William O'Law's

guide to critical rolls

 William O'Law's
Guide to critical rolls
A way to make D&D critical attacks and rolls much more effective and fun!
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Introduction
Throwing dices is the main characteristic of tabletop games
and thus tabletop modules, like D&D or Pathfinder.
Usually getting the maximum or the minimum result is
considered a Natural Critical or a Critical Failure. On a 20
faces die, the first one is a "20", and the second one, a "1".
Upon this rolls happening your action will be considered
and instant success or an instant fail.
With this guide we'll explore more options for making it
much more interesting and varied. And don't forget enemies
can also benefit from it!
⠀ additional action or an opportunity attack. This choice is up
Critical success
On attacks
When attacking there's several instances that can happen:
You roll a Natural Critical: Then you must roll twice the
amount of dies you would have rolled for this attack. For
example, if you were to roll 4d6+10, now you'd roll
8d6+20 instead.
Your attack exceeds AC by 10 points: This is considered
a Soft Critical Attack. In this case you immediately have
advantage on the damage rolls relative to this attack.
Your attack duplicates the AC of the objective: This is
considered a Hard Critical Attack. In this case you
immediately deal twice the maximum damage your attack
would have done. If you were to roll 4d6+10 you would
instantly deal 68 ((4*6+10)*2) hit points of damage.
Natural Critical + Soft Critical: You now have advantage
on both damage rolls. This means you make 4 damage
rolls and use the 2 highest results.
Natural Critical + Hard Critical: You deal four times the
maximum damage your attack would have dealt. This
means if you were to roll 4d6+10, you now would deal 136
hit points of damage ((4*6+10)*4).
"Wow, those seem unbalanced!" Just imagine you
annihilate a 1HP and 8AC seagull with your epic ultimate
attack with your magic +5 maul pointed to its head by making
a d20+21 attack roll. Now it doesn't sound that ridiculous.
⠀ who has to try to be creative but fair.
On saves
A Natural Critical on a save roll gives you the best result
possible. If you were to take half the damage from any source
you take none. If you had to avoid something, you do avoid it.
On checks
Nor only you succeed, but you also do it swiftly and clean. You
even can decide the way your character makes the action.
For example, Boblin the Goblin wants to break a door he
gets a Natural Critical: he then does a triple backflip and
knock down the door with a ninja kick, breaking the door that
hard that it banishes into oblivion!
In your case don't forget to make it accordingly to your
character's personality and somewhat realistic!
On opposed rolls
Nor only you win but you can trigger extra options, like an
the to GM and depends on the situation. He/she also decides
the result when a tie happens based on character's modifier.
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Critical failure
On attacks
If you roll a Natural Failure nor only you miss the attack but
the GM can decide one of this situations happening to you:
You loose your weapon, it simply falls to the ground or the
other combatant can pick it up for itself.
You fall prone or to the ground.
You become blind, stunned, paralyzed or incapacitated for
1d4 turns or a specific amount of time.
You activate an opportunity attack.
A custom effect or situation adapted to the in-game status.
On saves
A Critical Failure on a save roll gives you the worst result
possible. If you were to take damage from any source you
take twice as much. If you had to avoid anything, you don't
and the consequences for not doing so are doubled, for
example, being stunned 2 turns, you now are stunned 4
turns.
On checks
You fail extremely hard and you make the opposite of what
you wanted to do.
Imagine Boblin the Goblin trying to break that door, but he
slips and breaks the door knob, locking it forever!
The consequences of this failure are up to the GM's choice,
On opposed rolls
In case of a Critical Failure, it is considered that the other
one rolled a Natural Critical. In case of both failing, they both
suffer the consequences of a Critical Failure.
 William O'Law's
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