever happens to
be behind them.
Literal artifacts/magic Items
Chris Peckham (gen13_freak at hotmail.com)
One of the funniest tricks I have played on my PCs is to include items
that do what they are called. For example, a Bag of Holding that
doesn't let go; a Ring of Invisibility that you can't find;
Intelligent swords that are afraid of open places (ie. Agrophobia) and
even swords that are afraid of enclosed places (Claustrophobia).
Biozome at aol.com
This trap consists of a room about 40' long by 20' wide by 30 or so
feet high. The ceiling is lined with spikes about 3' long and they are
close enough together to prevent any PCs from winding themselves
between them.. along the walls are four or more small alcoves large
enough for one person. The idea is that the characters will jump into
these alcoves in hope of saving their skins, and it will.. However,
there is an eensy weensy drawback, the spiked ceiling doesn't go
away.. It simply hits the ground and stays there, imprisoning the
PCs.. After this a sleeping gas fills the chamber, knocking the PC's
out.. when they awake, they find themselves in a prison cell, bound
and gagged in front of the head baddie..etc.
Mendossa's Very Cruel & Sadictic Trap (groy at videotron.ca)
The PCs are walking on their hands and knees in a tunnel which is
about 4 feet wide. The tunnel leads in a chamber about 60' X 120' ,
30' high, and there's another tunnel entrance on the other side of the
room. The tunnel does not lead on level floor but at the ceiling's
level. That means that the PCs have to jump down, walk and climb to
the next tunnel entrance.
As soon as a PC touches the floor, the ceiling starts to go down, and
in 1 round the tunnel entrances on both sides are inaccessible. There
is a hole in the ceiling, just large enough for a human to stand in it
(like 6' high, 2' diameter). So the PCs have to fight to determine
who's gonna stand up and fit in the hole while the others are gonna be
crunched by the ceiling. However, the ceiling is made of a large block
of stone, in which a tunnel is built. When the ceiling touches down
the floor, the tunnel fits right into the 2 tunnel entrances. So if
your PCs where smart enough to wait, they have a regular tunnel in
front of em.=20
Meanwhile, the PC who's standing in the ceiling hole is now stuck in
this hole. You can let him die there or have a trap open under his
feet, trap that could lead to some secret chamber or another part of
the dungeon.
part 1 (ceiling up):
| stone |
|-------------------------------|
tunnel
|-------------------------------|
| |
| stone |
| |
| __ |
| || hole |
---------||----------------------
-----| ceiling |--------
tunnel tunnel
-----| |--------
| |
| chamber |
| |
| |
| floor |
---------------------------------
part 2 (ceiling down):
| stone |
-----|-------------------------------|------
tunnel
-----|-------------------------------|------
| |
| stone |
| |
| __ |
| || hole |
---------||----------------------
The results of this trap: some dead PCs, some stuck PCs, some PCs
goin' on.
Thrash (bob.towsley at sk.sympatico.ca)
This trap is best used on the house of a secluded crazy-man, but it
will work great anywhere you can fit it.
The house is made of brick, covered in plaster, so as to make it look
like one solid lump. The door is a plain, wooden door with a single
knocker on it. The knocker has a very small string of fishing line (or
some other transparent string) attached to it. Around the doorframe
are about 20 small holes, each containing one dart (poison is
optional). These holes have had a very thin layer of plaster put over
them, to make them nearly invisible.
When the knocker is pulled, the string sets off the trap. The darts
come flying through the plaster directly at the arm and wrist of the
player doing the knocking. Each dart does approximately 1d4 damage. To
make this trap easier for low-level players, you can decrease the
amount of darts, or the damage they do. Of course, if that arm is the
player's sword arm, their attack rolls will be reduced by 3 until the
damage is sufficiently healed (at the DM's discretion).
If you want, you can also have another set of darts pointed at the
doorknob.
Chris McNorgan (chrismcn at mail.on.rogers.wave.ca)
Sitting on a small stone pedestal is an object of worth (or maybe THE
object of worth). While it isn't clearly protected by a physical
barrier, glowing streaks of light seem to shimmer in a field around
the object. Touching the field results in some bad effect (damage,
reduction to 1hp, level loss, etc.). Engraved into the stone is the
command word that dispels the field. The words are written in some
ancient language requiring either A) someone able to read ancient
languages, or B) a skilled thief (in the AD&D world). The catch to the
command word is this: the letters of the word are written in the
circle so that depending on the time of day, one must start at a
different point on the circle to read off the command word (e.g.,
depending on where the sundial points to, or where a ray of sunlight
points to). The word in the circle should be something that could be
read in a circle, such as CAMERA, which might be read CAMERA, MERACA,
ERACAM, AMERAC, ACAMER or RACAME. In fact, using CAMERA would be
especially devious because players would likely think, "Oh, it says
camera." without considering different readings. Reading off the
incorrect word causes the object to sink into the pedestal. This would
be bad enough were it not for the triggering of some other nasty
effect...
Arious(ddwjr at satcom.whit.org)
Three rooms are set up to look like giant bells. It turns out that
they are just that. The first of these bells, when rung, makes magic
armor appear. The second bell, when rung, makes magic weapons appear.
The third bell, when rung, makes money appear. However, here is the
catch. If one player rings the same bell more than once things go
wildly wrong! All of the players are knocked unconscious, when they
awake, they find themselves surrounded by hungry monsters of the DM's
choice. (It is optional as to whether they have their weapons and
armor still on.) This same thing will happen If the singular player
rings all three of the bells as well. In some ways this trap may very
well bring a grisly end to the game.
The Ice cream Cone
Curt Arrowsmith (curta at gorge.net)
A conical room, any size. The floor is made up of three stone pressure
plates, joined at the middle of the room. When there are 300 lbs. on
any one pressure plate, or 600 lbs on the three pressure plates
combined, the trap takes effect. The PCs all fall into a
semi-spherical room beneath the trapped room. The room is filled with
Neopolitan Ice Cream, magically kept cool (and solid, the PCs will
give the DM a satisfying **SQUOOSH!**).
Column of Lightning
Curt Arrowsmith (curta at gorge.net)
Any room, with a 20' metal pole in the center and an open skylight
above that. Resting on the pole is any minor magical item. Whenever
anyone enters the room, a lightning storm appears in the sky within 1
turn +1d4 rounds. When someone tries to climb up the pole, it begins
rising into the air, about 20', through levitation (so there is
nothing holding it up to be grabbed). Of course, by this time, there
is a violent lightning storm happening. Lightning storm, metal pole. .
. . I would say maybe 6-10d8 points of damage, but it's up to you.
Elastic Sword I Curt Arrowsmith (curta at gorge.net)
There is a magical looking type sword sticking out (blade first) of a
stone wall. When the PC tries to pull the sword out of the wall, the
sword just stretches. He/she can't get it out even with the mightiest
power!
Elastic Sword II Curt Arrowsmith (curta at gorge.net)
Same thing as elastic sword I, only the sword is on the long wall of a
long and narrow room. The PC pulling the sword is so intently
concentrating on getting this infuriating weapon out of this wall, he
neglects to look behind him. And when he steps on the pressure plate,
MANY spikes come out of the wall opposite the sword (which should be
no more than 10'-15' away) and the PC backs into them. Roll 5d4 for
the number of spikes backed into, and 1d4 points of damage per spike.
If the PC survives, his fellow players should get a good laugh over
this. HA!
Drain Blades
Tas Vince Burrfoot (taselhof at whidbey.net)
This trap consists of a ten-foot deep and a 30 foot wide room filled
with water up to eight feet. The room above has a tilting floor that
leads down a chute which has 1d10 wooden stakes that do 1d4 damage per
stake. A successful dexterity check must be made to avoid all damage.
Then the adventuring party falls into the room with the water. At the
very bottom of this water is a drain. The party does not suffer any
falling damage (I guess you can if you want to--my party gets upset
because of damage like that) The vibrations of the parties falling
bodies hitting the top of the water can be felt by a mechanism in the
drain. The drain opens and starts to pull the water in with it.
The party can all make successful strength and dexterity checks to
stay afloat until all the water has filtered out. If they fail, then
they get sucked into a ten foot long tunnel with the rest of water.
They very suddenly feel a breeze in the tunnel that soon grows to a
roar and two whirling baldes become visible within the tunnel. The
adventurer(s) must make a successful dexterity check to grab a
handhold in the drain and climb out. If failed, randomly determine
which part of the body is cut off beyond repair. The adventurer then
falls another ten feet into a plain room (or whatever,) suffering
falling damage.
Bone Thug
Daniel Olson (daniel.olson at mail.cal.shaw.wave.ca)
The PCs walk into a room of any medium size with a small pillar in the
center and bones piled along the outside on the floor and shelves. If
the players search the piles they will find no skulls. On top of the
pillar is a skull. The skull is wearing a leather circlet with a
crystal hanging from the center. If a player puts the circlet on, a
quantity of bones fuse themselves with the character's armor. This
bone armor has a cumulative AC of -4 (subtract 4 from character's
current AC) and gives +3 Str. This armor is really a type of
doppleganger that possesses the character after 1D4 turns. After 5D4
turns (after possession) the doppleganger attacks the other players.
Variant: the armor causes mind rot as per the spell.
WOLF TRAP Daniel Olson (daniel.olson at mail.cal.shaw.wave.ca)
This was originally a wolf trap in colonial America but has been
enlarged to fit humans. There is a 20' deep pit covering a square area
of floor. The walls are slanted so the pit is larger at the bottom
than at the top. the trap has a cover over it. This cover is a board
or thin piece of stone supported by one axis which is stuck loosely in
the wall so it can rotate. Any weight placed on the cover causes it to
rotate 45 degrees dropping the PC(s) into the pit, causing appropriate
damage, unless they save vs. death ray. On either side of the axis is
a counterbalanced weight which resets the trap. The measurements for
this trap are 10' deep(min) for every 5X5 area of the cover. The top
of the pit is 3" wider on all sides of the cover. The walls of the pit
should be decorated and slanted according to the DM's tastes of death
and decay.
NOSEBLEED
Daniel Olson (daniel.olson at mail.cal.shaw.wave.ca)
The PCs encounter a normal door styled to the dungeon. The door is not
locked but if the knob or whatever means of opening is used the door
swings rapidly open until it hits something then closes just as fast.
If it hits a PC's head or body it causes 1D4 damage and immobilizes
them for one turn. a variant is that the real hinges to the door are
on the same side as the knob. The result: the PC is sandwiched between
the door and wall.
Dimension Cube
Daniel Ettinger (skypilot at tfs.net)
The dimension cube is a curiosity trap. All a player has to do is
touch it. They are pulled into a square room with four doors. They
must choose a door. DM rolls d100. If 00 comes up, they're free, if
anything else comes up, they must try again. DM's discretion as to how
often. Time passes normally and creatures can be encountered, as they
are also trapped. Players may even encounter deceased adventurers who
were killed or starved. Even if a party enters, each player receives a
percentile roll as they go through a door, even if its the same one.
Teleporting Door
Frodo11111 at aol.com
This trap is nearly guaranteed to kill PCs who depend on brute
strength to fight. This trap works well at the end of a hallway. When
the PCs reach the end a door opens in the ceiling and an illusionary
monster drops out of it. The PCs should attack it and when they do it
fades out and their weapons hit the door behind it. When the weapons
hit the door they are teleported behind the PCs and they continue
moving but at double the speed and causing double damage each time
they are teleported. If they hit a PC, they cause their damage but
start moving again at their original speed. The PCs can't stop their
weapons unless they teleport them to another area or dispel the
teleporter. Then the PCs must travel through the ceiling panel.
Eagle1 (Eagle1 at sisna.com)
Both of these are cute little traps designed to keep PCs from
advancing in a dungeon. The first one was _very_ frustrating for the
PC's in the game I introduced it in. You need two rooms, EXACTLY
IDENTICAL, right next to each other. The first room is an empty room
with a door leading to the second room. The second room is identical
to the first, except for the trap, a hidden teleporter. It can be
positioned anywhere in the room, but for maximum effect, place it in
front of the door out. When stepped on, it teleports the PC's to the
same spot in the first room w/o their knowledge. Thus PC's that never
figure it out would be stuck in an endless loop and keep going
forever! (unless they go back the way they came or disarm the trap, or
open the door without stepping on the trap, then jump over the trap,
into or through the door way. Nasty DMs might have a rock wall just
behind the door, making the hassle a waste of time, or put another
trap in the doorway.)
The second trap involves a fairly large room, and illusion, a set of
colored floor tiles, and a magic barrier. First, the room. It's an
empty room, with the barrier going from wall to wall across the middle
of the room like so:
|------------|
| |
|************|
| |
|------------|
Then, the tiles (which should be colored so that they stand out [i.e.,
green tiles on a tan floor or something similar]) go through the
barrier in a footprint-like arrangement, but wide enough that the PC's
would have to hop from one tiles to the next. Now, the illusion. The
illusion is of something humanoid (a little girl, a little boy, a
goblin etc. DM's choice) hopping from tile to tile, on one foot,
singing an odd little rhyming tune. The tune drops hints that the PC's
have to hop on the tiles too. If the PC's just hop on the tiles they
run smack into the barrier (or if the DM chooses, get zapped for
whatever amount of damage the DM sees fit) that prevents them from
going through. However, if they hop from tile to tile singing the song
(which the illusion stops singing when the PC's start), they can hop
through the barrier.
Nicole B=E9langer (nico at sympatico.ca)
The trap consists of a spherical room. The players must be compelled
to enter (magical objects, weapons or the like is perfect for that
purpose). As soon as the players enter, a stone door slide down and
open the trap. A huge ball starts rolling in the PC's direction. The
room is large enough to let the PCs escape the first attack. However
because of the room's shape, the ball will continuously roll around.
Here's the trick: the spherical room is actually a false room. The
sphere lies on four blocks in a larger cubic room. Any blow made with
enough strength will make the sphere fall off the blocks and shatter
on the floor freeing those inside.
Shadowgold at aol.com
A short corridor leads to a mirror positioned at 45 degrees, pointed
at a hole in the ceiling. It thus appears that the passage leads out
of the dungeon. When a PC walks into the mirror attempting to leave
the dungeon, the mirror collapses, causing the PC to fall a DM-decided
number of feet into a chamber of sinister bats, ice toads, or whatever
is the most suitable for the occasion. There's generally no way out
except by climbing, or the PC's adventuring companions to drop him
down a rope.
OR...
The mirror drops the PC directly into one of the "All fall down. And
down... and down..." traps.
The WOOPS! Trap
Sam (SAGECO at hotmail.com)
This trap works especially good on Barbarians because they have a
tendency to smash things. This works in any room, any size, any shape.
The characters walk into a room that looks crudely carved out of
stone. Across the room, a massive, unmovable, weak-looking stone slab
is blocking off a door (the characters will only see the door if they
look at the side of the slab and see the door through the space left
between the wall and the slab). Absolutely no spells or enchantments
work in this room (it's good to leave anything living but the
characters stay out of this). No matter how many characters try, the
slab is unmovable. A very observant character would notice that an
illusion portion in the wall (this is the only spell that works in the
room) that gives you a passage around the slab to the door (which is
VERY easy to open, no roll required). If anyone attempts to smash the
slab (it is very weak), sharp, little rock shards that have a THAC0 of
11, and 1d12 will hit each character within 10' of the slab, 1d10 to
each character in the 10' after that, and so on down to 1d2. Each
shard that hits will do 1d4 points of damage. After the slab is
smashed, the illusion will disappear, and reveal the illusionary
passageway.
The illusion is a level 3 illusion that you can just plain walk
through. Anyone that teleports into the room will automatically
teleport into the stone around the room. What can be done, is give the
characters a Wand of Dispel Illusion which can be used in the room.
Really Steamed
Conway Brew (cbrew at fchn.com)
I use this for characters who like to wear a lot of steel armor or
other bulky garments. The trap, though seemingly harmless at first,
becomes more difficult. It begins at a wooden door, when the players
open they are greeted by a small gush of steamy air, not too much (by
the way, this has to be the only way to a particular destination, the
only door, etc.). Players must enter to continue. At first, it's not
so bad. A little hot, very humid. After the first right or left hand
turn of the corridor (it doesn't really matter which way it goes) the
door becomes invisible (no one will notice yet because they are paying
attention to moving forward). After ten or fifteen minutes the steam
becomes thicker, making it difficult to see. In addition, the metal
armor is now heated enough to cause damage every turn to the players
continuing to wear it (usually 1-3 points per turn, depending upon
player level). Everyone's constitution score is affected as they
become dehydrated, weak and tired from the humid and Variations
include, maze like passages that confuse and bewilder, and thus
prolong exposure to the steam. Or, some small creatures adept at
hiding in or using steam for cover who pester and attack the
characters.
Raging Waters
TERRI MEADOR (terrijoe at swbell.net)
In this trap, death is an unimportant concept. A chamber, with
illusions of rings, trinkets, etc., is the bait. When attempted to
snatch, it disappears, causing all doors to lock. White panels raise
to show holes in the wall. Vibrations bring the victim to his/her
knees, just as water rushes into the room. Small snakes flow in, as
well as weak poison. (The snakes aren't poisonous, either.) As the
water rises to their neck, the room shatters, leaving the person
swimming down dangerous rapids. The person falls down a 20 ft. high
water fall, and floats to shore, unconscious, but not dead. When they
wake, random items may be missing, and the poison causes severe
sickness, but fades quickly.
Fast Freddy (FastFreddy at webtv.net)
I have a trap that nearly killed my low level PCs. First, you need a
square room roughly 30 x 30. along one of the walls place a magical
object against the wall. Anyone taking that weapon must replace it
with something more valuable or equal to the value, or else the floor
starts to drop in a spiral pattern (doors automatically close) which
kill any PC in that area. Placing the object back will do absolutely
nothing. I allow 30 seconds before anything happens.
PowderburnHarpel at hotmail.com
A glowing green cube appears around a victim or group, it can be as
big or small as the DM needs. The cube is like a cell or cage. The
more force exerted on the walls, floor, and ceiling the stronger the
cage gets. It starts with a mere 10 hps but it increases with the
number of damage done to it. There are only two ways out of this trap,
for someone on the outside to reach in and pull someone out or to
attack and destroy the square from the outside. For added fun you can
have the walls shrinking to get them to attack the walls.
Ghost Busters
Mephistopheles (Mephisto667 at aol.com)
This traps is actually fairly simple. Throughout the dungeon, place
various programmed illusions of a ghost. Do this several times until
the players are confident that the next one isn't a ghost. Of course,
they don't need to know that this time it really is...
Every which way but up
Mephistopheles (Mephisto667 at aol.com)
A room with various metal spikes on the ceiling, and any exit/entrance
to the room has trip wire that activates a reverse gravity spell.
Every which way but up 2
Mephistopheles (Mephisto667 at aol.com)
Same as before, except there's no trip wire for reverse gravity. The
ceiling is highly magnetized and has enough force to draw up the PC's
Extremely encumbered PC's not carrying loads of metal items may be
exempt. Good way to relieve PC warriors of equipment and most weapons.
What does it say?
Mephistopheles (Mephisto667 at aol.com)
Just give them a faulty fireball scroll that centers on the caster.=20
Telescope
Mephistopheles (Mephisto667 at aol.com)
The PC's find a telescope. At the other end of the telescope is a
reduced medusa's head. You can figure out the results.
Invisible Bridge
Mephistopheles (Mephisto667 at aol.com)
The PC's come to a large chasm. There is a single bridge connecting
the two sides, and somewhere nearby (on a wall or something) there are
2 levers. The first lever makes the bridge disappear, making it
invisible. The other lever makes an illusionary bridge appear nearby.
The result is the PC's assuming the second illusionary bridge is the
real one. For added realism you might want to have an illusion of a
creature or something appear to fall through the real bridge and
another illusion of another creature walking across the illusionary
bridge.
The Greek Fire Greed Trap
Brendan (Frodo11111 at AOL.com)
This is a sure fire way to kill greedy PCs. Have the PCs stumble into
a small dwelling during a storm. The House is located near two lakes
(hehe). In the house there is a door on one wall marked *Do not open*
and through a window the PCs can see a small room with several magic
artifacts. When one of them gets greedy enough and opens the door one
of the small rooms walls collapse due to the pressure change; a jet of
water hits the PCs knocking them out a second door into the water. You
may say a lit candle is knocked over and the house begins to burn, to
add effect. Next a Flaming Cloud of Sodium and Oil begins to rise form
the bottom of the lake. It rises at 10' a round (The lake is 50'
deep). Any characters hit by this cloud suffer 8d6 points of damage a
round for as long as they are in the cloud and 4d6 for every round out
of following that. The Cloud burns for at least 1 turn after reaching
the surface. Diving under water only doubles the damage.
Jon Palmer (vpalm at erols.com)
Use this trap in a place where the PCs will use the room a lot. The
PCs come to a room 100' x 100', with some furniture about (the
furniture has a permanent levitate spell cast so that it is just above
the floor). There are also some grooves where the walls meet the
floor, but are barely discernable. Either the floating furniture or
the grooves can be seen with a Wis check at -2 because there is so
little to spot. What they will notice is that the floor of the room is
about 1' lower than the rest of the hall(s). Once all the PCs have
entered the room, all doors slam shut, magically locked and can't be
opened until the trap is complete. A Magic Mouth starts laughing at
the party and says stuff along the lines of "Welcome to your doom!!!",
etc. This is because the floor has divided 50' ahead of them and the
floors have begun receding into the walls. Below is a pit, about 70'
deep, with the floor there covered in spikes (doing more than enough
damage to kill any PC that might fall). The PCs will try the doors to
find that the will not budge at all, not even a knock spell will work.
The floor keeps receding into the wall until there is no more floor
left and they start to drop.......until they hit an invisible wall!
Once all the PCs leave, the floor returns to its original place. But
here is why the room should be used more and more often. Each time the
party leaves and floor moves back to place, a dispel magic spell is
cast (or some other spell to remove the wall) then the wall is
replaced, except 10' squared less so that it is only 90' x 90' with
the outer ring missing. The PCs won't even notice, until someone
starts to fall. Every time they leave, the invisible wall gets smaller
by 10' squared each time until there is nothing left and then it goes
back to 100' x 100'. The trap is triggered by weight so if the party
flies through, the doors will slam shut and lock but the floor won't
move. So sooner or later, you'll end up with a party full of
pincushions. If you want to be extra nice, you could put a switch or
something in the dungeon to keep the doors from closing.
The Piston
Chris McNorgan (chrismcn at rogers.wave.ca)
Quite often I see traps that are contrived inventions involving magic
and fire and spikes. Who designs castles where hallways are littered
with spike traps? More realistic is the trap which isn't really a
trap, but rather an accident waiting to happen.
Imagine a pyramid with a crypt accessible through a trap door in the
floor at the end of a long and narrow vertical shaft. The worshippers
laid their pharoah to rest in the room, and sealed it with a huge
block of stone at the end of the shaft. The stone, however, would have
to be wedged into place, perhaps with small wooden wedges.
A character climbing the shaft reaches the dead end. He tries to
jostle the stone. Perhaps he has a girdle of giant strength, or
gauntlets, or a KNOCK spell. In any case, if he is able to move the
stone at all, the wedges would fall loose. They fall down the shaft.
The character can't support the heavy stone, and HE falls down the
shaft. And so does the stone... I'd hate to be standing under that
hole in the ceiling!
That is the Trap Collection - Volume 2 so far.
--=20
J C Lawrence Internet: claw at null.net
(Contractor) Internet: coder at ibm.net
---------------(*) Internet: clawrenc at cup.hp.com
...Honorary Member Clan McFUD -- Teamer's Avenging Monolith...
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