Looking for crazy event table for crit hit/miss

[Deca4531]

i would like to add some more comedy and epicness to my game with some kind of extras in the even someone crits or fumbles. like having a limb chopped off, maybe something explodes. like i said i would like some options for both funny events and epic ones.

also, if possible, i would like to find some kind of system for describing possible deaths. in the Warhammer RPG they have a table you can roll on depending on the weapon your using to see just how they die, anywhere from there head is blown off at all their ammo ignites at once and they explode. is something like this exists for D&D i would love to find it.

[JusticeZero]

Those things are horrible. They always make me feel the need to make a dabbler in the dark arts, because casting spells is so much safer, and somehow, master warriors with skill far beyond the most experienced warriors of history manage to stab themselves in the back with fifteen foot long spears even more often than rank newbies.

[QuickLyRaiNbow]

I'd really like to reinforce that. Critical hit/miss tables for players are really, really bad.

[Deca4531]

so what do you guys do on a crit or fumble? im just looking to add some more flavor to the game.

[JusticeZero]

On a crit, you get a damage multiple. On a 1, you miss. That's the most realistic and balanced approach.

[Gavinfoxx]

im just looking to add some more flavor to the game.

If you want to do that, play a tome of battle focused game, or play codex martialis. Crit hit and fumbles only work when it is a comedy game where no one cares about the characters, the characters don't have any or serious names and are easily replaceable with identical characters after they die, and the players are mostly drunk.

[Irrek57]

Adding flavor can be as easy as that, just add some. Critical rules often punish players many times more over than the Npc/monsters they interact with due to the odds. In the past I've used critical effects that were purely flavorful but had no mechanical effect, i/e embarrassing yourself in some fashion on a nat 1, or a nat 20 that also yields a kill to gib an opponent, or seriously maim if it's not a death blow.
I've also used tables that favored PCs on a nat 20 with bonus effects, but an NPC with a nat 1 may suffer an ill or otherwise grim fate. My preference is to keep player penalties minor to nonexistent, they're the heroes....the NPCs, dead one way or the other.
Related example, I once had a barbarian PC "pin" an opponent in a grapple by using it's body as a skipping rope. (players idea)

*posted via phone because of exploded computer*

[Beardbarian]

Critical fumbles are the worst thing i can imagine in the game.
If you want to add some flavour just emphasize nat 20, but please leave the You-drop-the-sword idea

[Humble Master]

Punishing players with more than a miss on a 1 is generally a bad idea. It will make melee characters even worse because they will always have a 5% chance of having to spend a move action to pick up their sword (and also provoke an attack of opportunity). If you want flavor then just add flavor. For example:
Nat 20: Your sword slices through their neck like it was wood pulp, sending their head flying off in an arc.
Nat 20: Your dagger finds it's way through the Orc's armor, slipping into it's heart. The Orc's eyes glaze over instantly and the foe falls down, blood pouring out of it's back.
Nat 1: As your blade sings through the air you momentarily lose your grip. As the sword falls from your hand you manage to catch it and maintain your stance but the attack is wasted.

[lsfreak]

Yea, do it through description, not mechanics. The only crit fumble rule I've seen that I'd remotely be okay with is that on a nat 1 + confirmed miss, you provoke and then continue your action as normal, which is hardly more flavorful. But really the only time I'd ever find it appropriate to use crit hit/miss rules is in a silly game. For a normal campaign, dropping your weapon, ending your turn, or damaging yourself are all overly punishing to already-weak melee classes; and likewise critting and chopping off limbs, blinding, etc. are awesome when the players do it but extremely punishing when it happens to them.

So again, stick with descriptions if you want crits and fumbles to be more flavorful.

[Deca4531]

well aside from flavor i want people to have it feel more realistic, and what i mean by that is things like this:

when was the last time you saw someone loose and arm or leg in combat intead of this vague "hip points" these cuts and slams have to be landing somewhere.

DM: wizard you get hit for max damage, that cuts your hit points in half

Wizard: well that must have really hurt, glad that didnt actually damage anything and i can still fight at 100%

[Namfuak]

well aside from flavor i want people to have it feel more realistic, and what i mean by that is things like this:

when was the last time you saw someone loose and arm or leg in combat intead of this vague "hip points" these cuts and slams have to be landing somewhere.

DM: wizard you get hit for max damage, that cuts your hit points in half

Wizard: well that must have really hurt, glad that didnt actually damage anything and i can still fight at 100%

Depending on your preferred interpretation, people only start taking serious damage at 10 hitpoints or less, where above that they have enough energy to avoid or lessen the blows of the brunt of attacks, with higher damage numbers meaning a higher toll on the character's ability to do this. The alternative is just to stick with "it's an abstraction, deal with it." Alternatively, you could use the vitality and wound rules detailed here:
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/adventuring/vitalityAndWoundPoints.htm

[eggynack]

well aside from flavor i want people to have it feel more realistic, and what i mean by that is things like this:

when was the last time you saw someone loose and arm or leg in combat intead of this vague "hip points" these cuts and slams have to be landing somewhere.

DM: wizard you get hit for max damage, that cuts your hit points in half

Wizard: well that must have really hurt, glad that didnt actually damage anything and i can still fight at 100%
If you want things to be more realistic, a good way might be to not have ridiculous things happen to incredibly powerful characters in combat. Seriously, by level five these guys are at around the maximum of human potential, and at level 20 they're practically divine beings (not literally in D&D, but certainly the gods of some settings) and you presumably want them to lose their weapons and hit their allies. It just seems unrealistic. Critical fumbles are a bad way to accomplish just about any goal.

[lsfreak]

when was the last time you saw someone loose and arm or leg in combat intead of this vague "hip points" these cuts and slams have to be landing somewhere.
The thing is, these are not appropriate results of combat in most D&D-style campaigns. They are only appropriate for meatgrinder campaigns, where the players are likely not emotionally attached to their characters at all. Because in such a world, it's unlikely for a character to last more than a few sessions if one stray crit can cripple them for life.
In addition, I maintain that the only realistic crit fumble for someone with as much training as PCs are supposed to have is as I said before: misstep, provoke an AoO, continue as normal. A highly trained fighter dropping their weapon or damaging themselves with near-100% certainty in 60 seconds of combat is in no way realistic.


DM: wizard you get hit for max damage, that cuts your hit points in half
So don't describe it like that.
Or accept that hit points do not necessarily represent actual wounds: hit points are a character's ability to continue dodging, blocking, shrugging off light wounds, and otherwise avoiding being hit. They may not actually be hit with a weapon until they drop into the negatives, everything up until that point is them trying to avoid damage. Hits that deal lots of damage, but still don't drop them below zero, would be hits that were near-misses and took a lot of energy to redirect or avoid.

If you haven't looked into a wound system (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/adventuring/vitalityAndWoundPoints.htm), that might be closer to what you want. Crits are far more serious than normal games, without resulting in character-ruining mutilation, by dealing damage directly to a character's wounds, while normal hits are against a character's vitality, their energy level. This is simply a more explicit way of doing as I described before, with the addition that crits are far more dangerous.

[Gavinfoxx]

well aside from flavor i want people to have it feel more realistic

The problem is, fumbles make combat LESS realistic, because people do not mess up in combat the way most fumble rules work! See: http://www.thearma.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=24395

And D&D is an inherently unrealistic game with regards to hit points and such. Remember that by mid levels, a fighter or barbarian can survive reentry.

If you want a realistic game, make an E6 game, that is this:

http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?206323-E6-The-Game-Inside-D-amp-D

...and buy this:

http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/65250/Codex-Martialis-Set-%5BBUNDLE%5D

And only allow classes like this to exist in the setting at all:

Aristocrat
Commoner
Warrior
Samurai (both versions)
Expert
Fighter
Knight
Mariner (from Dragonlance Legend of the Twins)
Noble (from Dragonlance Campaign Setting)
Paladin (with a huge amount of acf's, from all over the place, to remove the supernatural parts of the class. You'll need to go book diving.)
Swashbuckler
Barbarian (several ACF's would also work quite well)
Master (Dragonlance War of the Lance)
Ranger (with a huge amount of ACF's, from all over the place, to remove magic from this class. You'll need to go book diving.)
Rogue (several ACFs would work)
Crusader (only some options chosen)
Warblade (only some options chosen)
Factotum (with homebrew ACFs, like this one: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=212864 with only Ex options chosen for that)

And remove all monsters and everything that isn't a human, and most of the monstrous animals, etc. etc.

[Deca4531]

If you want things to be more realistic, a good way might be to not have ridiculous things happen to incredibly powerful characters in combat. Seriously, by level five these guys are at around the maximum of human potential, and at level 20 they're practically divine beings (not literally in D&D, but certainly the gods of some settings) and you presumably want them to lose their weapons and hit their allies. It just seems unrealistic. Critical fumbles are a bad way to accomplish just about any goal.

those seem to be the two things people refer to a lot ""loose your weapon or hit your friend." what it the gravel under your feet caused you to slip on a powerful thrust and you trip, maybe you pull a muscle, maybe you miss-pronounce a word during a spell and it explodes in your face, maybe your crossbow bolt it deflected off the monster's horns, skips off the stone wall and hit the bard it the foot.

[JusticeZero]

That kind of thing is so rare as to be effectively impossible. Realistically, those things just never happen.

[Gavinfoxx]

those seem to be the two things people refer to a lot ""loose your weapon or hit your friend." what it the gravel under your feet caused you to slip on a powerful thrust and you trip, maybe you pull a muscle, maybe you miss-pronounce a word during a spell and it explodes in your face, maybe your crossbow bolt it deflected off the monster's horns, skips off the stone wall and hit the bard it the foot.

And this is realistic how? This sort of thing (the real life bits) is not how fights happen. What generally happens is that fumbles provoke attacks of opportunity. Anyway, the wizards aren't rolling D20's at all to cast their spells, are you adding a D20 roll for wizards somehow?

[eggynack]

those seem to be the two things people refer to a lot ""loose your weapon or hit your friend." what it the gravel under your feet caused you to slip on a powerful thrust and you trip, maybe you pull a muscle, maybe you miss-pronounce a word during a spell and it explodes in your face, maybe your crossbow bolt it deflected off the monster's horns, skips off the stone wall and hit the bard it the foot.
Those things are mostly covered by regular rules, though perhaps not in the way you desire. If you're on difficult terrain, you can just type it as difficult terrain, or otherwise put grease there. I wouldn't really expect a wizard to mispronounce a word unless he were under stress, and that issue is covered pretty well by the concentration rules. As for the thing about crossbow bolts bouncing back, I'm just going to quote Philistine's seminal words on the topic of that sort of unlikely event.

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.
In this case, you would presumably stand in a stone room and start launching crossbow bolts as the base statistic. I grant you much luck in your endeavors.

[Deca4531]

hit points are a character's ability to continue dodging, blocking, shrugging off light wounds, and otherwise avoiding being hit.

thats an interesting view of hit points, one i have never thought of before.

[JusticeZero]

Look at professional sports as a example. Pro athletes push themselves really really hard, as hard as live combat, with a similar level of adrenaline. Just think back on all the times in each game that people throw safety equipment accidentally across the field and hit teammates in the face, or drop the ball and trip over it - requiring a natural 1,you should see one such incident on every play on average.

[Hiro Protagonest]

If you want realism, why are you playing D&D? Play GURPS. Or even FUDGE.

If you want comedy... there is only one way that crit tables can end up with funny-haha results (http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Sameo).

[Karnith]

thats an interesting view of hit points, one i have never thought of before.
It's (more or less) the official version of how HP work. Per the SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/injuryandDeath.htm#whatHitPointsRepresent):
Hit points mean two things in the game world: the ability to take physical punishment and keep going, and the ability to turn a serious blow into a less serious one.

[Deca4531]

Look at professional sports as a example. Pro athletes push themselves really really hard, as hard as live combat, with a similar level of adrenaline. Just think back on all the times in each game that people throw safety equipment accidentally across the field and hit teammates in the face, or drop the ball and trip over it - requiring a natural 1,you should see one such incident on every play on average.

so in football what is considered a nat 20? i have seen players eat sh*t on the field before, break arms, get concussions, dislocate legs.

[Namfuak]

those seem to be the two things people refer to a lot ""loose your weapon or hit your friend." what it the gravel under your feet caused you to slip on a powerful thrust and you trip, maybe you pull a muscle, maybe you miss-pronounce a word during a spell and it explodes in your face, maybe your crossbow bolt it deflected off the monster's horns, skips off the stone wall and hit the bard it the foot.

The last one is realistic to you?

Anyway, the point you are missing is that while all of those things are possible, they aren't likely to happen very often, and certainly not as often as most critical fumble tables would allow them to. In particular, the half the reason swordsman learn how to stand and how to swing their sword in such a way that it doesn't cause them to trip or leave themselves vulnerable is that they want to walk away from the fight able to fight again. Killing your enemy isn't worth as much if you are maimed for life in the process. And this touches on the thing most people are saying, which is that if people make good characters, they don't want them to die from some random natural 1. Let's pretend I'm player 1. I make a Paladin, Sir Tumbleton, who was a soldier in the First War before he watched a member of his platoon kill an innocent woman to attack an enemy soldier. After making sure the man was court-marshalled, he joined Order of Justice to make protect innocents everywhere. He's joined this quest to slay a dragon who is burning a town. He has blue eyes and is fairly well-built, likes cats and plays chess in his spare time. Now he goes into his first combat, and while fighting a bugbear he manages to cut off his own leg and falls over, and then blacks out from pain as the bugbear coup de graces him. Guess who my next character is? He's a fighter. You might ask what his name is. My response is "Who cares? He's going to die next session anyway."


so in football what is considered a nat 20? i have seen players eat sh*t on the field before, break arms, get concussions, dislocate legs.

That happens only a few times in a season, though. To be fair, football players are following rules and practically wearing armor in order to avoid badly hurting each other, but the point is still that players who do get injured can't play for a few games to a whole season, or even possibly have to retire. The presence of healing magic in D&D does allow this to be dealt with somewhat, but usually people would prefer that their character was a juggernaught who shrugs off hits than a regular person who takes one hit and has to call for a medic. And no one wants the hit to be from physics deciding to take a hike and allowing the person to stab themselves with a spear or something.

[Deca4531]

If you want comedy... there is only one way that crit tables can end up with funny-haha results (http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Sameo).

thats funny, nondescript but funny.

[lsfreak]

The flurry of posts in this thread - faster than you've been able to respond to you - should give you an idea about how hated crit fumble rules are on this forum.

And it's not without reason, because as it's been described, it often arises from a misplaced desire for "realism," without taking time to think about how rarely these things will actually happen, nor how often injury would actually take place in fighting. Or a lack of alternative ideas of how to view hit points.

Often they're forced on players because the DM thinks it makes it funner, while the players dislike them intently (for good reason, it's more likely to screw over the players than the monsters).

The things you've described, I'd argue, are more appropriate to a silly campaign, whether "silly" means the more typically light-hearted, or extremely dark humor. They're simply not appropriate for most D&D campaigns. And as has been touched on, they hurt the weakest classes the most - melee more than spellcasters, TWF more than two-handed charging.

If you want to try out crit hit/miss rules, go ahead. Just recognize that it's not realism, a serious campaign may well be derailed or ruined because of the increased chance of unrecoverable mutilation or diminished emotional involvement by the players towards their characters, it is biased against already-underpowered classes and builds, and keep in mind at all times the player's preferences for continuing to use them.

[eggynack]

Guess who my next character is? He's a fighter. You might ask what his name is. My response is "Who cares? He's going to die next session anyway."
To be my accurate, he's a wizard, and his name is, "Captain Screwfumbles". Seriously, I would probably never go melee if fumbles are in the game, just because casters are so much better at avoiding them. You have to fundamentally change the way the magic system works in order to make critical fumbles apply equally.

[Deca4531]

The last one is realistic to you?

Anyway, the point you are missing is that while all of those things are possible, they aren't likely to happen very often, and certainly not as often as most critical fumble tables would allow them to. In particular, the half the reason swordsman learn how to stand and how to swing their sword in such a way that it doesn't cause them to trip or leave themselves vulnerable is that they want to walk away from the fight able to fight again. Killing your enemy isn't worth as much if you are maimed for life in the process. And this touches on the thing most people are saying, which is that if people make good characters, they don't want them to die from some random natural 1. Let's pretend I'm player 1. I make a Paladin, Sir Tumbleton, who was a soldier in the First War before he watched a member of his platoon kill an innocent woman to attack an enemy soldier. After making sure the man was court-marshalled, he joined Order of Justice to make protect innocents everywhere. He's joined this quest to slay a dragon who is burning a town. He has blue eyes and is fairly well-built, likes cats and plays chess in his spare time. Now he goes into his first combat, and while fighting a bugbear he manages to cut off his own leg and falls over, and then blacks out from pain as the bugbear coup de graces him. Guess who my next character is? He's a fighter. You might ask what his name is. My response is "Who cares? He's going to die next session anyway."

im not proposing a system where you have "oh you rolled a nat one, you lop your own head off." more of a "a nat 1, ok roll again.... ok a 19, [insert descriptive event text] you miss and loos the rest of your turn." or "oh a nat 1, roll again, another nat 1, ok lets go to the really bad fumble table, wow another nat one, now you lop your own head off"

[Namfuak]

To be my accurate, he's a wizard, and his name is, "Captain Screwfumbles". Seriously, I would probably never go melee if fumbles are in the game, just because casters are so much better at avoiding them. You have to fundamentally change the way the magic system works in order to make critical fumbles apply equally.

He did mention caster's spells blowing up in their face due to a misspoken word, so I assumed he'd be adding a d20 roll for spellcasting success or something similar.


im not proposing a system where you have "oh you rolled a nat one, you lop your own head off." more of a "a nat 1, ok roll again.... ok a 19, [insert descriptive event text] you miss and loos the rest of your turn." or "oh a nat 1, roll again, another nat 1, ok lets go to the really bad fumble table, wow another nat one, now you lop your own head off"

Alright, so he'll die sometime in the next 3 sessions. I still don't have a whole lot of reason to spend my free time coming up with a cool character and trying to get myself in his/her head so that I can roleplay it well. Also, depending on the level your game is starting at, even one fumble can be deadly. I happened to play one session with a DM who either had you drop your weapon or attack yourself or an ally (I think depending on how she felt, but she could have had a fumble table, it was over Roll20). All the characters were level 1, and my friend had a barbarian who managed to hit himself in the foot for full damage (survived somehow), and then later managed to hit the person who was standing on the other side of a goblin from him to flank it (despite using a greataxe, which doesn't reach that far), and critting him or at least doing enough damage to drop him below 0, which led to him getting killed by the goblin since we didn't kill it that turn. I can definitely say with certainty that he would not have made a new character that was much more than a statblock after that.

Sorry, some of that is that I wanted to vent that experience, but even if you use some system where really bad fumbles only happen once a level rather than once a session, people are still going to feel a bit cheated and probably not put as much effort into their next character because they will assume the same thing will happen again.

[lsfreak]

so in football what is considered a nat 20? i have seen players eat sh*t on the field before, break arms, get concussions, dislocate legs.
While I'd question whether football is comparable to combat, the key here is, how often does it actually happen compared to the number of rounds of combat? If you require two Nat 1's in a row, you should be expecting a major injury to a quarter of the players every ten minutes! If you don't require two Nat 1's, it should be happening a lot more often than that.

[eggynack]

im not proposing a system where you have "oh you rolled a nat one, you lop your own head off." more of a "a nat 1, ok roll again.... ok a 19, [insert descriptive event text] you miss and loos the rest of your turn." or "oh a nat 1, roll again, another nat 1, ok lets go to the really bad fumble table, wow another nat one, now you lop your own head off"
That's approximately what people mean when they're talking about fumble rules, so you're not really changing the discussion much with this clarification. Having characters cut their head off through crazy random happenstance just doesn't seem like a good time, no matter how low the chance is. Basically, critical fumble rules are universally a bad idea, with the degree of their badness proportional to how much they effect the game. For example, random flavor occurrences have no effect on the game, so they have no degree of badness, while chopping off your head on a one has a massive effect on the game, so it has about the maximum level of badness. The rules you've presented are somewhere in the middle.

Also, seriously, can you find me a source that talks about someone chopping their own head off with a sword? It seems somewhat impossible, or at least freakishly unlikely. It certainly doesn't happen once every 8,000 sword swings, and it probably doesn't even happen once every billion sword swings.

[Red Fel]

im not proposing a system where you have "oh you rolled a nat one, you lop your own head off." more of a "a nat 1, ok roll again.... ok a 19, [insert descriptive event text] you miss and loos the rest of your turn." or "oh a nat 1, roll again, another nat 1, ok lets go to the really bad fumble table, wow another nat one, now you lop your own head off"

The point I think people are making... well, points, really, seem to follow:

1. Critical fumbles are infuriating because they are unrealistic. Trained combatants don't make mistakes like that.

2. Critical fumbles are frustrating because they impact already-weak melee classes substantially more than already-powerful caster classes.

3. Critical fumbles are angering because they allow bad things to happen, based not upon story, decisions, or an enemy's combat action, but upon pure, vicious, random chance.

4. Critical fumbles are rage-inducing break because a single bad roll can mangle or kill a character. Even "you drop your weapon" or "you fall prone" could potentially be lethal, particularly at low levels.

5. Critical fumbles trigger a psychotic break because there is no real reason to add this element to the game. Unless the game focuses on lethality or dark humor, there's just no point in throwing insult onto injury.

6. Critical fumbles murdered my family.

I think that's what everyone is saying.

[eggynack]

He did mention caster's spells blowing up in their face due to a misspoken word, so I assumed he'd be adding a d20 roll for spellcasting success or something similar.
True, though it really depends on how the rule is implemented. Also, fighter fumbles necessarily occur when you're right in the enemy's face, when a failure is the most problematic, while a wizard's fumbles can happen at a distance, or even before combat through the power of buffing. In other words, it's really hard and complex to create fumble rules that hurt wizards as much as they hurt fighters.

[Gavinfoxx]

Here's a realistic critical fumble rule:

"On the first attack your turn, if you roll a 1, roll to confirm vs the targeted AC. If you miss the target AC, you provoke an attack of opportunity from the enemy you were targeting, provided he threatens you. Characters above level 6 do not cause this provoking."

Alas, it doesn't solve the 'casters never roll attacks' issue.

[Deca4531]

He did mention caster's spells blowing up in their face due to a misspoken word, so I assumed he'd be adding a d20 roll for spellcasting success or something similar.



Alright, so he'll die sometime in the next 3 sessions. I still don't have a whole lot of reason to spend my free time coming up with a cool character and trying to get myself in his/her head so that I can roleplay it well. Also, depending on the level your game is starting at, even one fumble can be deadly. I happened to play one session with a DM who either had you drop your weapon or attack yourself or an ally (I think depending on how she felt, but she could have had a fumble table, it was over Roll20). All the characters were level 1, and my friend had a barbarian who managed to hit himself in the foot for full damage (survived somehow), and then later managed to hit the person who was standing on the other side of a goblin from him to flank it (despite using a greataxe, which doesn't reach that far), and critting him or at least doing enough damage to drop him below 0, which led to him getting killed by the goblin since we didn't kill it that turn. I can definitely say with certainty that he would not have made a new character that was much more than a statblock after that.

Sorry, some of that is that I wanted to vent that experience, but even if you use some system where really bad fumbles only happen once a level rather than once a session, people are still going to feel a bit cheated and probably not put as much effort into their next character because they will assume the same thing will happen again.

is rolling three 1s in a row normal for you? from what everyone is saying nat 1 should almost be ignored, they dont want bad stuff to happen. ok, thats fine, but 20 shouldnt mean anything either. i hit is a hit and a miss is a miss.

[Gavinfoxx]

is rolling three 1s in a row normal for you? from what everyone is saying nat 1 should almost be ignored, they dont want bad stuff to happen. ok, thats fine, but 20 shouldnt mean anything either. i hit is a hit and a miss is a miss.

If you are saying, 'abandon this idea of changing the rules entirely, and use the rules as they exist', than yes, that is what we are saying.

[eggynack]

is rolling three 1s in a row normal for you? from what everyone is saying nat 1 should almost be ignored, they dont want bad stuff to happen. ok, thats fine, but 20 shouldnt mean anything either. i hit is a hit and a miss is a miss.
A 1 means an automatic miss. I don't know why it needs to mean more stuff than that.

[Gavinfoxx]

Also, please reread this thread OP, you have missed a LOT of posts and points and replies and such!

[lsfreak]

is rolling three 1s in a row normal for you? from what everyone is saying nat 1 should almost be ignored, they dont want bad stuff to happen. ok, thats fine, but 20 shouldnt mean anything either. i hit is a hit and a miss is a miss.

A 20 is a guaranteed hit with a chance of a little more, a 1 is a guaranteed miss. That's as much as it needs to be. I'd rather have crits taken out than fumbles added in.

[Skeller]

If you want crits and injuries to mean something can I suggest the vitality/wounds system? It seems to represent more of what you want out of the game by at least a little bit. Also I have had DM's try to spice up the game with crit tables and have had a tpk in one round against a single goblin. Fighter crit fumbled and killed the wizard and rogue and then the goblin crit and killed him. No levels on the goblin or anything. Just using a system where the actual damage was kinda meaningless. We were level 6. Fun times.... In other words I urge you not to use them but if you and your players all agree that randomly dieing pc's are fun then play however you enjoy the game.

[Deca4531]

lol, if i didnt expect 3 more pages of people telling me how bad of an idea this is by the time i was done i would.

i think i will just get rid of the nat whatevers all together. 1s are a miss, you dont drop anything or hit anything. 20s are a hit, not a hard hit or a soft hit just a hit.

[Gavinfoxx]

NO. Instead, Use the rules as they exist.

"A natural 1 on an attack is an auto miss."
"A Natural 20 on an attack is an auto hit. It also threatens a critical hit, with values based on the weapon."

[eggynack]

NO. Instead, Use the rules as they exist.

"A natural 1 on an attack is an auto miss."
"A Natural 20 on an attack is an auto hit. It also threatens a critical hit, with values based on the weapon."
True enough. Fighters need more hugs, rather than less, and removing critical hits has a weird impact on weapon balance, as well as several other facets of the game.

[Brookshw]

All I can say is that we used pretty ridiculous crit/fumble charts at one point, extremely ridiculous, and my players still love to laugh about them. Good memories all around.

[Deca4531]

if a 1 isnt bad why should a 20 be good?

[Gavinfoxx]

if a 1 isnt bad why should a 20 be good?

A 1 is bad. You miss, even if your bonuses are enough that you would otherwise hit.

[eggynack]

Also, a 20 doesn't trigger a critical hit. It only triggers an automatic hit. Threat range is basically determined by a separate property, which is weapon attributes. The two aspects of combat are separate.

[Deca4531]

A 1 is bad. You miss, even if your bonuses are enough that you would otherwise hit.

and a 20 hits, why diose it need to be anything more than that

[lsfreak]

Also, a 20 doesn't trigger a critical hit. It only triggers an automatic hit. Threat range is basically determined by a separate property, which is weapon attributes. The two aspects of combat are separate.

You know, despite the obviousness, what with many weapons having expanded crit ranges, for some reason I never thought of it like that.

[Gavinfoxx]

and a 20 hits, why diose it need to be anything more than that

Because you are then removing a substantial variety of the game math? If you want to simplify it and don't like confirming things, just make a 20 a max normal damage hit without rolling to confirm.

[Deca4531]

Because you are then removing a substantial variety of the game math? If you want to simplify it and don't like confirming things, just make a 20 a max normal damage hit without rolling to confirm.

you seem to be missing my point, criticle fumbles are bad, people hate them, thats fine we wont use them. but if you remove the extra negative to a 1 you should remove the extra positive to a 20, or a 19 or what ever the crit range is of whatever. if a crit fumble is meaningless that why should a crit hit mean something.

[Gavinfoxx]

you seem to be missing my point, criticle fumbles are bad, people hate them, thats fine we wont use them. but if you remove the extra negative to a 1 you should remove the extra positive to a 20, or a 19 or what ever the crit range is of whatever. if a crit fumble is meaningless that why should a crit hit mean something.

Remove...what extra negative? All we are saying is that you use the rules that are in the books. The way they are written. IE, get it back to normal. Which is the rules I mentioned.

[eggynack]

you seem to be missing my point, criticle fumbles are bad, people hate them, thats fine we wont use them. but if you remove the extra negative to a 1 you should remove the extra positive to a 20, or a 19 or what ever the crit range is of whatever. if a crit fumble is meaningless that why should a crit hit mean something.
As I noted, they're just completely different things. On a 1 you miss, and on a 20 you hit. That's all it is. The critical hit rules are essentially a separate thing, attached to weapon properties. It's like you're saying, "Disarming is a thing, so why don't people arbitrarily disarm themselves in the middle of combat?" or, "a glaive does 1d10 damage to its opponents, so why doesn't it sometimes do 1d10 damage to you?"

[Deca4531]

Remove...what extra negative? All we are saying is that you use the rules that are in the books. The way they are written. IE, get it back to normal. Which is the rules I mentioned.

im sure it isnt in an DMG, but out of the dozens if not hundreds of games i have played a 1 meant something bad other than i miss, or at least a chance at something bad. most of my own games if a 1 is rolled i give them a 50/50 chance that nothing happens or something happens. everyone hates 1s for a reason other than they didint hit the monster, just like everyone cheers when they see 20s cause they know that have a chance at bonus damage.

[eggynack]

im sure it isnt in an DMG, but out of the dozens if not hundreds of games i have played a 1 meant something bad other than i miss, or at least a chance at something bad. most of my own games if a 1 is rolled i give them a 50/50 chance that nothing happens or something happens. everyone hates 1s for a reason other than they didint hit the monster, just like everyone cheers when they see 20s cause they know that have a chance at bonus damage.
Yeah, but that isn't removing an extra negative. It's adding an extra negative, and then removing it. You don't need to balance out the changes you make to the game, if you're just changing the rules back to their normal state.

[JusticeZero]

Yeah, and removing those odd self sabotage effects is helping you to achieve your stated goal of "more realism".

[Deca4531]

Yeah, but that isn't removing an extra negative. It's adding an extra negative, and then removing it. You don't need to balance out the changes you make to the game, if you're just changing the rules back to their normal state.

well i would be changing the rules. i would be keeping the no crit miss since people dont like it, and removing the existing crit hit since it seems unbalanced to have one and not the other.

[Gavinfoxx]

Let's put this in perspective.

Every game you have played has been badly houseruled.

Okay?

[eggynack]

well i would be changing the rules. i would be keeping the no crit miss since people dont like it, and removing the existing crit hit since it seems unbalanced to have one and not the other.
How is it unbalanced? It makes mundane characters marginally better, and mundanes are generally the least powerful classes in the game. You should really try to get a better understanding of balance before making changes to the game's balance.

[JusticeZero]

It isn't. Part of that is the fact that critical hits aren't a game changing thing. They are a bit of a damage buff that is given to certain weapons in return for a different buff for reason of making people vary their weapon choice a bit.

[Deca4531]

How is it unbalanced? It makes mundane characters marginally better, and mundanes are generally the least powerful classes in the game. You should really try to get a better understanding of balance before making changes to the game's balance.

i dont imagen it would hurt much of anything honestly, if the bonus to "Marginal" that i fail to see how a dropped weapon isnt "Marginal" as well.

[lsfreak]

Besides a fallacious desire for symmetry where none need exist, what is your basis for removing crits? The game is "balanced," insofar as that can be said, around the existence of crits and no fumbles. "Seeming" unbalanced has nothing to do with it, the question is whether it actually, mathematically is... and I have very, very good reasons for doubting that removing crits will increase the balance of the game.

[TuggyNE]

is rolling three 1s in a row normal for you?

1/8000 chance. Way too high for most effects that fumble rules stick there.

[Deca4531]

Besides a fallacious desire for symmetry where none need exist, what is your basis for removing crits? The game is "balanced," insofar as that can be said, around the existence of crits and no fumbles. "Seeming" unbalanced has nothing to do with it, the question is whether it actually, mathematically is... and I have very, very good reasons for doubting that removing crits will increase the balance of the game.

probably not, no more than dropping a weapon on a 1 will horribly unbalance the game.

[eggynack]

i dont imagen it would hurt much of anything honestly, if the bonus to "Marginal" that i fail to see how a dropped weapon isnt "Marginal" as well.
Because of a few reasons. Because dropping your weapon causes you to lose future iterative, and incurs an AoO on the next turn. Because doubling your damage isn't as good as losing it is bad, even if the opposite would mathematically appear to be the case. Because though the general impact of critical hits on a fighter's damage is marginal, the impact on an individual combat is not. Because any reduction in a fighter's consistency, no matter how small, reduces the balance of the game, and that's a bad thing.

[JusticeZero]

Dropping a weapon is much worse than a minor damage spike. If it were fun and realistic it might be one thing, but it is neither.

[Gavinfoxx]

probably not, no more than dropping a weapon on a 1 will horribly unbalance the game.

Because it makes the weakest classes (ie, those that use weapons which can be dropped to do their thing) weaker.

Seriously, let's say that the Druid is currently a Polar Bear (let's throw a Wizard's Enlarge Person on him for added insult) and is attacking with claws. He fumbles, and it says dropped weapon. What happens? Nothing. Now, the fighter, who is a worse fighter than the Druid's Animal Companion, let alone the Druid, does the same, and drops his weapon, thereby having him have to eat a bunch of AoO's and interrupt his iterative attacks and so on... which makes balance WORSE.

[lsfreak]

Are you forgetting that crits don't just happen on Nat 20s? They're a separate system from the auto-hits.

[Deca4531]

Because it makes the weakest classes (ie, those that use weapons which can be dropped to do their thing) weaker.

Seriously, let's say that the Druid is currently a Polar Bear (let's throw a Wizard's Enlarge Person on him for added insult) and is attacking with claws. He fumbles, and it says dropped weapon. What happens? Nothing. Now, the fighter, who is a worse fighter than the Druid's Animal Companion, let alone the Druid, does the same, and drops his weapon, thereby having him have to eat a bunch of AoO's and interrupt his iterative attacks and so on... which makes balance WORSE.

like i said back in the start, its not something you limited to fighters. a caster can loose his spell, a druid in bear form can trip and fall.

anyway, this argument has gone in a circle for long enough so im just going to put and end to it and ask people to please stop posting. i realize many think its horribly game breaking to loose an atk or get an extra atk on you. i humbly disagree as is all our right.

[Abaddona]

Critical hit = damage x2 to x4 = extra one, two or three actions.

Weapon dropped on fumble = attack missed, lost 1 to three iteratives, move action to get weapon = no full action = lost another 1 to three iteratives, AoO from enemy = three to 8 actions lost.

Where are you seeing balance here?

Also - what exactly caster shoul do to lose his spell? Because unless you houserule it (and then it will have strange consequnces duriing buffing like "temple priest hurting around 1 - 5% of people who buyed healing from him") caster don't roll to cast a spell.

[eggynack]

like i said back in the start, its not something you limited to fighters. a caster can loose his spell, a druid in bear form can trip and fall.

anyway, this argument has gone in a circle for long enough so im just going to put and end to it and ask people to please stop posting. i realize many think its horribly game breaking to loose an atk or get an extra atk on you. i humbly disagree as is all our right.
What're your rules for spell fumbling in particular? Casters are getting an advantage, pretty much no matter what, but the inner workings of the system could make it more or less problematic.

[Gavinfoxx]

How does a caster, who doesn't roll any d20's in casting his spell, lose his spell?

And how does a 'dropped weapon' result on your chart impact the druid? Or are you not actually having a system for WHAT happens?

[Deca4531]

so how about that 5ed system coming soon, should be a big improvement over 4ed huh. wonder how many books i'll have to buy for it lol.

[Gavinfoxx]

I'd put 4e > 5e, actually. And you're not answering our questions.

And I'd put Legend above them both.

Notably, it's actually balanced -- even more so than 4e. No need to houserule THAT.

http://www.ruleofcool.com/

[Deca4531]

like i said back in the start, its not something you limited to fighters. a caster can loose his spell, a druid in bear form can trip and fall.

anyway, this argument has gone in a circle for long enough so im just going to put and end to it and ask people to please stop posting. i realize many think its horribly game breaking to loose an atk or get an extra atk on you. i humbly disagree as is all our right.

i didnt care much for the action system in 4ed, seemed too much like wow

[Abaddona]

Well Deca4531 was asking us to refrain from additional comments and effectively would like to close whole topic, so we should probably honor that.
(actually answering initial question - altough in my opinion fumble rules are evil - look at Pathfinder critical strike/fumble cards and may gods bless your players if you still wanting to introduce such rules in the game).

[eggynack]

Stuff
You do realize that one of the premises of your argument is that critical failure can apply to casters and non-casters equally, and that you've never defended that claim, right? It seems like a fair question.

[Gavinfoxx]

Yea, the whole, "I make a caster and one of my goals is to never roll a D20 on my turn. If I do that, I have failed" is a thing. You don't HAVE to roll D20's on your action if you don't want to -- you can have a bunch of combat effective actions that don't require you to roll at all, and a bunch of spells that remove your need to roll in a huge variety of situations..

[Skeller]

I realize you you probably do not want to talk about it any more but I just have one more thing to add. If a house rule to use critical fumble rules is what you AND your players enjoy then by all means use it. But please talk to your players first. What most people here(including myself) have been saying basically boils down to not liking those house rules and the game is all about having fun in the end. To that effect I would suggest if you still want to use house rules for it you may as well use this. http://dnd-wiki.org/wiki/Fumble_Chart_%283.5e_Variant_Rule%29

[Gavinfoxx]

I realize you you probably do not want to talk about it any more but I just have one more thing to add. If a house rule to use critical fumble rules is what you AND your players enjoy then by all means use it. But please talk to your players first. What most people here(including myself) have been saying basically boils down to not liking those house rules and the game is all about having fun in the end. To that effect I would suggest if you still want to use house rules for it you may as well use this. http://dnd-wiki.org/wiki/Fumble_Chart_%283.5e_Variant_Rule%29

Yea... that chart sucks since it does nothing for people with natural weapons or who aren't attacking with a weapon or who are attacking with a spell or a ranged weapon or any of another myriad things, and it doesn't have any sanity with regards to people getting MORE COMPETENT being more likely to make fumbles, and it doesn't add any D20's to spellcasting, etc. etc. etc.

[Skeller]

Yea... that chart sucks since it does nothing for people with natural weapons or who aren't attacking with a weapon or who are attacking with a spell or a ranged weapon or any of another myriad things, and it doesn't have any sanity with regards to people getting MORE COMPETENT being more likely to make fumbles, and it doesn't add any D20's to spellcasting, etc. etc. etc.

Honestly I do not really like any crit fumble chart. But you could use that for some ideas and make your own chart that works a little better for whatever you need it for.

[Psyren]

I don't mind crit fumbles as long as (a) there is no "insta-death" option and (b) you have to confirm critical misses (by missing a second time) just like you do critical hits.

If you're looking for interesting effects, Paizo has critical hit and critical fumble decks that affect ranged and casters as well as melee. Obviously the casters will generally be affected less, but conversely, their debuffs tend to be a bit nastier.

[The Trickster]

http://paizo.com/products/btpy8x9g?GameMastery-Critical-Fumble-Deck

Just because.

[Toy Killer]

Personally, I would only use a critical hit/fumble deck with 3d6 game instead of a D20 game.

an 18 and a 3 are just so much more rare in those circumstances. but you have to be conscious enough to balance out how many attacks are being swung at the party and how much are being swung by the party.

[Psyren]

Having to confirm helps brings the probability down a bit. but I agree, 3d6 works better for this sort of thing.

[Spuddles]

I don't mind crit fumbles as long as (a) there is no "insta-death" option and (b) you have to confirm critical misses (by missing a second time) just like you do critical hits.

If you're looking for interesting effects, Paizo has critical hit and critical fumble decks that affect ranged and casters as well as melee. Obviously the casters will generally be affected less, but conversely, their debuffs tend to be a bit nastier.

It also doesnt require rolling to confirm a fumble and has the same problem as any other fumble mechanic- a level 20 fighter ends up breaking his wrist every 4 rounds of full attacks.

It also nerfs the hell out of crits. But then, anything outside of a greatsword in PF isn't worth using anyway, so I guess it's a wash there.

[Toy Killer]

It also doesnt require rolling to confirm a fumble and has the same problem as any other fumble mechanic- a level 20 fighter ends up breaking his wrist every 4 rounds of full attacks.

No, no... if he has to miss on his confirm, he's far better off. The monk still has issues though (well, besides rolling a Monk, of course).

[Spuddles]

No, no... if he has to miss on his confirm, he's far better off. The monk still has issues though (well, besides rolling a Monk, of course).

There are no additional rules for rolling a fumble AFAIK- you roll a 1, your hand falls off or something else stupid.

[gooddragon1]

I feel like a lot of the responses here have an element of frustration and hostility towards the OP. I think it comes from people who hate extra negatives piled on for a natural 1. I know those frustrations too but we should demonstrate with neutrality why natural 1's are already bad enough.

Here it is:
A caster can cast a fireball without rolling any dice other than damage and a maximized fireball without rolling anything if the monster has no spell resistance. So there's no chance of him rolling a 1 on an attack roll because he doesn't make one. A fighter with a weapon of speed and a BAB of 16+ can potentially roll a 1 on any of 5 attack rolls whereas a first level fighter can only potentially roll a 1 on his 1 attack. Thus a 16th level fighter is much more likely to kill himself from those extreme fumble rules. The way that 3.5 is built causes casters to simply be much more powerful that non-casters unless the DM takes very extreme measures against it or there's a collaboration between the casters and the DM to seriously limit their potential. So extreme that I believe this forum nor any other has ever managed to make a set of houserules comprehensive enough to stop all potential things a caster could do without simply eliminating the ability to cast all spells or spells above a certain level. An example of this difference in potential can be seen when trying to optimize a fighter to deal 200 damage in a round vs trying to optimize a cleric (not druid) to deal 200 damage in a round as shown below:

Fighter:
Weapon Specialization
Melee Weapon Mastery
Greater Weapon Specialization

Water Orc (need an 18 in STR)
+4 STR Racial
+6 STR Item
+5 STR Book
+5 STR over 20 levels.
38 STR
2 hand a greatsword +5 Collision Aptitude Transmuting
21 damage from STR
13 damage from the weapon
6 damage from feats

40 damage per attack
Boots of Speed for Haste effect.
5 attacks dealing 200 damage.

===

Cleric:

Feats:
Maximize Spell
Empower Spell
Quicken Spell

Race:
Whatever

Stats:
At least 18 wisdom

Spell:
Ice Axe (http://dndtools.eu/spells/spell-compendium--86/ice-axe--3862/)
Divine Power Quickened

Maximized Empowered Ice Axe takes up an 8th level slot.
Quickened Divine Power takes up an 8th level slot.

2d12+10 ->34 maximized ->51 empowered
51*4=204 damage.

This requires 0 gp. The fighter needs 200,000 gp alone for his weapon. This is hardly even the limit to which the cleric can optimize (energy substitution for sonic damage if the target is immune to cold). A druid makes even the damage output of this cleric seem tame.

The point here is that doing natural 1 rules and removing the possibility to crit makes the game even harder on mundane classes. If you are looking for realism it may be better to include effects that occur at various hitpoint totals. Or even better, make it so that rolling a natural 20 not only potentially allows for a critical hit but can damage the limbs and organs of an opponent. This too will negatively affect frontline melee characters but at least they won't suffer even more for rolling natural 1's.

[Maginomicon]

Step #0: Ignore everyone here that's complaining about the basic premise for what you want. They're not actually helping. That's why a while back I added what's now the last line of my sig.

Step #1: Implement the "Good Hits and Bad Misses" crit/fumble tables in Dragon Compendium. It has you roll a d% to determine the result of a crit or fumble, and even then it states that the GM is free to determine when it should come into play at all so it's not like you're hamstrung into one way of thinking.

Step #2: Implement the Bell Curve Rolls variant from the SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/adventuring/bellCurveRolls.htm). This will reduce the odds of a fumble from "1 in 20" to "1 in 216". With these two methods combined, there's only a 0.074% chance on a given roll that you'll actually hurt someone. It may or may not pass the infamous "100-man straw target scenario" test, but personally I find that test to be fallacious at best (don't ask why, this is not the thread for that as it'll open another can of worms).

And always remember...

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/increased_risk.png

[Bovine Colonel]

Step #0: Ignore everyone here that's complaining about the basic premise for what you want. They're not actually helping. That's why the last line of my sig exists.

The last line of your sig is not some kind of law. People here disagree with the use of crit fumbles for a variety of reasons; they are perfectly free to voice that disagreement, just as other people are free to disagree with them in turn. If the basic premise of my thread is "the government is secretly using chemtrails to turn us all into green baboons" should other people be disallowed to disagree with the basic premise of my thread?

[gooddragon1]

Step #0: Ignore everyone here that's complaining about the basic premise for what you want. They're not actually helping. That's why the last line of my sig exists.

Step #1: Implement the "Good Hits and Bad Misses" crit/fumble tables in Dragon Compendium. It has you roll a d% to determine the result of a crit or fumble, and even then it states that the GM is free to determine when it should come into play at all so it's not like you're hamstrung into one way of thinking.

Step #2: Implement the Bell Curve Rolls variant from the SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/adventuring/bellCurveRolls.htm). This will reduce the odds of a fumble from "1 in 20" to "1 in 216". With these two methods combined, there's only a 0.074% chance on a given roll that you'll actually hurt someone. It may or may not pass the infamous "100-man straw target scenario" test, but personally I find that test to be fallacious at best (don't ask why, this is not the thread for that as it'll open another can of worms).

You're right, it doesn't help to not suggest what the DM wants. However, critical fumbles are widely disliked by players and we are voicing why that's the case. If the DM chooses to ignore that advice and his players choose to leave or at least complain we will have done our bit to show the OP why they took those actions. We are only trying to avoid a stressful situation for the OP by sharing our thoughts on the matter.

Also, telling someone that a build is bad just because it's not high tier is not helpful. However, steering a person away from disaster in a case like this one (at least in my opinion) is.

[lsfreak]

No, no... if he has to miss on his confirm, he's far better off.

Yes and no. Rolling a confirmed miss is certainly better than no extra roll at all, but it makes iteratives worse and worse. At higher levels, your fighter is basically going to be making judgment calls on whether or not it's worth trying for the extra attack, or whether the chance of a Nat 1 (that will be confirmed -15, and likely at -10 as well) is too much. This is especially the case if the fumble charts work off how badly you fumble. Getting more attacks from BAB should never be a punishment.

[TuggyNE]

The last line of your sig is not some kind of law. People here disagree with the use of crit fumbles for a variety of reasons; they are perfectly free to voice that disagreement, just as other people are free to disagree with them in turn. If the basic premise of my thread is "the government is secretly using chemtrails to turn us all into green baboons" should other people be disallowed to disagree with the basic premise of my thread?

Agreed; there's a reason the forum rules discourage "pointless negation of the purpose of a thread", and not merely all negation.

Then, too, it's often helpful to try to suss out what higher goal the OP might have that they are (perhaps incorrectly) assuming can best be accomplished by critical fumbles; if an alternative shows up that satisfies that, well, where's the problem?

[Deca4531]

Step #0: Ignore everyone here that's complaining about the basic premise for what you want. They're not actually helping. That's why a while back I added what's now the last line of my sig.

Step #1: Implement the "Good Hits and Bad Misses" crit/fumble tables in Dragon Compendium. It has you roll a d% to determine the result of a crit or fumble, and even then it states that the GM is free to determine when it should come into play at all so it's not like you're hamstrung into one way of thinking.

Step #2: Implement the Bell Curve Rolls variant from the SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/adventuring/bellCurveRolls.htm). This will reduce the odds of a fumble from "1 in 20" to "1 in 216". With these two methods combined, there's only a 0.074% chance on a given roll that you'll actually hurt someone. It may or may not pass the infamous "100-man straw target scenario" test, but personally I find that test to be fallacious at best (don't ask why, this is not the thread for that as it'll open another can of worms).


Thank you, this is 100% exactly what i was looking for, and you explained the implementation very well, i think i will run the idea of the 3d6 thing past my players along with this chart and see if its something they would like to use (i would of course never use any system that has a possibility of instant death without the party being on board.)

also, thank you for trying to help me find what i was looking for instead of "optimizing" or "min/maxing" my DMing style. while i respect its people's right to voice their opinion they (mostly, not all) did it without helping me in my request, and the thread was spinning towards a rant fest.

[Gavinfoxx]

I'm still curious as to how you will get spellcasters who aren't rolling d20's to do their thing to be relevant on the crit/fumble issue.

[Deca4531]

I'm still curious as to how you will get spellcasters who aren't rolling d20's to do their thing to be relevant on the crit/fumble issue.

with a little creativity, the target often get a saving throw, lets say if the target rolls a 20 on a saving throw then the spell rebounds back at them or something else happens. in the same way if the saving throw comes up a 1 maybe its effect it doubled.

[Gavinfoxx]

with a little creativity, the target often get a saving throw, lets say if the target rolls a 20 on a saving throw then the spell rebounds back at them or something else happens. in the same way if the saving throw comes up a 1 maybe its effect it doubled.

What if there are multiple targets? Or there is no save allowed? What if it is a buff? What if it isn't in combat?

[Deca4531]

What if there are multiple targets? Or there is no save allowed? What if it is a buff? What if it isn't in combat?

well since it all depends on what they spell is, since there are thousands, it all boils down to your ability to not suck at being a DM and finding a fair result.

as for things out of combat, like lets say detect magic, there is no roll, your not under any kind of stress (since you could apply fumble rules to a concentration check if nothing else.) so you shouldnt fail.

[eggynack]

well since it all depends on what they spell is, since there are thousands, it all boils down to your ability to not suck at being a DM and finding a fair result.

as for things out of combat, like lets say detect magic, there is no roll, your not under any kind of stress (since you could apply fumble rules to a concentration check if nothing else.) so you shouldnt fail.
Let's be clear here then with some specifics. What happens if our noble wizard stands 50 ft. away from his opponents, and casts solid fog? There's absolutely no roll caused by that spell. What happens if the wizard casts polymorph? In fact, let's take it a step further. What happens if the wizard casts cloudkill? That spell actually does have a save, but that save only happens after the spell starts existing. Do the enemy's successful saves arbitrarily cause the cloudkill to bounce off of them towards the wizard, despite the fact that the spell has no real connection to the wizard anymore? Similarly, what happens if you cast a wall of stone around an enemy, such that they get a reflex save to avoid the wall? The wall isn't even being resisted by the enemy, and it's not even magical when the save takes place. In fact, the wall necessarily exists in order for the save to happen at all, and there's not much in the way of logical negative outcomes at that point.

What happens in all of these situations? Every single spell that a wizard can cast without incurring a failure chance is one more way than the fighter has to get around critical failure rules. If these spells can't critically fail, then your system is intrinsically imbalanced in favor of casters. There are two other issues, actually. The first is that adding the actual effect of critical fumbles to spells is hard. Swords just do one thing, so you have one chart of what could go wrong. Magic does all the things, and many of those things would necessarily go wrong in different ways. The second is the fact that you're apparently adding a provision for non-weaponlike spells to critically succeed. This has two issues in turn. The first of which is that you're giving wizards any kind of boost in power, whereas fighters only experience sadness and loss. They already had critical hits, so this is only bad for them. The second relates back to the original first issue. How does one double the effects of a spell that doesn't damage? Basically, ask yourself what it would mean to critically hit on a wall of stone, or a solid fog, assuming that you find a way to make those critically fail. This is a more problematic issue than you think it is, is what I'm saying.

[Deca4531]

Let's be clear here then with some specifics. What happens if our noble wizard stands 50 ft. away from his opponents, and casts solid fog? There's absolutely no roll caused by that spell. What happens if the wizard casts polymorph? In fact, let's take it a step further. What happens if the wizard casts cloudkill? That spell actually does have a save, but that save only happens after the spell starts existing. Do the enemy's successful saves arbitrarily cause the cloudkill to bounce off of them towards the wizard, despite the fact that the spell has no real connection to the wizard anymore? Similarly, what happens if you cast a wall of stone around an enemy, such that they get a reflex save to avoid the wall? The wall isn't even being resisted by the enemy, and it's not even magical when the save takes place. In fact, the wall necessarily exists in order for the save to happen at all, and there's not much in the way of logical negative outcomes at that point.

What happens in all of these situations? Every single spell that a wizard can cast without incurring a failure chance is one more way than the fighter has to get around critical failure rules. If these spells can't critically fail, then your system is intrinsically imbalanced in favor of casters. There are two other issues, actually. The first is that adding the actual effect of critical fumbles to spells is hard. Swords just do one thing, so you have one chart of what could go wrong. Magic does all the things, and many of those things would necessarily go wrong in different ways. The second is the fact that you're apparently adding a provision for non-weaponlike spells to critically succeed. This has two issues in turn. The first of which is that you're giving wizards any kind of boost in power, whereas fighters only experience sadness and loss. They already had critical hits, so this is only bad for them. The second relates back to the original first issue. How does one double the effects of a spell that doesn't damage? Basically, ask yourself what it would mean to critically hit on a wall of stone, or a solid fog, assuming that you find a way to make those critically fail. This is a more problematic issue than you think it is, is what I'm saying.

Say a fighter is in control of a landslide trap, he dosent need to hit with it but the bad guy dose need to try to avoid it. the fighter cant crit with it, or with a net, or with a pit trap. area of effects have no rolls and so have no crits or fumbles. now an attack spell that targets like say "Daze" has a chance to be resisted, so a roll is being made. lets say the save is crited on, then we, as a DM, can use our creativity (assuming we have any) to come up with a reason why something might happen, like maybe "Lacking a suitable target your spell instead miss fires, causing its summoned power to effect the closest suitable target, you."

as i said before, im not going to make a criticle hit/miss sheet for every spell in the game. also i know things like these are seen as "unbalanced" but if your players are fine with it who the hell cares? if you try it and its not fun then you stop, but at least you tried. D&D isnt World of Warcraft where you are limited to A, B and C, even the rules in D&D themselves arent really rules so much as guidelines.

[Maginomicon]

Thank you, this is 100% exactly what i was looking for, and you explained the implementation very well, i think i will run the idea of the 3d6 thing past my players along with this chart and see if its something they would like to use (i would of course never use any system that has a possibility of instant death without the party being on board.)

also, thank you for trying to help me find what i was looking for instead of "optimizing" or "min/maxing" my DMing style. while i respect its people's right to voice their opinion they (mostly, not all) did it without helping me in my request, and the thread was spinning towards a rant fest.

You're very welcome. Be sure to get the Dragon Compendium Errata (http://paizo.com/download/dragon/compendium/DragonCompendiumVolumeIErrata.pdf) while you're at it. One of the entries in one of the crit/fumble tables was misprinted but corrected in the errata.

[eggynack]

Say a fighter is in control of a landslide trap, he dosent need to hit with it but the bad guy dose need to try to avoid it. the fighter cant crit with it, or with a net, or with a pit trap. area of effects have no rolls and so have no crits or fumbles. now an attack spell that targets like say "Daze" has a chance to be resisted, so a roll is being made. lets say the save is crited on, then we, as a DM, can use our creativity (assuming we have any) to come up with a reason why something might happen, like maybe "Lacking a suitable target your spell instead miss fires, causing its summoned power to effect the closest suitable target, you."
That doesn't really provide an advantage for fighters at all. What benefit do fighters have in creating landslide traps? Fighters are good at one set of things, and that set of things is entirely governed by rolls that can critically fail. You keep talking about DM creativity, like anyone who can't resolve this incredibly difficult problem is doing something wrong, but I don't think that it's a problem you're resolving particularly well. I mean, your one example doesn't even make sense, because your spell has a target and they're right there. In fact, the opponent can't save if they're not targeted, so in order for them to be targeted, there must have been a target.


as i said before, im not going to make a criticle hit/miss sheet for every spell in the game. also i know things like these are seen as "unbalanced" but if your players are fine with it who the hell cares? if you try it and its not fun then you stop, but at least you tried. D&D isnt World of Warcraft where you are limited to A, B and C, even the rules in D&D themselves arent really rules so much as guidelines.
The problem isn't so much that you're creating a mechanic that applies unequally. The problem is that you're creating a mechanic that applies unequally, but in the wrong way. Wizards are already ridiculously consistent with their casting, in a way that fighters never even come close to approaching. Critical failure further exacerbates the game's balance problems.

[Deca4531]

because your spell has a target and they're right there. In fact, the opponent can't save if they're not targeted, so in order for them to be targeted, there must have been a target.

thats was fluff, to describe how or why the spell would have rebounded to the PC. said creatures will save so so high it didnt just resist it, it became untargetable by it, and nice the caster couldnt know that some crazy **** happened.



The problem isn't so much that you're creating a mechanic that applies unequally. The problem is that you're creating a mechanic that applies unequally, but in the wrong way. Wizards are already ridiculously consistent with their casting, in a way that fighters never even come close to approaching. Critical failure further exacerbates the game's balance problems.

Honestly, i dont care about fighters, few people play a pure fighter or rely only on melee damage to get the job done for them (in refrance to high level games, since low level the fighter is better than the wizard). i just wanna do something that might be fun, and if im ok with it and my players are ok with it who cares if its unbalanced. im not trying to re-invent D&D, just tweek a few things to add some more excitement.

[JusticeZero]

First attack only, and only if the fumble misses an AC 10, incur an AoO from the opponent that can only be used for a combat maneuver. Said combat maneuver does not have any inherent retaliation component for failure that might ordinarily be contained in the original technique. Flat 5% chance of incurring such an AoO for doing anything other than combat while standing in a threatened area.

[Red Fel]

Honestly, i dont care about fighters, few people play a pure fighter or rely only on melee damage to get the job done for them (in refrance to high level games, since low level the fighter is better than the wizard). i just wanna do something that might be fun, and if im ok with it and my players are ok with it who cares if its unbalanced. im not trying to re-invent D&D, just tweek a few things to add some more excitement.

As someone who prefers to play melee fighters, I have several things to say to that.

First, this mechanic does not create excitement for me. It creates disappointment. It creates frustration.

Second, since this primarily impacts melee types, shouldn't people who play those types be the ones to decide what constitutes exciting for them? And since this is a group you have said you don't play and about whom you don't care, I don't know that it's terribly appropriate for you to be imposing these harsh rules on them. Especially since you don't seem to understand how this will disproportionately impact melees.

Third, not cool. Just, not cool.

[Deca4531]

As someone who prefers to play melee fighters, I have several things to say to that.

First, this mechanic does not create excitement for me. It creates disappointment. It creates frustration.

thats fine, im not asking you to play with them


Second, since this primarily impacts melee types, shouldn't people who play those types be the ones to decide what constitutes exciting for them?

As i have said in earler posts, my players are willing to try it.


And since this is a group you have said you don't play and about whom you don't care, I don't know that it's terribly appropriate for you to be imposing these harsh rules on them. Especially since you don't seem to understand how this will disproportionately impact melees.

i have played fighters, and i like fighter for 1 or 2 levels. as a matter of fact almost all of my favorite builds are melee builds, but its not all about what balanced or optomized al long as you have fun with it. im not DMing a level 20 game, my players are lv 1. i could understand your distress if you were playing in a game like this with a lv 20 pure fighter, but that isnt the case. my players are fine with trying this and if they dont like it we can stop, very simple.


Third, not cool. Just, not cool.

*casts Chill Touch* there, now its cool :D

[eggynack]

thats was fluff, to describe how or why the spell would have rebounded to the PC. said creatures will save so so high it didnt just resist it, it became untargetable by it, and nice the caster couldnt know that some crazy **** happened.
I get that it was fluff. It's just illogical fluff, given the rules of the game. For example, you're allowed to cast dominate person on someone with mind blank. It just won't do anything. There's no spell deflection of any kind in that case, so your critical failure falls apart to some extent when put under scrutiny. That kinda problem is pretty common with this kind of rule, because lots of spells have their own baggage and issues, and coming up with a rule that covers all of them ranges from tricky to impossible.




Honestly, i dont care about fighters, few people play a pure fighter or rely only on melee damage to get the job done for them (in refrance to high level games, since low level the fighter is better than the wizard). i just wanna do something that might be fun, and if im ok with it and my players are ok with it who cares if its unbalanced. im not trying to re-invent D&D, just tweek a few things to add some more excitement.

First of all, fighter is just a stand in for whatever melee guy we're talking about. I honestly don't care if it's a fighter 20 or a Barbarian 1/ Fighter 1/ Ranger 3/Horizon Walker 10/random other class 5, or some kinda warblade build. There is no class, based solely on melee, that is more powerful than a wizard, so it doesn't matter what the specific class is. Second of all, fighters are not more powerful in low level games, unless by "low level games" you mean "first or second level games". The imbalance starts piling up that early on. For a druid, the imbalance starts right at level one, and extends all the way to 20. You're trying to tweak a few things, but I don't think you understand the thing you're tweaking well enough to know what to tweak.

[Deca4531]

No im well aware that criticle fumbles badly hurt melee classes, and making them weaker just makes the by allowing them to drop weapons or hit themselves puts casters at and even better advantage compared to melee.

but i dont play RAW, never have never will. if player or DM i make this game my own for my own enjoyment and that of the people i play with.

i dont care what the rules are, what "makes sense" to some and not others, or where X class falls compared to Y class. im not trying to balance the classes and if they fall it bit more out of balance then we tweek this or that to try to compensate (like using 3d6 instead of a d20).

maybe i'll go with a "time of troubles" rule where magic is unstable and every spell has a 5% chance to blow up, or cast some other random spell. some might find that fun and some wouldnt.

"but your unbalancing casters now, the whole game could fall apart."

"so?"

[eggynack]

but i dont play RAW, never have never will.
I don't know why you expect us to be able to construct rule sets, or evaluate old ones, when there's apparently a ton of hidden information involved.

[Deca4531]

I don't know why you expect us to be able to construct rule sets, or evaluate old ones, when there's apparently a ton of hidden information involved.

well the fact that the title of the thread has the words "crit miss" in it should tell you this thread is not based on RAW.

also, i never asked anyone to evaluate anything, i just asked for an alternate system. (it took 3 pages of people telling me they hate fumbles and how over powered wizards are but i eventually got one.)

[eggynack]

well the fact that the title of the thread has the words "crit miss" in it should tell you this thread is not based on RAW.

Not really. The general assumption is that everything in the game follows RAW unless otherwise noted. It wasn't otherwise noted, so it was implied that non-crit fumble elements would maintain their original state. You don't create home brew in a vacuum.

[Yeturs]

On a nat 1, i make something embarassing but not harmfull happen. Like, you swing your sword and hit the wall. With a clang a a moment of pulling, you dislodge it. The innkeeper might ding you more for property damage, but the point is 5% of the time you dont just miss, you look like a scrub too.

[Deca4531]

Not really. The general assumption is that everything in the game follows RAW unless otherwise noted. It wasn't otherwise noted, so it was implied that non-crit fumble elements would maintain their original state. You don't create home brew in a vacuum.

and they did, all non crit fumbles are just as they always were, i dont even think non crit fumbles were mentioned actualy. but the point of the thread was crit fumbles, which are not RAW, have never been RAW (in 3.5), and probably never will be RAW.

[Deca4531]

On a nat 1, i make something embarassing but not harmfull happen. Like, you swing your sword and hit the wall. With a clang a a moment of pulling, you dislodge it. The innkeeper might ding you more for property damage, but the point is 5% of the time you dont just miss, you look like a scrub too.

thats a good idea :)

[sketchtb]

I don't know if this has been pointed out but...

http://paizo.com/products/btpy8x9g?GameMastery-Critical-Fumble-Deck

We play with both this and the critical hit deck and it definitely adds some flavor to the game.

[gooddragon1]

Well, for those of us who gave the reasons why this is a bad idea we have done our part. If the OP runs into problems later we can point back to this thread to show how to fix this problem and if not then it doesn't really matter as that's how his gaming group wants to have fun.

[Deca4531]

I don't know if this has been pointed out but...

http://paizo.com/products/btpy8x9g?GameMastery-Critical-Fumble-Deck

We play with both this and the critical hit deck and it definitely adds some flavor to the game.

I have played with them before, they can be quite entertaining.

[Dapple Birch]

Having never played with a critical hit/fumble table I don't have an opinion one way other other about them. You can find a few with a simple google search but here's one right off the top of the list: http://www.paperspencils.com/2012/11/26/critical-hit-and-critical-fumble-charts-for-pathfinder/

I chose that one because it also has a critical hit table. If you're going to use one, it seems only reasonable to use the other.

My advice before implementing it would be to look it over and ask your self if you'd be ok with any of the results on there, even unlikely ones like a player rolling the worst crit fumble, or the worst crit hit twice in a row. Then show the table to the players and make sure they're all on board with it.

[TuggyNE]

Honestly, i dont care about fighters, few people play a pure fighter or rely only on melee damage to get the job done for them (in refrance to high level games, since low level the fighter is better than the wizard).

There you have it folks, thread's over, let's all go home.

[gooddragon1]

I don't know. I got more the feeling that it was more of a role-playing centric group that was less focused on the rules and more on the story so they could accept unfortunate things happening as that makes more flavor to the story.

But I'd like to echo what Dapple said: Make sure your players are on board with it.