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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Gargoyle" data-source="post: 7694481" data-attributes="member: 529">I get what Monte is saying.  They aren't always fun for players or DMs, and they aren't always as fun as we remember them in hindsight.Critical fumbles can be great fun and everyone has a story about how Joe the Barbarian accidentally cut off the head of Bob the cleric, or how Sheila shot Paul while shooting into melee, or how a botched spell caused the fireball to ignite on the party.  Good times.... at least, in nostalgia, maybe not at the time.  My problem is when they are too frequent or they are too damaging or both.  Players shouldn't be too upset to roll a 1 because over the course of a campaign they are going to roll at lot of them.  Also chances are, one player will roll worse than others and suffer most of the effects of fumbles, and depending on their personality it might be very annoying to them.Five percent of the time is too often, as players typically roll a lot of attacks, especially the non casters.  Systems that require one to confirm the critical are better, but you run the risk of never seeing a fumble at higher levels when hitting is easy.  A saving throw or ability check to avoid the fumble might be better.  The other problem is that of fumbles that are too damaging.  When limbs are being cut off, or player characters killed, it may raise a chuckle 10 years later, but at the time, it's often not as fun.  It's also jarring and non-heroic when hordes of orcs barely dent your group but your healer struggles to reattach the leg that just got cut off by an errant battle axe, or the super genius wizard never gets a spell to work all night.  Better to have those accidental hits strike NPC's or perhaps have weapons blunted to do less damage temporarily or some other less serious outcome, or for spells just add some wild magic style effect.As a DM I neither embrace nor outlaw fumbles and go with rulings over rules.  If a player character rolls a 1 and I think of something interesting to happen, it happens.  Same with a roll like a 2 or 3.  I might let the make an ability check to avoid or mitigate the outcome.  Or I might just say "you miss" and move along.  The risk of course is that I might appear unfair, but I haven't had that complaint yet and it keeps things moving and still allows for some unpredictability, so it works for our table.  If an NPC rolls a 1, there is much more of a chance for a fumble, and certainly if I think of something entertaining.</blockquote>

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