Houserule idea: adjust coup de grace to automatically giving a natural 20

[TuggyNE]

So, I had an idea to make coup de grace, vorpal weapons, and perhaps Profession: Executioner slightly more potent (and also more logical): change the wording of coup de grace so that you're treated as having rolled two natural 20s (i.e., auto-hit, critical threat, and auto-confirm).

Alternatively, make it so you get a free natural 20 to auto-hit, but you still need to confirm it; this means that a non-proficient wielder has a somewhat tougher time facestabbing someone, which is probably a good thing.

Proposed wording:

Coup de Grace
As a full-round action, you can use a melee weapon to deliver a coup de grace to a helpless opponent. You can also use a bow or crossbow, provided you are adjacent to the target.

You are treated as having rolled a natural 20; this means, among other things, that you automatically hit and threaten a critical hit, which must still be confirmed. If the defender survives the damage, he must make a Fortitude save (DC 10 + damage dealt) or die. A rogue also gets her extra sneak attack damage against a helpless opponent when delivering a coup de grace.

Delivering a coup de grace provokes attacks of opportunity from threatening opponents.

You can’t deliver a coup de grace against a creature that is immune to critical hits. You can deliver a coup de grace against a creature with total concealment, but doing this requires two consecutive full-round actions (one to "find" the creature once you’ve determined what square it’s in, and one to deliver the coup de grace).

You may choose to deliver a non-lethal coup de grace (or a coup de grace against a creature with regeneration not overcome by your weapon); failure on the Fortitude save deals non-lethal damage equal to the defender's full maximum HP + 10.

What do you all think? Any particular unforeseen consequences to this?

[Keneth]

Doesn't CDG already work that way? You hit automatically and it's a critical hit. So basically you're just removing the SoD element, which is what CDG was intended for...

[Chronos]

I think he's just saying "let a Vorpal weapon do its thing on CdG". Which would be fine: Honestly, even without an expensive special weapon, the general expectation of a CdG is that the target is going to die unless they're extraordinarily lucky.

[CaladanMoonblad]

Consequences of the proposed word change modifying CDG;

Daggers do 1d4 base damage, have a 19-20/x2 crit range. The average damage is 2.5, and a crit is 5.0. Now, only peasants can be killed by cutting their throat and bleeding them out.

With the status quo, Conan the Barbarian is just as susceptible to a his throat cut as the peasant above. With the change, a dagger across the throat will not kill Conan; he'll simply laugh.

In effect, changing CDG is a huge nerf to smaller weapons (traditional weapons of death for assassins, rogues, thieves, etc.) and middling nerf to higher damage weapons. IMO, such a change would put more strain on the suspension of disbelief (ie, make our model of emulating reality less valid than it already is).

[White_Drake]

With the status quo, Conan the Barbarian is just as susceptible to a his throat cut as the peasant above. With the change, a dagger across the throat will not kill Conan; he'll simply laugh.

I like the current coupe de grace rules, but isn't that actually what Conan did when that happened, numerous times?

[Raimun]

I like the current coupe de grace rules, but isn't that actually what Conan did when that happened, numerous times?

Conan can still make his Fort-check. Dagger's DC won't be that high, since it's based on damage dealt.

Yes, current CdG is fine as it is.

[Douglas]

Daggers do 1d4 base damage, have a 19-20/x2 crit range. The average damage is 2.5, and a crit is 5.0. Now, only peasants can be killed by cutting their throat and bleeding them out.

With the status quo, Conan the Barbarian is just as susceptible to a his throat cut as the peasant above. With the change, a dagger across the throat will not kill Conan; he'll simply laugh.
Um, no, the "status quo" Rules As Written have Conan laughing off the dagger just as much as with this change. 5 damage is a DC 15 fort save, Conan can make that easily.

Or, wait, are you thinking he's removing the fort save or die part of CDG? I'm pretty sure his intent was to leave that part unaltered, so he didn't bother mentioning it one way or the other. The point of this proposed house rule is to allow things that trigger on the die roll result specifically, rather than on crits in general, to work. A CDG is still a save or die, it just lets Vorpal weapons and similar effects do their thing at the same time.

[TuggyNE]

Hmm, so far no one's mentioned Profession: Executioner; I don't have access to those rules directly (and I only dimly recall the outlines), so I can't check whether this does anything to that. Anybody want to comment on that?


Um, no, the "status quo" Rules As Written have Conan laughing off the dagger just as much as with this change. 5 damage is a DC 15 fort save, Conan can make that easily.

Or, wait, are you thinking he's removing the fort save or die part of CDG? I'm pretty sure his intent was to leave that part unaltered, so he didn't bother mentioning it one way or the other. The point of this proposed house rule is to allow things that trigger on the die roll result specifically, rather than on crits in general, to work. A CDG is still a save or die, it just lets Vorpal weapons and similar effects do their thing at the same time.

Yes, exactly, thank you. Sorry for the lack of clarity, all; I'm not usually so sloppy.

Basically, this should make it so that a) vorpal works; b) non-proficiency/low Str/low BAB makes it a bit harder to kill someone, but not impossible.

Come to think of it, since helpless treats the target's Dex as 0 (and gives a +4 to melee attacks), Joe Commoner can still quite easily whack all but very well armored targets (i.e., confirm the critical): confirmation AC is basically 6+armor+natural armor+deflection+shield, but if they're helpless, some of those might also be knocked out as well (like shields).

Oh, might also make a change to allow non-lethal coup de grace, while I'm thinking about it. Not totally satisfied with that part of the draft, but eh.