What is the best save?

[Kae'Yoss]

No offense taken.

Sure, it's his best save, but you said "all you really need is reflex saves", and he wouldn't want to have bad fort and will saves, in case he has to save twice. (But those feats are great, and the one save per round will probably be enough most of the time).



As for the topic on hand: The best save is, of course, the one you succeed in

 

[Ratama]

Natural Saves

Why do folks keep referring to natural 1's on saves as automatic failures?

I realize that the Sage weaseled that into the FAQ, but it's still a house rule; according to the SRD (and the Core books), only attack rolls are automatic hits and misses on natural 1's and 20's.

I hope none of you guys use that in your games thinking it's core...

 

[Li Shenron]

I haven't been at higher levels yet, but I think most "save or die" effects require Fortitude ST, and they are the ones who scare me most.

Will saves come up more often (at least until now for us), but then it's up to the foes to decide what to do with you when you're chramed, asleep or anything... mostly the effect itself is not deadly (notice we don't play in a heavily destructive campaign where every hostile NPC kills you with ease, nor the PCs can kill anyone without consequences).

Reflex saves can still sometimes make the difference between life and death, but usually success is only 50% less damage; if you win ALL your Reflex STs you may be dead anyway at the end

 

[Kae'Yoss]

Re: Natural Saves

Why do folks keep referring to natural 1's on saves as automatic failures?

I realize that the Sage weaseled that into the FAQ, but it's still a house rule; according to the SRD (and the Core books), only attack rolls are automatic hits and misses on natural 1's and 20's.

I hope none of you guys use that in your games thinking it's core...

As it's quasi-official by WotC-Standards (Sage Reply says so, several of their Rulebooks say so) and it makes sense, most here on the board consider it official.

 

[Ratama]

Saves

Where in the Core rulebooks does it say anything about saves automatically succeeding or failing on 20's or 1's?

From the SRD:

BASIC TASK RESOLUTION SYSTEM

These rules assume a standardized system for determining the success or failure of any given task. That system is:
d20 + Modifiers vs. Target Number

The Modifiers and Target Number are determined by the type of task.

If the result of the d20 roll + the Modifiers equals or exceeds the

Target Number, the test is successful. Any other result is a failure.

A "natural 20" on the die roll is not an automatic success.

A "natural 1" on the die roll is not an automatic failure.

Sorry if the Sage snookered you into believing him, but that's another one if his kooky house rules.

I guess a level 80 Wizard failing his Will save against a level 1 Cleric's Command spell one time in 20 seems silly to me, but YMMV.

 

[Archer]

Will saves can be as deadly as death effects. Hold person should be death but most DM's let the PCs live because save or die effects based on fortitude don't come up until 5th level spell. Being dominated is worse than death for your fellow party members.

Reflex is very common but rarely save or die unless you are lacking the key elemental resistance in a very high damage situation.

 

[AuraSeer]

Re: Saves

I guess a level 80 Wizard failing his Will save against a level 1 Cleric's Command spell one time in 20 seems silly to me

Sillier than an 80th-level Arcane Archer firing at the broad side of a barn, with epic magic arrows from his epic magic bow, and missing 5% of the time?

Sillier than a crippled farmer swinging a blunt stick at an 80th-level fighter, managing to do damage (piercing the obscenely magical armor) one time in twenty?

Any game rule looks silly if you take it to absurd extremes.

 

[Ratama]

Yup.

And if you use automatic 1's and 20's in your game, you have no one but yourself to blame.

Having the automatic hits and misses on 1's and 20's in the core rules is bad enough; why go looking for more D20 mechanics to break?

 

[hong]

Re: Yup.

Having the automatic hits and misses on 1's and 20's in the core rules is bad enough;

It's been part of D&D since Gygax crawled out of the primordial ooze, and has never, to my knowledge, caused undue problems. Your silly example says more about your own inability to contribute anything relevant to this thread than anything.

why go looking for more D20 mechanics to break?

PKB.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

While the miss thing might sometimes become stupid, the natural 20 thing seems to be somehow neccessary - imagine 8.000 orc warriors attacking a Level 20 Fighter in Full Plate+5 and Large Steel Shield +5 - impossible to hit? Even if they had time to fight hours and hours? Even if the Fighter would fight Unarmed, without the appropriate feats or combat gloves?

Mustrum Ridcully