Ye Olde Inn

My players have been through a 14 quest custom campaign, and 7 quests into another. I feel like I've been pretty liberal with my use of traps, and trapped chests, but not a single player has purchased a toolkit during all this time.

I'm not sure if this is just their play style, or if they feel that the tool kit is overpriced at 250 gold coins? The dwarf does what he does best, and the rest, they take the body damage penalty happily in exchange for the treasure inside the trapped chest! Have you experienced this in your games? In my custom armory, I'm considering lowering the price of the toolkit, just to open up a new game mechanic for the non-dwarf players to try out, rather than trial and error every time. OUCH!

Make the traps more difficult, make some traps so that only a Dwarf with a tool kit can possibly open it.
Require a tool kit and a Mind Check looking for a Black Shield to disarm the nastier traps. More difficult traps may require 2 or more Skulls on a Mind roll with a tool kit.

Make the traps more brutal. Who cares if the Barbarian takes a Body point? Now if the trap does brutal damage say like 5 dice... or perhaps saps strength so that the victim looses a Combat dice or two the chances are they may be a bit more prudent?

My preferred furniture trap involves said trap destroying the furniture's contents. The Ur Example would of course be an exploding treasure chest. If the Heroes think they can just tank the hit, they won't get the treasure!
As an alternative, use Falling Block traps to cut off foolhardy Heroes from immediate reinforcements.
Also, the best way to increase the value of the Tool Kit in the Heroes' eyes is simply to have more traps, such that it would take them too long for the Dwarf to disarm them one by one in the midst of what would hopefully be combat.

Count Mohawk wrote:My preferred furniture trap involves said trap destroying the furniture's contents. The Ur Example would of course be an exploding treasure chest. If the Heroes think they can just tank the hit, they won't get the treasure!
As an alternative, use Falling Block traps to cut off foolhardy Heroes from immediate reinforcements.
Also, the best way to increase the value of the Tool Kit in the Heroes' eyes is simply to have more traps, such that it would take them too long for the Dwarf to disarm them one by one in the midst of what would hopefully be combat.

I love this one.
A chest full of scrolls that gets shredded and turned to confetti would be a reminder to get a tool belt. Of course the Wizard should recognize that at one time the papers were powerful spells.

Gold and silver will not get destroyed. But potions would....

cynthialee wrote:

Count Mohawk wrote:My preferred furniture trap involves said trap destroying the furniture's contents. The Ur Example would of course be an exploding treasure chest. If the Heroes think they can just tank the hit, they won't get the treasure!
As an alternative, use Falling Block traps to cut off foolhardy Heroes from immediate reinforcements.
Also, the best way to increase the value of the Tool Kit in the Heroes' eyes is simply to have more traps, such that it would take them too long for the Dwarf to disarm them one by one in the midst of what would hopefully be combat.

I love this one.
A chest full of scrolls that gets shredded and turned to confetti would be a reminder to get a tool belt. Of course the Wizard should recognize that at one time the papers were powerful spells.

Gold and silver will not get destroyed. But potions would....

Well, it's true that gold and silver are relatively nonreactive metals, and also strong in coin form, but strong or magical acid would almost certainly be able to destroy them. In the same vein, you could add Rust traps, which destroy items (mostly weapons and armor if it's the classic Rust) the Heroes are currently carrying rather than the stuff they would receive.
Or, why destroy them at all? The trip triggers a floor panel to rotate, dropping the treasure chest into a lower-level compartment the Heroes are unable to reach, while also knocking the searching Hero in the face for a point of BP.

I actually increaded the costs of weapons & armour accross the board. I started by doubling the cost of weapons and trippling the costs of Armour. I left the tool kit as it was. It wasn't a high-priority item, but the other players soon started buying them.

To answer the question of "why heroes don't buy toolkits"...

Because if there are monsters the heroes can't search for the traps to disarm.
If there are no monsters there's no pressure and the superior dwarf can simply take his time.

More and better traps doesn't really change this.

The lack of Time Preassure has long been a problem here.

I came up wit the idea of the EWP recieveing a token each turn that there are no Monsters on the game board. These tokens can be spent for various nasty affects.

Definitely make the traps harder to trip and more deadly. Poison is a good one, if you have rules
that make use of poison. My poison rule is that it lowers your maximum BP by a certain amount until
cured with an antidote or cure poison magic spell...something like that.

Gas clouds that cause damage to everyone is a good one.

Then you have what is already suggested - a trap that cuts the group apart. A great example would be a
portcullis. It causes no damage, but is impossible to lift or get through. In one of the Drizzt novels, Wulfgar
cracks through a door, only to be trapped by a portcullis coated with lard...can't life it...can't break it.
He is stuck with a big bad monster to fight by himself.

Fireball traps are good...causing damage to multiple heroes and possibly blowing up any treasure that might
be there.

Include magic traps - statues come to life - monsters are summoned - the hero is teleported away to somewhere
else on the board - the hero gets turned into a toad - the hero loses his voice or sight.

I've been pondering over treasure chest traps always taking half the hero's starting body points.