DwD Studios

Stuffed goblin heads are so 3rd century.

Goblin heads? SSssoooooo last edition. We've moved on to OGRE HEADS!

Ogre heads are alright for creating Maces, what with the rock hard skulls and all(and leaving the skin intact and the right enchantments get a nice Bite attack added on)...but Goblin heads still make the best enchanted Prophecy Engines. Also, Goblin heads still have the best tone when hooked up to the crystal pipes of my Doom Organ.

Has anybody tried Hobgoblin heads yet? I hear they're awesome for the Baritone chords but my suppliers keep delivering sub-standard ones with cleft foreheads and improperly preserved in weak brine...if anyone would like to arrange a trade I have several fine full Ogre skeletons and skins-i've found they make the most weather-resistant shelters! I'll throw in some nice tent plans for free if you pack them properly in Ocean salt and leave at least two vertebrae attached to the skulls for a proper mounting point. I'm easily reached by e-mail or Enchanted talking crow.

I apologize jesales-I think we diverted course from your original question...

If you know any taxidermists nearby, let them know that you'll take any medium to large skulls and humanoid arms-there are many imperfect and unsalable results during apprenticeship, and since the parts are usually ground up and added to the midden to compost you can get them for very little investment. Once you have the proper remains, have your local Whitesmith smelt some bronze or brass and give each fingertip on each hand a nice dip and a sharpening-while you're waiting, visit your local farrier for a bag of horseshoe nails, borrow some tongs and a file and perform some impromptu dentistry on any of the skulls.

Once the remains are properly prepared with nice, sharp metal talons and teeth, enchant them with the usual Animations and bury them near key areas-I recommend no deeper than three inches. Make sure to install the usual verbal or amulet-keyed failsafes, i've seen too many clients forget this crucial step and come to bad ends! If you have planned properly, any unwelcome guests should be receiving some nasty sharp talon attacks and bites-don't forget that many of your intruders will damage themselves a bit trying to dislodge your traps from their legs with melee weapons, and that the patina from the rusted metal can lead to lovely blood poisoning.The screaming and panic are lovely byproducts too..

If you require more inspiration I run a Seminar on this sort of thing every New Moon on the stroke of Midnight-notify me with a sending to the Etheric Lens and i'll give you the verbal keys to the Gateways Stone. Be warned, it's a popular seminar so be prepared to share an Altar-and bring some extra Essential Salts, we're always running low during the hands-on portion of the course!

To be honest, I'm generally cautious about over-using traps and poisons. Not because I don't believe in them, I just know that most people don't put them where they're going to go every day. For instance, take a random "Temple of Unholy Doom" filled with fanatical *insert monster or race of choice here* who are out to no good. The PC's have got to go 'Save the Day'™ for the sake of all goodly peoples. If you fill the Temple with traps and poisons and poisoned traps, you have two real problems.

1: I grant you, a certain measure of realism is going too far in a game, but a certain measure is required. How feasible is it, for the Temple dwellers to have to disarm or disable 47 traps to walk from their bedroom to the kitchen for breakfast? The 5 minute trip turns into an hour and they'll never finish their Unholy Rites™ by lunch time, let alone capture the virgin (or whatever other nefarious plan they have) by dinner. That doesn't even take into account the wear and tear on each and every trap from over-use. The dwarf slaves are moaning and groaning constantly about all the work work work work just repairing springs and sprockets.

2: THIS IS THE BIG ONE! The PC's expect it, they check every time they take a step anyway, and you're just doing damage by the dice, which is sssoooooo less satisfying than, say, having only about 4 traps in the whole place where they least expect them, and then when they've gotten tired of checking for traps and rolling every time, they just stumble through one. Of course it doesn't quite kill them, it just debilitates them really well, then the other door opens and in walks the high priest. This could be bad.

Well anyway, you get the idea...

Oh, an aside. I forgot to mention, I think the idea of poisons relatively freely available is more accurate. I had a GM one time who made any kind of poison highly illegal in every city and country of the realm. We used to tease him unmercifully about the rat problems and squirrel problems and how the mayor was going to be arrested for having Holly bushes and mistletoe in his trees. Sometimes, poison is necessary and just plain old out there.

Though Neolithicwolf is attempting to take me to town on my references to realism regarding using cost to balance platemail, I hardily agree with his realistic assessment on traps and poisons in dungeons IF they use springs and ropes and IF they use biodegradable poisons and IF the temple doesn't have a way for the dwellers to suspend the operation of multiple traps simultaneously and IF you're not interested in an Indiana Jones style temple raid. (There's a whole lot of searching going on at the beginning of the first movie.)

But really, the only thing I find grating about dungeon delves is that the thief player never gives any thought to simply springing some traps. (That and the GM doesn't simply make many traps plainly visible without dice rolls. After all, the scariest traps are the ones you can see. It means the makers aren't concerned with hiding it and are in fact seeking to discourage raiding.) Yes, some have to be disarmed, but others simply need to be triggered, and still others need simply to be beat for speed or ingenuity. It's partially the fault of the GM not to arrange for and encourage such differences and partly the players' fault for not thinking outside the trap's box. As a GM, I personally would reward such outside the box thinking more so than trying to disarm each and every trap. The thief player might occasionally hear me say "You determine that the trap is impossible to disarm because its mechanisms are on the other side of the wall, out of your reach. Physical skill will be the only way this trap can be beat."

At each trap the thief needs simply to determine if the trap has repeating mechanisms or not and if it can be sprung or not without taking damage. If it will only work once, then spring the trap. If it has repeating mechanisms, or if there is no way to trigger it without taking the damage, and if it can't be disarmed, or if nothing can be determined about it, then it will need to be beat with physical skill. In fact, some traps may be impossible to disarm, impossible to avoid and repeats, but when that's the case, there's always a way to simply turn it off with a button, switch or other mechanism somewhere.

It's true, barring sorcery most Traps do need resetting-also, most mundane Traps do degrade over time, what with damp and rot and rust. Metallic poisons stay potent over a long amount of time in the Real World, but the really potent ones such as Neurotoxins and hemotoxins tend to degrade very quickly, alas.

Now if you want to REALLY throw your players for a loop, have them enter an older, abandoned location (decades-old mansion, centuries-old temple or dungeon, etc) and have it full of rusted, jammed and harmless traps and no monsters. While the PCs are jumping at paranoid shadows-or possibly getting overconfident-spring the REAL hazards such a place might have:

Rotted and unsafe floors
Weakened support beams
Erosion from below by groundwater
Bad, stale air or pockets of non-breathable gas
Flammable gas (BOOOOM!!)
Infestation of normal but possibly venomous or diseased vermin
Freezing, rapid underground rivers
Clogged and befouled cisterns, possibly full of scavengers or leeches
Chests full of treasure-the locks aren't trapped but rusted shut and waiting to give somebody Tetanus, said chests too rotted to lift and bits of broken glass and old, decayed Potions are mixed in the coinage
Layers upon layers of undisturbed dust, ready to churn and blind, befoul and choke hapless trespassers-and if torches are involved Gods protect you(BOOM!!!)

-and at the deepest, darkest location, the heart of the remarkably trap-free but hazardous facility, our overburdened, wounded, feverish, poisoned PCS stuggle to gasp in stale air...and meet a few Undead things that don't take notice such weaknesses, moaning in appreciation of Flesh that isn't Blind Cave Fish!

Or for a more modern take-that Cultist's Hideout at the fairly-recent bungalow? It's in the swamp, and while the Cultists know where all the quicksand bogs and Gator trails are, YOU DON'T...

The Smugglers have a base in the Sewers of the city, itself built upon part of a city destroyed by a Sinkhole a century hence-then there are possible maintenance tunnels leading to an Ossuary, perhaps a back entrance to the abandoned Tin mine-are you sure that map is up to date? How much fresh water and food do you have? And does anybody know if they predicted a heavy RAIN today? Sewers tend to flood quite badly during those times, and empty into the quay...

You don't needs Traps as such to have danger, not if you feel too many fantastic Devices spoil the story. As for me and mine however, we were brought up on a steady diet of Ray Harryhausen, Roger Corman , Get Smart and Wrestling Women vs the Aztec Mummies, so I for one will retain my cunning Magic Clockwork Reloading Deathtraps and my Undead Landmines-now if only I could program a few of the intact Skeletons to finish the Humiliation Conga with a Mocking Jig...time for more Research!

You speak of setting off traps. One time in an AD&D game, we had a Barbarian player. Now I don't know if you remember AD&D barbarians, but they had an absolute outrageous but-stinking-ton of hit points. We were in a room with 4 doors, one on each wall. I think we had climbed down into it as we chased down an evil wizard. The thief determined there was a fire trap on one door and was examining the next one. The barbarian player was a teen ager and very impulsive, he said "Screw that, I'll just run through all 4 doors and then use the Heal spell on my weapon" (I don't remember what his weapon was). The GM told him ok, save for half on each door. He was kind enough to let the rest of us stand out of the way of the barbarians stupidity. I think we had to take one set of trap damage just because it was a small room. Well, make a long story considerably less long, the wizard was high level, the barbarian failed to save against at least two of the traps, and the GM rolled the damage in front of him. He used that dreaded phrase all players are scared of "I think I need more dice". The barbarian got to add up the damage himself, only to realize he had fried himself to death by about 40 points past dead. DED Dead. He was so mad, but that GM held the same philosophy I do, I seldom kill players for dice rolls (like almost never), but I'll kill one for stupid in a heart beat. I don't even think we ressurected the poor bugger. We were all pissed we had taken damage from his impatience.

At least you didn't have some Smartypants with a Ring of Animal control set off all your lovely devices with a herd of Goats, then take a nice long break for Goat Barbecue and GM mockery...and wait for the Henchmen to bring in another herd of course. :(

By the way, did you know that goats can't read? Too bad about that one small room with the Explosive Runes that need to be READ to trigger the effect, yes? And that lovely, lovely Roasted Goat Bouquet the party left all over the place TRIPLED the Wandering Monster checks, funny how that turns out... :D

You don't need my brain Ascent-you need my Player's brains for a whetstone! And after awhile with my players you need a nice, reinforced wall to beat your head against. Use a stud-finder so you don't put any unsightly holes in the board...

Come to think of it, I recently recalled a Warhammer Fantasy RPG campaign I ran last year-

http://dwdstudios.com/node/998

(shudder)

-and it was FULL of traps, all player made. I BURNED MY NOTES afterwards but a few of my mad band still had theirs, in, er, loving detail I may add. Here's a few if your adventures ever swerve into SAW territory:

THE RELAXATION CHAIR- a large, comfy overstuffed chair made of sturdy Oak and stuffed, stain-proof oilskin upholstry. The patron would relax from his or her labors, lulled by the smells of fresh pastry and meat and the pleasant singing of the cooks...if his or her head began to droop a helpful halfling chef would adjust the pilows....
And if the Patron was alone, then a simple lever activated the powerful springs which drove twin Poniards into each kidney. The same spring clamped the pillow across the face, smothering any noise and suffocating the prey if it still lived...any juicy goodness resulting was caught in the cushions and channeled into the base for soup stock. The CHAIR was on casters and parked next to the dumbwaiter-the body was gone from view in seconds...PIE TIME!

THE THERAPY BED- It was well known that one of the Halfling chefs was a Medical Apprentice (a carefully-forged document for the Halfling Hypnotist said so!) and so those who suffered pulled muscles, sprains would be invited to try the BED, a long, low table in the back room with boiled leather padding and spaces below for heated rocks from the ovens. The 'patient' would be gently restrained facedown with plenty of support, lovely oils and butters would be rubbed into the back and legs to ease the tension while the soothing voice of the Hypnotist made the pain go away amid the soothing warmth of the stones.The door would be locked for peaceful privacy...
Then the press of a button would send twin spikes deep into the victim's eyes and into the brain. On a busy day a cover would be lowered and hot stones would be cycled in every hour for some slow roasted goodness-on a quiet day the table would be tilted towards a handy barrel, and the juicy goodness would soon be joined by well-carved joints...SOUP'S ON!

THE ESCAPE TUNNEL Part A- Just in case of discovery, our Halfling entepreneurs made one of the service tunnels to the pantries into insurance. Our 'Heroes' could conduct business with no danger whatsoever, knowing that the spiderweb of sharp Cheese Wires was over a full foot above their heads. If chased however, Dwarves would get a nasty haircut and Humans/Elves would quite literally lose their Wits-at the neck.

THE ESCAPE TUNNEL Part B- Part of the Pantry had been redecorated in hardwood tiles. A cunning Halfling would skip across the Ash tiles to reach the security of the next room. Ignorant pursuers hover (likely on hands and knees after Part A) would probably hit the Maple tiles as well. THOSE tiles were sawed nearly in half, and the subfloor below had rusty bits of scrap metal pounded into them, leading to painful, tetanus-laden delays as hands, feet, knees and elbows were lacerated.

THE LAST RESORT- At the end of the pantry was a former Cloakroom. This room was full of whatever flour had gone 'off' during storage. A clever escapee gently crossed the five-foot room, churning flour dust into the air, then locking the door behind him...and lighting the fuse.

THE ESCAPE PODS- Five (one for each and a spare) human-sized oak barrels, lined with oilskin padding and sealed with extra tar. A lead plate ensured that the Pod would bob end down, the other end had holes drilled in for air and could be latched from the inside. Sewn into the padding of each pod was a carefully-hoarded pouch of Traveling Funds. Insert Halfling criminal, a push into the river and FREEEDOOOMMM!!!!!

My players scare me sometimes....but enjoy the Traps!

Hmmmmm-you know, it just occured to me that I might have a decent mini-adventure for BareBones Fantasy in the making here-do you think the world of Keranak is big enough-and strange enough-to contain four Mad Halfling Cooks and The Best Pies in Town? And do I dare unleash it on a helpless Gaming environment?

(scribbles)
(mild attack of PTSD)
(scribbles)

Yes, I do.
Along with dwarven beard braiders.

Ending in a series of covert Guerilla Actions between the Dwarven Beard Braiders and the Halfling Chefs and then possibly-an Alliance!

Enter the PCs wondering why a bunch of Short refugees from Gangs of New York are circling them and humming Sondheim under their breaths....

I think I got my Warhammer mixed with your BareBones-sorry!