Confirming critical hits threatened by a natural 20 without matching the AC

[The Friendly Lich]

A natural 20 on an attack roll always hits, even when the result is lower than the AC.

A natural 20 also is a critical threat.

But can you confirm a critical threat with a natural 20, even if the result of the confirmation roll is lower than the AC?

This is what the CRB says on the matter:

Quote:

If the confirmation roll also results in a hit against the target's AC, your original hit is a critical hit.

Is the phrase "a hit against the taget's AC" supposed to imply that you have to beat the AC to confirm the critical?

As in: "you must hit by matching the target's AC to confirm a critical threat - hitting with a natural 20 alone without also matching the AC is not enough to confirm the critical, even though it hits."?

[Lincoln Hills]

Right! If the confirmation roll does not meet the target's AC, the confirmation fails and the natural 20 is merely a regular hit.

Incidentally, if this ever happens, you're fighting way out of your weight class and should probably have spent the turn running away.

[Are]

A 20 on the confirmation roll automatically confirms regardless of the AC, since a confirmation roll is an attack roll, and a 20 on an attack roll always hits.

The two sentences before your quote wrote:

When you make an attack roll and get a natural 20 (the d20 shows 20), you hit regardless of your target's Armor Class, and you have scored a “threat,” meaning the hit might be a critical hit (or “crit”). To find out if it's a critical hit, you immediately make an attempt to “confirm” the critical hit—another attack roll with all the same modifiers as the attack roll you just made.

[Ughbash]

Two 20's is always a crit.

Odds of that happening are 1 in 400 normally ,1 in 10 when one of my friends rolls, and 0 when I roll.

[Calybos1]

Ughbash wrote:

Two 20's is always a crit.

Odds of that happening are 1 in 400 normally ,1 in 10 when one of my friends rolls, and 0 when I roll.

You've noticed that too, huh? Personally, I find that my best odds of rolling a 1 come from crit-confirmation checks.

[Orfamay Quest]

The Friendly Lich wrote:

This is what the CRB says on the matter:

Quote:

If the confirmation roll also results in a hit against the target's AC, your original hit is a critical hit.

Is the phrase "a hit against the taget's AC" supposed to imply that you have to beat the AC to confirm the critical?

No. That just tells you what the target number is (as opposed to, for example trying to 'hit' the touch AC or CMD). The rule that a natural 20 is always a hit means that a natural 20 on the confirmation roll is still a hit.

[Ughbash]

Calybos1 wrote:

Ughbash wrote:

Two 20's is always a crit.

Odds of that happening are 1 in 400 normally ,1 in 10 when one of my friends rolls, and 0 when I roll.

You've noticed that too, huh? Personally, I find that my best odds of rolling a 1 come from crit-confirmation checks.

My best chance of rolling a one is when I say, "I can make this save on anything but a one". That is usually followed by using a reroll ability and another 1.

[FrodoOf9Fingers]

There should always be a chance to critically hit. I mean, just look at the great warrior Achilles, obviously a high level fighter. He get's one shotted by Paris, who had little skill for warfare. Anyone ca land a critical, anyone.

[Lincoln Hills]

That nancy-boy? He probably took credit for somebody else's arrow. ;)

Hm. I interpreted the third sentence as an absolute, but the second does specify 'all the same modifiers' - which I've always assumed to refer to numeric penalties and bonuses, without realizing it could be read as a recursive reference to the first sentence. I'd say "I've been doing it wrong," except that it's never come up in play for me, so technically I haven't been doing it wrong. ;)

[Malachi Silverclaw]

The crucial part is that the confirmation roll is indeed an attack roll, and attack rolls (and therefore confirmation rolls) and saving throws auto hit/make on a nat 20 and auto miss/fail on a nat 1.