Recent thread got me to thinking on this subject and then made me realize something.

First off: Critical hit as we always used it was double damage on a natural 20.

Question then to those interested. Do you use critical hits in your D&D games or not? Assuming of course you play D&D at all.

Personally I enjoy them because they add a little "POW!" factor to combat.

Not sold yet on the Next version of criticals which is just do max damage.

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Which leads to the second observation...

I can not  recall when we started using criticals in AD&D. Or where we picked the method up from. Was not Dragon magazine I do not think. I thought I might have picked it up from Gamma World. But I am not seeing it there either.

So when were critical hits, and fumbles, actually added to AD&D officially? Unearthed Arcana? Dragonlance? Oriental Adventures? I do not have my books handy to check.
I know they are in 2nd ed. But I was using critical hits well before 2nd.

Were they officially added?

I know that they were common enough, there is an article in Dragon #39 mentioning how common their usage was.

I think it's just like ability checks, they were seemingly adopted by players and eventually got added officially.

Have been using them since 1980 but no idea where they came from.
Remember reading Gary complaining that there was no need for critical hits or trying to treat D&D hit rolls as a single strike becuase it was a melee of blows that lasted a minute. I think that is in the DMG somewhere.
Anyway we rejected that and continued with ciritical hits and fumbles on a natural 1 but you got to roll under your level on a d20 as a "save vs fumble" and sometiems we dropped fumbles all together but a natural 1 always missed.

interestignly enough we doubled everything so a backstabbling theif with a +3 sword at 9th level (x 4 damage) that rolled a nat 20 would do -
 (((1d8 +3)x4)x2) or (1d8 x +24
I know that he semi-offical rule was more
 (((1d8)x4)x2) +3) or (1d8 x8) +3
or even
(8d8 +3)

This became toughter still with UA and weapon specialisation when a figther with a magic sword and some strength and double spec might be dealing (1d8 +5) as on doubles it became (1d8x2)+10

Philotomy Jurament has some great ideas that really inspired me to do more with Critical Hits.

http://www.grey-elf.com/philotomy.pdf

In essence, you don't just double damage, but critical hits are moment of great DM flourish to tailor what the critical does based on the situation.

Example: Gehan the Cleric crits an orc with his mace. He rolls a 2 as his base damage. Instead of doubling damage to 4 points or adding another D6 damage, I could rule that the orc is dazed by the smash, maybe even needs to save vs. stun, or the mace comes down on the orc's shield, shattering it or the mace crushes the orc's arm, forcing him to drop its spear, etc.

Generally I've used critical hits in D&D, but there is definitely merit in the argument that using them universally is a bad thing for the players as the DM tends to roll more attack rolls than the party.

Quote from: Spinachcat;735137Philotomy Jurament has some great ideas that really inspired me to do more with Critical Hits.

http://www.grey-elf.com/philotomy.pdf

In essence, you don't just double damage, but critical hits are moment of great DM flourish to tailor what the critical does based on the situation.

Example: Gehan the Cleric crits an orc with his mace. He rolls a 2 as his base damage. Instead of doubling damage to 4 points or adding another D6 damage, I could rule that the orc is dazed by the smash, maybe even needs to save vs. stun, or the mace comes down on the orc's shield, shattering it or the mace crushes the orc's arm, forcing him to drop its spear, etc.

Generally I want my monsters and PCs to obey the same "physics" and I think that whist double damage can be scary to a PC these effects would piss them off more.

I don't think D&D needs them. The combat rules are meant to be abstract and the idea of a single roll mapping to to one "attack" just doesn't fit. It is the same justification for not granting a fighter with 2 weapons an extra attack. An attack roll is not "a swing" therefore critical hits are a clumsy fit.

I do like the idea of them but I believe that they make more sense in less abstract systems in which a particular attack CAN be mapped to a more discrete action.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;735163I don't think D&D needs them. The combat rules are meant to be abstract and the idea of a single roll mapping to to one "attack" just doesn't fit.

Actually, critical hits, at least those that do double damage, make more sense in an abstract combat than in a one-swing per die roll system. If an attack roll is the combination of multiple swings and feints, then it's possible for two of those swings to hit in that one "attack".

The rule for double damage on a 20 shows up in MAR Barker's original Empire of the Petal Throne manuscript from early in '74, just a few months after D&D was published. This probably means that Dave used them.

IMC, if a character rolls a critical (either a 20 or 10 more than he needed) he'll can roll double the damage (two dice instead of one die doubled) or he can perform any other special attack such as a trip, disarm, grapple, takedown, etc.

I use them.

In fact, I was considering starting a thread on this topic, as I'm debating which system to use for my recently started AD&D campaign.

I don't like the 'natural 20 is a crit' system, as it means that all characters, whether magic-users or fighters, have the same chance to score a critical hit.  That's implausible.  Also, sometimes a foe can only be hit with a 'natural 20' if they have a great AC.

The alternative that I'm using now is that a natural 20 gives the character the opportunity to score a critical hit.  The player has to roll again, and if he scores a hit (of any kind), his PC has scored a critical.  This means the PC does maximum damage and rolls one more damage die on top of that (so a longsword would do 8 + 1d8 + modifiers damage).  (I believe I took this from 3e, of all places, but I don't recall now.)

I'm not entirely happy with this system, and am looking for something more colourful, in the vein of the MERP system, but adapted to AD&D.

Since 1989 I've used something similar to the AD&D2 optional method for critical hits.  If you roll a natural 20, then you hit and get a bonus attack.  I play it so the bonus attack doesn't necessarily have to be against the same opponent as the original attack.

Before that I occasionally used a method in one of the Best of Dragon compilations.  It was one where whenever you hit you calculated the margin you hit by.  This margin then became a percentage chance you rolled against for a critical hit.  If you scored a critical hit you rolled on another chart for the exact effect.  It was a mechanically sound method, but tedious as all fuck.  That was why I used it irregularly and happily ditched it in favor of the much simpler and intuitive AD&D2 rule.

Quote from: hedgehobbit;735180Actually, critical hits, at least those that do double damage, make more sense in an abstract combat than in a one-swing per die roll system. If an attack roll is the combination of multiple swings and feints, then it's possible for two of those swings to hit in that one "attack".

The rule for double damage on a 20 shows up in MAR Barker's original Empire of the Petal Throne manuscript from early in '74, just a few months after D&D was published.

There is also the fact that characters are quite fragile enough. A 1st level character can be taken out by a single regular hit on average. Adding a 5% chance per attack roll to nigh ensure a PC kill doesn't seem like the best of ideas IMHO. Combat is already lethal enough.

Quote from: jibbajibba;735135sometiems we dropped fumbles all together but a natural 1 always missed.

Same.

I've played where fumbles cause various effects: damage to the attacker, dropped weapons, broken weapons, loss of next attack, etc.  I definitely don't play that way anymore.  I just say that a natural 1 is an automatic miss with no further effect.

I feel that fumbles suck all around, not just from a player perspective.  In D&D they especially suck because of how whiff heavy the combat system is and how little damage weapons do compared to how many HPs have to be depleted.  Adding additional fumble effects just exacerbates the inherent problems for no productive play purpose.

Quote from: Akrasia;735189I don't like the 'natural 20 is a crit' system, as it means that all characters, whether magic-users or fighters, have the same chance to score a critical hit.  That's implausible.  Also, sometimes a foe can only be hit with a 'natural 20' if they have a great AC.

That why I also let a critical occur when the attack roll is 10 more than required. This makes the attack roll for high level fighters still have meaning when they are just about autohitting. I also don't allow criticals if the number needed to hit is 17 or more.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;735192There is also the fact that characters are quite fragile enough. A 1st level character can be taken out by a single regular hit on average. Adding a 5% chance per attack roll to nigh ensure a PC kill doesn't seem like the best of ideas IMHO.

Just because players can score criticals doesn't mean that monsters can. Also, the fragility of first level characters varies by edition.

In my AD&D 2E game a critical hit (natural 20) automatically does maximum damage for your weapon.

I like it because on the one hand it guarantees that a critical will be significant (getting a critical under crits-do-double and then rolling a "1" on the damage dice raises the question of just what was so critical about this hit that did a mere 2 points of damage), but at the same time it isn't too devastating for a result which is likely to come up 1 in every 20 combat rolls.

EDIT: It also neatly sidesteps the "how come casters can do crits?" thing - here, they certainly can, but the weapons available to them mean that their critical hits are consistently not going to be as good as the fighters'. Anyone can get in a lucky shot, but not everyone is equally effective when they do.

Quote from: Omega;735133Not sold yet on the Next version of criticals which is just do max damage.

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Crits in Next are Max damage + 1 additional damage dice.

QuoteWhich leads to the second observation...

I can not  recall when we started using criticals in AD&D. Or where we picked the method up from. Was not Dragon magazine I do not think. I thought I might have picked it up from Gamma World. But I am not seeing it there either.
.

Don't know when it officially started, but I posted an article yesterday about an article in 1980 from Dragon magazine that talked about expanding it from just double damage to a table of possible results.

Personally I like crits, but usually do double damage to keep it simple.  And what's good for the PCs is good for the monsters