improved critical and touch spells

[amaranth69]

i play a duskblade in a 3.5 game. if i take the improved critical feat and score a crit while channeling do i get double damage dice on the spell damage. i was thinkingt of trying out a scimitar build and using improved crit to maximize my damage output. thanks in advance

[Person_Man]

i play a duskblade in a 3.5 game. if i take the improved critical feat and score a crit while channeling do i get double damage dice on the spell damage. i was thinkingt of trying out a scimitar build and using improved crit to maximize my damage output. thanks in advance

It depends.

Bonus dice of damage are never multiplied. This includes bonus damage from Sneak Attack, Sudden Strike, Flaming/Frost/etc weapons, bonus damage from Channeled spells, etc.

Non-dice damage are multiplied. This includes bonus damage from Power Attack, Smite Evil, Incarnum Radiance, Inspire Courage, and the bonuses provided by spells like Greater Magic Weapon.

And regardless, a critical hit based build rarely does an efficient job of adding bonus damage.

[Escheton]

Normally attack spells crit on a 20 and deal double damage. Channeling however allows you to use the weapon's stats of critrange and damagemodifier on the spell it channels. As such the answer would simply be yes.
Though I might be missing something.

[Darkfire]

No it doesn't! The spell damage is not multiplied on a crit:


If a duskblade scores a critical hit when channeling a spell through a melee attack, is the spell’s damage multiplied just like the weapon’s?
The rules aren’t as clear as they could be, but the Sage is inclined to say no. Here’s the key sentence, from the PHB II, page 20: “If the attack is successful, the attack deals damage normally; then the effect of the spell is resolved.”
If you score a critical hit, the attack deals the normal (critical) damage. Then the spell resolves normally, but it’s just a rider effect applied due to the successful attack roll—you’re not actually using the spell in the normal manner, so it can’t score a critical hit.
FAQ can be found here (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/er/20030221a) (wizards.com).

Shamelessly copied from my first post on the board.