CRITICALHITS Weapons and Unarmed Strikes*have a special feature for player characters: Critical Hits.Ifa player characterrollsa 20 for an attack roll with a Weapon or an Unarmed Strike, the attack isalsoa Critical Hit, which means itdeals extra damage to the target; you roll the damage dice of the Weapon or Unarmed Strike a second timem and add the second roll as extra damageto the target.For example, aMace deals Bludgeoning Damage equalto 1d6 +your Strength modifier. If you score a Critical Hit withthe Mace, it instead deals 2d6 + your Strength modifier. If yourWeapon orUnarmed Strike has no damage dice, it deals no extra damage on a Critical Hit.
Why? Now the only thing that can crit is WEAPON DAMAGE - this is garbage and should just be pulled. I know a lot of people are complaining about this, but NAw this needs to been seen more and i'm making it my job to spread this WIDE. What does this mean for classes? Sneak attack/Smite/SPELLS ******* SPELLS do not crit - you're Eldritch Blast? Naw, Sneak Attack - way to nerf assassin even more then 2 dead class features *clap clap* Paladin? Wow you must REALLY hate martials and this is a BUFF only for them....*clap clap clap*. I am a long time DM and i will ignore this rule 100%, but i KNOW i ******* KNOW DM's will run this as RAW in many campaigns because its a rule, just stop it and erase this garbage please theres many rules in DND that need to be fixed or shaped and this is just taking up space and time dedicated to fixing other things. Just please get rid of this all together - crits are fine it's a 5% chance let that be the only thing that it is and just STOP IT.
yes yes, we know. Eldritch blast doesn't really get much damage from crits, at least as far as average damage per round goes, but it is a bit shitty.
Divine/Eldritch Smite and Sneak Attack were obviously the main causes of this change, they do, do too much damage on a critical currently.
Booming Blade, Green-Flame Blade, and smite spells probably were partially related to this too since they also could get higher number of dice.
You can complain about this in the survey, I think the vast majority of people are. There is 100 better ways to handle the issues than has been chosen. Heck, 1 damage die per source of damage would have been better but I still think crits need changing more due to their other attribute, the ability to snake eyes. two 1s does not feel like a critical, when it gives a damage value that would be disappointing for a normal attack.
I'm not going to necro that, but arguing that player crits should be nerfed because monster crits are too strong at lower levels is not logically conclusive to me, there is a disconnect. They could have just said monsters can't critical anymore and left player crits alone. To me, your thread appears to be related more specifically to monster crits, this one is about player crits and they are in fact separate issues.
DnD players: spellcasters outclass martials in everything, and can deal insane amounts of damage, this needs to be balanced.
Same DnD players: WTF where are my spell crits, I want to do all the damage!
Also smite crits were cheating anyway. You decide to apply a smite after you hit. Of course, you'd always apply them to crits.
Why do people think the crit changes are a balance change? Crit changes are obviously going to hit the crit fishers more than anything so that is going to mainly be Paladin and Rogue, who gets negatively impacted. Paladin being one of the aforementioned Martials. So when of the two classes most nerfed by this change is a martial and the other isn't a caster either, would somebody think this is a spellcaster nerf? Most spells don't use attack rolls, they use saving throws, the class that uses the most attack rolls on spells being Warlock who are kind of lagging behind the rest in the whole caster department.
The change is obviously related to consistency and encounter design, but I'd argue that encounters do not need to go to plan every time, it risks making encounter bland. Crit fishers add a randomness to encounters that can cause fun chaotic things to occur.
I'm not going to necro that, but arguing that player crits should be nerfed because monster crits are too strong at lower levels is not logically conclusive to me, there is a disconnect. They could have just said monsters can't critical anymore and left player crits alone. To me, your thread appears to be related more specifically to monster crits, this one is about player crits and they are in fact separate issues.
Didn't read? That's fine.
I addressed player crits. I can address it again though. In short:
1.) Weapons being able to crit while spells cannot is a way to differentiate weapons and spells, and to allow Wizards to perhaps start using attack rolls for spells that merit it more. I will never not be pissed off that Disintegrate is a god damned saving throw instead of an attack roll even though I know exactly why that's the case (Disintegrate crits would break the game and making it a save forces it to be subject to Legendary Resistance). Again, specific beats general - spells like Blade of Disaster that simulate weaponry could still be allowed to crit, but having a basic combat cantrip like Fire Bolt completely and utterly outclass any form of weaponry is just kinda dumb.
2.) Character classes that over-rely on "crit fishing" right now can be improved in ways that would be difficult or even impossible if they were still allowed to Super Mega Ultra Crit for a gorrillion damage randomly for no reason. Math-minded players say rogue damage is super unimpressive at higher levels and thinbk rogues suck? Well, Wizards sure as shootin' can't fix that if players are also going to insist on rogues keeping the ability to roll 20+ dice whenever they crit. Same with paladins - the class is considered to be the strongest combatant in D&D in part because it can retroactively decide to spend resources to ultracharge a crit. Nobody else gets to do that, and it means paladin crits get to matter way more than they should. Without seeing the planned adjustments to both classes, we have no idea if the versions that are made possible by the less dumb crit rules are better overall than the versions we get stuck with if players force Wizards to abandon the improved rules.
3.) Nobody has a good reason to keep player SuperCrits and monster/paladin SuperMegaUltraCrits beyond "I like the dopamine shot I get from rolling a gorrillion damage". Which, all right - fair feedback. But encounter balance is going to keep being weird, paladins are going to keep being overtuned and drastically superior to other martials, rogues are going to continue to have surprisingly terrible damage any time they don't crit, and we're going to continue to not see any spells higher than secondish level that involve spell attacks and are all instead reliant on motherf@#$ing saving throws enemies get to pass for free because Wizards cannot allow high-level spell crits.
I think removing Sneak Attack & Smites as sources of Crit damage is a good idea, but not to remove it from spells. For one thing, most leveled spells force saves instead of requiring attacks, so by and large spell Crits aren’t the biggest balance problems in the game. For another thing, spending a spell slot and missing sucks eggs. A lot. The one thing that kept that balanced at all was that measly li’l 5% chance to Crit. Finally, Spell attacks are already differentiated from weapon attacks by the fact that one doesn’t add their Ability modifier to the damage rolls. What I believe would feel like a better fix would be to have Crits also double damage from Ability modifiers as that still favors weapons.
Critical hits are fun. Rolling huge handfuls of dice is fun. Players suddenly getting backfooted by an unexpected critical from a mob is fun. That's when interesting things happen in the story.
5e is already ridiculously safe. Including at Level 1...which typically lasts one game in the campaign. If there was any less risk to player characters there would be zero dramatic tension.
The nerfs to critical hits are a solution in search of a problem. No one was complaining about too many critical hits.
To specific classes:
1. If paladins are over-tuned, why are fighters the consensus choice as best DPS class in the game? Being able to smite on a crit for nova damage is great, and is what keeps paladins close to fighters and barbarians.
2. This is a massive nerf to rogues and makes assassination rogues, in particular, utterly pointless.
3. Taking crits away from Eldritch Blast is just mean to Warlocks.
Here's the thing with this proposal: it's nerfing fun. It's taking things away for no good reason. It's exactly the kind of meddling that WotC needs to stay away from. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
1.) They're not. Paladins are. Fighters only start pulling even late in the game, and only specific subclasses making use of specific feat combinations. if you're not doing GWM Power Blow cheese and adding a flat +10 to every attack, paladins are easily the most potent damage class. Barbarians get more damage per hit, but dingdong smites and combat versatility make them the better overall choice. There's a reason paladins are widely touted as the strongest class in D&D.
2.) You're not looking at the entire 1DD system. Obviously they will fix stuff that relied on the old crit rules to function. We have one small piece of the entire puzzle right now, and yet people are judging the entire puzzle. Stop that.
3.) Warlocks with Agonizing Doink already have the best at-will damage in the game. Period. Uncontestable. They have a weightless, infinite-ammo heavy crossbow with the game's best damage type that scales Extra Attacks better than the fighter does. A fighter needs an eighteen-pound, fifty-gold contraption that needs both hands to shoot, consumes ammo, and can easily be damaged/lost, as well as requiring a feat, to get 1d10 ranged damage out to twenty less feet of nominal range than Agonizing Doink, and EB spammers get their fourth shot three levels earlier than the same fighter. They can also amplify their weightless infinite-ammo magic force crossbow in half a dozen increasingly powerful ways. Warlocks are fine.
The proposal is taking things away for the good reason of "this gives us the room we need to make the baseline versions of these things better." If you want the baseline versions to keep being bad and only functional five percent of the time - or for the baseline version to be unfair and overpowered five percent of the time i.e. palladalladingdongs - then insist on retaining the current crit rules. Personally? I want the Better Baseline Stuff that comes from dumping the current crit rules. Rolling a 20 on an attack roll already means I automatically hit no matter what the target's defenses say. That is enough for me to get a charge out of a 20. I don't also need the game to hand me 25d12 bonus damage, or for the DM to decapitate my character and obliterate her soul forever when a CR 1/8 punk-ass no-name bandit scores a 20.
I'm not entirely sure I like the new crit rules either, but the current problem is that we only have a snapshot of the rules changes at the moment.
People are getting very shouty and ranty, screaming about spells and paladins etc, before we even know how these things are changing.
Changing the crit rules opens up design space for spells and classes that otherwise wouldn't be possible. E.g A rogue's sneak attack may get a specific cool feature that happens on a crit that currently isn't easy to balance due to their high crit damage.
So while pointing out these concerns is definitely a good thing to do so that Wizards know what else will need thinking about, let's try not to get too overheated at the moment!
Spells don't need to crit, most spells don't even roll a 20 or do damage in the first place. If anything, damage spells should by default have the casters spellcasting modifier (Int/Wis/Cha mod) added to the damage roll, like weapons do with their damage roll.
I personally think they will later in the class reworks add special wording to things like sneak attack or divine smite that these feature's crit alongside the weapon. This is a good balance change, as it prevents overs stacking damage by layering additional damage spells like holy weapon or green flame blade etc. on top of crits, since spells now don't crit anymore, they will still provide additional damage but not twice as much as intended. This will also allow them in turn to make damage spells more reliable, I hope, by increasing damage dice amount or simply adding the casting modifier as base damage to it.
The real key breaker here is that the Inspiration system is brokenly unfair. Melees with multiattack now outshine all other classes due to the fact they have more chances per turn to gain free inspiration and thus advantage to use against whatever saves they encounter or attacks they make. While they who only get to make around 1 attack have way less chances to get any. Casters have it worse as some spells don't even include a D20 roll in the first place, so they don't get any chances for inspiration unless they resort to their damage spells, which are to hit, like fire bolt but since they don't crit or have base casting mod damage added suck. I like that Inspiration now decays on a long rest and that you can't stack it, but I don't like that they try to make it overshadow the grand epic moment the D20 in a clutch moment itself is. I think this will hurt the game the most. The D20 is the symbolic main dice of DnD, representing it being a game of chance and fate. They would shoot themselves in the legs if they mess around with it like that.
As for monster's abilities to crit. Well, I think if they make it an optional rule like flanking, they could get away with it. They would also need to add a lot of extra recharge abilities to monsters other than dragons and so on to make it feel ok. for example, imagine a purple worm gaining a recharge ability "DM crit button" as they call it, that lets them jump out of the ground, attempt to devour a group of creatures in an area as it digs down on a spot within range for its body length. That's frightening and epic to use in an encounter, I would say.
I'm not going to necro that, but arguing that player crits should be nerfed because monster crits are too strong at lower levels is not logically conclusive to me, there is a disconnect. They could have just said monsters can't critical anymore and left player crits alone. To me, your thread appears to be related more specifically to monster crits, this one is about player crits and they are in fact separate issues.
Didn't read? That's fine.
I addressed player crits. I can address it again though. In short:
1.) Weapons being able to crit while spells cannot is a way to differentiate weapons and spells, and to allow Wizards to perhaps start using attack rolls for spells that merit it more. I will never not be pissed off that Disintegrate is a god damned saving throw instead of an attack roll even though I know exactly why that's the case (Disintegrate crits would break the game and making it a save forces it to be subject to Legendary Resistance). Again, specific beats general - spells like Blade of Disaster that simulate weaponry could still be allowed to crit, but having a basic combat cantrip like Fire Bolt completely and utterly outclass any form of weaponry is just kinda dumb.
2.) Character classes that over-rely on "crit fishing" right now can be improved in ways that would be difficult or even impossible if they were still allowed to Super Mega Ultra Crit for a gorrillion damage randomly for no reason. Math-minded players say rogue damage is super unimpressive at higher levels and thinbk rogues suck? Well, Wizards sure as shootin' can't fix that if players are also going to insist on rogues keeping the ability to roll 20+ dice whenever they crit. Same with paladins - the class is considered to be the strongest combatant in D&D in part because it can retroactively decide to spend resources to ultracharge a crit. Nobody else gets to do that, and it means paladin crits get to matter way more than they should. Without seeing the planned adjustments to both classes, we have no idea if the versions that are made possible by the less dumb crit rules are better overall than the versions we get stuck with if players force Wizards to abandon the improved rules.
3.) Nobody has a good reason to keep player SuperCrits and monster/paladin SuperMegaUltraCrits beyond "I like the dopamine shot I get from rolling a gorrillion damage". Which, all right - fair feedback. But encounter balance is going to keep being weird, paladins are going to keep being overtuned and drastically superior to other martials, rogues are going to continue to have surprisingly terrible damage any time they don't crit, and we're going to continue to not see any spells higher than secondish level that involve spell attacks and are all instead reliant on motherf@#$ing saving throws enemies get to pass for free because Wizards cannot allow high-level spell crits.
It's a 12 page long thread filled with overly long posts, I scanned the first post that other than a single bullet point doesn't even paladin.
1. Why would crits be a way to distinguish between spells and weapon attacks under the new rules? The new rules allow only a single damage die, so Disintegrate wouldn't be broken under them, it would go from 10d4 to 11d4, not the 20d4 of 5E.
2. Rogue's weren't underpowered because of crit fishing, they just lack anything in the late game to increase damage other than just the same +d6 on a sneak attack every 2 levels.
3. ... I mean the whole reason to play the game is for enjoyment, so the dopamine shot is a very reasonable reason, however I'd say it does go further, it creates moments and stories, which given what D&D is, these are good things for the game itself.
Why do people think the crit changes are a balance change? Crit changes are obviously going to hit the crit fishers more than anything so that is going to mainly be Paladin and Rogue, who gets negatively impacted. Paladin being one of the aforementioned Martials. So when of the two classes most nerfed by this change is a martial and the other isn't a caster either, would somebody think this is a spellcaster nerf? Most spells don't use attack rolls, they use saving throws, the class that uses the most attack rolls on spells being Warlock who are kind of lagging behind the rest in the whole caster department.
The change is obviously related to consistency and encounter design, but I'd argue that encounters do not need to go to plan every time, it risks making encounter bland. Crit fishers add a randomness to encounters that can cause fun chaotic things to occur.
While I feel sad for sneak attack not being able to crit anymore, a simple change in wording could fix it. As for paladins, they're the best martials in game with great damage, great defensive abilities and self-healing, a bunch of immunities, and utility spells as a sweet bonus. All other martials envy them. Time for nerf. Also, ekdritch blast isn't a spell anymore, it's no longer in any spell list. It's likely to become a basic feature for warlocks.
Why do people think the crit changes are a balance change? Crit changes are obviously going to hit the crit fishers more than anything so that is going to mainly be Paladin and Rogue, who gets negatively impacted. Paladin being one of the aforementioned Martials. So when of the two classes most nerfed by this change is a martial and the other isn't a caster either, would somebody think this is a spellcaster nerf? Most spells don't use attack rolls, they use saving throws, the class that uses the most attack rolls on spells being Warlock who are kind of lagging behind the rest in the whole caster department.
The change is obviously related to consistency and encounter design, but I'd argue that encounters do not need to go to plan every time, it risks making encounter bland. Crit fishers add a randomness to encounters that can cause fun chaotic things to occur.
While I feel sad for sneak attack not being able to crit anymore, a simple change in wording could fix it. As for paladins, they're the best martials in game with great damage, great defensive abilities and self-healing, a bunch of immunities, and utility spells as a sweet bonus. All other martials envy them. Time for nerf. Also, ekdritch blast isn't a spell anymore, it's no longer in any spell list. It's likely to become a basic feature for warlocks.
no need to nerf Paladin, instead buff Fighters, Barbarians, Rangers, Monk & Rogue. Paladins being the strongest martial, they are still around the middle overall.
no need to nerf Paladin, instead buff Fighters, Barbarians, Rangers, Monk & Rogue. Paladins being the strongest martial, they are still around the middle overall.
Well, I can surely agree on that. Though buffing them all up might be a helluva job.
Huh. Never thought of crits being the reason for all spells being saving throws.
I mean, it's nice to Crit as a low level mage so you feel like your piddly cantrip is doing damage, but it happens so little of the time that it doesn't matter. And when you do? Rolling a 2 and a 1 on Fire bolt just feels extra shitty.
And we get inspiration now too. I'm down with trading damage for accuracy.
As for rogues and pallys? We need to see the classes first. And that DM recharge thing, which sounds sexy as hell.
The crit rules are bad and none of the arguments in favor of them make much sense. Nerfing player crits only sucks out all of the excitement out of a fun moment.
Divine/Eldritch Smite and Sneak Attack were obviously the main causes of this change, they do, do too much damage on a critical currently.
No, they don't. I will die on this hill. There's no difference between the Fighter spreading out his crits over a bunch of attacks and the Rogue getting his crits on one big attack. It's a ~5% bump in overall damage either way, and any encounter that's broken by one of these crits would've ended next round, or maybe even later this round.
The real problem with Divine Smite is that it lets Paladins convert all of their spell slots into damage really efficiently and really quickly. There's no saves and they can smite as many times as they can swing. That's what's going to end your boss encounter prematurely. If they happen to crit along the way, that's just a small bonus. I don't believe Smite being so good at burst damage and opportunity attacks was an intentional decision.
DnD players: spellcasters outclass martials in everything, and can deal insane amounts of damage, this needs to be balanced. Same DnD players: WTF where are my spell crits, I want to do all the damage!
The premise is wrong. With the exception of Warlocks, there's generally more ways to be broken as a martial character than a spellcaster in 5e. I'll also die on this hill. The grappling/shoving rules are trivial to break, and so are Sharpshooter + Crossbow Expert. A spellcaster is generally better off just providing advantage for their broken-ass ranger friend than trying to put out damage directly.
1.) Weapons being able to crit while spells cannot is a way to differentiate weapons and spells, and to allow Wizards to perhaps start using attack rolls for spells that merit it more. I will never not be pissed off that Disintegrate is a god damned saving throw instead of an attack roll even though I know exactly why that's the case (Disintegrate crits would break the game and making it a save forces it to be subject to Legendary Resistance).
The real reason is that 5e streamlined things too much when it got rid of touch attacks (i.e. attacks that ignore armor), and the save became the lesser of two evils compared to having armor protect against Disintegrate. It was still a bad solution because it leads to dumb things like the wizard's aim being unaffected by being restrained, and also being unable to fire disintegrates blindly.
Getting rid of touch attacks was a really bad decision that reverberated through a ton of spells and monster abilities, and it's already reared its ugly head in One D&D. The devs finally realized the 5e grapple rules are awful, but because they don't have touch attacks, it's a straight attack roll against AC and now being in plate armor somehow makes you harder to grab.
Again, specific beats general - spells like Blade of Disaster that simulate weaponry could still be allowed to crit, but having a basic combat cantrip like Fire Bolt completely and utterly outclass any form of weaponry is just kinda dumb.
Martials outperform cantrips because 1d8 + 4 twice is better than 2d8 plus nothing or even 2d8 + 4. The main exception here is, again, Warlocks.
2.) Character classes that over-rely on "crit fishing" right now can be improved in ways that would be difficult or even impossible if they were still allowed to Super Mega Ultra Crit for a gorrillion damage randomly for no reason.
As I said above, that's not really the case. Paladins don't break encounters through crit-fishing and the Rogue dumping all of their damage in one hit isn't any better than martials getting a ton of hits with smaller crits along the way. If your encounter can't handle the 5% extra damage that crits add on average, the DM seriously underestimated the monster's HP. But there's no good way to adjust for "well, the Paladin might dump all their spell slots into this one fight" or "if the bard gets Faerie Fire off the party's damage per turn will double." The variance is too large.
Crits are fun, telling the wizard their Fire Bolt doesn't crit on a 20 is not fun, telling the Rogue they get just 1d6 on their crit Sneak Attack is not fun, and neither of those scenarios are currently problems in 5e.
Regarding monster crits, a better way to address the level 1 death problem is to just give level 1 characters another hit die. Sidekicks already start that way because almost every CR 1/2 stat block you'd use as a sidekick has 20ish HP to start. There's too many monster stat blocks already that don't have once-per-encounter or recharge abilities to justify throwing away monster crits in general, and just like player crits are fun and exciting, the risk of a monster crit adds tension to fights. You can never get too comfortable.
no need to nerf Paladin, instead buff Fighters, Barbarians, Rangers, Monk & Rogue. Paladins being the strongest martial, they are still around the middle overall.
Well, I can surely agree on that. Though buffing them all up might be a helluva job.
Well it's a great opportunity to rework the classes, give the martial characters a few new ways to inflict damage and be slightly more resilient against on the old saving throws.
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C RITICAL H ITS
Weapons and Unarmed Strikes* have a special feature for player characters: Critical Hits. If a player character rolls a 20 for an attack roll with a Weapon or an Unarmed Strike, the attack is also a Critical Hit, which means it deals extra damage to the target; you roll the damage dice of the Weapon or Unarmed Strike a second timem and add the second roll as extra damage to the target. For example, a Mace deals Bludgeoning Damage equal to 1d6 + your Strength modifier. If you score a Critical Hit with the Mace, it instead deals 2d6 + your Strength modifier. If your Weapon or Unarmed Strike has no damage dice, it deals no extra damage on a Critical Hit.
Why? Now the only thing that can crit is WEAPON DAMAGE - this is garbage and should just be pulled. I know a lot of people are complaining about this, but NAw this needs to been seen more and i'm making it my job to spread this WIDE. What does this mean for classes? Sneak attack/Smite/SPELLS ******* SPELLS do not crit - you're Eldritch Blast? Naw, Sneak Attack - way to nerf assassin even more then 2 dead class features *clap clap* Paladin? Wow you must REALLY hate martials and this is a BUFF only for them....*clap clap clap*. I am a long time DM and i will ignore this rule 100%, but i KNOW i ******* KNOW DM's will run this as RAW in many campaigns because its a rule, just stop it and erase this garbage please theres many rules in DND that need to be fixed or shaped and this is just taking up space and time dedicated to fixing other things. Just please get rid of this all together - crits are fine it's a 5% chance let that be the only thing that it is and just STOP IT.
yes yes, we know. Eldritch blast doesn't really get much damage from crits, at least as far as average damage per round goes, but it is a bit shitty.
Divine/Eldritch Smite and Sneak Attack were obviously the main causes of this change, they do, do too much damage on a critical currently.
Booming Blade, Green-Flame Blade, and smite spells probably were partially related to this too since they also could get higher number of dice.
You can complain about this in the survey, I think the vast majority of people are. There is 100 better ways to handle the issues than has been chosen. Heck, 1 damage die per source of damage would have been better but I still think crits need changing more due to their other attribute, the ability to snake eyes. two 1s does not feel like a critical, when it gives a damage value that would be disappointing for a normal attack.
DnD players: spellcasters outclass martials in everything, and can deal insane amounts of damage, this needs to be balanced.
Same DnD players: WTF where are my spell crits, I want to do all the damage!
Also smite crits were cheating anyway. You decide to apply a smite after you hit. Of course, you'd always apply them to crits.
The New Crit Rules are Better Than You Think They Are.
Please do not contact or message me.
Spell crits and even raw damage aren't the reason that casters outclass martials. This doesn't at all fix the real issue, it's just a feel bad change.
I'm not going to necro that, but arguing that player crits should be nerfed because monster crits are too strong at lower levels is not logically conclusive to me, there is a disconnect. They could have just said monsters can't critical anymore and left player crits alone. To me, your thread appears to be related more specifically to monster crits, this one is about player crits and they are in fact separate issues.
Why do people think the crit changes are a balance change? Crit changes are obviously going to hit the crit fishers more than anything so that is going to mainly be Paladin and Rogue, who gets negatively impacted. Paladin being one of the aforementioned Martials. So when of the two classes most nerfed by this change is a martial and the other isn't a caster either, would somebody think this is a spellcaster nerf? Most spells don't use attack rolls, they use saving throws, the class that uses the most attack rolls on spells being Warlock who are kind of lagging behind the rest in the whole caster department.
The change is obviously related to consistency and encounter design, but I'd argue that encounters do not need to go to plan every time, it risks making encounter bland. Crit fishers add a randomness to encounters that can cause fun chaotic things to occur.
Didn't read? That's fine.
I addressed player crits. I can address it again though. In short:
1.) Weapons being able to crit while spells cannot is a way to differentiate weapons and spells, and to allow Wizards to perhaps start using attack rolls for spells that merit it more. I will never not be pissed off that Disintegrate is a god damned saving throw instead of an attack roll even though I know exactly why that's the case (Disintegrate crits would break the game and making it a save forces it to be subject to Legendary Resistance). Again, specific beats general - spells like Blade of Disaster that simulate weaponry could still be allowed to crit, but having a basic combat cantrip like Fire Bolt completely and utterly outclass any form of weaponry is just kinda dumb.
2.) Character classes that over-rely on "crit fishing" right now can be improved in ways that would be difficult or even impossible if they were still allowed to Super Mega Ultra Crit for a gorrillion damage randomly for no reason. Math-minded players say rogue damage is super unimpressive at higher levels and thinbk rogues suck? Well, Wizards sure as shootin' can't fix that if players are also going to insist on rogues keeping the ability to roll 20+ dice whenever they crit. Same with paladins - the class is considered to be the strongest combatant in D&D in part because it can retroactively decide to spend resources to ultracharge a crit. Nobody else gets to do that, and it means paladin crits get to matter way more than they should. Without seeing the planned adjustments to both classes, we have no idea if the versions that are made possible by the less dumb crit rules are better overall than the versions we get stuck with if players force Wizards to abandon the improved rules.
3.) Nobody has a good reason to keep player SuperCrits and monster/paladin SuperMegaUltraCrits beyond "I like the dopamine shot I get from rolling a gorrillion damage". Which, all right - fair feedback. But encounter balance is going to keep being weird, paladins are going to keep being overtuned and drastically superior to other martials, rogues are going to continue to have surprisingly terrible damage any time they don't crit, and we're going to continue to not see any spells higher than secondish level that involve spell attacks and are all instead reliant on motherf@#$ing saving throws enemies get to pass for free because Wizards cannot allow high-level spell crits.
Please do not contact or message me.
I think removing Sneak Attack & Smites as sources of Crit damage is a good idea, but not to remove it from spells. For one thing, most leveled spells force saves instead of requiring attacks, so by and large spell Crits aren’t the biggest balance problems in the game. For another thing, spending a spell slot and missing sucks eggs. A lot. The one thing that kept that balanced at all was that measly li’l 5% chance to Crit. Finally, Spell attacks are already differentiated from weapon attacks by the fact that one doesn’t add their Ability modifier to the damage rolls. What I believe would feel like a better fix would be to have Crits also double damage from Ability modifiers as that still favors weapons.
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Critical hits are fun. Rolling huge handfuls of dice is fun. Players suddenly getting backfooted by an unexpected critical from a mob is fun. That's when interesting things happen in the story.
5e is already ridiculously safe. Including at Level 1...which typically lasts one game in the campaign. If there was any less risk to player characters there would be zero dramatic tension.
The nerfs to critical hits are a solution in search of a problem. No one was complaining about too many critical hits.
To specific classes:
1. If paladins are over-tuned, why are fighters the consensus choice as best DPS class in the game? Being able to smite on a crit for nova damage is great, and is what keeps paladins close to fighters and barbarians.
2. This is a massive nerf to rogues and makes assassination rogues, in particular, utterly pointless.
3. Taking crits away from Eldritch Blast is just mean to Warlocks.
Here's the thing with this proposal: it's nerfing fun. It's taking things away for no good reason. It's exactly the kind of meddling that WotC needs to stay away from. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
1.) They're not. Paladins are. Fighters only start pulling even late in the game, and only specific subclasses making use of specific feat combinations. if you're not doing GWM Power Blow cheese and adding a flat +10 to every attack, paladins are easily the most potent damage class. Barbarians get more damage per hit, but dingdong smites and combat versatility make them the better overall choice. There's a reason paladins are widely touted as the strongest class in D&D.
2.) You're not looking at the entire 1DD system. Obviously they will fix stuff that relied on the old crit rules to function. We have one small piece of the entire puzzle right now, and yet people are judging the entire puzzle. Stop that.
3.) Warlocks with Agonizing Doink already have the best at-will damage in the game. Period. Uncontestable. They have a weightless, infinite-ammo heavy crossbow with the game's best damage type that scales Extra Attacks better than the fighter does. A fighter needs an eighteen-pound, fifty-gold contraption that needs both hands to shoot, consumes ammo, and can easily be damaged/lost, as well as requiring a feat, to get 1d10 ranged damage out to twenty less feet of nominal range than Agonizing Doink, and EB spammers get their fourth shot three levels earlier than the same fighter. They can also amplify their weightless infinite-ammo magic force crossbow in half a dozen increasingly powerful ways. Warlocks are fine.
The proposal is taking things away for the good reason of "this gives us the room we need to make the baseline versions of these things better." If you want the baseline versions to keep being bad and only functional five percent of the time - or for the baseline version to be unfair and overpowered five percent of the time i.e. palladalladingdongs - then insist on retaining the current crit rules. Personally? I want the Better Baseline Stuff that comes from dumping the current crit rules. Rolling a 20 on an attack roll already means I automatically hit no matter what the target's defenses say. That is enough for me to get a charge out of a 20. I don't also need the game to hand me 25d12 bonus damage, or for the DM to decapitate my character and obliterate her soul forever when a CR 1/8 punk-ass no-name bandit scores a 20.
Please do not contact or message me.
I'm not entirely sure I like the new crit rules either, but the current problem is that we only have a snapshot of the rules changes at the moment.
People are getting very shouty and ranty, screaming about spells and paladins etc, before we even know how these things are changing.
Changing the crit rules opens up design space for spells and classes that otherwise wouldn't be possible. E.g A rogue's sneak attack may get a specific cool feature that happens on a crit that currently isn't easy to balance due to their high crit damage.
So while pointing out these concerns is definitely a good thing to do so that Wizards know what else will need thinking about, let's try not to get too overheated at the moment!
I dunno, aside from cantrips spells are a limited resource, where there is no limit on sword swings and practical archery.
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Spells don't need to crit, most spells don't even roll a 20 or do damage in the first place. If anything, damage spells should by default have the casters spellcasting modifier (Int/Wis/Cha mod) added to the damage roll, like weapons do with their damage roll.
I personally think they will later in the class reworks add special wording to things like sneak attack or divine smite that these feature's crit alongside the weapon. This is a good balance change, as it prevents overs stacking damage by layering additional damage spells like holy weapon or green flame blade etc. on top of crits, since spells now don't crit anymore, they will still provide additional damage but not twice as much as intended. This will also allow them in turn to make damage spells more reliable, I hope, by increasing damage dice amount or simply adding the casting modifier as base damage to it.
The real key breaker here is that the Inspiration system is brokenly unfair. Melees with multiattack now outshine all other classes due to the fact they have more chances per turn to gain free inspiration and thus advantage to use against whatever saves they encounter or attacks they make. While they who only get to make around 1 attack have way less chances to get any. Casters have it worse as some spells don't even include a D20 roll in the first place, so they don't get any chances for inspiration unless they resort to their damage spells, which are to hit, like fire bolt but since they don't crit or have base casting mod damage added suck. I like that Inspiration now decays on a long rest and that you can't stack it, but I don't like that they try to make it overshadow the grand epic moment the D20 in a clutch moment itself is. I think this will hurt the game the most. The D20 is the symbolic main dice of DnD, representing it being a game of chance and fate. They would shoot themselves in the legs if they mess around with it like that.
As for monster's abilities to crit. Well, I think if they make it an optional rule like flanking, they could get away with it. They would also need to add a lot of extra recharge abilities to monsters other than dragons and so on to make it feel ok. for example, imagine a purple worm gaining a recharge ability "DM crit button" as they call it, that lets them jump out of the ground, attempt to devour a group of creatures in an area as it digs down on a spot within range for its body length. That's frightening and epic to use in an encounter, I would say.
It's a 12 page long thread filled with overly long posts, I scanned the first post that other than a single bullet point doesn't even paladin.
1. Why would crits be a way to distinguish between spells and weapon attacks under the new rules? The new rules allow only a single damage die, so Disintegrate wouldn't be broken under them, it would go from 10d4 to 11d4, not the 20d4 of 5E.
2. Rogue's weren't underpowered because of crit fishing, they just lack anything in the late game to increase damage other than just the same +d6 on a sneak attack every 2 levels.
3. ... I mean the whole reason to play the game is for enjoyment, so the dopamine shot is a very reasonable reason, however I'd say it does go further, it creates moments and stories, which given what D&D is, these are good things for the game itself.
While I feel sad for sneak attack not being able to crit anymore, a simple change in wording could fix it. As for paladins, they're the best martials in game with great damage, great defensive abilities and self-healing, a bunch of immunities, and utility spells as a sweet bonus. All other martials envy them. Time for nerf. Also, ekdritch blast isn't a spell anymore, it's no longer in any spell list. It's likely to become a basic feature for warlocks.
no need to nerf Paladin, instead buff Fighters, Barbarians, Rangers, Monk & Rogue. Paladins being the strongest martial, they are still around the middle overall.
Well, I can surely agree on that. Though buffing them all up might be a helluva job.
Huh. Never thought of crits being the reason for all spells being saving throws.
I mean, it's nice to Crit as a low level mage so you feel like your piddly cantrip is doing damage, but it happens so little of the time that it doesn't matter. And when you do? Rolling a 2 and a 1 on Fire bolt just feels extra shitty.
And we get inspiration now too. I'm down with trading damage for accuracy.
As for rogues and pallys? We need to see the classes first. And that DM recharge thing, which sounds sexy as hell.
The crit rules are bad and none of the arguments in favor of them make much sense. Nerfing player crits only sucks out all of the excitement out of a fun moment.
No, they don't. I will die on this hill. There's no difference between the Fighter spreading out his crits over a bunch of attacks and the Rogue getting his crits on one big attack. It's a ~5% bump in overall damage either way, and any encounter that's broken by one of these crits would've ended next round, or maybe even later this round.
The real problem with Divine Smite is that it lets Paladins convert all of their spell slots into damage really efficiently and really quickly. There's no saves and they can smite as many times as they can swing. That's what's going to end your boss encounter prematurely. If they happen to crit along the way, that's just a small bonus. I don't believe Smite being so good at burst damage and opportunity attacks was an intentional decision.
The premise is wrong. With the exception of Warlocks, there's generally more ways to be broken as a martial character than a spellcaster in 5e. I'll also die on this hill. The grappling/shoving rules are trivial to break, and so are Sharpshooter + Crossbow Expert. A spellcaster is generally better off just providing advantage for their broken-ass ranger friend than trying to put out damage directly.
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Well it's a great opportunity to rework the classes, give the martial characters a few new ways to inflict damage and be slightly more resilient against on the old saving throws.