Ye Olde Inn

One of the rules that annoyed me was when searching a corridor and it's lack of logic because it was technically possible to search for secret passages in the long corridor from one end of the board and reveal the one down the end of the hall while not revealing the seven pit traps or nine spear traps in between, let alone the hoard of Chaos Warriors waiting to ambush the players half way along (although some might say this is a carrot being dangled to draw heroes into a trap). I think in our current games I decided that when you search for traps and passages (I don't allow searching for treasure in the interest of a quicker game), you search between you and junctions / corners but this still doesn't remove the slightly exaggerated annoyance from above.

While I have an untested house rule in my rules thread that's a bit different, I thought of a way to adjust the original rule as follows;
- you search between you and junctions / corners
- if you're searching for traps, you only find the closest trap*
- if you're searching for secret passages, you'll find the nearest passage but only if you don't trigger a trap in between

* this causes multiple searchings to slow down the progress of the heroes which might encourage them to be more reckless

Thoughts? Have others tried to better handle this situation? I haven't tried it yet but I think I'll try it when the second group finishes The Gathering Storm.

One easy way to make searching more difficult is to put monsters in otherwise empty hallways. Even one or two Orcs put about halfway up the hall will be able to menace the Heroes with the threat of a quick attack, which gets compounded when said Orcs also have crossbows and can run away and force the Heroes to come to them. (The fireball-using Orc statues from one of the Ogre Horde quests operate on similar principles.)

Now, if you think that the Heroes are taking too long searching for things, you could also implement a set of Evil Wizard event cards like what chaoticprime or GimmeYerGold had. Searching every hallway? Now Morcar has a full hand again; was that really wise?

I've never had a problem with the Heroes' ability to search an entire hallway for traps and secret doors, though. It may be a little contrived, but it's not unreasonable to Handwave for the sake of smoother gameplay.

This is simple to explain: The hero is so busy checking the walls that they miss and fall into the trap. The order of action is abstracted.

A Hero can't search for treasure in corridors, not sure why you put "(I don't allow searching for treasure in the interest of a quicker game)" .

The logic could be that the Hero found a lever in this section of the hall way or could see light shining through the crack in the wall at the end of the hall. They haven't actually passed the junction that would of revealed monsters.

I'm also not sure why you put "reveal the one down the end of the hall while not revealing the seven pit traps or nine spear traps in between" as those traps would be revealed. Searching for secret doors and traps is the same action. The game logic still comes into question though as how would the Hero of discovered the further traps or secret door with out having to jump or disarm the ones closer. Perhaps it's more a case of just seeing the holes in the walls, hanging bolders, obvious loose flooring so the extra minute to just take look instead of barging through is enough to notice the hazards down the hall.

edit: Just checked the rules and it appears American you search for everything separate but can't search for treasure in corridors. The UK rules you can search corridors for treasure but traps and secret doors are same search.

I prefer mixing the 2.

Well in the US version every Hero is allowed to search a room once, instead of allowing the search in corridors. if you don't allow either, then there are only very few treasure cards drawn in a quest. I prefer the European rule and allow searches in corridors, because its too much work to keep track of who searched what. especially after a few beers.

To cover all the eventualities, I long ago ruled that you can do any of the three searches anywhere, but only draw treasure cards in rooms.

mitchiemasha wrote:edit: Just checked the rules and it appears American you search for everything separate but can't search for treasure in corridors. The UK rules you can search corridors for treasure but traps and secret doors are same search.

I have two groups playing, one of each set of rules so I can see how the differences play out however, I didn't realise this;

mitchiemasha wrote:Searching for secret doors and traps is the same action.

So while this has been played correctly with the NA group, it's been played wrongly with the EU group.
I'm glad you've pointed this out, thanks

I'm also bothered as Redav is by the logic of searching corridors. That said, I certainly understand how others are comfortable with the rules that handwave my "logic" in the interest of smoother gameplay.

Redav wrote:- you search between you and junctions / corners
- if you're searching for traps, you only find the closest trap*
- if you're searching for secret passages, you'll find the nearest passage but only if you don't trigger a trap in between

* this causes multiple searchings to slow down the progress of the heroes which might encourage them to be more reckless

Thoughts? Have others tried to better handle this situation? I haven't tried it yet but I think I'll try it when the second group finishes The Gathering Storm.

Redav, I've pretty much decided upon the same house rules as you to satisfy my sense of exploring. One change you may want to consider is allowing all traps in a section to be found in one search, as with a room. This will speed gameplay and still keep secret doors secret until they can be logically, though abstractly reached. I'm suggesting this with the seperate searches of the NA rules in mind.

Daedalus wrote:This will speed gameplay and still keep secret doors secret until they can be logically, though abstractly reached.

Yup, nothing like search after search to kill a game. I have an untested alternate method that essentially has you searching as you move but I had hoped to come up with something a little more logical

There might be some ideas in this thread:
http://forum.yeoldeinn.com/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=2666&hilit=search+traps+secret+doors