MNblockhead
A Title Much Cooler Than Anything on the Old Site
If you have an option that doesn't penalize characters for having more attacks, I'd be curious to see details. But what you describe just sounds like high level fighters become extremely unlucky.
A 20th level fighter action surging has at least a 40% chance of fumbling. His halfling rogue buddy? He's probably firing from the shadows with advantage and rerolling the first 1 for around a 1.3% chance. The wizard that never rolls an attack never fumbles.
But the way most people implement the rule the fighters in the group are far more likely to fumble than any other class.
When I do house rules, one of the things I ask is whether or not it's going to significantly harm one class or build over all other classes. Fumbles don't qualify.
If I wanted to throw this kind of random penalty at my players (I don't) it would be a separate roll any time you take any action in combat. The more daring/dangerous the action, the more likely it is to cause a penalty. The higher level you are, the less likely you are to be penalized.
Fumbling on a 1 has it backwards. The higher level you are, the more attacks you have, the more likely you are to fumble. I try not to be overly critical of what other people find fun, but it's a dumb rule.
Well, you convinced me. Like another poster above, I use the Nord critical hits and fumbles decks. They are fun, but I'm finding that they are worse than DMs discretion.
Example. One of characters in the campaign I DM is 16th level fighter with the sharpshooter feet.
In the past if he fumbles, the string broke, he got something in his eye, or something tangled up in his quiver, or—rarely—he would hit another target that was very close to the target. The impact wasn't terrible and made some sense.
Something in your eye or your jostled, or lose your footing—you don't get the rest of your attacks that round.
String broke? You don't get any further attacks with the bow until you take an action to restring it—assuming you have extra strings.
A great archer firing three times in 6 seconds is putting his bow through a lot. I makes sense that the string may break every battle or so.
As for hitting the wrong person, I try to avoid it, but I want it to be an option. Yeah, you are inhumanely accurate and quick with your bow, but battle is chaotic. Friendly fire is a really common in the real world. Not that I want my fantasy to be "realistic" but it makes sense that friendly fire is something that should be a concern.
Generally, I would avoid breaking weapons. But sometimes it makes sense and can add to game. A sword may break and a fighter should have a backup. But I treat magic weapons as unbreakable. So, it is generally a lower-level concern.
In all these examples, with a creative and conscientious DM, fumbles can add to the flavor of the game. Knowing that there is a good chance you will hit the wrong person, you may choose targets differently. The party may use different strategies. The broken string issue may lead the sharpshooter to have a backup bow so maybe he only loses his extra attacks that round and not another three attacks the next round.
The problem with the Nord cards for fumbles is that you can have characters injure and even cripple themselves. I prefer to leave those threats to failed skill checks and failed saves. Maybe in some grim dark settings it makes sense. Front line fighters should have a much higher chance of being crippled, hurt, and other wise getting banged up when they fumble. But this is a game and many players would find that unbalanced and unfair and lead to selecting different classes and builds rather than just changing some behavior.
Now that I have more experience under my belt and have read a number of arguments about this, I think my new approach will be:
1. Most of the time, it is just a miss.
2. If something about the environment, combat situation, or other factors make the combat particularly treacherous, chaotic, or difficult, then I would still impose a chance for a situationally-appropriate complication to arise from the fumble.
3. For any fumble that I impose for a "1", the character will get a chance to make a save or skill check to avoid it so that more experienced/high-level characters are less impacted by fumbles over time.
To me, these guidelines keep the fun flavor of fumbles without overly punishing high-level characters.