DM Entry: Critical Hits and Critical Threats

I have done some digging around and found some things that need to be covered. Some of this changes the way our game is played.

First of all, concerning the Disciple of Dispater's ability called Iron Power that doubles and triples the threat range, this has been reviewed and answered before by me. I was digging around and found an article online that discussed this in detail and then realized it was my own post. So I will link it here and let the question concerning the Disciple of Dispater and critical threat ranges stand at that.

https://web.archive.org/web/20151104221728/http://community.wizards.com/content/forum-topic/2579831 (Scroll down to the #10 post.)

Secondly, on to the more important thing. I have found a rule that I was not aware of before. I will first post this rule and the source and then discuss how this works with the way we use the Critical Hit Deck.

Page 140 of the Player's Handbook sidebar reads: "When you make an attack roll and get a natural 20 (the d20 shows 20), you hit regardless of your target’s Armor Class, and you have scored a threat. The hit might be a critical hit (or "crit"). To find out if it’s a critical hit, you immediately make a critical roll—another attack roll with all the same modifiers as the attack roll you just made. If the critical roll also results in a hit against the target’s AC, your original hit is a critical hit. (The critical roll just needs to hit to give you a crit. It doesn’t need to come up 20 again.) If the critical roll is a miss, then your hit is just a regular hit.

And then again in the same sidebar "Increased Threat Range Sometimes your threat range is greater than 20. That is, you can score a threat on a lower number. In such cases, a roll of lower than 20 is not an automatic hit. Any attack roll that doesn’t result in a hit is not a threat."

This same information is repeated on page 40 of the Rules Compendium.

Now we do not confirm critical hits in our games (the blue highlighted stuff above), because we pull a card on a critical hit. However the thing that I never read before is the second yellow highlighted part. Any critical hit roll on less than a natural 20 still has to hit the target's armor class. The only automatic hit is a natural 20. So for our games, when you have a threat range greater than 20, unless it can actually hit the target's armor class by adding up the attack roll, no crit card will be pulled and it is a miss.

This new format favors the Player Characters (your characters). In the Dungeon Master's Guide page 26 sidebar, it discusses how critical hits favor the monsters in that any given PC is subject to many more critical hits than any given monster ever will be. Thus, by requiring threats of less than 20 to actually hit the target's Armor Class in order to pull a card, it makes the game slightly less deadly for the PCs.

Now thirdly (and lastly), I did do some research into the Critical Threat Range topic, and found the following:
1. You can get a threat range greater than 20 by certain weapons like Longswords (19-20) and rapiers (18-20).
2. You can improve a threat range with 1 of 3 ways: Feat (Improved Critical), Spell (Keen Edge), or Magic Weapon Property (Keen). Each of these specifically state that they do not stack with each other or with other things that improve threat ranges. In the best case scenario using these things, the best spread you can get is 15-20.

And then there is the Action Point. You can burn (spend) an action point in order to modify the Improved Critical feat (if you have that feat) to lower the threat range further, down to 12-20.

In conclusion, there is no way to get a better critical threat range than 15 to 20 in most cases, or 12 to 20 with an action point with the way Critical Threat Stacking works in D&D 3.5. Any 3.0 published material to the contrary needs to be discussed with the DM and is most likely either officially updated somewhere else or simply does not exist in our 3.5 game.

Be aware that any bonuses to confirm critical hits are simply ignored (in all situations) because we use the Critical Hit Deck.

Some other noteworthy effects that modify critical hits and how they are used in our games include the follow:
Critical Strike (spell) Spell Compendium page 56. This specifically states that it acts as the keen edge spell and that it does not stack with any other effect that increases your threat range.
Dolorous Blow (spell) Spell Compendium page 70. This spell allows any threat to be a critical hit without requiring you to actually hit the opponent's AC. Thus any natural attack roll result within your weapon's threat range pulls a crit card. This spell doubles your threat range but also says it does not stack with any other effect that doubles your threat range.
Exacting Shot (spell) Spell Compendium page 85. This spell allows you to pull a critical hit card on a critical threat of less than 20 against your favored enemy. It also states that it doesn't stack with other effects that improve critical threat range.
Hunter's Mercy (spell) Spell Compendium page 117. The next attack you make with a bow is an automatic critical hit (regardless of the attack roll, as long as it hits the target's armor class. A hit pulls a crit card.
Jagged Tooth (spell) Spell Compendium page 126. This spell doubles the threat range of a natural weapon, but does not stack with other effects that improve critical threat ranges.
Spikes (spell) Spell Compendium page 202. This spell doubles the critical hit threat range but does not stack with other effects that improves critical threat range.
Weapon of Impact (spell) Spell Compendium page 237. This spell doubles the critical threat range but does not stack with other effects that improves critical threat range.
Curse of Arrow Attraction (spell) Player's Handbook II page 109. Any attack roll against the target that results in a threat pulls a crit card regardless of whether or not it actually hit the target's armor class.
Blessed (magic weapon property) Magic Item Compendium page 29. Three times per day automatically confirm critical threats against an evil target. Pull a crit card regardless of whether or not you actually hit the target's Armor Class, as long as the attack roll is within the threat range. Does not stack with any effect that improves threat range or ability to confirm critical hits.
Flesh Ring of Scorn (magic clothing) Magic Item Compendium page 100. Three times a day, you may automatically confirm critical threats and pull a crit card regardless of whether or not it hits the opponent's Armor Class, but you also take damage from the magic item.
Reciprocal Bracers (magic clothing) Magic Item Compendium page 120. If someone scored a critical hit on your last round, you can activate this item twice a day to make any successful hit an automatic threat, you can pull a crit card as long as the attack roll hits the opponent.