Vorpal Crits

[Caliban]

I've submitted this question to Customer Service. If I get an answer, I'll post it here.

The Vorpal Weapon Property(page 236) states: "Whenever you roll the maximum result on any damge die for this weapon, roll that die again and add the additional result to the damage total. If a reroll results in another maximum damage result, roll it again and keep adding."

The Critical Hits (Maximum Damage) entry (Page 278) states: "Rather than roll damage, determine the maximum damage you can roll with your attack. This is your critical damage..."

How do these two rules interact? This has been hotly debated on the ENWORLD boards (http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=232887&page=1&pp=15).

Three different interpretations have come up, which one is the most correct?:

1) Infinite Damage: On a crit you determine the maximum damage you can roll with your attack, and use that damage. Since you keep rolling damage when you roll maximum damage with a vorpal weapon, the maximum damage you can roll with a vorpal weapon is infinite. So you do Infinite damage (+6d12) on a crit with a vorpal weapon.

2) If you don't roll dice, you don't Vorpal: The vorpal property only triggers when you are actually rolling damage dice, not when you are determing the maximum damage from an attack. So you do your normal maximum damage with that attack +6d12 and the vorpal property would kick in on the extra 6d12 damage dice your roll.

3) Vorpal activates for "free" on a crit: Since you use the maximum damage roll on a crit, your vorpal property automatically triggers once for each damage die you would have rolled, but you still have to roll the extra vorpal dice to see if it activates again. So an attack with a Vorpal weapon that does 3d10+15 damage would do 45(max dam)+6d12 (extra crit dice)+3d10 (extra vorpal dice) damage, and the vorpal property could trigger again on the 6d12 or 3d10 damage dice when you roll them.

Thank you for taking the time to answer this.

********************
Page Number: Page 236 and Page 278
Book Name: Player's Handbook (4e)

 

[Ten]

I did ask custserv yesterday; Here is their reply.

Response (Support Agent) 06/25/2008 07:34 AM
Caleb,

You do not roll damage in a critical hit, so all of the automatically maximized damage will not benefit from the Vorpal weapon's property.
The extra 6d12 which you do roll will benefit, so if you roll any 12s there, you will roll that die again.

Good Gaming!

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Interestingly enough, I was of the opposite opinion...

 

[Goolpsy]

Now to a real issue: If we ask Custserv 10 times: How many will say A and how many will say B? and how many really understand the difference ?

 

[Caliban]

I did ask custserv yesterday; Here is their reply.

Since it agrees with my reading of the rules, I find relying on Cust Serv acceptable in this instance (while reserving the right to discount any future answers I find unacceptable).

 

[DClown]

Oh thank god. Now we just have a few more pages of people complaining that CS isn't consistent or the book was badly edited, or the edition as a whole sucks or whatever they need to say to convince themselves they were not 'wrong' and the thread can finally die.

 

[DLichen]

It's already two consistent answers, we're on a streak here.

 

[Hypersmurf]

I've submitted this question to Customer Service.

I'm glad to see the +6d12 made it into option 1

-Hyp.

 

[Caliban]

I'm glad to see the +6d12 made it into option 1

-Hyp.

I felt that I would have done you a disservice if it wasn't included.

 

[gnfnrf]

I've submitted this question to Customer Service. If I get an answer, I'll post it here.

Isn't there a fourth option? I could have sworn I'd seen folk in this thread arguing that, while you took the maximum result on the weapon dice, you rolled them anyway, simply to check to see if they exploded.

That is to say, you roll the weapon damage, replace it with max damage, and reroll any dice from the roll you skipped if they showed max, even though you didn't need to use them.

While the rules support for this option is weak, it seems to preserve the relationship between a regular hit and a crit nicely, without accidentally causing infinite plus 6d12 damage.

--
gnfnrf

 

[DLichen]

Quite simply, that option has no rule support at all, but is a nice houserule option if you want to make vorpal crits more deadly.

It would be pointless to ask, since it definitely won't be the correct option according to the rules, but it's not a bad idea if your players demand it.