Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Darkseir 04-23-07, 10:36 PM	So this might have been brought up before, but please just humor me. I use the rule that if you threaten a critical with a natural 20 (or whatever is needed for your weapon), and then roll another 20, you threaten an automatic death. If, on your third roll, you roll a 20, then no matter what your attacking, it dies. This happens very very rarely, and I make certain rules on certain creatures (telling my players before hand that the 3 nat 20 rule doesn't work on this creature). What I've been thinking about lately is that if one of my players pulls off an auto kill on an enemy, they'll get less xp for killing it. Now, this only deals with enemies 3 or more CR higher than the group. I think that XP comes from actually experiencing the battle, not just killing the creature. What are your thoughts?
Bort333 04-23-07, 10:43 PM	I dislike it, if your enamoured by insta kill do a house rule like this. If you crit, and then roll a 20 to confirm you threaten an auto death. Enemy then rolls fort save at whatever DC you feel appropiate for insta deaths.
Empiro 04-23-07, 10:45 PM	As a DM, I do not think that it's a good idea. You seem to be going through alot of trouble first instituting this variant rule, and then changing it to make sure that it can never kill off any of your important enemies, and then going through more trouble to penalize PCs if they actually manage to pull it off. All in all, it seems like you're unfairly penalizing your players unless the auto-kill doesn't apply to PC characters. If it does, and one of them ever gets "triple 20'd" by a CR 1/3 goblin, will that PC lose less XP from the death? My recommendation is either: drop the instant kill rule altogether, or apply it evenly across the board, for any PCs and all monsters (that can be critted).
Vharuck 04-23-07, 10:48 PM	Rules like this in the end affect PCs the worst. If a kobold dies in one hit, whatever. It was probably going to die anyways and wasn't meant for much past that single encounter. If a PC dies in one hit, that's the end for that PC. Who was meant for the entire campaign. Not only that, but chances are against your PCs. Mainly because they have this odd tendency to be involved in every combat encounter.
Deep Blue 9000 04-24-07, 12:24 AM	If you think its cool, do it. Frankly, the probabilities involved are so low I doubt you'll see it happen this year.
KillerGM 04-24-07, 12:36 AM	I run the "instakill" rule from the DMG. It's similar, but actually easier than what you presented. Natural 20, followed by natural 20, followed by a regular hit = -10 instant death. I've only seen it happen once or twice, and never on a player (though one got the 20/20/miss scare) - and I always roll my rolls in the open, so there's no fudging on this side of the table. ;) It does disadvantage the PCs, statistically, because monsters are making A LOT more attacks than PCs over the course of the game. All of the players I've presented it to have had positive reactions. If there were misgivings at the table, I probably wouldn't use it. But they seem to like it, so if your players are cool with it, have fun!! :D
Heahengel 04-24-07, 12:47 AM	I would drop the rule, honestly. I mean, its a 1/8000 chance. I wouldn't worry about something so rare. But if you keep it, then don't penalyze the player for rolling well by lowering the xp they get.
KillerGM 04-24-07, 02:39 AM	But if you keep it, then don't penalyze the player for rolling well by lowering the xp they get. I missed that part of the original post. Don't dock XP because of good rolls!! Just as you shouldn't raise XP for poor ones!! :D
stackmachine 04-24-07, 05:04 AM	.... don't penalyze the player for rolling well by lowering the xp they get. best advise so far. even though there is a great deal of chance involved, your players beat the critter within the rules and with the hand they hold. no reason for an additional penalty. as DM - assuming i enforced the rule - i would give a lil incentive, like say, for the most gruesome or most masterfull hit in combat. like 50xp extra or something. and don't forget to give an extra-effort on what impact this hit has on the other critters. maybe they are struck with awe at that display.... frightened... etc. lots of nice things to harvest from such a rare event and make your players happy. Rules like this in the end affect PCs the worst. aye, there is a disadvantage you put your players into. even if rare, pc-deaths due to this rule will happen. do you really want to enforce it in the long run? bad felling-alert! As a DM, I do not think that it's a good idea. .... My recommendation is either: drop the instant kill rule altogether, or apply it evenly across the board, for any PCs and all monsters (that can be critted). either drop it or offer a doable way out like another save. i'd suggest the latter: fort-save against damage dealt (like in coup de grace) or reflex-save against the damage dealt to "only get crittted". just my 2cp though...
Darkseir 04-24-07, 12:00 PM	Well, the insta kill rule has been working fine, and out of seven games that we have played, it has happened an astonishing three times. What I was going for was more of a realistic feel towards experience, I guess. For instance, I think that a rogue who does nothing but kill things shouldn't be allowed to get better at stealing things. It was an attempt to make things more realistic, and after talking to my players about it, they decided against it, which is cool with me. With what I was trying to do, I was attempting to make it so that if the part came up against something they were supposed to talk there way out of or run from, they wouldn't get tons of xp from killing it by luck. The way I look at it, someone would get more experience in a long, gruesome battle against a chimera than they would from killing a dragon in the first hit.
Frugal 04-24-07, 12:11 PM	The thing is, if you open up the XP shaft for the instakill you also open it up for a lot of other things. For instance, a save or die spell can drop a guy in even less rolls (1 or 2) and can have a greater chance of success depending on the save DC, and if it requires a hit roll will probably be against touch AC. So, if the party caster launches one of those in the 1st round and drops the guy you should penalise XP too right? What about against low level creatures that you can drop in 1 hit (1 roll)? And so on. Players will like the rule because they'll have visions of dropping that 1000 HP beastie with 1 hit. However, see how much they cry when they suddenly see the triple 20's come up against one of them. All of a sudden the rule's "unfair" or "unrealistic", or he should be allowed a save. Honestly, I think that the instakill rule is begging for trouble. It won't come up much but Murphy's law dictates that it will happen at the worst time, either killing off a PC or killing a climatic fight, neither of which adds to the game experience if you ask me.
Argo 04-24-07, 12:20 PM	I would say consider changing it this way: 20 threatens critical - second 20 confirms and threatens Max damage - third 20 means you don't roll damage dice, it's just automatically Max damage times 2 (or three or four depending on the weapon involved). I personally think that any sort of instakill rule is more trouble than it's worth, but whatever rule system you choose to implement, docking XP for getting lucky is neither fair from a rules-perspective, nor fun from a player's-perspective.
TwiddleStootch 04-24-07, 12:29 PM	My group doesn't use the Inst'a-Death variant, but when ever someone rolls a natural 20 on a critical confirmation roll, they roll again to see if it could have been a Instant Kill. In the past year of gaming, there have been 2 times where it would have been an instant kill. One against the players and one against a monster. And when I think back, to when the PC could have dies there, it would have really sucked. "Ok, monster attacks ... your dead." no fun at all.
Grand Theft Otto 04-24-07, 12:33 PM	The auto kill rule works STRONGLY against players overall. We changed it to drop the creature to -1 HP as a result. I'd let it work against any monster. After all, unless you're cheating, the odds of them rolling a 1 on a save or die effect is much more likely. Its rather memorable when it occurs as well, and leads to good gaming stories.
Darkseir 04-24-07, 12:47 PM	For instance, a save or die spell can drop a guy in even less rolls (1 or 2) and can have a greater chance of success depending on the save DC, and if it requires a hit roll will probably be against touch AC. So, if the party caster launches one of those in the 1st round and drops the guy you should penalise XP too right? What about against low level creatures that you can drop in 1 hit (1 roll)? And so on. Ok, I'm stupid. :D I didn't even think of save or die spells. That really changes things, now that I think about it. 20 threatens critical - second 20 confirms and threatens Max damage - third 20 means you don't roll damage dice, it's just automatically Max damage times 2 (or three or four depending on the weapon involved). I like that idea.
tos_shai_hulud 04-24-07, 02:26 PM	Or if your instadeath rule has been working for you and your players like it, then continue using it. If at some point, they complain about it, you can deal with it then. Anyway, your idea about XP is not without merit. Experience is a very subjective matter. If you ever have a party member calculating experience before you hand it out, something is wrong. It should rarely be as cut-and-dry as, "You killed 1,352 experience worth of monsters a piece." It should be something that requires some thought. It may require some adjustments of numbers. It is extremely subjective. If you think that the instakill was a stroke of luck, award little XP for it. Don't tell your players why they are getting so little XP. If they want more XP, they need to adventure more; not if they want more, they need to treat the encounter differently. Anyway, I digress. Handle XP however you like. Don't let your players know where it is coming from. Keep that to yourself and add the realism as you like it. If they are not gaining the XP from battles, figure out how they would gain experience. Is it from the rogue breaking into somewhere? Is it from the mage researching the BBEG's spellcasting abilities at the local mage's guild? Whatever it is, it should roughly equal the amount they would have been earning if you assigned XP just for killing monsters. This is actually described in the DMG. It is called awarding Story Awards. All awards could be story awards, if you like.
MarkB 04-24-07, 06:16 PM	Well, the insta kill rule has been working fine, and out of seven games that we have played, it has happened an astonishing three times. What I was going for was more of a realistic feel towards experience, I guess. Not a good idea. Experience points are indeed a measure of characters' prowess and a guide to when they next get to level up, but these are only their secondary purpose. Their primary purpose is to reward players. Start penalising them for doing well, and you're telling them that you resent their success (whether that's true or not, it's the message you're sending). You also encourage ridiculous metagaming, where the players start saying "No, don't kill it yet, we'll get less XP!", and start having their characters deliberately gimp themselves in combat to draw things out.
Tiruvel 04-29-07, 07:50 AM	What I was going for was more of a realistic feel towards experience, I guess. For instance, I think that a rogue who does nothing but kill things shouldn't be allowed to get better at stealing things. Well, that's kind of complicated considering it's DnD. In some of the other rulesystems, experience works like this: When you succesfully use a skill, let say "Steal", you may get better with that skill. This doesn't affect other things like hit points or the "swordfighting"-skill. DnD-experience is much more abstract. You need a fixed amount of points to get to a new level. Those experience points can come from any source, you don't have to have 500 points from disabling traps and 500 points from swordfighting. Since DnD works like this, I wouldn't bother "fixing it". That said, it's ok to have the PC make use of skills if he wants to improve them, just for flavour. Maybe that's what you meant? Hm, this was kinda off-topic, so I'll end with agreeing with those stating that while automatic kill may add some realism and excitement, it generally leads to hurting the PCs. One of the DnDgames I participate in use fumble charts. We have lot's of stumbling, loss of weapons and self-wounding. :D While this CAN be fun, it generally makes the PCs look stupid, making them less heroic in a way.
Wopple 05-01-07, 09:43 AM	Easy fix: Don't make it instant -10 death. Make it instant stable 0 hit points "death". This way, it stacks it back in the player's favor. There tend to be more players around, and they obviously tend to not wipe, so they are around to tend to their faller friend. The mobs, on the other hand, tend to VERY rarely make it back up from unconscious, and a smart player can just kick them as they pass, or coup de grace them, if they want to be sure. Also, if you have a BBEG you spent hours on and don't want to meet such a horrible fate, there are always ally mobs with healing, the body could be run away with by a smaller mob, or any number of things so he can fight another day.