[RPG] How to design traps or dungeon rooms for a party with remote manipulation abilities

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The party that I'm DMing for has access to a lot of remote manipulation abilities, such as mage hand, telekinesis, and familiars. Because they are smart characters and smart players, they have used these abilities to defeat a wide variety of classic traps and trap triggers.

For example, mage hand is easily able to remotely disable tripwires. A few extra rounds of telekinesis is enough to disable most pressure plates. A disposable familiar can easily scout out a new area, and summoned creatures can be used to tank otherwise unavoidable damage. All of these abilities can be used from a safe distance, or at least far enough away that it's hard to predict where the "real" target will be standing.

I don't plan to completely remove such traps–they still require good gameplay and table engagement, and can still be rewarding to defeat. I'm also aware that some of these solutions consume resources.

However, I find that the process is becoming a bit predictable and rote: players encounter something, back up to a safe distance, and then fiddle with it for a while until they're sure that it's safe.

I would like to mix it up a bit and design traps and encounters that are immune to this kind of remote manipulation. I'd like to try to come up with an encounter or trap that can't be defeated by fiddling with it from a distance. Unfortunately, I'm not sure how to do this.

How have you designed traps that force your players to deal with it up close (or at least within vulnerable range)? How did they work in practice?

Best Answer

It sounds like you're over-using the 'hits the guy who triggers the trap, no reset' variety of trap. There are a lot of other, more exciting traps you and your players may find interesting:

'does something insidious but not immediately apparent, no reset'

  • When the players press this pressure plate, the ceiling of the entrance corridor to the dungeon seals shut, trapping the players inside. It will not reopen for 3 weeks, and if more than 10% of the stone is excavated it will not reopen at all. Hope your party brought supplies!
  • 10 minutes after this ward is breached, this section of the dungeon begins filling with (choose one: water, sand), which pours in via a mystic portal to the Plane of (Water, Fire). The substance continues to pour in until the body of material reaches the vaulted ceiling of this room, blocking access to the portal and causing it to shut off. If the material is somehow diverted, the portal closes 10 minutes after activating. The portal can transport up to 3 10' cubes worth of material per round.
  • Once this tripwire is triggered, an alarm is triggered far off in area 3, alerting the bugbears to the presence of intruders and allowing them to rouse their companions and prepare an ambush.

'does something obvious, but resets and continues to pose a potential threat'

  • This pressure plate triggers an arrow trap that fires down the corridor. The arrow trap is set to automatically reset each round, and holds a reservoir of 500 arrows (worth 12.5 gp if the party empties the container by triggering it and salvages the arrows). If the hobgoblins fight in this hallway, they attempt to form lines so the PCs closing with them will be forced to trigger the arrow trap.
  • This door is infested with Ear Seekers. Anyone touching the door transfers one of the foul creatures to their clothing on a failed reflex save (90% chance if the infestation is unnoticed by the party), and anyone attempting to listen at it is automatically affected.
  • When the ward is breached, the warded area appears to fill with whirling darkness and a piercing shriek can be heard. Under the cover of darkness, a set of scything blade traps attack everything within 10' of the center of the room. The darkness and shrieking is illusory, but the scything blades are real. The blades retract as soon as the room is unoccupied, at which point the darkness appears to drain back as if through a portal. The wards trigger again if any creature again enters the room.

'does something insidious, continues to pose a hazard'

  • This "pressure plate" is actually a rather intelligent mimic sitting in a floor cache that contains the level used to open the secret door to area 4. If the party presses the plate remotely or appears too difficult a fight, the mimic pulls the lever and opens the door. If the party appears weak, a single character attempts to pass through on their own, or the party has brought pack animals, the mimic attacks, first using its control of the secret door to isolate its victim or victims from help.
  • This bookshelf contains a translated copy of the ancient play 'The King in Yellow'. Any character reading the first act of the play finds it quite mundane but vaguely unsettling, but anyone reading even a word of the second act feels compelled to ensure the play is performed. This functions as a Suggestion spell cast with a 9th level slot except that it is a 9th level effect, functions even on creatures incapable of being charmed (though they possess advantage on the saving throw), lasts until the creature witnesses a full performance of the play, and can be removed only by Wish, Greater Restoration, Heal, or Dispel Evil and Good cast with the additional verbal component of the long-lost name of the eponymous king, thrice spoken. Warlocks with the Thought Shield feature are immune to the book's effects

Lastly, you can always use traps that hit someone other than the person triggering them, for example casting fireball or filling an area with toxic gas or otherwise generating an area effect, but that isn't terribly much different from what it sounds like you are doing now, and will just lead to players standing a little farther.

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