Sunday Sundries: We Knew It Was A Trap But...

...we had no idea how Machiavellian it was

Cuddles is by far the best trap genius I know. Sometimes it'll come from nowhere, but often she's forcing you to walk into something, complete with that smug GM smirk (you know the one), knowing it's a trap, but having to do it anyway.

And often then you get the surprise right alongside the trap.

For example…

A group of us were dungeon crawling. Standard crowd: sneaky fucker (that was me), ‘learned’ mage, White Knight…etc.

And we're just hunting for the key to a MacGuffin, killing a few things along the way.

In one room we take down a gigantic spider. As you do.

And then we find ourselves stood, at the threshold to a room, which is perfectly empty, except for the key we need hanging from a hook in the ceiling, directly in the centre.

Photo by Dagmara Dombrovska from Pexels

So we KNOW it's a trap.

I go back to the spider, lop off all its legs, and bring them over to scatter them around the room.

And Cuddles asks the question that I know I'm gonna get wrong: how do I scatter them?

She nods. Her face is blank, but I can see that smirk anyway. She says “OK,” in that very specific tone of voice she has which means “You are so very screwed. Yay.”

My blood drains from my face. Everything slows down. My character's life passes before my eyes.

And I tell her the truth - the original plan, which has had no in character moment for me to change (even tho player me now knows this is somehow the exact wrong thing to do).

I throw these legs along the floor, past the walls, basically doing as much coverage as I can.

Nothing triggers.

Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck.

But I'm the sneaky fucker, so, once the key proves resistant to magic (obviously, but we had to try), it comes down to me as the most likely to get furthest in before dying in an entertaining fashion.

I edge in.

So far so good.

Another step.

Am I wobbling or is it the…yep it's the floor!

Cue me, the no longer sneaky at all fucker, making a flying leap to the ONLY thing in this room I can hang onto - the hook with the key - as the ENTIRE. FUCKING. FLOOR. tips over. Showing glistening spikes below before it completes its Sweeney Todd 180 and snicks gently back into place.

Photo by Kristina Paukshtite

So I'm hanging on to a hook in a ceiling. I have somehow developed the presence of mind to pocket the key, but that's no fucking use to anyone if I'm about to be impaled.

On the plus side the spikes were gleaming, so they were probably at least clean…

Now comes some frantic discussion over how the fuck to get me back over where it's safe, before the muscles I'm using to hold myself up realise they're actually doing something impossible, and I get to do a cartoon stunned face as I fall to my death.

Eventually our ‘learned’ mage remembers they can do telekinesis magic.

So I am very slowly, and very carefully (lest I lose my balance before they get that fucking key from me), mind-maged back to the entrance, where White Knight pulls me to safety, and I hit the floor in a crumpled heap.

And I'm so amazed to be alive, that I even neglect to tease White Knight about carrying me over the threshold…

Cuddles, of course, has spent this entire time in gales of laughter so hard her ribs hurt the next day.

And I stop just long enough to give her a glare before joining in.

Photo by Ann H

Cuddles: Machiavellian Trap Genius.

That's all for today! I'll see you Wednesday for two stories - the last one that I failed to post due to chaos, and the new one.