This is something that's been discussed off and on in the group I play in, but no one has really directly called the players in question on this tactic after they used it. It's a dead topic, but, I finally got frustrated enough with that player's Supposed experience, but in actuality complete lack of knowledge about the system he's using, to ask.
In a fight, a pseudo pacifistic wizard had taken no damage spells, and had nothing to hurt people as a result. Just battlefield control spells, and for some reason he decided to not use those.
Instead, he used Mage Hand's (Yes, plural, he had multiple prepared, and one as a SLA for his race, which somehow means he can have more than one going at the same time) to try to break the monster's neck.
The GM didn't really like this, but it was his second time DMing, and the two players were arguing that this was possible had literally decades of experience each under their respective belts. So, he allowed the wizard to slowly throttle the monster to (Almost) Death (It got better).
The player was pissed. He hadn't wanted to cause it pain or hurt it, just remove the threat it represented, and periodically brings up the injustice that decision represented to his character.
So, here are the questions:
1) The primary argument was that since they can lift 5 pounds, they can apply more than 5 pounds of force each. And having 3-4 of em adds it together. the average human neck only needs 15 pounds of pressure to break. The GM could find nothing in Mage hand that said it could be used to do anything other than lift things.
2) If you have more than one prepared, or from different sources, you can have multiple going according to these two highly experienced players. Oddly enough, aside from their experience, we've seen nothing to indicate this is possible. Seems pretty obvious from the description that you need to be focusing on it to me.
Note: I'm aware of how unbalancing this is. It renders the grapple system useless, it makes first level wizards (And bards) ridiculously powerful assassins, or just AMAZINGLY good Darth Vader cos-players. The GM has since decided that no, this will not work as such. A cantrip should never be able to just directly kill people, not without extremely convoluted circumstances that massively buff or aid the effect (Acid splash a rope someone is hanging onto over a pit, etc).
So, anyone wanna take a whack at this? XD
Mage hand does not generate five pounds of force, it can move a five pound object. It can do nothing to an object even a single ounce over five pounds. What else is there to say?
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Calth has the right of it. The action was impossible from the get-go.
Frankly, sounds like two experienced players trying to buffalo a newbie GM while knowing full well they're making crap up.
There is so much wrong with this.
First off, it targets an object. Not a creature.
Next, as far as I know you can't cast a new spell while maintaining concentration on another. Since the duration of Mage Hand is Concentration, you can never have more than one.
Really, you don't even need to get into anything else to show that this doesn't work.
That's before getting into balance issues. New GM can be forgiven for getting confused. Players taking advantage of that? Not so much.
No no no no no no no no
Oh, and your experienced players sound like some real Richards. If they are truly experienced they would know this is against the rules and are purposefully deceiving the GM.
The sad part is, they AREN'T trying to deceive the GM or pull off a fast one.
They legitimately thought it was within the rules to do this.
I'm not very good with spells, so I didn't notice those two things till later. But, they WERE supposedly more experienced than I was.
Needed to ask, thanks all.
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People like to act if as if "playing forever" makes them better at reading the rules, but I have first hand experience that it doesn't especially if they can't separate editions or they let "how they think it should be" interfere with what the book says.
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"Experienced player" is a multi-edged sword.
Experienced players with rule mastery is great.
Experienced players who don't have rule mastery *suck*, because they think they do, and they are utterly convinced they know the rules when they're talking about things like concentration checks and your spellcraft skill or ::shudders:: crit fails and fumbles.
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Good work, team.
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Experienced players with rule mastery is great.
Experienced players who don't have rule mastery *suck*, because they think they do, and they are utterly convinced they know the rules when they're talking about things like concentration checks and your spellcraft skill or ::shudders:: crit fails and fumbles.
I have learned to LOVE pathfinder's crit system. I will gladly deal with the "Nerf" it received for one powerful reason:
Critical fumbles are gone! They're GONE! No more embedding my weapon in a wall, killing team-mates, dealing with GM fiat in terms of what unfortunate thing is going to happen to you next.
Oh, and not being auto-killed by a goblin who rolled a crit is nice.
Experienced players with rule mastery is great.
Experienced players who don't have rule mastery *suck*, because they think they do, and they are utterly convinced they know the rules when they're talking about things like concentration checks and your spellcraft skill or ::shudders:: crit fails and fumbles.
I have learned to LOVE pathfinder's crit system. I will gladly deal with the "Nerf" it received for one powerful reason:
Critical fumbles are gone! They're GONE! No more embedding my weapon in a wall, killing team-mates, dealing with GM fiat in terms of what unfortunate thing is going to happen to you next.
Oh, and not being auto-killed by a goblin who rolled a crit is nice.
Thing is, crit fumble wasn't part of 3.0 or 3.5. To the best of my knowledge, an actual printed rule for critical fumbles wasn't in the core rulebooks (PHB or DMG) of 2e either.
ETA: Our general rule in 2 was "Roll a 1, drop your weapon." But I don't think that was in the books. I do recall a massive set of Crit tables that came along in a very late 2e book, which I think was Combat and Tactics. It might have had fumble tables, as well, but I don't recall.
Critical failures are just a way of nerfing the martials, since casters can get by without needing to roll them.
The closest Pathfinder gets to critical fumbles are the misfire rules for firearms, and that's just to balance against firearms getting touch attacks.
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What is more dangerous than not having any knowledge?
Having a little knowledge. Just enough to get you into trouble.
Having experience is not an argument. It is the equivalent of simply saying "I'm right, you're wrong, that's the end of it". Technical term is known as the Appeal To Authority logical fallacy.
Experience is fine, but for it to matter they need to back it up with actual rules quotations or arguments.
And bringing real world biology and physics into a fantasy RPG is never a good idea.
-j
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Wow. Just. wow.
This is WAY BEYOND even MY reputed shenanigans.
The first instance of Critical Fumbles was in SpyCraft. However, in Spycraft, Criticals don't automatically happen - either you, another player, or the DM has to activate the Crit by spending an Action Dice. This wasn't an option, either - fumbles existed as a basic and VERY important part of the game.
Firearms' misfire is close to the fumble in SpyCraft.
People had been using Crit Fumbles for years before Pathfinder, though - it was always a houserule, however. Crit Fumbles came into being about the same time Critical Hits first became codified (which was a few years after 1st Ed AD&D surfaced). Critical Hits were a very-common houserule (so much that a lot of people didn't realize they weren't part of the BASIC rules unless they read the PHB cover-to-cover), until they became a core part of the game in 3rd Edition; fumbles weren't codified, however, 'cause having a 5% chance to out-and-out drop your weapon is always suck.
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I can't imagine why anyone would ever want to use fumble rules. "Oh, man, this is gonna be great, I'm gonna take my twf character and sw.. oh, I dropped my scimitar. On my foot. I'm rooted in place and taking 2 points of bleed. MAN THIS IS AWESOME"
The first instance of Critical Fumbles was in SpyCraft. However, in Spycraft, Criticals don't automatically happen - either you, another player, or the DM has to activate the Crit by spending an Action Dice. This wasn't an option, either - fumbles existed as a basic and VERY important part of the game.
As far as I can tell Spycraft was published in 2002.(although I vaguely remember a game from the 80's with a similar name but I could not find it which could be what you meant) Runequest 1st edition was published in 1978 so the origins of Critical success and fumbles goes back at least that far.
I also certainly don't rule out another ancient game predating RQ qith fumbles and Criticals
My group does this:
You Auto-Fail if you roll a Natural 1, and you Crit Fail Threat, as well; you then roll to see if you confirm the Crit Fail - if your roll (with your Bonus) would hit the enemy, you succeed and don't Crit Fail; if you fail (meaning your attack Confirm roll as an attack wouldn't hit the enemy), you drop your weapon; if you roll a natural 1 again, then you automatically Crit Fail, and have bad stuff happen.
When you roll your THIRD time (after rolling 2 Nat 1's in a row): if it's anything but a 1, you take damage equal to the weapon's damage dice; if it's a THIRD natural 1, then you fumble SO horrendously with your weapon that you actually FALL on it, which causes it to do a Coup de Grace on you (no bonus to Strength, though).
This is kinda fair, 'cause the chances of actually fumbling are typically less than 5%, and the worst that happens is the weapon drops from your hands.
The chances of the weapon falling from your hands AND hurting you is .25%, and your chances of FALLING on your weapon is .0125%, or a 1 : 8000 chance of occurring.
Of course, we also use the Triple-Twenty rule as a balance.
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The sad part is, they AREN'T trying to deceive the GM or pull off a fast one. They legitimately thought it was within the rules to do this.
Like many others, I am someone who played 3.5 for years that games with others who also played 3.5 for years. We have a good handle on things but still find small changes between the two rule sets on a regular basis. We also find new things that weren't in 3.5.
Read the fine print! Before using a spell, read the entire thing, not just the one sentance blurb. No one was intentionally trying to deceive, but they were being irresponsible. Spellcasting takes a lot of book keeping.
The first instance of Critical Fumbles was in SpyCraft. However, in Spycraft, Criticals don't automatically happen - either you, another player, or the DM has to activate the Crit by spending an Action Dice. This wasn't an option, either - fumbles existed as a basic and VERY important part of the game.
As far as I can tell Spycraft was published in 2002.(although I vaguely remember a game from the 80's with a similar name but I could not find it which could be what you meant) Runequest 1st edition was published in 1978 so the origins of Critical success and fumbles goes back at least that far.
I also certainly don't rule out another ancient game predating RQ qith fumbles and Criticals
weird - I meant to say "first instance of Critical Fumbles I ENCOUNTERED...
must've deleted that somehow.
Yeah, I knew they went back a long ways. A friend's dad who started playing D&D back when it first premiered showed us a decades-old Crit Chart he used, which included Fumbles as well.
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I will walk away from any table that uses critical fumbles.
I'll play an enchantment-focused Kitsune sorcerer. Attack rolls? What attack rolls?
If I wanted to play an RPG with fumbles, I'd look to see if anybody's made The Three Stooges: The Game
A wise policy BBT. I assume you have also had to play in a critical fumble campaign before? I found Paizo's fumble deck to be the most severe of anything I have ever experienced.
Years ago I made my own version of critical fumbles that had separate results for melee, ranged, and magic attack rolls. Like a critical threat you got to roll to confirm, so you got to make a second roll to save yourself. If that failed, there was a table and each result had varying levels of severity. "No effect" was the best outcome, "turn ends" was the worst, and the rest was in between. Since you were limited to one possible fumble per turn, and the end result was that monsters also got screwed sometimes, none of the players complained about the use of fumbles - which was very surprising to me.
In the end though, it was simply an experiment that lasted a dozen sessions or so, and was never used again. The reason for that was simply lack of interest. Even a reasonable critcal fumble system failed to add anything worthwhile to the games.
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I played with them once.
I had two PCs accidentally kill themselves.
I made it quite clear, after that, I would walk away, if used.
I did put in an exception, that if there was no other way to play, except with critical fumbles, that I would run a reroll focused Witch, and turn the system against my enemies.
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Years ago I made my own version of critical fumbles that had separate results for melee, ranged, and magic attack rolls. Like a critical threat you got to roll to confirm, so you got to make a second roll to save yourself. If that failed, there was a table and each result had varying levels of severity. "No effect" was the best outcome, "turn ends" was the worst, and the rest was in between. Since you were limited to one possible fumble per turn, and the end result was that monsters also got screwed sometimes, none of the players complained about the use of fumbles - which was very surprising to me.
Ending your turn is fine honestly. It's an inconvenience and mildly irratating, but it's not debilitating.
Throwing your warhammer into another PC's head for max damage as you slip and fall prone is just messed up.
Generally, anything that punishes randomly, rather than for a specific reason, makes things less enjoyable.
Only time I've (As a GM) used a Crit Fumble system (Non-DnD/Pathfinder) was one that I made since the default one was... awkward to use. The one I used instead simply modified how you did what you were trying to do. If you rolled a "Fumble" but actually succeeded the roll (Cause having +27 to something HAS to be worthwhile sometimes right? XD). You would succeed while failing in some way. Generally it was a side-grade to what you were actually trying to do. Running down the stairs at full speed would end up having you fall down them, take damage, but hey you made it down and helped someone else do the same. Of course, I did the same with Successes. If you failed a roll, but did so with a Crit, you would "Effectively" Succeed anyway. Attempting to avoid a Bad guy, but failing with a Crit Success would result in that you did indeed fail at avoiding the bad guy, but managed to trip him, or elbow him away from you, effectively still getting away from him.
Really, all it resulted in was fun. The players all enjoyed it, and were extremely willing to take risks for the chance at a good payout.
Hmmm... wonder how well this would work in Pathfinder...
Those are some great examples of bad critical fumble systems.
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Witch with Misfortune, Ill-Omen, Accursed Glare, Pugwampi's Grace, and various other reroll mechanics.
Watch, as all the DMs Monster, NPCs, big bad bosses, all bungle around, and kill themselves, by effects, that are all now possible save or die effects.
Oh, and all the Martial PCs will eventually murder themselves.
Fun times!
The only time I've played at a table with critical fumbles was at an organized event. The GM was hosting an unofficial session between the official ones, and he made it absolutely clear that his fumble deck was only for the monsters and bad guys.
It's the only time it was actually kind of fun.
I will walk away from any table that uses critical fumbles.
I'll play an enchantment-focused Kitsune sorcerer. Attack rolls? What attack rolls?
If I wanted to play an RPG with fumbles, I'd look to see if anybody's made The Three Stooges: The Game
The last time I played a game with crit fumbles was when I joined my current group. They were playing 3.5 with a ton of house rules, including a brutal critical fumble system that led to our sorcerer insta-killing himself with a scorching ray and a high rate of fire archer who would have his attack sequence stop early every two or three rounds. I was going to play a fun little oddball assassin Beguiler (the race, not the class) but decided instead to play a minmaxed to hell cleric that went something like eight or nine sessions before he ever made an attack roll. I just spent entire sessions buffing the party's AC so that the enemies all had to roll natural 20s to hit. They were just as likely to injure themselves as they were to injure my teammates.
I dont think those "experienced players" were purposefully deceiving DM to allow this - i fancy myself decently experienced and once unintentionally misled DM into thinking that Channel Energy do not affect outsiders when our cleric channeled near some monstrosity - I geniunely though it does not unless you have Alignment Channel, but actually you need that feat if you want to affect ONLY outsiders of specific alignment. Did not affected anything at the end but more you know :)
I will walk away from any table that uses critical fumbles.
I kinda like doing a fumbles but I make them rarer by making it so they also have to be confirmed: DC 10 Strength or Dex check, characters choice. Make it and it is just a miss. In the end it essentially means most PCs end up with a 1/400 chance of something bad happening on an attack. NPCs aren't afforded the same luxury though unless they are important; those goblins botch like crazy as a result, mostly to the tune of losing their turn and provoking an AoO, dropping their weapon, or falling prone.
That aside, the initial topic make me unreasonably angry when I read it, which lessened slightly when I read the part about how this was totally an honest mistake, but g@*@&!n.
My group actually *likes* critical fumbles - though of course they like critical hit tables even more. I'm far less enthusiastic, but with the following caveats, I think it's not quite as bad as some of the above descriptions:
1) Only the first attack roll in a round risks a critical fumble at all (removing the odd spectacle of high-level characters fumbling more often than newbs);
2) After a natural "1" you roll again to "confirm" the fumble, a miss vs the original AC is considered a confirmation (again, skilled fighters will risk fumbles less often, unless they're also facing highly skilled or defensive opponents);
3) The critical fumble results are tweaked so that nothing really bad can happen (no insta-killing or even max damaging yourself or your buddies). All negative results have a specific DR saving throw (usually reflex or fortitude).
Results are things like breaking your bowstring, dropping your weapon or shield or a carried item, slipping into a random adjacent square (no AoO, can occasionally be beneficial), slipping and falling prone, slipping and being staggered for one round, etc. Always with a saving throw to avoid the result.
The players in our group love it. I feel that it just adds more useless dice rolling and slows things down. But in many players' gaming experience, critical hit and fumble tables are deeply ingrained. Last night, a critical hit (nat 20/nat 20/15) tore an arm off a troll. It stopped bleeding after one round, thanks to regeneration, but had to finish the fight with only one clas and a bite. The severed arm was crawling towards the troll when one player (cowering with 2 hit points) spent an action to kick it into a deep pool.
It's those cinematic, crazy moments that liven up the tedium of running through the initiative order and tallying hit point losses.
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I will walk away from any table that uses critical fumbles.
I'll play an enchantment-focused Kitsune sorcerer. Attack rolls? What attack rolls?
If I wanted to play an RPG with fumbles, I'd look to see if anybody's made The Three Stooges: The Game
AKA Paranoia.
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This is kinda fair, 'cause the chances of actually fumbling are typically less than 5%, ...
Until you advance to higher levels where you make more attacks. You chance of fumbling during the round increases with more attacks, when it should decrease because you are better.
It also penalized martials but not casters, because many spells do not require attack rolls.
Our DM breaks our strings for every natural 1 with a bow/crossbow.
So, after 13 shots, you have a cumulative 50% of a broken bowstring.
It sucks.
So natural 1 = broken weapon. Did this also apply to swords? Bowstrings are designed to handle normal use, and breakage is due to age or improper care, not to being used as designed. IRL I have used bows and let off hundreds of shots. Being not so great, I am sure I had many misfires, and did suffer arrows that went somewhere not intended. I never had a string break. This is a bad rule, and not even realistic.
/cevah
AKA Paranoia.I will walk away from any table that uses critical fumbles.
I'll play an enchantment-focused Kitsune sorcerer. Attack rolls? What attack rolls?
If I wanted to play an RPG with fumbles, I'd look to see if anybody's made The Three Stooges: The Game
Yeah, basically.
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If I were going to equip an army, and I decided I needed a ranged weapon, I would not pick one that failed one in twenty times. It wouldn't exist. That's not a weapon, that's a farce. I can do better with stone-age drek made from shiny rocks.
This is kinda fair, 'cause the chances of actually fumbling are typically less than 5%, ...Until you advance to higher levels where you make more attacks. You chance of fumbling during the round increases with more attacks, when it should decrease because you are better.
It also penalized martials but not casters, because many spells do not require attack rolls.
Our DM breaks our strings for every natural 1 with a bow/crossbow.
So, after 13 shots, you have a cumulative 50% of a broken bowstring.
It sucks.
So natural 1 = broken weapon. Did this also apply to swords? Bowstrings are designed to handle normal use, and breakage is due to age or improper care, not to being used as designed. IRL I have used bows and let off hundreds of shots. Being not so great, I am sure I had many misfires, and did suffer arrows that went somewhere not intended. I never had a string break. This is a bad rule, and not even realistic.
/cevah
Nah, melee weapons get to 'confirm' the critical failure by rolling another 'to hit'. If they miss, they usually just drop the weapon unless there are some other significant circumstances that makes a different failure more flavorful.
Yeah, I pushed back a little on the string breaking rule, but I guess nobody has learned how to make non-crappy strings in that game world. ;)
The % might be <5%, but it still adds up with multiple attacks.
Let's say it worked out to 3%:1st level: 1 attack = 3% fail at least once.
20th level: 4 attack = 11.5% fail at least once.
20th level TWF: 7 atacks = 19.2% fail at least once.
More attacks = greater chance of failure.
Higher level = more attacks
Therefore, higher level = greater chance of failure.
Any critical failure system that punishes you for getting better is a system that does not work.
If failure causes a dropped weapon, they loose the rest of the round unless they are wielding another ready weapon or have quickdraw and another weapon. Then you also impose an AoO on the character as the next round they pick it up with a move action. This can really hurt a character. Since they used a move action, they cannot make a full-round-attack. For low level chars with only one attack, this has no effect. For a character that gets +6 attacks on a full-round-attack, this nerfs them big time.
This also affects casters differently. What do they drop? Free hands are good for a caster. They do not get hit with an AoO, nor a loss of full-round-attack. They don't even loose a second spell if they have one quickened. So this "rule" is weighted against high level martials and has almost no effect on casters. Where is this fair?
You want fair? Then critical fumbles can not affect combat. Let them be story elements instead. Makes them more fun for all, and is fair.
/cevah