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Switch to Forum Live View Triggered Floor Plate Traps - Need Some Creative Suggestions/help
2 years ago  ::  Oct 16, 2011 - 10:27PM #1
bendbuddy
Date Joined: Jul 5, 2006
Posts: 312

Hi All,


I'm currently working on a new encounter for the D&D Thunderspire Labyrinth 4E module. The group is about to walk down a long hallway to the Inner Sanctum for a big battle. I want to zest it up a bit. As the DM, nothing really happens in the hallway and I feel the evil gnoll leader, Maldrick Scarmaker, would put in an obstacle. My game is 6 characters and they are level 7. The group hasn't rested in a while so I don't want the damage in the encounter to be too high.


So, here's what I'm thinking...


The hallway is filled with fog (as denoted by the module description). I wanted to add some triggered floor plate traps. The party must carefully walk and remember where the person in front of them safely stepped. This requires a lot of concentration, right? So here's where an old game I play with my daughter comes in. 


Ever play the memory game? That's where there are 36 sets of pair image cards mixed up and flipped over. You take turns flipping two cards over at a time and trying to find/remember the matches. For added fun, I will make special cards with images of the NPCs the group has encountered throughout the module. 


I was thinking every time one of my players makes two incorrect matches, it triggers a dart floor plate trap. The damage is 1d6+2. They can make a reflex save (DC 18) for half.


Here are my concerns...


- With a group of six guys playing together, will the match game be too easy? (of course, 1 person goes at a time)
- Will the game be too hard and the group ends up taking too much damage before a big fight?
- Is this idea kinda lame? I just want to try something fun and different.

Other enhancement ideas:


- The person with the most matches regains a healing surge (from a swoon of confidence)
- The person with the most HP lost, loses 2 speed for the next encounter because their feet took such a whooping from the sprung traps.


Many thanks in advance for suggestions/assistance, 


Ben
BensRPGPile.com

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2 years ago  ::  Oct 17, 2011 - 1:01PM #2
nerraDetroK
Date Joined: Jul 17, 2010
Posts: 237
First off-  That picture with your minis and dungeon tiles is Awesome!

Secondly-  A Match game puzzle could be good, but a lot depends on how much each player pays attention and how much across the table talk they'll have.   Are you going to roll for the trap on each square they enter?  Or is it just on the square they end with?
After re-reading your post- it appeas that you'll Roleplay traversing the room. 
If that's the case, then your players will most likely destroy the Match game in a few rounds.  It might be too easy.
1d6+2 doesn't seem like much, but it depends on how many missed pairs there would be.  1 character missing 4 or 5 matches could be horribly bloodied at this point.

Battleship might work, but it could also take a while.
Actually, that may work better, but let the trap reset after each person goes through. 
Here's how it'd work:

The room is 6x6 squares (or 8x8, whatever works for you), and you design a path through where certain squares are safe.  Each safe space is only adjacent to 2 other safe spaces, the one you came from and the next safe space.  Perception and Thievery and Dungeoneering could be skill checks to notice the trap and disable the trap. 
If 2 players try to cross the room, the trap springs on all squares.  Once one person safely makes it across, the trap resets, with a different pattern of safe squares.   You literally could play it out like Battleship or Minesweeper.  If the Players succeed on a HARD Thievery check, it disables the square's trap, making it a safe space no matter what.  But that space may not be next to any other safe spaces.  To keep the PC's from taking hours (game time) on disabling all the trap squares, install a time limit or something really bad happens. 

This may still take a little while in playing time, but in the end, it's a tough and hopefully memorable encounter worth at least on Level XP, if not Level +1 or 2.

Overall, you want it to be deadly enough that the players don't just run across it and try to soak the damage, but also not so easy that they escape relatively unscathed.

Good luck with it! 
I'm interested in knowing how it turns out. 
I'll likely use something like this in an upcoming dungeon for my players.
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