Please help price two Critical related advantages

[Jareth Valar]

Originally Posted by malloyd

Incidentally, one rule that I've noticed a lot of people don't pick up on is that RAW getting a critical hit does not mean you get to roll on the Critical Hit Table. That comes up only if you roll a natural 3 or 4. Other critical hits, caused by higher skills, or modifiers take you into the critical range, just get the penetration benefit. In truth there's an argument to be made that the Critical Hit Table is superfluous, especially if you are using the rule on p.B326 where a 3 does maximum damage - that'll supercede a lot of the Critical Hit Table results for the 1 time in 4 it was a 3 that took you to the table.

I am curious on where this is from. I'm with WingedKagouti on this, I thought it was when you rolled within the critical range. Given Kromm's post about the "Every One's a Critical", it would seem to be supported, however, I would love to know if I mussed something.

I for one would buy the second one in a heart beat for my primary combat skill, even for 20 points.

My dice regularly mock me why helping me. I roll 7 more than any other result. One night that I counted, out of 37 rolls that night 19 were "7" in various permeations (1,1,5; 2,2,3; 1,2,4, etc.). That's with keeping at least 9 dice that I routinely switch between.🙄

As for the Swashbuckler power-up...Yes Please! lol
In all honesty, seems like a very logical breakdown at the end of the advantage.

As for the OP's first advantage, I agree with Fred Brakin, just a +/-1 to my roll "can", occasionally be useful, but not all that much. Now shifting up or down a result by +/-1 would be pretty potent...when a critical is rolled.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Kesendeja

I should clarify one thing about Improved Crilical Result. Each level shifts the number rolled by one. So if you had one level of it and rolled a 14, you could take the result of a 13, 14 or 15.

That was already my interpretation but I still don't think it's worth even 10 pts.

[Christopher R. Rice]

I priced it as 5 points in my campaigns and you could shift it up plus or minus 3 once per game session.

[corwyn]

Originally Posted by Jareth Valar

I am curious on where this is from. I'm with WingedKagouti on this, I thought it was when you rolled within the critical range. Given Kromm's post about the "Every One's a Critical", it would seem to be supported, however, I would love to know if I mussed something.

You didn't. Not sure where MA's interpretation comes from. Even in 3e, if you used crit tables they occurred on any crit. However, they were an alternative to the basic rule where rolling a 3 was a crit that did max damage, but 4 (and possibly 5 or 6) just automatically hit.

[RGTraynor]

I'd think that Christopher's take (at 5 pts/± 3) is the priciest it's worth. Luck at 15 pts -- where you get three bites of the apple on the critical table -- is vastly better than 10 pts to get a measly ± 1 ... provided you roll a critical at all during the session.

[Kesendeja]

Originally Posted by RGTraynor

I'd think that Christopher's take (at 5 pts/± 3) is the priciest it's worth. Luck at 15 pts -- where you get three bites of the apple on the critical table -- is vastly better than 10 pts to get a measly ± 1 ... provided you roll a critical at all during the session.

2 point per +/-1, max of 3, since you can use it on every critical.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by corwyn

You didn't. Not sure where MA's interpretation comes from.

It's right there in the definition of Critical Hits on p.B381.

Whenever you roll a natural 3 or 4 when attacking, you get a critical hit and you roll on the Critical Hit Table
(p. 556).

The emphasis is even in the original text. Getting a critical hit and rolling on the Critical Hit Table are two separate things. Note that there are also places where you are specifically directed to a different table for critical hits to the head. I suppose I can see how you could read it the other way, though it actually seems pretty clear to me. If the intent is any critical hit also rolls on a critical hit table, the rule is not well phrased.

[Farmer]

Originally Posted by malloyd

It's right there in the definition of Critical Hits on p.B381.


The emphasis is even in the original text. Getting a critical hit and rolling on the Critical Hit Table are two separate things. Note that there are also places where you are specifically directed to a different table for critical hits to the head. I suppose I can see how you could read it the other way, though it actually seems pretty clear to me. If the intent is any critical hit also rolls on a critical hit table, the rule is not well phrased.

As has been quoted already, B347:

A critical hit is a critical success scored on an attack. The GM does not determine the result. Instead, use the Critical Hit Table (p. 556).

Parsing that plainly says that you use the critical hit table on a critical success. The emphasis of the "and" on B381 is perhaps the emphasis that a 3 or 4 is always a full critical success regardless of the margin of success, I don't know, but prior to you I've never heard anyone suggest a critical attack didn't get to roll on the critical hit table.

To the topic at hand, we house rule that 7 becomes a crit if effective skill is 20+. We rarely have base skills above 25, and never 30+, so actually hitting with an effective skill at 20+ isn't that common, and the cost of the skill to achieve that level (because we tend to constrain stats to "reasonable" levels rather than min/maxing them) is significant. Just a another take on expanding crits. And, of course, opponents have the same capacity. At higher powered games this tends to help a little at defeating very high defences and gives us the cinematic style we usually want.

[Jareth Valar]

Originally Posted by malloyd

It's right there in the definition of Critical Hits on p.B381.


The emphasis is even in the original text. Getting a critical hit and rolling on the Critical Hit Table are two separate things. Note that there are also places where you are specifically directed to a different table for critical hits to the head. I suppose I can see how you could read it the other way, though it actually seems pretty clear to me. If the intent is any critical hit also rolls on a critical hit table, the rule is not well phrased.

OK, I see where you may get that from that sentence, however if you continue reading the paragraph, it goes on to include a Critical Hit for higher effective skill. It also includes this in the paragraph right after the example

A critical hit is often the only way for an unskilled character to injure a superior opponent in a fair fight or get through heavy armor with a light weapon. Once in a while, everybody gets a lucky shot. But note that the most likely result on the table is “no extra damage.”

This leads me to believe that it is intended that any Critical Hit also includes a roll on the Critical Hit Table.

There is also the wording in Critical Success on Defense Rolls

If you get a critical success on a defense roll against a melee attack, then your foe goes immediately to the Critical Miss Table (p. 556).

Implying that any Critical Success on a Defense roll will have someone roll on a Critical Table. It seems unlikely to me that the rules would favor forcing an attacker to roll on a Critical Fumble Table potentially more often that rolling on a Critical Hit Table, especially when the most likely result from said Critical Hit is "No extra damage".

I can see that perhaps adding an "also" somewhere in the description for the increased Critical Hit chance for higher skill would make this a bit clearer though.