I'm currently GMing 4th ed, and a few runs ago the shadowrun team had to infiltrate a gangs hideout that had an assortment of booby traps. Well a few of the players voiced their opinions that they didn't understand how I was figuring out how much damage they where taking. I told them to shut up, I'm the GM!...(actually I said that part in my head), I Told them I made up some rules based on the trap creators Logic + Intuition as an opposed combat test against whomever sprung the trap, against their Reaction. Net hits adding to the damage. Are there any rules on booby traps in any Shadowrun books that I might have missed? Anyone think my system is good or have a better idea, I welcome the feedback? How do you determine how much damage falling into a pit of spikes would be?

Why should there be any rules for that in a futuristic setting? Just use mines, grenades, monofilament, electric wires or firearms.

Do Breast Implants linked to a Cybergland filled with Universal Sealant count as a Booby Trap?

From a metagame aspect, booby traps are usually a bad idea. The clues that people have in real life don't exist in a game in which the action is all based on verbal descriptions. They can easily amount to "rocks fall everyone dies" when they set off the claymore mine behind the door.

What this results in an incredibly slow moving game in which people very carefully and methodically explore the area, always looking for evidence of a trap.

"I take a step and observe in detail, do I see anything?, I get two successes"
"No"
"Ok, so I have my flyspy with the cyberware scanner fly anyother 5 feet and check again, 3 success."
"No"
"Ok, I'll have the crawler move forward a meter and use it's scanners.....

I think you are on the right track. The one's making the trap would roll to see how effective and hidden it would be. I'd take a look at current weapon damage and try and figure out the closest to an attack the trap would make sense if it was perfectly put together. I'd probably just try and keep it simple by assigning something like a 5P and if the gang rolled well, it would stay 5P. If not, then I'd lower it. Or you could set the base damage value and step it up accordingly. The point is, you should decide whether the gang setting it up rolls to step the damage up or is used against the defender's reaction to get net hits.

The players you could easily just have a single roll to notice. If they don't and spring the trap, have them roll reaction to avoid some of the damage. You could either apply damage right there or allow a soak.

The basic idea is to give the mechanics a similar feel to existing rules. So, the 'attacker' rolls a success test and can step up the damage. The 'defender' gets a chance to avoid the damage and then soak.

Bah, all you need is a ten-foot pole!

~J

This was one of my first games with the group I was playing with for 4th ed, and I wanted to kind of humble them the fact that every dangerous situation they face isn't always going to be a cybered/awakened one, or the one with the biggest guns. Something mundane as a few spikes at the bottom of a well concealed trap can be just as deadly as a gun, or monowire. I tried to give the group a fair chance to avoid the traps and make them use their heads. The first one was a crossbow set to go off when the group opened a door that said "Don't Open this Door" on it, naturally the Runners opened the door and set off the trap.

I tried something different that run, knowing perception rolls would give things away, I had characters roll a dozen perception rolls and wrote down each one adding 2 different colored dice if they had specializations then anytime a perception roll was called for I would use the results factoring in the bonus if it applied. The game smoother then I hoped, the only argument was how much damage they were taking and wanting to know how I was determining it. Nobody died, well not from the traps anyways.

Make a list of your players' dice pools for "passive" checks, like perception (and lie detection). When one of these checks is called for, you roll them without telling the player what exactly you're rolling. If they get enough successes to notice anything, you tell the player what he found.

How do your players describe the way they move around? If they say they're moving slowly and carefully, maybe give them some bonus dice. If they're trying to be fast (or distracted), use some penalties.

Traps should have a Concealment Rating that is a threshold to notice them. The rating depends on bulk and the cleverness of the concealment. The damage depends on the type of trap. There'll often be some sort of trade-off between payload and concealment, but even a small trap can be vicious.

Consider also the following: what kind of traps, and where? You don't want to accidentally kill legitimate visitors or staff. Keep it real!

I propose the following rules (because PCs will also want to do this from time to time):

* Building a booby-trap should be a Logic+(Mechanic, Demolitions, Armourer or Artisan) [?, 1 hour] extended check, with threshold related to the amount of damage you want it to do (and to what area)
* Hiding it calls for an Intuition+(Mechanic, Tracking or Artisan) [?, 1 minute] extended check, with every 4 hits increasing its Concealment Rating by 1

* Detecting a trap is usually an Intuition+Perception [Concealment Rating] passive check
* MAD scanners and such make their own scan, and ignore any Concealment not specifically designed against it (well, if the trap would be detectable to a MAD scanner.)

Don't make booby-traps too powerful, it's not all that funny to die from, and excessive paranoia can really slow down a game.

The Threshold of the Concealment Rating might seem a bit low, but remember: visibility modifiers are a killer!

Also note that things like land mines qualify as pre-built traps that just need hiding.



Mental note: Home Alone meets Shadowrun...

Another idea for "Passive checks" if you want to speed things up and not be rolling dice all the time... Simplify. Use the 4:1 rule to determine their "Passive Perception Rating" (or if you're feeling generous, use the 3:1 dice average). This is strictly for those times when the players don't specify they're keeping their eyes open, and you don't want to tip your hand that somethings up. Other times, allow them to roll as normal.

Bascially, you set your traps and what not with a Target. 1 for easy, 2 for average, 3 for hard, etc. And then if they have, say 6 dice, plus 3 from Cyber Eyes for visual perception to spot the land mine, they have a Passive Perception of 2.

Bull

Female pornomancers. Wait, oh, not that type of boobies.

You are in essense trying to hide a weapon. Therefore roll a Disguise and let's see. The result of the test will be the threshold for perception for the other guys.

Thanks for the good responses

It would be pretty Simple to Observe in Detail. Move, Observe in Detail (Visual), Move, Observe in Detail (Hearing), Move... and so on, cycling through the senses. He could burn through those prepared rolls quite fast.

And the gangers also don't want to blow themselves up because of some mistake/technical flaw.

You can always give players some clues about gangers' boom-boom hobby - contacts could hear about it or maybe another gang had a nasty "incident" with their traps.

Oh, and Olfactory Booster could also help to find a trap. Think about police dog, used to "sniff" for drugs and explosives.

Well their ARE rules for explosive booby traps, their even called that under the rules, check page 95 of Arsenal. The rules could be pretty easily converted.
Use those rules an adapt them to cover whatever device you have set up to activate on the players. Just rember this is SR not D&D, traps should be simple and effective and in probibly controlled by the main node for the area if its anything over a trip wire.

Someone needs to review the description of the Red Hot Nukes, I think.

~J

You'd be surprised how much that does in the World's Largest Dungeon (that monster of a campaign for the cancer-causing game everyone knows and loaths).

One ceiling trap in the entire place (no really, the ENTIRE DUNGEON) and it made us paranoid.

Right. I mean most gangers.