Hey all, I'm working on a room trap for my group and could use some help, if you're willing. Here's my description of the room and the mechanics of the trap.  Please, constructive criticism and help, thanks. Let me know what you think. Finally, forgive me if this the wrong place for this thread.

The Chamber of Chains is a barrier trap room 100’ x 100’. This dark room is filed with black chains stretching at every angle from ceiling to floor, wall to wall. A basin set into the floor at the room’s center will gather the water that trickles as a stream in from the entrance.  The floor has an ever so slight incline and is crisscrossed with a maze of grooves and small inset basins. The water chooses a wayward journey around the room by means of the grooves, following a path that reveals the proper way to navigate the chain trap.  Gaps in the chains will allow a small or medium sized character to easily begin to traverse the path. The character must keep moving, as each time the water flows into a small basin node in the floor, the chains will constrict, making movement through the chain path more difficult until it is impossible and the character becomes irretrievably stuck and dies of starvation. When the water flows out of a basin, the chain path behind the character closes. The water will only follow the correct path while the character moving through the chains can follow a more direct path to the central basin.  If they do, the chains will quickly constrict. Moving through the chains is considered a climbing action, so each foot of movement costs one extra foot. Touching the room floor immediately constricts the chain trap, and any character within will suffer strangulation.  It takes 15 minutes for the chains to automatically reset.  The trap begins as a DC 5 Strength (Athletics) check and increases by DC1 each time the chains constrict.  If the character reaches the central basin at the same time as the water, they can step into it. The chains will retract into the walls and the room will be open for all group members to enter.  Three desiccated corpses will drop to the floor.  Looting these bodies of provide X items and treasure. It will take 1 hour for the basin to fill. Once at the brim, its overflow streams into a new channel towards one of several doors revealing the true exit of the room.

What happens if the PCs go with the brute force solution of breaking the chains?

This is a great question. For our adventure, characters will still be 1st level, and won’t have access to tools to bust it up. Still, that’s an option I hadn’t thought of, so thank you. 

Honestly, this seems to be an excessively harsh trap.  What the players need to do in it is somewhat counter-intuitive and the end result is inescapable death?  That's really too much for a first level party.

I like the idea but I might go for something a little different and I'll pinch an idea from the people over at Geek and Sundry. Behind your screen have a Snakes and ladders (or Chutes and Ladders if you're not in the UK) board, the offical board has 100 squars so that should be equal to a 50ft x 50ft room.

(pic I found on  line)

Pick some squares with nothing on them as places in the room where the basins are located and have the party enter at square 1.You can still describe the room as being filled with chains.

If they move through a square which starts or ends on the head or tail of a Snake/Chute then they activate a "constriction" this would be one of the following spells: Cloud of Daggers (the chains whip around at high speed), Entangle (the chains ensare a body part) or Spike Growth (the chains are barbed making movement difficult). These effects would then give you the mechnics you need to usher the party through and you can always tweak the damage of each effect to reflect their low level.

If they move through a square which starts or ends on the first or last rung of a ladder then they can activate a water effect which guides the water to the next basin by using the Interate with an object action to use a water pump.

Hope that makes sense.

Brilliant!

Basically, this is why I’m bouncing it off the group. Thanks for the input!

Here are a few things to consider:

• what if they try to break the chains? what if they roll a nat20 attacking the chains to do so? What if they use Pitons to lever the chains apart? Or acidic breath weapons?
• What if they climb the chains? If I were presented with this trap, and you told me that "as soon as your foot touches the floor, the chains constrict", then I would be climbing the chains across the room, not touchign the floor.
• What if they use Create Water, or some other means to flood the room?
• do the gaps in the path chains give the path away?
• Is there anything obvious that tells you that (or why) the chains respond to the water?
• Does this allow the party to move as a group, or will they have to wait 15 minute each if nobody stands in the baisin in the middle? Is there anything to make it obvious that the baisin needs to be stood in?
• Many people have things like Misty Step and the like, obviously you can't mollycoddle them but consider their chances of survivl if they just Misty-step through the first 30ft of the room, then start getting wrapped up.Perhaps a way to make the chains spit people back out the way they came from would be a good option for the players, especially at level 1. Won't help them get through, but will let them try a few things before they die!

Further to this point, the lever can be obvious. If they pull it, it spits some bodies out of the chains to them, showing them what it does. Then they might try to get through, and get tangled, and need someone to pull the "reset lever" for them.