Smite dice


4th Edition


The consensus seems to be that smite dice get doubled when the paladin criticals (even though they can choose to do so after seeing the critical has occurred).

However, I've seen some debate about whether the Great Weapon Fighter style allows 1s and 2s to be rerolled on the smite dice as well as the weapon dice. The discussion I saw didn't lead to any consensus.

What do you think? Do you think GWF allows one to reroll smite dice?

What about dice for weapons which grant +1d6 fire damage or similar - do they benefit from rerolls?

Do you think the way one treats criticals and smite dice hould have any bearing on how one treats GWF and smite dice?


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The critical double smite dice. The rules are unambiguous there. It does so for smite, superiority dice, sneak attack etc, even though all of those can be applied after seeing the result of the attack roll.

As for Great Weapon Fighting. There have been multiple different answers to this, sometimes the same developer said it does apply and later answered the opposite to the same question.

According to the most recent Sage advice on the topic great weapon fighting only applies to the weapon's damage dice (as in the greatsword's 2d6, great axe's 1d12 etc) and not any bonus dice, like smite, superiority, sneak attack, fire damage enchantment etc.

As for your last question, no I don't see the connection.


Threeshades wrote:

As for Great Weapon Fighting. There have been multiple different answers to this, sometimes the same developer said it does apply and later answered the opposite to the same question.

According to the most recent Sage advice on the topic great weapon fighting only applies to the weapon's damage dice (as in the greatsword's 2d6, great axe's 1d12 etc) and not any bonus dice, like smite, superiority, sneak attack, fire damage enchantment etc.

Cheers. I know it's been given contradictory answers by developers - I wondered what people thought would be reasonable at their table.


At the table i would advise against rerolling smite for the same reason sage advice does: Too much extra dice rolling.


I do wish they'd made GWF style more like the duelist - rerolling is a painful way to boost anything, IMO.

RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32

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Or just reduce the dice size by one and add 2 to damage.

1d12 becomes 1d10+2

2d6 becomes 2d4+4

Except I love rolling d12s and really really really hate rolling d4s.


Have you seen these?

They sound perfect for you!

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Thanks! I just bought them! :-D

I haven't bought new dice in FOREVER!

Now I can use daggers and magic missiles! :-D


They're pretty good. I just wish they came in more colours.


I think GWF and GWM are strong enough as they are to not have them also reroll the 1s and 2s on every damage die thrown by the player.

I've seen some people complain that it's too difficult to separate out which dice are used for what - but my opinion is that dice are cheap and it's easy to color code them. Plus, I have a bin of dice that my players can use if they want.

RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32

I also agree that those abilities only apply to the weapon dice, not any additional special abilities like Smite, Sneak Attack, or Spells (hex or hunter's mark).


SmiloDan wrote:

Or just reduce the dice size by one and add 2 to damage.

1d12 becomes 1d10+2

2d6 becomes 2d4+4

This almost works except for the case where the GWF rolls a 1|2 twice in a row.

RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32

2097 wrote:
SmiloDan wrote:

Or just reduce the dice size by one and add 2 to damage.

1d12 becomes 1d10+2

2d6 becomes 2d4+4

This almost works except for the case where the GWF rolls a 1|2 twice in a row.

I figure the trade-off is balanced by the reduced critical hit damage. :-P


I'd say GWF applied to weapon only, not Smite but Smite does get doubled on Critical Hits.

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