Post by Deleted on Aug 29, 2013 16:06:13 GMT
This is a discussion of critical fumbles. It's a house rule that I've seen before, but never liked.
Current:
If you roll a 1 on an attack roll, roll a d100 on the fumble chart, and apply the results. I'm particularly fond of 98, 99, and 100 which leave you helpless / unconscious, and thus vulnerable to coup de graces.
Problem 1: This house rule is way too deadly. It's potentially extremely harsh on low and high level characters alike. While higher level characters are more likely to survive some of the mishaps that would guarantee death for many first level characters in certain situations, they also make far more attack rolls.
Problem 2: It favors NPCs faar more than PCs. The average NPC only makes a couple of attack rolls. Thus, a PC might occasionally benefit from an NPC getting a crit fumble. On the other hand, PCs eventually make hundreds of attack rolls.
Problem 3: It dramatically favors certain builds over others: It penalizes martial characters over casters. It penalizes rapid fire attackers over high damage attackers.
An example of why you should be scared. Let's just look at rolling a 98-100. Those leave you vulnerable to coup de grace, but there's only a 3% chance of that happening, and there's only a 5% chance of getting a critical fumble. but if it does happen, you leave yourself open to (multiple) coup de graces, which has a very good chance of getting you killed outright.
Let's assume that you've got enough of an advantage that you're not scared of anything other than a 98-100 (this is unreasonably optimistic), but that if you ever get coup de graced you will be killed (this is reasonably pessimistic). There's a 0.15% chance per attack that you will fumble and become helpless. This gives the following chart:
and this is just the worst fumbles. Almost every fumble makes you lose an action or take a severe debuff, (though many allow non trivial saves to avoid). Oh, and there's a roughly 5% chance that your +1 sword will break within the first 20 swings.
Proposal:
As per base rules, a 1 on an attack roll is simply an automatic miss.
Current:
If you roll a 1 on an attack roll, roll a d100 on the fumble chart, and apply the results. I'm particularly fond of 98, 99, and 100 which leave you helpless / unconscious, and thus vulnerable to coup de graces.
Problem 1: This house rule is way too deadly. It's potentially extremely harsh on low and high level characters alike. While higher level characters are more likely to survive some of the mishaps that would guarantee death for many first level characters in certain situations, they also make far more attack rolls.
Problem 2: It favors NPCs faar more than PCs. The average NPC only makes a couple of attack rolls. Thus, a PC might occasionally benefit from an NPC getting a crit fumble. On the other hand, PCs eventually make hundreds of attack rolls.
Problem 3: It dramatically favors certain builds over others: It penalizes martial characters over casters. It penalizes rapid fire attackers over high damage attackers.
An example of why you should be scared. Let's just look at rolling a 98-100. Those leave you vulnerable to coup de grace, but there's only a 3% chance of that happening, and there's only a 5% chance of getting a critical fumble. but if it does happen, you leave yourself open to (multiple) coup de graces, which has a very good chance of getting you killed outright.
Let's assume that you've got enough of an advantage that you're not scared of anything other than a 98-100 (this is unreasonably optimistic), but that if you ever get coup de graced you will be killed (this is reasonably pessimistic). There's a 0.15% chance per attack that you will fumble and become helpless. This gives the following chart:
Number of attacks you've made | Probability of death by fumble -> helpless |
10 | 1.5% |
20 | 3.0% |
50 | 7.2% |
100 | 14.0% |
200 | 26.0% |
500 | 53.8% |
and this is just the worst fumbles. Almost every fumble makes you lose an action or take a severe debuff, (though many allow non trivial saves to avoid). Oh, and there's a roughly 5% chance that your +1 sword will break within the first 20 swings.
Proposal:
As per base rules, a 1 on an attack roll is simply an automatic miss.