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So we had a session last night that had two Hazards (not together, separate instances of singular Hazards), both of which resulted in the Hazard by itself nearly TPKing the party. The second one was even worse, despite it being by itself with nothing else in the vicinity that would threaten us.
After this fight, being drawn to the portal room downstairs with the Eclipse weapon being a key for the next step in the adventure path, we decide to send the animal companion ahead with the Collar of Empathy so our Ranger could scout the area out. It comes across a stone tree that animates, automatically hits us (or very likely crits us), grabs us without any recourse, and then applies the Doomed condition (which, after being struck 2-3 times, would basically put us right at Dying 2 with an already-applied Doomed 1 condition). If we tried to do anything besides step, we'd be automatically attacked and grabbed, bringing us back to square 1 while already being down from its initial onslaught, and it was able to do this upwards of 6 times in a round. From what we could examine, there was a slot to be put in the base of the tree (the appropriate item of which was not in our possession), and any attempt to use the tree for its intended purpose from our successful Knowledge check was met with futility and near fatality, making our party leader almost die along with the animal companion if not for our quick thinking of Invisibility, timing, and using drag rules all because they went with a hunch that they weren't sure of would save them from the stone tree or not. In other words, we would've had to abandon the campaign altogether when our pivotal party leader would eat the dirt and we'd be starting all over again at a very anti-climactic segment of the adventure.
This also isn't the first time we've encountered Hazards that were this powerful within the AP itself, and after having ran an AP myself with a couple hazards, they weren't anywhere near as bad as the ones we've encountered thus far, even with their very first books!
Compared to in the Plaguestone AP, Vilree's private chambers, there was an alchemical frost downpour that would affect anyone within the vicinity of the lyceum before her quarters. While the PCs were able to spot the hazard and plan appropriately, the check to disarm the trap failed, resulting in our Rogue PC being turned into a little popsicle. It wasn't bad enough to automatically kill them, and they were able to take care of the trap for future reference, but they ultimately did not get TPK'd by the Hazard, partly because they were able to see it on an appropriate roll, but also because they were able to plan ahead and rolled decent enough on their saving throws to not be crystallized into ice cubes. In fact, the players laughed and joked about it and actually enjoyed the trap a bit because of the way it played out.
The creatures/NPCs we've encountered have had their ups and downs in terms of difficulty and climactic engagement, but haven't been anywhere near as devastating as the Hazards have been so far, and it really makes me question why it is that a Hazard in the game is always infinitely more devastating that the creatures we come across? We've had to run from Hazards more than Creatures or other social encounters going down the drain so far, and it's proven to be extremely ridiculous as to the strength of the Hazards compared to what creatures we are supposed to face for our level. Even with multiple subsequent encounters, we've had close calls, and with abridgements from the Adventure Path, there was a "timed puzzle" segment that proved to be a lot more fun and engaging than any of these published Hazards! And the best part? We succeeded on our own without any sort of outside help or punch-pulling from the GM. (He would've pulled a punch if we failed, but he didn't have to, and that's what made the segment feel much more like an accomplishment.)
I mean, I understand traps are meant to stop/defeat would-be adventurers from foiling evil plans, but a BBEG could literally just taunt PCs with a big bad macguffin, line its (falsified) whereabouts with nothing but Hazards (because creatures are ineffective and have constant upkeep to deal with), and basically "entomb" PCs with these impossible hazards. In short, a GM throwing creatures unless they are like 6 or 7 levels above the PCs will always be ineffective compared to just throwing a 2-3 level above Hazard (or even a level-appropriate Hazard as I've seen in the above examples!) if they're wanting to make encounters appear extremely deadly, and that makes for a not-very-fun campaign in my honest opinion. I might as well play Pathfinder: Indiana Jones edition and run from a rolling boulder for 20 levels if that's the kind of game I want.
Are we the only ones noticing how imbalanced these Hazards are, and are consequently ranting about it?
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That hazards are seriously dangerous is not hazards being actually imbalanced.
They are more deadly than a creature relative to their level because they are more predictable, require less successful actions to defeat, and are also immobile so you can fall back, think of a strategy for dealing with the hazard while it is not an immediate threat, and return to try and deal with it.
There is a lot of room for players not adapted to the new play paradigm of using Recall Knowledge to come up with plans and 'retreating' from danger to buy time and safety to do so, rather than the 'brute force' of continued engagement with a hazard to feel "edition shock" though.
I disagree. Not all hazards are immobile (I know some generic hazards that were published that do move and aren't necessarily confined to a certain space), and with how strong some of them are in relation to our level, we were defeated by ridiculously-scaled DCs that not even Natural 20s could completely stop, and high amounts of damage that we had no recourse to stop or avoid before it was too late. There's no bad or little voluntary risky player agency resulting in the death, which creates a very bad form of gaming.
As for a strategy, it depends on the Hazard. Some of them don't have a valid strategy without an appropriate piece of an apparent puzzle, and when our strongest-hitting PC is struggling to hit/damage the Hazard on an average roll, it creates a very major imbalance in how we approach the situation, especially when there's no appropriate alternatives like skills or spells memorized or conceived in the game to tackle the situation, especially without recourse.
In the above cases, the fact we didn't have the appropriate piece to nullify the hazard, and not being told this information until it was already too late, doesn't really give us much of a strategy other than "We can't deal with this right now so we gotta cut our losses and do something else and hope we find what we need." I mean, it would make sense if we had the piece of the puzzle and had some adversity in our way. But the fact that we couldn't even appropriately approach the Hazard without it nearly devastating our whole party is mechanically unfair.
There's a fine difference between noticing a trap and going about it the wrong way (such as what our party leader did on a hunch), compared to approaching a Hazard appropriately, rolling excellent, still getting screwed over, and being brought to dying (or very damn near dying) in an instant. Or even better, not noticing a trap, being drawn in to save potential losses, and end up losing even more with no net gain other than a dead-end.
Our GM did point out that nobody in our 5 person group is beyond Trained at Thievery. This is a big problem all on its own, and now we're at the point in our adventure where we can't just go retrain it so we can deal with these things in a more appropriate fashion. The fact that we're being TPK'd because somebody in our group isn't a Thievery specialist is a little ridiculous, not unlike having someone in the group, magical or not, dedicated to healing in some form, whether it be medicine, spells, or both, resulting in player/NPC deaths.
Hazards also usually have a chance to notice them and shut them off before they even activate, which is not usually the case for monsters. (The first example, not so much, but that's the exception,not the rule.)
Also, as your last example illustrates, they often happen in a context where you aren't otherwise being attacked and can heal before the next fight.
Also, this question is answered in the GMG pretty explicitly.
"Extreme: While extreme values remain world-class statistics that are extremely difficult to meet or exceed, unlike with monsters, almost all hazards have one extreme statistic because hazards normally activate only if they have gone unnoticed or if someone critically failed to disable them. Does it have an extreme Stealth DC that makes it incredibly hard to find, an extreme Disable DC that makes it perilous to disable, or an extreme save DC that makes it deadly in the event it triggers? These are the most common choices, as each affects a different phase of encountering the hazard."
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Traps seems to be 'balanced' against the 'you'll have plenty of time to heal up afterwards' factor that might not actually come into play (the trap at the beginning of AoA3 was particularly nasty since it was part of an actual fight and not a stand-alone encounter like it should have been). In fact, after running into the next trap in that module, we noted that the traps were infinitely more dangerous than any of the actual hostile NPCs (luckily, we ran into that second trap after clearing out the hostiles in the area: It should have been a TPK if we'd 'gone the other way' and those hostiles had reacted to our presence after we got our backsides handed to us).
That trap in AoA1 was nasty: My maxed out trapfinding thief 3 was one-shot by it (crit for 44 damage) and I later calculated it was more likely to crit me than I was to find it. If you ran into it at first level, you are rather lucky it wasn't instantly fatal, which is somewhat appropriate to the system (a +3 levels encounter is supposed to be fairly deadly) but not exactly fair to players who accidentally skip ahead in the storyline (honestly, the GM really should have tried to push you 'back on the rails' here since the information you find in this location points you toward the part of the module that a level 1 party just won't survive). On the plus side, the fact that there were no hostiles in the area meant if the trap doesn't kill you outright, you just need to spend some time healing up afterward.
Age of Ashes book 3 spoiler
That encounter in the workshop was interesting in the group that I GM, the team did take damage from it (Aberrant Sorcerer got a critical hit, Ranger was targeted twice and Warpriest once), but the Sorcerer just used Resilient Sphere in the Hazard and the Warpriest gave everyone HP back with a 3 action heal and then got in the fight against Heuberk where the Sorcerer again was the MVP with a lvl 5 Command to save the hostage and every single Triad Sneak failed (they needed a 15 or more to save against the spell).
So we had a session last night that had two Hazards (not together, separate instances of singular Hazards), both of which resulted in the Hazard by itself nearly TPKing the party. The second one was even worse, despite it being by itself with nothing else in the vicinity that would threaten us.
** spoiler omitted **...
A level 1 Rogue only needs a 12 to find it (11 with Trap Finder). Most anyone else with Expert Perception needs a 13, assuming 14 WIS. Disabling it is a bit tougher, but you have to roll an 8 or lower to crit fail at level 1. By level 3 it goes down to a 4 for crit failure for a Rogue. That seems very appropriate. Don't be afraid to spend Hero Points to reroll either.
Not to mention, theres supposed to be a sense of urgency in chasing the Halfling. Not "We'll get to it when we're done dicking around town."
It only does an average of 13 damage, so it should be trivial for a level 3-4 party.
Now the Vision of Dahak nearly 1 shotted the entire pary...
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You'll have to point out any hazards that a party can't walk away from, because I did not see them on my read through.
In fact, I think it'd be most beneficial the discussion if we stuck to specific hazards at this point so we can discuss the particulars in an illustrative fashion rather than debate the philosophy.
But I can say that "strongest-hitting PC is struggling to hit/damage the hazard on an average roll" is a text-book example of the least effective strategy to deal with any hazard I've seen printed, and that is by design - it's a built-in "in case of emergency" element. One good roll of the right skill is the "plan A" solution of most hazards.
In the AoA3 book, both hazards we have encountered so far we couldn't really run away from for their own reasons.
In the second hazard, it was much more of a physical limitation than a philosophical/moral one. Short of stepping, verbal spells, or forced movement (such as being shoved, grabbed, dragged, etc.), you would be effectively automatically hit, grabbed, and forced to break free (wasting actions) and try it all over again. And then if you're already well within the room, you're screwed. With how hard it hits in relation to our health pools, we'd be dead within 3 rounds tops for our strongest frontliners. Combined with the narrow entryway and super-enclosed corridors, the fact that we only lost an animal companion is more a testament to our ability to adapt to a losing/impossible situation than it is actually solving or dismantling the hazard, especially when dismantling said hazard is actually impossible for our group. Of course, it could also be a testament to the GM being lenient when they realized how screwed we were, but it's not like the leniency was done solely because of that.
In short, we've had several hazards in one AP be more devastating that most any creature we've come across so far and was actually more devastating than another comparable AP.
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Responses here seem to take for granted the idea that you can see a hazard ahead of time and/or escape from it when it reveals itself.
But that's clearly not the case, no matter how much we condescendingly mock people for "brute forcing it" because a functionally undetectable trap instantly dropped them with no warning.
Unless by recall knowledge we mean reading the AP ahead of time.
Yep, the trap DCs I've been seeing require rolls of 15+ to detect on an optimized trap finder (Rogue with the Trapfinding feat and 16 Wisdom at creation), so noticing them ahead of time is generally 'unlikely' at best.
While its not always true that you can see a hazard/escape from it afterwards, it is a general theme. In most cases hazards are in a static location, cannot move, and have a reasonably easy to predict routine.
That's a huge disadvantage compared to a creature, so they're balanced around it.
If a hazard is in a circumstance where those assumptions aren't true, then yeah, it will be way harder. That should be considered when placing hazards, a disadvantageous setup is one way to increase an encounter level. A hazard may be a totally fair level 5 trap in a vacuum, but when you put it in a particularly nasty place it can act at a higher level, and the GM, or adventure author, should account for that.
Spoilers for AoE part 3
The trap in the beginning in the workshop was an encounter on its own, and it only runs for "multiple rounds" before stopping. That part has 2 encounters, the lathe and the triad, back to back, but the lathe is a full encounter on its own, and can be handled by simply leaving the room for a minute
The tree was a fair bit nastier of a trap, but it was static, predictable, could be disable with 2 actions (if you have the dream stone from further in), and relatively easily be run from/avoided.
They're certainly dangerous, the attack bonus on the tree for instance is super high, but that's balanced around a number of just as big disadvantages for the trap.
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** spoiler omitted **So we had a session last night that had two Hazards (not together, separate instances of singular Hazards), both of which resulted in the Hazard by itself nearly TPKing the party. The second one was even worse, despite it being by itself with nothing else in the vicinity that would threaten us.
** spoiler omitted **...
I believe you are WAY OFF on that AoA1 trap:
I tried to post this earlied, but it apparently didn't go through. Hopefully, this won't be a double post...
** spoiler omitted **So we had a session last night that had two Hazards (not together, separate instances of singular Hazards), both of which resulted in the Hazard by itself nearly TPKing the party. The second one was even worse, despite it being by itself with nothing else in the vicinity that would threaten us.
** spoiler omitted **
We were told that the DC to both detect and disarm the trap was 25. Even with a 1st level Ranger of Expert Perception with +1 Wisdom (+5 total), a 19 was not enough to notice it. Either your GM lowered the DC on the trap to compensate for a lower level party, or our GM buffed this trap, which I don't buy since it being a level 4 hazard would mean that yes, it's much harder for a 1st level party to deal with. Either way, this probably wouldn't be ranted about if it was a one-time freak accident. But it's been consistent; the Hazards in AoA2 weren't as bad, but still easily could've been if we didn't have the tools to deal with it, and in AoA3, not having the tools to deal with the hazards, we're basically stuck in the AP using the most unorthodox methods to overcome hazards that not even the book would cover, and this is after encountering them and extremely risking what may come our way. It might sound fun, but I'm now dreading and despising hazards for their apparent imbalance than I am appreciating how well they are executed or the potential hilarity that ensues.
You'll have to point out any hazards that a party can't walk away from, because I did not see them on my read through.
In fact, I think it'd be most beneficial the discussion if we stuck to specific hazards at this point so we can discuss the particulars in an illustrative fashion rather than debate the philosophy.
But I can say that "strongest-hitting PC is struggling to hit/damage the hazard on an average roll" is a text-book example of the least effective strategy to deal with any hazard I've seen printed, and that is by design - it's a built-in "in case of emergency" element. One good roll of the right skill is the "plan A" solution of most hazards.
In the AoA3 book, both hazards we have encountered so far we couldn't really run away from for their own reasons.
** spoiler omitted **...
For the tree of dreams, its not super difficult to get the first group of creatures free and then just walk backward. The athletics/thievery dc to open a branch is actually pretty low for its level and you're not pressured to actually move forwards. And its not an intelligent creature, so it should just activate as soon as it can, not wait till everyone is inside the room and too deep to escape.
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I believe you are WAY OFF
Close, it's DC25. That's still a natural 20 for a level 1 rogue without extra Wisdom to succeed, though.
I am running AoA and have had no big issues with hazards. The trap in Vos's was nasty and we got a laugh cause our Goblin thief has been paranoid about looking for traps all the time and here was the one time he didn't and almost got killed by it.
This was after getting to lvl 3 though. If players decide to stick their noses into places they shouldn't be (early in AoA they shouldn't be breaking into Vos's house they have no evidence before faceing Clemont) then let them get ok'd or possably killed. Hazards need to be "Hazardous" if you don't approach them properly the can and will kill you but as a GM there are subtile ways to make sure players are prepared at least a little. Let them know that some hazards need expert lvl in certin skills offhand if they don't take the hint then it's the hard way. The vision of Dahak was another fun encounter. My players tried to brute force it but after 3 turns they just made a run for it after getting a bit too roasted. Though they almost had beaten it they were so frightened of it they wouldn't go back through even after getting a few more lvls. (Though now they could almost solo it). The one time players needed to go back through they used the duck and cover approach and didn't even try to fight it just had the wiz cast resist fire on them and ran for it.
** spoiler omitted **** spoiler omitted **So we had a session last night that had two Hazards (not together, separate instances of singular Hazards), both of which resulted in the Hazard by itself nearly TPKing the party. The second one was even worse, despite it being by itself with nothing else in the vicinity that would threaten us.
** spoiler omitted **
I mixed up the Detect and Disable. It's DC 25 to Detect, but only DC 20 to Disable. So yeah, it takes a 16 to Detect for a properly built Level 1 Rogue. But they only Crit fail to Disable it on a 3. So, assuming you failed to Detect it, the Tank goes first, takes some damage, and then you rather easily Disable it.
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** spoiler omitted **You'll have to point out any hazards that a party can't walk away from, because I did not see them on my read through.
In fact, I think it'd be most beneficial the discussion if we stuck to specific hazards at this point so we can discuss the particulars in an illustrative fashion rather than debate the philosophy.
But I can say that "strongest-hitting PC is struggling to hit/damage the hazard on an average roll" is a text-book example of the least effective strategy to deal with any hazard I've seen printed, and that is by design - it's a built-in "in case of emergency" element. One good roll of the right skill is the "plan A" solution of most hazards.
In the AoA3 book, both hazards we have encountered so far we couldn't really run away from for their own reasons.
** spoiler omitted **...
I used my remaining actions to disarm that tree limb.
Tree's init came up: Crit me for another 50 damage and put me at dying 2 (my max health was 105 minus 9 from already being Drained 1, so 97 damage in less than a round was a 'bad thing'). I think it took the 'I search the tree room' PC down as well at this point (possibly before he had a chance to act).
Basically, it was 'all crits, all the time' (meaning the GM was just rolling double digits) and we couldn't take multiple 40-50 damage crits. By the time the last couple of people in the party had a chance to act, there were multiple PCs down in the 'danger zone' and we were already pretty much tapped-out on healing spells from the earlier fights, so retreating was not really an option.
I assume things would have gone better if we hadn't entered the room one PC at a time...
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I mixed up the Detect and Disable. It's DC 25 to Detect, but only DC 20 to Disable. So yeah, it takes a 16 to Detect for a properly built Level 1 Rogue. But they only Crit fail to Disable it on a 3. So, assuming you failed to Detect it, the Tank goes first, takes some damage, and then you rather easily Disable it.** spoiler omitted **** spoiler omitted **So we had a session last night that had two Hazards (not together, separate instances of singular Hazards), both of which resulted in the Hazard by itself nearly TPKing the party. The second one was even worse, despite it being by itself with nothing else in the vicinity that would threaten us.
** spoiler omitted **
Don't dismiss 'some damage' until you take into consideration how likely it is to crit, how big a level 1 character's maximum health is, and the Massive Damage rules.
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it takes a 16 to Detect for a properly built Level 1 Rogue.
Is maxed wisdom and one specific feat really what you consider the standard for a 'proper' rogue?
16 wisdom, not 18. But yes.
Speaking as someone who walked straight into that AoA1 trap: Level 3 Elf Barbarian with 14 Con, it crit me from full to unconscious in one hit. If we'd been there at level 1 it would absolutely have straight up killed someone. And while I didn't even have a Perception roll (didn't even think of checking for traps there, will not be making that mistake again) even if I had information from here is telling me I would not have had great odds to spot it anyways.
Of course, said character also died straight out later because crit persistent damage is also deadly, and not even Hero Points can save you when you get crit twice in a row in a level+3 encounter, but yeah. Honestly the character was just kinda cursed a bit.
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"Extreme: While extreme values remain world-class statistics that are extremely difficult to meet or exceed, unlike with monsters, almost all hazards have one extreme statistic because hazards normally activate only if they have gone unnoticed or if someone critically failed to disable them. Does it have an extreme Stealth DC that makes it incredibly hard to find, an extreme Disable DC that makes it perilous to disable, or an extreme save DC that makes it deadly in the event it triggers? These are the most common choices, as each affects a different phase of encountering the hazard."
Let's look at it this way:
If a Hazard has high Stealth, it has the most likely chance of affecting PCs no matter what precautions they take. If a Hazard has a high Disable DC, it makes it highly unlikely to just "turn it off," meaning "brute forcing it" might be the more consistent option, depending on what needs to be done to disable it. If it has a high to-hit/save DC, it just makes it extremely devastating when it DOES trigger.
The problem I have with this formula is that of all the traps we've encountered, it does not adhere to this concept very well at all, and is Extreme in all forms, even with an optimized party.
In the first AoA Hazard, while it's harder to detect than disable (proving that even an optimized character will have less than 25% chance to succeed on perceiving it, and a coin flip to disable it), it is still a very deadly trap in spite of this and can quite easily one-shot a PC. In this case, the fact that it has a high stealth should mean that it should be fairly easy to disarm and be moderately deadly. But instead, it's a nearly impossible stealth with an average disable and a very high to-hit/damage/save DC.
With the couple we came across in the 2nd book, we were able to disrupt them with appropriate checks, and even on checks that were failed were largely due to very bad rolls and not a case of tackling the hazard incorrectly.
In the third AoA book, the first Hazard we came across had basically no stealth and not much of a disable check (unless it was activated), with an insurmountable amount of damage that drained a lot of resources that pressured PCs into staying and toughing it out or else the scenario would be lost. This trap is really only bad because you risk losing the hostage if you retreat and face an uphill battle if you stay and fight. If there was no hostage situation? You could just retreat and wait it out. But the fact you can't do that or risk the scenario is precisely what makes this in-your-face trap so nasty compared to it.
The second Hazard had an extremely high Stealth with an extremely high Attack/Damage (with nasty Doomed debuffs) with basic Save DCs to escape so you can run, but then came with automatic Attacks of Opportunity that encompassed the entire room with a very narrow entry-way blocked by fellow allies, which doubled down even more on the offensive portion. In short, once you were too close when the Hazard activates, you were already dead unless some very genius outside help comes to save you, and even they are at risk depending on what they do. And that adds a very major problem to being able to "Disable" the Hazard when 1. The only true means to disable it is not in your possession until you do other things, something you won't know until it's way too late, and 2. You got the Hazard grabbing you and constricting you and slaughtering you to bits before you even get the opportunity to try disabling it.
Hazards being all-over-the-place like that and being in circumstances extremely favorable to its function not being factored into how truly menacing a Hazard can be is not good game design. It's not unlike throwing highly resistant enemies against PCs who do not have a means to overcome said resistance, or throwing durable enemies with weaknesses or regeneration with PCs not having tools to exploit such things, and it's going back to the "CR" rules back in PF1. It's bad, it's outdated, and needs to be reneged.
Most of my thoughts have already been well covered by the posts of Krysgg, but I have one additional thing to add:
Most hazards are meant to do things like take a relevant level character down to dying if they go off unmitigated (and those that aren't that dangerous is, by the design philosophy, because they are harder to mitigate) - and that's not "too much" because recovery from that state is very simple and often very low-cost in terms of resources.
Yeah, getting knocked to dying is pretty common in PF2 and not really the end of the world. Though it may feel pretty discouraging to folks like Darksol. But for all that his party members may have been "nearly" killed by hazards, none of them actually were from what I can tell. The only death I see mentioned is from a critter.
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Isn't a hazard being dangerous kind of the point? They're called hazards after all.
because out of combat healing is so powerful in this edition that if hazards just did a little bit of damage they would be utterly pointless. The party would heal up to full spending 10 minutes and no resources.
Exactly what I came here to say. Any trap by itself has to hold the capability of killing a PC, or there's no point to it... then it's just a time drain at most. It's not like 5e where traps exist just to sap away resources from a dungeoneering party.
The spear launchers in AoA exist only to teach the party to be careful. The one in discussion in this thread is nowhere near any other encounters. So if at worst it's just gonna bop a player for a small chunk of their health and then never do anything again, it's a troll and nothing more. If it has the small chance of knocking out a player and the very rare possibility of outright killing them through massive damage rules, then it actually has meaning from a gameplay perspective.
However, if they're part of a bigger encounter or chase or something, then they should only tax resources and not threaten lives.
That's my opinion.
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Any trap by itself has to hold the capability of killing a PC, or there's no point to it...
Maybe we shouldn't bother, then.
I mean, maybe I don't get it but there's nothing about the idea that you walk through a door with no indication there's anything strange going on and then with absolutely no opportunity to act or react your character is bleeding out and needs a bunch of healing, or maybe if you're just a tiny bit less lucky they're dead and you need to roll a new character that makes me think "wow, what a cool addition to this adventure!"
What about that is good gameplay or good storytelling?
I always thought people saying "rocks fall, you die" was a snarky jab at bad or vindictive GMing, but I guess from reading this thread it's actually something people crave.
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Any trap by itself has to hold the capability of killing a PC, or there's no point to it...Maybe we shouldn't bother, then.
I mean, maybe I don't get it but there's nothing about the idea that you walk through a door with no indication there's anything strange going on and then with absolutely no opportunity to act or react your character is bleeding out and needs a bunch of healing, or maybe if you're just a tiny bit less lucky they're dead and you need to roll a new character that makes me think "wow, what a cool addition to this adventure!"
What about that is good gameplay or good storytelling?
I always thought people saying "rocks fall, you die" was a snarky jab at bad or vindictive GMing, but I guess from reading this thread it's actually something people crave.
You're going a little dramatic there. Also wildly misunderstanding the "rocks fall" meme or what it actually is talking about.
The trap in question can do 4d6+3 damage. A level 3 wizard with 10 con has 24 health. It doesn't just have to crit to kill someone--you need to roll 21 out of 24 on 4d6 to do it. Against almost the lowest-health character you can come across at that level (I didn't mess with negative con).
That's a very, very outside chance of fatality, which assumes the party a) failed the search check, b) are going straight in the front door instead of a side path or something, and c) are sending their squishiest character to stick their face in a potentially dangerous situation involving a literal assassin's house...
Characters should largely be in danger of death during the run of the game only in the cases of very bad luck or very bad decisions. For this, it would involve very bad luck and in the case of point c, some pretty poor decision-making. This is how people learn to not just have the greedy wizard kick down doors, but instead have the champion cautiously open it with his shield raised?
A trap like this will possibly knock a character out, but definitely only carries the risk of a kill when players aren't being cautious. The typical result of this would be a tankier character taking some spines to the face, being told they just went unconscious after taking 40-some-odd damage, and watching a couple of their teammates go pale after realizing that spear could have directly killed them...
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I can't comment on AoA, as I am just starting book 1 as a PC so I am avoiding looking at the spoilers. But in Fall of Plaguestone there are 3 traps.
The first is a Spear Launcher, it has a stealth of 20 and a disable and AC of 18. At level 1, DC 20 perception is hard, requiring a likely 15+ roll. The disable is much easier, as you are much more likely to have a PC with +7 to Thievery or Attack. So, it's hard to see, but if you do see it, you can bypass with likely no damage. If it does hit you you are looking at average of 13 damage, so likley only dropping a spellcaster and only on an unlucky (for the PC) damage roll or a crit. (They show up again later but now with a 15 DC and an automatic check).
Second is Falling Debris. This has stealth of 17, to a PC with 10 Wis still succeeds on a 14. A cleric or someone with expert Perc can succeed on a 10 or 12. So much easier to spot. The disable check is only a 15. If anyone is trained they are likely to succeed, and only crit fail on a 1. Damage allows for an easy Ref save. It mostly is there to slow you down and alert the monsters below.
The Third is an Ice Fall Trap. PCs are level 3 by now. Stealth is DC 22. So again a 15+ check, although more likely to have a expert in Perc by then too. Thievery is 20, but with an expert thief you likely only a 9 or better to disarm and only crit fail on a 1. Even just trained and 14 in Dex you only need a 13. Average damage is only 14, not much at level 3 (even the 8 con elf wizard has 21 hp by then), and save DC only requires a 15 with 10 Dex.
All three are away from combat and allow plenty of time to recuperate if you have bad luck. If they didn't hit hard, you would just ignore them.
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The villain boobytrapping her building so it’s not opportune for curious characters to explore early is not a “rock falls, everyone dies” scenario.
Well no, not everyone. Obviously in this scenario, just the one person.
But even setting aside the potential for death. Again, what about "You opened a door now you're bleeding out haha" is fun or good gameplay?
It's pretty much, in this scenario, just the GM arbitrarily downing a player... and when threads griping GMs pulling stuff like that in homebrew games show up, the forums usually encourage the OP to bail, call the GM terrible, make snide comments about off-brand Tomb of Horrors and other comments to that effect.
A level 3 wizard with 10 con has 24 health.
The characters in question were level 1. Level 1 wizard with 10 con has, at most, 16 hp. Probably 14.
The trap also has a +17 to its attack roll and said level 1 wizard will probably have 14 or 15 AC, so they're crit on a 7 or 8.
So a 60% chance to be crit for an average of 34 damage, which translates to instant death.
That's a very, very outside chance of fatality, which assumes the party a) failed the search check
Which we already established required the party rogue to roll a 20.
Any trap by itself has to hold the capability of killing a PC, or there's no point to it...Maybe we shouldn't bother, then.
I mean, maybe I don't get it but there's nothing about the idea that you walk through a door with no indication there's anything strange going on and then with absolutely no opportunity to act or react your character is bleeding out and needs a bunch of healing, or maybe if you're just a tiny bit less lucky they're dead and you need to roll a new character that makes me think "wow, what a cool addition to this adventure!"
What about that is good gameplay or good storytelling?
I always thought people saying "rocks fall, you die" was a snarky jab at bad or vindictive GMing, but I guess from reading this thread it's actually something people crave.
Set up is really important for traps, so that it doesn't feel like it comes completely out of nowhere, but when you break into a wizards house when they are not around, it is not a rock falls, you die, kind of scenario. The situation is important.
The issue is that traps easily become negligible when you have 4 average or better perception characters primarily making perception checks looking for traps, which is why the Stealth DCs get so high. Parties that know they are headed into trapped locations and want 1 person raising their shield (standing at the front), 1 person sneaking quietly along the side, 1 person detecting magic and one person making perception checks are leaving themselves very vulnerable to non-magical traps. But if the DCs came down to expect only one party member keeping an eye out, then it becomes a trivial situation when 4 players are being cautious.
As a GM, the responsibility largely rests on you to make sure that you don't give your party no reason to ever make perception checks for 90% of the campaign and then give the party no clues or notice that there are very lethal traps ahead in a situation where that changes.
It is also ok to have some traps that are easy to spot when they are in locations where they can become an environmental feature of another encounter/ something each PC might have to spot for themselves while they are in a combat encounter.
Overall, and especially for stand alone traps (not tied to another immediate encounter), I am much happier to see how lethal they have become. Having a Rogue in the party, especially one that choses to take Trap Finding should be a meaningful and valuable choice for the party. Especially with the medicine skill being as spammable as it is, it would otherwise be too easy for the best trap detection method to just be, "send in the barbarian. Walk everywhere, touch everything, and then we'll heal you up afterwards."
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But even setting aside the potential for death. Again, what about "You opened a door now you're bleeding out haha" is fun or good gameplay?
It teaches you to be cautious and that traps are scary in this edition. Otherwise traps are non-issue.
It's pretty much, in this scenario, just the GM arbitrarily downing a player... and when threads griping GMs pulling stuff like that in homebrew games show up, the forums usually encourage the OP to bail, call the GM terrible, make snide comments about off-brand Tomb of Horrors and other comments to that effect.
It’s not? Not even in the slightest?
It’s not an insta-kill, it’s not undetectable, it’s not arbitrary.
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it’s not undetectable
You're right. The rogue had a 1 in 20 chance of finding it. I guess that makes it fine.
it’s not undetectableYou're right. The rogue had a 1 in 20 chance of finding it. I guess that makes it fine.
Thats a lot more chance than...
...having 0 chance of finding it.
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it’s not undetectableYou're right. The rogue had a 1 in 20 chance of finding it. I guess that makes it fine.
Well crit or die is SO much better than insta death as it at least gives the illusion of some fairness. So it's not 'rocks fall, you die' but 'no one rolled a 20 so 'rock fall, you die'': that's better right? ;)
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Traps were almost completely uninteresting in PF1. They were at worst just HP attrition on the way to the next fight. For traps to be interesting they have to be:
1) Sufficiently threatening that you care.
2) Something that can be overcome by strategic action.
I'm not sure they found the right balance yet but "hazards are hazardous" is better than the alternative.
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I guess I overlooked the part where the party was springing traps in areas they weren't expected to be for literally half a book...
It's a rude shock with the chance of knocking a player unconscious when on level. When you're two levels behind anticipated, you're gonna run into some nasty trouble wherever you go if the GM doesn't find a way to either dissuade you away from there or modify encounters to not ruin you. If it were a level 4 monsters instead of a level 4 hazard, the result likely would have been way worse for the players.
I personally think traps by themselves are dull. I think hazards should exist to add complexity and difficulty to actual encounters. But if a trap is by itself and is built to not pose a threat to anyone two levels below its supposed intended threat ability... there's nothing interesting to that. It's just a silly gotcha moment where the GM can say "boy are you dumb for not seeing that!" Because if it didn't carry the capacity to knock a player on their ass, there is literally no point to it existing at all.
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Traps were almost completely uninteresting in PF1. They were at worst just HP attrition on the way to the next fight.
Are the things here any better? As pointed out, healing, especially non-combat healing, isn't that hard to come by this edition.
So in practice, we're talking ultimately about this trap making the party wasting a little bit of time healing. Or, if the trap is dangerous enough, it's way for the GM to apply the Wounded condition without actually having the party fight enemies. Is that interesting?
It sounds like all we've really accomplished is made 'out of combat healer' a mandatory party role. Which just means someone is going to be stuck making sure their character can do that. Cool, I guess?
I feel like for a trap to be interesting it should be... uh... interesting. Something to interact or engage with. Something that provides puzzles, strategic play, story beats, something like that.
Just taking damage and maybe dying because you didn't nat 20 your perception check isn't any of those things.
Because if it didn't carry the capacity to knock a player on their ass, there is literally no point to it existing at all.
And my thought is that even with the capacity, it still doesn't really add any value.
As said, the most likely outcome is someone takes a bunch of damage, the party spends 20 minutes healing them with their infinite out of combat healing resources and then everyone moves on and all you've actually done is just waste a little time and maybe made your players more paranoid. Maybe someone has wounded 1, or the party has to run back to town to pick up their next disposable adventuring companion, but even then the end result is still the same.
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Traps were almost completely uninteresting in PF1. They were at worst just HP attrition on the way to the next fight. For traps to be interesting they have to be:
1) Sufficiently threatening that you care.
2) Something that can be overcome by strategic action.I'm not sure they found the right balance yet but "hazards are hazardous" is better than the alternative.
I don't think I'd equate deadly with interesting. As to #2, that only matters is you can actually perceive the trap which interferes with #1: even then, if you can't find them when you take care, it seems more like rolling for free damage and not something interesting. If your party isn't likely to find the trap/hazard it's as interesting as rolling on a chart, taking your free damage and burying your dead...
I personally think traps by themselves are dull. I think hazards should exist to add complexity and difficulty to actual encounters.
This. It's the only time I personally find traps interesting: maneuvering/moving to trip up enemies [or PC's] with traps/hazards makes for real tactical options. Past that, normal damage traps/hazards are dull at best: now if it activates some long term condition/curse/ect it crawls back to mildly interesting but plain old straight damage?
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But even setting aside the potential for death. Again, what about "You opened a door now you're bleeding out haha" is fun or good gameplay?It teaches you to be cautious and that traps are scary in this edition. Otherwise traps are non-issue.
Go run World's Largest Dungeon.
I'll wait.
Our party's standard operating procedure by the time we finished the campaign was probably two pages long. We move 5 feet a round, search the walls, ceiling, and floor, every object, every object part of that object, murder everything and everyone, and burn the remains behind us.
What I'm hearing from people who've had these traps sprung on them (my group is unlikely to continue after finishing the first part of Plaguestone) is very reminiscent of the above. Traps that the players had no business expecting, with ridiculous stealth DCs, and knock characters to dying from a single hit.
MY group has had a similar problem, but with the ambulatory obstacles. Its honestly the least fun I've had around an RPG table since I had a bridge dropped on me.
Well, ok, the Shadowrun 4 mission where you kidnap a little girl was also pretty bad, SRM02-03 "The Grab". "Designed to kill the entire party" pretty much sums up a lot of people's feelings about it, not just my group.
Tell it to Them Straight
As you drive along the streets of Denver,
Catherine cries in the back seat. She won’t
talk to any of you. She won’t react to any
attempts to calm her down. All she does is
keep repeating, “Please don’t hurt me,” or,
“My daddy will kill you creeps,” depending
on whether her axis of emotion is swinging
more toward afraid or enraged at any given
moment. Somewhere along the interstate,
you decided to crank the radio to drown out
her screams. Now, thankfully, the Aurora
Warrens are slipping into view along the
horizon.
That’s when you hear it. Even above the
radio, you hear it. You turn the radio down.
It’s louder, and closer. You look up, and see
an Ares Dragon descending on your
position. The side door slides open. A
human woman wearing a black and gray
paramilitary jumpsuit, and body armor,
swings the business end of a vehicle
mounted Ultimax HMG-2 in your general
direction. A large troll, secured in rappelling
gear and wearing similar attire, leans out the
door and keeps his eyes trained on your
vehicle as the chopper gets closer.
If it ain’t one thing, it’s another.Behind the Scenes
Catherine has an RFID implant to aid in
locating her should such a kidnapping
attempt such as this happen. Before the
runners can get her to the safehouse, the
Trinity triangulates her location and come to
crash the party. This scene assumes the
runners are traveling by vehicle, and is one-
hundred percent chase combat. Deimos is
rigging the Ares Dragon that carries his
teammates. Diva is operating the door gun
(an Ultimax HMG-2 firing APDS
ammunition), and Jackhammer intends to
drop onto the characters’ vehicle and do
some up-close-and-personal damage if the
helicopter can get close enough.
Yes, the players get attacked by a helicopter. I'll note for people who aren't familiar with the rules, but that sort of firepower against the sort of vehicles the players have access to only ends one way: with the players dead in a burning wreck on the side of the road at the end of the first turn nine times out of ten. The tenth time the players end up dead on the side of the road with the vehicle still mostly operational (crash damage suuuucks).
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Well crit or die is SO much better than insta death as it at least gives the illusion of some fairness. So it's not 'rocks fall, you die' but 'no one rolled a 20 so 'rock fall, you die'': that's better right? ;)it’s not undetectableYou're right. The rogue had a 1 in 20 chance of finding it. I guess that makes it fine.
You’ll only die if you really shouldn’t have been looking for traps and the rest of the party does nothing after you’ve been knocked otherwise.
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...But even setting aside the potential for death. Again, what about "You opened a door now you're bleeding out haha" is fun or good gameplay?It teaches you to be cautious and that traps are scary in this edition. Otherwise traps are non-issue.Go run World's Largest Dungeon.
I'll wait.
** spoiler omitted **
What I'm hearing from people who've had these traps sprung on them (my group is unlikely to continue after finishing the first part of Plaguestone) is very reminiscent of the above. Traps that the players had no business expecting, with ridiculous stealth DCs, and knock characters to dying from a single hit.
MY group has had a similar problem, but with the ambulatory obstacles. Its honestly the least fun I've had around an RPG table since I had a bridge dropped on me.
Well, ok, the Shadowrun 4 mission where you kidnap a little girl was also pretty bad, SRM02-03 "The Grab". "Designed to kill the entire party" pretty much sums up a lot of people's feelings about it, not just my group.
** spoiler omitted **
”oh you checked for traps in this square but not that one so you didn’t see it” is Bad GMing.
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Squiggit, you're reacting to the trap as it was presented to your party, and the experience you had with it - and that's 100% valid. The way that this trap played out was no fun, and you are right that it shouldn't have played out that way.
But what others are saying is that, for the adventure as intended, your party shouldn't have been 1st level when you encountered this trap. The adventure is written with the assumption that you won't go there until you are level 3.
The problem is the gap between how the writer intended this to play out, and how the information was presented. Because it is entirely possible to take a specific path through the adventure that lets smart players jump to some assumptions and decide to go there way too early; and the adventure doesn't do a good job of putting info in the GM's hands to realize this is a problem.
My recollection is that the adventure says, if the PCs want to go to that site, the town council doesn't approve them breaking in without a reasonable amount of evidence. Based on just hearsay from an apparently-crazy guy, the evidence that you should be allowed to break into a building is pretty thin. If you're doing it without even asking the town council, that's burglary. But unfortunately, the info isn't presented in a way that guides the GM to realize the problem and head this off using those arguments - and so your group got "too much info" and/or put some clues together, and headed somewhere way too soon.
So yes, as the first adventure of a new edition, it would've been nice if this adventure had realized the risk and guided the GM on how to discourage the party from skipping two levels of XPs before moving to that site. But it isn't really the fault of the Hazard itself in that case. The hazard is appropriate for a 3rd level party, and won't kill anyone in such a group.
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Are the things here any better? As pointed out, healing, especially non-combat healing, isn't that hard to come by this edition.
It’s from the Wounded condition you gain that adds some extra concern, yes you can remove it from a lot of extra healing and time, but you have to have those.
I feel like for a trap to be interesting it should be... uh... interesting. Something to interact or engage with. Something that provides puzzles, strategic play, story beats, something like that.
That’s a puzzle, not a trap, though they can overlap.
(Also puzzles aren’t apparently frowned upon usually, going off reviews and feedback Paizo writers have received throughout the years that they’ve talked about).
As said, the most likely outcome is someone takes a bunch of damage, the party spends 20 minutes healing them with their infinite out of combat healing resources and then everyone moves on and all you've actually done is just waste a little time and maybe made your players more paranoid. Maybe someone has wounded 1, or the party has to run back to town to pick up their next disposable adventuring companion, but even then the end result is still the same.
Taking this dismissive stance, what’s the point of combat then?
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The villain boobytrapping her building so it’s not opportune for curious characters to explore early is not a “rock falls, everyone dies” scenario.Well no, not everyone. Obviously in this scenario, just the one person.
But even setting aside the potential for death. Again, what about "You opened a door now you're bleeding out haha" is fun or good gameplay?
It's pretty much, in this scenario, just the GM arbitrarily downing a player... and when threads griping GMs pulling stuff like that in homebrew games show up, the forums usually encourage the OP to bail, call the GM terrible, make snide comments about off-brand Tomb of Horrors and other comments to that effect.
A level 3 wizard with 10 con has 24 health.The characters in question were level 1. Level 1 wizard with 10 con has, at most, 16 hp. Probably 14.
The trap also has a +17 to its attack roll and said level 1 wizard will probably have 14 or 15 AC, so they're crit on a 7 or 8.
So a 60% chance to be crit for an average of 34 damage, which translates to instant death.
It's not an average of 34 Damage. That trap does an average of 13 Damage. An average crit for it would be 26. Also, again, Level 1 Characters are not supposed to encounter that Hazard!
It has a Stealth DC of 25. Why does a Rogue have 10 WIS? It's the class's Secondary or maybe Tertiary stat. Building a sub-optimal character is going to yield sub-optimal results.That's a very, very outside chance of fatality, which assumes the party a) failed the search checkWhich we already established required the party rogue to roll a 20.
it’s not undetectableYou're right. The rogue had a 1 in 20 chance of finding it. I guess that makes it fine.Thats a lot more chance than...
** spoiler omitted **
...having 0 chance of finding it.
Yes, that Hazard is hella OP, not to mention virtually impossible to even tell it's a Hazard and not an actual Creature.