Traps?

[Little Brother]

Is it possible to make them practical in combat? The PCs are going to hunt down a group of enemies on the lamb, and one of their targets is a brilliant engineer, who was responsible for what is effectively a non-sentient Heterodyne Castle, and so the idea is I want him to make a basic camp(as in a few tents in a clearing with a fire and an Alarm) into an effective defensive location in five minutes, or a passable in one or two. Rune spells are okay, but I was thinking like having some in a bag of holding, and pulling out and setting them up. How about fortifications? This is for a low-level party, for reference, so no super-items they could conceivably get their grubs on?

Is this possible? Thanks for any input.

[Flickerdart]

The rules on traps remain curiously silent about the actions necessary to install a trap once it has been crafted. If you rule that deploying a ready-made trap is some sort of full-round action, this is plausible, and in fact easier than making stationary traps since the Search and Disable DCs don't need to be very high at all. However, low level traps are not very impressive and really quite expensive - if the party just lets the guy run away and loots his traps, they will have made quite a fortune.

Or you can just spread green slime everywhere, cover it with branches and laugh when the PCs step in and eat Constitution damage.

[Fenryr]

Caltrops? A hidden pit fall? A concealed bear trap?

Booby traps in the Trapsmith section in Dungeonscape may help.