UA: V/WP - what about this?

[Nifelhein]

It indeed looks interesting, in my opinion, but at some point it would be a real problem, a fighter with weapon specialization in longsword and a medium stat would have a +4 to damage, if he critical hits, consider he wields a longsword, he has a chance to kill the character.

This character would be 4th level by then, of course it looks good, what I think would be needed is a kind of chance for the players to take their characters out of this situation, thus something like action points from d20 mdoern, although I am not familiar with it, read it once only.

Anyway, thansk for the help, it has been great so far. But what about my questions there... huh?

 

[James McMurray]

From the way the article is written, it would appear that even DR of X/- is overcome, and that if an elemental or other crit immune critter with a con gets criticalled, he also gets his DR bypassed and takes the damage as wound damage.

A very deadly situation indeed (albeit only when criticals occur). As long as no one gets critted, the system is almost exactly the same as the default hit points rules.

 

[Nifelhein]

It seems odd that critical hit immunes now suffer them, but mayeb there is a point to all it, my problem would be with sneak attack now... does it do VP damage of WP damage... ?

 

[3d6]

Sneak attack would do VP damage, except on a critical hit or when the target had 0 VP.

 

[Nifelhein]

So a critical hit with sneak attack would deal all damage to wound points? Man... beware the improved critical rapier of the sneaking rogue!

 

[Stalker0]

It seems odd that critical hit immunes now suffer them, but mayeb there is a point to all it, my problem would be with sneak attack now... does it do VP damage of WP damage... ?

I thought I heard it was WP damage, but every SA dice counted for only 1 pt of damage now. Although that's still preety nasty.

 

[Quixon]

You might also consider removing Improved Critical and Keen from the game, since they can give a Scythe wielder a 13-20 crit range (11-20 if he's a weapon master, 9-20 if he's also a psychic weapon master). Unless of course you really want to mow through your characters quicly.

Well for 3.5 it wouldn't quite be that bad - Improved Critical and Keen and such don't stack.

 

[James McMurray]

Right, if they stacked then a Scythe wielding weapon master / psychic weapon master would have a crit range of 5-20!

 

[Plane Sailing]

slight hijack-

does anyone see the motivation for having crits ignore DR? This is basically opposite of what their other vita/wounds systems have done wherein DR only applies to wound damage (most often from crits)

Simple answer: in normal circumstances a crit multiplies your damage and thus gives you more chance of bypassing DR. In this WP/VP setup you don't multiply damage on crits, thus you reduce the DR instead to give a comparable effect (i.e. crits help overcome DR).

Where they may have got it wrong (I've not seen the whole article) is that clearly creatures which are immune to crits should *still* be immune to crits, thus when attacking oozes, elementals, constructs and undead you should still apply full DR (since in normal 'hp' D&D you wouldn't be getting a weapon multiplier to punch through their DR 'cos you can't crit them).

Cheers

 

[the_mighty_agrippa]

Damn, this is just plain nasty. How do you account for Power Criticals, Augmented Criticals, Keen weapons or Hunter's Mercy?

These are pretty much confirmed crits and would kill most characters right off the bat. Even a tough barbarian only has his Con in WP? Even raging, one crit by a good fighter and he's taking a dirtnap.