In Oblivion, you could be exploring an old Aylied ruin and suddenly be crushed by a cave in, be impaled by spikes through the floor, be crushed by a floor rushing to the ceiling, and me injured a multitude of other ways, yet escape nearly unscathed. This bugged me and still does.

Now, I think being hit by a trap should affect you more seriously than a little health taken off. It may be too late in development for anything new thats too major to be impemented, but maybe have traps be deadlier such as impalement by floor spikes, or get knocked out if a giant log hits you at full force, only to be taken by nearby bandits who heard the noise.

I'm asking for real consequences from activating traps. In Fallout 3 and New Vegas, if you stepped on a beartrap, odds are it would break your leg, and In Dragon Age Origins, if you were knocked unconsious in battle, you recieved a random injury. Maybe mix these new ideas, like if you are hit by a swinging mace trap, you get a chance to be injured, killed, or knocked out depending on what area of your body was hit, what kind of a trap it was, how heavy the armor you're wearing is, and perhaps the perks that could be associated with trap abilities.

My last idea is that a certain skill that has to do with scouting, maybe sneak, would give you better awareness of traps by giving them a certain sheen or just making them more noticeable, or maybe give perks that can increase awareness by giving you more time/slowed down time to react, or by decreasing the chance of an injury or certain death.

Just wondering what people think, leave ideas or suggestions below

NO traps shouldnt be insta kill was pain in ass in Mournhold during the mainquest

they should be so long as i can detect them and disarm/avoid them.

Personally, instead of seeing traps for how much damage they do, I'd prefer traps to work like puzzles (as I believe they've said they're trying to do). An example of what I'd love to see in dungeons in Skyrim would be traps and puzzles like how they exist in past Zelda games. Not that I'm saying to take ideas from Zelda or anything, but just with some interesting ways to activate traps and puzzles to get from one place to another place in a dungeon. I'd like to have to think a bit more when it comes to this stuff.

Although I wouldn't mind OHKOs with traps, if there was a warning or some sign of it being there. I think it would be cool to instead of just romping around some certain more deadly dungeons like a berserker, you had to be a bit more cautious and pay attention to detail. The "being captured" thing is also interesting, although gameplay-wise, I've no idea how that could be effectively oriented.

EDIT: Perhaps they could even use the clairvoyance spell's downward effect to be like a perimeter checker, where it checks for any nearby traps within a certain range?

More lethal traps please, and fitting, say the floor part who come up should be instant kill, they are easy to see, the dart traps should not do much more damage as they are hard to avoid, however adding paralyze or other effect on the darts would be fun.
Note traps can also be used to kill enemies
Regarding npc, it would be nice if it was a way to disable all trap types, followers has problems with things like the swinging blades. Making traps more lethal will make things harder here.

damn only one who voted a no on perks xD

As long as I can snipe the trip-wires still I don't give a damn. I always killed the second goblin you see in oblivion by sniping the tripwire.

unless I'm mistaken, I don't think there was a TES game in mournhold :shrug:

One other fun idea is tactical traps, traps in combination with guards, even a noisemaker would be a problem for you if it alert the bandit camp. Add paralyze and things get sticky.

Expansion of Morrowind Tribunal :
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Mournhold
http://images.uesp.net/e/e4/TR-map-Mournhold.jpg

"The city of Mournhold and the ruins of Old Mournhold were featured in the Tribunal expansion pack for TES III: Morrowind."

Good idea.

It'll teach you NOT to rush through dungeons and to study your surroundings as you should in caves. One thing I loved and found satisfying is finding a tripwire or pressure plate. Disarming the trap, and sneaking by it unscathed.

TES: 3 Morrowind GOTY Exspansion pack Tribunal

woulda posted faster but couldnt find even 1 video on youtube of a trap in action for tribunal :/ ratehr upsetting lots of final encounter vids tho

If you had the difficulty up high enough in Oblivion some traps were instant death.

I don't mind instant death traps in a game like Tomb Raider but this isn't Tomb Raider. They should do moderately high damage in my opinion. As far as realistic injuries or getting captured and such I think that's too complicated, and the injury part strays too far from the HP health system.

I'd like fewer but more lethal traps than a load of weak / moderate traps personally.

Instant death traps are bad because you don't see them coming and it feels cheap and arbitrary to die to them. They might as well just load your last saved game for you instead.

That said: yes, absolutely, much more damaging traps are a necessity. They should not just hurt you, but also weaken you. Spikes should make you bleed and continue to suffer damage over time. Poison-trapped chests should, well, be in the game first off, but also damage your ability to heal and recover stamina. Magical traps should impede your ability to cast spells or something. If it just hurts you it's a boring excuse to level your Restoration skill. If it has lasting effects? You will do your damnedest to avoid them at all costs, not because they're annoying but because they're a serious threat that you can nonetheless live through and thus not feel compelled to instantly press F9.

i used mods for oblivion that made traps instant death. much more fun. i really wish they would tie trap detection in with security skill since it would fit nicely and also add another use for security. dark messiah did this pretty well. if you stood still and had the necessary perk traps would light up after a few seconds. it wouldnt work when you were moving so you had to actually take your time to search for them. i really wish they would look at how that was done.


i think its a bit silly to be hit by a huge swinging blade or get impaled by a giant metal floor spike and expcet to only take some damage. thats just stupid. you should die for not detecting it pure and simple.