05-30-2012, 10:21 AM | #11 |
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Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: Europe
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Re: Different critical spell failure tables
Then you don't automagically get a critical failure on a roll of 17? I sit corrected, then!
0.5% is still very bad, but obviously and inarguably it is much less bad than 2%. It's just odd that everybody always talks about the threshold value of 15. Clearly saving the energy is very worthwhile, but it seems to me that hitting 16 is even more worthwhile because you redudce your miscast probability by 75%. |
05-30-2012, 10:22 AM | #12 | |
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Join Date: Oct 2007
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Re: Different critical spell failure tables
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Bruno? Others? |
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05-30-2012, 10:35 AM | #13 | |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: U.K.
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Re: Different critical spell failure tables
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Oh, and skill 15 also allows silent casting or casting while tied up. That's going to be a killer advantage in some situtations. In a dungeon fantasy, action movie, or flashy high-magic sort of game, where wizards are letting off spells every second in important scenes, and have large external energy supplies, a greater degree of twitchiness about critical failures might come to be considered normal. On t'other hand again, going up to 16 might well be considered worthwhile for the greater chance of critical success in many campaigns.
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05-30-2012, 11:01 AM | #14 | |
Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: Canada
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Re: Different critical spell failure tables
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There was a spectacular critical failure on Stop Bleeding which has established the local precedent that a critically failed Stop Bleeding used on a Mortally Wounded character acts as "Finish Bleeding" instead... I've since seen that critically fail mmm, another three times I think. We've actually only seen the spell succeed once, it's just got a really bad track record for no good reason. An evil cultist using black magic critically failed on a (pretty large) spell against the players in one game, and (rolling on the black magic crit fails table) created a swarm of angry rats in his viscera. That didn't go well for him. I didn't play a spellcaster in mlangsdorfs games (technically my bard knew spells but they weren't cast much); other than the Finish Bleeding incidents, I'm not remembering any PC critical failures, but that may be because I wasn't casting, or it may be because Harald387 had a 19 or 20 on all of his nymphs spells and she was a primary spellcaster so I remember her spellcasting the most. There was a few critical successes, the one that sticks out in my mind was the Frostbite spell that got upgraded to Flesh to Ice.
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05-30-2012, 11:03 AM | #15 | |
Join Date: Aug 2004
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Re: Different critical spell failure tables
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05-30-2012, 11:09 AM | #16 | |
Join Date: Nov 2008
Location: Yukon, OK
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Re: Different critical spell failure tables
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When I was suggesting an improvised result I meant specifically tailoring the crit fail to the circumstance and the type of spell being cast. Cosmetic effects might be a chill in the air or feeling of gloom for Necromancy, the smell of flowers fr a plant spell, etc. As to your other question: I ran and played in Magic for several years under 2e and 3e; crit failures did happen and we did actually get a demon result a few times however the skill 15 and 20 were definitely a priority over the benefit of a 16. |
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05-30-2012, 11:19 AM | #17 |
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Gothenburg, Sweden
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Re: Different critical spell failure tables
I was thinking of using the RPM which means there'll be a lot of die-rolling involved.
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05-30-2012, 12:26 PM | #18 |
Join Date: Mar 2010
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Re: Different critical spell failure tables
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05-30-2012, 01:13 PM | #19 |
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Gothenburg, Sweden
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Re: Different critical spell failure tables
Maybe I should think and read the rules before posting.
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05-30-2012, 03:39 PM | #20 | |
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Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: Europe
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Re: Different critical spell failure tables
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I happen to dislike ad hocking, but that is for other world feel reasons. And I maintain that most GMs who ad hoc critical spell failures do so in a whimsical and unconstrained manner that will fail utterly at achieving any world feel. |
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critical spell failures, magic, spell failure tables |
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