Good fumble rules

[nyjastul69]

I get where your coming from but a lot of new rules, once introduced, already make things "must have" in the sense they can provide significant value to wide ranges of characters, for example whirling frenzy barbarian which is not a default element of the game but if introduced becomes a major bonus for just about any melee character. Certainly its always worth considering how any rule introduced may affect the power of characters in the game.


Eh, my players still fondly remember and joke about our bygone crit and fumble tables which brings us back to the OP, to which I would respond good fumble rules are those conducive to the nature of, and fun had by the players and DM equally in, a particular game or campaign, and should only be evaluated on their merit in such applications. No one size game fits all groups and no one sized opinion or consensus regarding fumble rules would be sufficient to address any and all possible nuance of preference in the wide variety that exist in various groups.

I agree. That's why I said 'tend to'. If everyone in the group likes them, go for it. I find they punish players more than beasties and also bog down play. Everyone's mileage varies on these points.

[Karl Aegis]

Fumble rules are probably better if they are only on specific enemies related to luck. A powerful curse or a powerful blessing an enemy can use is a better explanation for why your supposed expert at guisarme fighting suddenly throws their weapon across the room and gets the entire party killed. More importantly, it's an effect the players have a means of removing if they don't like it themselves. Disjuction, Antimagic Field, Remove Curse or Break Enchantment effects shouldn't be uncommon enough that PCs won't have access to them if they wanted them.

[Yahzi]

The only fumble rule I would want is: when casting any spell, roll two d20. If they both come up 1, a demon of CR equal to the spell level appears and immediately attacks the caster (the demon gets a surprise round; killing the demon gains no XP).

This would strongly discourage casters from casting magic except when they absolutely had too. But then, I would prefer magic was used like that: only after every other solution failed.

[SinsI]

The only fumble rule I would want is: when casting any spell, roll two d20. If they both come up 1, a demon of CR equal to the spell level appears and immediately attacks the caster (the demon gets a surprise round; killing the demon gains no XP).

This would strongly discourage casters from casting magic except when they absolutely had too. But then, I would prefer magic was used like that: only after every other solution failed.

Discourage casters? How would it do that? CR9 demon to Wizard 17 is a walk in the park!

[Brookshw]

Everyone's mileage varies on these points.

Well said. I've been thinking on this and while we can't, and shouldn't, try to dissuade people from their preferences, I wonder if it might be possible and beneficial to try and categorize the types of fumble tables that may exist. From what people have said I'm gathering that quite often it's not fumbles in general that many people object to, but rather specific fumbles (notably things that offend verisimilitude, i.e., dropping a sword).

Offhand I'd consider potential categories to be;

Realism - permit things expected to be in the real of possibility for an experienced expert. Examples being leaving oneself exposed or unbalanced.
Mechanical - disregards elements of realism and uses penalties regardless of likelihood. Examples being dropping the sword, stabbing an ally (albeit friendly fire makes me wonder on this)
Slapstick - throws realism out the window and focus on entertainment value and absurdity. Examples being eye pokes, buses hitting players, falling through a Plane.

Admittedly there could easily be some overlap and how an effect is fluffed could affect what category something might fall into.

Balance could be another category possibly based on a way to turn around the fumble to not be entirely negative, or a critical chart that favorable conditions, but that seems like something that could be applied to any of the earlier categories (as opposed to a game that uses only entirely negative tables).

Plenty of room to expand and refine these but maybe there isn't any interest.

[eggynack]

Discourage casters? How would it do that? CR9 demon to Wizard 17 is a walk in the park!

To be fair, that's the level where the distance between spell level and real level is greatest. A CR 1 demon at level one is obviously a large threat, and even a CR 5 demon at nine at least eats some resources. I can't say I like the scaling on that though, where the fumbles transition from massive and potentially catastrophic problem to almost meaningless nuisance on a rather rapid basis.

[atemu1234]

To be fair, that's the level where the distance between spell level and real level is greatest. A CR 1 demon at level one is obviously a large threat, and even a CR 5 demon at nine at least eats some resources. I can't say I like the scaling on that though, where the fumbles transition from massive and potentially catastrophic problem to almost meaningless nuisance on a rather rapid basis.

CR = CL maybe?

[eggynack]

CR = CL maybe?

I'm inclined to think that level could make sense, or level with some negative modifier if you want to reduce the impact. CL boosters are a thing, after all, and while they're a thing associated with optimization, it's not like they're
powerful enough to justify a jump in power. Way I figure it, even if you have some melee fellow that dipped into cleric or something, that character would still find a roughly fair threat in an equally CR'd demon, and they'd be using magic a lot less to compensate. Theurge builds are the odd man out, I suppose, as they cast more spells than anyone and are weaker for it, but the same fair threat reasoning works here, and it's not like theurges are crazy weak.

[SkipSandwich]

I'm inclined to think that level could make sense, or level with some negative modifier if you want to reduce the impact. CL boosters are a thing, after all, and while they're a thing associated with optimization, it's not like they're
powerful enough to justify a jump in power. Way I figure it, even if you have some melee fellow that dipped into cleric or something, that character would still find a roughly fair threat in an equally CR'd demon, and they'd be using magic a lot less to compensate. Theurge builds are the odd man out, I suppose, as they cast more spells than anyone and are weaker for it, but the same fair threat reasoning works here, and it's not like theurges are crazy weak.

I'd use CL/2 + Spell level myself, lower level spells are less risky, though higher level casters still attract more powerful demons.

[OldTrees1]

Well said. I've been thinking on this and while we can't, and shouldn't, try to dissuade people from their preferences, I wonder if it might be possible and beneficial to try and categorize the types of fumble tables that may exist. From what people have said I'm gathering that quite often it's not fumbles in general that many people object to, but rather specific fumbles (notably things that offend verisimilitude, i.e., dropping a sword).

Well said.

I think that is a very accurate and useful categorization. Most won't find much use for this since most avoid fumble rules. However for those that do like fumble rules this gives some language to help identity if their DM's fumble rules would or would not be fun for them.

[eggynack]

I'd use CL/2 + Spell level myself, lower level spells are less risky, though higher level casters still attract more powerful demons.

I still don't think CL is a good statistic to use. It varies too widely across characters, and it doesn't seem like the kinda thing I'd like to penalize.

[dextercorvia]

Basing it on CL would mean that a CL40 epic wizard will more seriously screw up casting prestidigitation than a lowly apprentice. Seems counter intuitive. If you want it to scale faster, I'd recommend something like 2*spell level, and only have it apply to your 2-3 highest levels of spells. Unless you are playing in a very different system, there is no reason that a high level caster casting mage armor at the beginning of the day should have a random chance of summoning Orcus.

[Pex]

The only fumble rule I would want is: when casting any spell, roll two d20. If they both come up 1, a demon of CR equal to the spell level appears and immediately attacks the caster (the demon gets a surprise round; killing the demon gains no XP).

This would strongly discourage casters from casting magic except when they absolutely had too. But then, I would prefer magic was used like that: only after every other solution failed.

"There are a lot of orcs. Now would be a good time for a Fireball. "Oh no, I might summon a demon. I dare not cast."

"That vampire got be good. I could use a Restoration spell." "Oh no, I might summon a demon. I dare not cast."

"You know, if you Sleep the kobolds we can get by without them alerting others." "Oh no, I might summon a demon. I dare not cast."

"Hey guys, how come no one is playing a wizard or a cleric?" "Oh no, we might summon a demon. We dare not cast a spell with a DM who hates spellcasters casting spells."

[OldTrees1]

"There are a lot of orcs. Now would be a good time for a Fireball. "Oh no, I might summon a demon. I dare not cast."

"That vampire got be good. I could use a Restoration spell." "Oh no, I might summon a demon. I dare not cast."

"You know, if you Sleep the kobolds we can get by without them alerting others." "Oh no, I might summon a demon. I dare not cast."

"Hey guys, how come no one is playing a wizard or a cleric?" "Oh no, we might summon a demon. We dare not cast a spell with a DM who hates spellcasters casting spells."

Give those casters a few ranks in Knowledge(Math). Take the Orc example:
You can either:
A) Not cast fireball. Now you have a lot of orcs to deal with. Presuming the Orcs are CR 1/2 and "a lot" is around 8, that is a EL 4 fight.
B) Cast fireball eliminating a good deal of them(say 6). You have a 1/400 or 0.25% chance of facing 2 Orcs and a CR 3 demon(EL 4) and a 99.75% chance of facing 2 Orcs(EL 1).

Therefore the caster obviously should cast the fireball unless their Int/Wis is 12 or lower.

[SowZ]

"There are a lot of orcs. Now would be a good time for a Fireball. "Oh no, I might summon a demon. I dare not cast."

"That vampire got be good. I could use a Restoration spell." "Oh no, I might summon a demon. I dare not cast."

"You know, if you Sleep the kobolds we can get by without them alerting others." "Oh no, I might summon a demon. I dare not cast."

"Hey guys, how come no one is playing a wizard or a cleric?" "Oh no, we might summon a demon. We dare not cast a spell with a DM who hates spellcasters casting spells."

I once gave a player a spell book, (he found it in the Abyss,) written in infernal that was gibberish to him. He could cast a spell from a page, and in so doing learn what that page did, but a random spell effect took place that was frequently something like that. This is one way to add a cool randomized effect, but it gives players choice. I've done similar things with a paintbrush that performed a random conjuration spell, (from all such spells in the game,) and a staff that randomly performed any evocation spell. These have all been good fun but without nerfing character concepts.

The idea that all magic is eldritch and from hell and so has a chance of summoning a demon would work in a horror game, though.

[Psyren]

As this is the designated Master Fumble Thread I wanted to address a post that was replying to me in one of the previous ones:

I played in a game where the DM used "you drop your weapon" as a fumble, and falling prone if dropping it was impossible (like an unarmed monk). Those absolutely are harsh effects! In my case it was a high level game and I made a guisarme-using tripping dervish. DM forgot to tell me there were fumble rules till I rolled my first 1, which due to a slow pace and lots of noncombat scenarios and some sheer dumb luck, no one rolled a nat 1 in combat after I joined until 2 months in, when we were facing large numbers of foes...the very thing my character was supposed to be good at, having lead armies and fought in many wars.

Thanks to the number of attacks, AoOs, bonus trips from Cause Overreach tactic of Elusive Target, and the fact that tripping involves potentially double the attack rolls of attacking normally, I was making 20+ attack rolls each turn. And I was fumbling every single turn. I'd draw backup weapons and in a few seconds drop those as well on an AoO. I stopped bothering to use the tripping I invested so much into out of fear of dropping my freaking weapon. When you lose your weapon mid-full attack, you instantly lose the rest of your turn as you have no move actions left. Then next turn you need a move to pickup (and provoke an AoO! yay!) your weapon or draw a crappier copy if you have any, and again cannot full attack. Combats only last a few rounds, that's pretty brutal!

I did at least get to make an awesome snide fourth wall-breaking comment in character. I considered purchasing locked gauntlets to hold onto my weapon, but decided against it because then I'd start falling down all the time. The DM got pretty upset at me humorously pointing out how stupid his fumble rules were in-character.

I was ready to drop the character despite really enjoying playing as her due to the fumble rules in favor of a God Wizard who'd never make an attack roll to avoid the whole bs, but then he caved and dropped the fumbles. So yes, those stipulations are still REALLY BAD. Ironically, more so the higher level you are, which you'd normally think is when your character has become more competent.

No offense, but neither game is designed for 20 attacks per round. That just isn't a reasonable expectation for most tables. You should not only have been fumbling every round, you should have been critting every round too, and in fact critting much more often than you fumbled since fumble ranges can't be Keened or whatever. Seems to me you were wanting to have your combat cake and eat it too. I would honestly consider it odd if you were attacking that ridiculously fast with no downsides.

And again, if you were forced to confirm fumbles as I suggested, there was no way that even a ridiculous 20 attacks per round would result in 1 fumble per round.

And adding fumbles for casters, but only to attack roll spells? That's totally fair.... /heavy sarcasm
If anything, any spell should require 10 freaking fumble rolls, cause a martial can make way more attacks in a round than a caster can put out spells.

Why do people who demand that casters be nerfed consistently fail to distinguish between spells that let said caster steal the spotlight, and spells that said caster needs to play the utility/support role that lets everyone else at the table shine?

[SowZ]

As this is the designated Master Fumble Thread I wanted to address a post that was replying to me in one of the previous ones:



No offense, but neither game is designed for 20 attacks per round. That just isn't a reasonable expectation for most tables. You should not only have been fumbling every round, you should have been critting every round too, and in fact critting much more often than you fumbled since fumble ranges can't be Keened or whatever. Seems to me you were wanting to have your combat cake and eat it too. I would honestly consider it odd if you were attacking that ridiculously fast with no downsides.

And again, if you were forced to confirm fumbles as I suggested, there was no way that even a ridiculous 20 attacks per round would result in 1 fumble per round.



Why do people who demand that casters be nerfed consistently fail to distinguish between spells that let said caster steal the spotlight, and spells that said caster needs to play the utility/support role that lets everyone else at the table shine?

No matter how hard the DM wanted a serious game, when fighters are dropping their swords every 400 attacks, I just couldn't ever take his world seriously as it would strike me as so clearly a slapstick style shonen-comedy-anime.

[Arbane]

I always used the "If you roll a 1, you may permit something interesting to happen to you in exchange for a Hero/Action point." An example would be for reinforcement to arrive, a vial of oil to fall over and catch the building on fire, your weapon to get stuck in their chest, you fall out the window into the cooking quarters, stuff like that. Stuff to make it more intresting, rather than simply as a punishment.

I like it. I especially like that it has an opt-out, for when things are bad enough already.

The only fumble rule I would want is: when casting any spell, roll two d20. If they both come up 1, a demon of CR equal to the spell level appears and immediately attacks the caster (the demon gets a surprise round; killing the demon gains no XP).

This would strongly discourage casters from casting magic except when they absolutely had too. But then, I would prefer magic was used like that: only after every other solution failed.

1: How does anyone make it through their apprenticeship un-devoured?
2: This would be great, if D&D spellcasters had any FIRST resorts for magic to be the last resort to. But some-but-not-all spellcasting classes kind of suck at anything else.

[Psyren]

No matter how hard the DM wanted a serious game, when fighters are dropping their swords every 400 attacks, I just couldn't ever take his world seriously as it would strike me as so clearly a slapstick style shonen-comedy-anime.

What about 4000? Or 40000? You mean to tell me Musashi never dropped his sword even once? At what number of swings would you accept one of them having an unintended consequence?

Disarming is just one potential outcome among many. Others include 1 round of sickened, or dazzled, or entangled, or staggered, or taking nonlethal, or provoking an aoo from one adjacent foe, or no special attacks for 1 round, or small str/dex penalty, or small attack roll penalty on your next attack, or small damage penalty on your next hit, or take a small amount of bleed damage, or can't attack that target next round, or can only attack that target next round, or target gains partial cover, or drop your offhand, or lose a hero point etc. There's a lot of potential options.

This would strongly discourage casters from casting magic except when they absolutely had too. But then, I would prefer magic was used like that: only after every other solution failed.

Eh just ban casters altogether and skip the foreplay.

[SowZ]

What about 4000? Or 40000? You mean to tell me Musashi never dropped his sword even once? At what number of swings would you accept one of them having an unintended consequence?

Disarming is just one potential outcome among many. Others include 1 round of sickened, or dazzled, or entangled, or staggered, or taking nonlethal, or provoking an aoo from one adjacent foe, or no special attacks for 1 round, or small str/dex penalty, or small attack roll penalty on your next attack, or small damage penalty on your next hit, or take a small amount of bleed damage, or can't attack that target next round, or can only attack that target next round, or target gains partial cover, or drop your offhand, or lose a hero point etc. There's a lot of potential options.



Eh just ban casters altogether and skip the foreplay.

I would be surprised if Musashi ever dropped his sword during a fight, a spar, or training, yes, only because of my experiences and talking to other people with similar experiences. I've done some sort of HEMA/SCA/LARP combat for the past five or six years, so not the biggest expert, but certainly not someone brand new to it, either. Dropping your sword during a fight is not a thing that happens. I would believe one in a hundred and twenty-five thousand, I guess, if I am being lenient. Even then, people have done hundreds of thousands of swings during their fencing careers and not dropped swords. Maybe foil guys drop it every once and a while if the whippiness gets out of control? But that wouldn't be a problem with a real sword.

I don't know how many tens of thousands of times I have swung a sword. I have never once dropped it. I just did a tournament yesterday. I must have watched over two hundred bouts, each with several swings or more from two parties. This is full contact blunted steel allowing kicks, punches, throws, etc. No sword hit the ground outside of someone else's hand. The only thing close to a disarm was during a grapple where a large man just ripped the sword out of his opponents hand. I myself probably did forty bouts within six matches. Nothing close to a sword drop or disarm.Everyone else I've talked to about it or seen talk about it, from Rattan SCA guys to Olympic Fencers agree. People that have done it for a decade or more and maybe dropped their sword once or never. Dropping your sword is not a thing that happens in the same way that jiu jitsu practitioners don't punch themselves in the nose after messing up a throw.

You might drop your sword while absently standing there and talking to someone. But dropping your sword or hitting yourself with it while you are sparring or training? I imagine if you asked a soldier or cop or even a firearm enthusiast, "On the shooting range, about how many shots do you average before dropping your rifle mid clip?" you'd get a funny stare. I haven't shot enough guns to know for sure, but I imagine they don't drop their weapons, either.

I've been disarmed, but never when using a steel weapon. Maybe a boffer. Certainly not when I'm using two hands. Still, I can suspend my disbelief that disarming is easier in D&D world. I can't suspend it enough that people just drop their swords for no reason.

As to playability, if dropping your sword is just one possibility and is rare, I could probably suspend my disbelief even though it would take me out of it knowing my master swordsman has a worse grip than I do. But I could get past it. A lot of people make sword dropping the default fumble, which I find silly as it is such an astronomically rare event. The others seem fine, although the bleed damage one is a little silly, I think, and I don't like the Hero Point one for playability reasons as it encourages people with lots of attacks to spend it rather than save it and potentially lose it. The things like dazed one round might represent over stretching a muscle or temporarily losing your sense of direction, which can happen. Fumbles like that I honestly don't mind. Some games have action points where you have 7 a round or something. A fumble that loses an action point, or -1 AC for a turn, or -1 on the initiative roster for the rest of combat, or even gun jams if they are rare enough. I use systems that have similar things. But I still find it odd that higher level characters will fumble more often.

[Psyren]

With respect to those who LARP, I don't consider it very meaningful or persuasive to this topic. What I do see are actual boxers, fencers, and UFC fighters occasionally slipping up and making mistakes, mistakes that their opponents are quick to capitalize on (if they even need to.) And even those contests are not the desperate life-or-death duels that we're attempting to model through dice rolls.

And for the third time, losing your weapon or falling prone are but two of the myriad potential consequence of a fumble. If you don't particularly like either of those, there are many, many more to choose from.

[SowZ]

With respect to those who LARP, I don't consider it very meaningful or persuasive to this topic. What I do see are actual boxers, fencers, and UFC fighters occasionally slipping up and making mistakes, mistakes that their opponents are quick to capitalize on (if they even need to.) And even those contests are not the desperate life-or-death duels that we're attempting to model through dice rolls.

And for the third time, losing your weapon or falling prone are but two of the myriad potential consequence of a fumble. If you don't particularly like either of those, there are many, many more to choose from.

Sure, LARPing isn't very accurate, but I've done it so I thought I'd mention it. The tournament I did yesterday was HEMA Longsword, the closest thing you can get to an actual medieval swordfight. Find me a video where a HEMA fencer drops his sword. Even SCA rattan would do. My point about the boffer was that maybe I've been disarmed using boffers, but never real weapons.

I don't deny fails can happen. I've fallen to my knees before during fights. I've ended up in accidental grapples a lot. Occasionally I'll even get accidentally turned the wrong way. It's just the sword dropping thing and the hitting yourself thing that irks me. People don't drop their sword. They don't punch themself in the face or stab themself. These things just don't really happen, not with enough frequency to justify putting in the rules, and yet they are often considered the bread and butter of fumble rules. The most common fumbles I've seen are, "Drop your weapon, stab yourself, fall prone, stab an ally." The fall prone one, (and depending on the circumstances, hit an ally,) are the only reasonable ones.

[The Glyphstone]

That's a side of fumbles that no one really pays much attention to. It might actually be worth fumbles to play in a game where a monk could throw a punch, critically fail, and accidentally snap his spine in half.

[Ashtagon]

Realistic fumble rule:

If your BAB is +0 or less, On a natural 1, roll to confirm. if the fumble is confirmed, all adjacent opponents get a free attack of opportunity or combat manoeuvre against you. Characters with a BAB of +1 to +5 must roll to confirm the fumble twice. Characters with a BAB of +6 or higher do not fumble.

[OldTrees1]

It is fallacious to continue to critique potential Fumble rules based on results they may not have. You can critique the dropped weapon effect all you want, it is completely irrelevant to all the Fumble rules that do not have that effect.

In other words "Dropping a weapon is stupid therefore fumbles are stupid" is an invalid argument due to all the Fumble tables that don't include that effect.



PS: There is also a lot of the "I don't find this fun therefore you should not play with it." fallacy in this argument.

[Brookshw]

Realistic fumble rule:

If your BAB is +0 or less, On a natural 1, roll to confirm. if the fumble is confirmed, all adjacent opponents get a free attack of opportunity or combat manoeuvre against you. Characters with a BAB of +1 to +5 must roll to confirm the fumble twice. Characters with a BAB of +6 or higher do not fumble.

Ehhh.....I'm taking from this that after a certain point an expert simply can't make a mistake and that's not something I'd consider to be within the realm of realistic, especially if faced with someone who might also be an expert and could likely capitalize on small mistakes. As an alternative, perhaps tying the capacity to fumble to the differences between BAB?

[Andreaz]

It is fallacious to continue to critique potential Fumble rules based on results they may not have. You can critique the dropped weapon effect all you want, it is completely irrelevant to all the Fumble rules that do not have that effect.

In other words "Dropping a weapon is stupid therefore fumbles are stupid" is an invalid argument due to all the Fumble tables that don't include that effect.



PS: There is also a lot of the "I don't find this fun therefore you should not play with it." fallacy in this argument.

I don't know about the others, but the core complaint I have with fumbles is that they punish people for no good reason (fumbles are by definition here an aggravation of a mistake), and on both mechanical and realistic sense they also operate in a backwards fashion (punishments worsen as the characters get...better)

[Brookshw]

I don't know about the others, but the core complaint I have with fumbles is that they punish people for no good reason (fumbles are by definition here an aggravation of a mistake), and on both mechanical and realistic sense they also operate in a backwards fashion (punishments worsen as the characters get...better)

Out of curiosity, do you assume that fumbles exist without corresponding crit tables?

[Ashtagon]

Ehhh.....I'm taking from this that after a certain point an expert simply can't make a mistake and that's not something I'd consider to be within the realm of realistic, especially if faced with someone who might also be an expert and could likely capitalize on small mistakes. As an alternative, perhaps tying the capacity to fumble to the differences between BAB?

Based on that old Alexandrian article, 6th level is where characters are comparable to the greatest historical humans who ever lived. Realistic humans do fumble in combat, yes. The greatest ones that ever lived? When Bruce Lee fumbles, it's because he accidentally killed a guy by kicking harder than intended (didn't actually happen, it's part of the larger-than-life legend). Mere mortals may fumble. Once you're figuratively a god amongst men, better than any real person ever, living or dead, fumbles cease to happen. If that's beyond teh realms of realistic, well, so be it. At that character level, you *are* beyond the realms of realistic.

But you know what? Once you reach levels of rocket tag combat, even a normal miss is as good (bad?) as a fumble.

[OldTrees1]

I don't know about the others, but the core complaint I have with fumbles is that they punish people for no good reason (fumbles are by definition here an aggravation of a mistake), and on both mechanical and realistic sense they also operate in a backwards fashion (punishments worsen as the characters get...better)

I was referring to the more vocal or repetitive complaints in the argument at this time.


Your complaints are engineering problems that have been thought about and some innovations made even before these threads started but they are remain reminders for the need for innovation in designing complex systems.

Punishment: Beyond the fact that not all players find the aggravation as punishing to the player, there are many ways to implement fumbles (either by themselves or with their sibling the critical tables) such that it is not more punishing(some implementations are less punishing) per attack than the current non fumble rules.

Backwards Fashion: While the math to actually avoid this seems harder than expected(a simple BAB check is insufficient) it is not without valid attempts(Ex: You gain +X on the check per previous attack this round). It also excludes certain less thought through potential fumble results(dropped weapon, losing actions, hit ally, hit self, break weapon).

I guess this is the lesson to learn about mechanical systems. There are always many formulations of them and sometimes what initially looks like a fatal critique can actually be an engineering/design puzzle with a variety of solutions.