Undead/Contruct vulnerable to critical hits

[Maxus]

So I helped a friend with a playtest last night. He wanted to see how a monster he'd designed worked out, so I and a buddy each ended up controlling two characters against these mecha jaguars (I didn't waste time asking questions like "What the hell...?" and just rolled with it).

It worked allright. Pounce proved to be extremely powerful, as I'd figured it would as soon as he said, 'jaguar' (34 HP melee heavy lost 20 HP to one pounce), but my friend did a nice bit of houseruling. He made them subject to critical hits, but with light fortification. That let my other character, a randomly generated Rogue (actually not too bad at all, despite having a dagger, a rapier, *and* a spear) actually land a rapier critical and a sneak attack at the same time.

After we generated the data he wanted, he stopped it and I remembered something Frank said, about even undead and constructs having places that would HURT if they were hit. So I started wondering about how to handle criticals on them.

My inclination towards constructs is to say an appendage takes damage, and the construct loses speed or an attack or goes blind, depending on what got crushed or damaged.

I guess you could say mindless undead could get their heads and arms lopped off and start doing an Eternal Darkness (zombies in that game would start walking around and flailing randomly if you cut off their heads). Undead like ghouls and wights are trickier, but I suppose you could say losing an arm isn't good for anyone.

[josephbt]

Doesn't that add a shitload of complexity to the game? How bout a bigger AC versus crits for such critters? We'll call it Crit Resistance +X. Every time it gets crit threatened, the confirmation AC is +X greater.

[CatharzGodfoot]

Critical hits with an AC boost to confirmation is pure gold, although it might be a little tough to remember.

Precision damage against exotic creatures could be as simple as having a few Knowledge or Disable Device ranks.

[Maxus]

I dunno. My original idea might work better as some way to resolve critical hits. Maybe an option to say, "Yeah, I'll forego the bonus damage to say I'm crushing his upper arm". Or say that on a critical threat against anything, you should be getting some kind of benefit, and since you can't do extra damage against undead and constructs, you may instead make a called shot to try to cripple an enemy to make the rest of the fight easier.

[Jacob_Orlove]

If you want to make called shots, there's already a feat for that. It won't cripple enemies, but it'll let you lower your chance of scoring a hit (representing the precise aim required for a called shot), to increase the resulting damage dealt (the benefit). It's called "Power Attack", you may have heard of it.

There's some alternate class feature somewhere that lets you do half of your normal precision damage against anything that's "immune". That seems like a good baseline to work from for crits and SA against golems, etc.

[Maxus]

If you want to make called shots, there's already a feat for that. It won't cripple enemies, but it'll let you lower your chance of scoring a hit (representing the precise aim required for a called shot), to increase the resulting damage dealt (the benefit). It's called "Power Attack", you may have heard of it.

There's some alternate class feature somewhere that lets you do half of your normal precision damage against anything that's "immune". That seems like a good baseline to work from for crits and SA against golems, etc.

So that's Power Attack? I kinda figured it was more like a wild swing. Harder to hit with being you're not making as controlled an attack, but it if you get lucky, it hurts. And the fact that you can't Power Attack with a dagger (or any other light weapon) and get bonuses for using a big cow-killer would rule out it being precision damage, wouldn't it?

I'm thinking more of some rules for, say, gashing/bashing someone's shield arm to make him lose the effect of that arm. Or cut the tendons in a dragon's wing so it can't fly.

That's one downside of DnD's combat system. I've never heard any sort of rational explanation of why 8 damage at 1st level can be lethal, but you don't even really notice it at 10th level, and I have to wonder why some of the levels of Fast Healing say you can reattach a severed limb by pressing it to the stump. When the hell does anything lose limbs?

[/i]

[Jacob_Orlove]

A lot of the limb loss stuff is legacy rules from back when Swords of Sharpness would chop off random limbs.

But yeah, you can flavor Power Attack as a more precise hit, just as easily as you can flavor it as a Barbarian's wild swing. The difference is that the feat isn't as good for the Barbarian.

[SphereOfFeetMan]

And the fact that you can't Power Attack with a dagger (or any other light weapon) and get bonuses for using a big cow-killer would rule out it being precision damage, wouldn't it?

No. The reason you can't power attack with light weapons in 3.5 is because Andy Collins has a personal vendetta against two-weapon fighting.

That's one downside of DnD's combat system. I've never heard any sort of rational explanation of why 8 damage at 1st level can be lethal, but you don't even really notice it at 10th level,...

Magic did it. You might as well ask what the rational explanation for Fireball is. More seriously, that's just the rules the gameworld operates under. After killing dozens of formidable creatures you are in turn more difficult to kill. It's like The Highlander, only with Minotaurs (and the like).

[Psychic Robot]

3e HP is a mess, but it makes some sense: the reason that you can "take" more hits from a weapon at high levels is because you've gotten skilled enough in dodging, ducking, dipping, diving, and dodging that you can "roll with the blow" in such a manner that the wound is rendered less lethal to you.

[JonSetanta]

HP should never be confused with the abstract ability of high level characters to stay alive better, in a general sense.
It should be exclusively tied to the property of absorbing and surviving structural damage.

[Psychic Robot]

Well, I agree (though my stance for this is based on the name and "because I said so), and that's something I abhor about 4e. I can see the 3e version, though, and it makes some sense.