Halfling crits

[Ogrepuppy]

(pg. 46)

Just to clarify, a halfling gets a crit on a roll of 16 or higher, or literally on a roll of 16 and that's it?

It seems evident that it's 16 or higher...but maybe Joseph chose 16 as a random, whimsical crit number.

(Sorry if this belongs in the combat section of the feedback boards; move it as needed.)

[reverenddak]

I think he's pretty specific that it needs to be a natural 16. It's in reference that all halflings get to use d16s when 2-weap-fighting, regardless of Agility.

While everyone else needs to roll (total) exactly 20 to crit, a Halfling only needs a natural 16. It doesn't specify if the 16 has to hit, I assume so.

[finarvyn]

It's the top number of the dice type you're rolling (e.g. a 16 on a d16, a 14 on a d14, a 20 on a d20, etc) which means that crits are no longer exactly 5% all of the time. A little quirky, but it's not like it'll break the combat system.

Especially since fumbles are on a natural 1, so if you have a higher chance of rolling a crit you also have a higher chance of rolling a fumble.

[Hamakto]

It's the top number of the dice type you're rolling (e.g. a 16 on a d16, a 14 on a d14, a 20 on a d20, etc) which means that crits are no longer exactly 5% all of the time. A little quirky, but it's not like it'll break the combat system.

Especially since fumbles are on a natural 1, so if you have a higher chance of rolling a crit you also have a higher chance of rolling a fumble.

Except a halfling has to roll two natural 1's when doing two weapon fighting to have a fumble.

[jmucchiello]

So make a party of all halflings and see if it is more powerful than a normal mixed party. This is a playtest.

[goodmangames]

Comment above is correct, halflings crit on a natural 16. That "counts" as their natural 20 so they hit and crit on a natural 16, even if that is mathematically a "miss" against the target AC.

In play, a halfling fighting two-handed rolls a d16 which obviously has a lower range of results than d20...so they typically hit a little less often on each die but it's offset by rolling more dice and occasionally scoring more crits.

And the requirement to roll TWO natural 1's in order to fumble actually does come into play fairly often. Those d16's do seem to produce a fair number of 1's, but not often at the same time.

[Hamakto]

So make a party of all halflings and see if it is more powerful than a normal mixed party. This is a playtest.

We did some limited tests and halflings are interesting in combat.

They hit more often but do far less damage than a Warrior. Mainly because a warrior adds his MDoA die to the damage roll. This bumps his damage up just enough that a halfling is not quite statistically as powerful as a simple sword and board type fighter (fighter has higher damage output, wider range of weapons, and higher AC).

While you do get more criticals, you will find that the extra attack actually lowers the to hit probabilities the higher your opponent AC's get. One bonus is that AC's of creatures in DCC RPG are no where nearly as inflated as in 3e/4e.