In my NaNo last year, I had a heavily magic-based fight, and the character who'd be doing most (...essentially all...) of the fighting was worried about how it might go. And then he steamrolled over everyone and it was easy. One of my brothers, when he read the story, pointed out the discrepancy and suggested I either make the character less worried or make the fight harder. Naturally, I want to go with the second option.

Talking things over with Arien helped me realize that the group defending the location would likely be aware of the possibility of getting attacked by a rival group or possibly a very powerful being summoned by the rival group, and so they'd be a little more prepared than I'd originally had them. One of the things we thought about was that maybe they set up traps. Not ordinary tripwires or anything, though--magic-based traps.

So I'm hoping for some suggestions. The magic this group practices isn't something I've put much thought into (it's blood magic; the good guys don't do it) but I think its possibilities are largely limitless, provided you have the time (and willingness to shed blood) to set things up. So elaborate traps as well as simple ones are very possible. The traps also don't have to all be deadly--in fact, the powerful being(s) that could have been summoned is essentially immortal, so some traps meant to imprison are very likely.

Any and all suggestions are welcome, and if you have questions about the world and/or this particular scenario, please ask!

Well, I read a book where the magic users set up all kinds of crazy magical traps, according to their skills. They were defending the perimeter of a mansion, with a wall. So the strongest magic users set things like quicksand, bottomless sewage, electricity, things like that. The lesser mages, like gardeners, grow giant spike plants and thistles and brambles along the walls. The chefs and servants make rotten food traps everywhere.

Then there's Home Alone. :-)

*thinks* Well, not knowing a lot about how the magic works exactly, it's kind of hard to think of ideas, but here's a general one I have...

For a spirit or something you could have a vial with blood in it that could be meant to either distract the being, or draw it into the bottle (which would have to be pretty special to hold a spirit in it xD).

Ooh. Thanks for the ideas. They're inside a building (a giant clocktower, actually) so the plant ones might not work, but a variation on the quicksand and the electricity are good possibilities.


I don't exactly know how the magic works. Although I guess the way I've been thinking of it involves setting things up with rituals that include such things as chanting and blood-letting. Probably sometimes painting symbols with said blood and similar things. The one spell that's actually witnessed in the story has chanting, walking around, bloodshed, and a suicide. That was an extreme case, though--generally death isn't required.

No spirits, though: the possible summoned beings are fully corporeal, just also more or less immortal. Something that will kind of distract/pull one of them in a particular direction and then stick him in place might be possible, though.

Ahh, okay. Yes, I think it could still work if the spell were to simply bind him to the bottle, and the bottle to a certain place, or something like that.

On RPG there is a very big list of magical traps (they are really common in some sessions xD).

The biggest part is made by rune inscriptions on floor or walls. We have runes that can spell fire/water/etcetera by touching or only looking at the inscription.
There are some kind that are really cool: fear runes, soultrap (If you feel comfortable with that xD), and etcetera.

Thanks for the ideas!