Frieze Door Trap
An elaborately worked door, carefully made to balance upright on a horizontal bar, containing a deadly trap.
This door, worked in an elaborate frieze displaying some glorious scene out of history or legend, is in fact a carefully designed trap. Hollow, and balanced carefully on a horizontal pivot while giving the appearance of opening normally, the lower portion of the door contains a liquid; meanwhile, the upper portion contains a powder, kept separate by an easily-dislodged plate. The trap is sprung when the door is disturbed; pivoting on the horizontal axis, the powder and the liquid mix freely, reacting to create a deadly gas that erupts out the myriad hidden holes amid the elaborate frieze, giving the door the appearance of belching the deadly fumes out from countless nostrils, mouths, and eyes.
Generally, this door is used to guard sealed areas which none are meant to enter, or doors which the real owner of the area can bypass by some means, be it a concealed door nearby or magic to skip past it entirely. Particularly paranoid and antisocial individuals might even employ them in the living spaces, although they will tend to reside on a higher floor, safe from the dense fumes.
What if someone already used it?
When the adventurers reach this point of the maze/dungeon/house, they find that someone has already half opened the door. It is moved from the vertical position and hangs at an odd angle, leaving narrow gaps at the bottom and top. The only problem with crawling under it is the gas - it has been expelled from the door and now covers the floor in a thick layer of brightly coloured fumes (maybe even concealing the lower gap). It is a matter of wits and acrobatics to pass the trap now, without dropping into the poisonous cloud. A nasty surprise may be the body of the one that opened the door, hidden in the gasses that swirl on the ground (something to trip over).
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? Responses (12)
The distressed mother ran about the house, shouting and searching for her kids. Addressing her host, the venerable lord Randolph she said: 'Randolph! Randolph! Do you know where little Rupert is? I cannot find him anywhere!'
Randolph thought for a second and then replied: 'Uhhhh.... Ohhh.... Rupert? That bra, err, cute kid? Eh, I think he went... upstairs'.
Poor Rupert. The sleeping poison was too hard on his young body and he died from the overdose. After a dozen similar accidents, like the maid who broke her ankle as she fell asleep, or the young son of lord Mandragore who got bruised, Lord Randolph had to settle for a regular door and sold this one back to WotC industries who patented several similar ill conceived trap doors.
I like the bit about going into tons of detail on the trap door - a nice touch. There are some rough spots in the rest of the post though.
Well, it can be used, but only if there are no people around that would accidently trigger it.
Problematic for a normal residence, good for restricted places.
(Side note: the door nearby better be tight, or the sleeping gas knocks out the owner, too.)
Good for a tomb or perhaps a bank vault. Not good for a house or anywhere with small children, the elderly, or pets.
Agree with Manfred on this one.
While troublesome in your common mansion, this is actually a reasonable trap for a paranoid owner. "Don't go up the stairs or something will happen to you!"
As with many other traps, your can simply train your guards to not open this door... hopefully they are not that stupid. :)
Updated: Even though I never actually submitted this myself, instead making a whimsical and badly-designed sleeping-gas trap for a door-trap thread in the old forums, I finally noticed it was around and commented on.
Presumably this version is more acceptable.
I move over 1000 submissions (and comments on said submissions) from the old forum over. There were some others moved too. We let everyone know we were doing it, and you were around at the time (not during one of your hibernations).
But then again, the "rush of submissions" in the new Citadel seemed to cause many a person to have their eyes gloss over.
Some things were not "perfect", but they were there, useful, and "good enough". And they were used to fill out new categories that occured in Citadel v2.
Ah, it was shanghaied from the forums. That explains quite a bit.
I like the new version better and have revised my vote.
I seem to have a few entries which escaped without my knowledge from the forums and into my list of submissions. I may go through and rework them to be more palatable and less absurd.
Like the part about the smoke belching from the nostrils & mouths of the various creatures -- it's a nice artistic touch that would appeal to the sensibilities of the one designing this thing.