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View Full Version : D&D All. What's your take on Critical Faliures?



F1zban
2014-10-24, 09:14 AM
Hi Forum,

So I just found out that a natural 1 only counts as an automatic miss, even though the group I play in and the GM I learned under always had specific rules for rolling a natural 1. I'm interested to see what others have done with it. Starting with how I run it:

A natural 1 on an un-opposed roll counts as an automatic faliure. When rolled with an attack/spell the natural 1 causes a critical faliure. You lose the remainder of your actions and suffer an attack of opportunity. Natural 1's or natural 20's don't affect an opposed roll.

Edit: On a side note, my players never have to confirm critical hits, and we have an 'understanding' regarding stacking crit chances. No keen, improved critical, bladed gauntlet (SaF) etc.

Red Fel
2014-10-24, 09:39 AM
Short version? Crit failures hurt melees, make very little sense, and contribute nothing substantial to gameplay.

Long version in spoilers, because the short version says it all.
1. Critical failures hurt melees. Think about it. Rolling a 1 on a skill check doesn't mean automatic failure. There are only two places where it really comes up - making a melee or ranged attack, and rolling a save. And let's face it, rolling a 1 on a save really only means "automatic failure," at most; you can't exactly "critically fail" your save. What happens - you drop your willpower? You sprain an ankle? That's a special flavor of ridiculous.

But back to melees. Here's what happens if you're using critical failure rules. Your level 20 Fighter, a swordsman who has trained all of his life in the art of the sword, has a 1/20 chance to drop that weapon. And since he has multiple attacks per round, he has multiple chances to drop it every round. Or worse, if you're using a critical fail table, perhaps he impales his foot, or an ally, or hands it deftly to an opponent. It's absurd and embarrassing. Know what happens to a caster who rolls a 1 when casting a spell? Generally, nothing. The reality-warping spellcaster suffers no ill effect, while the guy who lives his life by a weapon drops it. It hurts melees, and melees hurt enough.

2. Critical failures make no sense. Look back at the example above. This guy has trained his whole life with his weapon, and he randomly drops it in combat? I get that combat is crazy and accidents happen, but this is absurd. Really, patently absurd. By contrast, the spellcaster who wields phenomenal cosmic power - the kind which, by all rights, should explode violently if mishandled - suffers no mishap from failure. It makes no sense.

3. Critical failures contribute nothing. Critical failures, first and foremost, are a variant rule. They're not strict RAW; by strict RAW, if you roll a 1, you simply fail, full stop. Critical failures are an optional rule, and as such, they should contribute something. Consider, for example, optional rules regarding flaws (which let you take a penalty in exchange for extra feats), armor as DR instead of AC (which allows a change in mechanics), and various expanded systems. These are options which lend versatility and new options to gameplay. Critical failures add nothing; rather, they create a chance to increase the penalty for failure. Any optional rule should result in a net gain to gameplay - not necessarily more success, but more options, and certainly not greater punishments.

Tl;dr: Not a fan.

tomandtish
2014-10-24, 09:41 AM
The problem with saying a one is a critical failure is that it actually punishes higher level (and presumably more skilled) characters more than lower level ones.

EX: Assuming no other factors a 1st level fighter has one attack. A 20th level fighter has four. That means the 20th level fighter has four times the chance to have a critical failure than a 1st level fighter even if fighting 4 orcs?

We therefore didn’t use critical failures. Of course, we also don’t allow critical hits if you can’t hit the monster on a non-critical roll.

Edit: Ninja'd

sktarq
2014-10-24, 09:42 AM
I am a fan. Though I treat any natural 1 as a critical failure. Skills especially spellcraft and psycraft included.

Vitruviansquid
2014-10-24, 09:53 AM
It pleases me to see the look of dismay on my players' faces when they roll a 1.

Then I turn the screws.

NoldorForce
2014-10-24, 09:54 AM
The issue with critical failures/critical success is that PCs are (from a narrative standpoint) far less disposable than NPCs, and thus Really Bad Things are more debilitating than the same Really Bad Things happening to NPC #32. And given the Law of Large Numbers, Really Bad Things will (assuming they're implemented) eventually come up for the PCs. It's a bit like handling a game's lethality, in that you want to minimize the time in which a player can't do anything useful. If you must have critical effects, my recommendations are either that they can't be triggered by "mooks" on PCs (balancing their narrative importance) or that a critical effect allows you to "fail forward".

“Whenever a character fails, the consequences of that failure should drive the game forward, rather than bringing it to a halt.”
Also as implied above, critical failures punish those who make loads of rolls, and systems such as D&D will often grant more rolls to some character types than to others. If you're going to have critical failures then you also want to make sure that each member of the party has (via players-roll-all-the-dice or whatever) approximately the same chance to trigger them.

Dire Moose
2014-10-24, 10:07 AM
I use critical failures, but the penalty is very light. If you roll a 1, you follow up with a confirmation roll. If you still miss the target's AC on that roll, you provoke an attack of opportunity from everything in melee range.

This applies to enemies as well, and is less of a problem for high-level characters because they have less chance of missing the confirmation roll and more ways of reducing the chance of AoOs hitting.

Zavoniki
2014-10-24, 10:08 AM
I was a fan of them until one of players sat me down and explained why they were bad. A good example to think of is the following scenario.

You have a keep. Inside the keep are 7 invulnerable training dummies and 7 legendary fighters(20th level). They attack these dummies for an hour to train. Lets assume they only make 1 attack per round. You get 10 attacks per minute for a total of 600 attacks per fighter. 4200 attacks total. There's a good chance a 1 has come up.

It makes absolutely no sense for anyone of these legendary fighters to have fumbled during this practice training. There swords should not be broken, dropped, or worse. It barely makes sense for them to have missed the training dummy at all.

Personally I like the way Eclipse Phase handles Critical Failures in combat. Its like a normal Failure. Identical even. This is because failing is already bad for a character. In EP combat specifically it can be extremely bad(the Systems combat is quite lethal). Making your failures worse just feels wrong.

If the average for a character is that they should succeed on what they are doing, failures and critical successes make sense. They are both one step away from success. Critical failures are two steps from success without a corresponding 2 steps away from success on the more success side.

They still sometimes make sense, especially for certain skill checks, but especially in combat I am not a fan.

Mr.Moron
2014-10-24, 10:17 AM
Conceptually I kind of like it. However in D&D context "On a Natural 1" is too frequent, at 5% of the time. If I was using a rule like that I'd probably do something like a confirmation roll (fail again) or something like a severity roll roll 3d10 (keep lowest) that's the severity of failure on 1-10 scale.

I'd also probably make something similar when 20 is rolled on a save (Critical Save).


1-4: Normal failure/save no "Critical" effects.

5-7: Minor critical failure, something slightly bad happens.(Next attack suffers -2 Penalty,enemy gets free 5' step; Crit Save: enemy takes no damage instead of half)

8-9: Moderate critical failure (fall prone; drop weapon, strike ally etc.. Crit Save: Enemy is partially petrified, before shaking off the spell throwing stone shards in a nearby allies face)

10: Horrible failure (weapon breaks, spell backfires as you cast it, etc..).

That said, it's probably not something I'd use often.

Prince Raven
2014-10-24, 10:24 AM
I like them in certain systems, none of said systems are d&d.

Rogan
2014-10-24, 10:30 AM
I would rather change the whole crit system.
A crit fail would need the result of your check be lower than the target number -5 (or any other value)
A crit suc would need the result of your check be higher than the target number +5 (again, you can use any other number, depending on how high/low you want the chances to be)

So there is no fixed chance of a crit, but rather a chance depending on your own competence.


This also means fighting weak chars, you will be more likely to win you were anyway, while your chances to win vs a stronger enemy are lower.

If you like it or not is up to you and the kind of campaign you want to play.

ElenionAncalima
2014-10-24, 10:32 AM
I only played with one DM who used them...and I'm definitely not a fan.

As others have said, it screws over melee fighters and doesn't really made sense. It means that odds are a 20th level monk with five attacks will do something so embarassingly bad that it actually damages their sides chances...roughly every 24 seconds.

I can understand how a group playing a casual, low-stakes game could get amusement out them...but in general as a mechanic, it seems to unfair to classes that already get the short end of the stick. On a non-d20 system, where critical failures are less frequent, I think I would be more open to them.

oxybe
2014-10-24, 10:33 AM
I've played D&D for about 16-17 years now.

I started with 2nd ed and played under various GMs.

Many of those had crit fumble rules.

None of which were any amount of ''fun" or "enjoyable".

"1 is an automatic miss on a attack roll or saving throw" is the absolute worst I would accept from a random pickup group.

My current group unfortunately uses them for our current game, but they are the exception since i've been playing with them for about 7 years. They've earned trust.

Random groups have not and it's one of the things I really don't tolerate in a group I'm thinking of playing with.

F1zban
2014-10-24, 11:16 AM
I can see a lot of points here, though I disagree with many.

Critical faliures affecting characters with more rolls (especially with a 5% chance) is unarguably true, but those same fighters also critically hit anything up to 15% of the time (ignoring dice roll curves for sake of the argument) within reason. This more than makes up for the chance of failure.

Fumble tables are not as much fun, on this I agree. This is why in our (my usual group's) games we have critical faliures as in the OP. Anything else is just wasting rolls at best. The skilled fighter that has trained for years may not have a 5% chance of dropping his sword, but he still has a chance to mis-step or badly judge a manuvre. As a swordsman of 18 years I can quite confidently say that a melee is messy enough that if I misjudge my opponent, the result is typically a loss of the fight. Mis-stepping is also a possible occurance. Heck there are even times when a good distraction has caused myself and an opponent to completley fumble over eachother and provide ample bruises on both sides lol.

Casters don't suffer from fumbles as such, nor do they have more chances at failing due to less rolls. They do however never critically hit*, they also lose a spell slot when they critically fail. That's a big thing. The fighter with 4 attacks doesn't lose one attack from a critical faliure, he gets all his attacks again in the next turn.

*Players have brought this up in the past and we run a house rule where casters that critically hit (attack like spells only) resolve the spell at +2 caster level, +2 as a bonus agreed upon by all players/gms.

TheCountAlucard
2014-10-24, 11:24 AM
I can see a lot of points here, though I disagree with many.

Critical faliures affecting characters with more rolls (especially with a 5% chance) is unarguably true, but those same fighters also critically hit anything up to 15% of the time (ignoring dice roll curves for sake of the argument) within reason. This more than makes up for the chance of failure.It really doesn't. A crit just means one more dead enemy, maybe, but losing your turn and provoking an attack of opportunity from everyone around you really screws you over, assuming it doesn't kill you outright.

Generally speaking, the fact that you rolled a 1 at all is bad enough most of the time.

Galen
2014-10-24, 11:28 AM
I don't like critical failures. They're basically the DM's way to stick a middle finger to the player.
Rolling a '1' when the entire table is watching, and knowing you missed, is punishing enough. No need to add any of this 'critical' or 'fumble' stuff on top.

illyahr
2014-10-24, 11:54 AM
I do Crit-Fails and Crit-Hits the same.

Threaten critical, roll to confirm. Confirmed? Critical hit.
Not confirmed? Normal hit.
Nat 20? Something awesome happens (usually 1/400 chance, eg. double crit target and hit target behind them)

Nat 1, roll to confirm. Hit AC? No benefits/penalties, continue turn.
Missed AC? End turn, you blew it. Think up fluff for mishap. (eg. slipped in some mud so regain footing)
Nat 1 again? Something terrible happens (again, 1/400 chance, eg. wood weapon on high DR target breaks)

Mr.Moron
2014-10-24, 12:42 PM
I don't like critical failures. They're basically the DM's way to stick a middle finger to the player.



This seems an extremely antagonistic view of the player/GM relationship. When you boil it down all adding "Critical Failure" does is change the spectrum of possibilities from

"Nothing happens (Miss/Failure)"-"Something good happens (Success/Critical Success) "
to
"Something goes horribly wrong(Critical Miss/Failure)" to "Something good happens (Success/Critical Success) ".

I don't see how this inherently giving the finger to anyone, when really all you're doing is increasing the possible range of outcomes.

Certainly like with any mechanic it can be poorly implemented, or used by jerks to try and spoil things for others. However I'm not really sure that speaks to anything outside those specific implementations or jerks.

Dasgovernator
2014-10-24, 01:10 PM
I use critical failures, but the penalty is very light. If you roll a 1, you follow up with a confirmation roll. If you still miss the target's AC on that roll, you provoke an attack of opportunity from everything in melee range.

This applies to enemies as well, and is less of a problem for high-level characters because they have less chance of missing the confirmation roll and more ways of reducing the chance of AoOs hitting.

This is generally how I like to use it it, though I only make it provoke from the opponent being targeted. It also makes more sense conceptually, since it just represents the person in question missing by a lot/overextending his/her swing rather than turning into a 3 stooges routine.

icefractal
2014-10-24, 01:23 PM
Critical faliures affecting characters with more rolls (especially with a 5% chance) is unarguably true, but those same fighters also critically hit anything up to 15% of the time (ignoring dice roll curves for sake of the argument) within reason. This more than makes up for the chance of failure.This is a common misconception I see. People seem to think that a critical hit is some massive force of nature that demolishes the enemy side. It is effectively an extra attack. One.

I'm talking about the 20/x2 critical, because that's the default for weapons that aren't specialized to be more deadly. Nobody is going to specialize a weapon to backfire on the wielder more often, so the baseline is the appropriate thing to compare to. And that baseline is "5% to get +1 attack equivalent, and you have to confirm it".


So what would the equivalent for a crit fail be?
1) You have to confirm it. Except that it would happen if the confirm roll was a miss, not a hit, obviously.
2) The effect should be equivalent to -1 attack. Not "lose ALL your remaining attacks" or something worse, just lose a single attack.

So what I'd do is create a condition - "Off Balance". When you're Off Balance, your attacks automatically miss. The condition ends when you make an attack, or spend a standard action focusing (just so you don't have to swing at the floor if combat ends while you're Off Balance).


Balance wise, this works out decently. People with more attacks are more likely to fumble one, but the effect is less of a penalty for them. However, it's adding an extra confirmation roll and thing to track for not much effect in game. So I wouldn't use it personally. However, if you did want to, I thought of a variant that eliminates the need for a confirmation roll.

1) When you roll a nat 1 on an attack, you become Off Balance (no confirm roll).
2) If you attack while Off Balance, roll 2d20 and take the lower one. Which effectively includes the confirmation roll into the effect.

OldTrees1
2014-10-24, 02:30 PM
My rule: Critical failures should be more enjoyable than rolling a 2 but should not be as beneficial as rolling a 2.
Any crit fail rule that is less enjoyable than rolling a 2 is discarded. Any crit fail rule where rolling a 1 is as/more beneficial that rolling a 2 is discarded.


I once tried crit fails/crit successes in the skill system. Within 5 minutes the system was tested by a character rolling two nat 1a on perception on their watch. The rest of the campaign the character had persistent hallucinations of 6 specific birds(they developed personalities). Next campaign the player asked if he could have the birds again. Later on in the second campaign another character rolled a nat 1 on a perception check. For a few minutes all their senses were crosswired "tasting" sights and "seeing" sounds. The group got a kick out of it and that is the important part. The nat 1 was worse than a failure but the group enjoyed the results.

I have not yet found a crit failure system for attacks that satisfied my rule for the entire play group. So I don't use it.

Sartharina
2014-10-24, 02:34 PM
I was a fan of them until one of players sat me down and explained why they were bad. A good example to think of is the following scenario.

You have a keep. Inside the keep are 7 invulnerable training dummies and 7 legendary fighters(20th level). They attack these dummies for an hour to train. Lets assume they only make 1 attack per round. You get 10 attacks per minute for a total of 600 attacks per fighter. 4200 attacks total. There's a good chance a 1 has come up.

It makes absolutely no sense for anyone of these legendary fighters to have fumbled during this practice training. There swords should not be broken, dropped, or worse. It barely makes sense for them to have missed the training dummy at all.

Personally I like the way Eclipse Phase handles Critical Failures in combat. Its like a normal Failure. Identical even. This is because failing is already bad for a character. In EP combat specifically it can be extremely bad(the Systems combat is quite lethal). Making your failures worse just feels wrong.

If the average for a character is that they should succeed on what they are doing, failures and critical successes make sense. They are both one step away from success. Critical failures are two steps from success without a corresponding 2 steps away from success on the more success side.

They still sometimes make sense, especially for certain skill checks, but especially in combat I am not a fan.

I say applying critical failures to 'invulnerable training dummies' defeats the purpose.

It's possible to make crit failures affect spellcasters almost as equally as fighters. Don't think of a crit failure as a fighter severely messing up his attack - think of it instead as the opponent critically succeeding on his defense.

Silus
2014-10-24, 02:47 PM
As a DM, if it's cinematically appropriate, something interesting will happen (mostly regarding skill checks).

As a player though, not a fan at all.

The Hanged Man
2014-10-24, 03:25 PM
A one is a failure, regardless of positive modifiers. And that's all. The action being attempted does not succeed.

I don't like the way it distorts gameplay when, 5% of the time you try to do anything, you accidentally crap your pants. Overly punitive critical failure house rules, or overly generous critical success house rules, are very strong indicators to me that I'm not going to enjoy myself with a particular GM. When those rules are actually structured into the system as written, I'm more willing to give them a chance.

Come to think of it, when weird crit rules are part of a set of written house rules, I've generally been able to endure them, even if I'm not a fan. It just seems that a lot of GMs have weird crit rules as unspoken house rules, and I hate unspoken house rules.

Sartharina
2014-10-24, 03:34 PM
I find a lot of tables/players invoke critical failures on themselves, due to the psychological effect of rolling a Natural 1 at a dramatic moment.

Ettina
2014-10-24, 03:52 PM
I usually say it should be something entertaining but not devastating.

However, it only applies on attacks. If you have enough skill ranks in something, you can often make the DC even if you get a 1, so it makes no sense to have a 1 be an automatic failure. And it bugs me to have my character screw up something that should be easy for him/her/it.

oxybe
2014-10-24, 04:04 PM
I can see a lot of points here, though I disagree with many.

Critical faliures affecting characters with more rolls (especially with a 5% chance) is unarguably true, but those same fighters also critically hit anything up to 15% of the time (ignoring dice roll curves for sake of the argument) within reason. This more than makes up for the chance of failure.

Fumble tables are not as much fun, on this I agree. This is why in our (my usual group's) games we have critical faliures as in the OP. Anything else is just wasting rolls at best. The skilled fighter that has trained for years may not have a 5% chance of dropping his sword, but he still has a chance to mis-step or badly judge a manuvre. As a swordsman of 18 years I can quite confidently say that a melee is messy enough that if I misjudge my opponent, the result is typically a loss of the fight. Mis-stepping is also a possible occurance. Heck there are even times when a good distraction has caused myself and an opponent to completley fumble over eachother and provide ample bruises on both sides lol.

Casters don't suffer from fumbles as such, nor do they have more chances at failing due to less rolls. They do however never critically hit*, they also lose a spell slot when they critically fail. That's a big thing. The fighter with 4 attacks doesn't lose one attack from a critical faliure, he gets all his attacks again in the next turn.

*Players have brought this up in the past and we run a house rule where casters that critically hit (attack like spells only) resolve the spell at +2 caster level, +2 as a bonus agreed upon by all players/gms.

Actually a 3.5/pathfinder caster can crit hit with a spell, like scorching ray.

3.5 (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/actionsInCombat.htm#criticalHits)

A critical hit means that you roll your damage more than once, with all your usual bonuses, and add the rolls together. Unless otherwise specified, the threat range for a critical hit on an attack roll is 20, and the multiplier is ×2.

...

Spells and Critical Hits: A spell that requires an attack roll can score a critical hit. A spell attack that requires no attack roll cannot score a critical hit.

Pathfinder (http://paizo.com/prd/combat.html):
Spells and Critical Hits: A spell that requires an attack roll can score a critical hit. A spell attack that requires no attack roll cannot score a critical hit. If a spell causes ability damage or drain (see Special Abilities), the damage or drain is doubled on a critical hit.

with the caster stuff done with, while melee types do crit more often (due to simply rolling more attack rolls) their crits are often less important narratively speaking.

The game revolves around the player characters. It doesn't really matter if the story is about the greater war between two kingdoms, the game itself tends to focus on the goings on of these 4-5 murderhobos.

Goblin #78390-76b is, for the most part a creature who's entire backstory is "he's here for the players to fight". That him and gobbo 77b get axed in one round is, narratively speaking, rather unimportant and for the most part that's where all those fighter crits are going to be put towards: getting rid of narratively unimportant chaff.

When a monster crits a player, it tends to be more significant since it means that one of the important people might get axed (at least in the early game where a crit can knock you dead and done rather quickly).

Think of it like if you're watching an action movie: Stud Gunhaver might pull off a few cool shots every now and then in the middle of the gunfight, but unless something explodes rather violently we don't really talk about those. Brick Dastard, the villain then steps out from the shadows, walks over a mountain of mook corpses and gloats to Stud that he's got his girlfriend (who is now revealed to be the President of the Free World's daughter and #1 supermodel rocket surgeon) and will kill Stud.

Gunfight occurs and Stud pull off a one-liner and kills Brick with a single shot.

That is the crit we talk about for months to come.

Not when Stud killed off "sunglasses wearing mook with pistol" by shooting his brains out with a single quick shot.

Now if a mook ends up shooting Stud with a crit, taking him out of the fight for a while as he bandages himself up we tend to remember this also quite a bit.

This is because Stud is a narratively important character: he's a PC.

This is why Crit success and failure, and when they apply to PCs is generally more important then how often a mook gets crit upon or how often they crit fail. People don't mind seeing a mook's Gun jam and then getting mowed down. They do tend to care when the protagonist's (or one of the protagonists, if there is a group) gun jams and he's basically out of the fight as he tries to get his gun working again.

Stud mowing down an important NPC can be either narratively awesome or boring, depending on the circumstances around the death but I generally see them as rather uninteresting when the talked up enemy dies in one hit, or is so crippled that he's forced to run, turning the whispered Dark Lord into a joked about Dork Lord, though most higher level enemies tend to have enough of a HP soak that a single crit won't immediately murder them in a party of reasonably made PCs (though the murderiest of murderhobos might be a different story).

But again: Crit rules, especially those where incredible success and horrible failure are pillars of the concept, need to be balanced/made with the idea that they affect player characters more. Not just in the idea that any given PC fighter is expected to roll more attack dice then an enemy fighter, but that the effects of these rolls generally apply to the most narratively important characters.

And if those rules make the expert weapon user look like a fool once every few seconds or take our potentially important players in the early game like shooting buckshot at fish in a barrel then I can't be bothered with them.

They can work with some groups, but unless you're that one group I don't mind them with (7 years playing on a weekly/biweekly basis is a lot of trust building), it's a dealbreaker for me.

Arbane
2014-10-24, 05:01 PM
I've seen a grand total of one game with a critical failure rule I like: Legends of the Wulin. When you get a roll that ends in a zero in that game, you can choose to take 'Interesting Times' - you gain a luck point, and something happens to make the situation even more complicated than a simple success or failure would. (You accidentally insult a passing magistrate while arguing; you cut through the ninja AND the support pillar behind them; you knocked over a candle and now the building's on fire; etc...)


It's possible to make crit failures affect spellcasters almost as equally as fighters. Don't think of a crit failure as a fighter severely messing up his attack - think of it instead as the opponent critically succeeding on his defense.

How? Most D&D spellcasters don't roll dice for casting at all.

Jay R
2014-10-24, 06:51 PM
We always re-roll to confirm critical hits. If you fail to hit on the second roll, then it's a critical failure.

That means that 5% of all your failures, not 5% of all your attempts, are critical failures.

But also, we use the Critical Failure chart from The Dragon #39, and a significant number of them have a good chance of having no effect. For example, 01-19 slip; roll dexterity or less on d20 or fall and stunned for 1-4 rounds. If you make the DEX roll, the only effect is, "You slipped, and deftly recovered."

Prince Raven
2014-10-24, 08:44 PM
I once had a D&D game where my character was going to be able to have something like 12 or 16 attacks in a full attack at higher levels, I was then informed (not by the GM, but by a fellow player) that if I rolled a natural 1 on any of those attacks I would not only damage myself, but also lose all my remaining attacks. I immediately reconsidered the direction of my character.

In Dark Heresy, on the other hand, I'm completely okay with "critical fumbles", as they've been accounted for in rules. You can mitigate the likelihood by using melee weapons or guns with the Reliable quality (both of which never jam), by removing the Unreliable quality via modifications (which would make the gun more likely to jam), or by devoting less energy to using a psychic power (making Perils of the Warp less likely, and reducing the potential penalty).
Generally, the more powerful your weapon is, the more likely it is to jam/perils, and the only other ways to make weapons more likely to jam is by damaging or dual-wielding, from rank 1 to rank 10 the likelihood of jamming does not increase as the likelihood of critical fumbles does for d&d.

Honest Tiefling
2014-10-24, 09:47 PM
I like the idea of them, but not as a 1 in 20 chance. Maybe more like 1 in 100 or so. And even then, more when a character is using a skill they aren't trained in. That's why you let the master do it. And seeing master swordsmen hurl their swords across the battlefield as an accident is less amusing to me.

NichG
2014-10-24, 09:51 PM
Since this is in the Roleplaying Games forum and not a D&D-specific forum, I think it makes sense to consider the case of Critical Failures/Successes independent of the whole caster/melee bias thing. That is to say, assuming we design the rest of the system to not exacerbate things, what are the up-sides and down-sides of having them in a system?

Upsides:

- One major aspect of critical failures/successes is that they allow you to prevent situations in which the game is 'locked up' a certain way by making sure you can never actually drive your fail chance to zero, nor can you drive someone else's success rate to zero. So for example, in a system without critical failures then a sufficiently dodgy character could dodge every attack from an army of 10000 snipers. The problem is generally that there's a very sharp threshold where this happens - its usually not that the guy who can dodge each of the 10k attacks is 10000 times as dodgy as the guy who can dodge all the attacks from a single sniper. Instead, the threshold occurs at the level of granularity of the dice system, whatever that may be. Critical successes on attacks is a way to guarantee a bound on that, so that e.g. even if you're a very dodgy character, you can't just ignore certain situations. Similarly, on the side of critical failures (for example saving throws), it means that the saving throw system never produces outright immunity to effects. There are alternate systems which capture this kind of thing (for example, opposed exploding dice systems), so critical success/failure isn't the only option here.

- There is a psychological effect of having rare, special outcomes, that can make the game more interesting in sections where it threatens to become a bit of a slog. Generally, parts of the game where you're repeating large sequences of dice rolls tend to get a bit dull, because a disproportionate amount of time is being spent on activities that are fairly predictable - either individually or en masse due to Central Limit Theorem effects. When the mage rolls a 10d6 fireball, the outcome is going to be close to 35 almost all the time, so a lot of energy is spent on something where the variance doesn't matter all that much. The chance that a rare, special case could come up helps spice up these situations and focus attention by always leaving the possibility that a random fluctuation could come up which matters - e.g. which forces both sides to recompute their strategies. This can make the dicing parts of the game more tense and enjoyable. Of course you need to normalize correctly so you don't introduce spurious biases (which is what happens in D&D with longer attack sequences having a greater crit fail rate, and custom crit fails generally being multiplicatively harmful whereas custom crit successes are usually only additively beneficial)

Downsides:

- Additional uncertainty makes it harder for players to plan. If you want a game in which you can implement and attempt to execute fairly in-depth plans, this could be harmful. Alternately, it introduces metagame behavior of players picking abilities that allow them to accomplish things without rolling dice (don't make a Hide check, just go invisible).

- Outcomes need to be able to be somewhat arbitrary in order to be interesting, but by their nature are particularly hard to balance on the fly. The reason for the former is that basically without crits being different than just automatic hits/misses, you lose the beneficial psychological effect; but for them to be special they have to be appropriate to the situation, which means a degree of on-the-fly determination. The reason why this is hard to balance is that its easier to come up with penalties which cascade than it is to come up with advantages that cascade, so you often have crit failures being much worse than crit successes are good. This is exacerbated by the fact that particular ideas aren't symmetric under different circumstances. For example, lets take the following potential rule for crit successes/failures:

"For attacks: On a crit success, your opponent takes a -2 to checks for one round. On a crit failure, you take a -2 to checks for one round. Crit success/failure rates are correctly normalized by number of attacks to be constant per-round regardless of the character."

It seems symmetric, but the consequences are very different depending on whether its party-vs-single-monster or party-vs-mook-horde. In party-vs-mook-horde, the (non-player) recipient of a crit isn't likely to survive the attack sequence. Furthermore, weakening one mook is not worth as much as the harm caused by weakening one PC. Furthermore, because of the normalization, there's a much higher chance that the PCs end up getting -2s inflicted on them than for the monsters in the horde to collectively have -2s. On the other hand, in party-vs-single-monster, the rule favors the PCs. If it were something more than a -2 - an auto-kill, for instance - then this imbalance is going to get amplified.

- Crit successes/failures can lead to absurdities if applied in a blanket way. Crit success on a skill check means that you have the same (fairly high) chance of miraculously jumping a 10ft gap as you do jumping to the moon. Furthermore, it means that for any task if you try enough times you will succeed, which means that you have to be especially careful about when repeated attempts are permitted and how you structure the consequences of failure. Alternately, if you have something where crit successes give you a side-benefit, you can just try something harmless many times to rack up the side benefit. With crit failures, the problem is a bit different. Crit failure on a skill check can mean that it matters when the DM judges that something is 'automatic' versus 'you have to roll'. Its pretty clear that walking shouldn't require a skill check. How about swimming in calm water? So for this kind of mechanic to work, the system has to be much more clear about when it applies.

Anyhow, I think it can work well if implemented well, but I think that it often isn't implemented well. For a crit system to work, I think the most important thing is for the system to first reduce the overall number of dice rolls and focus only on cases in which the dice are making a somewhat significant decision rather than just generating a distribution. Then, the situations in which dice are or aren't rolled should be standardized and made clear, so that crits aren't going to introduce spurious biases. At that point I think the system is in a good jumping-off place to add interesting crit mechanics.

Sartharina
2014-10-25, 01:04 AM
However, it only applies on attacks. If you have enough skill ranks in something, you can often make the DC even if you get a 1, so it makes no sense to have a 1 be an automatic failure. And it bugs me to have my character screw up something that should be easy for him/her/it.I disagree on this. Attacks are the WORST place for critical failures because they're so routine - that 5% becomes a LOT more obvious about how common it is. Now... 3 natural 1's in a row? Sure. In fact, it might be called for to make the Crit Fail so hard that it's a Crit Win instead (Turning bad luck on its ear, and throwing the players a slapstick show and a bone to recover).

For skill checks, it might be possible for Nat 1's to result in 'partial failures' if you're so skilled that you autosucceed anyway. Yes, your character is extremely skilled. But that skill goes from sending you soaring in victory to managing damage control when everything that can go wrong does go wrong. A Natural 1 means "The universe is out to get you on this check".

The best purpose of Critical Failures is to pull entertainment out of unbelievably terrible dice luck. Also - without player-driven critical failures, Digo Dragon's gaming group would have fewer entertaining quotes for us to read.

Jaycemonde
2014-10-25, 07:02 AM
Steps to making critical fails work in your game:

1). Make them hilarious when you describe them. The fighter trips on a tiny thread in the carpet. The Mage starts a runaway nuclear reaction. The crew drops the torpedo on their feet and it blows up. The sword was made in Mexico and it literally snaps in half, and that end hits the hireling. Yog Soggoth ties itself up with its own tentacles in a startling show of good luck for the players. That way nobody is too mad.

2). In the event of a player death due to a single bad roll (or several bad rolls, to the point it's getting ridiculous), have a handy trickster/comedian god on hand that brings players back every now and then just because they're too good to see die just once.

Tengu_temp
2014-10-25, 07:51 AM
A 5% chance for every attack to turn out to be a harmful and/or embarassing failure is way too much. It makes your character look like an incompetent dunce, and hurts characters who make a lot of attacks the most (read: the ones who are already underpowered in most editions of DND). An automatic failure is already annoying enough for the player, no need to rub it in further.

DM Nate
2014-10-25, 09:56 AM
So what would the equivalent for a crit fail be?
1) You have to confirm it. Except that it would happen if the confirm roll was a miss, not a hit, obviously.
2) The effect should be equivalent to -1 attack. Not "lose ALL your remaining attacks" or something worse, just lose a single attack.

This is exactly how I run mine. Often I roleplay it as "You slip on the blood still gushing from the last goblin you slew, and you need a moment to regain your balance. You are unable to make your attack this round, but you're fine otherwise."

Jay R
2014-10-25, 11:13 AM
It makes absolutely no sense for anyone of these legendary fighters to have fumbled during this practice training. There swords should not be broken, dropped, or worse. It barely makes sense for them to have missed the training dummy at all.

I have dropped a sword while training, without even having a practice dummy. I have also slipped while practicing footwork.

When training against an opponent, I have dropped weapons, slipped, had a fencing mask fall off, twisted my ankle, had the tang of my weapon break, had a piece of clothing rip, pulled muscles, fallen down, etc. Pro football players get serious injuries in practice.

Not anywhere close to one time in twenty, though.

Morty
2014-10-25, 11:30 AM
Dramatic failures of some sort, where a character not only fails to advance her goals but actively acts in detriment to them, have their place in many systems. But they shouldn't occur once in every twenty rolls.

Rhunder
2014-10-25, 11:33 AM
Just like with a nat 20, I do a roll to confirm. two bad rolls in a row creates a crit fail.

I also don't do auto hits and auto miss. Nat 20 = 30 for my games as well as a nat 1 = -10. That way, a well built class and or a ridiculous great stealth character shouldn't be punished for a 1/20 chance.

Sartharina
2014-10-25, 12:58 PM
A 5% chance for every attack to turn out to be a harmful and/or embarassing failure is way too much. It makes your character look like an incompetent dunce, and hurts characters who make a lot of attacks the most (read: the ones who are already underpowered in most editions of DND). An automatic failure is already annoying enough for the player, no need to rub it in further.
Or, if you play it right, it makes your opponent out to be an unlikely, suddenly hypercompetent badass. Remember - a critical failure on an attack roll can also be seen as a critical success on a defense.

Haruki-kun
2014-10-25, 01:07 PM
We have critical failures in our games, but after the 1 is rolled the DM rolls behind the screen to confirm if it's a critical failure. This way there's a chance nothing will happen and the failure stays at "your attack misses". It stops the problem of there being a critical failure once every 20 rolls.

Knaight
2014-10-25, 02:25 PM
I don't like them, generally. D&D has a particular problem, as they're likely to be way too frequent - this only gets worse in the D&D systems where multiple attacks are a thing. I also generally feel that critical failures emerging from straight dice rolls is just weird - something like failing by a certain threshold would work better, particularly with a decently designed penalty system. They're sufficiently important that they need to be built into the game at a fairly fundamental level, tacking them onto D&D just doesn't work well.

Take Shadowrun, which implements them well. It's a d6 dicepool system, if more than half of the dice you roll get a result of 1 you get a glitch. If it's on a success, the glitch means that the attempt succeeds but something goes wrong in doing it. With a failure, it's essentially a critical failure. However, because it's a dice pool system larger pools inherently decrease the probability of half ones.

That's pretty built in to the fundamentals of the system, and just couldn't transfer to D&D. It's not a dice pool system, so the low probabilities involved and changes with skill won't transfer well at all, and if they're imitated it involves bringing in a lot of extra rolling. Then the matter of who rolls what when comes up.

Anxe
2014-10-25, 04:29 PM
I use them. On skill rolls I use them in specific situations, but not every skill roll. An easy example is Concentration checks. Casters already have an easy out with Casting Defensively to almost nullify any melee character who hasn't taken Mage Slayer. A 1 in 20 chance of the spell failing makes sense to me.

I also use them with attack rolls, but with confirmation rolls. And if your confirmation roll happens to be a Crit instead of a Fumble, then it moves back up a tier to a normal attack that you can reroll. The penalty for fumbling is losing your action next round.

It comes up very rarely and often we even forget that person loses their action next round.

Is it more fun than not playing with Fumbles? I dunno. We've always used it... The cascading system where it can go back to being a normal attack roll and possibly even up to a critical hit is certainly fun. Being punished by losing your action has never seemed that horrible. Maybe it contributes to my group's avoidance of melee types? They are almost all casters now, but I feel like our group was gravitating towards casters anyway due to our system mastery increasing to the point that the players wanted more power.

Anyways, hasn't disrupted my game. Introducing it to skill rolls has certainly helped by nerfing spellcasters a little bit. Would it improve my game if I took it off of attack rolls? Maybe. The cascading thing is too much fun for me to seriously consider it.

The Oni
2014-10-25, 06:18 PM
Regarding critical failures on weapons vs. spells:

Pathfinder has the Dragon Pistol, which when loaded with a dragonbreath cartridge basically works like a Burning Hands spell in a can. There's no attack roll, just a saving throw. However, like every firearm it can misfire, and the way the misfire works is that if any of the damage dice are a 1, the weapon misfires.

Sartharina
2014-10-25, 06:25 PM
Regarding critical failures on weapons vs. spells:

Pathfinder has the Dragon Pistol, which when loaded with a dragonbreath cartridge basically works like a Burning Hands spell in a can. There's no attack roll, just a saving throw. However, like every firearm it can misfire, and the way the misfire works is that if any of the damage dice are a 1, the weapon misfires.

... wow. Those things are guaranteed to blow up in your face.

Nagash
2014-10-25, 07:03 PM
Hi Forum,

So I just found out that a natural 1 only counts as an automatic miss, even though the group I play in and the GM I learned under always had specific rules for rolling a natural 1. I'm interested to see what others have done with it. Starting with how I run it:

A natural 1 on an un-opposed roll counts as an automatic faliure. When rolled with an attack/spell the natural 1 causes a critical faliure. You lose the remainder of your actions and suffer an attack of opportunity. Natural 1's or natural 20's don't affect an opposed roll.

Edit: On a side note, my players never have to confirm critical hits, and we have an 'understanding' regarding stacking crit chances. No keen, improved critical, bladed gauntlet (SaF) etc.

Your version sounds fair enough.

I've played with them and without them. Pathfinder has an app with some fun added affects for critical hits, including with spells so I use that usually. Comes with a fun sound effect too.

For crit fails I'll have it cost the next action or allow the enemy to push you a few feet in whatever direction he wants, or move 5ft freely himself in any direction. Unless it happens when your firing into a melee. In that case naturally you have to roll a 2nd attack roll against an ally.

On a side note these rules apply to spells, which winds up being a little more ad hoc. Spells with attack rolls are easy enough. for other types of spells i base it on the opponents saving throw with a 1 being a critical success for the spell attack and a 20 being a critical failure for the spell effect.

When it comes to the effect itself it could be extra damage or duration for a crit success. And again missed actions, total immunity from that type of spell for things like mind control or the effects of say improved evasion rather then half damage for an area affect.

TheCountAlucard
2014-10-25, 07:23 PM
I have dropped a sword while training...You're also not anywhere near twentieth level. You definitely don't have magic weapons. A twentieth-level fighter is so skilled that, if he intentionally invested in a cross-class skill along the way, like Escape Artist, he'd still have enough at this point to worm his way through a hole no bigger than his skull. If he instead invested in a class skill like Jump, you'd see him reliably beating our real-life world records for jumping distance.

Anxe
2014-10-25, 10:59 PM
You're also not anywhere near twentieth level. You definitely don't have magic weapons. A twentieth-level fighter is so skilled that, if he intentionally invested in a cross-class skill along the way, like Escape Artist, he'd still have enough at this point to worm his way through a hole no bigger than his skull. If he instead invested in a class skill like Jump, you'd see him reliably beating our real-life world records for jumping distance.

More importantly, tripping (rolling a 1) and beating out real-life world records.

Kamai
2014-10-25, 11:24 PM
I haven't seen a fumble system for D&D that sounds fair. I had to straight ask my poor DM if he was going to enforce failures on Nat 20 saves against my spells, and I got a No, why should it even work that way? Blargh.

Anywhos, the only "fumble" system that I would consider would be a system that resembles stunts, and only have the fumbles when the player is willing to take a high risk for an amazing (read non-standard) result. I just have no idea how I'd do it off-hand.

awa
2014-10-26, 12:05 AM
I have a fumble system that my players seem to like as they remind me about it when i forget to implement it. basically its not about rolling a 1 if your total result is less then a 1 you fumble.
So your trained fighter swinging his trusty long sword will virtual never fumble. If he gets drunk grabs an exotic weapon hes not proficient with then he can end up with an end number less then 1 and hurt himself, break the weapon what have as decided by me.

mephnick
2014-10-26, 12:08 AM
Only 'crit fail' system I like is Numenera, where it causes a GM intrusion and effects the scene or combat in an interesting way, like adding reinforcements or messing up the terrain.

Seerow
2014-10-26, 12:11 AM
I have a few litmus tests for critical fumbles. I have yet to see any rule that passes all of them, but failing any is enough for me to say "Nope, not playing with this".


1) The "Are you a moron? Stop trying to gimp the weak classes" test. Does this fumble rule hurt a Fighter more than a Wizard? This includes can a Wizard's save based spells fumble, but also considers things like action economy and the penalties inflicted. If any of these things favor the Wizard being less effected, this rule should have been put out to pasture before you even started thinking it up.

2) The "Epic Hero" test. Does a higher level character have the same or worse chance of fumbling as a low level character? As an untrained character? Your higher level characters should be less likely to screw up. That's literally the function of level. If your fumble rules are arbitrarily punishing high level characters, this rule is not going to work.

3) The "target dummy" test. If you have a squad of soldiers (of any level) training by hitting something completely non threatening for an hour or so, how many will be injured, maimed, scarred, or dead as a result? If that number is greater than 0, there is a problem with your rules.

4) The "test of time". How long does it take for your fumbles to resolve? If it takes longer than it takes to confirm a critical hit (say by adding a step to reference a chart, draw a card, or anything else along those lines), this rule is a problem.

5) The "three stooges" test. Does the result of your fumble chart bring to mind the antics of the three stooges or any other slapstick comedy? This can also include things that trigger the target dummy test, but goes beyond that. If you have characters slipping and falling, dropping weapons, dazing themselves, etc, I do not accept this rule.



I haven't found a rule that satisfies all of these criteria, but I'm sure if someone cared enough they could design one. The real question is, why would you really want to?

The Oni
2014-10-26, 12:26 AM
... wow. Those things are guaranteed to blow up in your face.

What do you expect? It's a handheld flamethrower in a setting where most guns are flintlock. To make it fairer, you could say a spell is a fumble if ALL the damage dice are 1's.

Kamai
2014-10-26, 02:00 AM
I have a fumble system that my players seem to like as they remind me about it when i forget to implement it. basically its not about rolling a 1 if your total result is less then a 1 you fumble.
So your trained fighter swinging his trusty long sword will virtual never fumble. If he gets drunk grabs an exotic weapon hes not proficient with then he can end up with an end number less then 1 and hurt himself, break the weapon what have as decided by me.

I've tried this one before, and I found the only one interacting with this rule was the Archery Ranger, who was stuck dealing with all manner of penalties usually between cover, poor lighting, and Rapid Shot. It really was not fun for him dealing with broken bow-strings and the like all of the time.

Mr Beer
2014-10-26, 03:06 AM
No problem with critical fails, but 1 in 20 is ridiculously too often. Something like 1 in 100+ feels better.

The Oni
2014-10-26, 03:19 AM
No problem with critical fails, but 1 in 20 is ridiculously too often. Something like 1 in 100+ feels better.

This would closer to my idea. I'd take it farther and roll it like a critical hit. If result = 1, then roll again. Then, if you roll a 1 (with a crit-20 weapon), it's a fumble. If you roll a 1-2 or 1-3 with a 19-20 or 18-20 weapon respectively, it's a fumble. To keep crits from being too double-edged, Improved Critical would lower this chance by 1, rather than increase it (since it's the user's precision, not the weapon's deadliness, that's been enhanced).

Doorhandle
2014-10-26, 04:15 AM
Having played with a DM who used a quite nasty set of fumble (and critical) tables, both for players and monsters, I have to say i have mixed feelings.

On one hand, having your dice snatch defeat from the jaws of victory is allways a pain, and fumble tables exasperate this.

On the other hand, many hilarious moments were fueled by the table. such as when my clerics somehow managed to knock himself out about 30 meters from the nearest foe. Or the running gag of the fighter cleaving something so hard he embedded the sword in the ground.

Personally, I would ask for the consent of the table, unless it's a game like Paranoia where ridiculous failure is the point. Maybe even make it like the wild mage, where the potential cost for flubbing your attack is matched by the potential extra benefit on a crit... I think that the homestuck 4e hack did something similar.

Talakeal
2014-10-26, 04:29 AM
I have a few litmus tests for critical fumbles. I have yet to see any rule that passes all of them, but failing any is enough for me to say "Nope, not playing with this".


1) The "Are you a moron? Stop trying to gimp the weak classes" test. Does this fumble rule hurt a Fighter more than a Wizard? This includes can a Wizard's save based spells fumble, but also considers things like action economy and the penalties inflicted. If any of these things favor the Wizard being less effected, this rule should have been put out to pasture before you even started thinking it up.

2) The "Epic Hero" test. Does a higher level character have the same or worse chance of fumbling as a low level character? As an untrained character? Your higher level characters should be less likely to screw up. That's literally the function of level. If your fumble rules are arbitrarily punishing high level characters, this rule is not going to work.

3) The "target dummy" test. If you have a squad of soldiers (of any level) training by hitting something completely non threatening for an hour or so, how many will be injured, maimed, scarred, or dead as a result? If that number is greater than 0, there is a problem with your rules.

4) The "test of time". How long does it take for your fumbles to resolve? If it takes longer than it takes to confirm a critical hit (say by adding a step to reference a chart, draw a card, or anything else along those lines), this rule is a problem.

5) The "three stooges" test. Does the result of your fumble chart bring to mind the antics of the three stooges or any other slapstick comedy? This can also include things that trigger the target dummy test, but goes beyond that. If you have characters slipping and falling, dropping weapons, dazing themselves, etc, I do not accept this rule.



I haven't found a rule that satisfies all of these criteria, but I'm sure if someone cared enough they could design one. The real question is, why would you really want to?

Two questions:

For number three, the system I use would fail number three, except you would never actually roll out an hours worth of men attacking a target dummy, if anything you would have them roll once at the end, more likely you would skip over it because it isnt important or a pass fail type situation. Also, the fumble rules only apply when it is dramatically interested to do so if the PCs are not direcltly involved. Would that be a problem for you because the fumbles rules could end up in that result because you force them into a situation where they were never meant to go and the rules tell you you shouldnt?

As for number five, what sort of fumbles DO results you accept? Because tripping or dropping a weapon in combat are just about the most common mishaps out there and don't seem particularly silly to me.

NichG
2014-10-26, 04:38 AM
What about this for a crit system?

Each round, the DM rolls a 'Tides of Battle' check, consisting of a 1d10 for each significant participant (participant whose individual CR is no less than 2 points below the average CR of their side of the encounter, lets say). For each d10 that shows a 1, the DM gets a 'point' to spend during the round. For each d10 that shows a 10, the PCs get a point to spend during the round. Points cannot be retained from round to round (normally; good idea for a magic item/spell/feat chain though).

Any player can spend points from the party pool, and of course the DM can spend points from the DM's pool. Points can be spent in the following ways:

1 point - Add a +3 Luck bonus or apply a -3 Luck penalty to a single saving throw, attack roll, ability check, CL check, or skill check. Can be applied after the check is rolled.
2 points - Add a special penalty for failure to a single check, before the check is rolled. This can be one of: 'Target is Staggered next round, Target loses all remaining actions/parts of actions this round, Target drops a held item, Target is Flatfooted for one round'. This penalty only applies if the target actually fails the check that it is applied to.
3 points - Cause an attack roll to automatically hit with a confirmation roll for a crit, or to automatically miss. Cause a saving throw to automatically succeed.
4 points - Cause a saving throw to automatically fail.

So for example, with 4 PCs and 4 enemies you'd only have a 1/100 chance per round that either side could force an automatic fail on a saving throw, but generally people would be able to throw a few bonuses and penalties around each round. Something like an Improved Critical feat or improved crit range on a weapon might make it so that it only costs 2 points instead of 3 points to get the auto-hit, for example.

DrMartin
2014-10-26, 05:16 AM
I use two rules for critical fumbles:

- a natural 1 followed by a roll to confirm carries a small negative consequence. Either drop the weapon, resolve an attack on a random square next to the one attacked, or something of that magnitude. The post above suggesting to give a 5ed disadvantage on the next roll may even be a better rule.
Every character that gets iterative attacks (BAB 6 or higher) does not risk to fumble anymore - so higher level character get to the "safe spot" where they no longer fumble, and combat oriented classes gets there faster.

- any character can "raise" their attacks, calling the master on a small bet: stating something nice and out of the ordinary that happens if they succed on the attack, or if they succeed with a given margin, and something nasty that happens if they fail. The DM can accept or refuse the bet, according to how cool and / or likely the good and bad outcomes are. This way higher level character can still fail in a spectacular way, and in ways that no critical fumble table can hope to emulate if you have good players, but only when trying to achieve something heroic or out of the ordinary. And in this way the players actively *choose* when and how big they fail :smallbiggrin:

also, mandatory link to an epic fumble: Sameo (http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Sameo)

also, first post! yay.

Seerow
2014-10-26, 07:58 AM
Two questions:

For number three, the system I use would fail number three, except you would never actually roll out an hours worth of men attacking a target dummy, if anything you would have them roll once at the end, more likely you would skip over it because it isnt important or a pass fail type situation. Also, the fumble rules only apply when it is dramatically interested to do so if the PCs are not direcltly involved. Would that be a problem for you because the fumbles rules could end up in that result because you force them into a situation where they were never meant to go and the rules tell you you shouldnt?

Yes it would be a problem. Because the actual point isn't what happens to people attacking a target dummy, that's just the scenario to show how absurd it is. The actual point is what statistics say happen based with your rules over a large number of attacks. Which PCs will undoubtedly make over their career.

And if your point is "Yeah, but they'd end up dead after an hour of hitting a dummy because they'd die to a thousand little cuts from hurting themselves on 1s" then I'm just going to say the reason I hate critical fumble rules so much in the first place is personal experience where a fight was decided not based on who beat their enemy, but which character rolled the most ones to kill themselves first. Seriously the whole fight not one attack landed, but at the time critical fumbles were in play and if you got a 1 you'd hit yourself. Both of the involved characters here were rolling so poorly that one was at half HP and the other was dead, with neither having their opponent hit them once.

This should not be a scenario that can EVER conceivably happen. If it is a possibility, your rules are crap. And if statistics say you'll kill yourself after a few hundred or thousand attacks, chances are that it will happen at least once in game.


As for number five, what sort of fumbles DO results you accept? Because tripping or dropping a weapon in combat are just about the most common mishaps out there and don't seem particularly silly to me.

They may be common mishaps, but should not be remotely common, or even feasible, to happen to a high level character. I'd be more okay with something like this for a level 1-3 character, but by level 4-6 the character should be able to shrug it off and go "nope that didn't actually happen" most of the time, and beyond that straight up should never happen.

I tend to be most okay with critical fumbles that leave the character open to follow up from an enemy. Things like granting advantage on the next attack against you or the like.

Morty
2014-10-26, 08:12 AM
I think "fumbles", or critical failures, or whatever, simply shouldn't come down to simple statistics. If the chance is too great, it's absurd, and if the chance is microscopic, then the rules might as well not be there. So if there are critical failure rules, they should be caused by circumstances. In the New World of Darkness, the statistical chances of a dramatic failure are pretty small - you need to have your dice pool reduced below 0, and then get a 1 on the single chance die you roll. But the newly-released second edition allows players to turn a simple failure into a dramatic one and get experience. Plus there are mechanical effects that transform failures into dramatic failures. This is just one example of how to do it.

Seerow
2014-10-26, 08:15 AM
I think "fumbles", or critical failures, or whatever, simply shouldn't come down to simple statistics. If the chance is too great, it's absurd, and if the chance is microscopic, then the rules might as well not be there. So if there are critical failure rules, they should be caused by circumstances. In the New World of Darkness, the statistical chances of a dramatic failure are pretty small - you need to have your dice pool reduced below 0, and then get a 1 on the single chance die you roll. But the newly-released second edition allows players to turn a simple failure into a dramatic one and get experience. Plus there are mechanical effects that transform failures into dramatic failures. This is just one example of how to do it.

And that's fine for WoD. I'm also not too bothered by the "critical glitch" rules from Shadowrun because they have such a miniscule chance of happening unless you are trying something your character is not good at. But this thread is specifically about "D&D All", in which fumbles invariably boil down to rolling a 1 on a d20, plus maybe some confirmation roll.

Zalphon
2014-10-26, 08:16 AM
Absolutely a fan. ABSOLUTELY. But I apply Critical Failures to all things. Like a 1 on a Disable Device Roll triggers it.

Rolling a 1 becomes a dreaded event...or a glorious occasion if a monster does it.

One of my players favorite events was watching a Dremora (it was an Elder Scrolls campaign) who was a boss roll a 1, then a natural 20 (to-hit against himself), and then roll max damage to cleave his own head off. The players lost it in both laughter and rejoice that they survived without anyone dead.

Then again a fellow buddy of mine in a campaign we played together in quite literally killed himself with a flying kick (he was a monk) that somehow managed to kick himself in the head and crush his skull--killing him as his brain leaked out his ears. We all lost it laughing. And then had him resurrected. ...That Monk killed himself more than he did killed monsters--he had to have crit himself into the Dead-Book a half-dozen times, but we'll never forget him for that reason. And that's something that's honestly quite cool in my opinion.

Sartharina
2014-10-26, 08:19 AM
-snip-
All of those are only relevant if you ignore that there's another agent on the other side of the attack roll. A critical failure is a critical success from the other party.

Talakeal
2014-10-26, 08:27 AM
Yes it would be a problem. Because the actual point isn't what happens to people attacking a target dummy, that's just the scenario to show how absurd it is. The actual point is what statistics say happen based with your rules over a large number of attacks. Which PCs will undoubtedly make over their career.

And if your point is "Yeah, but they'd end up dead after an hour of hitting a dummy because they'd die to a thousand little cuts from hurting themselves on 1s" then I'm just going to say the reason I hate critical fumble rules so much in the first place is personal experience where a fight was decided not based on who beat their enemy, but which character rolled the most ones to kill themselves first. Seriously the whole fight not one attack landed, but at the time critical fumbles were in play and if you got a 1 you'd hit yourself. Both of the involved characters here were rolling so poorly that one was at half HP and the other was dead, with neither having their opponent hit them once.

This should not be a scenario that can EVER conceivably happen. If it is a possibility, your rules are crap. And if statistics say you'll kill yourself after a few hundred or thousand attacks, chances are that it will happen at least once in game.



They may be common mishaps, but should not be remotely common, or even feasible, to happen to a high level character. I'd be more okay with something like this for a level 1-3 character, but by level 4-6 the character should be able to shrug it off and go "nope that didn't actually happen" most of the time, and beyond that straight up should never happen.

I tend to be most okay with critical fumbles that leave the character open to follow up from an enemy. Things like granting advantage on the next attack against you or the like.

Well, my system requires a confirmation roll on a natural 1, and players have several mechanics to negate them using action points or traits. I generally don't see more than one or two fumbled from a player in an entire weekend of gaming, and maybe half a dozen random mooks if there is a lot of combat.

I can't imagine an actual fight where fumbles come up reasonably often. Even if you auto fumble on a twenty, and the fight is only between two people, and only lasts three rounds, that is a 1/64,000,000 chance of all fumbles occurring, which is not conceivable. The odds of anyone actually killing themselves is even smaller unless they are carelessly tossing around AOE attacks in melee.

Honestly, I think the chances of actually killing yourself, or even an ally, are smaller than in reality going by statistics on accidental death or friendly fire.

Zavoniki
2014-10-26, 10:17 AM
Absolutely a fan. ABSOLUTELY. But I apply Critical Failures to all things. Like a 1 on a Disable Device Roll triggers it.

Rolling a 1 becomes a dreaded event...or a glorious occasion if a monster does it.

One of my players favorite events was watching a Dremora (it was an Elder Scrolls campaign) who was a boss roll a 1, then a natural 20 (to-hit against himself), and then roll max damage to cleave his own head off. The players lost it in both laughter and rejoice that they survived without anyone dead.

Then again a fellow buddy of mine in a campaign we played together in quite literally killed himself with a flying kick (he was a monk) that somehow managed to kick himself in the head and crush his skull--killing him as his brain leaked out his ears. We all lost it laughing. And then had him resurrected. ...That Monk killed himself more than he did killed monsters--he had to have crit himself into the Dead-Book a half-dozen times, but we'll never forget him for that reason. And that's something that's honestly quite cool in my opinion.

These are both examples of why I think Critical Failures are bad.

DM Nate
2014-10-26, 10:27 AM
Well, failing the Disable Device by more than 5 triggers it anyway.

TheCountAlucard
2014-10-26, 11:08 AM
Well, failing the Disable Device by more than 5 triggers it anyway.But triggering a trap when you roll a 1 is a lot different from triggering a trap when you miss the DC by 5. Sometimes a combination of buffs, magic items/tools, and a good skill modifier make the roll itself more or less unimportant. Simple traps should have a microscopic chance of being accidentally set off by a skilled rogue, not 5%.

Sartharina
2014-10-26, 12:07 PM
But triggering a trap when you roll a 1 is a lot different from triggering a trap when you miss the DC by 5. Sometimes a combination of buffs, magic items/tools, and a good skill modifier make the roll itself more or less unimportant. Simple traps should have a microscopic chance of being accidentally set off by a skilled rogue, not 5%.Why are you rolling?

Of course, if I were houseruling critical failures, I'd have such a situation be similar to Shadowrun's 'Glitch on a Success'. Sure, Nat 20/Nat 1's aren't as scaling-friendly as Shadowrun's Exploding on Max/Glitch on Half 1's, but they're generally enough playing with anyone that isn't an emotionally dead math nerd unfazed by the face of the die.

There's a psychological effect of rolling minimum/maximum on a die.

Jay R
2014-10-26, 12:27 PM
also, first post! yay.

Welcome to the playground.


also, mandatory link to an epic fumble: Sameo (http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Sameo)

Note that with no critical fumble rule, we would never have had the story of Sameo.

awa
2014-10-26, 01:00 PM
I've tried this one before, and I found the only one interacting with this rule was the Archery Ranger, who was stuck dealing with all manner of penalties usually between cover, poor lighting, and Rapid Shot. It really was not fun for him dealing with broken bow-strings and the like all of the time.

at least in my system only one of those is a penalty cover improves the other guys defense, poor light grants concealment not a penalty.

rapid shot grants a penalty of -2 i would hope that anyone taking such a feat has at least 1 bab to go along with the required minimum 1 dex making it unlikely to come up with out additional debuffs. And at least in my game pcs throw out debuffs more often then monsters

Kamai
2014-10-26, 02:13 PM
at least in my system only one of those is a penalty cover improves the other guys defense, poor light grants concealment not a penalty.

rapid shot grants a penalty of -2 i would hope that anyone taking such a feat has at least 1 bab to go along with the required minimum 1 dex making it unlikely to come up with out additional debuffs. And at least in my game pcs throw out debuffs more often then monsters

Ok, so there were some goofed up rulings that I didn't realize that made things harder on him (I treated cover as a penalty for simplicity's sake, and I thought Concealment was both a penalty and a miss chance). On top of that, it was early levels, and he took a chance on Rapid Shot instead of Precise Shot, having that penalty in there. The main part that nobody else interacted with the rule stands, and if nobody's set to interact with the rule, what's the point of it?

Raine_Sage
2014-10-26, 03:06 PM
I am a fan of critical fumble rules but generally as an extension of murphy's law rather than an instant fail condition.

For example, rolling a natural 1 on a check to leap nimbly down from the roof of a building doesn't mean the rogue has suddenly gone flat footed, more that one of the shingles came loose at exactly the wrong time and instead of silently escaping into the night, they now have to lose their pursuer.

Or in combat, the fighter doesn't cleave his own head off, he just missed so widely that the enemy got in a free shot because he left himself open. Once an enemy rolled three 1s in a row (I do also like rolls to confirm to shrink 5% to something a little more manageable) and that meant the cleric's god decided that they were going to be especially awesome that day and smote the beast in a rain of holy fire as it still raised its mace.

I've played with critical fail rules pretty much as long as I've been gaming, I never felt they were particularly unfair. That might just be because if we were rolling in the first place then rolling poorly meant bad things could happen even on a normal failure. If the rogue had rolled a 5 instead of a 1 they would still have failed as escaping silently and needed to lose their pursuer. They just wouldn't have fallen off the roof into a trash bin. That extra little detail actually helped take the sting off because it was something we could all laugh about.

awa
2014-10-26, 03:07 PM
Ok, so there were some goofed up rulings that I didn't realize that made things harder on him (I treated cover as a penalty for simplicity's sake, and I thought Concealment was both a penalty and a miss chance). On top of that, it was early levels, and he took a chance on Rapid Shot instead of Precise Shot, having that penalty in there. The main part that nobody else interacted with the rule stands, and if nobody's set to interact with the rule, what's the point of it?
in my game? it comes up becuase the pc like stacking debuffs, morale penalties, luck penalties ect on bad guys and then feel very pleased with themselves when there foes weapons break and so on. Sure it doesn't come up very often but it does come up.

TheCountAlucard
2014-10-26, 08:45 PM
Why are you rolling?I wouldn't be, but if the GM was forcing fumble rules on people, then yes, that 5% chance of catastrophic failure would make rolling necessary.

Prince Raven
2014-10-26, 09:29 PM
My least favourite critical fumble systems are the ones where I could conceivably defeat most non-magical opponents by simply building high enough AC and waiting for them to kill themselves.

Mr Beer
2014-10-26, 10:43 PM
Absolutely a fan. ABSOLUTELY. But I apply Critical Failures to all things. Like a 1 on a Disable Device Roll triggers it.

Rolling a 1 becomes a dreaded event...or a glorious occasion if a monster does it.

One of my players favorite events was watching a Dremora (it was an Elder Scrolls campaign) who was a boss roll a 1, then a natural 20 (to-hit against himself), and then roll max damage to cleave his own head off. The players lost it in both laughter and rejoice that they survived without anyone dead.

Then again a fellow buddy of mine in a campaign we played together in quite literally killed himself with a flying kick (he was a monk) that somehow managed to kick himself in the head and crush his skull--killing him as his brain leaked out his ears. We all lost it laughing. And then had him resurrected. ...That Monk killed himself more than he did killed monsters--he had to have crit himself into the Dead-Book a half-dozen times, but we'll never forget him for that reason. And that's something that's honestly quite cool in my opinion.

These are arguments against using critical failures.

Teron
2014-10-26, 11:18 PM
Nah, it's a demonstration that critical failures turn a game into a slapstick comedy. If that's what you're after, knock yourself out.

Alex12
2014-10-27, 12:26 AM
My group doesn't use crit-failures for attack rolls. We do use them for skill checks, kinda.
If you roll a 1 on a skill check, and would normally fail it on a 1 or otherwise are insufficiently awesome (generally agreed upon to mean a less than +10 bonus to the skill) then you either fail harder or fail amusingly. If Bob the level 1 Commoner tries for an untrained Acrobatics check to jump over a small puddle in the road, and he gets a 1, he'll land in the puddle, slip, lose his balance, and fall prone and maybe have to make a low Reflex save or take a bit of damage (say DC 8 to avoid 1d2 damage). If his brother Ed the level Monk with his +16 to jump rolls a 1 on the same check, he still lands exactly where he wanted to because he's just that good at jumping that he's not relying on luck.
To balance this, a natural 20 on a skill check, explodes recursively, but only in situations where you can't take 20 without using any limited resources or abilities.

Talakeal
2014-10-27, 09:50 AM
Nah, it's a demonstration that critical failures turn a game into a slapstick comedy. If that's what you're after, knock yourself out.

A few years back my uncle went hunting eith a couple of his buddies. One of them forgot to put his safety on or unload the gun when they were done. As he was putting it in the car it went off, shooting him in the throat. He bled to death on the way to the hospital.

Does this sound like a slapstick commedy to you?

Fumbles happen. Sometimes they are funny, sometimes they are tragic. Sometimes they are frustrating or embarrassing, sometimes they turn a boring day into an adventure. A decent DM should be able to narrate a fumble in such a way that it matches the desired mood rather than ruining it.

Earthwalker
2014-10-27, 10:40 AM
When mentioning crtical failures in DND all I think is.

EWWWW someone has spilt Runequest all over my DnD, Quick mop it up before it sticks. (I do love the murpheys rules where it does some number crunching on a runequest battle and with 500 people on each side, something like 8 people would chop thier own heads off)

I am not a fan of critical failures in DnD. Don't think they add anything and as people have pointed out its just another mechanic that works against melees more than casters.

illyahr
2014-10-27, 11:43 AM
Nah, it's a demonstration that critical failures turn a game into a slapstick comedy. If that's what you're after, knock yourself out.

Don't say stuff like that! What are you trying to do, jinx us? :smallbiggrin:

icefractal
2014-10-27, 01:23 PM
A few years back my uncle went hunting eith a couple of his buddies. One of them forgot to put his safety on or unload the gun when they were done. As he was putting it in the car it went off, shooting him in the throat. He bled to death on the way to the hospital.

Does this sound like a slapstick commedy to you?

Fumbles happen. Sometimes they are funny, sometimes they are tragic. Sometimes they are frustrating or embarrassing, sometimes they turn a boring day into an adventure. A decent DM should be able to narrate a fumble in such a way that it matches the desired mood rather than ruining it.If 5% of hunters shot themselves fatally on each hunting trip, then it would be considered a huge crisis and most people would stop hunting until a solution was found to prevent it.

That's the problem with fumbles. **** happens. But not 5% of the time for every action you take. Not even 1/400th of the time, for extreme stuff like shooting yourself. Fumbling ridiculously often does turn the game into comedy (maybe dark comedy), or just gibberish.

Merellis
2014-10-27, 01:53 PM
A few years back my uncle went hunting eith a couple of his buddies. One of them forgot to put his safety on or unload the gun when they were done. As he was putting it in the car it went off, shooting him in the throat. He bled to death on the way to the hospital.

Does this sound like a slapstick commedy to you?

Fumbles happen. Sometimes they are funny, sometimes they are tragic. Sometimes they are frustrating or embarrassing, sometimes they turn a boring day into an adventure. A decent DM should be able to narrate a fumble in such a way that it matches the desired mood rather than ruining it.

That's less of rolling a 1 and more a lesson in gun safety being key to avoiding such situations.

Talakeal
2014-10-27, 01:55 PM
Which is only a problem if you insist on rolling for every little thing. But that doesnt happen in actual play, only people crunching numbers on the internet.

Yes, if you make players (and npcs) roll for everything they will fumble all the time. But you dont play that way, you only roll for dramatically important ings, and over time this shouldnt cause any more fumbles than real life.

icefractal
2014-10-27, 02:05 PM
Which is only a problem if you insist on rolling for every little thing. But that doesnt happen in actual play, only people crunching numbers on the internet.

Yes, if you make players (and npcs) roll for everything they will fumble all the time. But you dont play that way, you only roll for dramatically important ings, and over time this shouldnt cause any more fumbles than real life.Umm - you don't roll for attacks in combat? Because that's where a lot of the issue shows up.

Let's take some soldiers as an example. We'll even say that they're only making one "attack" a round, although they're definitely shooting more than one bullet per six seconds. If twenty soldiers are in a fire-fight that lasts one minute, then by 'natural 1' rules, about ten of them would have shot themselves. Does that seem reasonable?

Ok, so we make it require a confirmation roll. Now only 3-5 shoot themselves. Each time they go into combat. Still seems high.

Ok, only on a natural 1, followed by another natural 1. This is more scarce than most people mean when talking about fumbles, but I have seen it used, so ... Now only one soldier shoots themself for every two fights. I'm not actually sure what the statistics are, but that still seems too high.

(If, by the way, the use of automatic weapons is considered to give the soldiers a second attack / round, or their training is considered to include Rapid Shot, or they're elite units with BAB +6, then double/triple all those numbers. Yes, the SEAL team would apparently shoot themselves more often than a new recruit).

oxybe
2014-10-27, 02:22 PM
Our fighter in the wednesday pathfinder game has three attacks per round. That means every round he has a 3/20 chance of fumbling. This means that every round he full attacks, he has a 15% chance of fumbling.

This means that he's almost guaranteed a fumble once every 6-7 rounds.

In the "real time" terms that means in a section of combat that lasts less then a minute our level 13 fighter, FAR above what most mortals can even think of accomplishing, is silly, especially in a game where the top end we are at right now have VERY little grounding in "reality".

And that's the thing: we fully expect the fighters (or fighter likes) to be mundane guys with mundane capabilities but yet fully want them to competently stand up against supernatural things. The fumble rules generally punish these characters more then they should, especially at the higher levels where they have a much harder time staying relevant.

In the middle of a pitched combat with a balor, would you really want a guy who might throw away his sword across the room, the sword being his only real way to contribute, in less then a minute's time?

And that's one of the reasons I don't like those rules.

Red Fel
2014-10-27, 02:52 PM
And another point, which has been mentioned somewhat by others, is that fumble rules penalize PCs more than they penalize NPCs. Why? Action economy.

Let's look at a combat situation. Let's assume that we're dealing with a team of 4 level 15 melee-types (so 2-3 attacks apiece on a full attack, or 8-12 total attacks per round) versus a Young Adult Black Dragon (CR 9). It's a Large Dragon, so it gets 1 bite, 2 claws, 2 wing slams and 1 tail slap - a total of 6 attacks in a round.

If we assume that all characters are using only melee attacks, the PCs have between 8-12 chances to fumble in a round. The dragon has, at most, 6 chances. (And because it's using natural weapons, it doesn't have the "oops, you dropped your weapon" or "oops, your weapon broke" options.) Ironically, the advantage of the action economy - multiple PC actions for an NPC's one - turns into a disadvantage when fumble rules are introduced.

Now, let's change the combat situation. Let's replace 2 of our 4 melee-types with casters. They are no longer subject to fumbles. Further, let's play the Dragon smartly. As a Young Adult, he's going to fly, cast spells, and strafe with his breath weapon, a line of acid. None of that is subject to fumble rules. Right now, the only characters subject to fumbles are PCs - the two melees.

That's the point. If a PC is designed around non-magical combat, he will almost always be subject to fumble rules. At low levels, NPCs will have fewer melee actions to the PCs' actions, and will thus see fewer fumbles; at higher levels, they will have generally have magical options not subject to fumbles, and will thus see fewer fumbles. On average, therefore, the PCs are likely to fumble more than NPCs.

And as a rule, any option which hoses the PCs but leaves NPCs relatively unscathed (Sameo's epic story notwithstanding) isn't a very tempting option, in my book.

Kelb_Panthera
2014-10-27, 03:37 PM
For general play, absolutely not. For the reasons others have already hashed out and rehashed more than once now, I normally -despise- fumble rules.

The former is qualified for one reason and one reason only; once in a great while, my group would do a one-off comedy adventure. Class choice is restricted to NPC classes and the plot hooks lead to fairly mundane tasks in which relatively frequent screw ups (fumbles) are paired with absurd characters and even more absurd complications that make the whole thing into a gut-busting farce.

Magic Myrmidon
2014-10-27, 04:14 PM
Steps to making critical fails work in your game:

1). Make them hilarious when you describe them. The fighter trips on a tiny thread in the carpet. The Mage starts a runaway nuclear reaction. The crew drops the torpedo on their feet and it blows up. The sword was made in Mexico and it literally snaps in half, and that end hits the hireling. Yog Soggoth ties itself up with its own tentacles in a startling show of good luck for the players. That way nobody is too mad.

2). In the event of a player death due to a single bad roll (or several bad rolls, to the point it's getting ridiculous), have a handy trickster/comedian god on hand that brings players back every now and then just because they're too good to see die just once.

I've given considerable thought to crit fails, and this is probably my least favorite way to handle it. Then again, I'm not a fan of comedic campaigns. I want my campaigns to feature heroes who do incredible things. I want MY character to be proficient, confident, and good at what he does. However, stuff happens, and if it just so happens that there's a pothole that his foot gets stuck in, fair enough. That doesn't hurt his image. If he's fighting, and trips on a pebble, then it does.

I hate crit fumbles as a rule, but if I HAVE to play with them, then I certainly hope that they will be more dramatic moments, not slapstick.

Lord Torath
2014-10-27, 04:22 PM
Note that with no critical fumble rule, we would never have had the story of Sameo.<Link blocked at work.> Is that the story of the Paladin who gallantly chose to stall for time against the demon BBEG and got the fumble "Kill self and adjacent creature" result?I was planning on mentioning that story. I love the story, but I still don't like critical failures. Automatic failures I'm okay with, just like I'm okay with automatic successes. But only within certain limits. I like a certain amount of verisimilitude in my games, and a Natural 20 letting you convince the King that he's the imposter and should give you his crown just doesn't work for me, any more than a Natural 1 meaning you end your attack with your sword firmly embedded in your own torso does.

Strigon
2014-10-27, 04:55 PM
I've played with two groups.
The first, (Let's call them group "A".) was a group of friends who liked hanging out anyway, and D&D provided a nice way to keep up an interesting conversation, and a distraction from everyday life. We are highly social, and things rarely get serious. Abuse of statements the DM makes is accepted, and expected.
The second, (Group "B") is what you might expect; we play together because we enjoy the game. We wouldn't hang out much if not for D&D, and we go to play D&D in a more serious, rules/story-focused setting.
The first group enjoys crit fails, because there are no embarrassing moments, combat is rarely down-to-the-wire, and it makes everyone suddenly a lot more interested when it happens.
An example was when one player tried to make a heal check on another. Now, there's really only one thing to do when you crit fail a heal check, and I know all of you playgrounders would probably be irate if it happened to you. As it stands, however, the look of despair on the face of the one who received the "healing" is enough to make us all laugh to this day. Nobody was angry with it, and good times were had by all.
Group B on the other hand, does not have critical fails. The worst that happens is you auto-miss/fail your check. A cleric with huge heal skill and 16 WIS should not be attempting battlefield surgery on a lightly wounded dwarf. As a result, the game is less ridiculous, but far more reliable in its outcomes.

TL;DR, it depends on if you play as a social event, or play because you want to play a good, thought-provoking game.

Knaight
2014-10-27, 05:45 PM
Our fighter in the wednesday pathfinder game has three attacks per round. That means every round he has a 3/20 chance of fumbling. This means that every round he full attacks, he has a 15% chance of fumbling.
That's not how the statistics work. The odds aren't (.5*3), they're 1-((.95)^3). It's a 14.26% chance. It's still pretty terrible, but it's worth keeping track of the statistics properly.

Psyren
2014-10-27, 06:05 PM
Of course, we also don’t allow critical hits if you can’t hit the monster on a non-critical roll.

Isn't that how the rules work anyway? If you can't hit them normally then you can't confirm the crit either.

Seerow
2014-10-27, 06:12 PM
Isn't that how the rules work anyway? If you can't hit them normally then you can't confirm the crit either.

A natural 20 will still confirm normally. It seems as though they removed that.

oxybe
2014-10-27, 07:57 PM
That's not how the statistics work. The odds aren't (.5*3), they're 1-((.95)^3). It's a 14.26% chance. It's still pretty terrible, but it's worth keeping track of the statistics properly.

While the .74% difference is a tad negligible for the most part, at least in a practical sense, I'll accept my error on that account.

Point still stands though: every 6 seconds of combat there is still a much higher % chance then what I would like that one of the most skilled martial combatants in the known area would huck any of his magical blades across the room or fall arse over tea kettle when fighting a powerful foe and it affects the person who's already lagging behind in options by making his best option a potential liability (or simply negating it).

illyahr
2014-10-28, 12:19 PM
A natural 20 will still confirm normally. It seems as though they removed that.

Nat 20 will automatically hit but you still have to confirm and RAW doesn't allow another Nat 20 to confirm. If you can't hit the creature without a Nat 20, you will never confirm a critical according to RAW.

Jay R
2014-10-28, 01:54 PM
<Link blocked at work.> Is that the story of the ...?

Yes. It was cited in the quote in my post. Here it is again.


also, mandatory link to an epic fumble: Sameo (http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Sameo)

Talakeal
2014-10-29, 08:10 AM
Umm - you don't roll for attacks in combat? Because that's where a lot of the issue shows up.

Let's take some soldiers as an example. We'll even say that they're only making one "attack" a round, although they're definitely shooting more than one bullet per six seconds. If twenty soldiers are in a fire-fight that lasts one minute, then by 'natural 1' rules, about ten of them would have shot themselves. Does that seem reasonable?

Ok, so we make it require a confirmation roll. Now only 3-5 shoot themselves. Each time they go into combat. Still seems high.

Ok, only on a natural 1, followed by another natural 1. This is more scarce than most people mean when talking about fumbles, but I have seen it used, so ... Now only one soldier shoots themself for every two fights. I'm not actually sure what the statistics are, but that still seems too high.

(If, by the way, the use of automatic weapons is considered to give the soldiers a second attack / round, or their training is considered to include Rapid Shot, or they're elite units with BAB +6, then double/triple all those numbers. Yes, the SEAL team would apparently shoot themselves more often than a new recruit).

Yes, I roll in combat. IF the PCs are involved. I do not roll if two groups of NPCs are fighting each other or if they are just firing at an inanimate object like a training dummy. For those situations I would just roll once and gauge the overall result.

Also, the results of a fumble do not necessarily mean hitting yourself, although they could. It could also be dropping a weapon, having a gun jam, tripping, damaging a piece of equipment, hitting an ally, hitting a bystander, pulling a muscle, etc. If you include any type of screw up, not just injury, I would say that as long as you have a confirmation roll fumbles don't happen significantly more often in RPG combat than they do in real life sports.

I don't use iterative attacks either in my home brew or my D&D house rules, so it isn't an issue, but if you do I genuinely suggest you only allow the main attack the potential to fumble. The only exceptions are double weapons and gatling guns, which are supposed to be extremely risky and unreliable.

I think most people's biggest problem with fumbles, even if they don't realize it, is that they RP to look cool. Their PC is awesome, and by extension they are awesome, and a fumble is embarrassing and shatters that feeling. I think a DM can disarm that problem based on how they narrate a fumble, making it clear that they did the best they could but external circumstances got in the way. For example, they didn't wreck their car by driving poorly, some dumb kid jumped out into the street from behind a parked car and they had to swerve into a parking meter to avoid hitting them.

One thing I don't generally recommend is using a deck or a table, but letting the DM narrate the fumble organically from the situation. Normally I don't like DM FIAT rules, but this is one of the situations where I belong to the "magic tea party" school. A table can give you utterly ridiculous results like stabbing yourself in the chest with a long spear or auto killing a demon lord. That kind of stuff is both unbalanced and immersion breaking, and I would save that for a comedy game.


A few anecdotes about fumbles that I remember:

1: The players found an ancient piece of Atlantean technology. It was a climbing device that was similar to Link's hook-shot, but when retracted just looked like a short metal cylinder. The player fumbled their test to appraise it, and I told them they thought it was some form of ancient sex toy. Everyone at the table laughed for five minutes straight, and to this day when someone rolls a natural one on an identification role there is a good chance they will proclaim to the rest of the party that "It's a dildo!" and crack everyone up.

2: The PC in question was a Nymph Monk who was infiltrating an enemy base. She was unaware that there was a guard on the rooftop as she snuck past, so I rolled a perception test for the guard. He fumbled. I ruled that he noticed her, but was entranced by her beauty, and slipped while leaning over the ledge to get a better look at her, landing unconscious at her feet. This served as both a humorous mood lightener and also made the player feel like their choice of race really mattered, and because it was an NPC I made sure to play up the face that he was an idiot rather than a victim of circumstance.

3: I few weeks ago I was playing in a horror game. I was exploring a haunted house and was investigated a nest of what appeared to be undead crows. I fumbled my perception test to look at them, and the GM ruled that one of them attacked me, flying into my face and scratching up my eyes, leaving me blind. Horror is hard to do in an RPG, PCs tend to treat it like just another combat. But now I am blind in unfamiliar hostile territory, and as a player I am nervous because I don't know if this effect is permanent or not, or what sort of supernatural curse I may be afflicted with. This really drove home the element of fear and uncertainty to make a horror game really work instead of just being another dungeon crawl.

None of these experiences made the game less fun for anyone, and I think they all significantly enhanced player enjoyment.


Also, as long as this thread is active I am going to report fumbles to see what you think.

During a game I ran last night using my fumble system (Natural 1 followed by a confirmation roll means something bad happens) two fumbles came up in a four hour game. This is actually a bit higher than usual, but the dice were cold.

First time a beast was attacking a zombie, fumbled its attack roll and lost its next turn. I described it as the beast swallowed a mouth full of stinking rotted flesh and spent its next turn gagging it out.

Second time a player decided to take a shot when one of his allies was standing directly in his line of fire. I ruled that the other player moved unexpectedly at the last moment and got in the way of the shot, being hit in the back of the shoulder for a little damage.


And another point, which has been mentioned somewhat by others, is that fumble rules penalize PCs more than they penalize NPCs. Why? Action economy.

Let's look at a combat situation. Let's assume that we're dealing with a team of 4 level 15 melee-types (so 2-3 attacks apiece on a full attack, or 8-12 total attacks per round) versus a Young Adult Black Dragon (CR 9). It's a Large Dragon, so it gets 1 bite, 2 claws, 2 wing slams and 1 tail slap - a total of 6 attacks in a round.

If we assume that all characters are using only melee attacks, the PCs have between 8-12 chances to fumble in a round. The dragon has, at most, 6 chances. (And because it's using natural weapons, it doesn't have the "oops, you dropped your weapon" or "oops, your weapon broke" options.) Ironically, the advantage of the action economy - multiple PC actions for an NPC's one - turns into a disadvantage when fumble rules are introduced.

Now, let's change the combat situation. Let's replace 2 of our 4 melee-types with casters. They are no longer subject to fumbles. Further, let's play the Dragon smartly. As a Young Adult, he's going to fly, cast spells, and strafe with his breath weapon, a line of acid. None of that is subject to fumble rules. Right now, the only characters subject to fumbles are PCs - the two melees.

That's the point. If a PC is designed around non-magical combat, he will almost always be subject to fumble rules. At low levels, NPCs will have fewer melee actions to the PCs' actions, and will thus see fewer fumbles; at higher levels, they will have generally have magical options not subject to fumbles, and will thus see fewer fumbles. On average, therefore, the PCs are likely to fumble more than NPCs.

And as a rule, any option which hoses the PCs but leaves NPCs relatively unscathed (Sameo's epic story notwithstanding) isn't a very tempting option, in my book.

It depends on the effect of the fumble. If it is a hit yourself / ally, than it makes no difference as far as I can tell. All that changes is that guys with a lot of attacks get frequent small fumbles and guys with only a few attacks get rare large fumbles.
If you say you auto miss your next turn than yeah, that could be a problem, and I suggest the DM change it to make them miss their next attack instead.

Jay R
2014-10-29, 08:52 AM
One reason I like the use of critical fumbles is that it adds an element of immediate concern to each roll in what can sometimes turn out to be a long, tedious business of taking away a large set of hit points one hit at a time - a process akin to eroding rocks.

But I also think that the results of a critical fumble should be fairly modest:
make a DEX check or lose your footing,
lose your next attack,
arm hit, all attacks with that arm at -2,
etc.

They should almost always be difficult to deal with, rather than immediately deadly.

Sartharina
2014-10-29, 10:30 AM
A few years back my uncle went hunting eith a couple of his buddies. One of them forgot to put his safety on or unload the gun when they were done. As he was putting it in the car it went off, shooting him in the throat. He bled to death on the way to the hospital.

Does this sound like a slapstick commedy to you?When framed as such - yes, yes it can be. Welcome to black comedy. "Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall down an open sewer and die", after all. In real life, your uncle (or his buddy)'s death is tragic. But have you seen The Three Stooges? There's a lot of "Oops, I accidentally shot Curly/Moe/Larry" going on (Always nonfatal, and usually non-wounding as well, though. Yay for Hitpoints!)

Talakeal
2014-10-29, 10:34 AM
When framed as such - yes, yes it can be. Welcome to black comedy. "Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall down an open sewer and die", after all. In real life, your uncle (or his buddy)'s death is tragic. But have you seen The Three Stooges? There's a lot of "Oops, I accidentally shot Curly/Moe/Larry" going on (Always nonfatal, and usually non-wounding as well, though. Yay for Hitpoints!)

It wasn't my uncle, it was one of his buddies. And it wasn't the first time it has happened to them either. I suspect alcohol is involved.

But yes, it CAN be funny. It all depends on how it is framed though. IMO a skilled DM can make it seem funny or tragic, as need be. If you want to have fun and make the game lighter describe it in a funny manner. If you want to game to be darker or hopeless describe it as tragic or just frustrating.

Fumbles are a powerful tool for spicing up the narrative and breaking monotony, and it is a shame to throw them out because they can be misused.

Red Fel
2014-10-29, 10:46 AM
Fumbles are a powerful tool for spicing up the narrative and breaking monotony, and it is a shame to throw them out because they can be misused.

Let's be clear, though: If you're not using critical failures, you're not throwing them out. Fumbles are an optional variant; if you're not using them, you're simply declining to add them in. It's like Psionics, Maneuvers, or any of a number of additional systems - they're not the default, and it takes a conscious choice to include them. You're not making the active choice to exclude fumbles; a fumbles-free D&D is the default.

Even if you decline to use critical fumbles, failure is still a thing. Rolling a natural 1 on certain things (such as attacks) is an automatic failure. This is true even if you decline to use fumbles. Failure happens, for various reasons. And failures can be just as effective in creating tension, or a sense of futility or intensity, as critical failures. (And with the right description, they can be just as entertaining.)

Including critical failures is a conscious choice, which says, "I know you would have failed on a 1, but I want to create the possibility of that being even worse than simple failure."

Talakeal
2014-10-29, 10:54 AM
Let's be clear, though: If you're not using critical failures, you're not throwing them out. Fumbles are an optional variant; if you're not using them, you're simply declining to add them in. It's like Psionics, Maneuvers, or any of a number of additional systems - they're not the default, and it takes a conscious choice to include them. You're not making the active choice to exclude fumbles; a fumbles-free D&D is the default.

Even if you decline to use critical fumbles, failure is still a thing. Rolling a natural 1 on certain things (such as attacks) is an automatic failure. This is true even if you decline to use fumbles. Failure happens, for various reasons. And failures can be just as effective in creating tension, or a sense of futility or intensity, as critical failures. (And with the right description, they can be just as entertaining.)

Including critical failures is a conscious choice, which says, "I know you would have failed on a 1, but I want to create the possibility of that being even worse than simple failure."

That's absolutely true for D&D. Most of my favorite RPG systems do use them as the default, and I was more responding to the people in this thread who say something along the lines of "Any game with fumbles is crap and I won't play it."

Jay R
2014-10-29, 02:01 PM
Let's be clear, though: If you're not using critical failures, you're not throwing them out. Fumbles are an optional variant; if you're not using them, you're simply declining to add them in. It's like Psionics, Maneuvers, or any of a number of additional systems - they're not the default, and it takes a conscious choice to include them. You're not making the active choice to exclude fumbles; a fumbles-free D&D is the default.

That's true, and if we were debating what the rules say, it might even be relevant. But this discussion has always been focused on which is better to use, not which is the rules. Talakeal wrote that because it is a tool that spices up the narrative and breaks up monotony, it would be a shame to throw it out. That argument remains valid even when you are talking about throwing out an optional variant. To argue against his position logically, you need to either disagree with his contention that it spices up the narrative and reduces monotony, or show why a spiced up narrative and decreased monotony aren't an improvement to the game.


Even if you decline to use critical fumbles, failure is still a thing. Rolling a natural 1 on certain things (such as attacks) is an automatic failure. This is true even if you decline to use fumbles. Failure happens, for various reasons. And failures can be just as effective in creating tension, or a sense of futility or intensity, as critical failures. (And with the right description, they can be just as entertaining.)

This is closer to an actual argument against his position. Now you need to indicate why you think mere failure can be just as effective as critical fumbles. My experience is that there is less monotony and more spice with both failures and critical failures than with only one.


Including critical failures is a conscious choice, which says, "I know you would have failed on a 1, but I want to create the possibility of that being even worse than simple failure."

Yes, of course it's a conscious choice. If it wasn't, this thread would be meaningless. We are debating which way to make that choice, so pointing out that it's a choice doesn't support either decision.

Sartharina
2014-10-29, 02:25 PM
Sometimes failure isn't enough.

Of course, I'd say attacks are the worst place for critical failures, at least in D&D. You want critical failures only to apply to dramatic moments. In combat, you might want 2 nat 1s in a row to be a crit fail (Or use a crit confirm rolll), and the effect should be more comical than devastating, at least at higher levels.

As far as skills go - I think Nat 1s should always risk failure, but Nat 20s risk great success. If you cannot fail other than on a 1, you want to roll for the chance of a 20, or not roll at all.

JaminDM
2014-10-29, 03:34 PM
Critical Failure is the result of rolling a 1 and then confirming with a roll under 11. The result is leaving yourself flat-footed and provoking an attack of opportunity from any enemies with melée weapons able to hit you.

endoperez
2014-10-29, 03:58 PM
Critical Failure is the result of rolling a 1 and then confirming with a roll under 11. The result is leaving yourself flat-footed and provoking an attack of opportunity from any enemies with melée weapons able to hit you.

According to this rule, when a fighter and a cleric of 6th level with identical equipment, Dex and combat buffs fight against identical enemies, the Fighter is more likely to get hit. The Fighter attacks twice, the Cleric only once. That's because for each attack, there's a 2.5% chance of drawing attacks of opportunity.


That's kinda stupid, don't you think? Being a better fighter means you make more mistakes.

Prince Raven
2014-10-29, 08:19 PM
The way I handle it in my games, getitng the DC of the check means you fail, getting a natural 1 means you fail hilariously. No additional penalties to the character, it just makes them look a bit incompetent in front of everyone.

Talakeal
2014-10-29, 08:21 PM
The way I handle it in my games, getitng the DC of the check means you fail, getting a natural 1 means you fail hilariously. No additional penalties to the character, it just makes them look a bit incompetent in front of everyone.

I'm pretty sure a large majority of the people who hate fumbles do so because they don't like to look bad and might see this as a worst of both worlds solution.

Seerow
2014-10-30, 01:01 AM
I'm pretty sure a large majority of the people who hate fumbles do so because they don't like to look bad and might see this as a worst of both worlds solution.

I don't like it but I'd take it before any system that involves characters being able to decapitate themselves or miss a flying kick so hard they die more often than they kill enemies, or crit fumbling so hard you one-shot the epic level BBEG that was beating you effortlessly (seriously why do people point to that story as a good example of fumbles?!), or half the other insanity posted in this thread by supporters of fumbles.


Like my only real complaint with that rule is it makes higher level characters look increasingly more incompetent, and makes warriors look like baboons compared to casters who never have to roll anything. Those are annoying effects, but since there's no actual mechanical penalty attached, no real harm done.

Sartharina
2014-10-30, 01:07 AM
... someone hasn't played 4th edition. Fumbles can be really fun there, and nobody's immune or overly-affected - everyone makes about the same number of rolls.

Prince Raven
2014-10-30, 01:29 AM
With the way 4th edition D&D has become a bad word* amongst the RPG community, it shouldn't be surprising that plenty of people haven't played it.

*Yes, I'm aware it's multiple words

Jon_Dahl
2014-10-30, 02:43 AM
I'm a fan. I'm sure that my some of my arguments have already been made, but I will explain without reading the whole thread:
- Critics say that critical failures hurt melee. I've made a slight adjustment to this: single-classed fighters receive a partial immunity to fumbles, so that's the ONLY reasonable way to explain why there are so many single-classed NPC fighters in the world who are not completely insane or stupid. If you don't have critical failure tables and you don't give single-classed fighters some slack with them, then try to explain why are there so many single-class NPC fighters? In D&D 3.5, why Sir Robilar hasn't taken one level of barbarian? Why has he even bothered to advance in the fighter class beyond the 4th level? Give a reasonable explanation to this, please. In my game, the explanation is clear.
- Some people say that having multiple attacks per round means multiple critical failures per round. Please stop and imagine the following:
There are 100 blind and quadriplegic ducks lying in a row. A 1st-level fighter and 20th-level fighter start bashing them with their sword and no critical failure rule is used. During 100 rounds, the 1st-level fighter has made approximately 5 embarassing misses. During 25 rounds, the 20th-level fighter has made approximately 5 embarassing misses. Why is the 20th-level fighter making the crowd howl four times faster than the 1st-level fighter?
It's because "1 is always a miss" is already critical failure. If you add some critical failure table and if you don't go overboard, at least you have some variation to the "miss even a sitting duck" scheme. In short: "1 is always a miss" rule is off = Fine. "1 is a critical failure and some table is used" = Fine. "1 is always a miss" rule is used, but with no critical failures = Repetitive, boring.
- Critical failures generally add more excitement to the game, at least for me. I've been using critical failures for 110 sessions, and they've been just fine. If they suck so much, then why are we having fun?

Prince Raven
2014-10-30, 03:29 AM
I'm a fan. I'm sure that my some of my arguments have already been made, but I will explain without reading the whole thread:
- Critics say that critical failures hurt melee. I've made a slight adjustment to this: single-classed fighters receive a partial immunity to fumbles, so that's the ONLY reasonable way to explain why there are so many single-classed NPC fighters in the world who are not completely insane or stupid. If you don't have critical failure tables and you don't give single-classed fighters some slack them, then try to explain why are there so many single-class NPC fighters? In D&D 3.5, why Sir Robilar hasn't taken one level of barbarian? Why has he even bothered to advance in the fighter class beyond the 4th level? Give a reasonable explanation to this, please. In my game, the explanation is clear.

So what you're saying is you've put in a rule that results in the bar moving closer to "no critical fumbles"? Sounds like support for the anti-fumble side to me.


It's because "1 is always a miss" is already critical failure. If you add some critical failure table and if you don't go overboard, at least you have some variation to the "miss even a sitting duck" scheme. In short: "1 is always a miss" rule is off = Fine. "1 is a critical failure and some table is used" = Fine. "1 is always a miss" rule is used, but with no critical failures = Repetitive, boring.

So don't be boring, don't just say "you miss the duck", put a little bit of roleplaying into your combat. You don't have to fix everything by adding in unnecessary mechanics. I say unnecessary because, as you just stated, there already is a failure mechanic built into the base rules.


- Critical failures generally add more excitement to the game, at least for me. I've been using critical failures for 110 sessions, and they've been just fine. If they suck so much, then why are we having fun?
That line of reasoning is easily reversed:
I've had to put up with critical fumbles in many sessions, if they're so great, why did they suck enjoyment out of the game?

Jon_Dahl
2014-10-30, 03:35 AM
That line of reasoning is easily reversed:
I've had to put up with critical fumbles in many sessions, if they're so great, why did they suck enjoyment out of the game?

You logic slightly fails. No one would play a sucky game for 110 sessions. I'm not holding their families for ransom, you know.

Prince Raven
2014-10-30, 03:40 AM
You logic slightly fails. No one would play a sucky game for 110 sessions. I'm not holding their families for ransom, you know.

I was new, my friends wanted me to play with them, and I didn't know of any other RPG groups nearby. There are plenty of reasons why people might continue playing a game despite not liking one of the GM's house rules.

Arbane
2014-10-30, 03:42 AM
You logic slightly fails. No one would play a sucky game for 110 sessions.

You're not familiar with gamers OR the Sunk Cost Fallacy, are you?


crit fumbling so hard you one-shot the epic level BBEG that was beating you effortlessly (seriously why do people point to that story as a good example of fumbles?!)

I don't point to it as a good example of fumbles. I point to it as an awesome example of fumbles. There is a difference.

Jon_Dahl
2014-10-30, 03:44 AM
I was new, my friends wanted me to play with them, and I didn't know of any other RPG groups nearby. There are plenty of reasons why people might continue playing a game despite not liking one of the GM's house rules.

You make a valid point, but that's not the case here. For two years or so, one of the players travelled 400 km in total per a game session. There would have been games closer by.
(I know that it seems that I'm making this up, but I'm not)

Jon_Dahl
2014-10-30, 03:47 AM
You're not familiar with gamers OR the Sunk Cost Fallacy, are you?

No, but thank you for making me read up on the theory. That was interesting.

Prince Raven
2014-10-30, 04:02 AM
You make a valid point, but that's not the case here. For two years or so, one of the players travelled 400 km in total per a game session. There would have been games closer by.
(I know that it seems that I'm making this up, but I'm not)

What I'm saying is "my players like them, therefore they're good" is just as valid as saying "my players hate them, therefore they're bad". It's a very small sample base you're working with.

NichG
2014-10-30, 04:10 AM
So don't be boring, don't just say "you miss the duck", put a little bit of roleplaying into your combat. You don't have to fix everything by adding in unnecessary mechanics. I say unnecessary because, as you just stated, there already is a failure mechanic built into the base rules.

The reason this is boring, and that narrating things doesn't fix the underlying problem, comes from the fact that fighting in D&D is basically an exercise in watching the central limit theorem be generated. E.g. you're rolling multiple times to answer a very simple question at the end of the day: 'how many attacks does it take to get to the center of this orc?' Its such that with a little mathematics, you could compress the entirety of a fighter's participation in combat to a single d100 roll and a chart lookup telling you how many rounds the fighter needs to keep attacking the enemy until it dies.

Part of this is that if you're just talking about hits or misses, the eventual consequence is totally independent of context. Lets say it takes 8 hits to kill the dragon. The fighter makes 16 attacks and the dragon dies. This could happen because the fighter missed 8 times in a row and then hit 8 times in a row, or interchanged miss/hit/miss/hit/..., or had some other pattern. But at the end of the day, all of that context is removed when you just turn it into adjustments in a hitpoint track. The only time the context matters is if you can kill the dragon with fewer attacks, e.g. it has to do with the positioning of the last of the hits (but the rest don't matter). This also means that usually you never have to change your plans on the basis of how well the fighter does on their attack sequence - just wait it out and the central limit theorem will make everything nice and reliable for you.

That's why even variations of 'you miss the duck' aren't going to be all that interesting.

If you want to make those individual die rolls more meaningful you have to make them non-commutative somehow. Critical failure charts are one way to do this, because the consequence of a critical failure early on in the fight is going to be different than the consequence of a critical failure near the end of the fight. Early on, a debuff is more harmful. Later on, additional damage to the attacker is more harmful. Either case may involve a change in the plan of action to accommodate its influence.

But in general it comes down to there being more interesting questions one can ask using random generators than 'how long will it take me to succeed?' or 'did I succeed or fail?'. Dice systems where specific dice outcomes mean something in addition to the thing being tested help with this, for example, but it requires a bit of caution to make sure that they don't end up being really metagamey.

Prince Raven
2014-10-30, 05:54 AM
Well, maybe my players and I just haven't played enough to get that jaded.

Jon_Dahl
2014-10-30, 06:09 AM
Well, maybe my players and I just haven't played enough to get that jaded.

What I'm saying is "my players aren't that jaded, therefore it's still interesting" is just as valid as saying "my players are jaded, therefore it isn't that interesting". It's a very small sample base you're working with.

Prince Raven
2014-10-30, 07:16 AM
What I'm saying is "my players aren't that jaded, therefore it's still interesting" is just as valid as saying "my players are jaded, therefore it isn't that interesting". It's a very small sample base you're working with.

http://i.qkme.me/3pppdp.jpg

In all seriousness though, I really don't understand this whole "combat encounters are boring" thing you're talking about, for a lot of players combat is the most exciting part. D&D is a combat-focussed game, after all.

JaminDM
2014-10-30, 07:25 AM
According to this rule, when a fighter and a cleric of 6th level with identical equipment, Dex and combat buffs fight against identical enemies, the Fighter is more likely to get hit. The Fighter attacks twice, the Cleric only once. That's because for each attack, there's a 2.5% chance of drawing attacks of opportunity.


That's kinda stupid, don't you think? Being a better fighter means you make more mistakes.

Good point...

Okay... I think this can be fixed by adding your BAB+Dex modifier to the confirmation roll that has to be less than 20 to confirm a critical failure.

NichG
2014-10-30, 07:53 AM
http://i.qkme.me/3pppdp.jpg

In all seriousness though, I really don't understand this whole "combat encounters are boring" thing you're talking about, for a lot of players combat is the most exciting part. D&D is a combat-focussed game, after all.

Combat is interesting, but it has its ups and downs. The ups are hinge points where the future of the fight is in flux because of something or other. The downs are sequences where you're waiting to do the detailed evaluation of what is basically a foregone conclusion (4ed seems to in particular have a problem with this kind of 'down'). Its very exciting when some spell hits the field and now I have to evaluate whether to keep the same target or move out of a damaging area or seek healing or whatever. Its exciting when people are rolling saving throws against things which, if they fail, will really change their available options (now you're blind - what do you do?). But its pretty boring when you're waiting for someone to roll through his full attack: its boring because you don't really need to pay attention, but at the same time its something that has to get done for the combat to move on.

This is more of a problem with full attacks being somewhat poorly designed mechanics than anything else in particular. My personal preferred fix for that is homebrew and martial options that reduce the need for people to make use of long attack sequences (e.g. stuff that lets you sacrifice attacks for fixed buffs to a single attack, maneuvers that resolve as a single attack, etc) but critical successes/failures with 'special effects' can serve that goal as well.

Alex12
2014-10-30, 10:01 AM
The only times I can see critical fumbles being reasonable and not kind of dumb in the games I play is if it was only applied to some characters. Say, half-BAB characters, no relevant feats or class abilities, below-average Str or Dex (or Wis or whatever you're using to determine to-hit) as appropriate, and no magic weapon.

Kelb_Panthera
2014-10-30, 12:01 PM
Combat is interesting, but it has its ups and downs. The ups are hinge points where the future of the fight is in flux because of something or other. The downs are sequences where you're waiting to do the detailed evaluation of what is basically a foregone conclusion (4ed seems to in particular have a problem with this kind of 'down'). Its very exciting when some spell hits the field and now I have to evaluate whether to keep the same target or move out of a damaging area or seek healing or whatever. Its exciting when people are rolling saving throws against things which, if they fail, will really change their available options (now you're blind - what do you do?). But its pretty boring when you're waiting for someone to roll through his full attack: its boring because you don't really need to pay attention, but at the same time its something that has to get done for the combat to move on.

This is more of a problem with full attacks being somewhat poorly designed mechanics than anything else in particular. My personal preferred fix for that is homebrew and martial options that reduce the need for people to make use of long attack sequences (e.g. stuff that lets you sacrifice attacks for fixed buffs to a single attack, maneuvers that resolve as a single attack, etc) but critical successes/failures with 'special effects' can serve that goal as well.

Full attacks don't have to take significantly longer than anything else to resolve as long as you're organized and use a calculator if you need it.

You're right about battles with foregone conclusions being boring as heck, though that's hardly something to lay on the humble attack roll.

It's also something that fumbles don't effect any more than enemy critical hits. Ultimately it's just a slightly worse result than the miss that was already gonna happen unless it's a -major- debuff like blindness, stun, or prone for multiple rounds (not that I'm aware of anything that causes that last one) except when it's already a tight battle.

In the case of an already tight battle the extra resolution will just drag things down and increase the PC's chances of ultimate failure, which is rarely a good thing.

Fumbles as an avenue for introducing more uncertainty -sounds- good in theory but the same thing can be accomplished by using enemies with special abilities.

There's also the matter that odds are pretty good that if a player rolled up something whose primary interaction with the enemy is mostly unmodified attack rolls with the occasional charge and/or power attack calculation, he doesn't -want- extra complications. Forcing that extra complication on -every- combat, regardless of how simple the foe is, seems a bit mean spirited, IMHO.

Knaight
2014-10-30, 12:22 PM
It wasn't my uncle, it was one of his buddies. And it wasn't the first time it has happened to them either. I suspect alcohol is involved.

Alcohol usually is, and it doesn't mix well with firearms.

Coming back to gaming, if there was some sort of fumble system that only applied if the character was already severely wounded, or drunk, or drugged up on something other than alcohol - and it didn't have bizarre instant deaths where they make no sense - I'd like it a lot better. The idea that the expert swordsman swinging a sword around shortly after smoking a bunch of opium accidentally throws it away with some frequency works pretty well.

Sartharina
2014-10-30, 01:00 PM
Sounding like a broken record here, but treating critical failures on attacks as Critical Defenses on Defense makes critical failures work.

But crit fails, ironically, are best when used on rarely-used skill checks, when the use of each is a dramatic moment.

Kelb_Panthera
2014-10-30, 01:46 PM
Sounding like a broken record here, but treating critical failures on attacks as Critical Defenses on Defense makes critical failures work.

But crit fails, ironically, are best when used on rarely-used skill checks, when the use of each is a dramatic moment.

It only makes them -sound- better. Mechanically they're still just as bad.

As for skill checks, it's even worse; they're not normally subject to the natural 1 rule so you're adding a whole new vector for failure that never even existed before.

Sartharina
2014-10-30, 03:54 PM
It only makes them -sound- better. Mechanically they're still just as bad.No more than letting enemies attack at all.


As for skill checks, it's even worse; they're not normally subject to the natural 1 rule so you're adding a whole new vector for failure that never even existed before.Which is why I said 'ironically' - they normally don't apply to skills, yet are actually pretty good on them (See: Shadowrun's 'glitches'. Or a substantial number of Digo Dragon's campaign quotes.)

Prince Raven
2014-10-30, 06:55 PM
No more than letting enemies attack at all.

... what? I just don't understand. How is "the enemies actually fight back with all those swords and stuff they're carrying" just as jarring as "The mighty warrior, Ungoth the Lichbane, slayer of dragons and champion of the people drops his sword, trips over on a rock, or accidentally stabs himself roughly once or twice for every minute of combat".

NichG
2014-10-30, 07:52 PM
Full attacks don't have to take significantly longer than anything else to resolve as long as you're organized and use a calculator if you need it.

I don't actually agree with this statement in general (its a bit too idealistic to assume that everyone is going to be this on-the-ball in a world filled with other people whose habits you can't personally control), but even assuming that its true and all actions have a constant-time resolution, the actual density of meaningfulness is still lower during attack sequences during e.g. the resolution of an attack that applies a status condition. Its basically because damage doesn't change the game state meaningfully unless it drops its target. The same would be true of rolling damage for an AoE spell (which is why I encourage taking average on damage dice pools, but that's another story)


It's also something that fumbles don't effect any more than enemy critical hits. Ultimately it's just a slightly worse result than the miss that was already gonna happen unless it's a -major- debuff like blindness, stun, or prone for multiple rounds (not that I'm aware of anything that causes that last one) except when it's already a tight battle.

In the case of an already tight battle the extra resolution will just drag things down and increase the PC's chances of ultimate failure, which is rarely a good thing.

Fumbles as an avenue for introducing more uncertainty -sounds- good in theory but the same thing can be accomplished by using enemies with special abilities.

There's also the matter that odds are pretty good that if a player rolled up something whose primary interaction with the enemy is mostly unmodified attack rolls with the occasional charge and/or power attack calculation, he doesn't -want- extra complications. Forcing that extra complication on -every- combat, regardless of how simple the foe is, seems a bit mean spirited, IMHO.

Well, if we take for example the system I proposed earlier in this thread, critical hits/misses are rolled once for the entire round and create a pool of points which any player can pull from during the round to create effects. In that system, a player who doesn't want the extra complication can just ignore the pool and let others spend it. Similarly, because its a pool which must be spent to have use, the critical successes/failures always have an element of decision-making to them so they encourage the players re-evaluating their plans to take advantage of a sudden opportunity (we have enough points this round to provoke a failed save!) or to protect themselves from a sudden disadvantage (the enemy has a lot of points this round, so better not let them get off a full attack on someone). So in that case its not about the immediate results of a roll being better or worse, but more about making it so each roll is an opportunity to consider using a shared luck-based resource. That said, the particular system I proposed would do a lot less for adding spice of this sort to a long attack sequence because I specifically made it to have a crit rate independent of how many attacks people get due to the 'higher level Fighter fumbles more often' and 'spellcasters often don't have to roll' problems.

Sartharina
2014-10-30, 11:45 PM
... what? I just don't understand. How is "the enemies actually fight back with all those swords and stuff they're carrying" just as jarring as "The mighty warrior, Ungoth the Lichbane, slayer of dragons and champion of the people drops his sword, trips over on a rock, or accidentally stabs himself roughly once or twice for every minute of combat".

I'm talking "Critical failures are actually Critical Defenses" - As he's hewing through the goblin horde, Ungoth the Lichbane falters against Dies Horribly the Generic Goblin Warrior on the blood-soaked ground, who takes the opportunity to disarm Ungoth/Knock Ungoth Off Balance/force the terrible blade against its wielder in a miraculous (For the goblin) parry - buying the miniature fiends just a scant extra second before Ungoth recovers from the setback, and begins his slaughter with renewed vigor."

Or, "As Olaf One-Eye brought his axe down against the mighty dragon Numinex, the dragon caught the blade in his jagged scales, and his defensive twist manages to wrench it away from its wielder."

Seerow
2014-10-31, 01:07 AM
I'm talking "Critical failures are actually Critical Defenses" - As he's hewing through the goblin horde, Ungoth the Lichbane falters against Dies Horribly the Generic Goblin Warrior on the blood-soaked ground, who takes the opportunity to disarm Ungoth/Knock Ungoth Off Balance/force the terrible blade against its wielder in a miraculous (For the goblin) parry - buying the miniature fiends just a scant extra second before Ungoth recovers from the setback, and begins his slaughter with renewed vigor."

Or, "As Olaf One-Eye brought his axe down against the mighty dragon Numinex, the dragon caught the blade in his jagged scales, and his defensive twist manages to wrench it away from its wielder."

This runs into the weird situation where enemies are going to more frequently get a stroke of good luck/a lucky hit in against characters with more attacks.

But I am mostly okay with the idea of if you roll a 1 on the first attack roll of a round, the enemy gets some action to inconvenience you (say a free disarm/trip/bullrush attempt). The question then becomes how do you apply a similar logic to the spellcasters? If the enemy rolls a natural 20 on their saving throw, does it cause some form of backlash on the caster? What about spells that are no save, no attack, just win? Is there some way for the caster to fail there? What about against archer type characters? If they fumble and there isn't someone next to them to take advantage, is there no side effect? Or do they get the special "I'm a clown" fumble chart while everyone else has their enemies causing problems for them?

Important things to consider.

Sartharina
2014-10-31, 01:45 AM
This runs into the weird situation where enemies are going to more frequently get a stroke of good luck/a lucky hit in against characters with more attacks.

But I am mostly okay with the idea of if you roll a 1 on the first attack roll of a round, the enemy gets some action to inconvenience you (say a free disarm/trip/bullrush attempt). The question then becomes how do you apply a similar logic to the spellcasters? If the enemy rolls a natural 20 on their saving throw, does it cause some form of backlash on the caster? What about spells that are no save, no attack, just win? Is there some way for the caster to fail there? What about against archer type characters? If they fumble and there isn't someone next to them to take advantage, is there no side effect? Or do they get the special "I'm a clown" fumble chart while everyone else has their enemies causing problems for them?

Important things to consider.For casters - critical saves can give either a backlash on the caster (Most single-target spells), or a boon (On AoEs). Archery is probably the 'safest', but also weakest option. Most no-save-just-suck spells tend to be weak for their level as well, IIRC.

Kelb_Panthera
2014-10-31, 05:28 AM
I don't actually agree with this statement in general (its a bit too idealistic to assume that everyone is going to be this on-the-ball in a world filled with other people whose habits you can't personally control), but even assuming that its true and all actions have a constant-time resolution, the actual density of meaningfulness is still lower during attack sequences during e.g. the resolution of an attack that applies a status condition. Its basically because damage doesn't change the game state meaningfully unless it drops its target. The same would be true of rolling damage for an AoE spell (which is why I encourage taking average on damage dice pools, but that's another story)

A couple attack and damage rolls vs a saving throw and cyphering the change to the target's values vs opposed rolls and whatever resolution lies there (grapple, trip, loss of target awareness, etc); none of them take terribly long if the player and dm stay on the ball.

As for whether an attack can change the game state, that depends on how close things are. If things are tight, one missed attack can be the difference between having a pc survive the fight vs being dropped. Affecting how many rounds the enemy stays on its feet, and in a good fight there's always more than one enemy, is a achange to the game state, it's just a bit more subtle one than a debuff. Besides, unless you've got somesome kind of save or die, damage is necessary to resolve most combats, assuming you're not in the habit of leaving live foes behind you.


Well, if we take for example the system I proposed earlier in this thread, critical hits/misses are rolled once for the entire round and create a pool of points which any player can pull from during the round to create effects. In that system, a player who doesn't want the extra complication can just ignore the pool and let others spend it. Similarly, because its a pool which must be spent to have use, the critical successes/failures always have an element of decision-making to them so they encourage the players re-evaluating their plans to take advantage of a sudden opportunity (we have enough points this round to provoke a failed save!) or to protect themselves from a sudden disadvantage (the enemy has a lot of points this round, so better not let them get off a full attack on someone). So in that case its not about the immediate results of a roll being better or worse, but more about making it so each roll is an opportunity to consider using a shared luck-based resource. That said, the particular system I proposed would do a lot less for adding spice of this sort to a long attack sequence because I specifically made it to have a crit rate independent of how many attacks people get due to the 'higher level Fighter fumbles more often' and 'spellcasters often don't have to roll' problems.

While it's an interesting idea, it's not a fumble system. It's much more akin to some kind of mutant action point system than one for fumbles.

Jay R
2014-10-31, 08:17 AM
Just one interesting fact to muddy up the argument:

This year's best-performing running back in the NFL has had more rushing attempts than any other, and has committed more fumbles than any other.

It's not totally out of line for a great fighter who makes more attacks to have more critical fumbles. In real life, it can happen.

Prince Raven
2014-10-31, 09:55 AM
Seems like a bad comparision, he doesn't get swords stuck in him when he fumbles the ball, which explains why he's still alive despite all those fumbles. Under many critical fumble rules I've seen it is improbable for a character to reach even level 4 without accidentally chopping their own head off. And I'm sure even the worst fumbler in professional handegg fumbles somewhat less than a 5% chance every 6 seconds they have the ball.

The Glyphstone
2014-10-31, 10:06 AM
Seems like a bad comparision, he doesn't get swords stuck in him when he fumbles the ball, which explains why he's still alive despite all those fumbles. Under many critical fumble rules I've seen it is improbable for a character to reach even level 4 without accidentally chopping their own head off. And I'm sure even the worst fumbler in professional handegg fumbles somewhat less than a 5% chance every 6 seconds they have the ball.

Though to play Asmodean Advocate here, professional fighters don't fumble 5% of every six seconds they carry their sword peaceably through a forest, only when they use it - the handegg analogy would be every time that player 'rolls' to catch a pass from the quarterback or to dodge a blocker/interceptor.




On-topic, my perspective on Fumbles has always been pretty much Seerow's rules posted earlier in the thread, though my primary pass/fail was the straw-dummy test. Fail that, and you can butter your fumble rules and eat them.

Talakeal
2014-10-31, 11:03 AM
I'm talking "Critical failures are actually Critical Defenses" - As he's hewing through the goblin horde, Ungoth the Lichbane falters against Dies Horribly the Generic Goblin Warrior on the blood-soaked ground, who takes the opportunity to disarm Ungoth/Knock Ungoth Off Balance/force the terrible blade against its wielder in a miraculous (For the goblin) parry - buying the miniature fiends just a scant extra second before Ungoth recovers from the setback, and begins his slaughter with renewed vigor."

Or, "As Olaf One-Eye brought his axe down against the mighty dragon Numinex, the dragon caught the blade in his jagged scales, and his defensive twist manages to wrench it away from its wielder."

A good explanation for a warrior fumbling against a horde of weak enemies is that he hits them TOO hard and got his weapon stuck in the last one, meaning he needs a moment to pull it out. Of course, the DM may need to narrate this carefully as it is a side effect of past actions rather than a result of the action that is currently being fumbled.

Also, I hate iterative attacks in general. The math is annoying and slows down the game and they make combat really static with everyone having to just stand in place swinging. Fumbles are a good system made stupid by iterative (imo) and iterative is a bad system made worse by fumbles.

None of my homebrew systems use it, and when I run d20 I usually just give a damage bonus equal to BaB and ignore iterative attacks, allowing people with flurry of blows or duel wield to just attack twice on a standard attack.

Stellar_Magic
2014-10-31, 11:09 AM
One thing to consider is to make critical failures 'optional'. If you're playing 3.5 with the 'hero points' rule from UA, you could give the player a choice of taking the fumble and gaining a hero point, or just missing.

I'm doing the same thing with a Star Wars Saga Edition game I'm running.

oxybe
2014-10-31, 02:05 PM
@ Sartharina

If the problem is one of narration alone, where instead of "crit fail, you look like a fool" you get "crit fail, enemy looks competent" I wouldn't have much issue with it to begin with. As it currently stand in the normal failure rules, where a one is a miss and nothing else, this is perfectly acceptable and I would say preferred for most games.

The problem is when the GM starts inputting additional mechanical effects like "weapon is thrown across room" or "you hit your adjacent ally" where the game accidentally turns into one of black comedy, which is most often the result of a GM adding additional mechanics to crit failures "it's a failure so something bad happens to you".

I blame it on the name of the mechanic "critical failure": it lends itself well to the theme of spectacular failure by default. I'm pretty sure if it was called "automatic miss" instead of "critical failure" we wouldn't have as many charts where fighters hurl greatswords into ceilings or accidentally lob off the dwarf's foot or something.

But to reiterate, it's one thing to turn a 1 into a comedy of errors with narration but no additional mechanics involved, but people I've gamed with that gave any special attention to crit failures do so by adding a mechanical repercussion beyond "auto-miss".

It's a great idea I would like to see used more often when Crit Fails are pure narration, but i find that this is rarely the case.

Sartharina
2014-10-31, 02:53 PM
There's not a problem with adding mechanics to critical failures.
In its most abstract, combat is on a 'victory' track.

A normal success advances the person down that victory track by one point.
A critical success advances the person down that victory track by two points, or advances the person down the track by a point and pushes the enemy back up the track one point.

A normal failure does not advance the person down the victory track.
A critical failure either sends the user back up a point on the victory track, or advances the opponent down the victory track by one point.

Critical failures are just as likely to occur as critical successes (Or even less likely), and are just as likely to be triggered by either side. While a player character will accrue more critical failures over the course of a campaign than a monster, he'll also accrue more critical success, and it's all irrelevant because only encounter-level statistics matter.

Losing a sword on your enemy's critical defense doesn't make you look any more incompetent than that same enemy disarming you on their attack. Other self-attacks are similar, but only really make sense on a defense (An enemy parrying so well as to drive the blade back against his assailant, or redirecting an attack to strike his assailant's ally instead). There tend to be awkward feats that allow this, but feats are just an obnoxious way of saying "No you can't do this".

Jay R
2014-10-31, 07:55 PM
Seems like a bad comparision, he doesn't get swords stuck in him when he fumbles the ball, which explains why he's still alive despite all those fumbles. Under many critical fumble rules I've seen it is improbable for a character to reach even level 4 without accidentally chopping their own head off. And I'm sure even the worst fumbler in professional handegg fumbles somewhat less than a 5% chance every 6 seconds they have the ball.

Then the problem is the critical fumble table. It should almost always create an annoying problem, not a death.
Make a DEX check or drop your weapon.
You are open to the next attack. DEX defense does not apply.
You slip. Miss one attack.
Your shield strap breaks. No shield for the rest of the combat.

By the way, is that an absurd exaggeration, or have you actually seen entire parties destroyed by critical failures before 4th level?

Prince Raven
2014-10-31, 10:48 PM
Entire parties, no. But I have seen one person go through 3 characters thanks to his ability to roll natural 1s and accidentally kill his own character. Only 1 non-caster in the original party made it to level 4.

You're right though, those are generally much tamer outcomes of a critical fumble (though not a huge fan of "drop your weapon"). My least favourite outcomes include: accidentally stab yourself, roll damage (yes, strength bonus, power attack, etc. did apply. Made me happy I was low strength and wielding a dagger, the 18 strength greatsword wielder was less impressed); accidentally hit adjacent ally (again, full damage); weapon breaks, you are now useless this entire combat; Lose all remaining attacks this round and fall prone/become flat-footed/drop your weapon/etc.

Yes, all of those happened in the same campaign. Critical fumbles only applied to mundanes and skill-monkeys, casters who didn't have to roll to hit and only ever used knowledge and social skills were completely unaffected.

Jay R
2014-11-01, 09:25 AM
Entire parties, no. But I have seen one person go through 3 characters thanks to his ability to roll natural 1s and accidentally kill his own character. Only 1 non-caster in the original party made it to level 4.

I agree that in that case, the critical fumble table marred the game. But the problem isn't critical fumbles; it's a bad table.


You're right though, those are generally much tamer outcomes of a critical fumble (though not a huge fan of "drop your weapon").

It's not that bad an outcome, but I've never had a melee fighter without a backup weapon, even back in 1975 before I ever heard of critical fumbles. When skeletons show up, leave the sword in its sheath and draw the mace.


My least favourite outcomes include: accidentally stab yourself, roll damage (yes, strength bonus, power attack, etc. did apply. Made me happy I was low strength and wielding a dagger, the 18 strength greatsword wielder was less impressed);

On the extremely rare case that a "damage yourself" outcome occurs, power attack bonuses should not apply, because the sword isn't hitting at the spot all that power was focused on. A competent DM should also take into account the weapon. You can't stab yourself with a rapier, though you can cut your left hand with a really stupid parry. You can strike yourself with a sword, but not with the sweet spot; damage should be reduced.


accidentally hit adjacent ally (again, full damage);

This can happen, but should be ridiculously rare. It's happened to me once in 35 years of SCA melee. Again, it doesn't occur unless the ally moves in front or at the end of a spent swing. Lower damage.


weapon breaks, you are now useless this entire combat;

Draw your dagger, or punch, or kick, or tackle, or pick up rocks to throw. You are not useless.

Once you start reading about real warriors and what they take to battle, you'll see that there is always a backup weapon. Also, if you are fighting armed warriors, there are free weapons as soon as the first one dies.

Any player who thinks his character is useless if his primary weapon breaks has not yet begun to play the character of a melee fighter.


Lose all remaining attacks this round and fall prone/become flat-footed/drop your weapon/etc.

Becoming flat-footed and losing attacks is actually the most common "critical fumble" I've seen in SCA combat - often because something weird just happened that distracted you.

Falling happens. Roll, get up, or stab up.


Yes, all of those happened in the same campaign. Critical fumbles only applied to mundanes and skill-monkeys, casters who didn't have to roll to hit and only ever used knowledge and social skills were completely unaffected.

If they are out of the melee, they aren't getting constantly jostled. What makes it fair is that as soon as one single orc gets to melee range, the wizard is more helpless than the fighter who fell or dropped his first weapon.

The Glyphstone
2014-11-01, 01:56 PM
Draw your dagger, or punch, or kick, or tackle, or pick up rocks to throw. You are not useless.

Once you start reading about real warriors and what they take to battle, you'll see that there is always a backup weapon. Also, if you are fighting armed warriors, there are free weapons as soon as the first one dies.

Any player who thinks his character is useless if his primary weapon breaks has not yet begun to play the character of a melee fighter.


You must not play above very low levels in most cases, because you are drastically underestimating how much weapon bonuses matter to a melee character. At level 1-5 or so, sure - having your +1 weapon break and switching to your masterwork backup weapon isn't a big deal. At level 10+, switching from your +4 weapon with weapon focus/specialization/mastery to your masterwork backup you don't have feats to support is a huge drop in relative effectiveness.

Knaight
2014-11-01, 01:57 PM
Becoming flat-footed and losing attacks is actually the most common "critical fumble" I've seen in SCA combat - often because something weird just happened that distracted you.

Falling happens. Roll, get up, or stab up.

This sort of thing works, though the frequency of failures is still a bit high - much of the fighting I've done has been on pretty bad ground, and between weapon losses (which happen), slipping and falling (which happens) and something weird suddenly throwing somebody off so they don't do much (which definitely happens), nobody fails anywhere near 5% of the times. A table with a "nothing happens" result can help here, but then it slows the game down.

Another method would be to have a set of tracks. You roll a 1, you can add a mark to a disarm track, a weapon damage track, a slip track, etc. Once they finally peak, then something bad happens. It's a bit of a metagame mechanic in a few ways, but that's not necessarily a problem.

Jay R
2014-11-01, 04:16 PM
...nobody fails anywhere near 5% of the times.

I don't approve of making all 1s critical failures. As I've said more than once in this thread, most critical fumble tables make you roll for a second time if you roll a 1.

And the table we use, from The Dragon #39, has you make saving rolls much of the time.
01-19 slip; roll dexterity or less on d20 or fall and stunned for 1-4 rounds
20-33 stumble; roll dexterity or less on d20 or fall and stunned for 1-6 rounds
In fact, about half the time, a DEX roll negates the penalty.


You must not play above very low levels in most cases, because you are drastically underestimating how much weapon bonuses matter to a melee character. At level 1-5 or so, sure - having your +1 weapon break and switching to your masterwork backup weapon isn't a big deal. At level 10+, switching from your +4 weapon with weapon focus/specialization/mastery to your masterwork backup you don't have feats to support is a huge drop in relative effectiveness.

I repeat - have a backup weapon. My current 7th level Ranger (actually a Fighter2/Ranger 3/ Horizon Walker 2) has a +2 guisarme to use his Improved Trip feat, but he also has a +2 Flameburst longsword. By level 10+, you've found more than one weapon apiece. Keeping a second weapon you found is usually more useful than selling it for half value. (Of course, my Ranger also has a bow, but we're talking about melee.)

And I don't use weapon focus/specialization/mastery. They reduce your options when you have to pick up a weapon quickly, or when you find a superior weapon. Use feats to create more opportunities, not fewer ones. In fact, the reason I have the +2 Flameburst longsword is that the other fighter took weapon focus & specialization, and so couldn't use it.

Yes, optimizing your character for a single narrow option looks great, but stuff happens. If you have a maxed out +4 weapon but no other real option, then you went out of your way to not be ready for a melee. Your problem isn't the critical fumble table; it's that you aren't prepared for what happens in combat.

You're optimizing for "I hope nothing changes," and then getting upset at the critical fumble table. Your character is probably slightly more effective than mine if nothing ever goes wrong.

But I optimize for survival in any likely scenario, and so I'm not hurt that much by the ordinary random effects of combat.

Once you recognize that the critical fumbles can happen, and need to be planned for, they are just one more obstacle to have fun overcoming.

Seerow
2014-11-01, 04:21 PM
And the table we use, from The Dragon #39, has you make saving rolls much of the time.
01-19 slip; roll dexterity or less on d20 or fall and stunned for 1-4 rounds
20-33 stumble; roll dexterity or less on d20 or fall and stunned for 1-6 rounds
In fact, about half the time, a DEX roll negates the penalty.

What? Dragon 39 was released *googles* in 1980. That's like immediately after AD&D was released. So we're talking the point in time where 1 round was a full minute, and stats averaged very close to 10.

We're talking about a typical fighter swinging his sword, and 2-3% of the time falling on his ass so hard he can literally do nothing at all for up to 6 minutes.

That's so hilariously bad I don't know what to say.



Sorry I don't mean to pick on you, but this is exemplary of the problems with critical fumbles. All the time you hear "Yeah, they can be bad but the rules I use/like aren't anything like that!". You see it in any discussion involving someone trying to defend fumbles, including in this thread. But any time an actual example is given, it results in horrific results like this. Followed by it being pointed out how absolutely absurd it is, then someone else saying "yeah okay that sucks, but my tables aren't anything like that" along with some vagaries to deflect providing an actual rule. Eventually someone else provides a crit fumble rule and the process starts all over again.


edit:

My current 7th level Ranger (actually a Fighter2/Ranger 3/ Horizon Walker 2) has a +2 guisarme to use his Improved Trip feat, but he also has a +2 Flameburst longsword.

What?!

Okay maybe if your games throw wealth by level out the window and everyone can afford to have not one, but multiple high end weapons for their level to carry around as backup, and selling those weapons to exchange for loot that might actually get used that can be the case. But really? You are level 7 with a +4 weapon as a backup?! And a +2 weapon as your primary? A +2 weapon costs 8,000gp! A +4 weapon costs 32,000gp! Level 7 wealth is 19,000. Even if you go to the slightly more generous pathfinder, it's 23,500gp. I can't imagine a level 7 group that gets a weapon worth 32,000gp and their thought is "Yeah hold on to that in case you crit fumble your weapon and need a back up" rather than "Lets sell that, split the 16k we get from it 4 ways, and cover half our expected wealth gain between this level and next from that item alone"

Like what you describe is so far outside game expectations it's absurd.

Jay R
2014-11-01, 04:55 PM
What? Dragon 39 was released *googles* in 1980. That's like immediately after AD&D was released. So we're talking the point in time where 1 round was a full minute, and stats averaged very close to 10.

We're talking about a typical fighter swinging his sword, and 2-3% of the time falling on his ass so hard he can literally do nothing at all for up to 6 minutes.

That's so hilariously bad I don't know what to say.

That's such hilariously bad math I don't know what to say.

If we roll a one, we then roll another "to-hit" roll. Only if that fails do we go to the table. Then, I have to roll over my DEX for that to take effect, and my character's DEX is 18. Even if it happens, a roll of one round is just as likely as 6. So falling down for 6 rounds happens about 5% times about 1/2 (chance to hit varies) times 14% times 1/10 times 1/6 - call it 0.006%, not 2-3%.


What?!

Okay maybe if your games throw wealth by level out the window and everyone can afford to have not one, but multiple high end weapons for their level to carry around as backup, and selling those weapons to exchange for loot that might actually get used that can be the case. But really? You are level 7 with a +4 weapon as a backup?! And a +2 weapon as your primary? A +2 weapon costs 8,000gp! A +4 weapon costs 32,000gp! Level 7 wealth is 19,000. Even if you go to the slightly more generous pathfinder, it's 23,500gp. I can't imagine a level 7 group that gets a weapon worth 32,000gp and their thought is "Yeah hold on to that in case you crit fumble your weapon and need a back up" rather than "Lets sell that, split the 16k we get from it 4 ways, and cover half our expected wealth gain between this level and next from that item alone"

Like what you describe is so far outside game expectations it's absurd.

When I came into the game at 7th level, I bought the glaive; my backup was a non-magical longsword. We found the Flameburst longsword. And I'm pretty lightly armored as a consequence of spending that much on the guisarme. Neither weapon is inherently a back-up. In our last game I used both in successive battles -- the Flameburst sword against Frost Giants, which are more vulnerable to it, and the guisarme against a large number of humans for better battlefield control.

"everyone can afford to have"? Why make this up? I'm currently the only member of the party with two weapons that high, but I believe that the Fighter has a +2 rapier and a +1 dagger.

And the issue of selling it won't come up until we get to a place where we could do it. But even when it does, this is a group of people more concerned with optimizing the party than each individual. I'll get less of the next hoard (probably none), but, no, we have no intention of turning a 32,000 value that we can use well into a 16,000 value.

You're just making up things that are untrue, based on incomplete information. I admit I was surprised that I got it, but the Fighter in the group has taken Weapon Focus/Specialization and Weapon Finesse, so he's pretty locked into a rapier. As I said, that approach doesn't allow flexibility, so I get the longsword.

Seerow
2014-11-01, 05:50 PM
That's such hilariously bad math I don't know what to say.

If we roll a one, we then roll another "to-hit" roll. Only if that fails do we go to the table. Then, I have to roll over my DEX for that to take effect, and my character's DEX is 18. Even if it happens, a roll of one round is just as likely as 6. So falling down for 6 rounds happens about 5% times about 1/2 (chance to hit varies) times 14% times 1/10 times 1/6 - call it 0.006%, not 2-3%.

So let's keep moving those goalposts by adding more information that wasn't mentioned to start with, in an attempt to make the rule more palattable shall we? First, I was going based off roll a 1 then fail a dex check, which will average to around 2.5%. the 2-3% gives some leeway for higher or lower dex scores, but you trying to say "I have an 18 dex so it's actually fine!" is totally disingenious. Similarly in the post I quoted you didn't once mention "roll a second attack and miss that too" before moving on to the check. I didn't bother factoring in the d100 roll because without having the full chart available, I feel comfortable in assuming the whole table is full of pretty awful things, the only two entries you showed both involve the Fighter falling on his ass for multiple rounds. You will note I said "up to 6 rounds" not "exactly 6 rounds", so your 1/6th multiplier at the end is adding in an extra condition that has no purpose.

But now that we have the full picture, you roll, then roll again, then roll a d100, then roll a dex check, then roll a die for duration. We're rolling 5 fricken times to resolve a single attack just to give a chance to change someone's attack from a miss into giving them a chance to take themselves out of the fight entirely. What is the point?!

When I came into the game at 7th level, I bought the glaive; my backup was a non-magical longsword. We found the Flameburst longsword. And I'm pretty lightly armored as a consequence of spending that much on the guisarme. Neither weapon is inherently a back-up. In our last game I used both in successive battles -- the Flameburst sword against Frost Giants, which are more vulnerable to it, and the guisarme against a large number of humans for better battlefield control.


Which says nothing to change that you have twice your wealth by level in weaponry alone, and can only use one of the items at a given time. You were using this as an argument in favor of critical fumbles causing you to disarm yourself, saying that everyone should have a backup weapon! Bringing your own experience with it automatically sets that experience as what you expect to be the average for the purpose of the discussion, and that bar you set is so far outside a normal play experience that it makes the entire argument laughable.

An average level 7 character with a +2 weapon doesn't have even a +1 backup weapon. He's falling back onto a masterwork weapon. If we supplant that into your example, you're not pulling out the Masterwork Longsword when you fight frost giants, you're going to stick with your +2 Guisearm, because it is more accurate, has more damage, and has better reach which is important when fighting creatures with reach. So you're reduced to the character carrying around what amounts to dead weight in the form of a backup longsword, just for the off chance that he fails so hard he throws his weapon across the room and needs something else to do.



Basically, just because your special snowflake character with his 18 dex and +4 backup weapon worth more than half of what the party owns combined doesn't feel the bite from critical fumbles doesn't mean the rules aren't dumb. They're still dumb. It's still an awful rule. It works for out for you because of extremely contrived circumstances. Congratulations. The design still sucks, and I wouldn't just walk from a table trying to use them, but run as fast as possible.

Prince Raven
2014-11-01, 08:24 PM
It's not that bad an outcome, but I've never had a melee fighter without a backup weapon, even back in 1975 before I ever heard of critical fumbles. When skeletons show up, leave the sword in its sheath and draw the mace.

My major problem is when it happens during a full attack and you lose all your attacks unless you're lucky enough to roll that 1 on the last attack. Which brings up another issue - a character using a full attack action becomes much more likely to fumble based on how many attacks he can have (and when you have a build that's throwing out 16 attacks at higher levels that's a big problem).


On the extremely rare case that a "damage yourself" outcome occurs, power attack bonuses should not apply, because the sword isn't hitting at the spot all that power was focused on. A competent DM should also take into account the weapon. You can't stab yourself with a rapier, though you can cut your left hand with a really stupid parry. You can strike yourself with a sword, but not with the sweet spot; damage should be reduced.

I agree on both points, but not all GMs do.


This can happen, but should be ridiculously rare. It's happened to me once in 35 years of SCA melee. Again, it doesn't occur unless the ally moves in front or at the end of a spent swing. Lower damage.

Which brings up another problem I have with most critical fumble house rules, they happen way too often. A 5% chance every single swing means a party of 4 mundanes is probably getting at least 1 fumble every combat encounter. The only critical fumble system I've ever liked is one where you had to roll to confirm the fumble, there were no major penalties to characters such as accidentally stabbing someone or losing all your remaining attacks, and they only applied to the first attack roll in a full attack. It was also a low-magic campaign, so the mundane vs. caster discrepancy didn't really matter.


Draw your dagger, or punch, or kick, or tackle, or pick up rocks to throw. You are not useless.

Ok, not useless, substantially less effective I should say.

Zale
2014-11-02, 05:02 PM
So far almost every game in which I've had critical fumble rules have been very light hearted, low-stakes comedy games. And they're usually quite funny.

Of course, natural twenties could be almost as bad as failure, since sometimes those would result in doing too well.

Like the time someone fished up a kraken.

Luckily I saved us with kamikaze zombies.

But in a serious game they'd be a real pain.

Prince Raven
2014-11-02, 09:02 PM
Sure, critical fumbles do have their place in a comedy game. There are lots of things I'd put in a comedy game that I'd keep as far away from a serous game as possible.

Totema
2014-11-02, 09:17 PM
Critical failures should be as extraordinary as critical hits, but easier to get for low-level characters than high-level characters. Because of this, I ask that my players confirm fumbles, just like they do for crits.

If the confirmation roll beats the target's AC, then they use their original 1 for a traditional attack roll, rather than it being an automatic miss.

If the confirmation roll doesn't beat the target's AC, it's an automatic miss, but nothing more than that. However, if the confirmation roll is also a 1, then there's an additional negative effect. It's nothing so over-the-top as "you attack yourself instead", but usually something to the effect of being flat-footed or triggering an attack of opportunity.

(FYI, I also removed the idea of nat 20s being automatic hits. If a player's crit confirmation roll doesn't beat the AC, they just use the 20 for the attack roll instead. Confirmed crits are still automatic hits with bonus damage, as is typical)

I hate the idea of completely cutting them out of the game, but I completely agree that every attack carrying a 5% chance of making the PC look like a total ass is unacceptable. This way, there's still a titch of dramatic tension when a player rolls a 1, but it's very unlikely to completely derail a fight.

Prince Raven
2014-11-02, 09:41 PM
^ Now that's a critical fumble system I can get behind.

Talakeal
2014-11-02, 09:52 PM
If the confirmation roll beats the target's AC, then they use their original 1 for a traditional attack roll, rather than it being an automatic miss.

If the confirmation roll doesn't beat the target's AC, it's an automatic miss, but nothing more than that. However, if the confirmation roll is also a 1, then there's an additional negative effect. It's nothing so over-the-top as "you attack yourself instead", but usually something to the effect of being flat-footed or triggering an attack of opportunity.


I'm confused. If your attack bonus is high enough that you need a 1 to auto miss, wouldn't that mean that you can't fail the confirmation role without also invoking a fumble?

It seems like you could just say "A 1 is not an auto miss, however you must roll again and if the second roll is also a 1 you fumble," and get the exact same effect.

Totema
2014-11-02, 10:14 PM
I'm confused. If your attack bonus is high enough that you need a 1 to auto miss, wouldn't that mean that you can't fail the confirmation role without also invoking a fumble?

It seems like you could just say "A 1 is not an auto miss, however you must roll again and if the second roll is also a 1 you fumble," and get the exact same effect.

If your BAB is high enough, and your target's AC is low enough, then yes, that would be the effect. Why wouldn't an epic-level fighter be able to tear through CR 1/4 goblins like rice paper?

Talakeal
2014-11-02, 10:23 PM
If your BAB is high enough, and your target's AC is low enough, then yes, that would be the effect. Why wouldn't an epic-level fighter be able to tear through CR 1/4 goblins like rice paper?

But wouldn't your attack bonus ALWAYS exceed your targets AC for the "auto miss on a 1" rule to come into play? Otherwise a roll of a 1 would already miss regardless of whether or not you are playing with "A roll of a natural 1 automatically misses" or not.

Or are you saying that you only add your base attack bonus to the confirmation roll rather than your full attack bonus?

Sartharina
2014-11-03, 01:22 AM
Critical failures should be as extraordinary as critical hits, but easier to get for low-level characters than high-level characters. Because of this, I ask that my players confirm fumbles, just like they do for crits.

If the confirmation roll beats the target's AC, then they use their original 1 for a traditional attack roll, rather than it being an automatic miss.

If the confirmation roll doesn't beat the target's AC, it's an automatic miss, but nothing more than that. However, if the confirmation roll is also a 1, then there's an additional negative effect. It's nothing so over-the-top as "you attack yourself instead", but usually something to the effect of being flat-footed or triggering an attack of opportunity.

(FYI, I also removed the idea of nat 20s being automatic hits. If a player's crit confirmation roll doesn't beat the AC, they just use the 20 for the attack roll instead. Confirmed crits are still automatic hits with bonus damage, as is typical)

I hate the idea of completely cutting them out of the game, but I completely agree that every attack carrying a 5% chance of making the PC look like a total ass is unacceptable. This way, there's still a titch of dramatic tension when a player rolls a 1, but it's very unlikely to completely derail a fight.

I've been kicking around a similar idea, but a nat 1 provokes an AoO, which can be used to attack or perform a combat maneuver without risk of AoO retaliation - that way, you still get "Drop sword/fall prone/break weapon/suffer penalty/sudden makeout" etc, but resolved through the game's already-established mechanics instead of having automatic pratfalls. I thought about having the nat 1 need to be confirmed, but that's the purpose of the enemy's attack. As a bonus, though, a critical hit, instead of requiring confirmation, allows the same array of options - so you can crit for massive damage, or crit and deliver a rider instead (Or do any of said combos - maneuvers can also crit, so you might be able to disarm and harm someone on a crit, or knock them down and disarm them in one awesome crit). These crits can explode endlessly, though, for added Critical Insanity.

As for why the epic-level hero can fumble against a level 1 goblin? Well, the true hero of the moment is not always the one with the highest CR.

Totema
2014-11-04, 12:18 AM
But wouldn't your attack bonus ALWAYS exceed your targets AC for the "auto miss on a 1" rule to come into play? Otherwise a roll of a 1 would already miss regardless of whether or not you are playing with "A roll of a natural 1 automatically misses" or not.

Or are you saying that you only add your base attack bonus to the confirmation roll rather than your full attack bonus?

I'm not sure where your confusion comes from. It's a confirmation roll just like for confirming a critical hit, so it uses all your attack modifiers. In this way it's pretty symmetrical with critical hits, in that it's really hard for a high level martial character to fail a critical hit confirmation or a critical failure confirmation, and a lot easier for a lower level character to fail both. Which is the goal of this version anyway.

Sartharina
2014-11-04, 12:58 AM
I'm not sure where your confusion comes from. It's a confirmation roll just like for confirming a critical hit, so it uses all your attack modifiers. In this way it's pretty symmetrical with critical hits, in that it's really hard for a high level martial character to fail a critical hit confirmation or a critical failure confirmation, and a lot easier for a lower level character to fail both. Which is the goal of this version anyway.

The problem he's having is that there's no point in distinguishing between hitting, and missing on a non-nat1. Those that don't miss on a nat 1 can't fail to hit unless they fumble because they confirm 'normal attack' on a 2. Those that do miss on a nat 1 won't gain any benefit from beating the AC on the confirmation roll, because they miss anyway.

People who hit on a 1 will always confirm except on a fumble.

People who miss on a nat 1 will never hit even if they confirm.

Totema
2014-11-04, 03:13 AM
The problem he's having is that there's no point in distinguishing between hitting, and missing on a non-nat1. Those that don't miss on a nat 1 can't fail to hit unless they fumble because they confirm 'normal attack' on a 2. Those that do miss on a nat 1 won't gain any benefit from beating the AC on the confirmation roll, because they miss anyway.

People who hit on a 1 will always confirm except on a fumble.

People who miss on a nat 1 will never hit even if they confirm.

Ah, I hadn't considered that consequence. (which should demonstrate just how ad hoc my little system really is) I could argue that it's supposed to do that, but it does defeat the purpose of preserving the dreadful reputation of the nat 1, even for high level characters. I'll think on how I can work with it.

Dunsparce
2014-11-04, 05:11 PM
There was only one instance where the group I'm in played with a critical failure table. While there was one instance where it was an awesome thing(An enemy Barbarian was about to charge and kill our rogue(anything 2 and above would hit and kill him) crit failed so badly he dropped his weapon, broke his armor, and fell prone in one go). Because I was a Mystic Ranger, I felt the table more than the other party members since Ranger's are all about making many attacks in a round. the DM dropped the whole thing when I rolled 3 crit fails (two during the same full attack), and all three got the "your weapon breaks" option. None of us really enjoyed it, and the DM just wanted to try something different.