I have a plan to have the characters go into what is essentially a treasure room. Each character will see one treasure chest: the one meant for them. However, in the room, there are actually 5 chests - it's just that they can only see the one for themselves.
My problems is that I can't figure out how to explain this in the narrative without explaining it all. I thought it would make a nice bit of confusion, but it may be one of those things that just doesn't translate well.
Am I just overcomplicating? Should I just make it so they can only open the one meant for that character?
It's a powerful blend of magics. Illusion especially, but also enchantment and charm. It's a fantasy game, so the players will hop onto the "free magic item" bus!
Have them each roll a perception check. Then give them slightly different descriptions with different locations and color chests as if it were related to the perception check.
You rolled a 16? You see a green chest in the center of the room.
You rolled a 20? Oh wow, you see a purple polka dot chest in the far left corner.
Also be prepared to tell players that the other guys seems to be pulling items out of thin air.
Are you playing with some kind of map, or theater of the mind?
With a map, you can say, Bob, you see a chest here. Then point. Sarah, you see a chest her, then point. And point to a different spot for each player. Maybe embellish on what the chest looks like.
Then sit back while they spend a half hour trying to figure out the trap. It could really be entertaining.
With TotM, you just need to do more to describe the location. Or maybe write out notes. That can give you time to describe locations in detail. And you hand a note to each player.
Then sit back while they spend a half hour trying to figure out the trap.
I think you would want to describe to the characters what they see. Start off without too much detail, the type of information the character's would share.
"You see a chest in the room."
Characters/people wouldn't say "I see a a red cubical chest", "I see a yellow chest with a curved top" ... this doesn't happen until the characters/players begin to figure out that the characters are seeing different things.
If the characters want to enter the room and start interacting with the chest, then the needed details would start to be revealed.
"I go check the chest for traps" ... when a character does this describe them walking up to the chest THEN describe to the rest of the party that the character appears to be examining an empty space no where near the chest.
I think the key to this is figuring out what the other players see when a player decides to interact with their chest so that you can describe it to the other players. What the character interacting with their own chest sees is pretty easy.
The next stage is when the players start to think they are seeing an illusion, they will try to figure out which of them is looking at a real chest (if any). They may then discover that they can all interact with their own chest.
It's up to you to figure out what the other character's see when those interactions occur. For example, if someone opens a chest and gold glitter explodes out of it, you can describe it covering everything but perhaps the characters only see the one character who opened that chest suddenly covered in gold glitter. Figure out the rules you want to use ... for example, things only become "real" for other characters once the character to whom the chest belongs has interacted with its contents - until then chest and contents don't exist for the other characters.
Once you have the "rule" of how interactions work, you can then adjudicate how the characters interacting the chests looking for traps will appear to the other characters also in the room.
I have a plan to have the characters go into what is essentially a treasure room. Each character will see one treasure chest: the one meant for them. However, in the room, there are actually 5 chests - it's just that they can only see the one for themselves.
My problems is that I can't figure out how to explain this in the narrative without explaining it all. I thought it would make a nice bit of confusion, but it may be one of those things that just doesn't translate well.
Am I just overcomplicating? Should I just make it so they can only open the one meant for that character?
It's a powerful blend of magics. Illusion especially, but also enchantment and charm. It's a fantasy game, so the players will hop onto the "free magic item" bus!
Have them each roll a perception check. Then give them slightly different descriptions with different locations and color chests as if it were related to the perception check.
You rolled a 16? You see a green chest in the center of the room.
You rolled a 20? Oh wow, you see a purple polka dot chest in the far left corner.
Also be prepared to tell players that the other guys seems to be pulling items out of thin air.
Are you playing with some kind of map, or theater of the mind?
With a map, you can say, Bob, you see a chest here. Then point. Sarah, you see a chest her, then point. And point to a different spot for each player. Maybe embellish on what the chest looks like.
Then sit back while they spend a half hour trying to figure out the trap. It could really be entertaining.
With TotM, you just need to do more to describe the location. Or maybe write out notes. That can give you time to describe locations in detail. And you hand a note to each player.
Then sit back while they spend a half hour trying to figure out the trap.
I think you would want to describe to the characters what they see. Start off without too much detail, the type of information the character's would share.
"You see a chest in the room."
Characters/people wouldn't say "I see a a red cubical chest", "I see a yellow chest with a curved top" ... this doesn't happen until the characters/players begin to figure out that the characters are seeing different things.
If the characters want to enter the room and start interacting with the chest, then the needed details would start to be revealed.
"I go check the chest for traps" ... when a character does this describe them walking up to the chest THEN describe to the rest of the party that the character appears to be examining an empty space no where near the chest.
I think the key to this is figuring out what the other players see when a player decides to interact with their chest so that you can describe it to the other players. What the character interacting with their own chest sees is pretty easy.
The next stage is when the players start to think they are seeing an illusion, they will try to figure out which of them is looking at a real chest (if any). They may then discover that they can all interact with their own chest.
It's up to you to figure out what the other character's see when those interactions occur. For example, if someone opens a chest and gold glitter explodes out of it, you can describe it covering everything but perhaps the characters only see the one character who opened that chest suddenly covered in gold glitter. Figure out the rules you want to use ... for example, things only become "real" for other characters once the character to whom the chest belongs has interacted with its contents - until then chest and contents don't exist for the other characters.
Once you have the "rule" of how interactions work, you can then adjudicate how the characters interacting the chests looking for traps will appear to the other characters also in the room.
This is all amazingly helpful. Thank you all!