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Yeah. Smart thinking. Would you mess with something like that at low level upon seeing it? If so, you would pay the penalty. This realm of thinking that a mechanic at all is needed has to do with the way our home campaign (Castle GH/Castle ERK) was run as opposed to the way published adventures were structured. And we've discussed this before, Scotty. There was tough stuff sprinkled here and there (like in real life and like in the pulp stories, like in myth and legend) and our players learned this, or the vets informed the newbies of this, real quick. This lead to less "diving in" and to a more cautious approach overall. Players actually developed strategy & tactics! And in all phases of the developing adventure, not just in its combat phase. Ths lead as always to players attempting to "divine" an encounter situation (lietrally, not figuartively through game play spells and such, though these would be used too). One must wonder why the augury spell was created, however... A most undervalued spell, IMO. In all the philosophy is not unique to home campaigns, but does not fare well within the premade adventure, which in fact, and in my opinion, does not allow for these far ranging options of design and play as do home brew ones.

In all fairness, EGG and I would signal in one way or another if the party was to do something as stupid as enter such places. Like, "Your magic user senses strange and potent MAGICAL emanations just standing near it." Hints like that for those who were clueless (which were not many in our campaign). If they proceeded after that, well, we just shrugged...

Your views are erroneous.

D&D was never a strict lnear-level-based game. The outdoor encounters were various and random; the city adventures were wide, varying from approacable to dangerous. Do you expect a church in a major city to be assailable just because you are 1st or 2nd level? The dungeon encounter scheme from the very beginning had a sliding scale built into it, so we could find a Balrog actually encountered on the 4th level! Each DM has to lead in teaching how these things fit, if they do or not; the whole does not work for premade adventures, which your mind adheres to in forwarding your examples. If people find that they do not want to place such obstacles and challenges out of fairness or for reasons lacking in their mentality as DMs, so be it, place it in strict linear scaling like a premade adventure. But that is not how D&D was playtested on our end nor promulagted through the many games we participated in. There was always something there that you had to come back to fight when you were tougher. Yes. You would have died Scotty, as the rest of our vets shook their heads walking away.