Quote from: _kent_;586127That is visually interesting but here is a question for you. In some movies and computer games secret doors are really puzzle doors presenting an unmistakable if difficult challenge. But shouldn't secret doors be anonymous, mundane and invisible no matter how grand the vistas beyond? At least if I was an architect that is how I would design them.

Yes you're right. I had forgotten to mention that the set of three doors is in fact behind a secret door, but that is a more conventional one with a push mechanism. It's the red area here:



OK. How about this one? The area with the arrows just north west of the red area? The long corridor that makes a U shape. OK. This corridor is only accessible by the door in the middle above the U (where you see the teleporter). Then when you step onto the first floor trigger indicated by box A you arm the trick of this place. An illusion appears behind A like the corridor is going on behind you and the door behind you disappeared.

You go down the corridor, and reach plate B. There's an illusion there behind plate B that makes the corridor look empty before you. When you step on plate B, you are teleported to A and the position you're facing is switched 180 degrees. For a brief moment, the illusion in front of B breaks and you see a glimpse of a door in front of you. Then you are teleported to A facing south.

You're going like this in loops in an infinite corridor, getting an idea that there are plates at regular intervals, and seeing the door flash before your eyes once in a while. To reach the eastern door that opens in the room and get outside of the loop, you need to step backwards onto plate A to be teleported to plate B switched 180 degrees, now facing north, the illusion behind B dissipated, and potentially find the secret door there, or go back to the teleporter room.

I know it's not about opening the secret door itself... but it's more about accessing it in the first place.

(speaking of which, looking at this again allowed me to realize I had forgotten the one-way arrows on the doors leading to the U corridor, which I've added here for the sake of clarity - thanks Kent)

Quote from: _kent_;586127That reminds me of the illustrations in C1 and S1. It is very satisfying to give players good handouts, Warhammer 1e was particularly good for that, but I hadn't thought of it for secret doors and it sounds almost perfect as a device. There may be difficulty though in giving them a picture without informing them there is a secret to be discovered if the idea is used more than once or you don't have many pictures of the environment.

Yes. I imagine that for that to work, you'd have to have a bunch of insteresting sketches and other handouts, as in the case of C1, so as to not give away that you've got to do this or that with it. If it's one amongst other handouts, it might be taken for a clue for another area later, some historical context for the place, etc. Not necessarily a secret door.

Quote from: mcbobbo;586274I'll have to assume you're being facetious since you didn't offer even one rebuttal...

What is there to rebutt? You and Vile really don't like a figure of speech currently in use, to the point where you both don't seem to engage in the concept that it is shorthand for. Big fuckin' deal. Get over it. Pixelbitching exists.

Quote from: jeff37923;586183Yes, it would take a dick DM. However, it is a sign of a dick DM to allow a secret door that only opens / is found when the PCs do a certain action.

Jeff I am curious what your thoughts are on that example I posted from the 1e DMG.  See above.

Quote from: Mistwell;586381Jeff I am curious what your thoughts are on that example I posted from the 1e DMG.  See above.

Not a dick move by the DM. The smudged map provides a clue.

The pixelbitching I'm talking about are things like there is a secret door, but only if you place your two fingers in the eye sockets of the most frightening looking skull on an altar will allow the altar to be moved and expose the hidden stairwell. That may work if your Players have seen The Name of the Rose and remember the scene, but otherwise the Players will be lost if they do not have a clue to indicate that there is a secret door in the room and/or how to operate it.

Quote from: Guy Fullerton;586139Based on what I said already, some of the detail might be obvious from the back cover illustration, shown here:
http://www.chaotichenchmen.com/2009/01/fane-of-poisoned-prophecies.html

I like it. In fact I have been using stairs with the property of dislocation myself recently.

Quote from: _kent_;586407I like it. In fact I have been using stairs with the property of dislocation myself recently.

Bendy doors could be cool too:

Quote from: Benoist;586276Then when you step onto the first floor trigger indicated by box A you arm the trick of this place. An illusion appears behind A like the corridor is going on behind you and the door behind you disappeared.

You go down the corridor, and reach plate B. There's an illusion there behind plate B that makes the corridor look empty before you. When you step on plate B, you are teleported to A and the position you're facing is switched 180 degrees. For a brief moment, the illusion in front of B breaks and you see a glimpse of a door in front of you. Then you are teleported to A facing south.

You're going like this in loops in an infinite corridor, getting an idea that there are plates at regular intervals, and seeing the door flash before your eyes once in a while.

There is a very similar teleport trick in Starstone. I suppose they are all similar in principle but could certainly be graded beginner, intermediate and advanced depending on the prominence of hints that teleportation is occurring.

I assume if you walk clockwise you experience a symmetrical effect of looping clockwise. As soon as the door flashed up and I had gone through one iteration I would have gone back to the u-bend and put a spear on the ground parallel to the south wall and walked again to B, now I see the spear ahead not behind and know that I am repeating half cycles and not that there are two separate flashing doors 'B' in NE and SW. I would know that 'A' exists and do a clockwise loop too but primarily I would try to skirt 'A' going north and try to approach 'A' from the north. I am not sure I would think of walking backwards onto 'A'.

Quote from: jeff37923;586372What is there to rebutt? You and Vile really don't like a figure of speech currently in use, to the point where you both don't seem to engage in the concept that it is shorthand for. Big fuckin' deal. Get over it. Pixelbitching exists.

So you don't disagree that the word could be improved?  It's just that you're not interested in improving it.  Right?

Quote from: jeff37923;586390Not a dick move by the DM. The smudged map provides a clue.

The pixelbitching I'm talking about are things like there is a secret door, but only if you place your two fingers in the eye sockets of the most frightening looking skull on an altar will allow the altar to be moved and expose the hidden stairwell. That may work if your Players have seen The Name of the Rose and remember the scene, but otherwise the Players will be lost if they do not have a clue to indicate that there is a secret door in the room and/or how to operate it.

" The most frightening looking skull" is subjective. So long as the actual object is identified as the trigger (3rd skull from the right for ex.) everything is ok.  Presumably the secret door exists no matter if a skull is approached or not. Quite often, a secret door can be detected while the means to open it may take a bit more effort.

So, being able to detect the secret door if it is searched for combined with a detailed description of the room's contents is just fine.

With the old school rules in play there are actually a couple ways to find a secret door. You can make the die roll, find the door, then explore the area for the trigger

OR possibly fail the roll to find the door, and trigger it anyway by messing with the room's contents while just exploring.

Quote from: Mistwell;586143I always liked the example in the AD&D DMG Page 99: [Players have a clue that there should be a way out of a room they've arrived at from a smudged map they found]

The DMG is in a class by itself and in many ways remains advanced. I can't imagine DMing for a player who would not prefer even to fail at such exploration and discovery than succeed by rolling a 1 on a d6.

Quote from: mcbobbo;586425So you don't disagree that the word could be improved?  It's just that you're not interested in improving it.  Right?

No, I think you are just trolling.

Quote from: mcbobbo;586235I believe that each gaming session has a purpose and that the players and GM should agree on that purpose.  Secret doors can then be good or bad depending on what that purpose is...

Scenario A - Players expect to be given a task, go out and resolve the conflict, return and spend the treasure.

In this situation, placing the only method of resolution behind a secret door is a dangerous idea, just as any other method of puzzle use would be.

Justin Alexander already explained this better than I could, so maybe go check this out...

Scenario B - Players expect to explore a space sandbox style, and if they cannot make progress in an area, they will simply move on.

This makes secret door use much more acceptable.  In fact, in a megadungeon, for example, they will probably be back to the area later, and may find the door then.

Scenario C - The GM likes to make the players dance, and enjoys seeing them quiver under the sheer intellect of his designs.

I played under a guy like this once.  It was a lot of fun, but again we all knew the expectations going in.

I only recognise Scenario B above as you have defined them though I don't like the word 'sandbox' because it has become a loaded definition but I know what you mean.

Scenario A - Players expect to be given a task, go out and resolve the conflict, return and spend the treasure.

This is closer to how I play with a critical change to the definition because there are always real events developing and characters the players want to interact with but there is no sense that tasks are measured to fit and there is no expectation of success. So I would redefine A.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;586426" The most frightening looking skull" is subjective. So long as the actual object is identified as the trigger (3rd skull from the right for ex.) everything is ok.  Presumably the secret door exists no matter if a skull is approached or not. Quite often, a secret door can be detected while the means to open it may take a bit more effort.

So, being able to detect the secret door if it is searched for combined with a detailed description of the room's contents is just fine.

With the old school rules in play there are actually a couple ways to find a secret door. You can make the die roll, find the door, then explore the area for the trigger

OR possibly fail the roll to find the door, and trigger it anyway by messing with the room's contents while just exploring.

I get what you are saying here, however when I speak of pixelbitching it relates back to the OP.

Quote from: _kent_;585830[1] Do you design secret doors with mechanisms which require specific verbal instructions from your players to discover and unlock?

I prefer to have multiple method of discovery and opening a secret door in my games, including just destroying the secret door and the wall it is in. However, there are some very subjective definitions of what is considered to be good "specific verbal instructions" and bad "specific verbal instructions" which are dependant on the DM. How specific those instructions are should be dependant upon how many clues and how informative those clues are - greater complexity means better and more informative clues. Which can get downright stupid at times in Actual Play.

Quote from: _kent_;586420There is a very similar teleport trick in Starstone. I suppose they are all similar in principle but could certainly be graded beginner, intermediate and advanced depending on the prominence of hints that teleportation is occurring.

Yes. I'd say so.

Quote from: _kent_;586420I assume if you walk clockwise you experience a symmetrical effect of looping clockwise.

Correct.

Quote from: _kent_;586420As soon as the door flashed up and I had gone through one iteration I would have gone back to the u-bend and put a spear on the ground parallel to the south wall and walked again to B, now I see the spear ahead not behind and know that I am repeating half cycles and not that there are two separate flashing doors 'B' in NE and SW. I would know that 'A' exists and do a clockwise loop too but primarily I would try to skirt 'A' going north and try to approach 'A' from the north. I am not sure I would think of walking backwards onto 'A'.

Yes. Jumping over the plates is a possibility. I'm reluctant to add force walls north of A and B though. Maybe the plates could be replaced by metal casings around the corridor at these spots instead, and act as teleportation fields. Stepping through A the first time would trigger the loop.

Cool thread.

Just an aside taking up a throwaway comment upthread: who actually has characters discovering not only the door but the means to open it with a die roll?  The example in the DMG involves a find secret door roll (admittedly by inference; he rolls dice earlier when the party is unaware that the door is 10' above their heads...I always assumed the detect door roll was made after making sure the [demi]human pyramid didn't collapse).

I've always used the roll to let players determine that a secret door exists.  The opening relies on player description.  I've never played with anyone else who does it any other way, but that's admittedly meaningless.

I've never really had an ultra-clever secret door in my dungeons, really.  I figured they were meant to be used, so elaborate means of opening them would be stupid.