critical hits on dragons

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atlascott
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critical hits on dragons

Post by atlascott »

So let's say my extremely foolish party of 3rd level characters desire to fight a large ancient dragon.

By the grace of goodness, they get an initiative and a warrior strikes a critical and the critical says that the warrior does an additional 3 D 12 damage and the recipient of the blow dies in 1d3 plus one rounds.

1. If the dragon takes an action to heal itself, is it still going to die?

2. The critical hit charts seem Humanoid centric. Would a result indicating smashing an opponents brains in really be appropriate when your opponent is a dragon?

Thoughts greatly appreciated!
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GnomeBoy
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Re: critical hits on dragons

Post by GnomeBoy »

The first thing I think of is that that dude Achilles had a heel... he had two, actually, but one was more significant than the other.

Letting the results stand may make good when the dice later go against the players -- less disgruntledment or wanting to worm out of a roll that goes against them, if you let stand a roll that demolishes a mighty foe in one blow.

There's also cooking up your own "vs. Giant Beastie" crit chart, if that doesn't seem like enough of an answer. You could even crowd-source such a thing here...
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Rick
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Re: critical hits on dragons

Post by Rick »

Could be wrong, but without a hefty Luck expenditure, I don't think a 3rd level Warrior (d16/III) can achieve that severe a critical. And the dragon would still get a save w/ a bonus = to its HD (1d10+6).

That said, I'd wouldn't "rob" the player of such an epic achievement by having the dragon just heal it away* but I'd also make the very most of those 1d3+1 rounds & not let it go down w/o a quick (but nasty) fight. Depending on the die roll the dragon could still get in as many as, what, 20 attacks and 3 uses of its breath weapon ("death throes") in that time.

*Unless that was one of its unique powers, etc.
atlascott
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Re: critical hits on dragons

Post by atlascott »

The recipient of a critical hit does not get a saving throw to avoid the effects of the critical, do they? Or is this a special dragon power?
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GnomeBoy
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Re: critical hits on dragons

Post by GnomeBoy »

atlascott wrote:The recipient of a critical hit does not get a saving throw to avoid the effects of the critical, do they? Or is this a special dragon power?
Rick has a point.

For a 3rd Level Warrior, they're rolling a 1d16 modified by Luck on chart IV... They'd have to have a very high Luck AND still do some Luck burn to get the result you point out (24+ on Crit Table IV). The result itself mentions a Save for the target (DC 23 in this case) -- the Save is not to negate the Crit, it's to negate the death in 1d3 rounds.

Supposing the Warrior's magic sword was such that they add +8 to all Crit Table results (not a bad magic sword at all), I'd let the result stand.

As long as everything was on the level, I'd let it stand.

Just think of being able to play with the rep that guy is going to get... the number of hot shot punks that are going to want to test themselves against him... the jobs he'd be hired for that actually put him out of his depth because the assumption is that a long-shot fluke is the norm for him... So. Many. Stories. To. Tell....
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atlascott
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Re: critical hits on dragons

Post by atlascott »

You guys convinced me! ;)

Thanks!
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Skyscraper
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Re: critical hits on dragons

Post by Skyscraper »

I think that slaying an ancient dragon in a single stroke is stuff of legend. Achieving legendary status in a RPG game is simply great.
Maledict Brothbreath, level 4 warrior, STR 16 (+2) AGI 7 (-1) STA 12 PER 9 INT 10 LUCK 15 (+1), AC: 16 Refl: +1 Fort: +2 Will: +1; lawful; Armor of the Lion and Lily's Blade.

Brother Sufferus, level 4 cleric, STR 13 (+1) AGI 15 (+1) STA 11 PER 13 (+1) INT 10 LUCK 9, AC: 11 (13 if wounded, 15 if down to half hit points), Refl: +3 Fort: +2 Will: +3, chaotic, Robe of the Faith, Scourge of the Maimed One, Darts of Pain.
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Re: critical hits on dragons

Post by JediOre »

Skyscraper wrote:I think that slaying an ancient dragon in a single stroke is stuff of legend. Achieving legendary status in a RPG game is simply great.
That right there is gold!
fanditch
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Re: critical hits on dragons

Post by fanditch »

Like David slaying Goliath with five stones and a sling! Love it...
oncelor
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Re: critical hits on dragons

Post by oncelor »

The party in my campaign was killing really tough dragons routinely far too easily for my taste -- mostly by means of thieves burning luck to sneak, hit, and do a critical to incapacitate the dragon for multiple rounds. I ended up ruling that effects that stun dragons for a number of rounds instead cause the dragon to lose that many attacks. I've extended this rule to major demon type things and similar. I've also added a simple magic resistance rule to the game and usually give nastier things like dragons a healthy magic resistance.
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catseye yellow
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Re: critical hits on dragons

Post by catseye yellow »

i do not allow thieves to backstab dragons (or other non humanoids) without some general knowledge of its weak spots. unless a bird appears and points lucky thief to some chink in dragons armor his/hers only way to find is to quest for it.
atlascott
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Re: critical hits on dragons

Post by atlascott »

With good bless spells and spellburn, a 3rd level wizard with a Sleep spell can immediately and in the first round put a Dragon to sleep. You need a 20-23 to put the dragon in a supernatural sleep, Game over.

A Luck burn and a good roll means a Warrior slays the big bad, quick and easy.

The rules are fun, but swingy. Not even swingy -- as soon as a smart guy runs a wizard with a cleric, you have problems. No one but a God should be able to kill a dragon with one blow.

Unless your name is Bard. Lol.

Another example: a 20-23 on Magic Missile, easily, easily attainable, grant 1d4 +2 missiles which each do 1d6 plus CL. So a Third level Wizard, in one shot, with no save, can deal between 12 and 54 points of damage in one shot, with an average around 33 hp.

An average adult dragon the size of a house will have 8 HD on average, 5 hp per die, for 40 hp. The wizard with a LITTLE luck one shots an average adult Dragon.

Fighting a Dragon becomes an exercise in who wins initiative, but with a +8, you probably aren't beating a Dragon to the punch often.

Dragons Giants/Titans and high level Demons should have damage and spell resistance to some level to justify their mythical status as The Big Bad. Patrons also. And definitely Gods.

Another thing to consider is that if your Party constantly spellburns against the big bad, start giving them a tough combat AFTER the big bad, or pick up immediately after a combat at the next session before the spellburn heals.
atlascott
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Re: critical hits on dragons

Post by atlascott »

I should clarify -- I know that some folks runs games right off the top of their head like they do on Nerd Poker.

That's cool, and its rules lite and almost rules invisible.

But I like to plan my games, incorporate the mandatory background stories, feature certain characters in certain game sessions so everyone feels relevant and important.

I throw in published scenarios and tweak them and then run stuff of my own devising.

When I spend the time to roll up a big bad, and the characters can toss a Bless and a few points of spellburn and one shot the big bad, how did he come to be a big bad, again?

Big bads in my games have to have spell resistance and damage resistance. Period.

It is not an epic battle for the PLAYERS sake if they epic battle is over in one round. You have 4 hours of game build up and they reach the big bad -- bless, spellburn, done. Where's the loot?

It is not an answer to say that players who want their characters to be as combat effective as possible are munchkins or minmaxers. They are good gamers, but they want to live and prosper and do well, and if reading the rules helps them, then they do it.

I love these rules, and I am sticking with them. We must tweak the rules to make the game challenging and fun.
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cjoepar
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Re: critical hits on dragons

Post by cjoepar »

I don't disagree with the swingy-ness of things, Atlascott, because they can easily go the other way just as quickly (and since a dragon gets an initiative bonus equal to it's HD, they will tend to win the initiative battle more often than not).

But I will make one comment, and that's that I would never put an adult dragon in an encounter with less than 100 hp's, regardless of the way the monster is written up. Dragons use d12 for HD, with an average size dragon getting 5 to 12 d12 h.p's That's a range of 5 to 144 hp's. I know Dragon Table II says that an adult dragon should get 5 hp's per die, for a range of 25 to 60 hp's, but IMHO, that's just not enough HP's for an adult dragon, so I would bump it up to 100+, depending a little bit on the strength of the party. Like you, I like to prepare things ahead of time, but I also like to keep a major encounter that is central to the storyline just barely within reach of the party to accomplish. If for some reason the party was to find a dragon in a random encounter, I might be more inclined to just use the guidelines in the rulebook just to get on with it and not slow the game down too much, but generally, I arbitrarily make encounters harder (or sometimes easier) if I think there is justification. I also generally work out strategies ahead of time for the dragon, and may even specifically create the terrain to put the party at some kind of disadvantage, since I think that's what a dragon would do. For example, a young dragon that only has, say 40 hp's, but can breathe fire will be well aware of his vulnerability to a party of adventurers of level 2+. So the entrance to it's lair might have a 20' wide puddle of pitch that the party has to cross to approach it.

In the end I agree that keeping things challenging is paramount to the enjoyment of any rpg.
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GnomeBoy
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Re: critical hits on dragons

Post by GnomeBoy »

atlascott wrote:as soon as a smart guy runs a wizard with a cleric, you have problems.
There was a big discussion about this situation on G+ a short while back. The Cleric was casting Bless constantly, giving the Wizard an insane boost. But the person posting about how this was short circuiting the game never completely clarified how that was actually working... e.g., why wasn't disapproval reigning the Cleric in at all? Is it just a crazy series of lucky die rolls for the players? I had some suspicion that maybe they were running Disapproval wrongly (perhaps not increasing the range with each failure and just leaving the bad stuff at a natural 1), but couldn't suss that out.

I still think there's lots of mileage in letting the PCs knock down "Big Bads" - and then getting around to where this puts them in the world they are in. Do they become the "Big Bads" that others are now trying to take down? Who (or What) has noticed the stir they're causing? Certainly, at some point their lucky dice have to break, and their spells fail them -- how hard do they fall...? Who's there to take advantage of their failure?
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DM Marcus
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Re: critical hits on dragons

Post by DM Marcus »

Yep... Whenever a western gunslinger knocks off the fastest gun in the west, every two-bit wanna-be who wants to earn a quick reputation hunts them down and tries to make a name for himself. Their party kills a legendary dragon? How would the bump in their reputation effect the world around them? Who is gunning for them now? Who thinks that they are in possession of great treasure? What local economy suffers or excels because of the dragon's death?

Short term... They killed a dragon too easily...
Long term... The repercussions might make them wish they hadn't and the story threads it gives you as a Judge have dramatically increased!
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