Critical Failure: Difference between revisions

The amount of explanation you may get depends on how broadly it's being applied. If being used on everything from swordplay to archery or magic then it could be just an element to show the inherent danger in messing about with such dangerous things. Perhaps it's described as the unseen weak chink in the armour or the sudden gust of wind or [[Jerkass Gods|the gods just being dicks]] that day. When used only on particular items or actions, it could be used to show how they are the riskier choice or contain some particular special power that must be paid off for with a special risk.

 

 

[[Magic Misfire]] is one possible consequence or subtype. See also [[Luck Stat]]. Can sometimes result in a [[Critical Existence Failure]] but the tropes are not directly related.

 

== [[Tabletop Games]] ==

** That being said, the Critical Failure rule has been included in the Dungeon Master's Guide since 3rd edition as an example of what a house rule is. In 4th Edition, the suggested House rule format is that a player who rolls a 1 on an attack roll loses all subsequent actions this round. Rather tame and less deadly than the more classic versions.

** The 3.5 Dragon Compendium includes expanded rules for what happens when rolling a 1 or a 20 on an attack roll. The critical failures are rather amusing.

** The technical term for these is "BOHICA": [[Fun with Acronyms]] for "Bend Over, Here It Comes Again".

* Due to a quirk of the system (the use of 3d6 rather than a d20, and success made by rolling ''under'' a target number) ''[[GURPS]]'' reverses the normal expectations and has critical failures on an 18 and critical success on a 3. This may be due to [[Champions]]'s influence on Steve Jackson; Hero System runs the same way.

* ''[[Exalted]]'' has its own version, which tends to be very, very bad for you. To fail you have to have half ones and NO successes. The more dice that come up one, the worse the problem. You screw up less often as you get more skilled but when you do it is more catastrophic. That's the Exalted for you - even their screw-ups are epic.

* Speaking of White Wolf, [[Old World of Darkness|both]] [[New World of Darkness|versions]] of ''The World of Darkness'' come with rules to this effect. In the Old version, should you roll no successes and one or more dice come up 1, you get a "botch" (also the term ''[[Exalted]]'' uses) -- which is usually a horrific mishap of the amusing-but-grievous variety. In the New World of Darkness, when your dice pool is reduced by penalties to nothing, you get a "chance die"—it only succeeds on a 10 and gives you a Dramatic Failure on 1.

** ''[[Demon: The Fallen]]'' is notable for encouraging Storytellers not to rely on just "you fail in a horrible manner" for botches. Their example was jumping across rooftops: on a failure, you fall; on a botch, you barely make it across... [[Oh Crap|and interrupt a Mafia execution.]]

* ''[[Scion]]'', which uses a readjusted variant of the ''[[Old World of Darkness]]'' system, carries over the Botch rule. However, there is one form of relief—if you have Epic Attributes (which add automatic successes to rolls involving them), you ''can't'' botch rolls of that attribute. Divinity means that even if you fail, you fail ''well.''

** There is also a 1-in-6 critical failure chance in non-magic affairs, such as combat. If you roll a 1, no matter how skilled your warriors are, you miss.

*** The new Skaven army book has misfire charts for virtually every weapon more complex than a pointy stick (and even some of those). With the amount of 1-in-6 failures inherent in the army, you are practically guaranteed never to end a game without one of your wonder weapons shooting your own troops / exploding / gassing itself / blowing up / imploding / causing daemonic burns / catching fire / sucking the user into the Realm of Chaos.

** Previous editions were even more fun. The second edition, with its detailed skirmish-level rules, included obscure failure modes for the most experimental or cobbled-together weaponry available. As a particularly memorable example, shoulder-mounted missile packs could misfire in a manner which required the player to roll for direction and range over and over again as the wielder's remaining arsenal launched itself around at random and the poor soul spun around comically. Chaos Space Marines got the worst of it, with plasma weapons which could fail in fashions ranging from "weapons jam" to "smouldering crater", and Juggernaut war-machines that would randomly go on an auto-pilot rampage across the board and never be seen again.

** Chaos Dreadnoughts, being psychotic super-soldiers entombed in a walking tank, have a special Crazed table you have to roll on each turn, giving you a one-in-six chance that your mobile weapons platform will unleash a salvo of missiles and plasma fire on its own side.

** Speaking of Daemons, they will suffer a combination of Critical Failure and [[Critical Existence Failure]] if they suffer too many wounds. If they fail the resulting leadership test, they will completely evaporate back into the warp, which in-game destroys the unit.

** Apocalypse games allow fielding the Land Raider Terminus Ultra, which can suffer a Critical Failure if all 5 of its Las-cannons overheat, effectively turning it into a mini-nuke.

* [[Role Master]]. Its critical hit and critical fumble charts have some legendary results, including one that involves "tripping over an imaginary deceased turtle". (This is of course humour indicating that the character just blundered big time with zero style.)

** Of course, this was counterbalanced by its critical success tables, with such legendary entries as "Target's bones are vaporized, target is reduced to a liquid paste. Try a ladle.". In a later ''Companion'', both aspects combined led to Fatigue criticals, which if you played the rules straight meant you could kill yourself by what amounted to explosive decompression through exhaustion. Or hunger.

* Every weapon has a chance of critical failure in [[Kingdom of Loathing]], which it calls a Fumble. Some weapons, such as the [[Awesome but Impractical]] [http://kol.coldfront.net/thekolwiki/index.php/Ridiculously_overelaborate_ninja_weapon Ridiculously overelaborate ninja weapon] has a 3x chance of [[Critical Hit]] but a 3x chance of fumble. If you assemble the Cyborg Armor, made of ''[[Inspector Gadget]]'''s coat, pants, and fedora, fumbles become positive side effects.

* ''[[Arcanum]]'' has a wide range of critical failures, such as breaking your own weapon, breaking your own armour, knocking yourself out, dropping your weapon, dealing heavy damage to yourself, semi-permanent disfigurement and injury... and it's not unusual for several effects to happen at once, which is hilarious when it happens to an enemy and incredibly frustrating when it happens to you. (And it will happen to you A LOT when starting out. Expect the words "Are you blind? What in the gods-er, better luck next time!" to be burned into your mind.) There's also a trait that makes critical hits and misses less common, but more spectacular. Oh, and the critical failure chance of technological weapons [[Magic Versus Science|is increased in the hands of a magic user]], and vice versa.

* Elly from ''[[Xenogears]]'' has a 1 in 5 chance of having her ether spells fail. She is the only character whose ether attacks have such a property, making her a bit of a [[Scrappy]].

* The map-based operation-level war game ''The Ardennes Offensive'' incorporated the element of chance into its battles by listing six possible outcomes, ranging from worst to best, and rolling a die. Basically, the greater your numerical and tactical superiority, the better the six possible outcomes would be - but no matter how [[No-Holds-Barred Beatdown|completely]] you dominated the battlefield, rolling a 1 would always mean losing more than you gained. Yes, even when chasing stragglers with [[No Kill Like Overkill|entire armoured divisions.]]

[[Category:Tabletop Game Tropes]]

[[Category:Index Failure]]