Stacking an improved crit?

[Aleolus]

OK, I was going through the math the other day, and I figured out that if you took a weapon which had an 18-20 crit range naturally, and you took Improved crit for it, you would have a crit range of 15-20. If you applied the same benefit again, you would have a crit range of 9-20! So does anyone know of a way you can improve the crit threat range of a weapon that will stack? I would be very interested to find out!

 

[Percivellian]

The standard rule in D&D (with some rare exceptions) is that double-doublings end up being triple. So if you naturally threaten on three numbers (18, 19, 20) a doubling will threaten on six (15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20) and another feat/magical property will threaten on nine (12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20).

So the threat range would be 12-20.

EDIT: And DM below me is correct, Improved Critical and Keen no longer stack according to RAW in 3.5. There are, however, arguments for house-ruling it back to 3.0 RAW.

 

[DungeonMaester]

Edit:

It doubles the range. If the range is two, then it would increase by another two. If the Crit range is 1 or zero, then it is increased by 1.

Also, Keen and imp crit do no stack. Also, messing with crit range is a bad idea.

---Rusty

 

[Darklone]

As 3.5 came out, some mathguys showed that stacking of Imp Crit and Keen would not be bad or overpowered.

This does not include all magic special weapon abilities that get triggered on a critical hit.

 

[UltimaGabe]

OK, I was going through the math the other day, and I figured out that if you took a weapon which had an 18-20 crit range naturally, and you took Improved crit for it, you would have a crit range of 15-20. If you applied the same benefit again, you would have a crit range of 9-20! So does anyone know of a way you can improve the crit threat range of a weapon that will stack? I would be very interested to find out!

As others have said, two doublings equals a tripling. So the aforementioned crit range would be 12-20, not 9-20. On a similar note, in 3e, there was an ability the Weapon Master prestige class got that doubled the character's crit range, but if he already had Improved Critical, it simply added 2 to the enhanced) crit range. So, if you had a keen rapier or scimitar with Improved Critical and this prestige class, your crit range would be 10-20, for a 55% chance of getting a critical threat.

Of course, keep in mind you'll almost never hit on anything below a 15 anyway, so those extra 5 numbers were kinda pointless, but it was still cool.

 

[Darklone]

Dervish Dance plus a bard in the group and you'll hit on lower numbers than a 15

MWM helps too.

 

[wildstarsreach]

As 3.5 came out, some mathguys showed that stacking of Imp Crit and Keen would not be bad or overpowered.

This does not include all magic special weapon abilities that get triggered on a critical hit.

Then why have they ruled against these feat and magic weapon properties stacking. Weapons that have large crit ranges do only only x2 damage and usually do lower dice in damage.

So a keen Rapier or someone with improved Crit and a rapier would do 1d6+3 normally with 14 str and a +1. 30% of the time would do 2d6+6. This is not overwhelming. If you could stack these, then 45% of the time you would do 2d6+6. Also, most of these weapons that have large crit ranges should not be eligible for 2 handed PA damage bonuses which would tend to skew results otherwise.

 

[blargney the second]

The only stacking threat-increasing effect that I've seen is a teamwork benefit in Forge of War (Eberron). Unfortunately, I can't remember the name of it at the moment.

If one of your team members scores a crit on an enemy, all team members get +1 threat range against that opponent as long as they don't attack anyone else.

 

[cignus_pfaccari]

Then why have they ruled against these feat and magic weapon properties stacking. Weapons that have large crit ranges do only only x2 damage and usually do lower dice in damage.

Back in 3.0, my DM had a BBEG Disciple of Dispater using his Keen Vorpal Falchion to get a 10-20 crit range.

At that time, Vorpal triggered on a crit, so if you confirmed, it was an auto-kill.

As you might imagine, he cut a swath through the party.

It's my understanding that it was the Vorpal property and combo thereof with stacking crits that led to the change. Now, given that Vorpal now functions only on a natural 20 anyway, one would think that'd be enough of a change.

Brad

 

[Arkhandus]

Yeah, the 3.5 designers messed it up and there really wasn't any reason for it.

They nerfed Vorpal, so having a huge threat range wasn't so much of an advantage, and the fact that qualities like Vorpal/Flaming Burst/etc. don't add to attack rolls already means that if you try to get the most critical hit damage possible, you'd probably hit less often (and crit less often too, since you'd also have less chance of hitting on most of the numbers you have a threat range for, and you'd need to confirm those crits with another attack roll anyway). A +3 Keen Flaming Burst Shocking Burst Icy Burst Falchion is going to hit (and confirm crits) less often than a +5 Keen Falchion of Speed.

Thing is, the math was done by Sean K. Reynolds, but was ignored by Wizards of the Coast or something. SKR's webpage still has his article on why Improved Critical and Keen should stack, which shows his math for how this stuff worked out in 3.0. And since WotC removed the Vorpal problem, the two really should stack in 3.5, but they don't.....

SKR's article