Morgrim's Traps and encounters - Part 4 #

From the Dread Lord Morgrim's tome of Phylactery Defence comes advice for devious traps for any prospective Lich, Demon or Dungeon Master. Perhaps these inspire deadlier traps still.

Spectators and Beholders #

I don't have much advice for running Spectators except they are pretty rubbish against a high level party with a Paladin and Barbarian. Either way, as flavour, they work to build towards a battle with a Beholder. They should naturally hover as far away from Melee players.

For Beholders, the advice is similar, but prioritise Paladins due to them providing their teammates with bonuses to saving throws. Additionally, make sure they are hovering as close to the ceiling. Make sure to track what eye beams have had no effect on players, as a Beholder is smart enough not to waste its rays on enemies that it will have no effect on. Additionally, its antimagic field eye should be set up to cover most of the room, and primarily targeted at spellcasters and people using magic items a lot. Aside from that, make sure to be using their legendary actions and lair actions. It's a fairly simple boss-style enemy to run in my opinion.

The Bell of Deafening #

There is a small room suspended above a pit, made of brass or bronze. In the middle hanging by a chain is a gold ball worth some 10,000GP. Trying to nick this gold ball, will end up ringing the bell, dealing damage that is halved on a constitution saving throw. Additionally, failing this should temporarily reduce that player's passive perception by 2(maybe more if you're feeling particularly mean) as they are now deafened. The DC for this should be high if you're inside the bell, and low if you're directly outside the bell. Put this next to a room full of angry monsters and let the players ring the dinner bell. What's on the menu? Them.

The Paralysing Sawblade Labyrinth #

A fairly simple and straightforward set of traps. This is a labyrinth with sawblades nearby doors, and behind doors are spike pits coated in poison. The doors are trapped to release a paralysing gas and to push players back(in D&D 5e this is done with Hold Person and Thunderwave Glyphs of warding, though a mechanical version where the trap has paralysing gas inside of it, and has a spring to push people would work). Behind the doors are spike pits and nearby the doors are sawblades. Bashing down the door results in you going into spikes. Getting pushed AND paralysed, results in you getting sliced to ribbons by the sawblade. Pretty devious if I say so myself.

The 25ft long bottomless and ceilingless pit #

Another fairly simple and straight forward trap. This is a 25ft long pit corridor with a closed door on the other end. Falling down the pit results in you looping after a bit from the ceiling. Being stuck in the loop will build up the amount of fall damage you take if you land. You can use Portal style momentum to try and get across sustaining some fall damage. Items stuck in the loop will also be you know... stuck in the loop. You can optionally make it possible for players to see that it is looping on first inspection, or just describe it as a 25ft long bottomless and ceilingless pit.

The overcautious trap inspector #

This is just a room with 4 suits of armour, 24 or so 5ft by 5ft pressure plates, each individually covered with a 5ft by 5ft rug and an obvious impression that it's there. There should additionally be a criss-cross of mounted dragon heads with a hole at the back of their mouth. In each corner of the room there is a small mouse trap with a little bit of cheese. In the middle is a chest, that is covered with some kind of sticky residue. Everything here serves a purpose:

• Everything in this room will glow with a magic aura if someone uses detect magic. If you need some sort of magical effect, things are self-repairing
• Inside the chest is a single gold coin that activates a gear system that players can hear. Inside the chest is 1 gold coin. It's not a real gold coin, it's a chocolate coin.
• The mouse traps will trigger on any detect trap.
• The pressure plates make players uneasy. Make this extra uneasy by making a roll each time they step on one.
• The dragon heads look like either arrow or fireball launchers
• Mimics are sticky in D&D 5e, so a player opening it will think it's a mimic
• The suits of armour are melded into the wall, as if they are some kind of animated armour-golem hybrid

Everything about this room is designed to be a very funny red herring after all the traps they've encountered previously.

Conclusion #

This concludes the fourth part of Morgrim's everlasting miserable defences of doom.

Send all complaints of failed traps to "1, Dungeon of almost certain Doom and Misery, City of Yendor, M1S-3RY".

Published on 2026/03/04