Ayleid Traps

Throughout many, if not all of the Ayleid ruins in Cyrodiil, there are a variety of different traps for the Hero to negotiate. Many of these guard entrances to important tombs or a particular stash of treasure with valuable items in them. All are extremely dangerous and need to be tackled carefully if the Hero is to survive.
==Featured traps==
===Gas traps===
These particular traps throughout the ruins are most commonly found around individual tombs, on each corner of the plinth the tomb rests on. They are characterized as a square grille that when stood on by the Hero, give off a toxic gas that causes their health to drain as long as they are still standing in the gas.
This can be dangerous to lower level characters or those who do not have a lot of health through class or previous encounters with traps/enemies. However, they are easily avoided so should not pose much of a problem or cause unexpected character deaths. In some select ruins, a larger form of the gas trap may be found, where it is one large grille in the center of the room that when stood on emits gas like the smaller versions.
Additionally, walls come up to surround the Hero, trapping them and forming a kind of gas chamber so there is no escape from the fumes. This form of the trap has a wider effect radius and stronger potency, so must be avoided at all costs if their health is low.
===False floor traps===
Featured in most ruins, a false floor trap is an entire section of the room's flooring, generally the center, that falls down into a pit of spikes when the player stands on it. These traps are characterized by having many holes in the floor, giving the Hero an indication that it is actually a trap. Avoiding them can be difficult, as the trap takes up the entire pathway that leads to the next room or passage.
Thankfully, there are always alcoves to either side of the trap, each one containing a tomb. These allow the Hero to jump horizontally across the corners of the false floor, avoiding touching the trap and allowing them to proceed without being harmed. However these traps can also come in handy for them. If there is an enemy on the other side of trap and they attack, they will seemingly not know that there is a trap there and walk across it, activating the false floor and falling onto the spikes. If they are a lower level enemy, such as a rat, they will probably be killed instantly.
===Crushing floor traps===
These traps are a variant of the false floor ones, as they contain the same principle of a section of flooring in the center of a room that cannot be avoided without jumping across the corners and into the alcoves. These ones however, upon contact with the Hero, quickly rise up and attempt to crush them on spikes that are built into the ceiling, drastically reducing health and even killing lower level characters and enemies.
It is recommended that the Hero does not have reduced health when tackling these traps for this reason. Spotting them can be tricky as they do not have the characteristic holes of the false floor traps, but occasionally there will be a dead body or a splatter of blood in the center of the trap, indicating that someone has been crushed there. It is best to err on the side of caution just in case.
===Falling blades traps===
These traps feature heavily along the walkways of most Ayleid ruins, rising and falling intermittently as the Hero activates them. Dangerous and hard to avoid, it is best that they tackle the blades one at a time, allowing it time to rise high enough for them to walk under it but not so high that it comes straight down again.
When they are on the ground, they can be jumped over if one has a high enough Acrobatics skill, but if not completely cleared with a jump can still cause massive damage to the Hero's health. Lower level characters are recommended to be patient as being hit by one or more blades may result in the character's death, and certainly running blindly throughout the entire section of blades can result in the death or severe injury of higher level characters.
===Sweeping blades traps===
Found most commonly in narrow passages, the sweeping blades are very dangerous traps that are moderately easy to avoid. They usually consist of two separate sets of blades that sweep independently from each other, offering the Hero an opportunity to avoid one set, wait for the other to sweep, then walk past that one.
The reasonably long gap between each sweep means there is plenty of time to avoid getting hit, so negotiating these traps is not too difficult. However, if hit with one of these blades they can cause severe injury, if not death in lower level characters.
===Spiked grille traps===
Not as common as the other traps, the spiked grilles are found on the walkways like the falling blade traps. It consists of a spiked, metal grille that is suspended from the ceiling, and that every so often slides across the walkway to knock off or impale whatever is in its way. The only way to avoid this trap is to jump up onto the ledge at the edge of the walkway, walking along that so that the grille misses the character completely.
==Modified Ayleid Ruins==
In some occupied ruins, Bandits and Goblins have added their own traps, such as the spiked iron ball on a chain and the spiked logs that are activated by pressure plates. These traps are only in the first section of the ruin (if another section is applicable) and can be expected to be found around the entrance to the ruin or certain rooms.
Compared to the Ayleid traps, these are generally unsophisticated and easy to spot; just look for the metal plate on the ground. The damage done by these traps is also minimal.
==Appearances==
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Category:Ayleid Culture
Category:Ayleid Ruins
Category:Oblivion: Gameplay