Criticals - fail or fun?

[Altair_the_Vexed]

I'm doing a bit more research for my blog (http://running-the-game.blogspot.co.uk/)(it's about time I wrote more gaming articles after all that running stuff).
Being a sciencey sort of bloke, I like to check whether the real world matches the preconception that I have, before I go spouting off about it.

So - as I'm writing about criticals in games, here's a few questions.

What do you like or dislike about critical successes?
What do you like or dislike about critical failures?
What is your favourite critical (success or failure) mechanic? ("None" is a valid answer.)

Thanks!

[Mastikator]

1. I like when critical success involves something special occurring, but I dislike the "auto-success" part, and I dislike how often it occurs, since it's mostly used in d20 systems, 5% minimum success rate on all tasks, no matter how impossibly hard, is too high.
2. Similarly I dislike that any easy or mundane action can be critically failed. It's ridiculous.
to both 1 & 2, I dislike how important the mechanic becomes. I think both should occur less, and when they do it should be less of a big deal.
3. none

[Poil]

I have to agree with that.

1) Critical success should not be an automatic success. Something unusual is perfectly fine and can make things more interesting.

2) Critical failure meaning automatic failure is such an awful mechanic. For example, if applied to combat rolls it effectively means that a very high leveled fighter will screw up more often than a level 1 fighter since he gets more attacks and has to roll more dice for it. Having a one chance in twenty to fail regardless of your skill or what the action you're rolling for is isn't fun at all.

3) The closest I can think of is in Rolemaster, which is d100 based (using two d10 for the rolls), where if you roll a fumble you make another roll and subtract that from your skill bonus. If your second roll is low or your skill is high enough you can still make the check. Being d100 based really reduces the amount of equivalent critical successes and failures.

A critical success means you, normally, roll the dice again and add both results to your skill. You can still fail it though and the system isn't perfect.

[Khedrac]

Tables for Critical Successes and Failures are something I generally don't like. In the beginning they add nice bits of flavour (just read the old RoleMaster tables for some fun descriptions) but over time they start becomign too repetetive ("Oh you shot someone through the ear again - so much for it being a 'million-to-one' shot").
Also when they have effects that cannot be applied to all actors (like stun and undead in 3.5 D&D) the usual ruling is to ignore that part of the effect - thus making the table variable depending on circumstance (i.e. race).
Better I think are fixed effects like 3.5 D&D's damage multipliers on criticals; boring but better in the long run.

Critical failures I generally don't like at all. They instantly disadvantage characters who make more dice checks that are subject to critical failures when compared with characters who don't. In a D&D-based game consider an AoE-based spellcaster and a fighter - one makes attack rolls and can fumble, the other doesn't and cannot.

Currently my main D&D 3.5 DM uses critical fumble tables from Dragon (I think). Quite a few of the results have a DC20 Balance check to avoid - so they are not an issue to most rogues, but they are a serious issue to fighters. WHat's worse here is that rogues have sufficient skill points that they can take enough ranks in balance even if they would not otherwise, the fighters don't. (Thankfully the DM is the main one to actually fumble, though he hasn't learnt any lessons from that.)

The other problem with Criticals, especially table-based ones is how lethal they can be. In 3.5 D&D at first level most characters have problems surviving a critical hit from a greataxe, but they usually can survive (even if they are left dying) most other weapon criticals. Once they reach second level surviavilty goes up rapidly. However in Rolemaster/MERP the wrong fumble/critical result straight-out kills regardless of level. This may be more realistic, but it is a lot less fun for the player.

All that said, one of the most amusing incidents I have had while gaming was when my character was watching a fight between a barbarian and two cave trolls (RoleMaster, level 30-40 iirc). Both the barbarian and one of the cave trolls managed to "trip over an imaginary dead turtle" - we came to the conclusion that they knew somethign everyone else did not...

[NNescio]

1. I like when critical success involves something special occurring, but I dislike the "auto-success" part, and I dislike how often it occurs, since it's mostly used in d20 systems, 5% minimum success rate on all tasks, no matter how impossibly hard, is too high.
2. Similarly I dislike that any easy or mundane action can be critically failed. It's ridiculous.
to both 1 & 2, I dislike how important the mechanic becomes. I think both should occur less, and when they do it should be less of a big deal.
3. none

Under most d20 systems, a natural 20 is not an automatic success except for attack and saving throw rolls (and maybe some other checks). A natural 20 on a skill or attribute check is usually only a +20 bonus. Similarly, a natural 1 is not an automatic failure.

This prevents silliness like jumping to the moon or an archmage being unable to identify a basic cantrip. Or dying after chargen because you failed a "breathing" check. Not that RAW isn't silly in the first place, but still.

[neonchameleon]

There is a grand total of one critical fumble mechanic I have ever found made for a better game; the weapon breakage rules in 4e Dark Sun. These state: If you roll a natural 1 on your attack roll, you may reroll. If you succeed on the reroll it's a hit. If you fail your weapon breaks (metal weapons are only broken on a roll of 5 or less). (The Cortex+ Opportunity rules are also pretty decent but that's because they aren't as spectacular as critical fumbles).

Normally critical fumble rules read something like "A natural 1 is an automatic fumble." These add a keystone-cops element to what are normally meant to be skilled and experienced adventurers (if you're Paranoia clones this isn't a problem) - and mean that people who are skilled enough to roll more attack rolls are more likely to fumble - so more skill -> more fumbles. No. The reroll option turns it into a risk/reward machanic; no character ever makes a critical fumble unless taking a big risk. The player doesn't feel it sas unfair if they critically fumble using the reroll - they were going for something big and took the additional risk while less scary fights are less likely to make them take the risk. And having the extra range where you can critically fumble adds something to the game.

Critical successes, especially in combat, have two aspects. The first is that they are fun. The second is that they are deadly - and being deadly is something that cuts against the PCs because most things fighting PCs in adventure RPGs are going to die anyway. So increasing random lethality leads to more PC kills. I'm a fan of two different critical success mechanics; explosive dice (which have a kinaesthetic feel that really helps) and a simple Max Damage on a natural 20 - nice and fast at the same time.

[Bulhakov]

The main argument for crit fails/successes is how memorable they can be.

Short example: A nosferatu PC who did not want to get captured alive decided to blow himself up with a grenade. I made him roll for it, he critically fumbled and dropped the grenade into a sewer grate below him. This was 15 years ago, yet everyone who played that game remembers him being saved by rolling a bunch of 1s.

[Slipperychicken]

What do you like or dislike about critical successes?
What do you like or dislike about critical failures?
What is your favourite critical (success or failure) mechanic? ("None" is a valid answer.)


Dislikes About Critical Success: They often allow for very strange or immersion-breaking results, like a flea successfully wrestling a house-sized dragon, or an untrained person hacking the Pentagon and launching nuclear missiles at his enemy, or striking your opponent and sending him hurtling into space. Preposterous results are often misrepresented as being much more likely than they are.

Likes About Critical Success: They provide hope even with bad odds, and are usually joyous events when experienced by the players. They, like critical failure, also underline the truly random and chaotic nature of combat. The fact that even a "throwaway" enemy could kill you if he rolls well enough is kind of exciting (when that actually happens, though, is a different story).

Dislikes About Critical Fail: They're often overdone to the point of absurdity, and the results of a "critical fail" are usually things which a person with any training would never need to deal with (i.e. chopping your own head off, setting a bowl of cereal on fire while making breakfast, snapping your bowstring, shouting "I ROLLED A 4!!" while sneaking, and so on). Even when they are plausible, the system has them occur with shocking regularity (for example, a 1 in a trillion event would be represented as one in a thousand, or even a one in twenty). When they occur far too frequently, or are too punishing, they can even break campaigns (http://spoonyexperiment.com/2011/11/03/counter-monkey-botchamania/) (the comments section has some examples too).

Like About Critical Fail: I think it's reasonable to have a chance of failure for some things (although a highly skilled character should have a failure chance much, much lower than 5%), just to keep tension. "Goofy" or absurd fails can be amusing when done right and the game is explicitly a lighthearted comedy game, and isn't supposed to be taken seriously. Otherwise, it comes off as crass and immature.

[imaloony]

Now, for combat, I liked how they worked in AD&D. You crit on a 20, period.
This whole "Confirming Crits" in 3.5 is pretty dumb imo.

For Critical successes... well, I'm split. On one hand, for certain tasks it's fine to have an auto success (Climbing a slick wall with limited hand holds? Sure, crit success), but there certainly should be a limit for what a natural 20 can do, as saying "I want to balance on air, hey look I rolled a natural 20 AWAAAAAAAAAAAY" probably shouldn't fly.

[Water_Bear]

I like Critical Successes in combat or on Saving Throws because they can break things up and . For the same reason I dislike them on Skills or similar because they take focus away from talent and move it towards luck.

I hate Critical Failures with a passion, because they tend to either come up rarely enough to not matter or be a constant nuisance. They're also usually extraordinarily punitive, especially in systems where GM's are encouraged to "make failures interesting."

Accordingly, I like the Critical Hit / Auto Save on 20 rules from D&D 3.5 because they explicitly doesn't apply to skills or ability checks (despite what some believe). The Critical Miss / Auto Fail Saves on 1s rules there are ok, as they don't provide extra failure, but I'd prefer to scrap the concept entirely.

[Trebloc]

What do you like or dislike about critical successes?
What do you like or dislike about critical failures?
What is your favourite critical (success or failure) mechanic? ("None" is a valid answer.)

We do not use any critical success/failures outside of the 3.5 rules.

For my group, we have had a number of times where a 20 was needed for success (skills, saves, attacks...whatever) and a PC rolled it, and then there was much rejoicing and lots of awesome factor. We did not need any additional Omega Supreme Awesomo critical hit table confirmation fantistico to make it better for us -- typically cheers, high fives and PCs/DM adding in some flavor as to why the 20 was a success.

For failures, same thing happens, except cheers are replaced with moans and laughter. Had one melee do a full attack and roll five 1's in a row. We didn't need the Three Stooges table of slapstick failure to make it memorable -- the DM/PCs did that with some flair as to what happened for this suckiness.

Last, we don't use the critical failures because it favors casters who already don't need additional help. In addition, critical failure tables always end up screwing over PCs as they gain levels and attacks -- it would be insane to play a dual wielding fighter at level 20. Also would really suck to be a marilith. Not to mention that it takes up more game time, which fights already do with being a bit on the slow side.

[Zombimode]

Now, for combat, I liked how they worked in AD&D. You crit on a 20, period.
This whole "Confirming Crits" in 3.5 is pretty dumb imo.

Well... Let look at the implications.

In both editions, someone with an attack bonus <= (target AC - 20) can only hit the target with a natural 20.

With the need to confirm a critical, only a very small percentage (5% to be exact) are going to be critical hits.

Without confirmation, all of those hits are critical. In other words, the attacks of someone with the lowest chance to hit are always critical hits when they hit.

With confirmation, the chance to score a critical is proportional to your overall skill.

To me, the later outcome makes much more sense.

[illyrus]

Critical successes I'm generally okay with for PCs and NPCs as long as the initial action was within the realm of that game's physics. So saving against a spell that you could only save with a natural 20 is fine in my mind, a mundane human 4 year old bending the bars to a jail cell is not.

I despise critical failures with further descriptors then simply failing in a serious game. I've noticed too many GMs seem to take it as time for a Looney Toons moment when a character critical fumbles which breaks immersion. For a beer and pretzels style game I don't care much either way.

Most memorable one was when we were using some slight variant of the fumble/crit rules. Wizard cast a fireball-like spell and it impacted early (I think on an invisible wall) catching the caster in the blast. He fumbled his reflex saving throw and his spell book was destroyed. It was funny in a cruel way as he had no backup spell book with him and our party had no way to escape the dungeon without teleport. The GM thought it was hilarious up until he realized he had just destroyed his own campaign. We didn't give him a chance to figure something else out and rotated GMs.

[Jay R]

The critical hit or failure should be confirmed by a second role, or very poor fighters always hit with a crit, and excellent fighters nearly always fail with a critical miss.

I enjoy the added chaos of combat, which I think is necessary. This way, you actually care about every round. Without it, a high-level fighter is not risking anything for the first few combat rounds.

[Note: I've never played anything more recent than 2E, so this may be less true with the modern games.]

[mjlush]

I run the old FASERIP Marvel superheros I run rolling 01, 10, 20, 30.. 00 is a "special result" I roll high low to see if its extra good or bad. Thus a success can be a bit blunted and failure made a little bit less abject.

[tommhans]

I love the critical failure and success, it adds excitement for when you roll a dice. And they tend to give into great RP and story situations. For example me and my group came to this pirate town on a ship we had stolen(as ours was destroyed) and we were put for a trial infront of the king, and our wizard in the group took a step forward and was going to sweet talk his way out. He hit a one,and he insulted the king, the city and in general everyone. We were put in jail and were sentenced to death. So we had to break out of there, knowing the whole city were after us.

If he had gotten a 20 there we wouldve been feasting with the king and had no problem further on in the campaign.

I like that there is a chance to be able to master anything, no matter how hard it is, thus likewise with failure, it usually is fun for the others around the table, because the DM gets to decide the fait and usually something original. Right now im the DM so im trying to do my best on that part ^^

[SuperPanda]

1.a) What do you like about critical successes:

A critical success at the right time, in the right place, is what legends are made of. The fact the critical successes are possible is what adds spice and flavor to the game, the ability of the heroes to roll the dice (figuratively... and literally in this case) against seemingly impossible odds and still come out on top. When Crits have a sense of timing they can be the most memorable part of a game.

At the same time, the "auto-success" aspect of critical hits in the systems I've seen keeps from becoming completely irrelevant even if they are still practically irrelevant. In the places it makes sense to have a critical hit it can be just as wonderful to have an auto-hit.

1.b) What do you dislike about critical successes:

The above stuff is all based on the somewhat heavy caveat of timing. Dramatic turnabouts, character building conflicts, adventure changing moments of inspiration are wonderful but just like good luck can pile up so can bad. I've seen mooks which were suppose to be a warm up for a difficult battle tear a party apart because of some very good rolls.

2.a) What do you like about critical failures?

If they are rare they can be a great way to add dramatic tension. Fumbles which result in an advantage for the other side while still being plausible within the narrative framework go along way to capturing the chaos and danger of conflict in systems (d20) that try really hard to remove that sense of danger.

Like critical successes these can become defining moments of a battle, though they tend to be less satisfying as victories go. They work amazing "Oh sh-" moments if the party is otherwise evenly matched and has the ability to recover.

2.b) What do you dislike about critical failures?

Generally I've seen critical failures to be more punitive than critical successes are rewarding. I have been guilty of this in the past, and I could see it wasn't very fun all things considered.

Critical hit/successes are generally spelled out pretty clearly in rules systems while critical failures generally aren't, and I've seen more than one bad roll turned far worse than it could have been.

3. What is your favourite critical (success or failure) mechanic? ("None" is a valid answer.)

I'm not sure I've seen one I could call my favorite, so I'll weigh in on 3 that I think have potential.

a) GURPS. What I like:
Your crit chance it tied into your skill. The better you are at something the more likely you are to succeed and the more likely you are to succeed exceptionally well, and inversely so too. There will always be an outside chance of success and failure when under pressure.

b) Pathfinder crit cards:
Like: Adds spice and can lead to some insane critical bonuses/penalties. If fate aligns you could have something awesome happen (Like my Mommy druid shape-change into a bear and knock someone 20' away when they tried to stab her daughter :smallbiggrin:).
dislike: too random, and too varied in impact. While you might get a dramatically appropriate moment, you can also get something too weird to be considered (Like our sorcerer fumbling a ray of frost and accidentally changing his own alignment from Neutral Good to Chaotic Evil with spell backfire... :smallannoyed:).

c) House-rule from my first DM: Critical hits works as normal for 3.5, critical failures (on confirm) cause one of the following:
i)You Over-extend: provoke AoO and you have a -2 pentalty to AC for this
AoO.
ii) Bad footing: All opponents get +1 to attack you until your next turn.
iii) disarmed: while trading blows with your opponent they managed to knock your weapon away.
iv) Off-balance: Opponent may make a strength check against you to knock you prone.

(And a few other situation ones like this.) When it happened the DM would roll 2 or 3 results and then let the player choose which of them happened most of the time.

In general I think this worked really well.

[Arbane]

What I like about critical failures: They made the tale of Sameo (http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Sameo) possible.

What I dislike about critical failures: They take the genre from Heroic Fantasy to Slapstick. If I signed on for Happy Fun Miserable Failure Hour(tm), like in Paranoia, they're tolerable. Otherwise, I recommend this:


Critical Fumble Rule:
If at any time a DM shall propose using a "critical failure" or "fumble" table of any sort in a 3.X game, the players are to beat the DM with folding chairs until each of them has accidentally struck himself with his chair at least once, while keeping a count of the number of strikes made before this happens. Then, the average rate of such "fumbles" as generated by a table full of nerds swinging improvised weapons will establish the maximum probability of a "fumble" within the game mechanics for a level 1 Commoner (note that this already will probably require rolling multiple Natural 1's in succession to confirm a fumble), with the probability dropping by at least an order of magnitude per point of BAB of the attacking character. Thus a full-BAB character at level 20 might have to roll 20+ Natural 1's in a row to before you even bother glancing at the Fumble Table.

[Altair_the_Vexed]

Thanks everyone - some interesting examples there...

Now I need to see what this all means for the blog post I'm writing. :smalleek:

[Gettles]

For you people who say that critical fumbles can't be fun, have you ever made someone do a natural one on a bluff check.

Tons of fun.

[imaloony]

Well... Let look at the implications.

In both editions, someone with an attack bonus <= (target AC - 20) can only hit the target with a natural 20.

With the need to confirm a critical, only a very small percentage (5% to be exact) are going to be critical hits.

Without confirmation, all of those hits are critical. In other words, the attacks of someone with the lowest chance to hit are always critical hits when they hit.

With confirmation, the chance to score a critical is proportional to your overall skill.

To me, the later outcome makes much more sense.

"Makes more sense" doesn't mean that it "Makes for a better game". Confirming crits slows things down and can really get on a player's nerves. To me, a failing a confirmation roll is denying someone their 20. Sure, they still hit, but a natural 20 is a special thing. That doesn't mean I expect to rend the universe in half, but to me a natural 20 represents a heroic action, be it a critical hit or a skills check, and just hitting an enemy seems a bit weak for a 20.
And on that note, the crit ranges in 3.5 really killed the mood, in my opinion. The ability to build a character (Albeit a bad one) around critting just seems stupid. "Oh, my Keen Rapier threatens to crit on a 15-20, and I have a +4 on the confirmation..."
At that point, critting becomes so common, what's the point?

[neonchameleon]

Otherwise, I recommend this:

Nice! Although I would point out the optional reroll on a 1 version that doesn't suffer the Comedy Slapstick Hour problem (in general you only ever fumble when the chips are down and you take that extra risk).


For you people who say that critical fumbles can't be fun, have you ever made someone do a natural one on a bluff check.

Tons of fun.

Oh, they can be fun. It's just a fumble on a natural 1 is (a) far too common for combat (you roll bluff less often) and (b) means the highest skilled players fumble most often.

[Person_Man]

My feeling is that critical hits and failures are fun game mechanics, in that they create more excitement, and allow for the subsystem of rare but awesome/terrible effects.

But in most games that allow them, critical hits are triggered by a certain die roll (natural 20, three sixes, etc), but there is are multiple ways to manipulate it. (Some weapons have a higher threat range which can be further extended by certain Feats, easy to come by re-roll mechanics, easy to come by auto-crit abilities). This makes critical success much more common, and thus the effects of critical hits must be written to be far less awesome. (Or every power gamer will optimize critical hits).

On the flip side, critical failures can sometimes be bypassed. For example, in 3.5 a Wizard can go entire campaigns without every rolling to attack, and instead depend on spells like Fireball, Solid Fog, etc, which do not require attack rolls. So "traditional" classes suck compared to classes that don't rely on normal attacks.

So my suggestion is that if you do have critical hits and fumbles, they need to be kept rare, spectacular, and they can't interact with or be manipulated by other game mechanics. Everyone must roll for any success. You roll precisely once (and if you have multiple attacks, it increases you damage or some other effect, not the number of dice you roll). And there needs to be some sort of chart or stack of effect cards that are thematically appropriate to the game you are playing.

For example, critical hit only occurs on a natural 20

[The Fury]

For you people who say that critical fumbles can't be fun, have you ever made someone do a natural one on a bluff check.

Tons of fun.

I suppose so. Though I still have some problems with critical fumbles on principle. Consider a character who is a champion rock climber, just for example. This guy has been climbing since he could walk and is one of the best in the world. When asked to make a fairly simple climb check he rolls a 1, falls, twists his ankle and takes down two other people with him. Maybe it's a little funny but it's still weird to see supposed experts fail so spectacularly. Personally I prefer to just say that a natural 1 is just a 1 or maybe an auto-miss on an attack roll. That does away with the weirdness of having the captain of the royal guard accidentally cutting off his own hand somehow.

[Altair_the_Vexed]

Thanks again for all the contributions! I've posted my blog on the topic over here (http://running-the-game.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/taming-chaos-probability-and-heroes.html).