Editing Coup-De-Grace: Arena Design (section)

===Pit Types===

A "standard pit" might be considered to have a hard stone floor after a drop of ten feet or so. Represent this by having a mini that falls in automatically lose 1 HP, with no roll required. The fixed damage from falling in means that heavy armoured characters are just as prone to gravity as unarmoured ones! 

A "spiked pit" has some sort of extra damage inherent in it. A good way to approach this is to have the fall in still do 1HP, but then have the spikes make an "attack" against anyone who falls in, potentially doing another HP damage. This makes heavy armour a decent protection against pit spikes, though the fall itself might cause damage.

An "instant kill pit" simply takes out of action anyone who falls into it. This might represent the classic bottomless pit, or a pit filled with lava, or scorpions. Instant kill pits are a fun thing to put at the edge of the arena, to discourage players from hugging those edges.