D&D 5E Critical Hits Appears to be Next in D&D Archive

[Plane Sailing]

I'm with you. It is dumbing down.

Let's quite with the "dumbing down" statements please, BryonD or anyone else. It is typically calculated to offend other people with a different point of view from you.

Thanks

 

[Plane Sailing]

If everyone automatically crits on a 20, then being able to land a devastating blow on an opponent is completely a matter of chance and has nothing whatsoever to do with skill. A farmer is just as likely to strike a devastating blow as a mighty epic hero.

Thoughts about this phenomenon?

The problem is your phrasing. You are implicitly defining "critical hit == devastating blow".

This evidently isn't the model that they are using in 4e. Rather they are saying that anyone has at least a 5% chance of doing as much damage as the weapon is physically capable of doing.

Critical hits are redefined as 'does maximum damage'.

In other words, for the farmer he might roll a 20 and do 6 points damage with his sickle - but he might roll a 14 and hit and do 6 points damage with his sickle.

Furthermore, the skill of the mighty epic hero would be reflected in his feats and powers which he can bring to bear on both his ordinary attacks and his critical hits - so that at ALL TIMES the mighty epic hero is doing more damage than the farmer, and on some of his critical hits he is probably going to be doing much more damage than even the best of his normal hits because of 'critical activated' powers or feats or magic weapons.

Cheers

 

[Merlin the Tuna]

If everyone automatically crits on a 20, then being able to land a devastating blow on an opponent is completely a matter of chance and has nothing whatsoever to do with skill. A farmer is just as likely to strike a devastating blow as a mighty epic hero.

Thoughts about this phenomenon?

A crit from a farmer with a greatsword will by all odds do less damage than a mighty epic hero slapping someone upside the head. I contend that your phenomenon doesn't exist.

 

[Benimoto]

If everyone automatically crits on a 20, then being able to land a devastating blow on an opponent is completely a matter of chance and has nothing whatsoever to do with skill. A farmer is just as likely to strike a devastating blow as a mighty epic hero.

Thoughts about this phenomenon?

My main thought is what's so devastating about a farmer making a critical hit with a rake? He's going to do what, 5 or 6 damage? That might mortally wound a goblin minion, but is going to do jack to anything the hero would fight. Depending on how much damage weapons, feats and techniques do at the epic level, which we don't know that much about, I would guess that the fighter's attack is going to be much more devastating.

It's true that if a critical hit represents a "perfect strike" that both characters have equal chances. I think that's fine. It just shows that there are things beyond the control of character skill.

 

[Wolfspider]

A crit from a farmer with a greatsword will by all odds do less damage than a mighty epic hero slapping someone upside the head. I contend that your phenomenon doesn't exist.

My post has nothing to do with damage. It has to do with actually being able to score a critical. You are right that most heroes will do more damage than the farmer. Still, the ability for a untrained combatant and a knight to have the same chance of successfully landing a blow rankles me somewhat.

 

[Wolfspider]

My main thought is what's so devastating about a farmer making a critical hit with a rake? He's going to do what, 5 or 6 damage? That might mortally wound a goblin minion, but is going to do jack to anything the hero would fight. Depending on how much damage weapons, feats and techniques do at the epic level, which we don't know that much about, I would guess that the fighter's attack is going to be much more devastating.

It's true that if a critical hit represents a "perfect strike" that both characters have equal chances. I think that's fine. It just shows that there are things beyond the control of character skill.

I guess it depends on how they define a critical. If it's just a random, lucky blow, than fine. Everyone has the same chance of getting lucky. If a successful critical is suppsed to involve the precise ability to strike at a vital spot, then the new critical system doesn't seem conceptually sound to me.

 

[The Little Raven]

Only offers frustration?

Yeah, it's just an extra step that adds nothing meaningful except the chance to lose your crit. Removing it, and making crits happen on a natural 20 removes a useless dice roll.

Consistency? Makes me think that hobgoblins will be a big part of 4e.

Ummm... what does consistency of mechanics have to do with hobgoblins?

This is a good point. Maybe the rules should have been modified so that the players are always making the rolls, whether to attack or defend, somewhat like Cinematic Unisystem. In that way, a player would roll a saving throw against a spell effect but also rolls to overcome the spell resistance of an opponent. This way would mean that players are always empowered and always involved.

I prefer letting the DM make some rolls, too, instead of him always having static values that the players roll against (which is what this system would do). I just prefer consistency between what is rolled (attacks) and what is passive (defense).

 

[Merlin the Tuna]

My post has nothing to do with damage. It has to do with actually being able to score a critical.

A devastating blow is one that deals a lot of damage. Whether it's a crit is pretty irrelevant. In 3.X, if a rogue pokes at an CR 20 enemy with his flimsy dagger held by his weak girly arms for 2d4-2, that's not a devastating blow, regardless of the fact that he critted. If a barbarian swings a barstool at the same monster for 1d6+200 damage, that's a devastating blow, despite the fact that he didn't. It has everything to do with damage, and getting rid of the multiplier actually eliminates the phenomenon of a farmer with a scythe-crit being able to out-damage a 20th level fighter with a longsword every once in a blue moon.

As Plane Sailing already went through, you're making a false assumption.

 

[Wormwood]

Ummm... what does consistency of mechanics have to do with hobgoblins?

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds" -- Emerson

A quote I've been tempted to .sig since the 4e edition wars started---but I managed to retrain myself.

 

[The Little Raven]

An automatic hit is absolutely nothing?

We're talking about the critical system, not automatic hits. How many times does that have to be stated? A NATURAL 20 AS AN AUTOMATIC HIT IS NOT A PART OF THE CRITICAL SYSTEM, AND THEREFORE, IS NOT A PART OF THIS DISCUSSION, WHICH IS ABOUT *GASP* CRITICALS.

Ok, so clerics can apparently heal random party members when they get a critical hit. Or they could back in August, anyway. That's certainly something interesting, but it is odd that the article on critical hits doesn't mention anything about class powers that work off crits.

Because the article is focused on detailing the differences between the 3e and 4e crit systems, rather than telling you every single detail that interacts with it.

Plus, it says "In addition, some powers and magic items have extra effects on a hit. So crits are doing just fine without all those dice." which seems to be a slight mistake ("on a hit" sounds like it should be "on a crit").

That article says absolutely nothing about crit-related feats.

And nothing says "There are no critical-enhancing feats or powers," but they talk about feats being permanent changes to your existing character, how they're bringing back some old favorites from 3e... oh noes, I speculated on something that is incredibly likely.

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.