Devestating Critical

[Enverex]

as for damaging them due to DR does anyone have dr 50 vs slashing out there cose all eds crits are all over that u just dont see the crit damage unless u save and if u have less HP left that the crit will do it does not make u save u just take the damage and die eds had this feat for quite a while now and yes it is powerfull but can still not kill things as quick as a mage of the same lvl ie time stop chain lightening chain lighteng chain lightening or time stop wilting wilting wilting

its a feat that give a fighter an edge if there where no good fighter epic feats why would u ever play an epic fighter

mages have hell ball and dragon knight and i bet they can have higher ac than most fighters as soon as they take epic mage armor

i think dev crit makes an epic fighter more feared which in my opinon is a good thing

lloydy

Remember though, Mage Armour only adds 5AC which isn't that much. Can Dev Crit be used as many times as you want or is it a once a day jobby? As you say it doesn't kill things as fast as mages doing that, true, but mages can only do that once or twice before sleeping. So thinking about it, mages wouldn't want to be doing that anyway.

[lloydy]

so epic mage armour only adds 5 ac does it ???


lloydy

[Enverex]

so epic mage armour only adds 5 ac does it ???


lloydy

Yes Ed, not 20 as per the manual. (5 dodge, 5 blah, 5 blah, 5 blah).

[lloydy]

sorry dont want to start a mage verse fighter argument we all know classes are not balanced lets not go there again

lloydy

[Vanor]

we all know classes are not balanced lets not go there again

Exactly. The fact that a mage spells is or isn't on par with Devistating Crit means nothing. Classes aren't blanced and never will be.

Devistating Crit works as writen in the PnP rules for both 3.0 and 3.5, so we will do nothing about it.

[Enverex]

Yeah... but no-one answered the question. lol. How many times can you use it (a day)? or is it automatic?

[Redloved]

Yeah... but no-one answered the question. lol. How many times can you use it (a day)? or is it automatic?

Automatic

[Vanor]

How many times can you use it (a day)? or is it automatic?

It's triggered every time you get a critical hit with the weapon it was taken for.

[Fire Monkey]

Remember though, Mage Armour only adds 5AC which isn't that much. Can Dev Crit be used as many times as you want or is it a once a day jobby? As you say it doesn't kill things as fast as mages doing that, true, but mages can only do that once or twice before sleeping. So thinking about it, mages wouldn't want to be doing that anyway.

Actually thats not strictly correct. It does add 20AC its just 5 dodge, 5 deflection, 5 natural etc. That means if you already have all +5 AC gear it will only add +5 (dodge) to your exisitng AC. However, if you cast the spell you can take all your armour items off and use a much wider set of equipment without losing any AC. As I understand it is also 1hr/lvl and not dispelable so all in all its a pretty decent spell really.

[Fuzz]

Just out of curiosity, what's the DC for a monks "quivering palm" death attack?

DC is 10 + level/2 + Wis modifier.

The key difference there is that a monk, unlike any other class, really, has to worry about at least 4 stats at character creation, which is hte limiter to Monk power. Str and Con, as they are melee fighters, and Dex and Wis for AC and AB. This is would also be why they get all three saves, since they're expected to be pretty well-rounded. It's the nature of the class.

Thus having a monk with ridiculously high Wis isn't that much a threat, since all it gives them is AC and DC on their ki attacks, (Quivering Palm and Stunning Fist) while their attack bonus will still suck complete ass, since most monks have pitiful attack ratings. That's why standard NWN shipped with monk gloves that went all the way up to +8, because +5 monk gloves aren't comparable to a +5 weapon. At least, if Bioware had coded them properly, and not set Attack Bonuses as being able to penetrate DR. Stupidass Bioware.

[myzmar]

its a feat that give a fighter an edge if there where no good fighter epic feats why would u ever play an epic fighter

My problem with this feat is not that its something to give fighters an edge (I play mainly fighters myself, and I know well how they sucked compared to spellcasting classes until now), my problem is this is the _only_ feat that can give a fighter an edge. It is so ridiculously powerfull compared to anything else available it makes it very difficult not to build your character specificaly for it. In other words, my prognostic is we will have soon more and more and even more fighters built especialy for that. Which sucks somehow, imho, as it removes some of the flavour we had when fighters would still specialise in axes, longswords, and all the rest of nice weapons with a x20 critical and have some other feats than those required for dev. crit. (and the requirements are, as mentioned, quite high, which I fear will contribute to the creation of this "clone army" of fighters I mentioned... I really see it comming...)

You mentioned a mage can still kill faster, yep, perhaps, but he needs some resting after 10 minutes of fun. You just move around scoring a critical on every second hit with a keen kukri and 6-7 attacks per round, its like an unlimited finger of death with a horrific DC.

Anyway, as I said, what I find frustrating is the unbalance between this feat and other epic feats available to fighters, which makes the rest of them (apart epic will, probably) more or less useless.

To transpose what you wrote a little: if you dont take devastating critical, why would you play an epic fighter?

EDIT: and yes, I don't care if its exactly like PnP or not, I care more for some general balance / fun issues. Thats my opinion, at least, PnP is not the Bible.

[Aloro]

My problem with this feat is not that its something to give fighters an edge (I play mainly fighters myself, and I know well how they sucked compared to spellcasting classes until now), my problem is this is the _only_ feat that can give a fighter an edge.

Permit me to completely disagree. Devastating Critical is a very nice feat indeed, but hardly the only feat that can give a fighter an edge.

Useful non-Epix fighter feats abound. Knockdown / Improved Knockdown and Expertise / Improved Expertise are quite powerful, when used properly.

- Aloro

[myzmar]

Useful non-Epix fighter feats abound. Knockdown / Improved Knockdown and Expertise / Improved Expertise are quite powerful, when used properly.

Yes, no arguing on that one. There are some good non epic feats, as you mentioned. The problem is, out of epic feats nothing compares to dev. crit., I fear. And a STR built for dev. crit. still can take all the four feats you have mentioned (expertise is even a must).

[Aloro]

Useful non-Epix fighter feats abound. Knockdown / Improved Knockdown and Expertise / Improved Expertise are quite powerful, when used properly.

Yes, no arguing on that one. There are non epic feats, as you mentioned. The problem is, out of epic feats nothing compares to dev. crit., I fear. And a STR built for dev. crit. still can take all the four feats you have mentioned (expertise is even a must).

It's not a common choice for fighters, but Epic Dodge is another incredibly powerful epic combat feat. One attack that would otherwise hit you, no matter how well struck, will miss you each round? Daaaaaaaaaaaamn. So much for that Dev. Crit. that would otherwise kill you...

Along the same lines, it's hard to Dev. Crit someone when their Improved Disarm has removed the weapon from your hands.

I agree, Dev. Crit. is extraordinarily powerful and among the best combat feats, if not the best. But others are surely also useful, both alone and in combinations, and there are many viable epic fighter builds that don't choose Dev. Crit.

- Aloro

[Nob]

Discipline quickly takes care of improved disarm.(Have you tried to disarm an epic fighter lately? 1d20 + 31 + 12 vs 1d20 + 39 isn't good odds.)

Here's I think the thing with epic feats in general.

They vastly encourage more blatant min-maxing. Understandable given the combat heavy nature of D&D, but still a bit silly.(PnP of course made it ridiculously easy to get some epic feats since all you needed was adjusted stats to fit the description.)

Also, small side-note, epic dodge is somewhat broken. It doesn't always fire plus the prereqs require at least 10 levels of rogue and 25+ dex. But I dunno, that's definitely not a scripting thing...

Can it be made like PnP where adjusted stats can be used instead of base stats?

[myzmar]

Can it be made like PnP where adjusted stats can be used instead of base stats?

I think if a feat could be taken if you have adjusted stats, but only used when the adjustment is present, it would solve many a problem.

I second Nob on the discipline, though. Disarm, knockdown and called shot are all three useless if you confront a fighter of equal level. Then it comes to the question who has, and who hasn't dev. crit, or to the question who has a better crit. range on his weapon / more weapons, if both have the feat. Simple as that. That is why I think dev. critical is the ubber feat, because it cannot be matched by anything else.

Unless parry would be fixed to work as intended, of course.

EDIT: or unless for ex. epic DR III would give immunity to crit hits, or something like that. This could allow other builds to have a chance as well.
And yeah, the concealment has to rock, but the requirements are incredibly high (30 dex) and almost un-reachable on a PW.

[mortzestus]

The key difference there is that a monk, unlike any other class, really, has to worry about at least 4 stats at character creation

Going offtopic but that's simply not true. Bards, paladins and even rangers have four stats to worry about too. Even fighters need decent scores in four stats if they want access to the "best" fighter feats and still have decent STR and CON.

[Gairus]

(not to mention most characters in an RP environment)

[Khaelindra]

And it's so easy to get, any strength based warrior can get it in the mid 20s, a halforc at level 21.

I have to question this statement.

To get this feat you need to be at least 21st level and have cleave, greater cleave, improved crit, overwhelming crit, weapon focus, power attack and a strength of at least 25. That isn't what I call easy. Even a power gamer would have to work their asses off for months to get this far. I say anyone who makes it here deserves to kick the crap out of whatever they face.

Not true, really. I saw a Wemic scythe-wielder created who, 6 weeks later, had 21 fighter levels and Devastating critical under his belly. Wemic has what, +8 STR? That's 6 weeks to create a veritable wrecking machine who will have crit-resist-DC's not really anywhere near fairly resistable. STR would be 18+8(racial)+6(level ability points)+10(items/spells)=42, DC would be 10+12+16=38 at lvl 24. Eat that...

Then of course as Lloydy says you have Ed, who was already relatively high level when HotU came out so didn't need to go that far and, when he switched to double-wielding keen katana's, also became a one-person wrecking machine, so there's two that i know of.

It's not like the Dev. Crit. will be anywhere rare when the builds, who were fired up after the prereqs became known, come to flourish.

Well, time to stay away from fighters i guess. Which should always be the idea. A mage just standing next to a fighter casting spells at him with the idea of "by the time you cut through my DR-spells, your'e dead already" will be a thing of the past, which IMHO is good.

[Gairus]

*continues hijack*

I'm highly amused by images of all high level fighters (PC and NPC) avoiding all melee with all other high level fighters due to instadeath. Reminds me why i'm in no hurry to be a high level

[Tangleroot]

In a story about dev-crit wielding wemic who made 24 in 6 weeks, the dev-cit is not what's sick.

[Nightshade]

What I can't help but wonder (to thorougly hijack this thread) is why so many classes (mage, druid, cleric, fighter, monk, there's probably others) have instadeath abilities, and yet the assassin, who might justifiably have access to something like this, doesn't.

I know the classes are unbalanced yada yada yada whatever, but still. I think it makes pretty darn good IC sense for an assassin to have some kind of death attack, even if you need to reach epic levels to get it. Don't suppose there's any chance of making a new feat to cover this?

[myzmar]

In a story about dev-crit wielding wemic who made 24 in 6 weeks, the dev-cit is not what's sick.

Hopefully he now has an eternal membership on the many, many famous "lists" the DM's have

[Jeffi0]

This wasn't supposed to be a discussion of classes vs other classes and what classes are feared most. I stated the simple fact that Devestating Critical allows any strength based epic fighter to kill pretty much any monster not immune to criticals, easily. In the mid epics, a fighter will have something like 20 feats. My HoTU fighter had so many feats I didn't know what to use them on. Regardless, I guess I'll just have to make the monsters immune to criticals. It's retarded that every time a fighter criticals, the monster has to save at a DC higher than even a necromancer can get. I had a HoTU fighter WM, so his critical was 13-20.

[Vanor]

Not true, really. I saw a Wemic scythe-wielder created who, 6 weeks later, had 21 fighter levels and Devastating critical under his belly.

Well for one thing... D&D Rules don't really account for things like Wemic PC's. I won't go into the 21 lvls in 6 weeks thing.

I guess I'll just have to make the monsters immune to criticals.

If you want to do that on your world or mod... Go ahead, but then plan on having 0 melee type PC's playing it.