So a player of mine was playing a Demonic Bloodline sorceress and cast the single actionHharm spell on an enemy. They rolled their touch attack roll. Nat 20. In 1E this would be a critical hit with double damage. However in the playtest this does not seem to be the case. The single action casting does not imply any special effects on a critical.
Somatic Casting: The spell has a range of touch. You must succeed at a melee touch attack to damage a living target.
Unlike the 2 action casting which DOES specify a critical effect.
Somatic Casting, Verbal Casting: The spell has a range of 30 feet and doesn’t require a touch attack when targeting a living creature. A living target must attempt a Fortitude save, taking half damage on a success, no damage on a critical success, or double damage on a critical failure.
The rules stipulate if a spell does not list a critical effect, one does not exist.
Some checks don’t specify every degree of success. If no critical success or critical failure is specified, use the effect of an ordinary success or failure, respectively. If no success or failure is described, nothing happens depending on what isn’t described.
And
Some spells require you to succeed at an attack roll to affect the target. This is usually because they require you
to touch your target, precisely aim a ray, or otherwise
make an accurate attack. Any attack you make is part of
the spell’s Somatic Casting action. Usually, such spells require a melee touch attack or a ranged touch attack. In both cases, make an attack roll and compare the result to the target’s TAC. Your proficiency modifier for a spell’s attack roll is the same as your proficiency modifier with spell rolls. Spell attacks are unarmed, but they don’t apply any special benefits from your weapons or unarmed attacks, nor do they deal any damage outside of what’s listed in the spell.
Personally this does not feel right to me. I feel that even the single action casting should have a critical effect (double damage) if you critically succeed at touching an enemy. Especially as it does not appear that holding a spell charge on a miss is a rule in the playtest, your using one of your very limited resources to do this, and while targeting TAC is nice I am note sure it makes this as worthwhile a spell. Am I the only one who feels this way or is there something I am missing that would make this spell to strong should a this be the case?
In PF1 the target would probably get a save even if you touched them; inflict wounds for instance gave them a Will save for half. With the 1-action harm they don't get a save at all. The loss of double damage on a crit touch may be to balance that out.
In PF1 the target would probably get a save even if you touched them; inflict wounds for instance gave them a Will save for half. With the 1-action harm they don't get a save at all. The loss of double damage on a crit touch may be to balance that out.
And Harm is already a versitile spell, but for clerics looking to dish out spell damage as their main form of attack and for divine list based sorcerers its one of the few lv 1 spells they have for damaging foes it feels a little lackluster. Comparing to the Chill Touch Cantrip as a lv 1 character, single action Harm deals your key ability mod on top of the damage and is one action less, but chill touch you can actually crit with. Personally i think it would be balanced to allow the one action to crit. At least ixzsdddddddddddf nothing else make it more interesting a spell.