Have an obvious pendulum blade above a chest. They disarm the trap and open the chest. The chest is a mimic and the pendulum blade was supposed to kill/injure the mimic so it never moved for fear of setting the trap off
One of my favorite traps that I've thrown at my players involved an enchanted mansion where all of the doorways within the mansion teleported my players to other random doorways within it. After getting lost in there for a little while, my party ended up in a long hallway with twelve doorways in it. Fed up with the absurdity of it, the druid cast Detect Magic to try and find a way forward. I said, "As you cast the spell, you sense conjuration magic emanating from every doorway, except for the one further from you at the end of the hall." They said, "Okay, I go and open that door." I said, "As you go to open that door, you find that your hand inexplicably sticks to the doorknob. Roll for initiative." Remember everybody: Detect Magic doesn't work on mimics. :^)
One of the most fun trap encounters I had in a game was DnD 3.5. We enter a room with a statue in the center, as we moved around the statue, it turned out to be a golem that was able to trigger a 90ft pit trap. I fell into it after a failed Relex Save, which I was terrible at. Halfway down the trap was a Gelentious Cube which caught me so I took less damage from the fall but I was now stuck in the Cube although it had suffered damage from the impact. On my next turn, I escaped the Cube and fell the remaining distance taking more damage. Unfortunately for me, I had a lantern that broke on impact so I was covered in flaming oil but for even more fun the pit started to fill with water which put out the fire. For reference, I was a Paladin in Full Plate armour so I had to cut my armour straps so I could swim. So there I was treading rising water with the pit trap door closed moving towards a Gelentious Cube. I had no idea what I was going to do. Then another part of the pit opens, it turned out there were multiple entrances in the room which the golem could trigger and the party Rogue fell into one (Rolled a 1 on a Reflex Save). They hit the Cube which had been moving towards me, The impact knocked the Rogue out but killed the Cube. So now I had to rescue the unconscious drowning Rogue and hope the party opened the pit trap before it completely filled with water. Fortunately, they did. But then I had to spend time swimming 90ft down to collect the Rogue and my equipment, plus loot from previous victims. This happened about 20 years ago but I still remember it to this day and have a good laugh with my friends about it.
@@MonkeyJedi99 It was a special game we played about four or five times a year for a full day. There was no complicated story or plot just a simple hack and slash dungeon, we started at level one and continued to about level 18. On average I had a character die a session. Another player had a level 13 character who on average made three attacks a round with damage of 1d12+110 per attack., it was ridiculous but only used material from official WotC books. Never could duplicate it closest I got was a Half-Dragon Were-Tiger Barbarian which did about 2d6+80 damage with three attacks. It was pure silly fun. It was a nice break from our usual style of games.
We had a game session once... where we opened a door into a hallway. And there were four gouts of fire coming down from the ceiling. They triggered when you went under them. We were all like level 2 or 3, so we couldn't just "run through the fire". We spent... a lot of time playing with ideas, experimenting, etc. We finally managed to get the entire party through the trapped hallway. And then looked back: and found a switch behind the door that none of us noticed. It was the off switch. :)
I think one of the most under appreciated parts of your videos are how great the thumbnails are. They’re recognizable and consistent while still having their own personality. They use a nice, easy to read font. They all have a lot of color. They never use clickbait but every thumbnail makes me want to click on their video. It’s a minor thing, but it’s something I really like about your videos
I forget where I read this recently, but the gist was that a good trap consists of three things: information, choices, and consequences. And really, that's every good encounter, whether it's a trap or anything else.
My most successful trap in 5e was, ironically, a Snare spell that I randomly threw into a dungeon encounter. At the beginning of the encounter, our eldritch knight simply walked into it, and... spent 90% of the encounter upside down and restrained. He kept failing dex saves (because of the disadvantage from being restrained), and only attempted (and failed) one Arcana check. It was hysterical.
To me, the most important thing about a trap is for it to make sense. It should actually be capable of accomplishing the desired end (entrapment, incapacitation, lethality, etc.). The construction should be commensurate with the capabilities of who made it. It should avoid needless complications that make it seem nonsensical. It should fit the environment. The trap should not imperil the players' immersion.
Not to me. To me, it would be more important that the trap fits the abilities of the player-characters. A magically obscured pit trap to a 100 foot drop into a basilisk den might be entirely appropriate for the story, but it's still a crummy trick to pull on first level characters. I once lost a first level character to an intelligent orb of destruction trap. It made sense for the dungeon, but my PC was basically doomed when he entered the dungeon.
@@lordzaboem IMO, that hits on a different aspect of making sense. An opponent capable of creating such a trap should have a dungeon full of such stuff. It would be silly for such a trap to be the only similarly challenging obstacle in a dungeon otherwise appropriate for first level characters. Now, a DM could come up with a story to justify it (ancient lair of a powerful wizard, and this is the last remnant of the original owner's defenses while the current occupants are much weaker), but that just starts opening up more questions that break immersion (how have the current occupants managed to avoid it?). But that doesn't mean that I do not feel that traps shouldn't be challenge level appropriate. For me, that step just comes after making sure the trap makes sense for the overall environment and setting.
Agree that it should make sense. If the dungeon is millennia old, then maybe the non-magical traps no longer work. Moreover, the reason for the traps, and the reason for the place they are in needs to make sense, too. What wizard would hide a Staff of the Magi at the bottom of a trip-filled dungeon rather than, you know, USE IT?! Also, it rarely makes sense for a trap to be in a highly-trafficked area. Things like that.
I remember a video where Mr Rhexx did discussing the true under use of Kobolds' employment of traps. Both magical & mechanical. I designed a pit trap with a corked oil well above the room. Once pulled using either small lines or mage hand the oil came down like a fire sprinkler system in the room where the only place left dry was the pit either in the middle or at the entrances to the space. Don't forget the arrow slits in the walls & casters (yes kobold casters are a very real thing) & any other thing you can throw in the mix.
I once had a trap based on the idea of Midas' Touch. The players triggered it by looting gold from inside of pillars that featured gold dragon statues wrapped around them. When the gold was looted, the gold dragons began to spray liquid gold onto the room dealing fire damage to them but also slowly encasing the players in a layer of gold if they kept failing (in a sort of flesh to stone mechanic). Eventually they had so much gold on them, they stopped taking fire damage, but also were effectively petrified as they were being turned into gold statues of themselves. One player realized what was happening and put the gold back that they had taken and it ended the trap and removed the petrification effect on the others.
Thank you for more ideas. One of my favorite creations was the "Magical Darkness Pit" trap. Long story short, after killing a bad guy, his spirit flew towards the catacombs. In the catacombs the party dealt with a few zombies, and split into two groups of 2. Each side had a 5-foot-wide hallway, with a magical dark pit, that went around a corner. Characters with dark vision just saw that part of the floor as black, instead of dark grey. I gave the pits a solution, which was light and/or fire. The only character to just get around it was a monk, who could run on walls. Everyone else had to deal with it. One player tried to throw in a torch, to see how deep the pit was, but the fire just bounced off the top, and part of the handle of the torch barely fell in. So, he had the idea of putting a bunch of lit torches on it, creating a path. If he wasn't careful, he'd take fire damage, but, he could get over the pit. The monk spent 3 turns trying to prevent his friend from falling into the pit. It was a bit of a puzzle, and it was interesting to see what each group tried. Light or fire would make the floor solid. Give your traps a solution, and see if your players happen to try it.
You might have had a good answer in your situation, but my biggest problem with traps is a) who put it there and b) why? So if you design a dungeon built by a mage specifically to hide his secrets, that might not be a problem. But an elaborate magical trap inside a typical dungeon does need some justification, in my opinion.
@@harmless6813 I put a spell in my world, called contingency. Basically a mage will perform the spell each day, and if they die that day, certain things happen. The mage they killed was powerful enough for 2 magic pit traps and a portal to appear in his hideout. A demon eventual entered the hideout from the portal. Later they will meet higher level mages. If the party kills them, other events and traps will appear in places they previously weren't. Basically, these things are to prevent grave robbers from taking the belongings of the mages.
I think it was the DM Lair that created a "click" mechanic. Your players hear a click and have a limited amount of time to react to gain advantage or disadvantage on their rolls.
The whole 'one and done' nature of old traps is probably how the idea of "the back-up guy for dealing with traps is whoever has the most HP" came about
I like the idea that Perception isn't a gimme. Plus, even once you identify the existence of a trap, getting past it shouldn't be a single skill check unless it was ever only supposed to be flavor text. I ran a small dungeon crawl once, where the place had already been sort of looted. I had corpses with poison arrows in hallways, and pits already opened up with skeletons impales on spikes at the bottom. There were very few still active traps left. But the obvious carnage in the place kept the players on their toes, and made them take every hallway as a threat. It was a pretty successful 1 shot, as judged by the level of player involvement.
Or an illusion of a hallway concealing a wall on the other-side of an obvious spike pit... Player tries to jump to the nonexistent hallway, smacks into the very real wall, drops into the pit they just jumped over..... (A lifelike forced perspective painting could work too if you want to take magic out of the equations...) Open graves could be a fun basis for a pit trap too, as they tend to come with tombstones the enemies can try to tip over onto the player in the pit....
One of my favorite traps, as an encounter, is present an elaborate description of a door... then watch the party deliberate for the next 15 minutes on how to safely navigate the obstacle.... its just a door... and its unlocked.
I was having an issue with my group with one person trying to do everything and not letting others try things so I implemented "roleplay initiative" as a flat d20 roll instead of normal initiative that way the bard with alert isn't always first. It's really helped with puzzles and traps and I think everyone feels more engaged
I made a great trap/puzzle room combining some ideas I found online. Basically they enter the room and have the door lock behind them. Inside is a table holding multiple colored orbs. Each orb representing a different damage type. Across the way is a door with slots in it for the orbs and the right combination of orbs opens it. Have the players roll initiative and limit their action by only allowing them to insert one orb at a time or switch two orbs already slotted. The walls in the room are covered in arcane sigils. On initiative 20 the sigils activate and do damage to anyone in the room. The type of damage changes every round. The solution to the puzzle is to insert the orbs in the order of the damage types at the beginning of each round. Ie. Round 1 lightning=blue orb, round 2 fire=red orb, etc. You can change the number of orbs based on the party size and the damage each round based on party level. Give your players saving throws. Or not. Just keep in mind three things: the number of possible combinations multiplies for each additional orb added, each party member will have a turn every round to try a different combination, and most importantly all of your players will have to go through multiple rounds of damage to solve this puzzle. I used four orbs for a group of four players. They were low level (I think 2) so the damage each round was only one point and no damage on a successful save. This was just enough to scare them before they figured it out but not enough to bring them close to a tpk. My players seemed to have fun with it.
for simple trap like dart or spiked fall, i use the rule of the "clic" When i said "Clic" everyone as like 10 second irl to tell me what their caractere doesn, like pushing the one in front, jumping, dodging ... and then i tel them wats the trap do. i dont even make them role just simple RP Quick event. works really great but you dont want to abuse its use
You guys forgot the Investigation skill. That's what a rogue would use to find a trap beforehand. The holes in the wall? Darts. That tiny depression in the path? Pressure plate. That weird shadow on the ceiling? Log suspended.
Reverse gravity. My favorite spell effect to throw out as a trap. Enchant a room with it or just certain spots on a battle map. Combine it with any standard trap to add a whole new layer of surprise. Never fails to make me laugh when I see my players reactions to me describing their character flying straight up. Just don't use it randomly. Make sure it matches the environment your players are in.
Last trap I used was a wide open pit. Two feet wide on one side. Something was down there, but the players only saw the loot. I explained that the floors were clean. Cube was down there.
My favorite trap was just a door. There were three locks on it, and they needed to be unlocked in order. Failing any lock would cause the others to magically reset, and each lock also had additional, progressively more dangerous effects for failure. Failing the first caused a Burning Hands spell to shoot out. The second spawned a Gelatinous Cube 15 feet behind whoever was picking the lock. And failing the third spawned a Rust Monster. Besides the skill check to pick the lock, a successful Arcana or Dispel Magic check would either lower the DC to pick the lock or suppress the effect of a failure one time, so the mage and the rogue were both involved, and the fighter and paladin were busy fending off the monsters that were exclusively trying to attack the rogue. It was an intense few rounds of initiative that involved the entire party, and all to just open a door. When they finally succeeded and ran threw, slamming it behind them, the rogue's player asked for a break to wash the sweat from her face. It was AWESOME.
So Kelly's been wearing a some C'thulhu/Octopus style t-shirts for a few weeks; is this one Azathoth? Another fun and informative video; thanks, Dudes.
@@johnhall3570 You are correct; evidentially, my brain strove to protect me from the true, sanity-blasting realization. For he is the key and the guardian of the gate.
There's some interesting food for thought in this video, especially regarding battlefield hazards and natural obstacles. For traps that are intentionally set in order to stop intruders, though, the way I see it is the trapmaker's goal is to either capture or kill the intruder, not just make them slowly use up spell slots healing as they progress. So, instead I run these traps as deadly puzzles. The party members just know how to notice the telltale signs that there could be some trap afoot, and they have to figure out how to get around it without setting it off, lest they trigger an alarm, get a forcecage summoned on them, or are impaled to death in a punji pit. The critical parts are A) the players at the table understand that intentional traps are deadly, and B) the GM lets the party notice small hints that there could be one without making the party rely on the binary pass/fail of a perception check. Then they become puzzles with stakes rather than a resource tax to slog through.
I like to use traps as teaching tools. When a new player is at the table -- and there is always a new player -- the first or second room will have a no-damage trap. A trap can be as simple as a trip wire connected to a brass bell. It can even be a stack of empty cans leaned against a door. Whether these simple traps get triggered or not, the players clue into how they need to start paying close attention to their environment and watch for hidden dangers.
I personally use Investigation way more to trap related situations. The perception roll exists, but just to notice that something is strange or it feels off putting. For me at least, makes it way more realistic and interactive. On the side of favorite trap, I made one for a boss fight that was the result of a wild magic surge on the place. It created areas that would randomly transport whoever stepped on it to another area inside the arena. It took the players a while to notice that the areas had a slight distorted view to it and in reality the possible exit points where the same as the possible entrance with 7 places. They needed 20 turns to finally start using it for themselves instead of wild goose chase
Random trap thought that came to my mind as I was watching: A pressure plate triggered bell. Kind of like having a doorbell. Could be used in a non-hostile person's house, just a neat way for them to know someone has arrived. Or perhaps as an alarm system for an entire dungeon so now the entire place is on alert and no enemies there can be surprised.
We had something like this in my first 5E campaign, where each door we came to had an obvious string which rang one of a number of bells deeper in the hag's lair. And we had no rogue, just the bard using thieves' tools without proficiency. ... So the hag had about five minutes warning we were coming.
First of all, Thanks dungeon dudes for another fantastic video!! Secondly, I Just finished designing a trap with “random” effects. Four levers are on a wall and the players are locked in a room with 3 doors to progress. The levers must be pulled in a certain sequence to open each door successfully but pulling the levers in the wrong order may result in nothing happening or a trap to be sprung such as a gelatinous cube falls from the space in the ceiling it was sealed or a bubble of magical darkness fills the chamber and now the players must do everything blinded until the effect fades or the spend a spell slot and dispel it. I’m still working on the rest of the dungeon and some of the bad effects so it will be a few weeks before I present this but please feel free to use this idea and expand on it in any way you think fits your campaign! Your last trap video is what inspired me to make this more random and visual rather than just looking for false stones that open each door.
I was already a fan of your channel. I've been playing and DM'ing for over 25 years, and I send new and experienced players alike to your videos regularly. This was one of the most helpful concept videos you've made. Traps are so played out, and this was a nice refresher of the things that make them interesting. Even the things I was already doing but hadn't thought about the why in a long time (as much of designing had become rote over the years) were nice to hear articulated. I watch your videos while building terrain, so this video may be replayed a few times while I build miniature trap elements for my table. Thanks, dudes.
It's interesting. This is exactly how I was planning on working traps in the book I'm writing. Never played D&D before, so I'm doing my best to make things as realistic as possible while at the same time make it feel like it's something that could still happen at the table. Super appreciate all of your videos! Keep up the great work!
What I have my players do when dealing with traps... Perception check to realize that it’s there, Investigation check to figure out the trap’s mechanics, then thieves’ tools check to disarm it. I know there’s no such thing as a crit on anything but an attack roll. But if a 20 is rolled for Perception or Investigation, it provides advantage for the next step’s d20 roll. One last thing: I only allow passive checks for Perception. Once a PC begins interacting with a trap, nothing is passive anymore.
Over 500 views and not a single dislike. Sounds about right considering the quality of the content. Thank you for this! This is a good way to have threatening, non combat encounters if you want to have a more exploration based game, rather than social or combat heavy.
I really like your videos. I knew that when I needed ideas to make a traps session interesting, clicking on one of yours would not disappoint me and it hasn't. You guys really do have a lot of good advice for new and youngish DMs
Currently running Out of the Abyss and, on Thursday, the party encountered the Pudding King. Diplomacy failed and out of anger and frustration, Cloudkill was cast prior to initiative. The druid immediately transformed into a tiger and blindly charged the throne. 10x10 pit trap was sprung, and with her momentum and claws successfully grasped the edge of the pit. Her hind legs were immersed into a Gelatinous Cube. Thankfully for the party, this marked the return of the beloved Glabbagool who willingly expelled the druid, further enraging the King. Pit trap gone right!
Now i just want to design an encounter that will make a player remember that they have skill with brewer's tools and realise that that is the fastest way to settle things and move on. (Edited for grammar)
I always love the idea of the cartoon double trap. First trap is poorly hidden enough to look like someone tried but still easy enough to spot on a check. The second trap is the real trap and usually encountered trying to avoid the first trap. The classic scene being the hole perfectly hideen behind the hole with poor covered branches and leaves...person jumps the first pit to find themselves falling into the second pit. Creativity is defiantly a key part to good traps and certainly ones that are memorable.
I would use this method setting traps in a LARP I played. An obvious tripwire with an "oops it doesn't work" trap over the top of a fallen log, then a fully functional pressure plate one step beyond the log
Some of my favorite trap ideas came from Forgotten Realms novels or just glancing through the monster manual and seeing different kinds of mimic creatures and of course there's the classic 10 ft hallway with a 10 ft gelatinous cube. Shout out to season 1 of drakenheim
Mimics are bad encounters for more than once in a campaign. They teach the players to roleplay as extra cautious paranoids who meticulously stab at every door and object mentioned in the adventure. That makes for a tedious game experience for everybody.
@@lordzaboem If the players get to paranoid and do that, i'd totally start implementing time sensitive stuff or give them disadvantage on certain saving throws. Being that careful comes at a price.
As soon as you mentioned traps as combat encounters I imagined someone sets off a trap and they hear something barreling towards them as a circular hole opens up behind them. They think it's a bolder, naturally, but it's actually- and ogre! Rolling down the path. Possibly a dead one (which would then be really fun to make undead), alive and ready to fight- or perhaps for a lower difficulty- make it sickened, dazed, or injured from the fall- or extremely fierce because it's angry and hungry to go the other way.
I use traps to challenge the players and force them to think about a problem instead of bashing it with a hammer. Therefore I place traps in different categories than you: Damage, Detain, Delay, and Direction. - Damage is simple. It does damage. Traps that damage tend to require vigilance and common sense to avoid. They are the kind of traps associated with player vices like greed. These kinds of traps always have a saving throw and a likely skill interaction. I would include any trap that petrifies in this category as well, as well as things that may drop hazards like green slime or yellow mold on the party. - Detain are traps that capture. They might be nets, falling cages, pit traps with lids, etc. These are traps that the residents who made them use to capture intruders for their own nefarious purposes. Abandoned detaining traps can be a death sentence for the lone wolf player. Skill challenges to escape are always valid, so travelling in groups becomes the key to success. - Delay traps are things that slow the party down so that the foes on the far side can benefit from extra time for whatever purpose. Stairs that become slides which reverse a party's direction, earthen ramparts that slow progress, ball bearing that trip player characters and so on serve this role. They tend to more frustrate and anger less patient players, such that they are more likely to rush through Damage traps. Teamwork and patience win the day. - Direction traps redirect the path or intentions of the player characters. These could be hallways that change direction, teleportation traps, greased inclines or stairs that turn into ramps and spill the characters forward into something else. These traps almost always ruin the plans of a party, and will likely separate the players who tend to scout too far forward. These are tests of character planning and make the characters invent contingencies for similar problems. Each trap tests group dynamics, individual and group ingenuity, and likely are tied to some weakness within the group. Do they communicate well or not at all? Are some members likely to run ahead an loot before others discover the chest? Do some players want to hog the spotlight and do everything? Do some act without thinking? Traps are hazards, but they're also tests. Each has a lesson. Each has a solution - for no responsible DM should ever place a trap before a group without an answer to it - and they should also be open to ingenuity that they had not considered upon designing the trap. Players that defeat monsters may reflect at a later time about it, but those that defeat traps with new ideas and brilliance will never EVER let the DM forget it. Count on it.
14:50 I have a table of seven players (at one time ages ago at the FLGS it was 12, but we're at my house now). I have been using "out of combat initiative" for a long time. On my initiative tracker, I use the last initiative from the last combat as their out of combat. I works for both just "OK what are you all doing as you're going down the hall" order so no one i just a wallflower out of combat, but also when terrain / non-combat encounters happen, we've already got a set order.
I may have taken a multitude of poison darts to the face and almost got eaten by a mimic last adventure, but at least I didn't also plummet face first down the pit trap, so there might in fact be hope for me still.
This gave me an idea of a bell tower. each time it rings, the players move across the path to avoid a monster. To prevent it from being a normal encounter, it can be really strong and heavy. When it hears them, it could break the floor under the players, allowing them to hide again, but take damage and have a harder skill check getting out
Player: man, I really like this character! He’s got good hair, good attitude, good feet, good- Dm: (making even more traps in the dungeon) the feet are optional
The best trap I've run was the entrance to a wizard enclave, located in the face of a cliff. It was a short hallway with a statue at the end. As they approached the statue, they would be affected by Command "Flee"... Out the hallway and down the cliff. My players found ingenious ways to get closer such as using mold earth to create difficult terrain, parking a mammoth at the base of the cliff to reduce the fall to 15 feet, slippers of spider climbing or rope to negate the fall, until the old wizard remembered what the password was. ("What, you think we put a password on this?")
The Sleeping Castle, the whole castle was a trap. from molds that caused sleep to poisons, gas and other encounters that caused sleep. If a character fell asleep they were teleported to a hidden room. Causing the others to go deeper into the castle to find them. This was a good way to introduce a new NPC and a player that later joined us. The players loved it so much that they made the castle like their focus point of the main Campaign, which allowed me to expand on it. Granted it took my original Campaign in a different direction but it was more exciting and unique than the original.
I've done the religious temple trap idea trying to help the player that was the cleric shine. The players tried so hard to get her to see it was designed for her character but at the end the Rouge used UMD to fake a turn undead (3rd edition rules this was a thing) I was impressed by sad that my attempt to make that player shine failed
There were several involved in that one but getting out of the first space was a one and done to lead them to think differently for the ones that followed after. It at least successfully did that.
Distinct Encounter traps. I think I ran into a couple of those at the end of numerous Wily stages in several Megaman games. Why didn’t I think of that before. Game design is such a big part of the DM role that often gets overlooked. Thanks dudes.
This is an awesome video! I'm a fairly new DM preparing to run a dungeon encounter full of crude traps and this has given me lots of great ideas for diversifying this and future encounters! Thanks
D&D 3.5e Book of Challenges has a ton of great ideas for distinct encounter style traps which can basically be pulled out and thrown into any dungeon with only a little bit of translation work to pick new monsters/skill challenges & DC's.
My most memorable session of D&D was trying to survive a hallway as a level 2 rogue with a level 2 ranger. That hallway was absolutely terrifying. It had an incendiary cloud trap, a reverse gravity trap, blades that came out of the walls, darts, and more esoteric things. The end of the hallway had an illusion, and there was a fear spell at the end of the hallway that would send you running back down the hallway, which was a death sentence. Most of the traps would have instantly killed us. This was in 3.5, and we checked every 5 foot by 5 foot square with the ranger's polearm before I checked it. We calculated how much experience that hallway should give once we got through it, and it was enough to reach level 5. I think there was a rule that limited XP gain to halfway through the next level, but regardless, that session stuck with me.
I hope you guys read the comments, but I really liked this video! IDK if you do alot of content like what I'll suggest, but would you be open to doing a "Let's make a trap together" example video, especially in the 3rd option situation? I would love to see how you do this in action, but that might not fit the same style of content you like to make. Either way, love the video!!! Thanks for all your work, this is awesome.
A few years back, I was playing in a 3.5 campaign, and the DM loved using nasty surprises, and it showed in the way the players chose to outfit themselves. The rogue had a suit of mithril chainmail enchanted to be both weightless and silent. The paladin had her helmet enchanted with waterbreathing after she fell off a boat. A trap as part of a combat encounter. We were fighting a mated pair of manticores. After taking one out with a spectacular headshot, the DM made us all make reflex saves. I was dropped to negative HP by a freefalling manti-corpse.
Great video, I especially enjoyed the points about monsters using traps as part of their lair defensive strategy, and the use of different skills and multiple checks to overcome the more difficult traps. Needle trap that does 5 pts poison damage is less interesting and makes less sense than a needle trap that causes 10 minutes of sleep and rings a (dinner) bell elsewhere. I was reading The Sunken Citadel, and the difference between the kobolds area and the goblins area was bothering me. This helped me realize what: The goblins set up their territory with several traps and the kobolds did not. It seems to me that kobolds, as the LN/pack tactics/individually weaker race would likely have more traps and fortifications. The goblins should have more random mob chaos and shock troop type tactics. Tribe, what do you all think?
I always associate kobolds with traps, as it helps offset their weakness. Covered pit traps, crossbows on trip wires, bags of poisonous pollen to drop from the ceiling, a bucket of lamp oil over a slightly ajar door followed by a toppling candle, and sound alarms. - I can see goblins being more about barriers than clever traps. A pit with spikes in it (no cover), a tree across a road to stop horses and wagons, rocks they can roll down a steep hill onto enemies.
@@MonkeyJedi99 Thanks! I reread and the kobolds have some annoying traps, but when I run it I'm adding some that specifically defend them from the neighboring goblins. You're right, the goblins are better builders, the kobolds more clever/patient/mechanical.
Sometimes the simple ones are the best. I doubled up on a pit trap one time when my rogue was testing for traps with a pole. He triggered the net trap, figured the trap was sprung and walked right into the pit under the net.
Their is one trap i used on my players that i enjoyed. It was a blade trap where when they walked within a certain area blades scythe out of the wall. And the players found a way around it by crawling underneath. Later when they were backtracking they forgot about it and the cleric went down. They have been more careful since then
Trap as an encounter is waaaay more satisfying than "roll die, find trap; roll die, disarm trap; fail roll, roll die to save; pass save, yawn, and repeat". It also cuts Bomb Squad D&D off at the pass and allows for a little more RP. You could have the trap indicated while the party is gathering information about a dungeon which makes disarming the trap as important as any setpiece.
The moat brutal traps I threw at my players was a hallway with a pressure activated chute which would slide them into a section of the sewers of the fortress they were in. Two out of four players failed their saves and they both slid into the trapped section of the sewers. The room they were trapped in was beginning to fill with acid, and they tried to climb out with rope. The first to get on the rope was grabbed by one of two clay golems in the room posing as statues. The rest of the party ended up voulenterally going in to try and save them. They only had one of their party memebers go down, but it was a memorable and brutal trap.
I guess my favorite trap is one I made, in which the PC's had to cross a foggy room, and get to the other side. When doing so, they would each see fragments of their past, in a flashback. There was a Charisma save to not get pulled into the memory, which would allow a character to understand it's a vision, but they would see the vision anyway. Characters that stayed too long in the room would need to reroll this test with a lower DC, still risking forgetting reality and falling into the dream. Once believing the dream/memory, they would have to make Con and Wis saves to avoid psychic damage, and would have to find a way out of the dream, usually through the same way the character originally got over that situation in their past. Mechanically, it's a dumb trap. Roll to avoid getting caught, roll to avoid suffering too much damage. Walk to exit to escape. Narratively , though, it was great. We got to flesh out characters and their back stories, and what they cared about or feared. A spy master character would remember their mansion in the capital being raided during the war. A soldier would remember their time in the battlefields. An escapee drow would remember the final moments before going to the surface and being chased by their old companions. There was no way to disarm the trap, and they all had to go through it. We all had lots of fun.
Backtracking successes isn't the greatest way to go, unless you're fairly certain as a DM that your party will succeed more than fail with the DCs you've set. Try "you must succeed X times before you fail Y times or Z happens." This could be revealed with a sufficient initial roll, or conveyed narratively with a loud, ominous click somewhere in the room. Up to you!
It can also be revealed with a riddle, poem or art on the wall. "Thrice did Athenar's labors repeat, to stave off a looming and certain defeat. Once plus once is the path to the fall, and death come from all but the southernmost wall."
@@manuelmatos9100 a little buggy, (minor issues, and once requiring a restart if the game/program) but it is early access. A little light on some content as of right now, (hope for more minis of some races). However, updates since early access on steam have been about every week to 10 days and new content is being added regularly it seems. I personally found it really easy to use compared to other programs online. User interface is nice, comes with built in guides/minor tutorials. Let's you build your own campaigns and join others. (Have yet to use any of these features yet) All and all, I am happy with it so far, blew my gaming group's collective mind dropping my first map on them. Looks great graphically. I have high hopes moving forward.
Sure, @@Skarnet1. The building is a submerged pyramid. The few rooms at the top introduce the iconography, and have two puzzle doors. (The party surprised me here, and broke one of the necessary statues, but then pulled the base of so they could "lock-pick" the mechanism. I went with it.) As the party moves further in/down, they come across doors and traps that are imblazoned with the symbols for safety and danger. Sometimes it's a floor panel, a button, or a physical object to be used with pairs of statues. The top floors also use one element per room, while the lower floors combine elements. For instance, one of the middle floor rooms contained statues (with the key objects in a different room, for a change), obvious floor plates that shoot fire when stepped on, and an easy to access door that is marked with a double danger symbol that lets in a flood of sand. (The group buried the room out of curiosity, and had to find another way.) There are some other traps that could be cleverly used, such as the whole crumbling floor tiles thing, leading to major fall damage, which could be used to safely repel to the lower floor. A few mid dungeon minibosses, that also uses the symbolism. Such as a warning picture mural, offering a (missed) hint that the mummified judge seeks out treasure stolen from the tomb. The final puzzle was rushing out of the place as it was crumbling in around them, closing off familiar paths, forcing them through the skipped puzzles, with little time to think.
Here's an idea: traps within a dwarvan fortress, and a dwarf is with the party. Perhaps allow that dwarf to make use of their racial Stonecunning ability to make History checks to either predict, find, or know ways on how to stop such traps, giving advantage on the rogue's checks to disarm them or completely bypassing them safely by preventing the trap from going off.
My most beloved trap. was a bit of an social encounter :P ( with a combat time pressure) *you enter a forgotten temple. * you see images of rituales and traditions and myths on the walls * one of them ( but just one of many) is a cleansing ritual before speaking to a god ( you need to wash your nape) * a few rooms later you enter a room with a fountain in the middle. and a little behind the fountain a short stair with a door behind. and over the door the simbol of the god * if someone atempt to climb the stair without washing their nape in the fountain before, 1d4 shadows will apear and will scram "kill the infidels" * the shadows only attack the ones that are not washed ( and each round you add 1d4 shadows more) the shadows would not exit the room nor pursue the the PC if they try to escape. * once there is noone in the room without ther nape unwash the shadows disapear and the door with the symbol opens :P
used thistrap with few changes over the years and EACH TIME it is amazing :P .. (i try to reflavor it for each adventure.. and my players LOVE when they see it in a new way )
Van Richten's includes new Haunted traps, which rather than being countered with Counterspell or Dispell Magic, instead only react to the use of a Channel Divinity, remove curse, or dispel evil/good.
A good thing to remember is the monster that put the trap there. Blue dragons have flat immunity to lightning damage, so electrified floor tiles protecting something they want easy access to would make sense. It doesn't matter if it triggers the trap, or even if the tiles just stay on all the time, because the tiles don't hurt it.
I love using the simple you hear a click. What do you do? You get a reaction to move in a direction, cast a reaction spell or brace yourself. If you don't answer in a moment you do nothing... Which might also work
I always try encorporating traps into my dungeons and often use agility checks for saves like "barely dodged as the spike scrapes your helmet"... i use them to get my players thinking: Like i had combat in a room full of swing out blades and spikes on a leaver and pully system and they used it to defeat a mighty Vettr Warlord *edit* ... i'm gonna add a lot of these elements into my next campain
working on a plant themed adventure with an evil druid. Wanted something like a Sarlacc Pit in it's lair but couldn't figure out how to set it up. After this video I think running this "Sarlacc" as an environmental hazard will be way more fun.
I recommend checking out the Legends & Lairs books: Traps & Treachery I and Traps & Treachery II. I have found the had been highly adaptable for dnd 3.5, and could be adapted for 5e, even if only for inspiration. In the book, they break down all the traps to a basic mechanical or magical level. This allows me to describe in fine detail how the trap works, what it looks like, what they can and cannot see, what substances or materials they could glean from it and more. I really enjoyed using this book to inspire me to create my own traps in such depth, and gave me additional resources to add to my own repertoire of devious devices and materials to use against my players/.
i recall i made a boss of Chrono trigger (the dragon tank) as a monster with basically the equivalent of complex traps as his skin, it was crazy neat seeing the party maim it to pieces because it felt, just like in the game, you have to destroy his pieces to reduce its offensive power to deliver the finishing blow to the steam tank.
Kobold tunnels. Hall with pit trap with thin ledges on the side. Small creatures, like the kobolds, can pass at half speed, but medium or creatures require half speed + dexterity(Acrobatics) check. As player approach the edge of the pit, however, a swinging log comes down from the ceiling requiring a Dexterity(Acrobatics) check to duck under. Any character in the path and failing the check takes bludgeoning damage and is moved 10 feet closer to the pit, generally knocking them in. All the while, two kobolds at the far end of the hall are hunkered behind the steps down to the next room (Half cover) and firing their short bows at the party. Once a player is past the pit, the kobolds run deeper into the tunnels to alert the warren.
My favorite trap I’ve designed was a treasure chest on a pressure plate. If the weight was disturbed, it would trigger a minor explosion (1d4 fire damage). The caveat was there was a 1hp chicken on top that was really a polymorphed T-Rex that refuses to leave the chest.
Remember, folks, good traps don't actually have to be traps at all. Picture this: players enter a large room. The stone floor extends ten feet from the wall they entered through, after that the ground is a fine white sand, the surface of which is about an inch or two lower than the edge of the stone floor, for the next 25 or 30 feet. Beyond that is another 10 feet of stone floor and then the exit in the far wall. That's it. There's nothing else. The best traps are the ones that exist in your players' minds. Just be prepared for the grr-hate once they discover that the sand is only a few inches deep. And be prepared to reward any really creative bypasses they come up with!
One thing to mention about a 10x10 foot pit trap is that any character that has at least a 10 in Strength can just perform a long jump accross it so it won't be that effective if it's in the middle of a long corridor. A more devious way of employing the simple 10x10 foot pitfall trap is to put it around a corner because a long jump requires you to move 10 feet before making the jump. Rules as written, it's just 10 feet of movement in general before jumping but I would honestly say that it needs to be in a straight line to make a jump like that unless you combine it with some kind of athletics or acrobatics check.
The three kind of traps that I love experiencing aren't at all changing the type of trap, but how you use it: 1. The Pickproof Door: most rogues would utilize their thrieves tools to disarm a trap, or to pick a door open, but knowing this can allow a rogish character like a kobold to make the mechanism or lock be the trigger for a trap. That way, when the party relies on the rogue as not to scout out the mansion's secret entry code, and fail to notice how central the lock is, they may find themselves falling down the 30ft pit trap disguised as a porch. 2. Double Trap: especially with old ruins, I find mysself (often uselessly) vigilent for this by rolling for perception on the area surrounding a trap. What better way to utilize a tripwire trap than to install a pressure trap right where the victims will jump to? Or more naturally, for a pit trap's cover to have crumbled in some ruins giving a hit that jumping on the landing might make that stone crumble as well... 3. The False Traps: I love this idea when I think of Tucker's Kobolds as I think this would be right up their alley. Have your trap maker be proficient in pottery and pave a hallway with 50% fickle tiles, 10% pressure plates, and 1 pit trap or snare. Especially after having fallen to the porch and survived the crumbling stone, these tiles build on the group's growing gloomy uncertainty and puts them on edge, thinking there is danger everywhere. I can especially see this being used as the last kobold alive defending the dragon's keep, as it would make an alarm and need little maintenance... Or you could even use such a hallway as a leap of faith, having them switch from perception to insight checks in order to survive.
The most memorable trap encounter I had was when we trying to eliminate the thieves guild in our city as they were causing more and more problems. Every room, door and hallway was trapped and quite easy to spot but the trick was always how to get past them. I don’t think most of them did any damage but they didn’t need to as each failed check generally required either a save to avoid alerting the guild (you try not screaming in pain if you step on a mouse trap) Or gave you disadvantage on the next check (encouraged rotating who was leading) as they steadily wore you down. Best individual trap was a quicksand trap that a room held. Wasn’t a threat unless you failed multiple skill checks and no one helped you but each failure made you gain carrying capacity as the sand stuck to your character which would make your character overburdened and eventually immobile due to the sheer weight.
Have an obvious pendulum blade above a chest. They disarm the trap and open the chest. The chest is a mimic and the pendulum blade was supposed to kill/injure the mimic so it never moved for fear of setting the trap off
That is diabolical, and I love it!
One of my favorite traps that I've thrown at my players involved an enchanted mansion where all of the doorways within the mansion teleported my players to other random doorways within it. After getting lost in there for a little while, my party ended up in a long hallway with twelve doorways in it. Fed up with the absurdity of it, the druid cast Detect Magic to try and find a way forward.
I said, "As you cast the spell, you sense conjuration magic emanating from every doorway, except for the one further from you at the end of the hall."
They said, "Okay, I go and open that door."
I said, "As you go to open that door, you find that your hand inexplicably sticks to the doorknob. Roll for initiative."
Remember everybody: Detect Magic doesn't work on mimics. :^)
One of the most fun trap encounters I had in a game was DnD 3.5.
We enter a room with a statue in the center, as we moved around the statue, it turned out to be a golem that was able to trigger a 90ft pit trap.
I fell into it after a failed Relex Save, which I was terrible at.
Halfway down the trap was a Gelentious Cube which caught me so I took less damage from the fall but I was now stuck in the Cube although it had suffered damage from the impact. On my next turn, I escaped the Cube and fell the remaining distance taking more damage. Unfortunately for me, I had a lantern that broke on impact so I was covered in flaming oil but for even more fun the pit started to fill with water which put out the fire. For reference, I was a Paladin in Full Plate armour so I had to cut my armour straps so I could swim.
So there I was treading rising water with the pit trap door closed moving towards a Gelentious Cube. I had no idea what I was going to do. Then another part of the pit opens, it turned out there were multiple entrances in the room which the golem could trigger and the party Rogue fell into one (Rolled a 1 on a Reflex Save). They hit the Cube which had been moving towards me, The impact knocked the Rogue out but killed the Cube. So now I had to rescue the unconscious drowning Rogue and hope the party opened the pit trap before it completely filled with water.
Fortunately, they did. But then I had to spend time swimming 90ft down to collect the Rogue and my equipment, plus loot from previous victims.
This happened about 20 years ago but I still remember it to this day and have a good laugh with my friends about it.
That sounds fun as heck!
@@MonkeyJedi99 It was a special game we played about four or five times a year for a full day. There was no complicated story or plot just a simple hack and slash dungeon, we started at level one and continued to about level 18.
On average I had a character die a session. Another player had a level 13 character who on average made three attacks a round with damage of 1d12+110 per attack., it was ridiculous but only used material from official WotC books. Never could duplicate it closest I got was a Half-Dragon Were-Tiger Barbarian which did about 2d6+80 damage with three attacks.
It was pure silly fun. It was a nice break from our usual style of games.
That sounds awesome!
Embodiment of but wait it gets worse
Dungeon Dudes have been hitting it out of the park for us new DMs this past month! Thank you Monty and Kelly!
We had a game session once... where we opened a door into a hallway. And there were four gouts of fire coming down from the ceiling. They triggered when you went under them. We were all like level 2 or 3, so we couldn't just "run through the fire". We spent... a lot of time playing with ideas, experimenting, etc. We finally managed to get the entire party through the trapped hallway. And then looked back: and found a switch behind the door that none of us noticed. It was the off switch. :)
I think one of the most under appreciated parts of your videos are how great the thumbnails are. They’re recognizable and consistent while still having their own personality. They use a nice, easy to read font. They all have a lot of color. They never use clickbait but every thumbnail makes me want to click on their video. It’s a minor thing, but it’s something I really like about your videos
💯
Agreed! This may be not mentioned a lot in the YT world, but I do appreciate it as well.
Not minor at all. I'm so fed up of all those "I'm so surprised" faces and the friggin pointing
I forget where I read this recently, but the gist was that a good trap consists of three things: information, choices, and consequences. And really, that's every good encounter, whether it's a trap or anything else.
My most successful trap in 5e was, ironically, a Snare spell that I randomly threw into a dungeon encounter. At the beginning of the encounter, our eldritch knight simply walked into it, and... spent 90% of the encounter upside down and restrained. He kept failing dex saves (because of the disadvantage from being restrained), and only attempted (and failed) one Arcana check. It was hysterical.
To me, the most important thing about a trap is for it to make sense. It should actually be capable of accomplishing the desired end (entrapment, incapacitation, lethality, etc.). The construction should be commensurate with the capabilities of who made it. It should avoid needless complications that make it seem nonsensical. It should fit the environment. The trap should not imperil the players' immersion.
Not to me. To me, it would be more important that the trap fits the abilities of the player-characters. A magically obscured pit trap to a 100 foot drop into a basilisk den might be entirely appropriate for the story, but it's still a crummy trick to pull on first level characters. I once lost a first level character to an intelligent orb of destruction trap. It made sense for the dungeon, but my PC was basically doomed when he entered the dungeon.
@@lordzaboem IMO, that hits on a different aspect of making sense.
An opponent capable of creating such a trap should have a dungeon full of such stuff. It would be silly for such a trap to be the only similarly challenging obstacle in a dungeon otherwise appropriate for first level characters. Now, a DM could come up with a story to justify it (ancient lair of a powerful wizard, and this is the last remnant of the original owner's defenses while the current occupants are much weaker), but that just starts opening up more questions that break immersion (how have the current occupants managed to avoid it?).
But that doesn't mean that I do not feel that traps shouldn't be challenge level appropriate. For me, that step just comes after making sure the trap makes sense for the overall environment and setting.
Agree that it should make sense. If the dungeon is millennia old, then maybe the non-magical traps no longer work.
Moreover, the reason for the traps, and the reason for the place they are in needs to make sense, too. What wizard would hide a Staff of the Magi at the bottom of a trip-filled dungeon rather than, you know, USE IT?! Also, it rarely makes sense for a trap to be in a highly-trafficked area. Things like that.
Yes yes yes, another trap video. Scritches, take some notes!!
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.
I remember a video where Mr Rhexx did discussing the true under use of Kobolds' employment of traps. Both magical & mechanical. I designed a pit trap with a corked oil well above the room. Once pulled using either small lines or mage hand the oil came down like a fire sprinkler system in the room where the only place left dry was the pit either in the middle or at the entrances to the space. Don't forget the arrow slits in the walls & casters (yes kobold casters are a very real thing) & any other thing you can throw in the mix.
I once had a trap based on the idea of Midas' Touch. The players triggered it by looting gold from inside of pillars that featured gold dragon statues wrapped around them. When the gold was looted, the gold dragons began to spray liquid gold onto the room dealing fire damage to them but also slowly encasing the players in a layer of gold if they kept failing (in a sort of flesh to stone mechanic). Eventually they had so much gold on them, they stopped taking fire damage, but also were effectively petrified as they were being turned into gold statues of themselves. One player realized what was happening and put the gold back that they had taken and it ended the trap and removed the petrification effect on the others.
Thank you for more ideas.
One of my favorite creations was the "Magical Darkness Pit" trap.
Long story short, after killing a bad guy, his spirit flew towards the catacombs. In the catacombs the party dealt with a few zombies, and split into two groups of 2. Each side had a 5-foot-wide hallway, with a magical dark pit, that went around a corner. Characters with dark vision just saw that part of the floor as black, instead of dark grey. I gave the pits a solution, which was light and/or fire.
The only character to just get around it was a monk, who could run on walls. Everyone else had to deal with it. One player tried to throw in a torch, to see how deep the pit was, but the fire just bounced off the top, and part of the handle of the torch barely fell in. So, he had the idea of putting a bunch of lit torches on it, creating a path. If he wasn't careful, he'd take fire damage, but, he could get over the pit. The monk spent 3 turns trying to prevent his friend from falling into the pit.
It was a bit of a puzzle, and it was interesting to see what each group tried.
Light or fire would make the floor solid. Give your traps a solution, and see if your players happen to try it.
You might have had a good answer in your situation, but my biggest problem with traps is a) who put it there and b) why? So if you design a dungeon built by a mage specifically to hide his secrets, that might not be a problem. But an elaborate magical trap inside a typical dungeon does need some justification, in my opinion.
@@harmless6813 I put a spell in my world, called contingency. Basically a mage will perform the spell each day, and if they die that day, certain things happen. The mage they killed was powerful enough for 2 magic pit traps and a portal to appear in his hideout. A demon eventual entered the hideout from the portal.
Later they will meet higher level mages. If the party kills them, other events and traps will appear in places they previously weren't.
Basically, these things are to prevent grave robbers from taking the belongings of the mages.
I think it was the DM Lair that created a "click" mechanic. Your players hear a click and have a limited amount of time to react to gain advantage or disadvantage on their rolls.
The whole 'one and done' nature of old traps is probably how the idea of "the back-up guy for dealing with traps is whoever has the most HP" came about
I like the idea that Perception isn't a gimme. Plus, even once you identify the existence of a trap, getting past it shouldn't be a single skill check unless it was ever only supposed to be flavor text.
I ran a small dungeon crawl once, where the place had already been sort of looted. I had corpses with poison arrows in hallways, and pits already opened up with skeletons impales on spikes at the bottom. There were very few still active traps left. But the obvious carnage in the place kept the players on their toes, and made them take every hallway as a threat. It was a pretty successful 1 shot, as judged by the level of player involvement.
You might have an illusionary pit trap with a real pit trap just past it, hidden by another illusion.
Very Grimtooth
Goes in line with a party that avoids a major battle by leaving with major image... another illusion.
Or an illusion of a hallway concealing a wall on the other-side of an obvious spike pit... Player tries to jump to the nonexistent hallway, smacks into the very real wall, drops into the pit they just jumped over..... (A lifelike forced perspective painting could work too if you want to take magic out of the equations...)
Open graves could be a fun basis for a pit trap too, as they tend to come with tombstones the enemies can try to tip over onto the player in the pit....
This is brilliant! Player jumps over "pit trap" & falls into pit trap 🤣
That is a great idea!
One of my favorite traps, as an encounter, is present an elaborate description of a door... then watch the party deliberate for the next 15 minutes on how to safely navigate the obstacle.... its just a door... and its unlocked.
I was having an issue with my group with one person trying to do everything and not letting others try things so I implemented "roleplay initiative" as a flat d20 roll instead of normal initiative that way the bard with alert isn't always first. It's really helped with puzzles and traps and I think everyone feels more engaged
I made a great trap/puzzle room combining some ideas I found online. Basically they enter the room and have the door lock behind them. Inside is a table holding multiple colored orbs. Each orb representing a different damage type. Across the way is a door with slots in it for the orbs and the right combination of orbs opens it. Have the players roll initiative and limit their action by only allowing them to insert one orb at a time or switch two orbs already slotted. The walls in the room are covered in arcane sigils. On initiative 20 the sigils activate and do damage to anyone in the room. The type of damage changes every round. The solution to the puzzle is to insert the orbs in the order of the damage types at the beginning of each round. Ie. Round 1 lightning=blue orb, round 2 fire=red orb, etc. You can change the number of orbs based on the party size and the damage each round based on party level. Give your players saving throws. Or not. Just keep in mind three things: the number of possible combinations multiplies for each additional orb added, each party member will have a turn every round to try a different combination, and most importantly all of your players will have to go through multiple rounds of damage to solve this puzzle. I used four orbs for a group of four players. They were low level (I think 2) so the damage each round was only one point and no damage on a successful save. This was just enough to scare them before they figured it out but not enough to bring them close to a tpk. My players seemed to have fun with it.
Yessss. I'm being trained in the Jedi arts by Count Dooku
Admiral Ackbar, "It's a trap!"
@@euansmith3699 "How could this happen? We're smarter than this"
for simple trap like dart or spiked fall, i use the rule of the "clic"
When i said "Clic" everyone as like 10 second irl to tell me what their caractere doesn, like pushing the one in front, jumping, dodging ... and then i tel them wats the trap do. i dont even make them role just simple RP Quick event. works really great but you dont want to abuse its use
You guys forgot the Investigation skill.
That's what a rogue would use to find a trap beforehand.
The holes in the wall? Darts.
That tiny depression in the path? Pressure plate.
That weird shadow on the ceiling? Log suspended.
Giving legendary actions to a trap is one of the coolest ideas I've ever heard. Well done gents, that is gold.
Reverse gravity. My favorite spell effect to throw out as a trap. Enchant a room with it or just certain spots on a battle map. Combine it with any standard trap to add a whole new layer of surprise. Never fails to make me laugh when I see my players reactions to me describing their character flying straight up. Just don't use it randomly. Make sure it matches the environment your players are in.
they may have seen the pit trap on the floor, BUT WHAT ABOUT THE SPIKES ON THE CEILING
Funny indoors. Deadly outside...
yes - roll for initiative in a trap setting - - and a foe potentially could appear after a few rounds to check on what happened with the trap, anyway
Last trap I used was a wide open pit. Two feet wide on one side. Something was down there, but the players only saw the loot. I explained that the floors were clean. Cube was down there.
Greed is a liability.
My favorite trap was just a door. There were three locks on it, and they needed to be unlocked in order. Failing any lock would cause the others to magically reset, and each lock also had additional, progressively more dangerous effects for failure.
Failing the first caused a Burning Hands spell to shoot out. The second spawned a Gelatinous Cube 15 feet behind whoever was picking the lock. And failing the third spawned a Rust Monster.
Besides the skill check to pick the lock, a successful Arcana or Dispel Magic check would either lower the DC to pick the lock or suppress the effect of a failure one time, so the mage and the rogue were both involved, and the fighter and paladin were busy fending off the monsters that were exclusively trying to attack the rogue.
It was an intense few rounds of initiative that involved the entire party, and all to just open a door. When they finally succeeded and ran threw, slamming it behind them, the rogue's player asked for a break to wash the sweat from her face. It was AWESOME.
So Kelly's been wearing a some C'thulhu/Octopus style t-shirts for a few weeks; is this one Azathoth?
Another fun and informative video; thanks, Dudes.
Based on its composition of spheres/bubbles, I’m gonna say it’s Yog-Sothoth rather than Azathoth.
@@johnhall3570 You are correct; evidentially, my brain strove to protect me from the true, sanity-blasting realization. For he is the key and the guardian of the gate.
@@euansmith3699 Seems you made a successful Sanity Check roll, then! 😉
There's some interesting food for thought in this video, especially regarding battlefield hazards and natural obstacles. For traps that are intentionally set in order to stop intruders, though, the way I see it is the trapmaker's goal is to either capture or kill the intruder, not just make them slowly use up spell slots healing as they progress. So, instead I run these traps as deadly puzzles. The party members just know how to notice the telltale signs that there could be some trap afoot, and they have to figure out how to get around it without setting it off, lest they trigger an alarm, get a forcecage summoned on them, or are impaled to death in a punji pit. The critical parts are A) the players at the table understand that intentional traps are deadly, and B) the GM lets the party notice small hints that there could be one without making the party rely on the binary pass/fail of a perception check. Then they become puzzles with stakes rather than a resource tax to slog through.
I like to use traps as teaching tools. When a new player is at the table -- and there is always a new player -- the first or second room will have a no-damage trap. A trap can be as simple as a trip wire connected to a brass bell. It can even be a stack of empty cans leaned against a door. Whether these simple traps get triggered or not, the players clue into how they need to start paying close attention to their environment and watch for hidden dangers.
Ah yes, the alarm traps. Where the damage comes from letting the enemies in the next area set a good ambush.
I personally use Investigation way more to trap related situations. The perception roll exists, but just to notice that something is strange or it feels off putting. For me at least, makes it way more realistic and interactive.
On the side of favorite trap, I made one for a boss fight that was the result of a wild magic surge on the place. It created areas that would randomly transport whoever stepped on it to another area inside the arena. It took the players a while to notice that the areas had a slight distorted view to it and in reality the possible exit points where the same as the possible entrance with 7 places. They needed 20 turns to finally start using it for themselves instead of wild goose chase
Random trap thought that came to my mind as I was watching: A pressure plate triggered bell. Kind of like having a doorbell. Could be used in a non-hostile person's house, just a neat way for them to know someone has arrived. Or perhaps as an alarm system for an entire dungeon so now the entire place is on alert and no enemies there can be surprised.
Or it just drops a church bell on the party.
We had something like this in my first 5E campaign, where each door we came to had an obvious string which rang one of a number of bells deeper in the hag's lair.
And we had no rogue, just the bard using thieves' tools without proficiency.
...
So the hag had about five minutes warning we were coming.
@@MonkeyJedi99 That is amazing
First of all, Thanks dungeon dudes for another fantastic video!! Secondly, I Just finished designing a trap with “random” effects. Four levers are on a wall and the players are locked in a room with 3 doors to progress. The levers must be pulled in a certain sequence to open each door successfully but pulling the levers in the wrong order may result in nothing happening or a trap to be sprung such as a gelatinous cube falls from the space in the ceiling it was sealed or a bubble of magical darkness fills the chamber and now the players must do everything blinded until the effect fades or the spend a spell slot and dispel it. I’m still working on the rest of the dungeon and some of the bad effects so it will be a few weeks before I present this but please feel free to use this idea and expand on it in any way you think fits your campaign! Your last trap video is what inspired me to make this more random and visual rather than just looking for false stones that open each door.
I was already a fan of your channel. I've been playing and DM'ing for over 25 years, and I send new and experienced players alike to your videos regularly. This was one of the most helpful concept videos you've made. Traps are so played out, and this was a nice refresher of the things that make them interesting. Even the things I was already doing but hadn't thought about the why in a long time (as much of designing had become rote over the years) were nice to hear articulated. I watch your videos while building terrain, so this video may be replayed a few times while I build miniature trap elements for my table. Thanks, dudes.
It's interesting. This is exactly how I was planning on working traps in the book I'm writing. Never played D&D before, so I'm doing my best to make things as realistic as possible while at the same time make it feel like it's something that could still happen at the table. Super appreciate all of your videos! Keep up the great work!
What I have my players do when dealing with traps... Perception check to realize that it’s there, Investigation check to figure out the trap’s mechanics, then thieves’ tools check to disarm it. I know there’s no such thing as a crit on anything but an attack roll. But if a 20 is rolled for Perception or Investigation, it provides advantage for the next step’s d20 roll. One last thing: I only allow passive checks for Perception. Once a PC begins interacting with a trap, nothing is passive anymore.
I really appreciate the time stamps that are in your descriptions!
Over 500 views and not a single dislike. Sounds about right considering the quality of the content.
Thank you for this! This is a good way to have threatening, non combat encounters if you want to have a more exploration based game, rather than social or combat heavy.
I really like your videos. I knew that when I needed ideas to make a traps session interesting, clicking on one of yours would not disappoint me and it hasn't. You guys really do have a lot of good advice for new and youngish DMs
"Trap filled pb&j"
Remind me not to let Monte cook for me 😱
Did someone say Monte Cook??
This is literally what fishing is. Hook in food trap... if my wife put a hooking my pancake I'd be done.
Currently running Out of the Abyss and, on Thursday, the party encountered the Pudding King. Diplomacy failed and out of anger and frustration, Cloudkill was cast prior to initiative. The druid immediately transformed into a tiger and blindly charged the throne. 10x10 pit trap was sprung, and with her momentum and claws successfully grasped the edge of the pit. Her hind legs were immersed into a Gelatinous Cube. Thankfully for the party, this marked the return of the beloved Glabbagool who willingly expelled the druid, further enraging the King. Pit trap gone right!
Now i just want to design an encounter that will make a player remember that they have skill with brewer's tools and realise that that is the fastest way to settle things and move on.
(Edited for grammar)
I always love the idea of the cartoon double trap.
First trap is poorly hidden enough to look like someone tried but still easy enough to spot on a check.
The second trap is the real trap and usually encountered trying to avoid the first trap.
The classic scene being the hole perfectly hideen behind the hole with poor covered branches and leaves...person jumps the first pit to find themselves falling into the second pit.
Creativity is defiantly a key part to good traps and certainly ones that are memorable.
I would use this method setting traps in a LARP I played. An obvious tripwire with an "oops it doesn't work" trap over the top of a fallen log, then a fully functional pressure plate one step beyond the log
Some of my favorite trap ideas came from Forgotten Realms novels or just glancing through the monster manual and seeing different kinds of mimic creatures and of course there's the classic 10 ft hallway with a 10 ft gelatinous cube. Shout out to season 1 of drakenheim
Mimics are bad encounters for more than once in a campaign. They teach the players to roleplay as extra cautious paranoids who meticulously stab at every door and object mentioned in the adventure. That makes for a tedious game experience for everybody.
@@lordzaboem If the players get to paranoid and do that, i'd totally start implementing time sensitive stuff or give them disadvantage on certain saving throws. Being that careful comes at a price.
As soon as you mentioned traps as combat encounters I imagined someone sets off a trap and they hear something barreling towards them as a circular hole opens up behind them. They think it's a bolder, naturally, but it's actually- and ogre! Rolling down the path. Possibly a dead one (which would then be really fun to make undead), alive and ready to fight- or perhaps for a lower difficulty- make it sickened, dazed, or injured from the fall- or extremely fierce because it's angry and hungry to go the other way.
Ooh, a hangry ogre...
I use traps to challenge the players and force them to think about a problem instead of bashing it with a hammer. Therefore I place traps in different categories than you: Damage, Detain, Delay, and Direction.
- Damage is simple. It does damage. Traps that damage tend to require vigilance and common sense to avoid. They are the kind of traps associated with player vices like greed. These kinds of traps always have a saving throw and a likely skill interaction. I would include any trap that petrifies in this category as well, as well as things that may drop hazards like green slime or yellow mold on the party.
- Detain are traps that capture. They might be nets, falling cages, pit traps with lids, etc. These are traps that the residents who made them use to capture intruders for their own nefarious purposes. Abandoned detaining traps can be a death sentence for the lone wolf player. Skill challenges to escape are always valid, so travelling in groups becomes the key to success.
- Delay traps are things that slow the party down so that the foes on the far side can benefit from extra time for whatever purpose. Stairs that become slides which reverse a party's direction, earthen ramparts that slow progress, ball bearing that trip player characters and so on serve this role. They tend to more frustrate and anger less patient players, such that they are more likely to rush through Damage traps. Teamwork and patience win the day.
- Direction traps redirect the path or intentions of the player characters. These could be hallways that change direction, teleportation traps, greased inclines or stairs that turn into ramps and spill the characters forward into something else. These traps almost always ruin the plans of a party, and will likely separate the players who tend to scout too far forward. These are tests of character planning and make the characters invent contingencies for similar problems.
Each trap tests group dynamics, individual and group ingenuity, and likely are tied to some weakness within the group. Do they communicate well or not at all? Are some members likely to run ahead an loot before others discover the chest? Do some players want to hog the spotlight and do everything? Do some act without thinking? Traps are hazards, but they're also tests. Each has a lesson. Each has a solution - for no responsible DM should ever place a trap before a group without an answer to it - and they should also be open to ingenuity that they had not considered upon designing the trap.
Players that defeat monsters may reflect at a later time about it, but those that defeat traps with new ideas and brilliance will never EVER let the DM forget it. Count on it.
Yes! (/applause)
This adds a lot of nuance to traps. Love this!
14:50 I have a table of seven players (at one time ages ago at the FLGS it was 12, but we're at my house now). I have been using "out of combat initiative" for a long time. On my initiative tracker, I use the last initiative from the last combat as their out of combat. I works for both just "OK what are you all doing as you're going down the hall" order so no one i just a wallflower out of combat, but also when terrain / non-combat encounters happen, we've already got a set order.
I may have taken a multitude of poison darts to the face and almost got eaten by a mimic last adventure,
but at least I didn't also plummet face first down the pit trap, so there might in fact be hope for me still.
So fun idea, have an arcane locked door that also has mechanically locked traps so that a knock spell will unlock the door and set off the traps
This seems like punishing the PCs for using their abilities in the ways that they are intended to be used. Are they badly overusing the knock spell?
@@lordzaboem no it just seemed like a cleaver trap
This gave me an idea of a bell tower. each time it rings, the players move across the path to avoid a monster. To prevent it from being a normal encounter, it can be really strong and heavy. When it hears them, it could break the floor under the players, allowing them to hide again, but take damage and have a harder skill check getting out
Player: man, I really like this character! He’s got good hair, good attitude, good feet, good-
Dm: (making even more traps in the dungeon) the feet are optional
The best trap I've run was the entrance to a wizard enclave, located in the face of a cliff. It was a short hallway with a statue at the end. As they approached the statue, they would be affected by Command "Flee"... Out the hallway and down the cliff. My players found ingenious ways to get closer such as using mold earth to create difficult terrain, parking a mammoth at the base of the cliff to reduce the fall to 15 feet, slippers of spider climbing or rope to negate the fall, until the old wizard remembered what the password was. ("What, you think we put a password on this?")
The Sleeping Castle, the whole castle was a trap. from molds that caused sleep to poisons, gas and other encounters that caused sleep. If a character fell asleep they were teleported to a hidden room. Causing the others to go deeper into the castle to find them. This was a good way to introduce a new NPC and a player that later joined us. The players loved it so much that they made the castle like their focus point of the main Campaign, which allowed me to expand on it. Granted it took my original Campaign in a different direction but it was more exciting and unique than the original.
I've done the religious temple trap idea trying to help the player that was the cleric shine. The players tried so hard to get her to see it was designed for her character but at the end the Rouge used UMD to fake a turn undead (3rd edition rules this was a thing) I was impressed by sad that my attempt to make that player shine failed
There were several involved in that one but getting out of the first space was a one and done to lead them to think differently for the ones that followed after. It at least successfully did that.
Distinct Encounter traps. I think I ran into a couple of those at the end of numerous Wily stages in several Megaman games. Why didn’t I think of that before.
Game design is such a big part of the DM role that often gets overlooked. Thanks dudes.
This is an awesome video! I'm a fairly new DM preparing to run a dungeon encounter full of crude traps and this has given me lots of great ideas for diversifying this and future encounters! Thanks
Player:I have dungeon delver tho
Me:I have an undying hatred of you tho
D&D 3.5e Book of Challenges has a ton of great ideas for distinct encounter style traps which can basically be pulled out and thrown into any dungeon with only a little bit of translation work to pick new monsters/skill challenges & DC's.
Great explanation for rolling initiative!
My most memorable session of D&D was trying to survive a hallway as a level 2 rogue with a level 2 ranger. That hallway was absolutely terrifying. It had an incendiary cloud trap, a reverse gravity trap, blades that came out of the walls, darts, and more esoteric things. The end of the hallway had an illusion, and there was a fear spell at the end of the hallway that would send you running back down the hallway, which was a death sentence. Most of the traps would have instantly killed us. This was in 3.5, and we checked every 5 foot by 5 foot square with the ranger's polearm before I checked it. We calculated how much experience that hallway should give once we got through it, and it was enough to reach level 5. I think there was a rule that limited XP gain to halfway through the next level, but regardless, that session stuck with me.
I hope you guys read the comments, but I really liked this video! IDK if you do alot of content like what I'll suggest, but would you be open to doing a "Let's make a trap together" example video, especially in the 3rd option situation? I would love to see how you do this in action, but that might not fit the same style of content you like to make. Either way, love the video!!! Thanks for all your work, this is awesome.
A few years back, I was playing in a 3.5 campaign, and the DM loved using nasty surprises, and it showed in the way the players chose to outfit themselves. The rogue had a suit of mithril chainmail enchanted to be both weightless and silent. The paladin had her helmet enchanted with waterbreathing after she fell off a boat.
A trap as part of a combat encounter. We were fighting a mated pair of manticores. After taking one out with a spectacular headshot, the DM made us all make reflex saves. I was dropped to negative HP by a freefalling manti-corpse.
Wow, that was very useful and enlightening. Now I cannot wait to one day try to implement that against my players
Great video, I especially enjoyed the points about monsters using traps as part of their lair defensive strategy, and the use of different skills and multiple checks to overcome the more difficult traps. Needle trap that does 5 pts poison damage is less interesting and makes less sense than a needle trap that causes 10 minutes of sleep and rings a (dinner) bell elsewhere.
I was reading The Sunken Citadel, and the difference between the kobolds area and the goblins area was bothering me. This helped me realize what: The goblins set up their territory with several traps and the kobolds did not. It seems to me that kobolds, as the LN/pack tactics/individually weaker race would likely have more traps and fortifications. The goblins should have more random mob chaos and shock troop type tactics. Tribe, what do you all think?
I always associate kobolds with traps, as it helps offset their weakness. Covered pit traps, crossbows on trip wires, bags of poisonous pollen to drop from the ceiling, a bucket of lamp oil over a slightly ajar door followed by a toppling candle, and sound alarms.
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I can see goblins being more about barriers than clever traps. A pit with spikes in it (no cover), a tree across a road to stop horses and wagons, rocks they can roll down a steep hill onto enemies.
@@MonkeyJedi99 Thanks! I reread and the kobolds have some annoying traps, but when I run it I'm adding some that specifically defend them from the neighboring goblins. You're right, the goblins are better builders, the kobolds more clever/patient/mechanical.
@@solar4planeta923 Glad to inspire a fellow DM!
Sometimes the simple ones are the best. I doubled up on a pit trap one time when my rogue was testing for traps with a pole. He triggered the net trap, figured the trap was sprung and walked right into the pit under the net.
My favorite trap encounter is in wizard of OZ. The field of poppies that put them all to sleep.
Love the content :) would've enjoyed hearing about a trap, that contained these elemtents, after talking so much about it :)
Their is one trap i used on my players that i enjoyed. It was a blade trap where when they walked within a certain area blades scythe out of the wall. And the players found a way around it by crawling underneath. Later when they were backtracking they forgot about it and the cleric went down. They have been more careful since then
Trap as an encounter is waaaay more satisfying than "roll die, find trap; roll die, disarm trap; fail roll, roll die to save; pass save, yawn, and repeat". It also cuts Bomb Squad D&D off at the pass and allows for a little more RP. You could have the trap indicated while the party is gathering information about a dungeon which makes disarming the trap as important as any setpiece.
The moat brutal traps I threw at my players was a hallway with a pressure activated chute which would slide them into a section of the sewers of the fortress they were in.
Two out of four players failed their saves and they both slid into the trapped section of the sewers. The room they were trapped in was beginning to fill with acid, and they tried to climb out with rope. The first to get on the rope was grabbed by one of two clay golems in the room posing as statues.
The rest of the party ended up voulenterally going in to try and save them.
They only had one of their party memebers go down, but it was a memorable and brutal trap.
I guess my favorite trap is one I made, in which the PC's had to cross a foggy room, and get to the other side. When doing so, they would each see fragments of their past, in a flashback. There was a Charisma save to not get pulled into the memory, which would allow a character to understand it's a vision, but they would see the vision anyway. Characters that stayed too long in the room would need to reroll this test with a lower DC, still risking forgetting reality and falling into the dream.
Once believing the dream/memory, they would have to make Con and Wis saves to avoid psychic damage, and would have to find a way out of the dream, usually through the same way the character originally got over that situation in their past.
Mechanically, it's a dumb trap. Roll to avoid getting caught, roll to avoid suffering too much damage. Walk to exit to escape. Narratively , though, it was great. We got to flesh out characters and their back stories, and what they cared about or feared. A spy master character would remember their mansion in the capital being raided during the war. A soldier would remember their time in the battlefields. An escapee drow would remember the final moments before going to the surface and being chased by their old companions. There was no way to disarm the trap, and they all had to go through it. We all had lots of fun.
Oh man, that sounds COOL!
Guys, as always, fantastic video with loads of inspirational ideas. Thanks again for all the hard work.
Backtracking successes isn't the greatest way to go, unless you're fairly certain as a DM that your party will succeed more than fail with the DCs you've set. Try "you must succeed X times before you fail Y times or Z happens." This could be revealed with a sufficient initial roll, or conveyed narratively with a loud, ominous click somewhere in the room. Up to you!
It can also be revealed with a riddle, poem or art on the wall.
"Thrice did Athenar's labors repeat, to stave off a looming and certain defeat. Once plus once is the path to the fall, and death come from all but the southernmost wall."
Have you guys heard of Talespire? Would love to ear you thoughts on it when the final version comes out! Looks like a great innovation on VTT!
I just built a map in it last night
@@immortalmonk2891 nice! What are your thoughts on it?
@@manuelmatos9100 a little buggy, (minor issues, and once requiring a restart if the game/program) but it is early access.
A little light on some content as of right now, (hope for more minis of some races).
However, updates since early access on steam have been about every week to 10 days and new content is being added regularly it seems.
I personally found it really easy to use compared to other programs online.
User interface is nice, comes with built in guides/minor tutorials.
Let's you build your own campaigns and join others. (Have yet to use any of these features yet)
All and all, I am happy with it so far, blew my gaming group's collective mind dropping my first map on them. Looks great graphically.
I have high hopes moving forward.
I really like the exhaustion idea
I designed an entire dungeon as a puzzle-trap, made with smaller puzzles and traps, each as a clue for the greater location.
uh that sounds amazing, care to leave some elaboration on the idea?
Sure, @@Skarnet1. The building is a submerged pyramid. The few rooms at the top introduce the iconography, and have two puzzle doors. (The party surprised me here, and broke one of the necessary statues, but then pulled the base of so they could "lock-pick" the mechanism. I went with it.) As the party moves further in/down, they come across doors and traps that are imblazoned with the symbols for safety and danger. Sometimes it's a floor panel, a button, or a physical object to be used with pairs of statues. The top floors also use one element per room, while the lower floors combine elements. For instance, one of the middle floor rooms contained statues (with the key objects in a different room, for a change), obvious floor plates that shoot fire when stepped on, and an easy to access door that is marked with a double danger symbol that lets in a flood of sand. (The group buried the room out of curiosity, and had to find another way.) There are some other traps that could be cleverly used, such as the whole crumbling floor tiles thing, leading to major fall damage, which could be used to safely repel to the lower floor. A few mid dungeon minibosses, that also uses the symbolism. Such as a warning picture mural, offering a (missed) hint that the mummified judge seeks out treasure stolen from the tomb. The final puzzle was rushing out of the place as it was crumbling in around them, closing off familiar paths, forcing them through the skipped puzzles, with little time to think.
Yes! More content for my TOA campaign!
Tomb of Annihilation?
You guys help me become the best dm and I can wait to spring better traps on my party
Thank you for doing these videos, Dudes, they are fun, informative and well made :D
Here's an idea: traps within a dwarvan fortress, and a dwarf is with the party. Perhaps allow that dwarf to make use of their racial Stonecunning ability to make History checks to either predict, find, or know ways on how to stop such traps, giving advantage on the rogue's checks to disarm them or completely bypassing them safely by preventing the trap from going off.
I like it.
My most beloved trap. was a bit of an social encounter :P ( with a combat time pressure)
*you enter a forgotten temple.
* you see images of rituales and traditions and myths on the walls
* one of them ( but just one of many) is a cleansing ritual before speaking to a god ( you need to wash your nape)
* a few rooms later you enter a room with a fountain in the middle. and a little behind the fountain a short stair with a door behind. and over the door the simbol of the god
* if someone atempt to climb the stair without washing their nape in the fountain before, 1d4 shadows will apear and will scram "kill the infidels"
* the shadows only attack the ones that are not washed ( and each round you add 1d4 shadows more) the shadows would not exit the room nor pursue the the PC if they try to escape.
* once there is noone in the room without ther nape unwash the shadows disapear and the door with the symbol opens :P
used thistrap with few changes over the years and EACH TIME it is amazing :P .. (i try to reflavor it for each adventure.. and my players LOVE when they see it in a new way )
My favorite trap was a pit trap with the way forward being a secret door half way down 1 wall of the pit.
Van Richten's includes new Haunted traps, which rather than being countered with Counterspell or Dispell Magic, instead only react to the use of a Channel Divinity, remove curse, or dispel evil/good.
Just a thought. Would be possible to get a trap chapter in the book of some the traps you might find in drakkenheim? ❤
There were some impressively-interwoven in the story! Avoiding spoilers... 🤓
A good thing to remember is the monster that put the trap there. Blue dragons have flat immunity to lightning damage, so electrified floor tiles protecting something they want easy access to would make sense. It doesn't matter if it triggers the trap, or even if the tiles just stay on all the time, because the tiles don't hurt it.
I love using the simple you hear a click. What do you do? You get a reaction to move in a direction, cast a reaction spell or brace yourself. If you don't answer in a moment you do nothing... Which might also work
I always try encorporating traps into my dungeons and often use agility checks for saves like "barely dodged as the spike scrapes your helmet"... i use them to get my players thinking: Like i had combat in a room full of swing out blades and spikes on a leaver and pully system and they used it to defeat a mighty Vettr Warlord *edit* ... i'm gonna add a lot of these elements into my next campain
working on a plant themed adventure with an evil druid. Wanted something like a Sarlacc Pit in it's lair but couldn't figure out how to set it up. After this video I think running this "Sarlacc" as an environmental hazard will be way more fun.
I recommend checking out the Legends & Lairs books: Traps & Treachery I and Traps & Treachery II. I have found the had been highly adaptable for dnd 3.5, and could be adapted for 5e, even if only for inspiration. In the book, they break down all the traps to a basic mechanical or magical level.
This allows me to describe in fine detail how the trap works, what it looks like, what they can and cannot see, what substances or materials they could glean from it and more.
I really enjoyed using this book to inspire me to create my own traps in such depth, and gave me additional resources to add to my own repertoire of devious devices and materials to use against my players/.
Amazing video man you guys rock. New hair killing it Kelly!
i recall i made a boss of Chrono trigger (the dragon tank) as a monster with basically the equivalent of complex traps as his skin, it was crazy neat seeing the party maim it to pieces because it felt, just like in the game, you have to destroy his pieces to reduce its offensive power to deliver the finishing blow to the steam tank.
Kobold tunnels.
Hall with pit trap with thin ledges on the side.
Small creatures, like the kobolds, can pass at half speed, but medium or creatures require half speed + dexterity(Acrobatics) check.
As player approach the edge of the pit, however, a swinging log comes down from the ceiling requiring a Dexterity(Acrobatics) check to duck under.
Any character in the path and failing the check takes bludgeoning damage and is moved 10 feet closer to the pit, generally knocking them in.
All the while, two kobolds at the far end of the hall are hunkered behind the steps down to the next room (Half cover) and firing their short bows at the party.
Once a player is past the pit, the kobolds run deeper into the tunnels to alert the warren.
My favorite trap I’ve designed was a treasure chest on a pressure plate. If the weight was disturbed, it would trigger a minor explosion (1d4 fire damage). The caveat was there was a 1hp chicken on top that was really a polymorphed T-Rex that refuses to leave the chest.
Remember, folks, good traps don't actually have to be traps at all.
Picture this: players enter a large room. The stone floor extends ten feet from the wall they entered through, after that the ground is a fine white sand, the surface of which is about an inch or two lower than the edge of the stone floor, for the next 25 or 30 feet. Beyond that is another 10 feet of stone floor and then the exit in the far wall.
That's it. There's nothing else.
The best traps are the ones that exist in your players' minds.
Just be prepared for the grr-hate once they discover that the sand is only a few inches deep. And be prepared to reward any really creative bypasses they come up with!
One thing to mention about a 10x10 foot pit trap is that any character that has at least a 10 in Strength can just perform a long jump accross it so it won't be that effective if it's in the middle of a long corridor. A more devious way of employing the simple 10x10 foot pitfall trap is to put it around a corner because a long jump requires you to move 10 feet before making the jump. Rules as written, it's just 10 feet of movement in general before jumping but I would honestly say that it needs to be in a straight line to make a jump like that unless you combine it with some kind of athletics or acrobatics check.
The three kind of traps that I love experiencing aren't at all changing the type of trap, but how you use it:
1. The Pickproof Door: most rogues would utilize their thrieves tools to disarm a trap, or to pick a door open, but knowing this can allow a rogish character like a kobold to make the mechanism or lock be the trigger for a trap.
That way, when the party relies on the rogue as not to scout out the mansion's secret entry code, and fail to notice how central the lock is, they may find themselves falling down the 30ft pit trap disguised as a porch.
2. Double Trap: especially with old ruins, I find mysself (often uselessly) vigilent for this by rolling for perception on the area surrounding a trap. What better way to utilize a tripwire trap than to install a pressure trap right where the victims will jump to? Or more naturally, for a pit trap's cover to have crumbled in some ruins giving a hit that jumping on the landing might make that stone crumble as well...
3. The False Traps: I love this idea when I think of Tucker's Kobolds as I think this would be right up their alley. Have your trap maker be proficient in pottery and pave a hallway with 50% fickle tiles, 10% pressure plates, and 1 pit trap or snare. Especially after having fallen to the porch and survived the crumbling stone, these tiles build on the group's growing gloomy uncertainty and puts them on edge, thinking there is danger everywhere. I can especially see this being used as the last kobold alive defending the dragon's keep, as it would make an alarm and need little maintenance...
Or you could even use such a hallway as a leap of faith, having them switch from perception to insight checks in order to survive.
This video is a game changer for me! Thanks guys!
The most memorable trap encounter I had was when we trying to eliminate the thieves guild in our city as they were causing more and more problems.
Every room, door and hallway was trapped and quite easy to spot but the trick was always how to get past them.
I don’t think most of them did any damage but they didn’t need to as each failed check generally required either a save to avoid alerting the guild (you try not screaming in pain if you step on a mouse trap) Or gave you disadvantage on the next check (encouraged rotating who was leading) as they steadily wore you down.
Best individual trap was a quicksand trap that a room held. Wasn’t a threat unless you failed multiple skill checks and no one helped you but each failure made you gain carrying capacity as the sand stuck to your character which would make your character overburdened and eventually immobile due to the sheer weight.