When are you within 10 feet of a trap?


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Silver Crusade Contributor

Ckorik wrote:
DM_Blake wrote:


Oh really? As opposed to all the millions of trap builders throughout all the centuries in which Golarion has had traps, magic, and trap builders, the only one, the ONLY ONE who knows what he is doing is the ONE guy who builds traps like RavingDork suggested?

Just saying - I have come across one like the symbol (party is teleported into a room with a symbol trap - activation is line of sight - does the rogue get a chance to deactivate it?) and I'm pretty sure I've seen at least one other that was like the hypotheticals used.

Both were very high level material, and for the life of me I can't recall the exact book they were in (different books) - but they stood out because they were among the highest DC traps I'd seen in Pathfinder. Again not every trap out there would be like this - simply because an effective trap is usually something you know how to avoid yourself, otherwise you run the risk of activating it. I do think it's OK to think about the rules and how traps interact, and I think it's ok to have a bit of variety as well.

The teleport/symbol one is from

Curse of the Crimson Throne:
Escape From Old Korvosa, in the Arkonas' Vivified Labyrinth.

Trap Spotter gives you an active check passively.

It was made to stop people doing move 5' check for traps.

You get within 10', and yo uahve trap spotter you get "an immediate perception check to NOTICE the trap".

I capitalized NOTICE because it does not say SPOT the trap it says notice. So SIGHT is not required. You could hear the slight change in the sound of your footsteps as you get close to a pressure plate. You could smell the magic in the air of the subtle alarm spell.

You come within 10' you get an ACTIVE perception roll for free. You may not know you had that roll (if you fail) but you get an ACTIVE perception roll free.


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As a general rule, GM's that routinely neutralize character abilities are pricks. Every once in a while is okay, but when you make people feel, "Why did I bother choosing that?", you're doing it wrong.


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
B. A. Robards-Debardot wrote:


PRD on Abjuration wrote:


If one abjuration spell is active within 10 feet of another for 24 hours or more, the magical fields interfere with each other and create barely visible energy fluctuations. The DC to find such spells with the Perception skill drops by 4.

Which is a nice thing to remember when building magical traps.

My parting thought before I go to bed is that we're probably not rolling enough reactive perception checks.

So to find a trap via abjurant fluctuation is equal to the trap's spot DC, and if there are more than one abjurations in close proximity, that spot DC drops by 4. Good to know!

That explains quite a lot! (Wheres before people didn't know why that abjuration rules even existed, we may finally now have an answer!)

Philo Pharynx wrote:
As a general rule, GM's that routinely neutralize character abilities are pricks.

Yep.


Philo Pharynx wrote:

As a general rule, GM's that routinely neutralize character abilities are pricks. Every once in a while is okay, but when you make people feel, "Why did I bother choosing that?", you're doing it wrong.

Right - out of dozens upon dozens of adventures I've read through (published by Paizo) I honestly can only remember two that seemed impossible to rule the rogue could disarm it before it went off. That's out of dozens and dozens of traps - I honestly cringe at the kind of history people must have with GM's that make them think the GM is out to screw them over all the time. When I'm running the game I want my players to feel badass - it's a tight rope to walk sometimes, ensuring that stuff isn't a walk through the park but fair. The entire point of the story is at the end, to have the players be big heroes and at the same time not make them feel like we could have skipped to the end and gone out for pizza.

Community & Digital Content Director

Removed some personally abusive posts.


An undetectable trap is Cr+3.

EDIT: Its actually Cr+2 since you can then lower the Disable Device check to DC15 since the players have no chance of finding the trap anyways.


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Chris Lambertz wrote:
Removed some personally abusive posts.

Awwww, shucks. I always hate to see these posts. Now I feel like I missed the best part of this thread...


DM_Blake wrote:
Chris Lambertz wrote:
Removed some personally abusive posts.
Awwww, shucks. I always hate to see these posts. Now I feel like I missed the best part of this thread...

I could be mistaken, but I think one of the posts removed was actually made by you - in that sense you didn't really miss anything. :)


Aha! You're so right!

I had no idea it was mine. This is the first time in nearly 6,000 posts that I'm aware of having a post of mine removed. In fact, I've posted more scathing things in other threads that were just fine. Oh well. I truly didn't think my first post in this thread crossed any lines, but alas, it seemed it did. Maybe it was because I quoted the other deleted post, even though mine came around to defend the OP?

Aw well, if I offended anyone then I'm sorry for that.

So I guess I didn't miss much after all.


DM_Blake wrote:

Aha! You're so right!

I had no idea it was mine. This is the first time in nearly 6,000 posts that I'm aware of having a post of mine removed. In fact, I've posted more scathing things in other threads that were just fine. Oh well. I truly didn't think my first post in this thread crossed any lines, but alas, it seemed it did. Maybe it was because I quoted the other deleted post, even though mine came around to defend the OP?

Aw well, if I offended anyone then I'm sorry for that.

So I guess I didn't miss much after all.

Probably the latter. Quoting posts get removed along with the offending one.


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Off-topic commentary on the post removal system:
It's been suggested earlier that problematic posts could be edited to highlight that they were found problematic (as an example the OotS-forum replaces the text in the offending post with SCRUBBED in giant red letters) or that the author of a problematic post receives an automated message that his post was removed. It can be hard to realize you're breaking the message board guidelines when the admins quietly clean up after you instead of pointing out that there was a problem and ideally also what the problem was, or for that matter knowing if your post was found offensive or simply caught in the chain reaction since they also delete everything that quoted the original post.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Avatar-1 wrote:

If there's no pressure plate (or something mechanically similar) as a trigger, and it's just a "magic proximity" trigger (or similar) then trap spotter just doesn't go off. There's nothing there to spot.

It'd be a different story if the rogue actively used detect magic, I guess - that kind of thing would warrant giving the trap spotter what he needs to know; moreso than just a regular casting of detect magic without trap spotter, if possible.

Remember that Trap Spotter isn't meant to be all-powerful vs spotting traps. It's not impossible for there to be some edge cases.

Detect Magic would be of no use as the trap and it's magic are still out of sight until the rogue steps into the trap's sensing area, thus triggering the trap.

Again, I would specify that this would have to be built as an expensive magical trap. Technically this would not even be classified as a trap, but an unavoidable Hazard.


LazarX wrote:
Avatar-1 wrote:

If there's no pressure plate (or something mechanically similar) as a trigger, and it's just a "magic proximity" trigger (or similar) then trap spotter just doesn't go off. There's nothing there to spot.

It'd be a different story if the rogue actively used detect magic, I guess - that kind of thing would warrant giving the trap spotter what he needs to know; moreso than just a regular casting of detect magic without trap spotter, if possible.

Remember that Trap Spotter isn't meant to be all-powerful vs spotting traps. It's not impossible for there to be some edge cases.

Detect Magic would be of no use as the trap and it's magic are still out of sight until the rogue steps into the trap's sensing area, thus triggering the trap.

But that's the basic question isn't it? Can the searcher (or detect magic) spot the detection area or just the sensor itself?

It's easy enough to handwave the "trap goes off when someone is within 10'" as a magical field that can itself be detected.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
thejeff wrote:
LazarX wrote:
Avatar-1 wrote:

If there's no pressure plate (or something mechanically similar) as a trigger, and it's just a "magic proximity" trigger (or similar) then trap spotter just doesn't go off. There's nothing there to spot.

It'd be a different story if the rogue actively used detect magic, I guess - that kind of thing would warrant giving the trap spotter what he needs to know; moreso than just a regular casting of detect magic without trap spotter, if possible.

Remember that Trap Spotter isn't meant to be all-powerful vs spotting traps. It's not impossible for there to be some edge cases.

Detect Magic would be of no use as the trap and it's magic are still out of sight until the rogue steps into the trap's sensing area, thus triggering the trap.

But that's the basic question isn't it? Can the searcher (or detect magic) spot the detection area or just the sensor itself?

It's easy enough to handwave the "trap goes off when someone is within 10'" as a magical field that can itself be detected.

here's the thing.. it's not a magical field as there is nothing at that spot. Dork's trap is a trap around the corner that's passively sensing what's in the straight line in front of it.

That said, as it's built, the trap springs on friend and foe alike. If there is however a hidden catch just before that corner that those in the know can use to bypass it, then normal trap spotting rules apply to find it.


LazarX wrote:
thejeff wrote:
LazarX wrote:
Avatar-1 wrote:

If there's no pressure plate (or something mechanically similar) as a trigger, and it's just a "magic proximity" trigger (or similar) then trap spotter just doesn't go off. There's nothing there to spot.

It'd be a different story if the rogue actively used detect magic, I guess - that kind of thing would warrant giving the trap spotter what he needs to know; moreso than just a regular casting of detect magic without trap spotter, if possible.

Remember that Trap Spotter isn't meant to be all-powerful vs spotting traps. It's not impossible for there to be some edge cases.

Detect Magic would be of no use as the trap and it's magic are still out of sight until the rogue steps into the trap's sensing area, thus triggering the trap.

But that's the basic question isn't it? Can the searcher (or detect magic) spot the detection area or just the sensor itself?

It's easy enough to handwave the "trap goes off when someone is within 10'" as a magical field that can itself be detected.

here's the thing.. it's not a magical field as there is nothing at that spot. Dork's trap is a trap around the corner that's passively sensing what's in the straight line in front of it.

That said, as it's built, the trap springs on friend and foe alike. If there is however a hidden catch just before that corner that those in the know can use to bypass it, then normal trap spotting rules apply to find it.

Is it? The original description was "A magical trap at the far end of the hallway detects your presence".

That doesn't say anything about "passively sensing" or about how it detects the presence. Why doesn't "magical field" fit just as well, especially as it lets the actual Perception and Disable rules work?

Scarab Sages

LazarX wrote:
thejeff wrote:
LazarX wrote:
Avatar-1 wrote:

If there's no pressure plate (or something mechanically similar) as a trigger, and it's just a "magic proximity" trigger (or similar) then trap spotter just doesn't go off. There's nothing there to spot.

It'd be a different story if the rogue actively used detect magic, I guess - that kind of thing would warrant giving the trap spotter what he needs to know; moreso than just a regular casting of detect magic without trap spotter, if possible.

Remember that Trap Spotter isn't meant to be all-powerful vs spotting traps. It's not impossible for there to be some edge cases.

Detect Magic would be of no use as the trap and it's magic are still out of sight until the rogue steps into the trap's sensing area, thus triggering the trap.

But that's the basic question isn't it? Can the searcher (or detect magic) spot the detection area or just the sensor itself?

It's easy enough to handwave the "trap goes off when someone is within 10'" as a magical field that can itself be detected.

here's the thing.. it's not a magical field as there is nothing at that spot. Dork's trap is a trap around the corner that's passively sensing what's in the straight line in front of it.

That said, as it's built, the trap springs on friend and foe alike. If there is however a hidden catch just before that corner that those in the know can use to bypass it, then normal trap spotting rules apply to find it.

If you're building this sort of unavoidable hazard trap, with a perceiving (sound, vision) (as opposed to a proximity trigger), you do need to roll perception checks for the trap to detect its target(s).

Your spells are limited to:
Clairaudience - +15 Perception checks to hear, limited to a specific area 10 ft in radius around sensor
Clairvoyance - +15 Perception checks to see, limited to a specific area 10 ft in radius around sensor
Arcane Eye - +20 Perception to see, Line of sight, distance limited by normal perception check penalties
True seeing - +30 Perception to see, Line of sight, maximum of 120 ft.

Only true seeing can see in the dark. Clairvoyance and Arcane Eye triggered traps will need a casting of darkvision to see in the dark (up to 60 ft). Do note, that you don't get Clairvoyance's basic 10 ft radius of sight. You can also fool any of these by winning an opposed stealth check. Invisibility and magical darkness would work against Clairvoyance and Arcane Eye.

If someone uses non-detection, may be able to bypass all of these, assuming the spell fails it's CL check.

Because of the Clairaudience/Clairvoyance spell creating a sensor that's only has a 10 radius (from a grid intersection), the rogue should get their trap spotter check to detect the trap with their trapfinding bonuses. Additionally, everyone who approaches should get a reactive perception check (DC 23) to locate the sensor, as per the scrying sensor rules.

Scarab Sages

Now here is something interesting, you can use a detect spell (detect evil, good, metal, magic, etc.) as your proximity spell, with the same emanation area of effect as the spell (the warded area would still count as the traps trigger mind you with the same perception DC).

But you could have the interesting situation, where an aligned item can trigger a detect alignment trap, even if were being carried by a neutral creature. Or you could pull a thin sheet of lead out and use it to block the radiation.

Scarab Sages

Actually, the thin sheet of lead works for Clairvoyance, Clairaudience, and Arcane Eye too. And while True Seeing, could see a sheet of lead, it couldn't see you behind it (cover). So you may want to invest in a lead lined tower shield.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
thejeff wrote:

Is it? The original description was "A magical trap at the far end of the hallway detects your presence".

That doesn't say anything about "passively sensing" or about how it detects the presence. Why doesn't "magical field" fit just as well, especially as it lets the actual Perception and Disable rules work?

If you look at the original description, it's basically an attempt by RD to put in a trap that could not be detected by approaching the corner. By his description the trap isn't triggered by a cord, or pressure plate or any physical switch, it's caused by someone getting to within sensing range of the trap.

He did not provide a trap build that would do this, as he was asking one of his hypotheticals. My response is that such a trap would need to be able to sense a presence in order to launch it's attack. Since there is no field at the intersection, there's nothing in line of sense to spot until it's literally too late.

This is about as "corner" a case as you can get.


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Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
LazarX wrote:
This is about as "corner" a case as you can get.

Oh geez. LOL.


LazarX wrote:
thejeff wrote:

Is it? The original description was "A magical trap at the far end of the hallway detects your presence".

That doesn't say anything about "passively sensing" or about how it detects the presence. Why doesn't "magical field" fit just as well, especially as it lets the actual Perception and Disable rules work?

If you look at the original description, it's basically an attempt by RD to put in a trap that could not be detected by approaching the corner. By his description the trap isn't triggered by a cord, or pressure plate or any physical switch, it's caused by someone getting to within sensing range of the trap.

He did not provide a trap build that would do this, as he was asking one of his hypotheticals. My response is that such a trap would need to be able to sense a presence in order to launch it's attack. Since there is no field at the intersection, there's nothing in line of sense to spot until it's literally too late.

This is about as "corner" a case as you can get.

To be fair I recall at least one trap in Mummies Mask who's trigger was 'sight' - it was a magical trap.


Mind Blanked rogues....

They do not detect by any divination trigger so they stealth right up to the trap and disable it.

Liberty's Edge

We all know Trapspotter allows a reactive perception check when in range of a trap.
What if the character walks out of range of the trap and then back in again? A new check?
What if he just stands there arguing with the teammates how he doesn't wanna walk first since he'll only spot a magical trap on a 20, will he receive a check every round?

Scarab Sages

TorresGlitch wrote:

We all know Trapspotter allows a reactive perception check when in range of a trap.

What if the character walks out of range of the trap and then back in again? A new check?
What if he just stands there arguing with the teammates how he doesn't wanna walk first since he'll only spot a magical trap on a 20, will he receive a check every round?

Well...

It depends on how you handle reactive perception checks. Most people sort of hand wave it unless there is a real reason to roll perception, you don't roll perception to see people standing 20 feet in front of you though a creature with +0 perception could fail the DC 2 check on a 1. But GMs might have the PCs roll to see the same creature 200 feet away when the DC is 20. And you might not make a check at all if the creature is benign like a bird or person on the street who has no ill-intent and no role in the story other than scenery, because why make a check when it doesn't matter.

But lets say this a perception check that will matter, it's the PC's archnemesis, and they're approaching the PC, but the PC fails the DC 20 check when the creature is 200 feet away. Do you make another reroll at 190 feet when the DC drops to 19 or was the first roll the only roll you do? Remember you've not entered combat yet.

I've seen two ways that I think are fair to handle this:
1) The PC has reactive rerolls every time the DC changes.
2) The PC notices the creature when the distance has closed enough that the first check makes the DC. For example the PC gets a 15 on the check, so the PC notices the creature at 150 feet. This way I prefer as you don't have to make so many rolls.

Either way, you need to keep up with PC perception scores. I saw this implemented once where the GM had a spreadsheet that autorolled perception scores for the entire party, I thought it was pretty slick, plus the players didn't keep hearing dice rolls which tends to make them jumpy.

on the sound of Dice Rolls:
Dice rolls are like the soundtrack to a thriller/horror movie, as you hear a GM roll them they are like the like the crescendo right before the axe murder jumps out at the teenage babysitter. However, sometimes it's just a cat and then the audience breaths a sigh of relief. However, sometimes after the cat the killer is right behind the babysitter after she picks up the cat! Feel free to use this concept on your players, don't overuse it, it gets really cliche after awhile.

With a trap, as it is hidden but potentially noticeable to the rogue. I treat it like a stealth check, where the trap always rolls the same every round (it's DC) and the rogue (technically the GM for the rogue) rolls its perception check every round he could observe it.

I would take the argument about spotting traps on a 20 as OOC as obviously the PC has no idea that his fate is being decided by dice.


Why do people feel the need to try to rules lawyer an already niche ability from doing its job?

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
BigNorseWolf wrote:
Why do people feel the need to try to rules lawyer an already niche ability from doing its job?

RD's major hobby is starting corner rules threads like this one.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Ughbash wrote:

Trap Spotter gives you an active check passively.

It was made to stop people doing move 5' check for traps.

You get within 10', and yo uahve trap spotter you get "an immediate perception check to NOTICE the trap".

I capitalized NOTICE because it does not say SPOT the trap it says notice. So SIGHT is not required. You could hear the slight change in the sound of your footsteps as you get close to a pressure plate. You could smell the magic in the air of the subtle alarm spell.

You come within 10' you get an ACTIVE perception roll for free. You may not know you had that roll (if you fail) but you get an ACTIVE perception roll free.

Re-read the OP. His trap is essentially designed to negate the rogue's trap spotting ability because it's a trap that can react to the rogue before he can get into range to spot it.


LazarX wrote:
Ughbash wrote:

Trap Spotter gives you an active check passively.

It was made to stop people doing move 5' check for traps.

You get within 10', and yo uahve trap spotter you get "an immediate perception check to NOTICE the trap".

I capitalized NOTICE because it does not say SPOT the trap it says notice. So SIGHT is not required. You could hear the slight change in the sound of your footsteps as you get close to a pressure plate. You could smell the magic in the air of the subtle alarm spell.

You come within 10' you get an ACTIVE perception roll for free. You may not know you had that roll (if you fail) but you get an ACTIVE perception roll free.

Re-read the OP. His trap is essentially designed to negate the rogue's trap spotting ability because it's a trap that can react to the rogue before he can get into range to spot it.

It also negates normal perception checks, or at least the around the corner version does.

Which is why you don't do that. Or you don't interpret the rules in such a way as to make that happen.

Throw a couple such traps at players and they'll go back to the old ways of describing elaborate procedures to check for traps at every corner or other case where they might not be able to detect it using the mechanics. Great fun if you want to go back there, but there are reasons the game moved away from it.

What does this do to the trap's CR, btw? Do you calculate it based on the theoretical DC of detecting and disabling it, even though it's not actually possible to do so? There's no CR modifier for "undetectable".


thejeff wrote:
LazarX wrote:
Ughbash wrote:

Trap Spotter gives you an active check passively.

It was made to stop people doing move 5' check for traps.

You get within 10', and yo uahve trap spotter you get "an immediate perception check to NOTICE the trap".

I capitalized NOTICE because it does not say SPOT the trap it says notice. So SIGHT is not required. You could hear the slight change in the sound of your footsteps as you get close to a pressure plate. You could smell the magic in the air of the subtle alarm spell.

You come within 10' you get an ACTIVE perception roll for free. You may not know you had that roll (if you fail) but you get an ACTIVE perception roll free.

Re-read the OP. His trap is essentially designed to negate the rogue's trap spotting ability because it's a trap that can react to the rogue before he can get into range to spot it.

It also negates normal perception checks, or at least the around the corner version does.

Which is why you don't do that. Or you don't interpret the rules in such a way as to make that happen.

Throw a couple such traps at players and they'll go back to the old ways of describing elaborate procedures to check for traps at every corner or other case where they might not be able to detect it using the mechanics. Great fun if you want to go back there, but there are reasons the game moved away from it.

What does this do to the trap's CR, btw? Do you calculate it based on the theoretical DC of detecting and disabling it, even though it's not actually possible to do so? There's no CR modifier for "undetectable".

Here is a published trap that falls into that category:

Spoiler:

Trap: The statue of *name* bears a powerful curse that
represents with the *name* disdain for those who
would dare to unite against him. The statue automatically
targets and attempts to curse any nonevil creature that comes
within 30 feet of it.

*names* CURSE CR 13
XP 25,600
Type magic; Perception DC 34; Disable Device DC 34
EFFECTS
Trigger visual (detect evil); Reset automatic (1 day)
Effect *named* curse (see above; Will DC 22 negates);
multiple targets (all nonevil creatures within 30 feet)

(names removed to avoid any issues - I tried to only use text that was relevant to the discussion at hand - this is from Mummies Mask #5)

So there you have it - not a corner case - not 'theoretical' - not 'something no one would ever design' - but in fact an actual published trap.

How does Mr. Rogue actually get within 10 feet of it for his trap spotter to go off - when the range that it activates at is 30 feet.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Ckorik wrote:
Throw a couple such traps at players and they'll go back to the old ways of describing elaborate procedures to check for traps at every corner or other case where they might not be able to detect it using the mechanics. Great fun if you want to go back there, but there are reasons the game moved away from it.

I assume that going back to that style is the intention for Mummy's Mask. There are traps that are only going to be spotted if they are actively being searched for, and at a significant penalty as their sensing range is around 30 feet. Then again, it is a high CR trap.


Ckorik wrote:


Spoiler:
So there you have it - not a corner case - not 'theoretical' - not 'something no one would ever design' - but in fact an actual published trap.

How does Mr. Rogue actually get within 10 feet of it for his trap spotter to go off - when the range that it activates at is 30 feet.

The rogue detects it at 40', 10' before the trigger of the trap.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
bookrat wrote:
Ckorik wrote:


Spoiler:
So there you have it - not a corner case - not 'theoretical' - not 'something no one would ever design' - but in fact an actual published trap.

How does Mr. Rogue actually get within 10 feet of it for his trap spotter to go off - when the range that it activates at is 30 feet.

The rogue detects it at 40', 10' before the trigger of the trap.

The rogue does not get to detect it if it's at the end of a corridor around a corner, out of his line of sight. Also detection at that range depends on active searching, as trap spotter only activates at the last 10 feet.


LazarX wrote:
bookrat wrote:
Ckorik wrote:


Spoiler:
So there you have it - not a corner case - not 'theoretical' - not 'something no one would ever design' - but in fact an actual published trap.

How does Mr. Rogue actually get within 10 feet of it for his trap spotter to go off - when the range that it activates at is 30 feet.

The rogue detects it at 40', 10' before the trigger of the trap.
The rogue does not get to detect it if it's at the end of a corridor around a corner, out of his line of sight.

Not possible. The rogue will have line of sight before the trap has line of effect. The sensor area is part of the trap: otherwise 99% of magical traps can't be disarmed because you can never get TO the trap without going through its alarm.

The rogue is comming arounc a cooridoor from A 1
4███████ Trap here
3█
2█
1█
_ABCDEF

When the rogue hits A2 His north west corner can see the north west corner of b 4, putting the trap in his line of sight.

And people wonder why folks stop trying to play smart and just kick down the door. You're making playing smart impossible.


OK I can fix the trap with one spell cast at first level. On a carved face in the corridor 15' away from the corner a magic mouth causes the mouth to move up and down triggering the trap.

The range limit of a trigger is 15 feet per caster level, so a 6th-level caster can command a magic mouth to respond to triggers as far as 90 feet away. Regardless of range, the mouth can respond only to visible or audible triggers and actions in line of sight or within hearing distance.


LazarX wrote:
bookrat wrote:
Ckorik wrote:


Spoiler:
So there you have it - not a corner case - not 'theoretical' - not 'something no one would ever design' - but in fact an actual published trap.

How does Mr. Rogue actually get within 10 feet of it for his trap spotter to go off - when the range that it activates at is 30 feet.

The rogue detects it at 40', 10' before the trigger of the trap.
The rogue does not get to detect it if it's at the end of a corridor around a corner, out of his line of sight. Also detection at that range depends on active searching, as trap spotter only activates at the last 10 feet.

What corner? There was no mention of a corner in Ckorik's description. Did you even read what he posted or are you just making things up?


He is combining the example trap with RD's premise.


BigNorseWolf wrote:
LazarX wrote:
bookrat wrote:
Ckorik wrote:


Spoiler:
So there you have it - not a corner case - not 'theoretical' - not 'something no one would ever design' - but in fact an actual published trap.

How does Mr. Rogue actually get within 10 feet of it for his trap spotter to go off - when the range that it activates at is 30 feet.

The rogue detects it at 40', 10' before the trigger of the trap.
The rogue does not get to detect it if it's at the end of a corridor around a corner, out of his line of sight.

Not possible. The rogue will have line of sight before the trap has line of effect. The sensor area is part of the trap: otherwise 99% of magical traps can't be disarmed because you can never get TO the trap without going through its alarm.

The rogue is comming arounc a cooridoor from A 1
4███████ Trap here
3█
2█
1█
_ABCDEF

When the rogue hits A2 His north west corner can see the north west corner of b 4, putting the trap in his line of sight.

And people wonder why folks stop trying to play smart and just kick down the door. You're making playing smart impossible.

Lazar is assuming that the trigger is separate and apart from the trap, therefore the rogue cannot find the trap by locating or spotting the trigger, but must actually be at the trap itself to detect it or disable it.

A rational person would understand that the trigger is a part of the trap, not separate from it, and therefore the rogue can use Trap Spotter to locate it.

Lazar is also against anything other than the literal use of abilities - especially if it hinders PCs (does not apply to the GM). Since the ability is called Trap Spotter, one must spot - or use their eyes - to locate the trap. No other sensory organ is allowed. So if the trap is out of sight, it cannot be detected, not even by sound or smell or some other sense.

Combine those two together and you'll understand his position a lot better.


LazarX wrote:
thejeff wrote:
Throw a couple such traps at players and they'll go back to the old ways of describing elaborate procedures to check for traps at every corner or other case where they might not be able to detect it using the mechanics. Great fun if you want to go back there, but there are reasons the game moved away from it.
I assume that going back to that style is the intention for Mummy's Mask. There are traps that are only going to be spotted if they are actively being searched for, and at a significant penalty as their sensing range is around 30 feet. Then again, it is a high CR trap.

Forget "actively searched for" and "at a significant penalty". I'm talking "must actually describe how you poke a mirror on a stick around every corner so you even have a chance to find the trap"

It's trivially easy for a GM to come up with traps that can't be found or disarmed if he wants to. I don't think that's the intent.

Thus the interpretation that the sensing area is part of the trap for detection purposes - and probably disarming ones too.

Also, how does the new unchained rule (and likely FAQ) on searching play into this? You can only search a 10' square at a time. Can you do that at range? Back in the 3.5 days, where there was size limit on searched area, you also had to be within 10' of the area you were searching. Apparently, under your interpretation, you could never find a trap that triggered farther than 10' away - and yet they had Perception DCs.


bookrat wrote:
What corner? There was no mention of a corner in Ckorik's description.

That isn't what 'corner case' means? :)

There are four places that could be considered part of a trap:
The source point of the trap effect.
The source point of the trap trigger.
The area that the trap can affect.
The area that the trap trigger can sense.

In my games I'm going to treat all four to be parts of the trap that the rogue can sense within ten feet. So if there's a sensor at the end of a long corridor that fires a lightning bolt at anyone it sees, the rogue will definitely have a chance to see it coming.


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Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
LazarX wrote:
BigNorseWolf wrote:
Why do people feel the need to try to rules lawyer an already niche ability from doing its job?
RD's major hobby is starting corner rules threads like this one.

Though a more or less true statement, I dare say this particular instance isn't much of a corner case at all. I run into traps like this all the time in Paizo modules and PFS. Also, as was pointed out by others, nearly every symbol spell functions this way.


Ravingdork wrote:
LazarX wrote:
BigNorseWolf wrote:
Why do people feel the need to try to rules lawyer an already niche ability from doing its job?
RD's major hobby is starting corner rules threads like this one.
Though a more or less true statement, I dare say this particular instance isn't much of a corner case at all. I run into traps like this all the time in Paizo modules and PFS. Also, as was pointed out by others, nearly every symbol spell functions this way.

And yet, they're all listed with Perception and Disarm DCs, which seems pointless if you can just make them impossible to detect.


bookrat wrote:


A rational person would understand that the trigger is a part of the trap, not separate from it, and therefore the rogue can use Trap Spotter to locate it.

As a cop once asked me - define rational ... (hint - his answer was that's the most objective statement you can make as there is no definition that two people ever agree on - thus a horrible argument to make).

I didn't understand the trigger was part of the trap (on a magical trap anyway) - it makes perfect sense if it's a mechanical trap but for magical traps you have to ignore *common sense* and go back to 'the way the rules work'.

That (to me) is the opposite of rational (rational being 'without rules you would expect a sight based trap to not be detectable from range, it's only when you apply rules that break reality to make a *game* where it happens'.) I can accept that explanation but the trap rules don't really give you clear cut examples which would help.

There is another trap in MM where you need to fly up a shaft - a trap based on location casts disable magic as you go by. The fun part about that is without perfect flying there is a very large chance the rogue will get a 'oh by the way you are about to go into a trap' with no way to stop. (what is the DC to come to a dead stop with flight?). The point I was making is that this isn't 'an imaginary scenario' there are traps out there where reading them it makes it very difficult to figure out how a rogue can disarm the trap without setting it off.

In this case - ok so the rogue can spot the trap outside the 'sight' range - at 40 feet - lets agree on that for the moment to ask the next question:

Does the ability to disable a trap let the rogue disable at range?

I say no - because doing so is a class feature of Arcane Trickster - without a way to mask his alignment (unless he's evil) the rogue can't disable the trap in the spoiler without setting it off.


Ckorik wrote:
bookrat wrote:


A rational person would understand that the trigger is a part of the trap, not separate from it, and therefore the rogue can use Trap Spotter to locate it.

As a cop once asked me - define rational ... (hint - his answer was that's the most objective statement you can make as there is no definition that two people ever agree on - thus a horrible argument to make).

I didn't understand the trigger was part of the trap (on a magical trap anyway) - it makes perfect sense if it's a mechanical trap but for magical traps you have to ignore *common sense* and go back to 'the way the rules work'.

That (to me) is the opposite of rational (rational being 'without rules you would expect a sight based trap to not be detectable from range, it's only when you apply rules that break reality to make a *game* where it happens'.) I can accept that explanation but the trap rules don't really give you clear cut examples which would help.

There is another trap in MM where you need to fly up a shaft - a trap based on location casts disable magic as you go by. The fun part about that is without perfect flying there is a very large chance the rogue will get a 'oh by the way you are about to go into a trap' with no way to stop. (what is the DC to come to a dead stop with flight?). The point I was making is that this isn't 'an imaginary scenario' there are traps out there where reading them it makes it very difficult to figure out how a rogue can disarm the trap without setting it off.

In this case - ok so the rogue can spot the trap outside the 'sight' range - at 40 feet - lets agree on that for the moment to ask the next question:

Does the ability to disable a trap let the rogue disable at range?

I say no - because doing so is a class feature of Arcane Trickster - without a way to mask his alignment (unless he's evil) the rogue can't disable the trap in the spoiler without setting it off.

Of course you could make the same assumption about that as about Trapspotter. The Trickster could disarm it from 30' from the detection area, not just 30' from the sensor/trap source.

A normal trapfinder using Disable would have to be at the detection area to do so. That's part of whatever the trapfinding gives you that lets you disable magic traps. Remember that without that class feature, you can't do it, regardless of how high your Disable Device is.


He might not be able to disarm it but he should be able to detect it and if he can roll high enough will know enough about the trap to possible get close enough to disable it if he has the right tools.


Talonhawke wrote:
He might not be able to disarm it but he should be able to detect it and if he can roll high enough will know enough about the trap to possible get close enough to disable it if he has the right tools.

And by "roll high enough" you mean make his Disable Device check. And by "if he has the right tools" you mean his thieves tool kit or he takes a -2 penalty.


I thought there was a roll to determine how a trap worked before you attempt to disarm.

And with tools I meant that once he knows how said trap activates he could circumvent the trigger long enough to get close.

Also I didn't realize i had a post in between i was responding to Chorik specifically.

Sovereign Court

deusvult wrote:

an "alarm" trap that consists of a bell tied to a string that goes up through a hook in the ceiling and then is nailed to a nearby door. The door opens, the bell rings, and the trap is sprung. Basically, something like virtually every shop has to announce customer traffic, only on a solid door with no windows in it.

When the PCs come from the other side of the door, is there zero chance of detecting the trap via perception or trap-spotting? If not, why not?

I wouldn't let searching the door before opening it find anything.

But Trap-Spotter would have a shot.

If they open the door a crack, it wouldn't be unreasonable to slip a blade through the narrow opening and cut the string before it rings the bell.

Or - if it's the other type where the door hits the bell itself - the door can just be opened extremely slowly.

Silver Crusade Contributor

A trap might need disarm conditions under "unstoppable" circumstances if you can avoid the trigger in the first place.

Many high-level magical traps use true seeing as their trigger. A mind blanked rogue could meander up and disarm it, clearing the way for her companions. Obviously, this is a higher-level example, but a similar principle holds for most other types of triggers.

Just a thought. :)


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

You can't open the door without setting off the trap, and you can't find the trap without opening the door. Catch 22s make for bad roleplaying, and worse GMs.

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