Conductive Weapon special ability and criticals

[Hellim]

If an anti-pally confirms a critical hit with a conductive weapon, spends the 2 charges of corrosive touch necessary to channel his/her corrosive touch through the weapon upon the target, is the corrosive touch also a critical?

[concerro]

I can't find a corrosive touch. Did you mean touch of corruption?

[Hellim]

Yes, Corrosive Touch, pardon me.

[concerro]

Touch of corruption?
If you really mean corrosive touch then I don't see that ability in any book or online.

[Archaeik]

Does it matter what special he's talking about?
I think the question is more broadly, "does a confirmed critical with a conductive weapon cause the Sp/Su ability to crit as if the touch attack had been a critical?"

I'd say yes, but it seems a little murky :/

[concerro]

Actually it does matter because not all things multiply.
If the ability is does not multiply on its own the answer is no. If it does then the answer is yes. <--general answer.

[Archaeik]

This is hurting my brain a little (reading over it again)

Okay, so not all things multiply (can't think of one off the top of my head though)

In terms of an algorithm though, wouldn't a critical still process but just come back as "cannot crit" (or x1 depending on how you want to think about it)

Regardless, the wrinkle I'm seeing is that you can choose to activate this ability after a hit. (never risk wasting your N/day)

Quote:

When the wielder makes a successful attack of the appropriate type, he may choose to expend two uses of his magical ability to channel it through the weapon to the struck opponent, who takes the effects of the weapon attack and the special ability.

So I'm actually starting to lean toward "no", even though it takes effort to engineer crits.

[Hellim]

Oh, wow am I sleep deprived. I meant to agree with Concerro, Touch of Corruption is the one. And like Archaeik said, it doesn't really matter what special ability I'm speaking of as long as it has the potential to crit, like touch spells and supernatural abilities.

As I read the Conductive ability, it simply is not clear enough when the effect takes place. Is the special ability part of the entire attack (thereby benefiting from weapon critical hit range but only multiplying by 2 as per normal spell criticals) or is it added after the attack (thereby adding the special ability's normal, non critical, result to the weapon attack regardless of if the attack was a critical hit or not).

As a GM, I'd say no auto crits on the special ability. As a player I'd say hell yes. If only the description of Conductive said something like:

"...who takes the effects of the weapon attack and THEN the special ability."

or

"...who takes the effects of the weapon attack and the special ability combined in one blow."

something like that. People will want to crit with this kind of combo, it needs to be resolved.

[LazarX]

Hellim wrote:

If an anti-pally confirms a critical hit with a conductive weapon, spends the 2 charges of corrosive touch necessary to channel his/her corrosive touch through the weapon upon the target, is the corrosive touch also a critical?

No. the spell is just traveling for the ride there's nothing that's giving it a crit effect, unlike the use of say, spellstrike with a weapon attack roll spell.

[Archaeik]

How are spell storing weapon casts resolved? If they auto hit because the weapon did, then they can't crit... (and shouldn't since you'd just wait for a crit otherwise)

As for conducting, I agree that RAW says no, but considering that it costs 2 uses, I'm more inclined to let it go, or set up some stipulation like "first attack per round"

[Hangman Henry IX]

Critical Hits wrote:

Exception: Precision damage (such as from a rogue's sneak attack class feature) and additional damage dice from special weapon qualities (such as flaming) are not multiplied when you score a critical hit.

the conductive stuff would be part of additional damage dice from special weapon quality