|
A nat 20 always hits but does a second nat 20 autmaticall crit? For example, mob has a ...31 AC, Player rolls a nat 20, hits, rolls another nat 20 to confirm but the player only has a +10 to hit so his total roll with the nat 20 is 30, 1 short of the 31 AC. Now that you understand, does a nat 20 always confirm?
We have a houserule that if you get a second natural 20 it causes maximum damage, no dice roll required (weapon damage anyways, not sneak attack or energy damage, etc).
Sure, plus two nat 20s in a roll (.25% chance I think) is exciting.
yes the confirm roll is another attack roll vs ac. a natural 20 always hits. 3.x had a optional rule that if a 2nd natural 20 roll was made and confirmed again. it would out right kill the creature struck despite hp or saves. It was removed from pathfinder for good reason, but the intent of a 20 always hit is still valid.
I am pretty much 100% certain that any "insta-kill" rule from rolling some number of natural 20s in a row on an attack roll is a house rule, and was not something WOTC ever published in an official D&D 3.x publication.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
yes the confirm roll is another attack roll vs ac. a natural 20 always hits. 3.x had a optional rule that if a 2nd natural 20 roll was made and confirmed again. it would out right kill the creature struck despite hp or saves. It was removed from pathfinder for good reason, but the intent of a 20 always hit is still valid.I am pretty much 100% certain that any "insta-kill" rule from rolling some number of natural 20s in a row on an attack roll is a house rule, and was not something WOTC ever published in an official D&D 3.x publication.
Actually, it appeared in the 3.0 Dungeon Master's Guide! However, it was clearly labeled as an optional rule you could choose to implement.
yes the confirm roll is another attack roll vs ac. a natural 20 always hits. 3.x had a optional rule that if a 2nd natural 20 roll was made and confirmed again. it would out right kill the creature struck despite hp or saves. It was removed from pathfinder for good reason, but the intent of a 20 always hit is still valid.I am pretty much 100% certain that any "insta-kill" rule from rolling some number of natural 20s in a row on an attack roll is a house rule, and was not something WOTC ever published in an official D&D 3.x publication.
I believe it was an optional rule like massive damage. Two 20s in a row, then a confirmation on the third roll was an auto-kill. I could be misremembering, though. If I can find my 3.5 books later I may thumb through them and see if I can find it.
EDIT: Morphling snuck in under the gun. 3.0 then. Was it removed for 3.5? I just remember seeing it at some point.
It was always an optional rule and an ill-advised one at that.
Sure, it can be fun for a player to roll three 20's in a row (I've seen it happen one time, and I let the PC kill the enemy in a gruesome, splattery kind of way).
But, statistically, most PCs get attacked far more often than they make attacks. Or put another way, in the course of a normal adventure, the GM rolls more attack rolls than the players all put together. So, you're more likely to kill a PC than you are to kill a monster.
Further, monster death is, well, ordinary and expected. No big deal. Bring on the next monster. So while it's fun for a player to splatter an orc, it doesn't really change the game. But PC death is traumatic and game-changing.
Worse, fighters, especially dual-wielders, or even more likely monks, will see this happen far more often than other character types, so it really only benefits characters who make lots of attack rolls over their career. Each player, even if he has a character who makes lots of attacks, will probably only roll one of these, or maybe zero, throughout his character's entire life - statistically, it only happens one time every 8,000 attacks. But the GM will roll half a dozen of these throughout a 20-level campaign, usually killing the tank since he absorbs most of the damage and takes most of the hits. How much fun is that for most players to never roll a triple-20 but one player has his character killed several times when it happens to him?
Combine those things, and a rule that will suddenly change the game by killing a PC and will happen more often to hurt the PCs than to help them, especially hurt one PC more than the rest, is quite ill-advised indeed.
The simple cure, of course, is to only apply it to the PCs and to nobody else. Monsters, NPCs, commoners, etc. - none of them get this rule. That way, the players get an occasional cool, memorable event but the players are never screwed up by the same events working against them.
It was always an optional rule and an ill-advised one at that.
Bah Humbug! It's fun and fine :)
And a quarter as likely as the classic percentile chart on a Nat-20, where 100=Beheading.
But PC death is traumatic...
It is?
The simple cure, of course, is to only apply it to the PCs and to nobody else. Monsters, NPCs, commoners, etc. - none of them get this rule. That way, the players get an occasional cool, memorable event but the players are never screwed up by the same events working against them.
If you're going for the PCs as superheroes, this makes sense. If you want a more realistic, gritty world, it does not.
But PC death is traumatic...It is?
How could it not be?
The player spent some time, probably hours, just thinking up the concept, background, and personality of his character. The GM spent 10 seconds looking at a stat block for the orc.
The player has invested hours, days, weeks, months into building and developing his character and personality as the campaign progresses. The GM has still only spent 10 seconds looking at the stat block for the monster.
When a PC dies, the campaign often comes to a halt, at least for a little while, while the survivors drag the body back to town, scrape up funds for a Raise Dead, more funds for a couple Restorations, and the PC has to suffer at least -1 to all his rolls for a week. When the monster dies, the PCs loot it and move on.
And the worst case, when a PC dies, sometimes that PC cannot come back at all. For example, at low enough levels when the cost of a Raise Dead is prohibitive. This can require the player to sit out the rest of the game, or sit there making a new character while everyone else plays.
All of this means there is far more impact, trauma, for the death of a PC than there is for the death of a monster.
Best case scenario is that the party cleric has a Raise Dead and a Restoration ready to go, so the PC can get right back up after the fight and rejoin the game, but even then, he misses the rest of that fight and he still is -1 to all his rolls for a week - that's still some trauma to deal with.
The simple cure, of course, is to only apply it to the PCs and to nobody else. Monsters, NPCs, commoners, etc. - none of them get this rule. That way, the players get an occasional cool, memorable event but the players are never screwed up by the same events working against them.If you're going for the PCs as superheroes, this makes sense. If you want a more realistic, gritty world, it does not.
Agreed.
Unfortunately, this optional rule causes much more "grit" for the PCs than it does for the monsters. When orc #27 goes down to the triple-20, orc #28 steps up and carries on the fight. But when Aragorn goes down to a lucky triple-20 from orc #47, that could really screw up the current campaign.
If that's what you want, then by all means, go for it; I said "ill-advised", not "impossible" or "unplayable".