Ignore handringing by Martial characters. Critical failures NEED to count for meele & ranged attack rolls in Pathfinder 2E!


Prerelease Discussion

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Quote:

I disagree that your assertion of a martial class is equal to an olympian at any level below 9th. Even 9th level is pushing it. An olympian would be like 15th level and above character.

most World Records on Earth can be broken by a character who is 5th level. takr a 5th level character with an 18 dexterity, acrobatics as a class skill with 5 ranks and Skill Focus. they can clear the World Long Jump Record 30% of the time which is a lot more reliable than real world olympic leapers.


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Vidmaster7 wrote:
Ryan Freire wrote:

Call baloney all you want. How many tens or hundreds of thousands of rounds are fired for every incident of friendly fire? How do you manage that miniscule chance at a table without stopping combat and bogging it down.

I'm not for critical fails but I will say that the game isn't a perfect simulation some things are meant to be more symbolic. So you probably are not going to perfectly recreate the 1 in 38 thousand or whatever that the chance for an actual critical fail might be. but if its very unlikely its probably close enough. ofcourse my thought if you want to keep critical fails is just make the fails be very slight disadvantages. like a -2 here or their.

If the chances are that low why add it?


Ryan Freire wrote:
Vidmaster7 wrote:
Ryan Freire wrote:

Call baloney all you want. How many tens or hundreds of thousands of rounds are fired for every incident of friendly fire? How do you manage that miniscule chance at a table without stopping combat and bogging it down.

I'm not for critical fails but I will say that the game isn't a perfect simulation some things are meant to be more symbolic. So you probably are not going to perfectly recreate the 1 in 38 thousand or whatever that the chance for an actual critical fail might be. but if its very unlikely its probably close enough. ofcourse my thought if you want to keep critical fails is just make the fails be very slight disadvantages. like a -2 here or their.
If the chances are that low why add it?

Oh you missed my point entirely. let me try again. real life chances of a crit fail might be really low. however PF isn't a perfect simulation. So in order to make it it fit into a system where probability is based on a d20 it becomes necessary to increase the chances of a critical fail to something that doesn't perfectly simulate reality. which is done multiple times in the system already because pathfinder once again isn't a perfect simulation of real life.

Now I don't think their should be crit fails however if they were going to be a thing I think the crit fails should be minor things like small penalties the next round or something like that.


Wait Spell's can't fumble?

News to me.


MerlinCross wrote:

Wait Spell's can't fumble?

News to me.

Crit success seems like its going to have a pretty big impact.


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Talek & Luna wrote:
Megistone wrote:
Talek & Luna wrote:
It does not UNFAIRLY punish martial characters because martial characters are REWARDED with extra damage on a critical hit. Just like how blaster spells are being rewarded with extra damage on a critical fumble and NO damage on a critical success, martial characters should follow the same formula. Its really not that hard to understand.

I'd just like to point out that in the previewed rules casters are already at an advantage.

Martials:
-Critical success: double damage
-Success: normal damage
-Failure: no damage
-Critical failure: no damage.

Casters (with blasts) have it reversed because it's not an attack roll but a saving throw, so:
-Critical failure: double damage
-Failure: normal damage
-Success: half damage
-Critical success: no damage.

Why would you want to punish martials further? If you introduce a rule that a critical success on a saving throw reflects the spell on the caster, than sure, but as it stands... no.

If cantrips worked that way you would have a point but from the spells preview they don't seem to. When I cast a fireball I spend a resource slot that I most likely won't get back. When I use a wand I have to spend resonance. When you swing a sword it costs you nothing, you can swing your sword next round and the round after for infinity unless your character is removed from combat. I don't get to cast fireball ad nausea therefore I get half damage on a save.

Let me put it to you this way. Would you say that if we were playing in a modern setting that if I threw a grenade at you in the open field and it blast area included you, you should suffer no damage if there is no cover between you and the blast? Fireball works on the same principal. Its not that hard to figure out.

Of course the caster is expending resources: the effect is much greater. You are firing a fireball for big AoE damage, or a scorching ray for 4d6 at range targeting touch AC, or magic missile for unfailing force damage. That's not comparable to a sword swing.

Besides, a martial may be expending resources too: rounds or rage, ki points (or whatever they will be now), magical arrows...

The problem here is that you are proposing a rule that would make magic even stronger compared to mundane in combat, when the disparity between the two is already problematic.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Maps Subscriber
Vidmaster7 wrote:
Hmm action lose I wonder if we can look at it in stages since that seems to be the way tings are moving so step 1 1 action step 2 2 etc till your complelty unable to do anything.

In the podcast this was called slow. Slow 1 meant you lost 1 action.


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I can't help but admire how the topic name essentially reads as "Ignore the people who actually have to deal with the problem."

That being said...

Talek & Luna wrote:

Real easy. "Ryan, I see you rolled a 1 on a D20. That is a critical failure. You lose one action. Ok, Bob what are you doing this round?"

Next

"Hey Ruyan, after one action to move, you lost the rest of your round to a failed attack. I hope you had fun not doing anything meaningful and ending up as a target next to the enemy.

Okay Bob, what is your caster who AoEs entire groups so there's always someone bound to be hit, who has more than enough resources for the entire day, and never has to worry about backlash because critical save successes don't work that way going to do?"

Caster resource expenditure is only relevant if they aren't expected to use these resources in every round of combat. So, unless "the casters ran out of resources, now they're just sitting there being useless" is their equivalent of a critically failed attack roll, in addition to all the positioning and only occasionally useful actions martials suffer more from than casters, your suggested "skip a turn, be useless" only affects martials.

It really does feel like "Ignore martials, I need them to suffer" is the appropriate reading here.
(Unless your casters spend 10% of all combat out of resources (martials would have a 5% chance for two missed actions, so they'd lose about 10% of their actions), in which case everyone suffers, but at least equally?)


Asmodeus' Unholy Barrister wrote:

I can't help but admire how the topic name essentially reads as "Ignore the people who actually have to deal with the problem."

That being said...

Talek & Luna wrote:

Real easy. "Ryan, I see you rolled a 1 on a D20. That is a critical failure. You lose one action. Ok, Bob what are you doing this round?"

Next

"Hey Ruyan, after one action to move, you lost the rest of your round to a failed attack. I hope you had fun not doing anything meaningful and ending up as a target next to the enemy.

Okay Bob, what is your caster who AoEs entire groups so there's always someone bound to be hit, who has more than enough resources for the entire day, and never has to worry about backlash because critical save successes don't work that way going to do?"

The solution is simple: Implement Tzeentch's/Nethys' Curse and/or Wrath of the Gods! Fighter loses an action occasionally to nat 1s? Well the wizard occasionally gets dragged screaming into the Realms of Cha- I mean Abbadon never to return among several d100s worth of other fun (for the GM/rest of the table) things! Equality!*

*Disclaimer: Do not actually do this. As much as I love those things, you'd need a system gutting and a complete flavor rewiring to make it work and make sense.


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Ilina Aniri wrote:
most World Records on Earth can be broken by a character who is 5th level. takr a 5th level character with an 18 dexterity, acrobatics as a class skill with 5 ranks and Skill Focus. they can clear the World Long Jump Record 30% of the time which is a lot more reliable than real world olympic leapers.

And let's not forget that, assuming they have a mildly above average Strength score of 12, they can break that world record while wearing leather armor and carrying a 25 pound pack. Let's see Olympians do that. The correlation between D&D/Pathfinder characters and real world athletes is shaky at best.

Scarab Sages

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Talek & Luna wrote:

Yeah, I said it!

I really like the tiered concept of critical failure, failure, success and critical success in Pathfinder. This system needs to be at the heart of all aspects of combat, not just spell saves and skill checks! Combat is the closes thing that approaches pure chaos and the dice rolls need to reflect this. Here are two examples I can think of for critical failures. Let me know if you can think of others.

A) A critical failure results in the loss of one action. If no other actions are available this round, this missed action carries over to the next round.

B) A critical fumble results in the fumblerer exposing herself to extreme danger and risk. The next single attack roll against her is a critical hit if it succeedes. If the attack misses or no attacks are made against the fumbler then the effects of the critical fumble expire at the start of the next round.

No thanks.

The Exchange

Asmodeus' Unholy Barrister wrote:

I can't help but admire how the topic name essentially reads as "Ignore the people who actually have to deal with the problem."

That being said...

Talek & Luna wrote:

Real easy. "Ryan, I see you rolled a 1 on a D20. That is a critical failure. You lose one action. Ok, Bob what are you doing this round?"

Next

"Hey Ruyan, after one action to move, you lost the rest of your round to a failed attack. I hope you had fun not doing anything meaningful and ending up as a target next to the enemy.

Okay Bob, what is your caster who AoEs entire groups so there's always someone bound to be hit, who has more than enough resources for the entire day, and never has to worry about backlash because critical save successes don't work that way going to do?"

Caster resource expenditure is only relevant if they aren't expected to use these resources in every round of combat. So, unless "the casters ran out of resources, now they're just sitting there being useless" is their equivalent of a critically failed attack roll, in addition to all the positioning and only occasionally useful actions martials suffer more from than casters, your suggested "skip a turn, be useless" only affects martials.

It really does feel like "Ignore martials, I need them to suffer" is the appropriate reading here.
(Unless your casters spend 10% of all combat out of resources (martials would have a 5% chance for two missed actions, so they'd lose about 10% of their actions), in which case everyone suffers, but at least equally?)

Your example is a false equivalency. If losing out on a single action in a round is devastating to a martial character then so is a miss. A miss would be such a waste of an action that you should write Paizo and insist that the cumulative penalties for multiple attacks in a round are unfair. Get real!

Spells suffer from all kinds of limitations and restrictions such as immunities, saves, attack roll requirements, components, etc. They are a limited resource and if you blow your compliment of them in a few battles you suffer serious combat impairement. Also, you should not be a one trick pony and have the ability to use spells for other purposes so you are MUCH more limited in your options and a miss on a target is a big deal.

Funny how much you downplay a single aoe miss due to a successful or critical successful save but act is if THE SKY IS FALLING if the same ruling is applied to a martial character who has this UNLIMITED resource. It doesn't add up and neither does your argument.

The Exchange

Tarik Blackhands wrote:
Asmodeus' Unholy Barrister wrote:

I can't help but admire how the topic name essentially reads as "Ignore the people who actually have to deal with the problem."

That being said...

Talek & Luna wrote:

Real easy. "Ryan, I see you rolled a 1 on a D20. That is a critical failure. You lose one action. Ok, Bob what are you doing this round?"

Next

"Hey Ruyan, after one action to move, you lost the rest of your round to a failed attack. I hope you had fun not doing anything meaningful and ending up as a target next to the enemy.

Okay Bob, what is your caster who AoEs entire groups so there's always someone bound to be hit, who has more than enough resources for the entire day, and never has to worry about backlash because critical save successes don't work that way going to do?"

The solution is simple: Implement Tzeentch's/Nethys' Curse and/or Wrath of the Gods! Fighter loses an action occasionally to nat 1s? Well the wizard occasionally gets dragged screaming into the Realms of Cha- I mean Abbadon never to return among several d100s worth of other fun (for the GM/rest of the table) things! Equality!*

*Disclaimer: Do not actually do this. As much as I love those things, you'd need a system gutting and a complete flavor rewiring to make it work and make sense.

Please don't do that to wizards. It will drive martial classes insane with envy. So some chump caster in a bathrobe who can barely pull off a sleep spell gets to rip open a planar rift and have some big, bad Demon Lord drag him away kicking and screaming? This chump can suddenly cast a Gate Spell at 1rst level! OP! OP! Hit them with the nerf bat! A martial rolls a 1 and only loses a single action by dropping his sword?Outrage! I demand that my sword drop causes the ground to split open and I fall into the Pit of Tarterus! I should also be able to survive a 7 day fall by being able to go into slow metabolic state. Why not? Druids can cast goodberry and survive for seven days on 1 casting! I demand a feat that does the EXACT same thing or else I am being cheated! I also demand a martial slow fall ability at will since all objects fall at the same speed and that wimpy monk in his pajamas can fall great distances without harm (probably a wizard in disquise!) and wizards can cast featherfall I demand the same for martials so that they don't feel cheated! Martial characters should be able to planar travel just like casters when they roll a 1 darn it!

I really don't want that but some martials will demand it since, you know, casters rule the multiverse and there is no reason to build another type of character.

To you good sir or madame I politely but most assuredly reply "Baloney"

The Exchange

Ilina Aniri wrote:
Quote:

I disagree that your assertion of a martial class is equal to an olympian at any level below 9th. Even 9th level is pushing it. An olympian would be like 15th level and above character.

most World Records on Earth can be broken by a character who is 5th level. takr a 5th level character with an 18 dexterity, acrobatics as a class skill with 5 ranks and Skill Focus. they can clear the World Long Jump Record 30% of the time which is a lot more reliable than real world Olympic leapers.

Yeah and they can take far more damage in a fight than a normal person could using lethal weapons in any normal circumstance. So what? You are handing out the near ultimate in human dexterity, probably the ultimate as I have never witnessed what I would consider a 20 dexterity and given that to a mid level character. It does not make that character Olympic in a fantasy setting at all. It makes them low to average at best.

The Exchange

MerlinCross wrote:

Wait Spell's can't fumble?

News to me.

As written now, no they cannot. Neither can melee attacks. The point of my thread is making BOTH open to being critical fumbles since BOTH can be critical successes by the tiny bit of rules they have released so far.


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Talek & Luna wrote:
Ilina Aniri wrote:
Quote:

I disagree that your assertion of a martial class is equal to an olympian at any level below 9th. Even 9th level is pushing it. An olympian would be like 15th level and above character.

most World Records on Earth can be broken by a character who is 5th level. takr a 5th level character with an 18 dexterity, acrobatics as a class skill with 5 ranks and Skill Focus. they can clear the World Long Jump Record 30% of the time which is a lot more reliable than real world Olympic leapers.
Yeah and they can take far more damage in a fight than a normal person could using lethal weapons in any normal circumstance. So what? You are handing out the near ultimate in human dexterity, probably the ultimate as I have never witnessed what I would consider a 20 dexterity and given that to a mid level character. It does not make that character Olympic in a fantasy setting at all. It makes them low to average at best.

if said character existed in our world, they would dominate olympic long jumps every f%+!ing time. the world record isn't even 30 feet, and this 5th level character can leap 30 or more feet forward 30% of the time. our best olympic leaper could leap like 28 feet on a crit naked. give the 5th level character a 25 pound pack, a strength of 12 and a suit of leather armor and they still have a 30% chance of breaking the 30 feet, which is more than the 28 foot long jump record.

considering most of the hardest knowledge or craft related checks in our world can be done in Pathfinder with a DC of 20 or 25. take a Mathmetician with 18 intelligence, 5 ranks in knowledge (mathematics), has knowledge (mathematics) as a class skill and skill focus. they can literally take 10 and solve any real world mathematical equation.

you won't beleive how many 4th-6th level characters have an 18-22 in their primary stat before magic items.


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Talek & Luna wrote:
MerlinCross wrote:

Wait Spell's can't fumble?

News to me.

As written now, no they cannot. Neither can melee attacks. The point of my thread is making BOTH open to being critical fumbles since BOTH can be critical successes by the tiny bit of rules they have released so far.

And you're fighting up a waterfall with one hand tied behind your back because the vast majority of the playerbase despises critical fumble results.


missing an attack isn't the same as losing an action 5 percent of the time. i wouldn't want spellcasters to waste a spell slot 5 percent of the time either. fumbles for nobody. and before you say "casters have a limited amount of spells per day."

Spells ignore A Target's Armor, can be tailored to Target Lower Saving throws, Generally have the Capacity to Affect Several Targets at once, can be done at longer ranges, generally have effects more crippling than raw damage, can be tailored to the lowest resistance, and casters have more than enough spellpower to cast a meaningful spell every round of combat and still have enough utility spells to solve every issue out there.

a country having one or two nukes in thier arsenal doesn't change the devastation said country could do to a signifficant portion of the planet with merely a single nuke. if you look at the Stuff Moses did in the bible, those are all comparable to the power level of a 5th level wizard casting maybe 3rd level spells.


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Talek & Luna wrote:
Spells suffer from all kinds of limitations and restrictions such as immunities, saves, attack roll requirements, components, etc. They are a limited resource and if you blow your compliment of them in a few battles you suffer serious combat impairement. Also, you should not be a one trick pony and have the ability to use spells for other purposes so you are MUCH more limited in your options and a miss on a target is a big deal.

Martial attacks suffer from all kinds of limitations and restrictions such as resistances, miss chances, attack roll requirements (heh), and melee attacks suffer from further requirements such as positioning and being in immediate enemy vicinity while ranged attacks can be completely shut down by the weather (or some spells).

In addition to that, some martials like barbarians need to spend various limited resources (like rounds of rage) to be competitive, making any lost round twice as painful, while those that can technically swing their swords all day only get the chance to do so during combat - the ten thousand sword swings they might do out of combat aren't relevant.
And that's just if they're willing to be one-trick-ponies - if they want to do anything except hit point damage, they have to spend far more permanent resources like feats on it just to stay competitive in one or two extra tricks.

But it's casters that are limited because they don't have infinite spells per day?

The way that you focus only on caster restrictions while ignoring martial restrictions, in addition to the "ignore martial characters" in the title makes you look like someone who has no idea how martials are played in practice trying to dictate rules for them.

(I mean, you seriously listed "attack rolls" as limitation of spells? Something that's needed for every single martial attack of any kind?)

Long story short, the "false equivalency" begins at the premise of the thread. Spells and martial attacks were never equal to begin with, so having attack rolls work like saving throws makes no sense. (Which, by the way, is a defense you're using whenever someone brings up "Well, then critically succeeding on a saving throw should penalize the caster!")


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I'm of the opinion that the possibility of fumbles, especially with the +/- 10 system, means characters (especially martials) have to better gauge their plan of attack, and is what I do on a regular basis, because yes, our table plays with fumble rules. Even being an archer type, I have to gauge whether I want to full volley the boss (and risk very easy fumbles), or split my weaker attacks to lesser enemies in an attempt to properly get the most out of my turn.

A game where I sit in one spot and end big bad monsters with a single full attack action isn't very exciting if all it is, is a matter of rolling dice just to see if I don't roll a 1 or 20, or having damage dice that don't matter because modifiers are the meta and greatly outweigh any need for dice rolls.

Attack plans should matter outside of "I full attack it to death," and while PF2 is making progress in avoiding this, having a fumble system is also a good way to enforce this, because maybe a player is smart enough to not make 20 attacks and realize that only 3 or 4 of them can reliably hit. Or, a player may be risky and decide he wants to roll the possibilities of very likely failure in hopes of getting more success on a favorable dice roll.

So before people sit there and badmouth fumbles because they only cause negative things (I've had fumble cards still turn misses into hits, just with a negative side effect), understand that it was created to make combats more dynamic and change how players approach a situation in an attempt to spice up combat.


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Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
I'm of the opinion that the possibility of fumbles, especially with the +/- 10 system, means characters (especially martials) have to better gauge their plan of attack, and is what I do on a regular basis, because yes, our table plays with fumble rules. Even being an archer type, I have to gauge whether I want to full volley the boss (and risk very easy fumbles), or split my weaker attacks to lesser enemies in an attempt to properly get the most out of my turn.

For me, it doesn't make a lot of internal sense that I drop my bow or fumble my arrows MORE often against a boss than a minion or a stationary target. Miss more, sure. Fumble? I can't think of a logical reason why, or a in game consistent reason for that matter.

Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
So before people sit there and badmouth fumbles because they only cause negative things (I've had fumble cards still turn misses into hits, just with a negative side effect), understand that it was created to make combats more dynamic and change how players approach a situation in an attempt to spice up combat.

IMO, I don't mind 'spicing up combat' or 'more dynamic' fights, but I'd rather they be from something that makes some sense. tactical positioning, environmental concerns, multiple different 'sides' in the attack are all ways to inject some interesting situations into the fight without some kind of 'unlucky field' projecting from every boss type creatures that forces more fumbles on you, cuz spice?...


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Darksol the Painbringer wrote:


understand that it was created to make combats more dynamic and change how players approach a situation in an attempt to spice up combat.

Understand that spice is a personal taste. Fumbles are like cilantro, but only if the vast majority of people had that genetic expression that caused cilantro to taste like dish soap to them.


Ryan Freire wrote:
Darksol the Painbringer wrote:


understand that it was created to make combats more dynamic and change how players approach a situation in an attempt to spice up combat.
Understand that spice is a personal taste. Fumbles are like cilantro, but only if the vast majority of people had that genetic expression that caused cilantro to taste like dish soap to them.

yeah, this... Man, I HATE cilantro and how it seems to get thrown in everything these days... :P It's a good way to get me to NEVER buy that product/food again.


graystone wrote:
Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
I'm of the opinion that the possibility of fumbles, especially with the +/- 10 system, means characters (especially martials) have to better gauge their plan of attack, and is what I do on a regular basis, because yes, our table plays with fumble rules. Even being an archer type, I have to gauge whether I want to full volley the boss (and risk very easy fumbles), or split my weaker attacks to lesser enemies in an attempt to properly get the most out of my turn.

For me, it doesn't make a lot of internal sense that I drop my bow or fumble my arrows MORE often against a boss than a minion or a stationary target. Miss more, sure. Fumble? I can't think of a logical reason why, or a in game consistent reason for that matter.

Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
So before people sit there and badmouth fumbles because they only cause negative things (I've had fumble cards still turn misses into hits, just with a negative side effect), understand that it was created to make combats more dynamic and change how players approach a situation in an attempt to spice up combat.
IMO, I don't mind 'spicing up combat' or 'more dynamic' fights, but I'd rather they be from something that makes some sense. tactical positioning, environmental concerns, multiple different 'sides' in the attack are all ways to inject some interesting situations into the fight without some kind of 'unlucky field' projecting from every boss type creatures that forces more fumbles on you, cuz spice?...

Well, that's because the fumbles are based off of what enemy you face and their AC. BBEG having better A.C. means you are more likely to fumble on him. A system that is a flat chance to fumble means you're just as likely to fumble on a mook as the BBEG, but is also not very exciting to happen. I imagine there are better ways to handle this, but since PF2 basically has this baked in with the +/- 10 system, you would have to either handwave it or find another system that doesn't function that way, since it's here to stay.


Ryan Freire wrote:
Darksol the Painbringer wrote:


understand that it was created to make combats more dynamic and change how players approach a situation in an attempt to spice up combat.
Understand that spice is a personal taste. Fumbles are like cilantro, but only if the vast majority of people had that genetic expression that caused cilantro to taste like dish soap to them.

I don't know what cilantro is, I don't eat fancy foods with outlandish french/spanish/italian/whatever names in them. They're usually too expensive and require an acquired taste to actually enjoy.

That being said, spice isn't for everyone, obviously. I mean, I don't handle spices that well, especially sauces, but if that's the case, a game with less dynamics, mechanics, and concepts in it would probably be more suited to such people.


Cilantro is a common mexican food spice. I'm pretty sure it features in some Indian cuisine as well but im not super familiar with Indian. Many people like it, it isnt actually that spicy, but a certain percentage of the population,literally on a genetic level, tastes it like it was a mouth full of dish soap.

Either way I'm pretty ok for some critters and classes having a reaction to a miss by 10 or more, but im not down with a baked in crit fumble system. I can probably get over goblin inclusion, or even non LG paladins more than i will be able to get over a crit fumble system. People want to complain about artifacts of an ancient time in the gaming world, crit fumbles are the shining jewel of such past-their-prime traditions.


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Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
I don't know what cilantro is,

It's a plant. The leaf is used to garnish some foods for a particular taste. For most people, it ranges from the "not bad, but meh" to the "I like it" range.

For some people, like Greystone and my wife, they have a genetic expression that makes cilantro taste like soap, and it's absolutely disgusting to them.

Likewise, fumble charts and rules are also of a particular gaming taste. Some people, like you, enjoy them. Heck, even I enjoy them in some games (and the chart is a huge reason why I love wild mages in D&D 2e and 5e). But for a lot of people, they don't like it.

Because the majority of people don't like it, it's better to be something you house rule into a game, rather than forcing the majority of gamers to house rule it out of a game. Hell, I've even house ruled fumble charts into PF games before - and it can be fun, but only for some style of games and only when the whole group is on board.


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Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
Well, that's because the fumbles are based off of what enemy you face and their AC. BBEG having better A.C. means you are more likely to fumble on him. A system that is a flat chance to fumble means you're just as likely to fumble on a mook as the BBEG, but is also not very exciting to happen. I imagine there are better ways to handle this, but since PF2 basically has this baked in with the +/- 10 system, you would have to either handwave it or find another system that doesn't...

Oh, I understand the mechanics... It's just the results that are... odd at best. A far away targets AC DON'T make it harder for you to shoot: hit, SURE but it loosens your grip on your weapon? greases your arrows? IMO, excitement takes a back seat to making sense. Unless you gain an unlucky field aura as you level, ranged AC altering your fumble chance doesn't make sense IMO.

Basically, I don't see it as realistic for my character to go "I shouldn't go all out [full attack] that big powerful guy because I'm likely to shoot myself in the foot so I should instead do the EXACT same thing to those weak looking guys over there and somehow I'm NOT going to harm myself then..." I'm doing the exact same action and not directly/physically interacting with the target but the target is affecting my 'luck'. Melee, I can see as that's meant to be an exchange of blows but ranged?

Ryan Freire wrote:
tastes it like it was a mouth full of dish soap.

I'd say it's more of a chemical taste but I could see some going with dish soap.

Ryan Freire wrote:
Either way I'm pretty ok for some critters and classes having a reaction to a miss by 10 or more, but im not down with a baked in crit fumble system.

This is my feeling also. It solves my issue with ranged attack critical misses: A creature is going to have to have a reaction that has a range to affect ranged targets so it brings it back to making sense to me. It makes sense that the 'boss' might have an effect that can exploit your mistake: that's different than you JUST being less lucky fighting them.


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My "favorite" fumble story is when I rolled a Nat 1 and threw my sword in a random direction. Rolled "up" and it got stuck in the ceiling. I was playing a Halfling, and the ceiling was 30 feet up, so there was no way I could reach it.

That was the round before we had to flee because reinforcements showed up, so I lost my weapon.

This was a low magic game (read: low magic for the PCs and not for anyone else), and it was my one magic item. I lost it due to a fun let, and didn't get a new magic item for another 6 or so sessions. We also fought a lot of creatures that could only be hit with a magic weapon, so I was fairly useless in combat for quite a long time.

Yay for fumbles.

I know this thread is about a weakened version of fumbles - just lose your next action - but they still suck.


bookrat wrote:
My "favorite" fumble story

Mine is when the big burly barbarian type character with a huge 2 handed plus weapons had a small lap dog jump through his chest in a 'joke' type encounter... That was with rolemaster though. In D&D there was an encounter with a giant weasel hiding over the door to a room [giant house] who won initiative, jumped down and lopped off the head of our cleric... 'ok, now it's the parties turn...' as the head rolls away...


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Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
Ryan Freire wrote:
Darksol the Painbringer wrote:


understand that it was created to make combats more dynamic and change how players approach a situation in an attempt to spice up combat.
Understand that spice is a personal taste. Fumbles are like cilantro, but only if the vast majority of people had that genetic expression that caused cilantro to taste like dish soap to them.
I don't know what cilantro is,

That's just the Spanish word for it, It's more commonly known, outside of the USA/Mexico, as Coriander, and it rocks the free world.


Weather Report wrote:
Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
Ryan Freire wrote:
Darksol the Painbringer wrote:


understand that it was created to make combats more dynamic and change how players approach a situation in an attempt to spice up combat.
Understand that spice is a personal taste. Fumbles are like cilantro, but only if the vast majority of people had that genetic expression that caused cilantro to taste like dish soap to them.
I don't know what cilantro is,
That's just the Spanish word for it, It's more commonly known, outside of the USA/Mexico, as Coriander, and it rocks the free world.

Usually coriander refers to the ground seeds and cilantro to the greens. Same plant. its usually the greens people have the taste reaction to though. The ground seeds are kind of an earthy citrusy spice.


graystone wrote:
Oh, I understand the mechanics... It's just the results that are... odd at best. A far away targets AC DON'T make it harder for you to shoot: hit, SURE but it loosens your grip on your weapon? greases your arrows? IMO, excitement takes a back seat to making sense. Unless you gain an unlucky field aura as you level, ranged AC altering your fumble chance doesn't make sense IMO.

Thank you for succinctly explaining why I can't get behind the concept of the -10 "Critical Fail" in this system. I could see the difficulty of "Critical Successes" becoming more difficult as enemies with higher AC become more difficult to get precision shots on, the DC of exceptional challenges requires a greater stroke of luck to excel at, or as, for my own characters, it becomes ever harder to exceptionally defeat enemy spells and abilities. But there are so many cases where it makes no sense to be more likely to make a blunder just because of what you're facing, espcially when the enemy or obstacle isn't taking action to ruin your chances. If the BBEG has a special ability that gives you a penalty on attacks, that's something, but just because they have really tough armor, my fighter is more likely to slip on a banana peel while attacking? As a GM, you could obfuscate this at the table, but anyone who looks at the math and wonders why will be left wondering where the logic is.


Logic in a fantasy game? GM just says "Because Magic!" And everyone moves on.


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Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
Logic in a fantasy game?

If a game isn;t internally consistent, then what does it have?

Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
GM just says "Because Magic!" And everyone moves on.

LOL That works for in a freeform game... One with actual rules... Not so much, especially when we're dealing with a situation that involves 0% magic. NO amount of fantasy to explains why wearing a mundane suit of plate armor makes it much more likely someone shooting you with an arrow will fumble... That's looney toons, 'walking on air because you haven't looked down' logic, not fantasy.


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Ultrace wrote:
graystone wrote:
Oh, I understand the mechanics... It's just the results that are... odd at best. A far away targets AC DON'T make it harder for you to shoot: hit, SURE but it loosens your grip on your weapon? greases your arrows? IMO, excitement takes a back seat to making sense. Unless you gain an unlucky field aura as you level, ranged AC altering your fumble chance doesn't make sense IMO.
Thank you for succinctly explaining why I can't get behind the concept of the -10 "Critical Fail" in this system. I could see the difficulty of "Critical Successes" becoming more difficult as enemies with higher AC become more difficult to get precision shots on, the DC of exceptional challenges requires a greater stroke of luck to excel at, or as, for my own characters, it becomes ever harder to exceptionally defeat enemy spells and abilities. But there are so many cases where it makes no sense to be more likely to make a blunder just because of what you're facing, espcially when the enemy or obstacle isn't taking action to ruin your chances. If the BBEG has a special ability that gives you a penalty on attacks, that's something, but just because they have really tough armor, my fighter is more likely to slip on a banana peel while attacking? As a GM, you could obfuscate this at the table, but anyone who looks at the math and wonders why will be left wondering where the logic is.

Bear in mind that the way Paizo is doing the -10 system is NOT what the OP is proposing. It is NOT a fumble system. If you miss someone by 10, you just miss, you don't lose a turn or hit yourself or anything.

What it DOES do is open you to enemy reactions. So if the enemy fighter has a Riposte feat that lets them AoO you when you miss by 10, or the rogue has a Slip Away feat that lets them get a free move when you miss by 10, THAT is what the >10< system allows. And I personally think that's great, it gives a good mechanical space for abilities like that.


graystone wrote:
Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
Logic in a fantasy game?

If a game isn;t internally consistent, then what does it have?

Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
GM just says "Because Magic!" And everyone moves on.
LOL That works for in a freeform game... One with actual rules... Not so much, especially when we're dealing with a situation that involves 0% magic. NO amount of fantasy to explains why wearing a mundane suit of plate armor makes it much more likely someone shooting you with an arrow will fumble... That's looney toons, 'walking on air because you haven't looked down' logic, not fantasy.

Blind loyalists, that is what the game has.

And yes, I would totally love a looney tunes vibe in my Pathfinder, the overflow of chaotic energies interfering with the natural flow of the world exists all over the place.

As to the full plate argument, maybe the character is so well armored the archer has to try some unorthodox shot to hit him, and it ends up biting him in the rear?


Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
Blind loyalists, that is what the game has.

LOL I'm FAR from that. I have plenty of issue with the status quo and am far from a yes man...

Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
And yes, I would totally love a looney tunes vibe in my Pathfinder, the overflow of chaotic energies interfering with the natural flow of the world exists all over the place.

I think pathfinder hit it's 'looney toons' limit with goblins... :P

Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
As to the full plate argument, maybe the character is so well armored the archer has to try some unorthodox shot to hit him, and it ends up biting him in the rear?

yeah... no. That explains the FIRST time... What about EVERY SINGLE TIME after that for EVERY other person on the ENTIRE planet? This is a constant of the universe type rule so an explanation must therefore work in the vast majority of situations: your example is the corner case, the exception not the rule.

Nothing makes sense about every single creature that EVER picked up a bow is required to perform exotic trick shots because the target is wearing plate vs no armor.

Sovereign Court

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Pathfinder Starfinder Society Subscriber

A cool enchantment for full plate would be special runes that backlash the attacker when hit.

Fumbles should not be a general rule, but forcing fumbles on crit fails is a perfectly fine design space for monster abilities and magic.

The Exchange

Ryan Freire wrote:
Talek & Luna wrote:
MerlinCross wrote:

Wait Spell's can't fumble?

News to me.

As written now, no they cannot. Neither can melee attacks. The point of my thread is making BOTH open to being critical fumbles since BOTH can be critical successes by the tiny bit of rules they have released so far.
And you're fighting up a waterfall with one hand tied behind your back because the vast majority of the playerbase despises critical fumble results.

I don't mind. I find an honest intellectual debate a good thing. Besides, the vast majority of PF1 players detested damage on miss attacks. What is going to be in PF2? Damage on miss attacks (sigh)

The Exchange

Ultrace wrote:
graystone wrote:
Oh, I understand the mechanics... It's just the results that are... odd at best. A far away targets AC DON'T make it harder for you to shoot: hit, SURE but it loosens your grip on your weapon? greases your arrows? IMO, excitement takes a back seat to making sense. Unless you gain an unlucky field aura as you level, ranged AC altering your fumble chance doesn't make sense IMO.
Thank you for succinctly explaining why I can't get behind the concept of the -10 "Critical Fail" in this system. I could see the difficulty of "Critical Successes" becoming more difficult as enemies with higher AC become more difficult to get precision shots on, the DC of exceptional challenges requires a greater stroke of luck to excel at, or as, for my own characters, it becomes ever harder to exceptionally defeat enemy spells and abilities. But there are so many cases where it makes no sense to be more likely to make a blunder just because of what you're facing, espcially when the enemy or obstacle isn't taking action to ruin your chances. If the BBEG has a special ability that gives you a penalty on attacks, that's something, but just because they have really tough armor, my fighter is more likely to slip on a banana peel while attacking? As a GM, you could obfuscate this at the table, but anyone who looks at the math and wonders why will be left wondering where the logic is.

What if his armor drops banana peels when its struck? What if it is made of mirrored metal like a highly polished bronze or silver that causes the sunlight to reflect brightly into the attackers eyes? Or maybe he is just such an effective fighter that he rope a dopes attackers into making a critical mistake by frustrating them and making them grow careless. All of these things are plausible ( the bananas are a bit silly but then again so is the bag of tricks)

The Exchange

Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
graystone wrote:
Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
Logic in a fantasy game?

If a game isn;t internally consistent, then what does it have?

Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
GM just says "Because Magic!" And everyone moves on.
LOL That works for in a freeform game... One with actual rules... Not so much, especially when we're dealing with a situation that involves 0% magic. NO amount of fantasy to explains why wearing a mundane suit of plate armor makes it much more likely someone shooting you with an arrow will fumble... That's looney toons, 'walking on air because you haven't looked down' logic, not fantasy.

Blind loyalists, that is what the game has.

And yes, I would totally love a looney tunes vibe in my Pathfinder, the overflow of chaotic energies interfering with the natural flow of the world exists all over the place.

As to the full plate argument, maybe the character is so well armored the archer has to try some unorthodox shot to hit him, and it ends up biting him in the rear?

Actually I am proposing that. I just don't see how often it would come up in a Pathfinder any edition setting.

I mean I play fighters that have ridiculous attack rolls of +7 at first level to +26 at very high levels. The DM would have to throw very high AC monsters or NPC's compared to your level to make it even plausible for you to critical fumble unless you roll a 1 or a 2. I think critical fumbles would happen more often to monsters trying to hit high AC martials than the other way around.

The Exchange

graystone wrote:
Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
Logic in a fantasy game?

If a game isn;t internally consistent, then what does it have?

Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
GM just says "Because Magic!" And everyone moves on.
LOL That works for in a freeform game... One with actual rules... Not so much, especially when we're dealing with a situation that involves 0% magic. NO amount of fantasy to explains why wearing a mundane suit of plate armor makes it much more likely someone shooting you with an arrow will fumble... That's looney toons, 'walking on air because you haven't looked down' logic, not fantasy.

Its the same fantasy that describes how you can evade a fireball drooped at your feet and your'Evade' while not moving or taking attacks of opportunity even though the blast damages everythign around it within 60 feet. If you saw Rambo in a movie just stand there and do a slight twist to avoid the grenade blast from a grenade that fell at his feet you would not be amused. But for some reason that is OK in pathfinder that rogues can do looney toons tricks to avoid an impossible blast but a fighter can't critical fail at an attack roll because you know, fear, adrenaline, fate, luck, chance, divine intervention, those things don't happen in a fantasy game. (rolls eyes)


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Talek & Luna wrote:


Your example is a false equivalency. If losing out on a single action in a round is devastating to a martial character then so is a miss. A miss would be such a waste of an action that you should write Paizo and insist that the cumulative penalties for multiple attacks in a round are unfair. Get real!

No, A miss is one thing, but you want to rub salt into the wound and go "not only do you miss, but you also lose your next action - it's all good, right?".

You are talking about multiplying the effect of a miss. It is not the same thing at all.


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Talek & Luna wrote:
What if his armor drops banana peels when it's struck?

That'd be one of those reactions I talked about: I don't mind if an ability can exploit a critical failure, I just disagree with the fumble without such a reaction. I wouldn't expect it to shoot peels 200' to hit an archer though.

Talek & Luna wrote:
What if it is made of mirrored metal like a highly polished bronze or silver that causes the sunlight to reflect brightly into the attackers eyes?

Again, as a reaction SURE! it's going to take a special feat/training ect for it to happen. It's not something that 'just happens' if you crit fail: the darkened cavern doesn't suddenly brighten just because you rolled badly.

Talek & Luna wrote:
Or maybe he is just such an effective fighter that he rope a dopes attackers into making a critical mistake by frustrating them and making them grow careless.

I see a pattern... Sounds like another of those reaction things...

Talek & Luna wrote:
All of these things are plausible ( the bananas are a bit silly but then again so is the bag of tricks)

Yes, plausible AS REACTIONS and not as the average thing that happens normally in combat.

The Exchange

Ilina Aniri wrote:

missing an attack isn't the same as losing an action 5 percent of the time. i wouldn't want spellcasters to waste a spell slot 5 percent of the time either. fumbles for nobody. and before you say "casters have a limited amount of spells per day."

Spells ignore A Target's Armor, can be tailored to Target Lower Saving throws, Generally have the Capacity to Affect Several Targets at once, can be done at longer ranges, generally have effects more crippling than raw damage, can be tailored to the lowest resistance, and casters have more than enough spellpower to cast a meaningful spell every round of combat and still have enough utility spells to solve every issue out there.

a country having one or two nukes in thier arsenal doesn't change the devastation said country could do to a signifficant portion of the planet with merely a single nuke. if you look at the Stuff Moses did in the bible, those are all comparable to the power level of a 5th level wizard casting maybe 3rd level spells.

If you would be upset about a caster wasting a spell slot then how do you explain the reason for spell resistance still being a part of the game? Shouldn't it be sent to the scrap heap of game design since a failure wastes an action?

I also don't buy your arguement that spells can be tailored with precision so that they can overcome any weakness. If spellcasters all combined the flexibility of sorcerers for casting and the vast ability to know all spells as a cleric then you would have a valid point. However, since Vancian casting is still a thing so you have to memorize spells and you have to make choices. So you could have an enchanter being crippled when fighting undead and golems, fire wizards against devils, electrical weilders vs undead, etc. This is all hand waved away by the assumption that every caster is a wizard with a vast library or a cleric but this is not often the case.

The Exchange

Asmodeus' Unholy Barrister wrote:
Talek & Luna wrote:
Spells suffer from all kinds of limitations and restrictions such as immunities, saves, attack roll requirements, components, etc. They are a limited resource and if you blow your compliment of them in a few battles you suffer serious combat impairement. Also, you should not be a one trick pony and have the ability to use spells for other purposes so you are MUCH more limited in your options and a miss on a target is a big deal.

Martial attacks suffer from all kinds of limitations and restrictions such as resistances, miss chances, attack roll requirements (heh), and melee attacks suffer from further requirements such as positioning and being in immediate enemy vicinity while ranged attacks can be completely shut down by the weather (or some spells).

In addition to that, some martials like barbarians need to spend various limited resources (like rounds of rage) to be competitive, making any lost round twice as painful, while those that can technically swing their swords all day only get the chance to do so during combat - the ten thousand sword swings they might do out of combat aren't relevant.
And that's just if they're willing to be one-trick-ponies - if they want to do anything except hit point damage, they have to spend far more permanent resources like feats on it just to stay competitive in one or two extra tricks.

But it's casters that are limited because they don't have infinite spells per day?

The way that you focus only on caster restrictions while ignoring martial restrictions, in addition to the "ignore martial characters" in the title makes you look like someone who has no idea how martials are played in practice trying to dictate rules for them.

(I mean, you seriously listed "attack rolls" as limitation of spells? Something that's needed for every single martial attack of any kind?)

Long story short, the "false equivalency" begins at the premise of the thread. Spells and martial attacks were never equal to begin with, so...

Most of the restrictions such as reach and facing are shared by all characters and not just martials. Weapon restrictions will be hopefully gone. Never liked the idea of the fighter with the golf bag.

I do share your annoyance with barbarian rage, but only because it is annoying that you have to spend a resource, take a penalty to your ac, have spellcasting restrictions and still be subpar dealing damage vs a normal fighter. Rage should be a resource that should be tracked but it needs to be meaningful and last an entire combat. Tracking rage per round is too much like bookkeeping and not much fun.

I never said ignore martial characters. I said ignore their fretting (handwringing). I want the rules for four tiers of resolution - critical failure, failure, sucess and critical success to apply fairly to all characters in all situations. Would it be fair to you if I only advocated it for mages like you are for fightewrs? If that were the case then the saving throw situation would be as follows:

For Spell save DC's only
critical failure, failure, success

That is exactly what you are advocating for martials. They can super succeed, just succeed normally or fail. I would not embrace this approach solely for casters and I don't feel this is the corrrect approach for martials either.

The Exchange

graystone wrote:
Talek & Luna wrote:
What if his armor drops banana peels when it's struck?

That'd be one of those reactions I talked about: I don't mind if an ability can exploit a critical failure, I just disagree with the fumble without such a reaction. I wouldn't expect it to shoot peels 200' to hit an archer though.

Talek & Luna wrote:
What if it is made of mirrored metal like a highly polished bronze or silver that causes the sunlight to reflect brightly into the attackers eyes?

Again, as a reaction SURE! it's going to take a special feat/training ect for it to happen. It's not something that 'just happens' if you crit fail: the darkened cavern doesn't suddenly brighten just because you rolled badly.

Talek & Luna wrote:
Or maybe he is just such an effective fighter that he rope a dopes attackers into making a critical mistake by frustrating them and making them grow careless.

I see a pattern... Sounds like another of those reaction things...

Talek & Luna wrote:
All of these things are plausible ( the bananas are a bit silly but then again so is the bag of tricks)
Yes, plausible AS REACTIONS and not as the average thing that happens normally in combat.

No, I am asking that the four tiers of success that apply currently to all aspects of the game EXCEPT attack rolls in combat apply to attack rolls in combat. My desire is logical and consistent with the success tiers of the game. Your desire is based purely on emotion. I am not rubbing salt in a wound. If I cast scorching ray and I critical fumble I lose an action too and I would rule that that would also stop me from finishing my ray attacks if I fumbled on the first roll. Since I am assuming that the casting of a two step spell such as scorching ray is my cost action I am more heavily penalizing a caster than I am you.

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