Another proposal re floor traps

[Therem Harth]

- Make all traps visible by default when lit, by calling pick_trap() at the end of place_trap()
- Make traps deadlier, especially at high levels
- Get rid of trap detection spells and items
- Get rid of disarming spells
- Make disarming items rarer and more expensive

IMO this would allow traps to be made much more interesting as a game mechanic.

(FWIW I'm trying out something like this in branch of my ToME clone repo on Gitorious. Currently it just has the first change, and ToME traps already cover the second pretty well, but there might be other changes in the works.)

[Patashu]

But then you have to add
- Disable tunneling from unlimited sources
Or now the solution to deadly, tough to disarm traps is 'tunnel around them'

[Derakon]

Or tunneling should be made more difficult (or otherwise have significant tradeoffs), so that you can't always afford to just dig around every trap you find.

Part of the problem with traps is that they often aren't placed sensibly, while in vaults (where they cannot be avoided) they're often spammed excessively. Vault trap placements + deadly, un-disarmable traps makes vaults painful.

Though, if you're going to go to the effort to change trap effects to be more deadly, going to the effort of modifying vault layouts wouldn't be an unreasonable secondary task.

[Timo Pietilä]

Or tunneling should be made more difficult (or otherwise have significant tradeoffs), so that you can't always afford to just dig around every trap you find.

Tunneling wakes up everything just like aggravation? After all banging granite wall should make quite a lot of noise. Don't know if that should apply to stone to mud spell though.

[Mikko Lehtinen]

Interesting! Here's what I'm playtesting, with good results:

Traps are only found in:

1) Rooms with closets in walls. Closets have treasure, so there's an incentive to spend time in the trapped room.
2) Vaults.
3) Around trap-setting monsters (if they are around when the level is generated).

You only get one Perception check to find a trap!

Also, you may only try to disarm a trap once! If it fails, subsequent tries tell you that "You have no idea how to disarm the trap."

Magical effects to disarm or detect traps are rare. They do exist as scrolls and staves -- you need to invest money and inventory space, if you want to be prepared.

Traps in Fay can be quite nasty.

[Therem Harth]

That's also interesting. A bit different from what I'm thinking of, but I can see its good points.

Invisible traps are powerful good flavor. OTOH, instakill traps are terrible for gameplay; and since your character is supposed to become a fairly skilled adventurer at some point, I think it's reasonable to assume that (s)he usually knows a trap when (s)he sees one.

I think the biggest flavor problem is posed by magical traps. Speaking in-universe, the fancy rune concealed in a narrow corridor under a pile of rubble might not be very noticeable until it sets you on fire.

[Mikko Lehtinen]

I've found that being killed by a summoning trap is much more fun when you know beforehand that the room is heavily trapped... And when you've made a conscious choice that carrying a pile of Scrolls of Protection from Traps wasn't worth it.

Making Perception skill more important also helps to differentiate races and classes. Grippli Rangers with high Wisdom aren't likely to be killed by traps.

IMO if the trap finding aspect of Perception was removed from the game, it might be a good idea to remove Perception skill altogether, and maybe invent a new useful skill to replace it.

I think the biggest flavor problem is posed by magical traps. Speaking in-universe, the fancy rune concealed in a narrow corridor under a pile of rubble might not be very noticeable until it sets you on fire.

Warding runes in walls that shoot evil rays to all cardinal directions might work better flavour-wise?

[Mikko Lehtinen]

I agree that instakilling traps are not fun.

I also think that traps that only cause some damage or distract you for a while are boring. They only matter if you step in the trap when there are dangerous mosters nearby. Usually these traps are pointless and just slow down the game.

IMO the best traps are ones that cause some kind of semi-permanent harm: destroy equipment, damage abilities, drain experience, curse equipment, etc. With traps like these, trap detection skills and equipment are very useful but not necessary.

[LostTemplar]

I agree that instakilling traps are not fun.

I also think that traps that only cause some damage or distract you for a while are boring.

There is a feature in angband, and all of it's variants, that anything, that does not kill in one turn does no harm due to escapes, one turn heal all hp, etc. It can be fixed, e.g. drain stats permanently, drain levels permanently, destroy equipment etc. traps may be added, so they are not deadly but harmfull.

[Derakon]

Some random thoughts:

* A trap that clears out walls in the area. The player likes to fight in confined spaces? Remove 'em. Combine that with summoning, possibly.

* Similarly, transmute walls into doors. This is possibly a bit wacky for Angband's flavor, though.

* Sound an alarm that quadruples monster spawn rates for the remainder of the dungeon level. If you want to keep exploring, be prepared to fight.

* Wake up the entire dungeon level. Possibly, deeper versions of the trap could also haste everything on the level.

Stuff that would be more feasible with some form of scripting:

* Summon an otherwise-normal monster with a special flag that causes it to clone and heal every N turns; the player has to take the monster out before that happens or risk it overrunning the level. Sort of like a breeder on steroids, except that this could be any non-unique monster type (self-replicating Archliches!).

* Teleport the player to an arena with an out-of-depth monster who has a guaranteed nice drop -- but leaving the arena forfeits the match.

[Mikko Lehtinen]

I'm going to have a trap that turns the player into a goblin or some other suboptimal monster species until he leaves the current dungeon level...

There's much design space for traps effects with long duration. Unfortunately "until you leave this dungeon level" duration works much better in Fay than most other variants.

[Therem Harth]

* Summon an otherwise-normal monster with a special flag that causes it to clone and heal every N turns; the player has to take the monster out before that happens or risk it overrunning the level. Sort of like a breeder on steroids, except that this could be any non-unique monster type (self-replicating Archliches!).

This idea is so monumentally great you could base a whole variant off of it. It'd be brutal at high levels though. Can you imagine a level overrun with replicating Qs?

(I'll admit I also like it because of the "greed kills" aspect. A player could attempt to farm such traps, but at the significant risk of getting overwhelmed!)

* Teleport the player to an arena with an out-of-depth monster who has a guaranteed nice drop -- but leaving the arena forfeits the match.

This feels more like a quest or special level thing - Morgoth sending a favored servant to kill your character, as per the Evil Overlord laundry list.

[Timo Pietilä]

Stuff that would be more feasible with some form of scripting:

* Summon an otherwise-normal monster with a special flag that causes it to clone and heal every N turns; the player has to take the monster out before that happens or risk it overrunning the level. Sort of like a breeder on steroids, except that this could be any non-unique monster type (self-replicating Archliches!).

I think that is too easy to abuse. You might actually want to have something that drops good items while not being dangerous as is. Can be horrendous if you accidentally trigger it, but if you know what it is before triggering too easy.

Which brings to my mind, one thing that made teleport/summon trap in older versions a bit more interesting was that you didn't know which one it is. How about making "magical" traps indistinguishable from each other? Pits with spikes, gas traps and arrow traps are more or less mechanical, but when you find a rune you might not be able to tell what does it do.

Then magical trap arsenal could be extended to pretty much any monster spell game has. Time trap anyone? Nether bolt? Darkness storm? Disenchantment?

Maybe separate trigger and source? put one magical trigger in one place and 1d5 traps in LoS of that trigger? Can jump all day above the trap without triggering it, but step onto trigger and all of them activate.

[Mikko Lehtinen]

Which brings to my mind, one thing that made teleport/summon trap in older versions a bit more interesting was that you didn't know which one it is. How about making "magical" traps indistinguishable from each other?

In Ey and Fay, only thieves know the exact trap type, and other classes can see only the general type, like "magic rune" or "gas trap".

[buzzkill]

I think that is too easy to abuse.

You could always throw in a evil mutation every x generations.

How about a trap that summons self-cloning, sentient, slow moving trap doors. The character must either manically (and perfectly) disarm or be forced off the level. Feel free to replace 'trap door' with chasm or void and have the dungeon level slowly collapse, taking the player with it.