Dungeon Masters, Do Not Add Insult To Injury (Without Consent)

There is this bizarre need that many dungeons masters have to take any bad situation, and make it worse for their players. A missed swing in combat is never just a miss; it always makes you do something disadvantageous, like screw up your footing, or damage your weapon. And if you roll a 1, hoo boy, that's when the real knives come out! That's when the blade your fighter depends on suddenly snaps, when the rogue stabs themselves in the thigh, or when the wizard scorches their fingers and takes a Dex penalty. All because a die happened to hit on that 5% chance.

If you roll a lot of these, you may as well commit seppuku.

I dedicated an entire category to this kind of DM in my recent article 5 Bad Dungeon Masters You'll Meet Throughout Your Gaming Career; the Punisher. A DM for whom, unless that natural one ends in disaster for the player who rolled it (or at the very least the potential for disaster), they feel like they're being too generous. As if, somehow, they allowed a player to break a rule without being punished for the act of trying to do something, but having uncooperative dice.

Let's be crystal clear, here. If your game already has critical fumbles built into its existing mechanics, that's fine. If you can point to the page in the rule book with the chart and effects, then you're just playing the game as it exists. On the other hand, if you feel the need to add fumble rules to your game, whether it's with the Paizo Critical Fumble deck or just with a random chart you made up yourself, then I would ask why you're doing that? How does this enhance your game, and how do you deal with the fact that it punishes your players a lot more than it punishes your villains?

But I Run It Fair; PCs and NPCs Both!

Equal isn't the same as fair in this case, because the burden is going to fall a lot harder on the players than it will on your monsters.

Because that 5% chance has a longer-lasting effect on players than on you.

While it's true that you and the players are both rolling D20s, and that you may even roll substantially more than the players do (and thus you will have to deal with more critical fumbles on average), the important point is that you have a never-ending stream of characters. The players have only one, and those characters have limited resources that can be easily wrecked by pure bad luck, quickly shifting their chances of progressing the story.

Take one of the most common crit fumble rulings ever; the broken weapon. Your sword snaps, your bowstring breaks, what have you, but your main weapon is now either crippled or useless because you had a particularly bad roll.

Now, say this happened to a monster you were running. Oh no, the goblin's sword broke, or the giant's club snapped in half. Is that monster totally out of options? Probably not. Chances are good they have some kind of back-up option like natural attacks, or they have additional weapons on their person. And even if they don't (say your PCs were ambushed by footpads in a city chase), did you expect those NPCs to survive the fight anyway? Probably not. In fact, a majority of the characters who get involved in combat on your side of the line are meant to get defeated. Even if it's a big boss, like the minotaur in the middle of the maze, or that necromancer you've been saving for a big fight, do you honestly want those characters to win? Especially if it means they kill the PCs, meaning that now everyone has to start over again?

You want your fights to be a challenge, because that's what makes winning all the sweeter. But critical fumbles don't make things more challenging; they turn combat into a disheartening slog.

Let's take that same broken weapon situation from the PC perspective. Your paladin charges in, sword held high, and when he brings it down, oops, it breaks. That's bad enough at low levels, but what about when your party has enchanted gear? Does it break just as easily as common steel? Or does it just impose a negative while you wield it until it's repaired? Either way, that character may not have a back-up option in the same sense that the monsters do. Sure he can punch with a gauntlet, draw his knife, or shield bash, but you took away their main fighting option for no reason other than hey, you rolled the 1 big guy, you should have known better. And that is going to last for the rest of the dungeon, which may consist of dozens of fights, in addition to the big, climactic battle.

There is no scenario where this kind of action feels like a challenge, instead of a slog. The archer's bowstring breaks, so now they have to take an entire round or two of combat to re-string their bow (assuming they even have a spare bowstring on hand). The rogue slips in spilled blood and goes down prone while surrounded by ogres who now all get bonuses to hit them. The barbarian loses their grip, and their ax goes flying, making them a sitting duck until they get it back. These feel like dick moves on the DM's part because players are being punished for trying to do something. Even if their strategy is sound, and their tactics are good, that natural 1 doesn't just make them fail; it slaps them across the face for even trying.

Aside from the fact that it feels like random punishment (because let's face it, you're being punished based on a random die roll), there's also the question of resources. How many weapons do you expect your warriors to carry because they know any die roll could break one? How many spare bowstrings do you expect bowmen or crossbowmen to have? And if we look at the more serious crit fumbles, what do you do if a party gets crippled (lost eyes, reduced stats, etc., etc.) due to bad rolls, and is now unable to be a legitimate threat to the big boss? Or they have to blow potent healing resources that were meant to carry them through, but instead they're out of bullets less than halfway through the night?

Why Add Insult To Injury?

Rolling a natural 1 is already a punishment in and of itself. Whatever you were trying to do, there's a pretty good chance it isn't going to work. You failed, and your action had no serious impact... that's disheartening enough. You don't need to randomly have your future effectiveness penalized as a result.

Hey, you shouldn't have rolled a 1 on your polymorph. No, I don't know how you'll undo it, either.

If you want to make your players feel challenged, then don't give them random negatives. Instead, bring your A-game when it comes to your own strategy and tactics. Engage them, and provide opportunities for them to succeed or fail not because of a quirk of fate, but because they came up with a plan and executed it well (or because they failed to anticipate your plan, and had to scramble to counter it).

When you lose in a game of chess, you lose because the other person out-played you, you made mistakes, or some combination of both. No one is ever in the middle of a strategic game, then suddenly loses the ability to move their queen because they rolled a 1, and considers that a refreshing challenge. It's just a pain in the ass, and it does more to harm PCs than it ever will your villains in the long run.

But If You're Going To Do It Anyway...

With all of that said, if you are hell-bent on using your 5th Edition critical fumble deck fresh from Critical Hit Publishing, far be it from me to tell you how to run your game. However, there is something that you should definitely do that will stop roughly half of the problems you find with introducing critical fumble rules to games where none exist.

Get your players' consent first.

Seriously, consent makes all the difference.

If you're going to be adding a rules set to the game that is not actually in the core rules, don't just assume that everyone at the table is cool with it. Ask your table, preferably during Session 0, if they want to use critical fumble rules at all, and if yes, if they want to use charts, or a deck, or whatever your preferred tool is. Another good question to ask is if they only want temporary negatives like one-round drawbacks, or do they also want the serious stuff that can shatter their equipment, give them permanent negatives, etc. Some folks who'd be okay with the former may balk at the latter, after all.

You need to be prepared for either a yes or no answer. Because if everyone is on board with those critical fumbles (even if, in the end, they do them more harm than good on average), then shine on you mad bastards! On the other hand, if there are players who don't like the odds of using critical fumble rules, or who are outright against the idea, then you might want to save that deck for another day. Because everyone has to play the same game, and what do you gain from bringing in additional house rules that your players don't want?

That's all for this week's Moon Pope Monday! If you'd like to find more work from me, you should check out my Vocal page, or just click my Gamers archive to see all my tabletop stuff. You could also go to the YouTube channel Dungeon Keeper Radio, where I make videos with other talented gamers.

If you'd like to stay on top of all my latest releases, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter. To help support me, consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or going to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to leave a small, monthly tip in my jar.

Or you could go to my Amazon author page and Buy My Books!

How To Keep A Positive Attitude At The Table (Even When You're Rolling 1's)

There is no experience like being at the table when the group is rolling hot. Swords are swinging, spells are flying, and the heroes are experiencing some of their finest moments. When that happens the excitement is fully-tapped, and even if you're not at center stage it's impossible not to feel the thrill as the story unfolds in front of you. Then there are those other times. The times when the fighter just can't get through the damage reduction, or the sorcerer's spells keep fizzling against the demon lord's resistance. The rogue's usually nimble tongue makes a diplomatic mis-step, or the ranger ends up getting hopelessly lost.

Artist's Rendition

These things happen. The key is that when they happen to you, you need to rise above them in order to keep the game going strong, even if the story isn't going the way you'd like it to go.

Moods Are Infectious

Have you ever been at work, and one guy on your team is just being shitty? He drags his feet, complains about everything he's being asked to do, and as soon as attention is no longer on him he goes back to messing with his phone? Even if you were having a good day, and positive things were happening, that attitude will eat through your defenses like acid until you start losing your energy as well.

People with shitty attitudes are vampires, is what I'm saying.

The same thing happens at the table. Dave's been swinging heavy with his fighter's mace, but when the party comes up against a lieutenant bad guy with DR 10/piercing, suddenly Dave loses his enthusiasm. He keeps going for a few rounds, but instead of switching to a dagger or a spear, he just keeps hammering away with his blunt weapon trying to do enough damage to make a dent. After a couple of rounds he tunes out of the game, talking about something out of character to another player, sending a text to his girlfriend, and only looks up once you've called his name three times. He rolls a d20, and maybe he hits, or maybe he doesn't. Either way his enthusiasm for the game is clearly gone, and that doldrums can infect the rest of the table. Even if the druid is owning the minions, keeping them off of the party, and the cleric is rolling maximum numbers on all of her healing, Dave's attitude is an anchor that can drown everyone.

So, the key is to make sure that, even when you're feeling discouraged, that you keep pushing forward.

How Do I Do That?

Well, the first key is to make sure that you come to the table with a plethora of options to hand. While every character is going to have something they're best at, players need to look for the gaps in their characters' skill sets, and fill them. That way even if your character's main trick is ineffective in a given situation (say, trying to fight ghosts with a non-magical sword), you can still do something to contribute (like pouring holy water over the specter).

Glad I invested in that goblet of endless holy water!

Even if you plan for every possible contingency, though, you're going to have those nights where luck just prevents you from doing what you want to. And if you fail often enough, it's going to take its toll on your mood. That's why instead of viewing the game as a simple pass/fail, you need to create a third option; the dramatic telling.

The Dramatic Telling: For DMs AND Players

I mentioned some of this in my post How To Roleplay During Combat, but I'd like to add some clarification via example.

Let's go back to Dave. He learned his lesson about carrying different weapons, but the party finds itself going up against a werewolf. Dave isn't carrying silver, but he gives it his best shot. He smashes his mace into the monster's jaws, cracking bone and knocking out two teeth. Even as he watches, though, the beast's flesh knits itself closed, re-aligning what was destroyed as it focuses its eyes on the man who struck it.

Now it's my turn.

Now, mechanically speaking, Dave did 12 damage in that blow. After the damage reduction, it only took 2. But how much less discouraged would a player feel knowing that he did something significantly cooler-looking than 2 damage, even if that's what gets marked down on the damage counter after his turn?

But what about when you miss? After all, even when you hit, you're still doing something.

All right, let's wind it back a bit. Let's say Dave swung, but his numbers just didn't add up. The DM should compare the attack against the enemy, and craft an appropriate response. For example, did Dave get close enough that it was only the monster's natural armor that saved it? Then the DM should tell the fighter that his blow struck home, but it glanced off the monster's thick fur and heavy, bony skull. What if Dave rolled lower, say, not even high enough to hit the werewolf's touch AC? In that case the description should be about how the monster jerked aside with animal quickness, or how it dropped down to all fours as the weapon whistled just above its back.

Neither of these descriptions actually changes the result of what's happening, which is that the fighter missed. However, by acknowledging that the player is doing something, and by crafting an appropriate response you are more likely to keep that player tuned in to what's happening. The reason is because you aren't just saying, "all right, Dave failed, who's next?" Instead, you're incorporating both successes and failures into the game's narrative.

And before you get the idea that this is all on the DM, players are not off the hook for this.

So, across the table is Steve. Steve is playing a grenadier alchemist, and his big schtick is his bombs. But it's one of those nights where Steve's dice just will not cooperate. He throws a bomb, and not only does he miss, but he misses badly. Natural 1 kind of badly. Instead of slumping back in his chair and gesturing for the next person to go, though, Steve adds details to his action. Maybe his alchemist grunts, saying something like "Goddamn wind shear!" to explain his lack of accuracy. Maybe the alchemist, jazzed on adrenaline and mutagen, is having a nasty reaction, and his hand is shaking. He is creating an explanation for why a mid-level, battle-hardened veteran didn't get the job done this round.

Once Steve contributes his bit, the DM should feel free to add onto it. Perhaps the bomb explodes behind the werewolf instead of striking it, dealing it minor splash damage. The wolf howls, backlit by the gout of fire, and murder shines in its eyes as it glances toward the alchemist. Action resolved, they move on to the next player's turn.

Keep The Story Going

The easiest way to avoid dropping out of the game is to contribute to the story in some, important way. How you do it is up to you, but finding that niche can be what keeps your enthusiasm up.

Impress me.

Let's go to the third member of the table: Debbie. Debbie decided to play a swashbuckler, and though her attacks are swift and deadly, she's just not hitting the big boss's AC tonight. On the other hand, he's having the same problem hitting her. So, while her flashing blade isn't drawing any blood, she could turn this stalemate into a vibrant battle scene, as she deflects the werewolf's teeth with the rim of her buckler, using the hulking creature's own momentum against him by guiding his claws away with her slender sword.

You can even add good story if you're on the wrong end of a beating. Tammy decided to try out the warpriest, but despite her high defensive stats, the DM is just laying into her. Tammy could describe how her devout priest of Gorum reacts to being hurt. Does she bellow in defiance? Spit blood on the floor and keep fighting? Do her eyes go dead as she keeps coming after the werewolf, showing no fear, or pain, or emotion as blood leaks from the rents in her armor?

If you've kept your RP focused only on one area, you might want to mine these others as well. If nothing else, it will help members of a TPK feel like they died nobly, and heroically, instead of just being backhanded by a plastic die and some unfortunate math.

I hope you enjoyed this piece, and if you want to make sure you don't miss out on further installments of Improved Initiative then plug your email into the box on the right, or follow me at Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter. If you want to keep this blog going, toss some bread into my jar by going to my Patreon page to become a patron today!

A Review of The Laying Waste Critical Hit System From TPK Games

Few things will make your heart go pitter-patter like a natural 20 on your die. You can already see your blade sinking deep into your opponent's neck, blood spurting as his eyes go dead. A lucky blow or great skill, it makes no difference when you're the one still standing and your enemy has gone down in defeat.

There's just one problem; your crits get less and less badass with every level you gain.

Wow, 2d6 instead of 1d6. Truly I am killed now.

While the thrill of scoring a critical hit never goes away, and some classes (*cough* Magus *cough*) can turn explosive critical hits into an art form, your average PC just doesn't get the same bang for a confirmed crit at higher levels. For those of you who were wondering if there was a cure for this there is... though it isn't for the faint of heart.

Well, What Is It?

The book you've been looking for is titled Laying Waste, and it's from 3rd party publisher TPK games. If you want to make your games truly vicious (both for the PCs and for the monsters) then the alternative system this game offers keeps things fast and furious.

Seriously, look at this goddamn thing!

I want to take a moment to make it very clear for players who are skimming; this is not part of the core rules, and no one is saying you must use these rules at your table. That said if you want to make your critical hits and fumbles (no crit fumbles aren't part of the core rules either, as I reminded folks in Playing By The Book: Rules Pathfinder Players Often Forget, but they exist in this book) a lot more vicious, this is the book for you.

So How Does It Work?

First of all take everything you know about critical hits and throw it right out the window. Under the Laying Waste rules there is no need to confirm a critical hit; if you hit your weapon simply does maximum damage. In addition to the weapon damage though you roll a d20, add your weapon's critical hit multiplier, and add the amount you exceeded the target's AC by. The result is then compared to a DC 20, 30, or 40 for the severity of the critical effect you deal. You then take the type of weapon you're wielding, and then roll on the appropriate chart. You could do anything from knocking a weapon out of an opponent's hand or temporarily reducing his dexterity to smashing in his teeth or cutting off an entire arm.

Improved Critical for the win.

Critical fumbles are more straightforward, but pretty disastrous. When you roll a one you roll on the chart for the potential fumble. You're given a saving throw (such as a Reflex of 20 to get a grip on your weapon again) and a condition (score a critical hit on an enemy to renew your confidence). If you make one or the other then the fumble either never happens, or the effect ends.

What Are The Advantages?

Despite the hate that a lot of 3rd party publishers get, Laying Waste has a definite upside. First and foremost it makes combat more dynamic (I'd hate to use the term realistic when talking about RPGs), and it keeps a genuine threat in every die roll. Even high level characters might be laid low by a lucky shot from a goblin, kobold, or even a commoner.

In addition to honing combat's edge, Laying Waste provides real benefits for martial classes at high levels (since they're the ones most likely to exceed an enemy's armor class by a large number to deal devastating critical hits). It makes critical hits a genuine threat, and a build based around critical hits can have an impact over and above a few extra points of damage on a given swing. It also makes things like concealment and cover more important to combatants, for those who want those kinds of mechanics to get more attention paid to them.

What Are The Disadvantages?

Aside from needing to learn a new mechanic, and then convince your DM (and the rest of the table) to institute this new rule, there are some issues with the system in Laying Waste. While critical hits are a lot more powerful with this system, some players might feel that random chance is taking over from solid character building. The idea of your next natural 20 decapitating the bugbear general is exciting, but if your DM starts dropping a lot of critical hits then a low CR encounter can quickly cut a party into little, bloody pieces.

I wouldn't go so far as to say that Laying Waste completely unbalances a game, because it doesn't. But it can lead to serious problems based on chance rather than on the deliberate actions of players (more so than RPGs already have). It can also really slow down combat any time someone has a critical hit or fumble as pages are checked, additional dice are rolled (and re-rolled for when a given crit simply doesn't make sense or the DM feels is inappropriate).

All in all Laying Waste is a fun little post-market add on for your game. You don't need it to play, but it might be fun to try out. If you notice that it's creating more headaches than heroics though don't be afraid to strip the sprocket out and go back to your old-fashioned critical hits.

For those who'd like to help support Improved Initiative please stop by my Patreon page and consider becoming a patron today! If you want to make sure you get all of my updates then all you have to do is plug your email into the box on the right hand side, or follow me on Facebook and Tumblr.