critical successes/critical failures

[TheCrowing1432]

Crits (20) have only ever been utilized in attack rolls, as have failures (1's) If you roll 20, (or lower depending on your weapons crit rate) you would automatically hit and deal bonus damage, if you rolled a 1, you missed regardless of other factors (and in some tables, the 1 would result as a critical failure, causing you to drop your weapon or some other mishap)

But do you incorporate these in skill checks and the like? If so, what do you come up with when they roll that 20, or 1?

If not, why?

[Troacctid]

No, because that's how the rules work. Skill checks don't automatically succeed on a natural 20 or automatically fail on a natural 1. That's just how skill checks work. And it's important that they work that way, because otherwise taking 20 would be an automatic success regardless of the DC--you could have -20 to Open Lock and still automatically unlock a DC 60 door in two minutes.

[Draconium]

That, and I thought Natural 20's and 1's counted as auto-success/failures on saving throws as well. But yeah, skill checks don't work that way.

[Deophaun]

If not, why?

Player: I take 20 and jump to the highest level of the 100-story mage's tower from the ground floor.

^^ That's why not.

[questionmark693]

I give players a +/-10 when they get natural 20 or 1 on skill checks. So it's still meaningful, but lsoes the complete shenanigans from the earlier examples.

[rrwoods]

My DM gives an unspecified off the cuff bonus for natural 20s on skill checks. Social and knowledge skills especially -- you can get another little tidbit of info, or be just a little more convincing or what have you.

[ekarney]

Also, I though 20 solely meant a threat, and an automatic hit.
You wouldn't get the bonus damage till you confirm the critical.

[paranoidbox]

It's also important for skills not to work this way because it would give everyone a 5% chance to auto-succeed at something, even if they have no or few ranks in the skill.

Players: "We ALL roll to intimidate the guy." *druid rolls a natural 20* "Woohoo! Tell me everything you know, ya bastard!"

Silly example, but this was a bit of a problem in a different (non-D&D) game before I made all skills "trained only".

[Tondrin]

We don't as a group, it tends to be a 5% chance to outshine someone who put X amount of skill ranks into something, and on the other hand it's a 5% chance to look like a complete idiot when you roll for something you shouldn't be screwing up.

[Andezzar]

Crit range is irrelevant for the automatic hits. Only natural 20s allow automatic hits.

[Crake]

I give players a +/-10 when they get natural 20 or 1 on skill checks. So it's still meaningful, but lsoes the complete shenanigans from the earlier examples.

I had a DM who did this and it pissed me off to no end. It literally only rewards people who don't invest in skills and punishes those that do. Doubly so for UMD, where rolling a natural 1 is only bad if the result is actually a failure, which, with -10, it will be a lot harder to make an auto-success (+29 for wands vs +19 normally). On the other hand, people who put no investment into skills at all can suddenly pass checks with DCs of up to 30 instead of 20, with no affect whatosever on the natural 1s they roll, because those were going to be failures anyway. The best example I gave with that rule was of an olympic swimmer drowning in completely still water because he rolled a 1, getting -10 to his roll, which you would need at least +15 to your swim check to not sink below the surface. Anyone with more than +5 should just not need to worry about treading water, even in stressful situations, i mean come on.

Honestly, the only time it had a positive impact on the game was when a purple worm rolled a 1 on it's grapple check, and the paladin rolled a 20, making it a successful escape by 1. But the thing is, if the DM had been playing properly, the purple worm should have been getting -20 on it's grapple checks anyway, because it was using the option to grapple with just it's mouth, while still attacking the rest of us and acting as if it wasn't grappled, so if things has been played as normal, he would have made the escape anyway.

The thing that annoyed me most about it though was that none of us liked the rule, and we all asked him to stop using it, but he kept on using it, claiming it was an optional rule in the DMG, even when it was explicitly explained to him that the optional rule was meant to replace the auto success/failure of natural 20s/1s on attack rolls and saving throws, and was not meant to be used for skill checks.

[Twurps]

If anything, skill checks are to random already. It takes quite a lot of levels and skill points for the "I have spent my life the circus" guy to consistenly outperform the 'never leave the library' wizard type on a jump for example. Having 1/20's autofail/succeed would only make this worse (As would the -10/+10 option, to a slightly lesser degree, though not by much.)

I think across the board, a d20 introduces enough randomness, and for that reason I'm not a great fan of auto-hit and auto-fail at all. (And don't even get me started on Critical fumble rules!) It's just stupid for a highly trained martial artist to completely mis an inanimate object (like a door he wants to smash) 5% of the time, and realy breaks immersion. On top of that: If you only mis on a 1 because of the 'auto-fail' rule, the DM is not using level appropriate opponents, and on the other end of the spectrum: If your nat20 only hits because of the 'auto-hit' rules, you're in over your head, and probably shouldn't be trying to hit at all. (Fleeing is an option after all).

In short: If your DM is any good, the autosucces/fail rules don't add a lot. They do ruin immersion though, and punish martials over magic, which is never good. Expanding the autosucces/fail rules to skill checks will only increase these problems. (As many skill checks can also be replaced by spells not needing a roll.)

[OldTrees1]

I will say something interesting(provided I can think of something) but harmless if a player rolls a 1 and also fails a skill check. (Example: "For the next minute you hear sights and see sounds" or "Your character knows nothing about X, do you want to make something up?")

The goal being to redeem that worst performance without imbalancing the skill system.

[Sacrieur]

Because there's no reason someone who has spent their whole life training to swim suddenly drowns.

[Pex]

There are some DMs, even Honest True benignly, who cannot accept the concept of a PC being just that good he cannot fail at a task. They flat out disregard the philosophy or invoke "where's the fun if there's no chance for failure". Of the former there's little chance of convincing otherwise. They may allow for it in the game mechanics, but they'll still resent it. Of the latter the fun is in spending time and effort gaining the levels and investing the game resources necessary to achieve the result. Once achieved the fun is in enjoying the spoils of all that effort and the satisfaction of having that one guaranteed thing among everything else in the game that is not 100% fail-proof.

My personal fun of guaranteed success is the ability to cast even my highest level spell defensive without provoking an attack of opportunity even on a roll of Natural 1. It's easy in 3E. Two feats, max ranks in Concentration, Con 14 you achieve it at level 4. Keep putting ranks into Concentration as the levels progress. In Pathfinder it's a lot harder. It takes 3 or 4 feats, a trait, and your spellcasting stat must be greater than 18. That's a lot of game resources I'm spending to cast Holy Word while surrounded. Worth it for me. The DM should not resent it. (My DM doesn't. :smallsmile:)

[Grod_The_Giant]

Why are critical succeedes on skills silly? Because it means that if you line up twenty random guys and force them to try to jump across the Grand Canyon, one of them will make it. You can also swim up a waterfall five percent of the time, or walk on water, or squeeze through a hole the size of your first, or read someone's thoughts.

Basically, it invalidates any sort of possible scaling. Your huge bonus can make you more CONSISTENT, but it won't actually let you accomplish anything a lucky commoner could.

[Psyren]

Because there's no reason someone who has spent their whole life training to swim suddenly drowns.

Especially not as frequently as 5%. I don't have constant surveillance on Michael Phelps or anything (not since he started spotting the drones anyway) but I'm willing to hazard a guess that he's swam more than 20 times without drowning once.

[Âmesang]

My personal fun of guaranteed success is the ability to cast even my highest level spell defensive without provoking an attack of opportunity even on a roll of Natural 1. It's easy in 3E. Two feats, max ranks in Concentration, Con 14 you achieve it at level 4. Keep putting ranks into Concentration as the levels progress. In Pathfinder it's a lot harder. It takes 3 or 4 feats, a trait, and your spellcasting stat must be greater than 18. That's a lot of game resources I'm spending to cast Holy Word while surrounded. Worth it for me. The DM should not resent it. (My DM doesn't.)
I can most certainly agree with this, though my sorceress lacks the feats so she's only auto-defensively casting 5th-level and lower at 15th-level (so there's still that fear of failure for 6th and 7th, though that can be chalked up to backlash from her overconfidence and hubris).

Likewise, I've jacked up her Spellcraft skill so that, when combined with her permanent arcane sight and the Magic Item Compendium (p.217), she can effectively auto-identify the properties of any magic item that's within her line-of-sight… a silly, cheesy, in-game explanation to let the DM just flat-out list magical loot by name instead of spending time discovering it ourselves.

[elonin]

A number of groups I've played with have all played by the auto success/fail rules with skill checks.

[Andezzar]

Likewise, I've jacked up her Spellcraft skill so that, when combined with her permanent arcane sight and the Magic Item Compendium (p.217), she can effectively auto-identify the properties of any magic item that's within her line-of-sight… a silly, cheesy, in-game explanation to let the DM just flat-out list magical loot by name instead of spending time discovering it ourselves.It does not work that way. The spellcraft option only works with detect magic, not with a spell that works similarly to detect magic.

But look at the Artificer's Monocle (MIC p. 72) for cheap and relatively quick identification. It's not like you need your 0 level slots.

[Crake]

It does not work that way. The spellcraft option only works with detect magic, not with a spell that works similarly to detect magic.

But look at the Artificer's Monocle (MIC p. 72) for cheap and relatively quick identification. It's not like you need your 0 level slots.

It would make sense that since arcane sight inherits the functionality of detect magic that it would work with arcane sight too.

[Andezzar]

I don't disagree, but that is not what the rules say and extending this functionality to arcane sight and/or greater arcane sight would be a house rule.

[Âmesang]

Well I could always use Use Magic Device as a fallback. :smalltongue: "Use Use Magic Device" is awkward to say.

[Crake]

Well I could always use Use Magic Device as a fallback. :smalltongue: "Use Use Magic Device" is awkward to say.

just abbreviate it to UMD

[Strigon]

Generally, our group works in such a way that rolling a 20 - not taking twenty - gives a slight bonus. If he needed an extra 2 to make it work, then he got it. If he was a commoner trying to jump 50 feet, then he wouldn't make it.

This bonus also extends to them if they'd have passed it with just the twenty; in that case, they get a little bonus - nothing major, it just turns out slightly better than simply passing it.


Nat 1s are kind of the opposite, but it won't make you fail anything you wouldn't ordinarily fail. It just won't work as well as they hoped - for example, if they were trying to jump across a ravine and they succeeded with a natural one, they'd land hard and be considered prone on the other side. If they failed on a 1, then they'd probably have hit their head on the other side, and take a penalty on their tumble check at the bottom.


Of course, our group is pretty rules light/comedy heavy, so this (as with anything else) will work for some groups and not for others.