Pressure plate

Version 0.32: This article is up to date for the latest stable release of Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup.

One of the floor stones doesn't seem that sturdy, and you notice that it is a trigger of some sort, though you can't tell what kind of trap it is attached to.

A pressure plate is a trap which causes some pre-scripted, generally bad event to happen. They are destroyed upon being stepped on.

Possible Results

• Drop Trap: Spawns several monsters right next to the player. This is by far the most common variation of pressure plate the player will encounter.
  • Spiders: You are immediately surrounded by eight redbacks.

A basket of spiders falls from above!

• Snakes: You are immediately surrounded by eight black mambas and mana vipers. Exclusive to the Snake Pits.

A basket of snakes falls from above!

• Klown Kar: You are immediately surrounded by three to eight Killer Klowns. Exclusive to the Realm of Zot.

With a honk a tiny klown kar falls from above, and Killer Klowns tumble out!

• Rats Trap: A narrow corridor with a pressure plate in the middle, which upon being stepped on reveals the adjacent walls to be filled with rats and river rats. Only found on Dungeon levels 4-10.
• Liches: Opens grates that hold liches, ancient liches and dread liches in them. Only found in one Crypt ending.

History

• Previously, there were harmful cloud traps, and traps that revealed various cells with harmful monsters in them.
• Snake and Klown Kar drop trap variations were added in 0.23.
• Prior to 0.16, you could levitate/fly over them if you managed to find one before stepping on it.