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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Doug McCrae" data-source="post: 5323277" data-attributes="member: 21169">Those are excellent points. I wouldn't defend the houserule from a simulationist perspective, but it is good at creating drama and excitement. Taking 10 can be used to counter those problems. By the 3e rules one can take 10 when one is 'not being threatened or distracted'. Personally I don't much like taking 10, because of the loss of drama, so I tend also not to allow it in a 'pressure situation', which I have never really defined but would include swimming a fast flowing river, climbing a mountain, jumping a pit or using a knowledge skill to learn about a monster once combat has started. All the main challenges of 'the adventure', really.This also raises issues about just how skilled the PCs are and player perception of their PC's skill level vs the GM's. Players quite often perceive their PCs as more capable than the GM does, I've noticed. How is the failure interpreted? If it's described as being due to outside circumstances or bad luck then it doesn't undermine the table perception of the PC as skilled, which is often important to players. However if the PC is a clumsy fool 1 time in 20 then that can be an assumption clash between player and GM.While I do use the 1 = fail rule in superhero games also, I perceive superhero PCs as being more skilled than D&D PCs, at least low level ones, so I don't have any kind of critical failure in superhero games. It's jarringly wrong for Captain America to slip on a banana skin 1 time out of 20, just as in your examples. As you say, from a simulationist perspective, the 1 in 20 rule is inadequate when dealing with super-skilled individuals such as House and Einstein.</blockquote>

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