Optional Rule for Botches

[ShadowImmor]

I have been running a game for a while, and I try to aim for a fairly simulationist game, and it occurred to me that it really bothers me that a 1 on a 20 sided dice (a 5% chance on any roll) will result in rather messy situations, it makes rolling more meaningless and makes the game less fun, and makes the players dislike rolling 1s (which I know is a curse of the system if you're using botches).

One of the rules I have decided to test out is an alteration of Botching.

The rule follows -

If you roll a natural 1 on a 20 sided dice, this is considered a botch (catastrophic failure). On a Botch, you roll a d20 to determine how bad a Botch it is. on high numbers (say 18 to 20) it's treated like a normal failure, where as on a 1 it's a truly catastrophic one with a lasting impact on the game, and it scales as you go down. (So 15 to 18 is a minor bad outcome).

How do you guys feel that works?

Do you guys have any other advice on making the botch rule more fun than just "you fail 5% of the time"?

Thanks in advance!

Dan

[Avonar]

I think the second d20 is a bit unnecessary. Or at least don't implement a scale. Perhaps add the second d20 to see if something AWFUL happens on another 1 but other than that just leave it open for DM creativity.

[DMThac0]

There are a number of tables that players have built when it comes to optional critical fail rolls. From the seriously detrimental to the more comical side, they can be helpful if you're looking for that kind of thing.

For me, I rather dislike punishing my players for a critical fail, it's enough you just wasted a part of your turn on a bad roll. I rarely ever have a weapon break, drop, or otherwise be removed from the player's possession. That type of experience should be used to create tension, not punish bad luck, and should be used sparingly. There are many other ways to mechanically show a miss, or simply narrate the miss so that it still feels like there's an impact during the flow of combat.

Examples:

You swing your greatsword at the Hobgoblin going in for a killing blow. As your blade arcs down to sever it's head from it's shoulders the thing drops out of sight. You look down as you are committed to this swing, only to see the Hobgoblin is removing an arrow head from it's foot, unwittingly dodging your attack.

You draw your bow, waiting for the creatures head to shift to one side or the other, and you release the arrow. Without realizing it you accidentally stripped a flight off the shaft of the arrow, you watch helplessly as the arrow veers off to the right...and manages to stick the barbarian in the thigh. (This kind of thing is usually a d8 after a 1 is rolled to see where the projectile lands in relation to the target.)

As you finish reciting the last words to the cantrip you realize...my mind wandered. You've cast this spell so many times that is should be second nature, but we are all folly to a wandering mind. You watch as the spark floats ever so gently to land in an imperceptible hiss on the creatures shoulder.

[Specter]

What I do:

If you roll a 1 in an attack, roll a d20

1-3: broken weapon/spell affects you/etc.
4-6: give op. Attack, lose remaining actions, etc.
7-10: lose movement
11-20: nothing

Works fine.

[NRSASD]

The system I use on a critical miss:

When a 1 is rolled, roll to confirm and consult below:

1: Hit self
2: Hit another target
3: Drop Weapon
4: Break Weapon
5: Fall down
6-8: Break weapon, but only if weapon is either cold iron or silver
9-20: Normal miss.

The system I use on a critical hit:

When a 20 is rolled, roll to confirm and consult below:
1: Triple damage and a DC 10 Con save. On a failure, target is dead instantly, regardless of remaining hp
2-5: Triple damage
6-20: Double Damage.


I apply the critical hits and misses on all attacks, NPC and PC alike

[ImproperJustice]

As someone who loves playing fighters I have always HATED crit fail tables.

They unfairly punish fighters who get as a class feature more attacks which equals more rolls, which means more failure.

A 20th level fighter will have 4 seperate 5% chances to crit fail which actually makes them worse than someone who rolls fewer times.

So no. Pleased join me in the movement to stop crit fail tables from further punishing martial classes.

Unless you want to add a magical mishap table that gets rolled on with a percentage chance equal to the level of the spell cast.

[JackPhoenix]

As someone who loves playing fighters I have always HATED crit fail tables.

They unfairly punish fighters who get as a class feature more attacks which equals more rolls, which means more failure.

A 20th level fighter will have 4 seperate 5% chances to crit fail which actually makes them worse than someone who rolls fewer times.

So no. Pleased join me in the movement to stop crit fail tables from further punishing martial classes.

Unless you want to add a magical mishap table that gets rolled on with a percentage chance equal to the level of the spell cast.

You'll have my... uh... PHB? Critical fails are stupid mechanic. At least in D&D, there are systems that can fit them better.

[Unoriginal]

I have been running a game for a while, and I try to aim for a fairly simulationist game, and it occurred to me that it really bothers me that a 1 on a 20 sided dice (a 5% chance on any roll) will result in rather messy situations, it makes rolling more meaningless and makes the game less fun, and makes the players dislike rolling 1s (which I know is a curse of the system if you're using botches).

One of the rules I have decided to test out is an alteration of Botching.

The rule follows -

If you roll a natural 1 on a 20 sided dice, this is considered a botch (catastrophic failure). On a Botch, you roll a d20 to determine how bad a Botch it is. on high numbers (say 18 to 20) it's treated like a normal failure, where as on a 1 it's a truly catastrophic one with a lasting impact on the game, and it scales as you go down. (So 15 to 18 is a minor bad outcome).

How do you guys feel that works?

Do you guys have any other advice on making the botch rule more fun than just "you fail 5% of the time"?

Thanks in advance!

Dan

A 1 will not result in "rather messy situations", by the books.


The rules are that if you roll a nat 1 ON AN ATTACK ROLL ONLY, you fail, no matter your modifier.

That's it.

Personally, I think that adding "botch rules" to make failure feel worse and more complex and time-consuming is a bad idea.

[Specter]

A 1 will not result in "rather messy situations", by the books.

The rules are that if you roll a nat 1 ON AN ATTACK ROLL ONLY, you fail, no matter your modifier.

That's it.

Personally, I think that adding "botch rules" to make failure feel worse and more complex and time-consuming is a bad idea.

On my table, it's a positive experience. It increases the gambling factor of the game, creates more tension in combat, and can give interesting strategic moments. Obviously, they apply to enemies as well.

[Theodoxus]

Only "Botch" rules I use are, in melee, it automatically opens you up to a OA from everyone within 5 feet of you - but made at disadvantage. My players really grumbled at that one, but so far only one OA has ever connected, and it was a player hitting a monster - so they've since calmed down.

If you roll a 1 on a save, it deals double damage or autofails the next round's saving throw, depending on the effect.

I shy away from DMs who employ critical fumble tables. If I know before a campaign starts that they use them, and I have no other recourse, I'll play halflings to mitigate the stupid.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Any critical fail other than "you miss" on an attack roll is an auto-decline for me as a player.

[MaXenzie]

Botches are unrealistic, which is why I don't use them.

A level 1, newbie, inexperienced Fighter attacks once. That's 5% chance to botch.

A level 20, legendary, masterful Fighter attacks 4 times. That's a 20% chance to botch at least once.

Ruins immersion for characters that should be seen as badass heroes to make a stupid mistake once in every 20 attacks.

[sithlordnergal]

I have always loved botches. Heck, my first D&D game I played in back during 3.5 used botches. Hehe, I have a rather fond memory of rolling a nat 1 with a Composite Greatbow. Not only did I shoot myself in the foot, but I rolled a crit to see if I did damage to myself.

I shot myself in the foot with an Icy Burst/Fiery Burst/Lightning Burst Composite Greatbow x3 I managed to barely survive the blow, but it was still hilarious.

I also miss the idea of accidentally hitting a companion in melee. I don't miss all the annoying percentages there used to be, but I happily use the "Roll a nat 1 with that spell/bow/whatever while the fighter is next to your target? Let's see if you hit your friend instead.

[Eric Diaz]

Fumbles are awesome! If you want your fighters to look like clowns!

But how often do people throw away their own weapons or fall to the ground due to incompetence or bad luck in the kinds of adventures that have inspired D&D? Can you imagine Elric or Conan doing something like that?

Fumbles are bad even when NPCs do it. How heroic is winning a fight because your adversary stabbed himself by accident? Finishing a battle this way is more anti-climatic than rolling again to find out that nothing happens.

In short, fumbles are mostly a comedic device. Nothing wrong if that is what you're looking for - I certainly had my laughs while "tripping in invisible turtles" when playing Rolemaster.

Still, I see at least one interesting use for "natural ones": as a risk-reward mechanic. This means that the natural 1 only matters when you take an exceptional risk. For example, if you want to jump down from a house over you enemy and stab it as you fall.

Fortunately, 5e has a good multi-purpose mechanic to go with it: advantage/disadvantage, which opens up all kinds of possibilities, specially "bittersweet" results. Here are two examples:

- Disadvantage: when you have disadvantage, the fumble only happens if both dice are natural ones, at it is probably related to what caused disadvantage in the first place (you fall if the ground is slippery, you stumble if you're fighting in the dark, etc). Fumbles will be frequent, but easy explained and not necessarily ridiculous.

- Advantage: if you take a significant risk to get advantage (jump from a tall house over an unsuspecting opponent), a double 1 means you fumbled. In addition, the GM will choose one of two possibilites before you roll:
* Make a natural 1 in any dice cause a fumble, no matter if your hit your target or not (fumbles will be frequent regardless of skill, but will not affect your chance of success).
* Ask you for some kind of a skill roll to avoid the risk, no matter if your hit your target or not.

- Regular roll: there are no fumbles unless you take some significant, uncommon risk before you roll. Ordinary actions shouldn't cause extraordinary problems for your characters - unless you prefer playing clowns to playing heroes.

But hey, if that is the case, I can guarantee there are plenty of laughs to be had with the right group of friends!

http://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com.br/2016/11/crits-are-fun-fumbles-are-funny.html

[Lunali]

If you want to use a critical fail table or the like, keep balance in mind. Under normal rules, a critical hit, with rare exceptions, results in less than a single hit worth of extra damage while a 1 results in automatic failure. Any change to increase the effect of rolling a 1 should either be very minor or be accompanied by a similar increase in the effect of a critical hit. Changing the effect of critical hits should be considered very carefully for it's relative effect on those that have unusual crits and on those that crit more often.

Personally I prefer the approach of having 1s have greater effects, but left completely to the DMs discretion and generally more for flavor than for actual combat effect. A rogue that carries a dozen knives might have the one they're using slip out of their hand but someone with one particular weapon that they use might instead fumble their attack on discovering that their last attack had splattered blood on the recently cleaned pommel.

[JakOfAllTirades]

Rules for "botches" add nothing fun to the game, ever.

Botch rules for broken weapons are an abomination in the gaming community and must be purged by ridicule.

You call THAT a house rule? :yuk:

[Spore]

If you are not against more work, maybe allow the boss monsters (not mooks) a counter attack (with disadvantage)? Basically an opening in the heroes' (or villains') defense that can be abused but only at a big cost. If they use it, the next round their defense is screwed and any attack against them is with advantage.

It increases the tension, gives the player (and DM) a choice to make and generally punishes the adjacent guy for his or her recklessness.

[Erys]

Rules for "botches" add nothing fun to the game, ever.


Poppycock!

While it does add a layer of book keeping for the DM, crit and fumble charts can add a lot of fun dynamics to the game as well as memorable events.

I still remember to this day a friend of mine who got a botch, and after a few rolls to see how bad it was not only missed the target and fell from his horse, but landed on his sword doing a sizable amount of damage.

Still talked about and laughed over to this day, well over a decade later.

If you do create botch tables for your game I would do both ends though; if your players can also land a crit that applies a temporary condition or advantage during a fight it will always add excitement and fun.

***
When we did this sort of thing, back in the day, we would use charts. Usually percentile based with the low end being 'just a miss' or 'just a regular crit' and the high end executing more creative effects.

Some of the chaotic things I have seen/experienced include: tripping on critters unseen during the fight (save against falling prone, lose of some move regardless), flinging your weapon d4 -1 hexes away, or even wounding yourself on the botch end; while the crit side had gems like causing a status effect (i.e. strike the face target is blind or deaf or hit the stomach and cause nausea) for d4 rounds, hitting a second opponent with your attack (reg damage) and even, on super rare occasions, rendering a limb useless until tended too.

The main thing to remember is whatever you do 1) make sure your players are on board and 2) make sure you can resolve the situation quickly. Players like JakOfAllTirades (I presume, apologies if incorrect) would probably not like such randomness in the game, and if you have to spend ten minutes trying to resolve a botch/crit you lose momentum in the fight at hand and risk boring your players.

All that said, good luck and have fun. :smallsmile:

[Erys]

Botches are unrealistic, which is why I don't use them.

A level 1, newbie, inexperienced Fighter attacks once. That's 5% chance to botch.

A level 20, legendary, masterful Fighter attacks 4 times. That's a 20% chance to botch at least once.

Ruins immersion for characters that should be seen as badass heroes to make a stupid mistake once in every 20 attacks.

There are easy ways to mitigate this though; like adding/subtracting your level to the roll (if using a percentile chart) to having a second attack roll that, if it still misses then and only then is it a botch with consequences- otherwise is just a regular miss.

The latter is nice because the lvl 20 fighter is much less likely to miss normally than his lvl one counter part- showing that even though his swing was errant he is more able to recover and not suffer and real detriment passed simply missing.

[Thrudd]

Botches, Fumbles, etc. (and wild magic), are great for a comedy game where characters accidentally blowing themselves up or maiming their friends or being useless but funny is a memorable silly experience. They are not great for games that are not meant to be primarily silly.

[OldTrees1]

Optional Rule for Botches that I am running:

When a player rolls a nat 1 on an ability check, they can request or invent a botch if they feel it would add to the enjoyment of the moment. This is related to the rule that if a player feels they rolled low enough they can declare their character failed before I compare the result to the DC (unless the DC in question is really low).

That is it, but also that is all that is needed.

[Vorpalchicken]

If a 1 comes up on an attack roll, roll a second d20

Roll Result
20 Normal miss
19 Wound yourself for normal weapon damage
18 Wound an ally for normal weapon damage
17 Your weapon breaks
16 Wound a family member who unbeknownst to you has followed you into the combat
15 Kill a politically important bystander. This ignites a global conflict
14 You mangle or sever one of your limbs, determined randomly
13 You break all of your weapons
12 Knock yourself on the head. Permanently lose 1d4 points of Intelligence
11 Wound a puppy. Your alignment changes to Evil
10 If indoors or underground, knock out a supporting structure. You are buried for 10d10 bludgeoning damage. If outdoors, a meteorite lands on you
9 Wound two party members
8 You lose your weapon and can't find it. Ever again.
7 You break every weapon carried by you and every other ally within 50 feet
6 Wound yourself for triple normal weapon damage
5 Wound every ally within 20 feet for quadruple normal weapon damage
4 Sever or mangle 1d10 body parts from allies within 30 feet
3 You fall down and tear your clothes, looking very foolish in front of your crush who has wandered onto the battlefield.
2 Your weapon goes into your skull, killing you instantly
1 TPK

[Rusvul]

I like botches in theory. I'm all for adding a little hijinks to an otherwise serious game, as long as it isn't overboard. I don't think it really works in any system that uses a d20, though. Either your heroes fail horribly a full 5% of the time (which is far too much for a serious game, in my opinion) or you overcomplicate things by adding more dice. Then there's the problem others have mentioned about characters that get extra attacks. You can solve that by saying critical fumbles only happen if you roll a 1 on the first attack on your turn, but even then you're adding another layer of complexity.

In a d100 system, I could see failure on a result of 00 (or 01, depending on the system) resulting in a fumble, with an addendum that it only applies to the first attack on your turn. 1% chance for critical failure might be fine for a semi-serious game. 5% is just too much, though.

Alternately, if you really like fumbles, and you want them to impact your story in huge ways, you could always go play Dark Heresy. I think that's a great example of comedic over-the-top fumbles done exactly right.

[ShadowImmor]

Firstly, thanks for all the replies so far.

I want to make it clear that I like Botch/Critting. I like the fact that sometimes, things go exceptionally well, and sometimes things go exceptionally badly. Sometimes it's just the way of the world. You can do everything right and play flawlessly, and still sometimes it doesn't work out, Botches allow a DM to find openings to work with and make the players remember that they can still fail. I LIKE having botches, and will continue to use them.

But as I said, a flat 5% botch rate is far too high. I want these guys to fear getting a botch, but I want them to happen less often as 5% of the time is ridiculously high. I feel that even 0.25% (rolling a second d20 and on a 1) is a bit too high, but I want botches to be more spectacular, hence why I instituted a scale.

However I do like the idea of adding the Characters level to the second roll, making it more important, or I could just add their normal modifier, on less than 10 total, it's a normal Botch, on higher than 10, it's a normal miss, that means they'll botch far less often the better they get.

I would also like to point out I haven't altered the Crit rules, an 20 is an automatic double damage, though I may add the option to induce a status effect instead of the extra damage, at the players discretion, or even add a second d20 roll to make Crits more effective (I won't reduce a Crit to being a normal hit as I WANT my characters to be able to feel powerful).

I admit it's extra bookkeeping for me, but I have also found that Botches/Crits add an extra layer to the game, as sometimes, no matter how hard you try, things can still go wrong, and having Botch rules allow that to happen.

[Cespenar]

We had a houserule that worked well towards addressing the "skilled people fumbling more" issue without cluttering it with additional rolls.

It was: "A natural 1 is a fumble only if the character misses more than 50% of its attacks in that same turn." So, the more attacks you got, the harder it became to fumble; and the clumsier opponents you fought, the harder it became to fumble (since you wouldn't miss most of your attacks).

We coupled that with fumble effects as minor as cantrip riders, so overall it was pretty balanced.

[ProsecutorGodot]

I thought fumble rolls would have been fun. We tried that out in one of the first games I'd had the chance of playing.

The party managed to get tpk'd because the dwarf fighter sprained his ankle and had to move at 1/4 speed. My character was attempting to drag him to safety and I ended up getting knocked unconscious. When the 3 remaining members of the party went into a nearby building to find shelter it was full of monsters.

One player had an opportunity to escape but the remaining two stood over me as the monsters collapsed on the 3 of us and killed us.

We did not continue that campaign and I would never advocate for a fumble table again, one of the players in that game literally will not join our sessions anymore because of how poorly it went. Automatically failing an attack roll has enough of a chance have somebody end up dead, I don't want to guarantee it.

If you're dead set on the idea, I'd recommend leaving the chance of anything beyond the normal failure at a small chance and most importantly make sure everyone at the table is aware of the rule. It might be memorable when Bob lost his favorite greataxe when he swung too wide and chucked it off the side of the mountain in a horrendous showing of bad luck, but it's not memorable for a good reason.

[ShadowImmor]

If you're dead set on the idea, I'd recommend leaving the chance of anything beyond the normal failure at a small chance and most importantly make sure everyone at the table is aware of the rule. It might be memorable when Bob lost his favorite greataxe when he swung too wide and chucked it off the side of the mountain in a horrendous showing of bad luck, but it's not memorable for a good reason.

I have made the whole table aware of it before I started, I actually threw a few ideas out to the group to see what they thought and used their feedback to come to the rule I have established. I want to try and decrease how often they happen/lessen the impact while still having them sometimes be really crazy.

My players are aware I'm using a few experimental rules in the system, and I will post about others in the Forum's shortly to get feedback on what people think works/doesn't work, and see if people can shed some light on which mechanics can work, or need to be refined, as I feel this botch ruling can be refined in a way that still makes it fun for the players, but also gives opportunities for some craziness to happen.

[Spore]

They might be aware but have you ever asked them if they LIKE your experiments? I know I would go insane with a DM that tried to add new rules every other session. I can tell because I have a fellow player like that.

[ShadowImmor]

They might be aware but have you ever asked them if they LIKE your experiments? I know I would go insane with a DM that tried to add new rules every other session. I can tell because I have a fellow player like that.

Good point, I will ask them. I did ask them about the Botching rules and made sure it was something they liked, and I don't plan on changing the rules very much, but will do if I/they think it's more fun. I may even ask them if they can think of any refinements to the Botching Rule to see if they have anything they prefer. My objective is to have a table where we can make our own rules that benefit the game to a point, and I know all my players LIKE Botching, because I'm just as harsh on botching with the NPCs as them, so they're happy as long as it's fair.

But I will double check with them how they feel.

[Seafarer]

Botches are unrealistic, which is why I don't use them.

A level 1, newbie, inexperienced Fighter attacks once. That's 5% chance to botch.

A level 20, legendary, masterful Fighter attacks 4 times. That's a 20% chance to botch at least once.

Ruins immersion for characters that should be seen as badass heroes to make a stupid mistake once in every 20 attacks.

Bold: no, not quite. It's actually ~18.5%. The rest, I agree with.

Each individual PC makes far more attack rolls than any individual NPC, so the PCs are going to get screwed by fumble rules far more than NPCs. If you're going to implement fumbles, ask your players, not random people on the Internet, and, if any of them doesn't like the idea, don't do it.