Fumble Chart

I liked critical hit tables back when I dndd, like.. wound tables really. To show where you got hurt, how bad, etc. Those are kind of fun.

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That's all I've got. Out of those, I'd say that is probably my favorite

thanks

>Hit weapon
>Crit weapon

You... hit your own weapon?

With your nose, yes.

IDK man maybe

Maybe you hit the enemy's weapon

idk why that's bad

>idk why that's bad
Because it's fucking retard?
As is a 5% chance to do any of the stupid shit on D20 fumble table.

>be creative
Creative thinking on the fly is probably a lot harder then it seems

>Do drama for over a decade with a focus on improv
>Accidentally become that GM that does no prep but everyone thinks is a plan master

It's nice but I think it also make it really hard for me to relate to anyone who can't just be creative on the spot.

I'm in the exact same boat. I literally have pulled entire dungeons entirely out of my ass and nobody was the wiser.

Best part is probably when my players start making connections that I never intended
>Players: wait a second, these guys are wearing a star shaped sigil! That's the same as the house symbol of Duke Dukington!
>Me: ... Yeeeeeeeeeees. Yes it is!
Keeps me on my toes. Always wondered what it would be like to prepare things ahead of time.

>Your aim is true, but you hit the enemy with the flat of the blade. He raises an eyebrow questioningly.

>In your anger you wound up too much. Your opponent easily evades your telegraphed attack and gets an attack of opportunity.

>There was a shrub that you didn't see through your visor. You stumble. Roll against your dex or suffer a minus 6 to your AC next round.

>Your sword turns pink.

>Somebody shouts "DUCK". Reflexively you dodge a danger that doesn't exist. Your opponent gets an attack of opportunity.

>Blood from a cut above your left eye blinds you for 1 round. You get a -4 on your AC.

>Your swing misses wildly. In your eagerness you stepped forward way too strongly. You hop past your opponent on your right leg while trying to maintain balance by stretching out the left leg. You and your opponent switch positions but as you regain your footing you are facing in the wrong direction.

It's not too difficult.

>Best part is probably when my players start making connections that I never intended
Yup
>I swear guys that art dealer from a few sessions ago has connections to that Sith lord
>Make them sisters separated at birth

The campaigns write themselves, especially if you put a slight twist on their theory's.

There are no good fumble charts. Having a 5% chance to fuck up tremendously with any attack you do is stupid.

Fumblers assume that all participants of the battle are drunk.

>As you prepare to do a super cool flippy shit off the wagon into the fray of enemies, you misjudge your timing and fall face first into the ground.
>Everybody stops to point and laugh.
>Also roll for fall damage

Who says you need to miss on a 1?
>your weapon is stuck in your opponent's rib cage and you can't get it out.

You know how you often have to confirm af critical?
Do the same with fumbles. If they roll a one, have them roll again. Over enemy AC? No fumble, just a miss. Under enemy AC? Fumble. Make up something minor appropriate for the situation. if you're bored one day, brainstorm a bit and write down fumble outcomes but don't make a chart.

I roll to hit another motherfucker with that motherfucker. I have weapon proficiency(motherfucker)

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I just house rule that a crit fumble (or success) gives me the option to insert something dramatic and non-standard into the fight. I've used them to cause bleeds, gain miraculous recoveries, rally morale, strike allies with ranged weapons, damage the environment, damage their equipment, and a million other things. The only rule I have to myself is that it should do something interesting.

d20 games are pretty good for this sort of thing in general. There's a 10% chance that 'something interesting' will happen on a given combat or skill check, which is enough.

Lots easier to have a list of those instead

That's why it's a second roll to see how bad it is. Instead of just 'you miss' or 'you drop your weapon' you have degrees of failure below just failing. It's a 5% chance to not only fail, but have something interesting maybe happen.

The key is the list can't be only crazy shit, it can be like... 1-30 you just miss, 30-40 you drop your weapon, 40-50 opponent gets attack of opportunity etc etc. Then at 90-100 you break it into 'you fucking trip and sprain your ankle you dumb shit' etc.

We roll a d6 on every critical or fumble. On a 5 or 6 there is an added effect. Crits range from mild effects like extra damage to serious shit like loss of limb. It's actually worked out pretty well for our party.

I think fumble charts are the stuff of teenagers and 9gag, to be quite honest. A true patrician uses a nat 1 as a method for introducing weapon durability.

>Each weapon has a different quality: Scrap, Normal, Superior, Flawless
>Each weapon has a different set amount of durability points. In order: 1, 3, 7, Infinite
>On a nat 1, the weapon loses 1 point of durability.
>If the weapon goes down to 0, it breaks, and the only way to repair it is to basically spend essentially twice its worth at a blacksmith skilled enough to handle it.
>A blacksmith can also restore durability for a price.
>Lesser spells like mending can restore some durability, but not all, and can never fix broken weapons.

Its simple, perfect, and makes people actually give a shit about the quality of their gear as opposed to just mindlessly writing down "Sword shaped thingy" on their sheet and rolling dice.

that sounds like it would work with every weapon, like fists and important artefacts

maybe instead like a chart that has a few options, and maybe it's random which thing happens and there's a few of these charts which apply to different situations and weapons etc that way you can easily come up with examples of different things to have happen during combat to illustrate the error or even have a list of charts with positive options in case they roll well what if we put all those ideas into a few pdfs and then gave them to op and he could use those if he wanted and people who want durability systems can make one thatisnt fucking garbage

This is a bad idea. Let's assume that the 3 point sword is your average sword. After 60 swings it's scrap. Nobody wants that. This rule might make sense for makeshift weapons in some sort of post apocalyptic setting however.

Fists operate under the same rules as the rest of the weapons. Only now when a fist is broken, it sprains the player, and they require medical attention, and if they do it too much, there's a chance it could become a permanent injury short of magic repair.

Important artifacts are obviously flawless and therefore don't break. Or if I need the players to treat it like glass, I say it's "fragile" and put it under the scrap title Easy.

Also, the system is easier than making a chart because I just mark down "2/3 DP" on the sheet and be done with it.

>Let's assume that the 3 point sword is your average sword. After 60 swings it's scrap. Nobody wants that.

First, swinging a metal stick 60 times before it breaks without attending to it is probably more than the lifespan of the average weapon.

Second, yeah, nobody wants that. That's why I do it. Sometimes bad shit happens to you. How does your character deal with it? Necessity is the mother of invention, and it also makes the player more keen on analyzing the quality of the weapons on their enemies.

Real thing said by a player under this system:
>"I do a quick appraisal on these weapons these bodyguards have. Mines about to break, I'm out of whetstones, and we're miles from town."
>"Oh, that bad? I take two of them. Because the first one will break".

Third:
>This rule might make sense for makeshift weapons in some sort of post apocalyptic setting however.
You're actually 100% right on that, I actually made it up for a post-apocalyptic setting, but my players and I agreed that it was a really fun, if small, mechanic that added to the fun of scavenging so I've been adding it to all my games with some pretty good success.

Try it out.

I always make the fumble based on the action.
>i want to try and headbutt the orc grappling me
>rolled 1, you attempt it, but are painfully reminded of the thick skulls of the creatures. Stunned yourself one round

If I have players who can't Fucking handle a little failure and bitch I'm making them in particular look dumb, I use charts and make them roll so no arguing.

this, most characters are experienced characters and most fumbles are just stupid for them. Having fumbles being oportunities for the enemy is much more interesting

see now THIS one is cool as shit. Fumbles are dumb, I don't think random chance should make your action hero character derp out, but combat should be dangerous.

if you have a habit for reading it's quite easy

lol happened to me, that's fucking great

we always try as a group to brainstorm and make something fun and fair, DM has final say on what we go with

Dont use them.
You are already half way to realising how retarded critical failures are.

Why did i watch that whole thing

Stealing.
These plus for criticals sounds like it would be a shit ton of fun

Any other important things to know about this system? You mentioned whetstones, is it basically like monster hunter, except the weapons break premanently?

Nope. Started in 5e, and I've been carrying it with me into most things that involve an accuracy roll. Right now, I'm playing a Basic edition D&D campaign with it, and it's working quite well. As for the whetstones, I usually say it repairs one point, and magic repairs it by 1 or 2 depending. Fine tune it how you want.

It's not quite monster hunter in that I don't lower the weapons effectiveness like Monster Hunter does. There's probably a way to do that without being too clumsy, but I think it's fine as it is.

>hurrr duuuuuuuuur, I know let's gimp martials even moooooar!!
Fuck off

I might give that a try then. I'm thinking about putting an emphasis on proper care and maintenence of their equipment. Maybe the occasional stop to the smithy every other town, or having a tailor fix up tattered clothing etc. I've been gathering ideas for drains on the players funds because I see too many players take gold and silver for granted. Little things like wagon maintenence and food don't really get touched on enough for my liking.

But if you have a list then people expect that list to make sense.

For your consideration: Make your casters buy their own spell components. A copper here, a silver there.
That adds up you know.

Are there really people that dont do this

Component pouches are retarded allowing them is like allowing still spell, silent spell or componentless casting

Yeah, I never liked component pouches. I like to have players scavenge for their components. Can use it to slow them down and make travel that much slower. With slower travel comes more risk of bandits, injury, setbacks.

I watch the whole thing every time.

Honestly OP you just have to be creative if you want them to not seem read off of a list or rehearsed. For example one of my players last session lost his wolf companion, it was drowned by a water weird. Skulking beneath the water was a sea hag who attempted to snack on the wolf. The cleric threw a guiding bolt but rolled a 1, so I opted for it to hit the wolf corpse and have it explode. Caused a little strife in the party, but was quite funny to see the party's family pet blown up in front of the ranger.

>making the cleric explode wolfey
Y-you monster

>mfw Wolfey goes ka-blewy

I assume the person saying these fumbles is the DM. What kind of DM can't think on his feet?

What's the source for this one? It looks like it's from the PHB but it's definitely not.

>caster just takes eschew materials feat

>If the weapon goes down to 0, it breaks, and the only way to repair it is to basically spend essentially twice its worth at a blacksmith skilled enough to handle it.
Twice? 60 swings of a +1 weapon cost 4000 gold? I'm not against the idea, but such a price is ridiculous, especially if you can re-enchant a fucking wand of CLW for 750.

>A blacksmith can also restore durability for a price.
What about we give martials credit to be able to maintain their fucking gear. +/- 30 hits, the blade is dulled (act as a -1 temporary enchantment on the blade that stacks with current enchantment). +/- 60 hit, the blade is broken. Everything returns when the guy spend 1 hour working on his gear.

FREE OTHERWISE.

+1 weapons would CLEARLY be in the Superior category, if not outright flawless. So you're looking at your hero needing to make 140 swings without ever seeing a blacksmith or tending to it with whetstones or mending spells for that to break down.

>What about we give martials credit to be able to maintain their fucking gear.
I do. Whetstones and Blacksmiths. They just have to tell me they're actively doing it.

Stop playing pathfinder.

> Stop playing pathfinder.
I try. Right now, I play in 3 campaigns, one of which is cursed with it. And your advice doesn't fit well with Pokémon Table Top Adventures.

Also, a +1 weapon would act as a -1 weapon (as in: -1 to hit and to damage) after 60 hits.

>Pokémon Table Top Adventures.
Well of course not. Half of that universe runs on lies, and the other half runs on literal magic.
>They're able to have the tech to make a ball that can stop all momentum mid-air, then reverse its direction back to its owner after releasing its payload
>This technology is so old that you can find ancient versions made of fucking wood at the bottom of ships
>Kids still have to travel around in the forest on foot

Like I said before, I don't make them lose any attack ability, I merely track their points. You CAN do that, if you'd like though. Nothing wrong with it.

The Unearthed Arcana Subplebbit.
There's some real quality material being made there. Lot's of classes, which I don't really care for, but there's also homebrew rules fixes, new monsters, new races, and updates of subsystems from previous editions.
It's well worth a check out if you're interested in that kind of stuff.
you'll also find the resources to make things look PHB tier quality on there. Get on it!
reddit.com/r/UnearthedArcana/comments/54qwql/the_complete_critical_hits_revisited/

attached another thing from there that I like

Don't forget really questionable ethics. We know. And we push that even further, reanimating fossils, creating wild tribes out of it on purpose and stuff.

I hear this kind of thing a lot, but do you think that doing drama/improv has actually improved your GMing methods?

Like, would you have been not as good at this stuff if you hadn't learned improv? That kind of thing?

I don't.
Every morning when I wake up, I ask myself "Do I want to keep track of where the wizard gets his supply of fairy fingernails and raven feathers?" As of yet, the answer has always been "No," but who knows? That might change.

>crit ally
You're fighting alone somewhere while the rest of the party is back at the tavern. Suddenly one of them gets your sword through their throat.

>as the rest of the group wonder what that's all about, they notice there is a piece of paper tied to the hilt
>you used your fumble to communicate vital information to your team members

>You manage to deliver a message by attaching a message to the hilt.
>As you're being attacked by enemies
>In an area that's probably several feet from where the tavern is.
>With enough accuracy to strike an ally.
>Even though you're presumably throwing said blade around corners, obstacles, pedestrians, etc.
>Also, you're completely unarmed and will probably be dead long before your party members reach you.

Let's not even get into the fact that if you tried to attempt this feat normally, you'd be forcing them to stack penalties after penalties after penalties to the point where it'd be damn near impossible for them to do, short of getting a critical success or something.

This is why crits are stupid.