Critical Hits for Undead, Constructs...

[Grazzt]

What if i flippen blast a flesh golem in the chest with a lighting bolt, dont you think it would do "Massive Damage".

Why would it? Hitting a construct in the chest is no different than hitting it in the face, head, finger, leg, knee, etc....no area is more important than any other....no vitals.

 

[Aeris Winterood]

Vital organs....

I do agree with all of you who have posted.... and am aware of what the rule states.... I still have a hard time with it.... Considering the fact of what if I hit a zombie with a great sword... tore him open from shoulder to groin.... he may still be alive... I mean.. undead... but was a much more tremendous blow than just scrapping away some dead tissue from an arm....

instead of chipping away a fragment of rock from a stone golem, I fractue a leg which collapses beneath him....

Do any of you have anything like that in your games? I do not want to seem difficult... but it still seems to me that you can critically hit something with out vital organs....

For example... a house may have no vital organs... but if I strike hard enough at a load bearing support.. the whole house may fall before I have spend days striking at it from every spot...

 

[Mark Chance]

Hey Krusty..long time no chat. And yeppers, you are correct. And since undead, constructs, etc. have no particularly vulnerable spots (read vital organs or areas), they are immune to critical hits.

True enough. Undead, constructs, et cetera, have not vital, meaning necessary for life, body parts.

But this doesn't mean that, say, an undead like, say, a zombie doesn't have vulnerable spots or body structures essential to correct functioning (i.e., like the ball-and-socket joint at the shoulder essential to correct movement of the arm). Thus, some hits do more damage than other hits because the hits do variable amounts of damage to essential body structures depending on force, what essential body structure is hit, et cetera.

Viewed this way, it doesn't seem unreasonable for it to be possible to receive special training in inflicting "critical" hits against creatures like the undead (see, for example, the brief on the alternate ranger as undead hunter in the DMG).

Such training would need to be the province of specific classes/prestige classes and/or result from new feats or feat chains.

 

[Grazzt]

Viewed this way, it doesn't seem unreasonable for it to be possible to receive special training in inflicting "critical" hits against creatures like the undead (see, for example, the brief on the alternate ranger as undead hunter in the DMG).

Such training would need to be the province of specific classes/prestige classes and/or result from new feats or feat chains.

True enough perhaps and unless I am mistaken, there are certain feats or PrC that allow a person to do such a thing. (I believe there was a PrC in Dragon several issues ago, like Hunter of the Dead or something......it mightve allowed this...cant really remember.)

 

[cerberus2112]

Re: Vital organs....

I do agree with all of you who have posted.... and am aware of what the rule states.... I still have a hard time with it.... Considering the fact of.... what if I hit a zombie with a great sword... tore him open from shoulder to groin.... he may still be a;ive... I mean.. undead... buit was a much more tremendous blow than just scrapping away some dead tissue from an arm....

instead of chipping away a fragment of rock from a stone golem, I fractue a leg which collapses beneath him....

Such a blow doesn't happen until you've "slain" the undead or construct in the first place. Remember, its moving and threatening you too, so you can't just wind up. If a critical hit could tear a humanoid open from shoulder to groin, it would be instantly lethal to almost any living creature, not just extra damage. Your exaggerating what a critical hit can do.

 

[s/LaSH]

It's similar to how piercing weapons don't tend to do too much damage to zombies - there's some trauma inflicted, but even if you can see through the zombie's face and out the other side, it's still got arms with which to beat you. You can cut off its hand, and instead of being crippled with pain, it beats you to death with the oozing stump. Complete dismemberment is really the only way to deal with creatures of this ilk.

That said, there is a case for at least tracking crits when fighting crit-immune creatures. If a crit can represent a hand being lopped off, and you're fighting a golem who's holding a key you really would like to have for yourself, then a crit could easily represent that hand getting severed (to be later picked up and chipped apart). The golem isn't particularly impaired - it's still several tons of angry inorganic muscle, and the difference between a fist and a flat piece of golem on the end of an arm is fairly minimal if you're on the recieving end. You don't get to roll for extra damage, but you do get a result from rolling well.

The crit system is theoretically based on a fairly gritty priciple, actually - the sort of shoulder-to-hip cleave that you get with really big swords isn't modeled; rather, everything's flesh wounds. A crit is a flesh wound that strikes an organ. I always consider crits to be huge flashy attacks that cause horrible damage, like the aforementioned torso splitting blow, which is more up D&D's thematic alley. In that regard, you would probably be justified in allowing crits on crit-immune monsters, seeing as how they're pretty darn tough already (d12 hit dice, often immune to piercing damage, that sort of thing).

 

[Aeris Winterood]

Re: Re: Vital organs....

Such a blow doesn't happen until you've "slain" the undead or construct in the first place. Remember, its moving and threatening you too, so you can't just wind up. If a critical hit could tear a humanoid open from shoulder to groin, it would be instantly lethal to almost any living creature, not just extra damage. Your exaggerating what a critical hit can do.

Ok... you just made my point..... Yes, a blow like such may instantly kill a live humanoid... but it critically did damage to the undead.... may kill it.. may not... but it was hit by a tremendous strike... which may or may not "slay" it.

 

[Mark Chance]

True enough perhaps and unless I am mistaken, there are certain feats or PrC that allow a person to do such a thing. (I believe there was a PrC in Dragon several issues ago, like Hunter of the Dead or something......it mightve allowed this...cant really remember.)

I'd be surprised if there wasn't already some sort of class/PrC/feat out there already. It seems like such an obvious idea, especially since it was outlined in the DMG.

 

[Felon]

OK, time to put my devil's advocate suit on again.

But this doesn't mean that, say, an undead like, say, a zombie doesn't have vulnerable spots or body structures essential to correct functioning (i.e., like the ball-and-socket joint at the shoulder essential to correct movement of the arm). Thus, some hits do more damage than other hits because the hits do variable amounts of damage to essential body structures depending on force, what essential body structure is hit, et cetera.

Well, damage involves a die roll, and that variance is supposed to cover the chance of hitting vulnerable areas like that shoulder socket.

Notice though that a zombie wouldn't be crippled by that severe blow like a living person would be. Hence the immunity to crit damage.

Viewed this way, it doesn't seem unreasonable for it to be possible to receive special training in inflicting "critical" hits against creatures like the undead (see, for example, the brief on the alternate ranger as undead hunter in the DMG). Such training would need to be the province of specific classes/prestige classes and/or result from new feats or feat chains.

Right, like the Foe Hunter PrC and Supernatural Strike feat, both from Masters of the Wild.

The big problem with allowing undead, constructs, and oozes to be critted is that they have no CON, hence relatively low hit points. Now, the new MM supposedly addresses that somewhat by giving constructs extra HP just like oozes. Not sures about undead.

 

[Thunderstorm]

I say we institute a new rule...Massive Damage...

To feed upon Aeris example of the house being destroyed by inflicting the right hit....You sould be able to destroy, outright, a non living being by damaging it in just that sort of way...

The notion of a golems arms and legs crawling toward me when he has no torso left seems silly....