Mechanisms

This skill covers working with delicate mechanisms such as traps, locks and snares, but also various secret doors and hidden switches.

Searching for Mechanisms

Whether you can discover a mechanism depends largely on its Inconspicuousness. If you succeed, you can avoid the mechanism, disable it or unlock it.

Inconspicuousness

The listed Inconspicuousness applies to good conditions, in which the mechanism can easily be concealed. In unfavourable conditions, for example in a well-lit room, its Inconspicuousness will be considerably lower (by up to 10); in very favourable conditions, for example in a dark forest, higher (by up to 10).

If you fail fatally, you are completely surprised and can only defend passively (this applies especially to darts, blades or explosions).

Active Search

You can also search for traps very carefully (actively) and gain a bonus. However, this is a slow and demanding activity, and you search at most 10 metres per minute.

Reflexes

If you do not find a trap and trigger it, lightning reflexes may save you. With a successful Rfx roll you have much more time - you can defend against the trap with a boosted defence. On a Total Success you avoid the trap entirely.

A failed reflex roll means you must face the trap as it is. Fatal Failure means the trap caught you completely unprepared and you have only a passive defence.

Defense

You can usually defend against a triggered trap only with a Dex roll (i.e. unarmed). The reflex roll, which decides whether you manage to react, is also important.

The effects vary greatly. Some traps merely glow, others deal damage like a missile, fire or a fall. Besides that, they may also be poisoned.

Unlocking Locks

Thanks to your knack for fine manipulation, you can open almost any lock or mechanism.

Lockpicks

An essential tool is a set of lockpicks or tools. You cannot simply buy them, but you can get them from someone, obtain them on the black market, have them made (which attracts unwanted attention) or make them yourself. Good lockpicks cost around 1 gold piece on the black market; a master blacksmith, for example, can make them.

Locks

Examples of typical difficulties are shown in the following table:

Roll for success:

Unlocking a lock takes from 1 minute to 10 minutes depending on its complexity (set by the GM). Total Success shortens the unlocking time considerably (by 2 steps).

On a Fatal Failure your lockpick breaks or you damage the lock so that it can no longer be opened (or both).

Disarming Mechanisms

If you find a trap or mechanism, you can try to remove it:

Traps

Traps, a deadly enemy to many, are a weapon and a helper to you. Warriors and archers must see their opponent; you only need to know which way he will go and set a deadly trap for him. You risk nothing and can gain a lot.

With this skill you can set traps and use triggers, and you also learn how to better find and remove set traps.

Mechanical Traps

Many traps have two numbers listed in their description:

Trapdoors, snares

Other kinds are written differently, usually just as a standard success roll:

Fire, explosion, acid, poison

Many traps are based on poisoning or explosions. These game mechanics are described in the chapter Fighting - Special Cases of Combat.

Preparation Before Setting

To set a trap, you must have the necessary equipment (otherwise you must improvise). The trap descriptions list the price of the material you need. This includes ropes, metal rods, crossbow stocks, spikes, blades and the like.

Some traps, however, require even more; for example a large stone sphere, a deep pit or pressure tiles in a castle corridor are rather the work of builders and masons, which you enhance with your own mechanism. Of course, you cannot carry them with you or prepare them in the short time of setting a trap (it often takes weeks and months).

Material Weight

Weight will also be a rather crucial parameter. Tell the GM which trap you will set, what you are buying and roughly how much you will invest. The GM will determine the exact price and weight by type (ropes up to 1 kg, blades and self-shooting crossbows several kg).

Setting Traps

When setting a trap, determine:

• the type of trap

• the area you want to cover with traps

Trap Type

Mechanical trap

A mechanical trap consists of various spikes, blades, protruding stakes or shooting bolts. The victim is either impaled or cut to pieces.

You cannot defend against them with a weapon, only unarmed or with a shield. They are usually set to attack from behind or to prevent a shield defence.

Deadly trap

You set up a huge sphere, a falling boulder or an avalanche so that the victim is crushed.

Alchemical product

You set up an alchemical product, ideally explosives or flames, so that it hits the victim as effectively as possible. This is a very effective but expensive affair. To cover a larger space, you need more products.

To use these products on your own, you must either master alchemy (see Secret Arts) or obtain the products together with information on how to use them (ideally from an alchemist).

Snare or Net

This trap is used to catch live victims. Once the trap is triggered, the victim ends up hanging high above the ground, upside down in the case of a snare.

An ordinary net can hold up to 5 human-sized victims (if they were close enough together); a snare as such is only for one victim.

Trapdoor or Pit

If you want to stop someone from advancing further, you can let them fall into a pit.

Each pit or trapdoor, however, has its own parameters, which differ in size (determined by whom it is meant for), location (forest, mountains, building) and depth (usually such that the victim cannot escape). If the pit is very deep or the landing spot very hard, the victim may suffer considerable damage (see the chapter Falling), or possibly further harm (judged by the GM).

Scope

The size of the area on which you lay traps significantly affects their preparation time and the resulting price. Choosing just one place makes sense, for example, for passages your opponent cannot avoid (a door, a window); a larger range makes sense in open spaces (a meadow, a field boundary). A larger range (short / medium / large) means a (small / medium / large) area. If an opponent enters it, he is automatically confronted with the set trap.

The larger the area you try to cover with traps, the more you pay. A short / medium / large range costs the additional price listed in the table only when the terrain is broken (for example a forest), where the number of passages is limited. On a bare plain you will have to count on a price 2x to 3x higher.

With traps over a larger area, the opponent may also be hit several times (2x-4x for medium, up to 10x for large) (unless he backs off after the first time).

Do not forget that you must have the necessary material at hand (bought in advance or on the spot); see the chapter Preparation Before Setting.

Success roll

After you choose the trap type and its range, roll for success. While doing so, you can try to lower the price or change the time:

If you succeed, the trap is set. On a Total Success you can choose:

• the trap has +5 higher Inconspicuousness

• increased trap effects (trap strength +5, e.g. hit or roll difficulty), possibly penetration as well

• the trap is harder to remove (whoever removes it gets a -5 penalty)

Trigger

Every trap has a trigger that sets it in motion. The victim activates it by stepping on it, pulling a string and the like. Triggers usually consist of various rods and wires (or other mechanisms) leading to the trap. Some traps have the trigger built right in, for example explosive traps (they react to touch, i.e. to being stepped on, etc.)

A trigger can therefore be a string, a pressure tile, a plank, a lock or door handle, the opening of a door or a lid.

Setting up triggers is an inseparable part of setting a trap, so you do not need to deal with them separately.