Trap

In IVAN there are only 2 types of traps. If a trap is active, it is hidden from view, unless placed by your character. If your IVAN character Searches often enough, you can detect these hidden traps and thus can avoid them. Note that planting either of these traps inside a building in a city will likely result in the population trying to slaughter you.

Beartrap

These are usually found in the UT levels, but are also found in GC, but not quite as often. The further into the game you are, the stronger the material the traps are made out of. The ones found in the "secret rooms" generally tend to be made of adamant. The beartrap's main purpose is to clamp onto your leg and prevent you from moving, however if it is made of a strong enough material, it can also sever your limbs as well. Sometimes when planting a beartrap, you can get a limb caught. The chance of this happening increases if you are burdened, stressed, exhausted or fainting. Limbs can also get caught whilst trying to escape from the beartrap. Beartraps can also be used against enemy monsters. You can deactivate beartraps by kicking them, or picking them up whilst levitating, however, picking them up has a chance of getting a limb caught.

The landmine

Mines are generally found active in GC, and unactive ones can sometime be found in the UT. Landmines are deadly to an early IVAN character, and stepping on one during the early stages of the game usually results in death. To be safe, a ring or cloak of fire resistance will help in preventing a death by landmine, as will a ring of searching, which will detect the mine before you step on it. Currently there is no known way to deactivate mines, but you can destroy them. Praying to silva, zapping a wand of fireballs, using the holy banana or getting a monster to step on it are a few ways to destroy mines whilst keeping safely out of range of the explosion. Mines also come in a bigger variant, the "big mine". These are much more deadly than the standard mine and have a larger blast radius.

Other traps

There are other items which can be considered as "traps" but are technically not traps because they do not become active or become hidden upon being dropped.

The first is the humble banana peel. These can be dropped on the ground and can cause anything that walks over them to slip over and fall down like in all those old cartoons. These are reasonably useful earlier in the game, and can be used to kill all the banana growers in New Attnam, and are also very useful for killing those annoying hedgehogs in the UT.

The second is the broken bottle. Similar to the banana peel, these have a chance of damaging whatever walks over them. However, unlike the banana peel, which can hurt any part of the body, the broken bottle damages the legs first, and if that which lies upon it has no legs, it start damaging the arms, groin, head and torso as well.

Lastly, there are backpacks full of gunpowder. Hardly a trap at all, they have many uses as traps. For one, if you place a few on top of a mine that you planted yourself, they will almost certainly kill anything that stands upon the mine by exploding themselves because of the mine's explosion. This is even better with big mines. Also, sometime when you throw a backpack full of gunpowder at an enemy, they will pick it up. This makes them easy prey for the wielder of a wand of fireballs. If placed on the ground, a nearby explosion will set them off, causing a chain reaction. This is very useful for clearing out hoards of enemies, and is VERY useful in the "big room" floor in GC.