D&D 5E What are your favourite fumble tables?

[Hawk Diesel]

Even if you only have a .25% chance to fumble per hit, the character with more attacks per round is still more likely to fumble.

Assume 4 hits per turn, that's a 1% chance per turn.

Compare that to a halfling rogue that has a .125% chance to fumble per turn (depending on how you handle halfling luck).

Reducing the chance of crits doesn't reduce the difference between people that have more attacks. A person that has twice as many attacks is going to fumble twice as often if all other factors are the same.

But it's a weird mechanic IMHO. If you're only fumbling 1% of the time, what's the point other than a lot of extra rolls? Why should the human fighter fumble 8 times more often that his halfling rogue buddy?

I think you may have misunderstood what I was saying. In the system I propose, when someone rolls a natural 1, they make the attack again. If that attack would miss, the natural 1 is confirmed and the attack is considered a fumble. If the attack would hit, then the natural 1 is only considered a miss.

For a fighter (let's assume they have 3 attacks), if they roll a natural 1, they would have to make the attack again with 2 rerolls (1 reroll for each extra attack, sort of like super advantage) to attempt to hit the target AC. If they miss all three of those confirm attempts, only then would a fumble occur. Otherwise, the attack is considered a miss.

Thus, while a fighter will automatically miss 5%, they would fumble less often when they do roll a natural 1 because they would get more chances to avoid confirming the fumble.

 

[Oofta]

I think you may have misunderstood what I was saying. In the system I propose, when someone rolls a natural 1, they make the attack again. If that attack would miss, the natural 1 is confirmed and the attack is considered a fumble. If the attack would hit, then the natural 1 is only considered a miss.

For a fighter (let's assume they have 3 attacks), if they roll a natural 1, they would have to make the attack again with 2 rerolls (1 reroll for each extra attack, sort of like super advantage) to attempt to hit the target AC. If they miss all three of those confirm attempts, only then would a fumble occur. Otherwise, the attack is considered a miss.

Thus, while a fighter will automatically miss 5%, they would fumble less often when they do roll a natural 1 because they would get more chances to avoid confirming the fumble.

If you allow for a number of reroll attempts equal to the number of attacks they normally have, that does balance things out some (a little too much math for my brain to figure out this late on a Friday), although it doesn't completely handle lucky halflings.

Still a lot of rolling for what you get IMHO if it applies on less than 1% of the time (depending on assumptions), especially for the DM that applies the same rules for the opponents.

As always, if you and your group enjoy it more power to you. I'll stop semi-hijacking the thread. I'm probably just still bitter over the DM that would lop off my fighter's head every other combat.

 

[Hawk Diesel]

If you allow for a number of reroll attempts equal to the number of attacks they normally have, that does balance things out some (a little too much math for my brain to figure out this late on a Friday), although it doesn't completely handle lucky halflings.

Still a lot of rolling for what you get IMHO if it applies on less than 1% of the time (depending on assumptions), especially for the DM that applies the same rules for the opponents.

As always, if you and your group enjoy it more power to you. I'll stop semi-hijacking the thread. I'm probably just still bitter over the DM that would lop off my fighter's head every other combat.

Yea, I definitely agree with you on the importance of fun factor. For my group, especially since we use max damage on unconfirmed crits and at minimum double max damage on confirmed crits, it can make encounters especially deadly and swingy. But my group enjoys that. All my players really enjoy describing both the crits and the fumbles, and it makes crits feel really special.

 

[MNblockhead]

We use Nord Game's Gamemaster Tookbox Critical Hit Decks. My player like the extra variety it brings to combat. The cards are leveled so that you can scale the level of impact (how deadly/crippling) they are.

 

[Grazzt]

We still break out the original Dragon #39 article "Good Hits and Bad Misses" from time to time.

 

[Bupp]

I go with simplicity. If you roll a natural 1 on a d20 for an attack, saving throw, skill check, or ability check, you gain disadvantage on your next d20 roll for an attack, saving throw, skill check, or ability check.

 

[fil512]

We use Nord Game's Gamemaster Tookbox Critical Hit Decks. My player like the extra variety it brings to combat. The cards are leveled so that you can scale the level of impact (how deadly/crippling) they are.

Got the cards and the players loved them!


Sent from my iPad using EN World mobile app

 

[Warmaster Horus]

Fumbles are stupid. They're saying that 1 out of twenty attacks a skilled fighter somehow has a notable and pathetic 'whoopsi daisy'. For a twentieth level fighter that's once every 5 rounds (30 seconds) of combat, less if they use bonus actions to attack. Dumb.

 

[dagger]

If you think they are stupid or dont use them why are you in this thread? The op said "What are your favourite fumble tables for 5e? a.k.a. critical fail, "natural 1."".

I like critical hits but not fumbles, but we have used them in the past. Normally we just did lose your turn and kept it simple.

I dont think they are stupid, we just dont use them now to help keep combat 5e simple. I am all over critical hits though...

 

[Celebrim]

Fumbles are stupid. They're saying that 1 out of twenty attacks a skilled fighter somehow has a notable and pathetic 'whoopsi daisy'.

No they aren't. I don't know where people get that. The only time I've ever seen anything like that is in a few DMs house rules. Published fumble rules almost never have that problem. The most infamous fumble table in D&D - the above mentioned 'Good Hits and Bad Misses' meant that a 1st level fighter fumbled about once every 20 attacks, while a high level fighter might fumble once every 200 or even 2000 attacks. Fumbles do not and have not ever inherently meant that you fumble more often as you get more skilled. If you want to dislike fumbles fine, but at least dislike them for rational and well considered reasons.