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DragonBaneDM
2009-11-30, 02:32 PM
Okay. I want your worst tricks. You're most suicide inducing puzzles. The deadliest skill challenges. The Dungeon Master's Guide cruelest traps. And the worst DM Mind Tricks you've used in your campaigns, or been victims of yourself.

If anything has brought tears to one of your player's eyes, it should be here.

The only stipulation is this: It has to not involve any, or at least very very little combat. I'm posting this thread not only for us to tell the stories of mental challenges of the past, but I'm also building an all roleplay/puzzle session for my party, and I figured some of your ideas would be invaluable, oh great Playground community.

If anyone wants to suggest any story specific stuff, Cyan Bloodbane, the trickiest Green Dragon to exist, has gone and turn a castle keep into a twisting dreamscape of nightmares come alive. They've got to navigate through his mind boggling defenses to fight the dragon himself.

But other than that, this thread is for sharing. ENJOY!

horseboy
2009-11-30, 03:18 PM
The meanest encounters are always the ones that aren't there. I know it's a bit overused in cartoons and what not, but once you've got your players paranoid enough to actually realize what they're doing and they'll jump at anything. There's a well. You know that well is just there to explain where all these kobolds are getting their water.
The players know that it's there because there's something living in it. Once they turn their backs that something is going to crawl out of there and sneak attack them all. So they throw things at it, cast all manner of spells and build elaborate plots to try and lure things that don't exist out into the open. Years later they'll still talk about stalking the killer cistern.

Mando Knight
2009-11-30, 03:25 PM
Here's two of Tycho's favorites (http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2009/10/9/).

oxybe
2009-11-30, 03:29 PM
*look up from notes*
[random player] roll spot/listen/perception
*checks notes*
...

the end

valadil
2009-11-30, 03:41 PM
It's all in the presentation. Here's one of my favorites:

Players are all laughing and having a good time while the GM looks up some rules. GM closes book, rolls some dice, looks around the table and fixates on one player.

GM, with a look of concern in his eye, "Jeffie, I need you to roll me a fort save."

Jeffie, "Why, what happened."

GM, "Jeffie, I need you to roll me a fort save."

Jeffie goes through his dice and finds his favorite 20. Everyone is dead silent at this point. We didn't know if he was hit by poison in the last fight, or we're being ambushed with a save or die spell. Natural 1. All eyes turn to the GM.

GM, "Jeffie, I need you to get me a sandwich. Turkey and swiss on rye, I'll pay when you get back."

It was one of my favorite moments in D&D. It helped that the GM was particularly talented and had a flair for the dramatic (and for sweater vests). And it didn't even happen in game.

Salz
2009-11-30, 03:44 PM
Have a room with spikes on the ceiling. When the players walk into the room have the door slam closed an an hour glass start. There is a button infront of the hour glass. If they press the button the sand magically resets and restarts.

Allowing the time to run out will open the door again.

Got it from some Paranoia site and adjusted it for this. Could be good I think.

Asbestos
2009-11-30, 03:49 PM
Have a room with spikes on the ceiling. When the players walk into the room have the door slam closed an an hour glass start. There is a button infront of the hour glass. If they press the button the sand magically resets and restarts.

Allowing the time to run out will open the door again.

Got it from some Paranoia site and adjusted it for this. Could be good I think.

I like it, but I might have the ceiling drop a few inches every time they reset the hourglass.

Hzurr
2009-11-30, 04:21 PM
I like it, but I might have the ceiling drop a few inches every time they reset the hourglass.

No, this misses the point. The point of this trap (I've seen it before with no spikes on the ceiling, and simply a countdown timer), it to exploit the paranoia of the players. The trap poses absolutely no threat, but the players won't expect that.


For added paranoia, add in 2 things: 1) make the room the source of an anti-magic field. (This freaks PCs out) and 2) rather than just have the PCs say over and over again "I push the button," give the players something physical like an egg timer or a stopwatch that they have to manually reset. The origional guy who came up with this trap had his players sitting there trying to figure out a way out of this room, manually resetting an egg timer every 20 seconds for over 2 hours before they finally gave up. If I remember correctly, once they finally gave up and let the timer run out; they physically chased the GM out of the room when he told them that the door simply opened.

Salz
2009-11-30, 04:24 PM
The idea about the egg timer is AWESOME! If I ever actually use that I will do that.

(I don't claim credit for it. Just saw it yesterday on a different forum.)


No, this misses the point. The point of this trap (I've seen it before with no spikes on the ceiling, and simply a countdown timer), it to exploit the paranoia of the players. The trap poses absolutely no threat, but the players won't expect that.


For added paranoia, add in 2 things: 1) make the room the source of an anti-magic field. (This freaks PCs out) and 2) rather than just have the PCs say over and over again "I push the button," give the players something physical like an egg timer or a stopwatch that they have to manually reset. The origional guy who came up with this trap had his players sitting there trying to figure out a way out of this room, manually resetting an egg timer every 20 seconds for over 2 hours before they finally gave up. If I remember correctly, once they finally gave up and let the timer run out; they physically chased the GM out of the room when he told them that the door simply opened.

Mando Knight
2009-11-30, 04:53 PM
No, this misses the point. The point of this trap (I've seen it before with no spikes on the ceiling, and simply a countdown timer), it to exploit the paranoia of the players. The trap poses absolutely no threat, but the players won't expect that.

But it exploits the paranoia more when the party thinks they're out of time, reset the trap, and it advances the ceiling.

The Glyphstone
2009-11-30, 05:07 PM
But it exploits the paranoia more when the party thinks they're out of time, reset the trap, and it advances the ceiling.

No, because unless it brings itself back to the top eventually, they'll get crushed, defeating the purpose of the trap (paranoia). Plus, you're swapping the cause and effect...if hitting the button moves the ceiling, the first thing they will do is not hit the button, ending your paranoia fest way too soon.

gman
2009-11-30, 05:23 PM
I once ran my party through a giant maze, hunting for a dread artifact hidden in the middle. The maze is a large set of corridors in the shape of tessalating hexagons, with rooms at the vertices, so that every room would have three entrances/exits. However, it exists on two planes (the shadowfell and the material plane). When you leave a room by turning left you travel to the shadowfell. When you turn right, you travel to the material plane. If you go back the way you came you remain on the same plane. There are no obvious differences between the planes, since we're just in a dungeon deep underground, but the rooms in each plane are subtly different so that players can eventually figure it out.

Furthermore, there are several traps and dead ends that only exist in one plane or the other. So unless you figure out how the planes are working your map won't work. A large majority of the traps are fire/water based traps that pose a high risk of destroying any maps the PCs may have been making. Finally, many of the corridors are subject to a magical effect that makes them seem shorter or longer than the really are, further hampering map-making.

The aim of all this is to stop the simple "we'll draw a map and brute force it" response to a maze, and get the players to feel like their characters are really lost.

It works particularly nicely if you set up some sort of time-pressure, curse, or other effect to prevent extended resting. Not knowing when they'll be able to get out will make the players really feel the drain on their resources from every trap or fight.

Once the players have figured it out, unleash some horrifying monster with phasing and regeneration, which the PCs can fight off but not slay (since they can retreat into the walls and come back fully healed a few minutes later), but which can only attack the PCs in the Shadowfell half of the dungeon. Then they have to use their knowledge to escape safely.

Fhaolan
2009-11-30, 05:48 PM
The best instance of the head game I pulled off was years ago when I used to specialize in classic horror-monster types of one-shot games in 1st/2nd edition AD&D.

Basically the party found itself in a small village full of interesting, yet slightly odd, NPCs. Kinda like those British small-village murder mystery stories that Miss Marple and her ilk get mixed up in. It was the season for horrible weather conditions in RL in southern Ontario, so I was having the game-weather match what was going on outside. Fog, snowstorms, hailstorms, etc.

The party decide to hunker down in the town and wait out the storms. As expected, the killing then began, starting with the local druid. It was pretty obviously a werewolf, but it was acting unlike the standard D&D monster in that it was using bestial cunning *and* intelligence. Attacking from ambush, running away when overmatched, etc. And when it killed someone, it did it with unholy relish and insane physical strength.

The party tried to figure out who the werewolf was, as they knew they'd have a higher chance of surviving when the creature was in human form. They also had a pouch of magic dust that would interefere with shapeshifting, but only enough for one use. They were running out of time, and villagers for that matter. So they gathered all the remaining villagers into the inn.

Standing above everyone on the walkway that overlooked the common room of the inn, the party had this discussion:

"I have no idea which one it is."

"How do we know it's even in here? Maybe it's someone we haven't met yet, an outsider?"

"No. It's in here. I can feel it."

"Too bad we can't just dump this dust over everyone down there."

*pause*

"They'd all change, wouldn't they?"

*pause*

"I'm fairly certain I'm not a werewolf."
"I'm not."

*pause*

"Let's be clear here; are you saying you're not certain you're not a werewolf, or that you're certain that you *are* a werewolf?"

*to DM* 'I make sure I know where the closest window is.'
'Why?'
'So I can jump through it. There's better odds in the fog, I think.'

Thomo
2009-11-30, 06:20 PM
No, because unless it brings itself back to the top eventually, they'll get crushed, defeating the purpose of the trap (paranoia). Plus, you're swapping the cause and effect...if hitting the button moves the ceiling, the first thing they will do is not hit the button, ending your paranoia fest way too soon.

What you really want to do to increase the paranoia is, once the door slams shut, have a grinding sound start (something akin to several tonne of stone grinding against each other). Every time they push the button, a click sounds and all is silent for a short period of time before the grinding noise starts again.

Unbeknown to the PC's, the grinding is actually the counterweight to the exit, but every time they flick the switch it resets. For added paranoia, have the ceiling shake a little...

Jack_Banzai
2009-12-01, 04:35 PM
One of my favorite traps (can't remember where I read it) was a room with a hundred buttons on one wall. Every time a button is pushed, each character in the room takes 1 point of damage.

People do horrendous amounts of damage to themselves, reasoning "one of these MUST do something!"

Lycan 01
2009-12-01, 06:29 PM
Last week the party fought a dragon in a dormant volcano. Everything they fought on the way to the dragon's lair was fire-based. Fire beetles, rooms full of lava, kobold slingers with fire shot, and a wyrmpriest with fire breath. So when they were going through the tunnel up to the mouth of the volcano, and snow flakes began to drift past them, they were pretty horrified. They'd been preparing for a Red dragon, not a White Dragon. Not like it made any differences, though... They didn't have much to protect them from neither. :smalltongue:


When they fought the dragon, the floor was actually a slab of volcanic rock blocking the magma from escaping. It should have broken free a long time ago, but the dragon had made two hunks of ice on either side of the room to weigh down the rock. The players realized half-way through the battle, and spent about 20 minutes arguing about breaking the ice. They thought it would kill them instantly... In fact, it would have led to the rock being blasted out of the volcano with them on it (except for the players who made a break for it, who'd have to race a wall of lava) and then dropping away, leading to an epic freefalling battle with a pissed off dragon with broken wings.

They eventually broke the rocks. :smallcool:

Belobog
2009-12-01, 06:36 PM
No, because unless it brings itself back to the top eventually, they'll get crushed, defeating the purpose of the trap (paranoia). Plus, you're swapping the cause and effect...if hitting the button moves the ceiling, the first thing they will do is not hit the button, ending your paranoia fest way too soon.

I think what he meant it that when time runs out, the ceiling raises. Since there's no immediately understandable reason for this, and it has no real effect as a trap, it would do nothing but increase paranoia as the players conjecture what happens when it hits the 'top'.

The Glyphstone
2009-12-01, 06:51 PM
I think what he meant it that when time runs out, the ceiling raises. Since there's no immediately understandable reason for this, and it has no real effect as a trap, it would do nothing but increase paranoia as the players conjecture what happens when it hits the 'top'.

Hm - if so, that makes much better sense for paranoia purposes.

Shyftir
2009-12-01, 07:23 PM
Don't neglect the classic rolling ball of doom from Indiana Jones.
Make it an illusion, anybody who gets caught by it disappears and the others have no clue what's going on. Tell the people who get caught, "I'll get back to you."
Eventually they all get caught. Then tell them they all wake up in a room that smells of sulphur, at this point they think they've died and have gone to a BAD BAD place.
Then they find out its just a gnome illusionist/alchemists' sanctum or some such.

Another one is to give them a NPC who is really greedy.
Take them through a vault full of freaky statues with huge gems for eyes. They should spend every moment getting ready to jump the NPC when he goes after the gems. Make him explore each statue thoroughly but never try to steal the gems. Make each statue of something more horrible with bigger gems for eyes. If they don't pee themselves when he starts climbing up the statue of a baalor, you aren't doing it right.

DragonBaneDM
2009-12-04, 12:52 AM
Ooo! Allow me to add something! This is an epic tier party, so no limits here! And I LOVE the idea of the non-crushing wall rooms.

BobVosh
2009-12-04, 01:06 AM
a 3x3 grid series of rooms that teleports you so you never leave. If you walk through the full series of three, you enter a 4th room. This room always has an illusion trap. All you have to do is finish walking forward. You are then out. Make the trap something horrible, so they can't just activate blah to get through.

My players spent 2 hours getting through this.

Thajocoth
2009-12-04, 01:06 AM
No words... Just random die rolls. I roll a lot of dice for no reason when PCs decide to do things.

PCs found a large heap of treasure (gold coins) with a single crown. They ID the crown as the King's. After defeating the treasure golem, which is what the pile became when they tried to take some, a member of the party did something with half the gold that was beneficial to the party's most chaotic member. This person, as part of his gesture of thanks, takes the crown and puts it on the player's head.

Me: "You put the crown on his head?"

Player: He pauses... "Y- yeah..."

Me: I roll a d20, take time to read the number... "Nothing happens"

Player: "That's sick, dude."

DragonBaneDM
2009-12-04, 01:08 AM
a 3x3 grid series of rooms that teleports you so you never leave. If you walk through the full series of three, you enter a 4th room. This room always has an illusion trap. All you have to do is finish walking forward. You are then out. Make the trap something horrible, so they can't just activate blah to get through.

My players spent 2 hours getting through this.

Could you explain this a bit more? I don't understand.

erikun
2009-12-04, 01:35 AM
How dangerous? Because the "Room of Doom" (http://www.headinjurytheater.com/article73.htm) (about halfway through) is basically an entire dungeon trying to kill you. There is also stuff like oozes or water elementals which are the size of a large lake. I once considered making a "dungeon" which was simply the insides of an enormous, several-mile wide gelatenous cube.

Probably the most original idea I had was in the Tucker's Gnomes thread from a long time ago. The idea was that a gnome had designed a castle, and had filled it with various traps. The castle had golems, and constructs, and animated objects. It also had illusions of golems and constructs, and summon traps which summoned golems, and shadow illusions which summoned partially real golems. It had Animate Objects traps which animated the furniture to attack, along with programmed illusions of furniture with attacked. Some of the doors were portals, which let to other areas of the castle. There were moving walls and illusionary walls and Walls of Force. Some rooms had subjective gravity, meaning character entering from two different directions couldn't reach each other. Other rooms rendered everything inside invisible. And then the castle had permanent invisible servants, which would reload traps, fix broken furniture, clean marks the party left behind, and carry off random objects while the party slept.

Oh, and Dimensional Anchor on the whole place, so no teleporting in or out.

Jothki
2009-12-04, 01:47 AM
No words... Just random die rolls. I roll a lot of dice for no reason when PCs decide to do things.

PCs found a large heap of treasure (gold coins) with a single crown. They ID the crown as the King's. After defeating the treasure golem, which is what the pile became when they tried to take some, a member of the party did something with half the gold that was beneficial to the party's most chaotic member. This person, as part of his gesture of thanks, takes the crown and puts it on the player's head.

Me: "You put the crown on his head?"

Player: He pauses... "Y- yeah..."

Me: I roll a d20, take time to read the number... "Nothing happens"

Player: "That's sick, dude."

Aww, no chance of the player being bathed in a halo of light, and everyone in the party realizing that he's the true heir to the throne?

Actually, that'd make for a pretty nifty cursed item. Like the helm of opposite alignment, but instead of reversing your alignment, it convinces you that you're the heir to some lost empire, and it's your duty and right to bring it back.

Thajocoth
2009-12-04, 01:52 AM
Aww, no chance of the player being bathed in a halo of light, and everyone in the party realizing that he's the true heir to the throne?

Actually, that'd make for a pretty nifty cursed item. Like the helm of opposite alignment, but instead of reversing your alignment, it convinces you that you're the heir to some lost empire, and it's your duty and right to bring it back.

Heh, actually, the King who's crown that is was in the very next room. I described him as being in his early 30s, wearing a blue regal outfit with gold trim that's mostly covered by scale armor, with a crown on his head and a battleaxe in his hands, facing away from the players.

They looked at the crown he was wearing before approaching... Identical to the one their holding. Little do they know that the copy the king's wearing is a magic item that dominates the wearer without dazing them or limiting them to at-wills or allowing the person to save from the condition.

dsmiles
2009-12-04, 05:31 AM
Another one is to give them a NPC who is really greedy.
Take them through a vault full of freaky statues with huge gems for eyes. They should spend every moment getting ready to jump the NPC when he goes after the gems. Make him explore each statue thoroughly but never try to steal the gems. Make each statue of something more horrible with bigger gems for eyes. If they don't pee themselves when he starts climbing up the statue of a baalor, you aren't doing it right.

Actually saw this in action as a player. I was palying a thief and ended up stealing the ginormous ruby eyes out of a statue of Lolth myself. Lolth was not pleased.

EDIT: Pick up a copy of Demons and Devils by Swords and Sorcery. There are some great tricks and traps in there if you're looking for something nasty. I had a party stuck on the RAS EVIL GRIN trap for about 3 hours of real time (3 days of game time).

EDIT (v2.0): Also, I have a large stamp that says "DECEASED" on it (if you've ever seen Monkeybone you know what I'm talking about). I place it on the outside of my DM screen during critical moments.

Swordguy
2009-12-04, 05:48 AM
OK, so you want something that messes with player's heads in any edition? Two words:

Tesseract Dungeon.

If you can track down a copy (or PDF) of Dragon #17 (yes, back THAT far), there's an article in there on building your own tesseract dungeons (something about "Making Meticulous Mapmakers Mad" in the title).

For those who don't know, the "simple" tesseract dungeon is a 3-dimensional construct. The easiest way to envision it is to stack a bunch of d6's in a 3x3x3 pattern. Each die represents a room, and very often each room connects to each adjoining room (not strictly necessary, but often amusing as PCs have to figure out how to get into a room directly above them). This isn't "technically" correct, but it works close enough for most people. Make sure there is only one way in and out of the entire construct. For extra Happy Fun-Time, have the cubic rooms move around, inertia-lessly (so the PCs inside don't feel them moving) on a random timetable. Watch the party mapmaker's head explode.

Great fun for a DM.

if you don't want to make your own, you can buy a semi-premade one from DriveThru RPG here (http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=65395&src=FrontPage). Or here's an image of a simple tesseract, each box being a room:
http://www.logic-alphabet.net/images/tesseract.gif


EDIT: If you want to run a "real" tesseract, instead of the 3x3x3 "cheater" dungeon, read up on Hypercubes; a 4-dimensional body in 3-dimensional space (every room connects to another room, so once you're inside the hypercube there's no non-magical way out). There's a GREAT thread about it on the Wizards Community Forum here (http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/19573430/Hypercubes_Made_Easier?num=10&pg=1). Or check this out: Making a hypercube. (http://chimera245.deviantart.com/art/Hypercube-54962701) The best part? There's a VERY old adventure which maps out Baba Yaga's hut - which is a true tesseract. So your players can't even say you're just making stuff up that D&D doesn't support to screw with them. It's already been done! :smallcool:

Guinea Anubis
2009-12-04, 07:51 AM
One I pulled on my players is a random encounter.

They came across an old women picking up sticks and making fagots (A bundle of sticks, twigs or small tree branches bound together). She looked like a witch from any fair tale (long nose with a wort and hunched over with bad teeth ext), and she asks for there help and invites them back to her spooky cabin in the middle of the deep dark woods.

When they get to her cabin she asked them if they would like an apple or some tea. Be sure to point out that she has an oven big enought that you could fit a full grown man in it. She will then insist they stay the night and will not take no for an answer. And will happen to have a room with just enought beds for them.

When the PCs go to bed for the night they will hear her in the kitchen all night making noise (banging pots, running water, humming, ext). In the moring they will find that she spent al night baking them honey bread.

TricksyAndFalse
2009-12-04, 09:25 AM
Cyan Bloodbane and his dream trap first appeared in DL10 Dragons of Dream. In that module, the primary head game was that the party became separated without realizing it. It required a lot of bookeeping, but each member of the party was accompanied by dream shades of the other party members.

Players controlled their dream shade character counterparts, and didn't know if they were playing their real character or a dream shade character at any moment. There's no need to worry about separation of knowledge between various dream shade iterations--the character knows everything his dream shade duplicates encounter in a dream-like kinda way. Each time a party finished an encounter, the action would shift to another party staring a different real PC (or, it might not, and might continue with the current real PC).

The players would probably not get a hint of what's going on until dream shade selves started dying in encounters. In the next encounter, they have a character standing around again (could be the real them, could be a dream shade that hasn't died yet) as if nothing happened. They even remember dying, but it seems like that was in a dream. The next hint comes when in a later encounter, so-and-so isn't around anymore.

As a quick example:

Three players, Alice, Bob, and Carl. They've been split up, but don't know it, because Alice is with dream-Bob-A and dream-Carl-A, Bob is with dream-Alice-B, and dream-Carl-B, etc.

In the first encounter, Alice is the real PC, but no one knows this. Dream-Bob-A dies, and dream-Carl-A keeps living.

In the second encounter, Bob is the real PC, and has his two dream-buddies with him. Alice says, 'But Bob died!' The DM says, 'That feels like it must have been a bad dream.'

In the third encounter, the DM switches back to real-Alice (he'll get to real-Carl later). Only dream-Carl-A is with Alice. They ask, 'Where's Bob?' The DM says, 'No, he died back in the first encounter, remember? That second encounter must have been a dream'.

The DM was encouraged to recap which encounters currently felt real, and which ones currently felt dream-like (the ones that currently felt real were the ones the current real PC had encountered).

Eventually, the PCs might be able to figure out what's going on, and which of them is real in any encounter (because while the continuity feels dream-like and interleaved between the real versions, each of the real versions definitely progresses in a strict continuous and chronological progression). In the original module, each real PC got a total of six encounters with their dream buddies, for six times the number of players total. Any dream buddies they could keep alive until the end got to help fight Cyan.

Another hint to what is going on is that each of the encounters can be tailored to the current real PC. There're in a dream afterall, so previous events in the characters' lives can be replayed with a twist. Characters might relive past successes, but this time the villain kills the important NPC before the heroes' eyes. They might relive past failures with no twist at all.

The last hint is good for the most clever player. In their final personal encounter, one of the dream buddies they've lost shows up again. It's really a doppleganger, though, and it tries to sabotage the PC's progress. For maximum head game, have the player of the dead dream shade play the doppleganger.

Alice: "Okay, encounters one and three are the ones that feel real. Bob died in encounter one. He wasn't there for encounter three where Carl died. I'm in encounter six now. Why is Bob standing here next to me? And why are you passing him a note? I thought I had this all figured out!"

In the final fight, Cyan also had dream duplicates of himself. The party had to face one Cyan for each of the PCs, trying to figure out which was the real one, and which of the others were just dreams.

The mechanics of the dream trap in that module always felt so cool to me. I've always wanted to use this on my players.

Guinea Anubis
2009-12-04, 09:34 AM
*snip*


Damn thats three shades of kick ass! I wish I could do that but with 7 PCs it would be way more book keeping that I want to do.

TricksyAndFalse
2009-12-04, 09:38 AM
Damn thats three shades of kick ass! I wish I could do that but with 7 PCs it would be way more book keeping that I want to do.

You could also buddy-system your PCs, maybe 2 real PCs in group 1, two real PCs in group 2, and three real PCs in group 3. It reduces the bookkeeping, though there'd still be quite a bit.

Shardan
2009-12-04, 10:05 AM
1) Reverse the usual tropes you use. Innocent, sweet, doe eyed blonde princess looking girl in pink and sparkles is the BBEG trying to convince the players to kill the paladin cursed into some horrific monster form who is the only one who actually knows what she is.

2) vertical maze (typical horrizontal maze just turned upright) with floors and ceilings that cause damage/are trapped and fill the maze with wall crawling/flying badies.

3) Seperate the characters (and players) and curse them with illusions so they see each other as monsters. Let them kill each other.

4) Epic tier version tuckers kobolds. small sized tunnels and short rooms and traps that will ravage tall people. Lots of twists and turns in the tunnels to ruin LOE and LOS but give the mobs ways to see around the corners. Ambushes when they try to rest so no resetting powers. Even hit and run ambushes to kill short rests or slowly crumbling dungeon so they HAVE to rush forward or be crushed. (sure you can rest for 5 minutes.. the room will collapse in 2 though) Not resting in 4E is probably the deadliest thing system wise.

DragonBaneDM
2009-12-04, 03:15 PM
All VERY good ideas! I really like the ghost image versions of the party, too, in fact I've wanted to do something similiar.

However, I'm trying to steer away from combat here. The only fights I want are the one with Cyan himself and DEFINATELY the one where they get seperated and then fight their own party members in monster form.

Now here's my dilemma... How do I do that without the PLAYERS knowing that they are fighting each other? This group WILL metagame. Ideas?

Thajocoth
2009-12-04, 03:50 PM
All VERY good ideas! I really like the ghost image versions of the party, too, in fact I've wanted to do something similiar.

However, I'm trying to steer away from combat here. The only fights I want are the one with Cyan himself and DEFINATELY the one where they get seperated and then fight their own party members in monster form.

Now here's my dilemma... How do I do that without the PLAYERS knowing that they are fighting each other? This group WILL metagame. Ideas?

2 rooms, 2 tables, each player's twin, and the Four Sword (to be in multiple places at once.)

Best you can do is have the party in 2 separate rooms when they're split up and simply say that they need a short rest together to play in the same room again. Then move back and forth between the two rooms. Start with things that aren't copies of the PCs.

DragonBaneDM
2009-12-04, 06:19 PM
That sounds like it would work, but is there any idea on how I could do it with them all at the same table? Never say die.

DragonBaneDM
2009-12-14, 05:55 PM
I have ONE more thing I need to figure out how to do to complete my dungeon for Cyan Bloodbane.

The final room before the second and final showdown with the draconic menace will be for each party member to undergo his worst nightmare.

No Will saves, nothing, but I want there to be something...amiss...in each nightmare. Something subtle that doesn't belong. If they pick up on it, they get out. Should I make it a common theme? Should it be individual for each player?

Basically what is the best way to run this type of challenge?

Fhaolan
2009-12-14, 06:24 PM
I have ONE more thing I need to figure out how to do to complete my dungeon for Cyan Bloodbane.

The final room before the second and final showdown with the draconic menace will be for each party member to undergo his worst nightmare.

No Will saves, nothing, but I want there to be something...amiss...in each nightmare. Something subtle that doesn't belong. If they pick up on it, they get out. Should I make it a common theme? Should it be individual for each player?

Basically what is the best way to run this type of challenge?

I'd say individual to each character (not player, there's a difference :smallsmile:)

However, to make it a bit odder, you could have the incongruity be something bleeding over from some other character's nightmare. As if the BBEG is having difficulty keeping them separate. For example, say you have four characters A, B, C, and D. A's nightmare has some oddity related to B, B's nightmare has some oddity related to C, C's nightmare has some oddity related to D, and D's nightmare has some oddity related to A.

DragonBaneDM
2009-12-17, 01:43 AM
Hm... Okay, yeah, yeah. I link them, right! I'll need to figure out some sort of reason A is linked to B and so on.

clockwork warrior
2009-12-17, 06:37 PM
this was an idea i had worked on, but never ran that i think would mess with players heads for a long time

basicly it works with the idea that in the future, they fight a villian who is capable of removing people from time and memory (in a d20 variant game there is a way to do this) so that the party fights and beats this villian, but one of there companions is removed and forgotten. this affects all time, so now, in the present where the characters are actually playing, they are short a person but dont realize why, and everywhere they go, for some reason there is more, always an extra chair, or an extra place set, or an extra ticket to something, an extra bed at the inn.

after an entire game of this, they will be incredibly confused, and probably scared, especially if npcs say things like "oh, im sorry, i could have sworn there were seven of you last time..." they will think someone is stalking them or worse...

edit: not really a trap per say, but still trippy...

DragonBaneDM
2009-12-17, 09:40 PM
Hm... If only I had TIME for that!

Unfortunately this is only one castle, more specifically, one antechamber within a castle devoted to the singular goal of recreating the character's fear.

R. Shackleford
2009-12-17, 10:13 PM
My first session:

A Legendary Heroine hires the party to escort her to the cave where her party imprisoned the soul of the BBEG. Before entering, she tells them to 'Keep running straight, no matter what.' Then, thanks to Gameplay and Storyline segregation, she leaves the party to themselves at the entrance.

The next five rooms were like a damn Saw film.

There were equal traps and rewards to obeying the instruction, but it was well worth seeing each player try to reconcile this.

I also love to casually throw in that running away from combat is an option (as a houserule we don't play with EXP, because we don't like dealing with the numbers, 'you level up when I say so'). The ensuing paranoia allows me to run occasionally unwinnable encounters, and to royally **** up the PCs, as well as having other relevant things going on during an encounter.

CarpeGuitarrem
2009-12-17, 10:20 PM
this was an idea i had worked on, but never ran that i think would mess with players heads for a long time

basicly it works with the idea that in the future, they fight a villian who is capable of removing people from time and memory (in a d20 variant game there is a way to do this) so that the party fights and beats this villian, but one of there companions is removed and forgotten. this affects all time, so now, in the present where the characters are actually playing, they are short a person but dont realize why, and everywhere they go, for some reason there is more, always an extra chair, or an extra place set, or an extra ticket to something, an extra bed at the inn.

after an entire game of this, they will be incredibly confused, and probably scared, especially if npcs say things like "oh, im sorry, i could have sworn there were seven of you last time..." they will think someone is stalking them or worse...

edit: not really a trap per say, but still trippy...
I shall have to steal this, and try and figure out how to reconcile it.

Fuzzie Fuzz
2009-12-17, 10:37 PM
These are brilliant, guys. I'm definitely taking some of these ideas. Messing with my players is definitely one of my favorite parts of DMing. (We do so much more work than the players, we've earned the liberty of confusing them. :smallwink:)

Moff Chumley
2009-12-17, 10:53 PM
I'm with you. I'm taking a break from DMing, and my character's shtick is that he's not supposed to be alive. There were prophesies foreseeing his death at an early age, his race was supposed to be wiped out years ago, and there's no logical reason for his powers. (He's the only Wild Sorcerer in the world.)

I homebrewed a PP/ED in which I get to start ignoring reality. Difficult terrain, low damage attacks, et cetera. The goal is that I eventually start pulling mind-f***s like those outlined here on the rest of the party. :smallcool:

DragonBaneDM
2009-12-18, 02:15 AM
I'm with you. I'm taking a break from DMing, and my character's shtick is that he's not supposed to be alive. There were prophesies foreseeing his death at an early age, his race was supposed to be wiped out years ago, and there's no logical reason for his powers. (He's the only Wild Sorcerer in the world.)

I homebrewed a PP/ED in which I get to start ignoring reality. Difficult terrain, low damage attacks, et cetera. The goal is that I eventually start pulling mind-f***s like those outlined here on the rest of the party. :smallcool:

So like a Parable that anyone can play? Not just wizards.

Oh, and I'm glad I started a thread that's helpful to so many people.