Crit varriants

[WSmith]

Has anyone tried using the natural roll on the attack dice as a the crit, instead of it being a threat and rolling again? It just seems to me rolling again to confrim the crit takes something away but I can't put my finger on it. I know this might be a little unbalancing, but has anyone tried it? If the results are not too far off, I might just use this.

Also, when a combatant rolls a natural 1, as a fumble I roll the d%. If I do not roll 100, then they just swung to wide or something and are now out of position, and only get a partial action the next round to bring themselves back into position. This is to mimmic the old, "fumble and you cannot act in the next round" rule my friends and I always used back in the 1e era. I really like it, but what do you folks think?

[edit: I forgot to tell you what happens on a 100. Something bad. of course, depending on the situation, like loosing balance, a broken weapon, falling, etc. That I adjudicate depending on the particulars of the fight. ]

What other varriants to Crits/Fumbles do you use?

 

[CRGreathouse]

OK, let's look at a typical scenario without crit confirmation. The dwarven fighter of the group wields a dwarven waraxe (crit 20/x3) an has an attack bonus of +6 (+2 BAB, +1 Focus, +3 Str). The elven wizard wields a longsword* (crit 19-20/x2) and has an attack bonus of +0 (+1 BAB, -1 Str).

Against a typical AC of 15, the fighter would crit 3% of the time; now he crits 5% of the time.

The elven wizard would have crit 3% of the time; now he crits 10% of the time!

An even more absurd example could be contrived (higher level characters, more divergent attack bonuses, and wizard using a rapier* instead of longsword*).

* Auto-proficiency (choose one) for elves.

 

[Crothian]

For fumbles (a natural 1) I have the person make a dexterity check DC 15. If they fail that, then something bad happens. The something bad varies with situation, but usually it's dropped weapon or left flat footed.

 

[WSmith]

Good Points CRGreathouse.

I wonder if there is a way to alter crits to only score on a natural 20 to attack, without the threat confirmation roll and loosing the impact the threat range or multiplier has. Or maybe only allow a fighter with wpn. Spec. to use the extended crit range for score on a attack roll with that weapon.

Ah, I will probably just use the threat as written.

 

[Thorvald Kviksverd]

WSmith--

In my Basic D&D campaign, criticals are more a result of skill than of luck. I suppose one way you could introduce this into 3e would be to say a critical occurs whenever the target's AC is exceeded by X points. X would vary based on the threat range of the weapon. The damage multiplier would remain unchanged.

For example, perhaps:

[color=red]

Threat Range     Req Score to Critical

     20                   AC+6

    19-20                 AC+5

    18-20                 AC+4

[/color]

The numbers are just there to provide a general idea--I have no idea what they would need to be to maintain a rough mathematical equivalence, nor have I given any thought to how improvements to the threat range would alter these numbers.

Of course, removing the "luck" element will mean that some foes are effectively immune to criticals, while lightly armoured foes will be much more succeptible--but this makes a certain sense to me (though it could dampen the heroic element a bit, depending on your style of play).

Happy Tweaking

 

[whatisitgoodfor]

How would a threat range of 12-20 fit on your table?

 

[Thorvald Kviksverd]

...Of course, removing the "luck" element will mean that some foes are effectively immune to criticals...

(nothing like quoting yourself)

This could be gotten around by allowing an open-ended attack roll...

On a roll of natural "20", roll again and add to the total; continue until a natural "20" is not rolled.

Whatsitgoodfor wrote:
How would a threat range of 12-20 fit on your table?

Like I said, I really don't know--but this open-ended attack roll has given me an idea...

The base X would never change; rather, each increase would instead allow for the possibility of increasing the mutiplier. The multiplier could be increased a maximum number of times equal to the improvements that would normally be made to the threat range. For every X above the foe's AC, beyond the first, the multiplier is increased by 1--up to the maximum noted above.

So, this might look something like this...

[color=red]

Base Threat   Critical   +1 CritMult   +2 CritMult

    20          AC+6         AC+12         AC+18

   19-20        AC+5         AC+10         AC+15

   18-20        AC+4         AC+8          AC+12

[/color]

Critical: Maximum normal result.

+1 Crit: Max result with Improved Crit OR Keen Weapon.

+2 Crit: Max result with Improved Crit AND Keen Weapon.

I don't know how this would play out, but hopefully it will spark some ideas.

Happy Tweaking