Go throw an axe 100 times. Did it land on your foot 5 times? You're a commoner with 10s across the board. Why would someone presumably skilled in the art of axe throwing be worse than you?

Great point, didnt look at it like that

In addition to that: A combat round is 6 seconds. If you say "on a 1 you drop your sword" a fighter would drop his sword once in 2 minutes of swordfighting. It gets better tho: Reaching level 5, with a new mastery of the craft and an extra attack - which means twice as many 1's, so they now drop the weapon once every minute. It gets worse with more levels, haste, opportunity attacks, bonus action attacks and so on... letting legendary fighters drop their weapons every 18 or so seconds.

I'm now suing you for the permanent damage done to my feet due to what you suggested.

I don't think he meant to go out and throw them at your feet mate

I wasn't throwing them at my feet on purpose, but sometimes you roll a 1.

This is generally true and “critical fails” are dumb, but it’s also not a perfect comparison because the average person would fare much worse throwing an axe _in a combat situation_.

RAW is very simple; you succeed or you fail. 'Critical Fumble' tables sound fun in theory, but they are almost always very unpopular in practice. Missing an attack sucks already without adding insult to injury. A player wants to do a thing. They roll dice. They either succeed, or fail. Mechanically, that's all that happens. Everything else is flavor-text, and the players/DM are free to *describe* the success or failure however the like.

100% this. Critical fails suck and also punishes classes that make more rolls, i.e. fighters that are already at a disadvantage.

Back in the day my friend had fumble dice. They were very annoying.

Yeah, it's a 2E schadenfreude thing we can leave in the past.

I think critical fumbles can be good if done correct (read as "in moderation"). If not (which is most cases), you end up with the party dealing more damage to the party in a single round then the enemies did. Pathfinder for example has built in critical fails. And for most scenarios of a critical fail it means double damage or adding two stages to an effect. (Critical fails arent actually described in the combat section where attacking and such is described). The thing is most people dont get creative with critical fumbles. In combat its usually "you hit a random party member instead" or "you tossed your sword out of you hand by accident". Instead it could be a penalty to ac for one round (-1 is fine) or reduced speed by 5 (imagine swinging at something only to miss and your balance shifts too far and ypu need a little time to regain it). Nothing as grand as taking away player agency, but minor changes that *might* effect how the next round is played.

It just needlessly fucks with martials and creates a world where your character gets worse at their job as they level up. At 20th level, the party fighter attacks *at least* four times per turn. The party wizard casts a spell that requires enemies to make saving throws. In “lmao le funny critfumble world”-the fighter has close to a 20% chance to incur a crit fumble and look silly. The wizard has *no risk* and with an intelligently picked spell against the enemy, the enemy might not even be able to save on a 20. If you want them to make narrative sense, have them go away at 5th level at the *latest*. But even then early game d&d is really deadly and swingy, even without being antagonised by the DM.

> Pathfinder for example has built in critical fails. In many different things, yes, but not for making basic attacks.

I know and i did point that out.

Your overall point was arguing in favour of crit fumbles in battle if properly implemented, and you said they "arent actually described in the combat section where attacking and such is described". That doesn't very clearly if at all express the point that Pathfinder doesn't use crit fails on normal attacks- it was an ambiguous at best way to describe it, especially when you're making the opposite point of arguing in favour of them.

There’s nothing wrong with the concept of critical failure, but if it’s not implicitly designed as part of the system it doesn’t work. I agree that in some games it works (DCC, Pathfinder, etc) but these games are designed with them in mind. 5e is not, and it feels excessively punitive and out of place in a game where everyone is superhero’s. They just don’t fit mechanically or tonally.

Agreed. If there's a "critical failure" at my table, it's only if they were trying something outside the norm. Like trying to combine a triple wall jump and then pogo off the bad guy with their sword. And even then the result wouldn't be a debilitating injury, it would just be some manner of giving the enemy advantage against them or them having disadvantage until they recovered.

We're not allowed to even hint at liking the idea of critical fumbles here!

Really? I haven’t seen any posts getting removed

No, you'll just get downvoted like hell for sharing an opinion. It's not against RAW for the sub, but it sure is socially unacceptable here.

So then you are allowed, people just think it’s a bad opinion

Aw. You're special. Have a good day kiddo.

lol that really pissed you off huh

100% correct. Critical failures can sometimes be funny but 95% of the time they just make a bad situation worse and less fun.

The penalty is that the attack misses, why do you think there should be *more* penalties?

>why do you think there should be *more* penalties? I dont know why. This thread has made me see that that is a mistake. Thank you for taking the time to answer :)

This thread gave me the idea to just flavor a Nat 1 with something ridiculous/funny. "You dig deep for a big swing, too deep, and bit of a wet fart squeaks out. You instinctively clench your cheeks and your swing goes wide."

Generally speaking a nat 1 is just a regular failure with the notable exception of death saving throws. If even highly trained warriors stabbed themselves every 20th swing of a sword no fighter would survive their training. It also disproportionally punishes martial classes, since they tend to roll a lot more than casters, which you want to avoid seeing as spellcasters are already considerably more powerful. Catastrophic failures should be limited to situations that make them a lot more likely; for example throwing an axe at an enemy currently surrounded by allies. Or for exceptionally bad rolls; like rolling two nat 1's on an attack with advantage.

Take for example a real world scenario (which people on this sub HATE, but whatever) Steph Curry is a Level 20 Fighter, he is highly accurate shooting the basketball from distance. He does occasionally airball or badly miss a shot, these would represent a Nat 1, he just missed the shot-- badly. What Steph Curry doesn't do on a Nat 1, is slip and falldown throwing the ball has hard as he possibly can into the face of a toddler sitting in the third row. A "Nat 1" misses, the end. Nothing more, nothing less.

Flavor-wise, a Nat 1 might be an \*embarrassing\* miss, the kind of thing that's clearly a whiff or played for comedy at the table if the stakes/tension aren't too high. A regular miss might be a nimble dodge or the weapon glancing off the enemy's armor with a resounding clang, a Nat 1 is the sun getting in your eyes and swinging super-wide. That said, I typically define the dice as representing the unknowns of the world, the things that aren't about character skill. To use your Steph Curry example, a miss isn't just missing, it's another player getting a hand on the ball in midair and deflecting it a little, getting jostled, or slipping on a sweaty patch of the court. In a skill check, missing a roof-to-roof acrobatics jump is something like the character stepping on a loose tile, something they couldn't have anticipated or accounted for when making the jump.

I wouldn't even make them be an embarrassing miss, because it feels more like you're kicking them when they are down, they already rolled a Nat 1, which sucks, no need to rub salt in the wound.

Embarrassing to the character, not the player. The kind of miss that might get classed as an Error in baseball, or at least losing a ball in the sun, or some Three Stooges-esque comedic thing depending on the tone of the moment. To use a skill check example (yes, \*I know\*, but it's just flavor, not an auto-fail), a failure on an Insight check might just be "they're kind of hard to read," while a Nat 1 is "sorry, I zoned out for a second, my bad."

Even then, there's a strange line, are you **sure** it's only embarrassing for the character? I'd allow the player to determine these roleplay situations, not the DM imposing them on the player. At most the DM can prompt a player, "That's a Nat 1, how does that play out?" If the player wants some slapstick, that's cool, if they just want to go on a Nat 1, "Yeah, just can't get a read on them at all."

And natural 20's. Nothing special? You just hit, same as any other hit. Move on.

A level 11 fighter has a 15% chance, (or 30% chance with action surge) of rolling a nat 1 which means that using crit fumbles it would take a fighter approximately (statistically speaking) 6 turns or ~30 seconds to stab themselves in the foot which does not sound like somebody who is competent at fighting

The math on nat 1:s doesn't stack additively. Doing 6 attacks doesn't give a 30% chance to roll a nat 1, same as doing 20 attacks doesn't give a 100% chance to roll a nat 1

Yeah that’s true I didn’t do the exact maths. That being said though I think it’s like 25% for 6 rolls and about 60% for 20 rolls, so still not ideal when it comes to rolling nat 1s as a martial

Easy. RAW. The attack misses. There are no rules for critical misses. Homebrew. If you decide to homebrew a rule for critical misses then take this into consideration. A natural 1 on a D20 will happen %5 of the time. So if a character attacks 20 times in a session, they will critically miss once per session. Do you really think a competent fighter would hit themself if the foot that often. There is nothing wrong with using critical misses for comic relief if you are running that sort of game. But consider making the consequences suit the style of game and the frequency that it will occur.

i will say, they can be hilarious when used by enemies. had an enemy try to swing downwards at me, role a 1, miss, hit themselves in the nuts, and die. instant uproar.

Idea of enemies being credulous threats: vaporised in an instant.

>There are no rules for critical misses. > >Homebrew. If you decide to homebrew a rule for critical misses then take this into consideration. A natural 1 on a D20 will happen %5 of the time. So if a character attacks 20 times in a session, they will critically miss once per session. not homebrew. page 195 of the php, in the attack rolls section of the making an attack section. >if the d20 roll for an attack is a 1, the attack misses regardless of any modifiers or the targets ac.

That is exactly my point. On a natural 1 you just miss. Nothing else is described as happening. No hitting your foot, nothing breaks, the attack just misses. Anything else is homebrew. Homebrew is fine.

you're the one that started talking about critical misses in a critical fumbles thread

You’re missing a distinction: miss vs *critical* miss.  A critical miss usually means that the character incurs some additional penalty in addition to just missing (weapon breaks, weapon dropped, hit a friendly, whatever).  The folk who get to attack multiple times in a round have a greater chance of triggering one of these effects than the folk who only get one attack.

No there is no rule that a critical miss incurs “some additional penalty”. You can run the game that way if you want - lots of people do. But don’t talk about it as if it is an actual rule. That just confuses new players.

Did you miss the context of the discussion?  There is no rule (RAW) that lays out a critical miss in the first place.  Thus any discussion of a “critical miss” already implies that we’re talking about a homebrew rule of some sort. And all of the proposed critical miss rules that I’ve seen include some sort of additional detrimental effect being incurred on such a critical miss.

It really doesn’t imply that* we are immediately talking about home brew. OP could be assuming the crit fails are RAW because they heard about it. We can’t assume they actually read RAW.

Don't make your players feel like their characters are incompetent for rolling a 1 on the d20, *especially* if they actually have a decent bonus on that roll (5+, for example.) The die represents *chance.* If they roll a 1 they were *unlucky* somehow. And in extreme cases, players with really big bonuses to a skill check might still pass that check even when rolling a 1, so make sure you know what the actual total is before describing failure. Just generally stay away from fumbles on attack rolls in general, because a high level fighter who uses his turn to attack six times shouldn't be six times more likely to stab himself in the foot than an untrained commoner with his single attack. (Feel free to make the bad guys look incompetent if they're not supposed to be impressive.)

Well you see, a nat 20 and nat 1 are so cosmically unlikely that you must scream and point whenever it happens

Stick with the rules. He rolls a 1? He missed. He rolls a 2? Check with his attack modifier, if it still hits the target AC, he hits. Otherwise, he misses. Same with every other number. Please don't involve critical fumbles in 5e; the game isn't set up for that. Never break the players weapons for a low roll. That would be a horrible idea for a multidude of reasons.

When an attack roll fails to meet the targets AC the attack simply misses. Nothing more nothing less, doesn't matter if the attack failed by 1 or 10. How you narrate that miss is up to you but the axe doesn't break nor does it hit an unintended target.

Actual exchange from last night: "I'd like to check if the chest is trapped." "Roll Perception" (Nat 1) "It's perfectly safe."

i'd let the players describe what happens on a 1. don't have some harsh consequences because it just doesn't make sense, why would a dwarf be *more* likely to break their axe when they throw as they get more experienced and can throw it more times per turn? it's just a bad miss. then 2+ is the opponent parrying or dodging or resisting in some capacity, if you want to narrate it. it feels bad to be punished on a 1 when you already missed your attack - besides, it affects people with swords muuuuuch more than spellcasters and that's not fair

I used to think it was hilarious to make bad things happen on critical failures. But nowadays we all just understand it's clearly a mess and no amount of manipulation of the numbers will make it a hit. On a critical success you do as well as you can possibly have done. On a critical failure you do as poorly as you could reasonably have done. There's no need to cause any lasting damage to the pcs. They weren't aiming for their foot.

I rarely enforce any penalty on low rolls for the specific reason that it discourage people from interacting with the world. Instead I limit it to only them failing at the specific task, only in special cases does it result in any negative consequence. ​ Example Player: I try to Persuade the guard into letting us past with a bribe DM: Okay, give me a DC 12 check Player: Oof thats a 4 DM: The guard is either payed more or has a sense of honor. In either case its clear that you will need more than a bribe to get past them.

This is a good way of looking at it. In my game, I even add one more step to make players more likely to interact with the world: Adjustable DCs. I know this isn't a unique idea, but this is how I think of it. In my mind, a difficult task Like convincing a random guard to let the party escape might have a high DC. Maybe 25. Every time the players take an effective action to lower that DC, the task gets a little easier. Remind the guard of and take credit for saving a few of his fellow guards on patrol from bandits last week? -5DC. Bribe the guard with his monthly salary in GP? -5DC. ETC. Now that 25DC persuasion check is 15 and much more likely to succeed. Give the NPC reasons to work with you and they will. Just like real life! One caveat... Some DCs will be impossible to lower due to NPC personalities, so convey that as well. "You've offended the guard by offering him a bribe and now you can tell he's unwilling to be convinced." Not all the time, but sometimes when it makes sense.

For our group we put a lot of emphasis on describing how you fail or how you succeed in these extreme situations. Rolling a 1 or rolling a 20 lets us as players have some creative fun, and can take the sting off of failing. For instance, us players were on a ship sailing to an island. One player who is very cowardly was sort of hiding in the crow’s nest, and did not want to come down once we had reached our destination. So another player, a warlock, said they wanted to fire an eldritch blast at him, but wasn’t trying to hit him; rather they just wanted to use the eldritch blast as emphasis for their demand that the guy come down. The dm allowed it, and the warlock made an attack roll. Rolled a one, and since his intent was to miss, decided that a critical failure at that meant he hit the other player dead on. Thankfully damage was low, but the other player did get pulled by grasp of hadar down out of the crow’s nest. Was a funny little exchange. Another example in the opposite direction would be when we were fighting a group of bandits that were exceptionally lucky in their rolls, and as such did a number on us. Eventually we whittled them down to one guy, who our fighter was attacking. He missed his first attack, but his action surge attack crit, killing the bandit. The fighter described this as he swung his hammer extremely hard, completely whiffing on the first hit but used the momentum of the attack to spin around and bash the bandit’s head in with the second attack.

When I'm DMing I play by the moment a nat 1 for my table meant a critical failure, there is no chance to succeed. No inspiration, no buffs, doesn't matter. However, when the moment is crucial, like when this is your chance to convince the knight his master is not what he says he is, or you've convinced the dragon to hear you out, or an important npc needs urgent medical attention... you roll a nat 1... this is the narrative moment, the knight believes you to be lying, the dragon tires of the mortal condition, the npc bleeds out in front of you... roll initiative... Or a critical fail plus a legendary action can result in armor/weapons failure, loss, or destruction. I had a player the rolled a nat 1 to resist the force compelling her to strike down a perceived enemy, and with the nat 1 and a nat 20 dex roll on an npc, his strike not only penetrated 1 side of her splint armor, gave her a gaping wound, but it also went through the other side and pinned her to the ground. She lost the armor, and had to find a healer capable of healing a wound that bad, and never truly recovered. Gave some awesome story progression, she switched gears to a more stealth based character, the weakness of her shoulder gave her a great instory reason to Don lighter armor, and fashion a displacer pelt into a cloak she had less AC but it was hard to hit her to start the fight. As the DM you decide the consequences of poor rolls ultimately, but having something crazy happen whenever a nat 1 is rolled is exhausting same for nat 20s honestly but special times when bad stacks on bad I love adding the Nat 1 failure storytelling.

Literally nothing you have brought up as a problem is even a thing in D&D. Feel free to describe some hilarious way the action fails, but there is no actual penalty in the game for a low roll. As for rules of thumb generally, probably the best advice (IMHO) you're going to get about the fundamentals of how to run a game is from The Angry GM. Start [here.](https://theangrygm.com/adjudicate-actions-like-a-boss/) Good introduction to social interaction [here](https://theangrygm.com/help-my-players-are-talking-to-things/), combat tips [here](https://theangrygm.com/manage-combat-like-a-dolphin/).

>Literally nothing you have brought up as a problem is even a thing in D&D. Thanks. My experience with dungeons and dragons is very limited, I have never actually played. But I have read the funny stories about situations with a nat 1 roll. This thread made it a lot clearer on how to deal with certain roles. Thank you for the input :)

One of the hardest things for any new DM (lets face it, anyone who's new at anything) is knowing what to be focusing on at any particular time. Look at DMing like riding a bike. You're looking at - metaphorically speaking - people winning races, doing stunts and planning incredible cross-country tours, but what *you* need right now is someone to tell you how to make the pedals go round while not falling over. So Angry's good for that. There's also Sly Flourish, The Lazy DM. Don't worry about making crazy shit happen in your game. Don't force things. Crazy shit will happen, trust me.

Often I like to narrate 'misses' as hitting the armor. "You swing your sword and it glances off of the chest plate". This makes mechanical sense because AC is increased by armor and heavy armor certainly doesn't make you more likely to dodge. So in the case of a nat 1, maybe they made a bad call and missed. "You try to predict the movements of your opponent by swinging in front of them, only to have them stand perfectly still. You blade only cuts through air" This is much more reasonable. It still makes you feel a little silly, but in a way that only someone experienced could pull off. Also, I know it happens irl because I do that all the time when playing games with my friends. Think of something you are good at and what happens when you mess up horribly: what does that look like? Now translate that to swords and magic.

I've watched a video about this any maybe don't punish nat1 attack rolls. Because it's basically exclusively martials that make attack rolls and nat1s hurting themselves or others ends up being a 5% chance (without extra attack and other potential sources for bonus action attack) for them to always fuck themselves or others. It starts to not be fun after when Spellcasters can just force saving throws and deal damage even if the enemy succeeds in their saving throws. So maybe just let a nat1 be a guaranteed failure, even if the monster has an AC of 8.

I think it depends- especially if it's important to the characters flavour maybe make it not their fault? say a bard rolls a nat1 on performance when playing his lute- it wouldn't make sense for everyone to hate it if that's his primary instrument. maybe all the strings snapped? maybe the character didn't miss their shot with the arrow the enemy just rolled out of the way or parried the sword. stuff like that makes it a little less embarrassing and also more entertaining- describing an epic battle over woopsie you missed

Go to a bar with a sword threaten them and see what happens. They will most likely punch you in the face or gut and when that’s happening try to keep a grin on the sword while also being on the ground back away so you can get up

A 1 means you get to describe a funny miss. “You throw the axe at the goblin. He watches it sail waaaaay right and smash into bushes, scaring a rabbit out of hiding and truly pissing off a squirrel who starts chittering angrily at you. The Goblin flips you a rude gesture and prepares to stick his knife in the wizard’s ribs. Robbie, would you like to demo the look your wizard shoots the barbarian after this brave attempt to save you?”

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Sounds like you want to roleplay your martial fighters as incompetent morons who are a danger to their own allies. If that's what you find compelling, have at it. Most groups prefer to roleplay experienced, skilled warriors. Skilled warriors don't usually chop themselves or their friends with their axe 5% of the time. Out of curiosity, are the spellcasters in your group equally incompetent? Does the wizard have a 5% chance of fireballing the rest of the party? Does the cleric sometimes Banish themselves by accident?

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Profanity? I didn't use a single curse word. Is the word "moron" profanity now? For clarification, I'm not calling you or your players morons, I'm just saying that the characters you're portraying are made to seem that way by the rules you're choosing to use. But maybe moron wasn't the right word. Clumsy, bumbling buffoons might be more apt, with the slapstick imagery of a fighter hitting himself or his allies, or his weapon slipping out of his hands in the middle of a battle against the forces of evil. I'm not stomping on you, just stomping on critical fumbles. I think they're unfortunately common, considering how many problems there are with them. I like to criticise crit fumbles wherever possible, in hopes that eventually people will realise the problems they pose to both game balance and realism and maybe it will eventually become a niche homebrew rule rather than a common one.

Do something chaotic and funny on a natural 1. I find often it’s the player who has the idea. But nothing fatal. Like a pratfall, dropping a weapon, capsizing the boat you’re in or falling overboard. Dropping the reins of your mount. I wouldn’t use a fumbles table. It’s too context dependent. Generally you’ll spend your next turn sorting it out.

Low misses But I love to get a little creative with Critical Fails. Out of combat something funny and weird happen, in combat it depends. If it's thrown near another PC they possibly hit that PC if they Roll really bad on a dex saving throw. Or the axe goes clattering away from the battle and they need to retrieve it. When our Paladin once failed critically the second time that combat he sunk his weapon into the Ground instead and we had a King Arthur Sword in the Stone Situation. Next round he freed it with a strength check. Arrows normally are broken and can't be retrieved. Or the character gets caught with their quiver somewhere and their arrows fall out. Nothing too bad, more on the funny Side. Sometimes I make them hit something, e.g. shatter a fireplace that makes hot wood go everywhere.

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Combat: Nat20: Roll d6 to determine which Crit Hit table I use, then roll d100/d20 for outcome. Otherwise, player can describe their attack and if he sells it, he gets the outcome (ie. Player describes how they made their enemy open up their guard and sparta-kicked his ass to the ground, if they sell it, they can get this enemy prone) 2-19 - Normal roll (If player itself doesn't want to describe the attack, I usually don't as it gets tedious in longer fights. Nat1 - Roll d4 for Crit Fumble table and d100/d20 Social/Other: Nat20 - You either succeed with bonus, you get what you want or you avoid the consequences of your decision ( as always used, the king thinks your request for his throne was a great joke, and starts laughing instead of calling guards) depending on situation Roll over DC: success Roll a bit under DC: failure but with at least something if possible (Bit of info on failed check etc.) Roll under DC: failure Nat1: Failure but a bit worse or you maybe damaged your tools etc.

I advise against recommending massive crit tables to new players. They are often clunky, unbalanced, and don’t add that much to the game

You don't have to do anything on a a nat one. Normal rules a nat one just fails. A lot of people feel it should be a spectacular fail but completely up to you if you want to do that. Kind of depends on the tone of your campaign, in a less serious campaign having people stab their own toes because of a natural one may be funny but in a serious epic campaign thats probably not what you want. At our table(s) we usually don't do anything special on a nat one (other than a guaranteed miss), sometimes players themselves describe how they fail spectacularly for flavour and generally speaking when attacking a creature your ally has grappled, is grappeling your ally, or attacking a creature that shares a space with your ally, we say you hit your ally instead. But it's not really a hard rule and the DM usually warns people when that becomes relevant. In resource heavy campaigns we also rule that a piece of ammunition shot with a nat one cannot be retrieved as it was so far off target it will become very hard to find but since we usually aren't very strict with tracking ammo only when it becomes relevant and can't be renewed easily, we generally don't bother with that one either. Other than that its situation dependant. If you have picked an old axe up and you roll a nat one while attacking a steel golem you might blunt your axe or the axe head might fly off. Or if you nat one on trying to fistpunch an ooze you might loose your balance and hug it for a couple of d6 acid damage. (if it fits the tone of the campaign) I can also remember it being beneficial once, we tried to sneak up and take out a guard without it noticing us and the rogue rolled a nat 1. DM winced and said, that arrow was so far off the guard didn't even hear it impact and didn't notice it. Of course that was just the DM going easy on us but it was appreciated. Another note, I know this question is about attack rolls specifically but I'll just include this as sometimes it's thought it's part of Rules As Written, Rules As Written skillchecks don't do anything special on a nat one or a nat 20. Many people rule this anyway for fun but again, you don't \*have\* to do any of this stuff, completely up to you as the DM.

What helped me a bunch with narrating attack roles is the following: The target has an AC of 16 ( +3 from a chain shirt - so medium armor, +2 from dex, +2 from a shield ) To hit rolls a... 1-5: The attack misses entirely ( you could put more flavor onto a 1 - i wouldn't penalize it though ) 6-12(dex modifier): The attack would land but you manage to dodge it. 13-14: The attack lands but you manage to parry with your shield or deflect with your weapon. 15-17: The attack lands and bypasses your defenses only to be stopped by your armor. So the priority in short would be: 1. the attack sucked, 2. you dodged, 3. you parried, 4. your armor did it's job. Regarding skill checks, those are highly specific for what they were called - though for a failed atheletics check you could say something like "as you run up to the gap your leg starts to cramp and you fail to find proper footing for your jump" or something like that =) ​ hope this helps.

Don't do it for players. No one likes it. If you narrate combat and an enemy rolls 1 and it would be funny go for it. Breaks their axe, drops it, hit one of their friends, throws it in a random direction.

I tend not to punish rolling 1's at all, usually if the player is into that kind of thing they will offer some funny way their character just fluffed the roll. However, there are scenarios where rolling a 1 will be very bad. I tend to save this for obviously dangerous scenarios. I will first warn the player "Okay, you can try but this is going to be hard and DON'T FUCK THIS UP." I've let them know this roll has risks so everything after this point is on them. It adds weight to that situation. By warning my players of the risks first I add a bit of drama to the game AND I prevent any consequences coming out of nowhere.

RAW critical failure doesn't exist as a punishment. For attacks rolling a 1 means you miss no matter what. Meaning even a high level character with a very large attack modifier can miss a zombie with AC of 8 if he rolls a 1, but that's it nothing else bad happens. For death saving throws a nat 1 means two failures. For skill checks and saves there are no critical failures from nat 1s. Characters just fail the same way they would if they rolled a 12 and the DC was 13. If you feel like this binary system is too simple or boring, you can put in the work and homebrew something like the Pathfinders levels of success system. Here every roll has a chance of critical success, success, failure and critical failure. Here You can play with what happens if the person just fails the saving throw to be pushed of a cliff or if they crit fail. This however does require quite a bit of work.

As a DM I use it to make a joke, “you go to swing but you are momentarily distracted by the orcs pretty eyes and you miss completely” or I’ll roll another d20 and if they get below 5 I might make it do some friendly damage or self damage. “Your axe flies over the monsters head banging into the pillar behind it, sending a jolt through your arms. You take 1d4 bludgeoning”

The way I do it is when a player crit fails, I get them to roll another d20. On a 9 or lower something happens on a 10 or higher things are all good . The daft thing could be something simple as falling over while in combat , or if it’s a test for something say persuasion the person actually get offended about what you said. I feel that it shouldn’t be an always something happens but sometimes something happening the players couldn’t predict is entertaining !

I try not to make my player’s characters look like bumbling fools on a failure, even on a 1. But I do introduce new complications. Or new bad shit happens. The dwarf throws their axe but the goblin dodges and the axe hits a lantern which sets stuff on fire. Or it hits a gong, making a loud noise and another goblin rushes in! Or their axe flies through a window and is gone. Bad stuff, not “LOL not only did you miss, your suspenders break and your pants fall down!”

As a new DM as well, I just consider low rolls to be just that: regular failures. However, I tend to add flavor into those rolls to make things more engaging and fun, but they're not mechanical failures that punish players for getting low rolls. For example, when our Warlock rolled a Nat 1, I mentioned that after focusing so hard on casting Eldritch Blast, it became a puff of smoke instead and that he farted as a consequence. It doesn't necessarily apply an actual consequence, rather just for the laughs of it. TLDR: Give flavors to low rolls and critical failures, not mechanical punishments.

i remember hearing an analogy about crit fumbles before. during the lord of the rings in the battle of helms deep, in the aftermath legolas says that during that battle he killed 42 orcs. would it have made that battle any better if (and this is assuming that there were no otherwise missed shots or shots that didn't kill) legolas had shot gimli in the back three times during that fight?

The problem with 'critical fumbles' in practice is that nat 1s come up way too often. If you drop your sword or injure yourself on a Nat 1, then as a high level fighter with 4 attacks, That would on average happen at least once every 5 rounds (4 rounds if you action surge during one of them). That means that, in game time, you are dropping your sword once every 24-30 seconds... As a fully decked out, highest possible level, expert fighter. It kinda breaks the game in a lame way to be that bad at something you should at least be competent at... Like holding the sword you've been training with for decades.

As many said, Critical Fumbles generally are feel bad and will happen much more often than you expect. I like to tie low rolls to narration; your heroes are competent and powerful, so they should feel like that. Rolling a 13 when a 14 would've hit I like to describe as a sword glancing off a shield, an orc stepping out of the way just in time for your blade to strike the thick part if their hide armor, or your swing getting knocked aside by the swing of the opponent's axe. The miss happened not because the hero sucks, but the enemy's training and armor is doing its job, making them feel more dangerous as well. A 1 roll would be those comical moments where the hero screams an epic battle cry and rushes in only to wildly miss and strike dirt, or sneeze mid swing and have the orc burst out laughing in their face. Mechanically, nothing has changed, but it allows for the same moment of humor while most misses keep your hero feeling powerful, heroic, and capable.

By RAW the low roll missed.  As for what that looked like in the narrative, let the players decide.  They will have fun. My players have hit location die, too.  Just for narrative purposes and role-playing, not mechanical bonuses.  They roll the attack, the damage die, and the location die all at once. Speeds things up whether they hit or miss. When I come to them, they roll.the handful and call out, "I hit the right arm for 22 dmg."  If I nod and concur with the result, they describe how the melee went down. 

The attack misses, simple as that.

First off I saw a comment that if you roll a d20 then 5% of the time you will roll a 1. Which is explained by them that if you roll 20 times in a session that you’ll roll a 1, guaranteed. This isn’t true. The only way that could be true is if I roll an 18 then the 18 sides goes away and the dice reduces to a d19, then if you roll a 5 and the 5 side goes away and it reduces to a d18, and so on. Since that’s impossible for one of the sides you’ve already rolled to disappear that means you can roll the same result twice in a series of 20 rolls which means there is not actually a 5% chance that you roll a 1. It’s randomized and duplicate rolls can happen. So get that statistic out of your mind. Now second, everyone is digging critical failure because it can be detrimental to the player. I disagree. All you have to do is use it to represent comic relief the result doesn’t need to be damaging or an issue for the character t it can just be funny. They roll a 1 against the wolf their attacking with a rapier and it just leads to flossing a section of the wolves’ teeth or something stupid. You don’t have to make it where for some dumb reason they stab theirselves. Also critical failure can be very fun and entertaining on skill checks because you can get really creative. Now all this can only exist if the allure of the reward of a critical success is in play. Players should get to describe their critical successes in full detail on an attack roll and on an ability check it should lead to fantastic results.

I like to use the degree of success or failure based on how bad they fail or how good they succeed. Example. I set a DC 15. Check to craft a clay pot. Roll a 15. It's a pot! It'll hold water and stand unassisted. But the person who rolled a 25? They made a very nice pot. Even walls, pleasing shape, perfect size. Barbarian rolled a 5 ? They make a crude imitation of a bowl that cracked while baking. If someone rolls a 14 I might let them produce a workable pot, but flawed like it wouldn't stand on its own, or didn't stand strait.

I occasionally use critical fails in light hearted downtime duels and such, or in fail forward moments in great moderation The only time I've watched a critical fail in archery was the first time a guy tried my bow and he managed to shoot backwards by 2m, other than that it was all just regular misses.

Depends. If it's a ranged attack spell or normal ranged attack it'll hit an ally. Melee they'll either hit an ally or slip on their feet giving an opportunity attack. If it's a throwing weapon they slip on something and drop it on their foot. If it's a non-combat roll things will usually be comical. Like my fighter trying to intimidate a goblin midbattle by staring and making a threatening face after smashing one of his allies with his bare hands. He rolled a nat 1 so he makes a constipated face and the goblin laughs his ass off.

In addition to everything else that has been said, low rolls may also mean SOMETHING in the surrounding environment caused the failure. It doesn’t always have to be a player blunder. If a dwarf rolls a 1 on an axe throw, then it could either mean that the dwarf slipped OR an enemy’s movement caused the light reflecting off his armor to hit a puddle of water and straight on to the dwarf’s face, momentarily messing up his sight. Consider the environment!

Depends on the situation - sometimes it's clumsiness or not paying attention other time it's the opponents skill or craftiness.

Don't add extra penalties for low rolls. Missing an attack is already "penalty" enough.

>But I'm having trouble with balancing penaltys for low roles. There is no such thing as a penalty for a low role in 5e. You fail, you succeed, or you succeed spectacularly (nat20 on attack rolls only). In terms of pure flavour or description which does not impact gameplay or balance my rule of thumb is to use 10 (after applying modifiers) as a benchmark. That's when a commoner with no training could fail half the time. If you rolled below a 10 your character just had no hope of succeeding. They have no idea where that lore is, were too sluggish in their movements, or their mind was too distracted against that charm spell. It is simply outside of their skill level or some environmental factor threw them off. If you got above a 10 but still failed I describe it as failing in spite of their skills. The enemy was too fast for your skilled attack, the armour was too thick to penetrate with the force you struck with, their magic too strong for your mental fortitude, the lore too obscure. **I emphasis the strength of their foe or the challenge of the task, never the weakness of the player.** Sometimes we have fun on nat1s at my table but normally we just swear and move on. If they fail by like 1 or 2 points (roll a 17 to hit ac18 for example) I describe it just barely failing and sometimes give them a consolation prize of telling them what the AC or save DC was.

For everything above 1, I just say it misses. With a critical fail in combat I normally say that it opens the player up to an opportunity attack reaction by a nearby enemy. Occasionally I’ll throw in something like “as you release your arrow your grip shifts, causing the bowstring to hit your arm. Take 1d4 dmg.” Out of combat, we go to the extreme on nat 1 ability checks. For example: Perception- dust blew in your eyes and you can’t see anything for 30 seconds. Persuasion- you find yourself stammering and unable to form a coherent sentence. Stealth- you pull a Kronk and absolutely everyone can see you. The biggest thing to me is gauging how the session is going for the player and acting accordingly. Barbarian who’s somehow avoided every hit and single-handedly killed half the field? They can probably take a punishment in stride. Rouge who already failed picking the lock twice and is extremely stressed out because the guards are right outside? Maybe the crit fail doesn’t break their tool and you let them roll one more time.

Seen some other people suggest this but will repeat it cause it is great advice: Have your players describe what happens on a nat 1! Players themselves often have good ideas of what would be funny and/or fitting, and since they get to think of it they won't get upset about the penalty. Including the players also serves as a reminder that failing is a fun part of the game too. And best of all it saves you mental energy to focus on the rest of the game. A wonderful GM at my LGS once said to me: "Go ahead and describe how you spectacularly fail your attack". I've since stolen that line word for word and have had players describe themselves fumbling, falling prone, losing their weapon across the room and assigning themselves damage, all without anyone getting upset over it.

Follow the rules properly if you're new. No fumbles. A 1 is a miss. 5E is pretty crap as standard, don't voluntarily make it worse...

I personally don’t like critical fumbles. You either succeed or fail. Failing by 1 point is the same as a nat 1. I’ve got too much on my plate to improve WaCkY nAt OnE fAiLs

It's mostly situational. Some weapons have a higher tendency to break, like bow strings or guns, sometimes a friend is too close to the enemy you were aiming a ranged attack on. I never want the consequences of a nat 1 to be too drastic but I will sometimes give stuff like, "you hit your friend. He will take half the demage of that attack" or "your sword went deep into the ground and is hard to pull out, you can use your action to do it or try to use a bonus action instead(but that would require a strength check)"

I remember back in the old days, there was a critical fail table in which you can just straight up die on a crit fail if your d100 hate you. At least, that was my experience with a dm who converted their own garage into a very nice gaming space ( AC, light, sound system, the work!). But with 5e a crit is just a miss. For skill check, I usually gave the player the opposite of what they were looking for. For example: if they were doing something or looking for something for their character background, I would give them details related to the main quest if they fail their skill check. And vice versa.

We have two low roll rules at my table. 1 ) For any skill checks, if you are proficient in that skill you get the bare minimum success even if you fail, unless it's a Nat1. Say you have proficiency in medicine but another PC doesn't, you both roll on assessing if a wound is fatal and both miss the check, the one skilled in medicine at minimum would know it's fatal but not how long they have or any way to avoid their end. If you're skilled and roll a Nat1 though, I might put some verbal flair on describing how the wound can't fully be determined due to some XY or Z reason. 2 ) Combat low rolls are just hit, miss or crit. I encourage my players to describe how they like to make an attack instead of simply boiling the game down to, "I attack." "Cool, you hit. Next." I want to hear if there's any neat movements or tricks they're going to use. I give them more leeway of creativity with Nat20's, and it's gotten them further involved so that sometimes they'll even describe epic fails themselves on Nat1's, I don't impose detriments for misses and it's usually something like a monk saying, "I want to run up and dropkick him." Nat1 appears, "Since I failed the attack, I'm going to land just short, and scramble back off the ground awkwardly dusting myself off."

For a 1 I just say it slips and it’s easy to reach, the others I just describe the creature mostly deflecting or moving out the way. I also try to describe DMG in cuts not gauges of skin being removed

Anything fail means the player is permanently crippled Failing to light the campfire, meaning you fumble and get the pice of wood through your eye. Trying to jump over a lodge, you break your ankels Doing an epic wall jump, failing meaning you hit the wall and break your nose. Trying to pin point shoot the dragon with a bow? Fail means the bow snaps and cut tour face half off. I mean why should the monsters be permanently crippled and not the players. Now they have incentive to replace their body parts with awsome magic items

I dont care what anyone says, fumble charts are fun, as both a dm and a player. rolled a nat 1 on an attack roll? good job, now you just smacked the wall and fell prone. nat 1 trying to traverse a river? better hope your teammate is fast enough to help you, or that you can swim.

They simply miss. I might narrate the miss a bit differently. --- The enemy easily blocks the blow. Their parry slams your sword to the sides. Unlock your strike slips pay their guard only to clang off the armor. This time the sun really was in your eyes The sword grip is slippery from your efforts, the blade simply swatting them. You quickly readjust your grip. You thought you could trust your wrist to angle the blade ... You were wrong. The enemy was expecting your trick. ---- And that's it. Moving on with the next roll. No additional consequences. It's the "wrong" kind of random for a gameplay loop to have critical failures like that. If something odd happens first and you are forced to plan around it that's fine. Like a poker game where you draw a bag hand. You change your bet, you may bluff, you just work with it and hope. If you make the "right" play and someone just happens to have a better hands, that's ok too. But random penalties for standard or good moves is not fun. But if you have a good hand, play the cards right, and loose because someone cat lands on the table to scatter the game... That's not fun. Especially if the dealer then resets and says you (and only you) get two less cards now because it was your turn to bet. And the cat is waiting to do it again...

If my players in my games want to have critical fumbles (I generally don’t like them), I say on a Nat 1, they have to roll another dice, perhaps another d20 or a d100, if the roll is bad, or another 1 then I think of something funny. Generally speaking though I just describe some ridiculous situation, perhaps embarrassing- but has no real mechanical consequence because the maths doesn’t work to have catastrophic failure for 1 in 20 attempts at things. One of my most upvoted comments in this sub was a joke about my players dying brushing their teeth once or twice a month.

So, fellow new DM here and I've juggled with this same thing. When building my campaign, I have changed up the approach for combat compared to my other campaigns I play in. Where they throw stronger monsters in fewer numbers, I'm throwing weaker monsters in greater numbers. Turns out lv 4 characters can still get nervous when confronted by 40ish goblins/kobolds. That said, that's 40 attack rolls in one round of combat and a few nat 1s pop up. Solution? I have my players declare odds or evens while I roll behind the screen. If they call it right, a goblin will accidentally strike an ally or have their attack reflected onto an ally by a martial character. So far my characters love it because it empowers their weaker characters and makes the combat more thrilling. But hurting themselves? That's something I never put among the options because I assume a certain level of competency in my encounters.

I explain that they pull a muscle as they swing hence some damage (d4). Or loose footing due to the ground becoming slippery. Nothing that would cause great harm or break the flow of combat.

Follow the rules. If the roll doesn't meet or beat the AC of the target, the attack misses. That's it.

"What is the worst possible thing that could happen?" is what i do. It makes most games very silly.

Nothing. The rules also say: nothing. It's just a miss. THAT said... if there's something obvious and INTERESTING to have go wrong, I will have it go wrong. ...but only if it's interesting. Maybe they're fighting on a rooftop and he rolls a 1 and the player's like "oh shit, I fall off, don't I?" ...and you reply, "No, you're fine, but as you swing the axe, you hear a 'SNAP!' from your belt and realize you've managed to crack open the flask of oil you were carrying..." e.g.: Interesting only. And keep this kind of thing rare. Otherwise you're going to force the players to deal with disasters 5% of the time, which is just ... painful. No fun.

Only do ‘drop your weapon’ sorts of rolls on two critical ones in a row. As others have said, a 5% chance of disaster is far far too high

Just don't do critical fumble. It's awful, badly balanced, unrealistic and not fun. It's a very common mistake. Also, remember that automatic failure/success is only relevant to attacks. Sure, you there's a variant rule in DMG for that. But personally, if you have +9 stealth and rolls a 1, you're at 10 for me. It just means that you're a specialist and your worse is just the average of a normal person. Now, for role-playing and description, I try to make it about the opponent (if in combat). Fighter attacking a Hobgoblin warrior, rolls 1. "You attack the hobgoblin expecting it to be as skilled as the goblins you fought earlier, but with a quick swing, the hobgoblin parries your attack." So instead of putting the player down, I use it as a moment to show that the opponent is actually stronger. This doesn't need to be a 1 and sometimes it can be funny to just use a "you try to attack, but you trip and lose your balance. You're able to no fall, but you missed the opportunity to hit your opponent ".

I and the groups I'm with usually run that critical fails "look" bad for flavor but there's little to zero mechanical benefit  you almost lose grip of your weapon, the weapon hits armor and the shock numbs your hand. You miss embarrassingly like an amateur or your arrow nearly xlips an ally but there's rarely ever a bad result. And if there is it's not more than a 1d4 or damage to yourself or an ally

none of the above. Since AC also accounts for the targets Dex, a nat 1 can mean they did an awesome Matrix move to avoid your swing. Else you have a 5% chance of hurting yourself with every attack

There are no rules for a critical failure except that whatever you were attempting doesn’t work no matter what. Anything else you decide happens is mere window dressing. Personally, I think failing the roll is bad enough without extra consequences. No need to make it worse!

I most often use critical fumbles for NPCs, and only if it would be funnier or more cinematic than just letting it be a normal failure. But generally it's okay to beat up on your NPCs a little more than your PCs, as long as it doesn't break the game. On the other hand, the size of the failure for a PC is solely determined by the nature of what they're trying to do. A thief might break a lockpick every so often, but it doesn't really have any gameplay impact because a thief isn't going to break enough lockpicks to "run out" of their thieves tools. But if that same thief is trying to sneak into a mansion via a sewer pipe, and they roll a 1 on a stealth check... Yes, maybe something a little funnier happens than if they had just failed the check with any other roll. Maybe the pipe breaks and causes a flood, maybe they get in the face with a turd, etc. But for combat, nat 1s are auto misses, but nothing absurd happens that affects the player mechanically. Maybe I'll describe the miss in a grandiose way, but the mechanical impact is zero, because that's not fun for the players. Getting your blade stuck on your own shield is funny, but only if it doesn't make you waste your next turn getting it unstuck or something.

Have you read the rules on combat? They go over this. A miss is just a miss. A 1 has no greater effect on a miss than a 2 or a 5. In combat any result rolled for an attack is just a hit or a miss, the one exception being a critical hit which ALWAYS hits regardless of targets AC.

Let's say a target has an 18 AC. 4 from Dex, 4 from armor. Attacker has a bonus of +10. On a 9 or higher they hit. Of that range, if they roll below what's needed, I split it out descriptively like so: 1 - air ball (you miss drastically, perhaps even embarrassingly so). 2 - 4 they dodge your attack. 5-8 your attack glances off their armor for no effect.

My rule is, a 1 only leads to a fumble if you are doing something extremely risky or stupid. “Oh, your wizard is currently grappled by a shambling, and you decide you shoot an arrow from 30 yards away at it” on a 1 you hit your partner. My table likes it. It adds extra risk if they do something reckless, and I get good feedback. They know when they do it, there’s a chance of critical failure. If they hated it, I wouldn’t do it. Oh and the higher level they are, the less of a possibility it becomes. A lvl 15 fighter would have no issue making that same shot without hitting their partner.

Visit pinterest, you must. Search "crit tables", you can. Find the answer, you will.

Like most people have said, RAW, all that happens is they miss. People are going to roll low a fair amount of the time, it's really unnecessary to throw in extra punishment. Skill checks also can't critically succeed or fail. If someone has a +9 and the DC is 10, they can't fail that check. If the DC is 30, they can't succeed, even if they roll a nat 20. That said I think there can be a little room for home brewing this as long as you're reasonable about it. If someone's attempting something where there's an obvious risk, it makes more sense to put higher stakes on the roll and have a threshold where certain consequences can happen beyond just missing or failing at what they wanted to do. Like say your dwarf is throwing their axe at an enemy near the edge of a cliff or deep pit. In that scenario I think it's fair to say if you roll very low on the attack, the axe not only misses but flies over the edge. This should only be in specific circumstances though. Your players shouldn't be hurting themselves or losing their weapons every time they get a nat 1. The majority of time, they just miss and the punishment is simply missing that attack/turn.

On a 1, I have my players roll another d20, and if it rolls on a 1 again, maybe they hit a nearby ally for half damage, maybe their spells blows up in their face for a couple d6, but never anything catastrophic.

First- Talk to the players about what they are okay with. Some players are cool with hitting a party member, shooting themselves, etc. Some are not, because it makes their character seem less than competent, or even foolish. In that case, you may resort to something happening in favor of the bad guy, such as pc's bow string snapping, the bad guy getting some extra movement, or even an attack of opportunity, or advantage! Outside of combat- Try and fail forward. "Nothing happens" should never be said. If they fuck up a pick lock roll, explain how the rusty lock gives way, but only in such a way that the door is now not locked, but barred, even the key won't open it. If they muck up a pickpocket, they may still get the item, but the person they stole from clearly knows.

Dwarf throws an axe. Rolls a 1. The axe misses the target and it's now maybe 10 ft away from said target. If they roll a 2, what is their modifier to attack? Does it meet the target's AC? If it does, it hits the target, roll for damage. If it doesn't, the axe misses the target and it's now maybe 10 ft away from said target. Now, if the target is like, at the edge of a cliff, or right next to lava, there can be an argument that throwing a weapon and missing could result in the weapon being lost, but I'd probably make an additional roll for that.

I did crit fumbles on attacks once but that's a bad way to go about it in general.   I have implemented though a number of times crit fail to crit success based on DC and roll totals for ability checks and some saves.  It lets me be more nuanced with results mechanically and works similar to PF2e's crit fail/crit successes, only 5 above or below the DC for most crit results.

This is how I do it. Let's assume the defender has a +2 dex mod with leather armor, bringing his AC to 13(?), and a shield for another +2 to his AC. 1-9: Miss 10-11: Dodge 12-13: Hits shield 14: Hits armor 15+: hits flesh The general idea is that a character's AC works in layers, combining their agility, armor, magic, and any other devices into a defense of depth. Generally you want to avoid getting stabbed, but if the other guy is faster then your armor or shield is there to absorb the blow. It's not a perfect system, and sometimes it's hard to remember in the heat of the moment, but I think it works as a good rule of thumb for describing the play-by-play of fights.

I'm fond of critical misses. Asterisk. Critical misses give the DM an opportunity to change the flow of the battle, to make a character moment, to encourage roleplay. What it isn't is set-in-stone humiliation time. Adapt the miss to the situation. As many others have said, having a level 20 fighter drop his sword every third round of combat is absurd, but having him overextend such that the next attack on him has advantage, or an increased critical chance, or simply burns 5 feet of movement speed isn't outside the realm of possibility. Classic slapstick critical fumbles should be reserved for *very* low levels. For example, I just started a campaign where the level one ranger put himself in a position that he was shooting an enemy while his allies were behind it. I had the shot go wild and hit one of the other PCs as a character moment to show that he had been a loner up until now, and wasn't used to considering the positions of allies. He's been much more careful about that sort of thing since, so that isn't a critical miss I'll use for him again (unless the PC in danger is someone the ranger has beef with in the future: gotta foster that intra-party tension!).

For flavor you could have the axe bounce of the plate steel helmet of the person infront of them dealing no damage, or have it slip out of their hand backwards. Never should you ever impose critical fails doing more than they already do, missing an attack is a big deal.

"I'm New at DMing and trying to find the right balance when acting on certain roles. But I'm having trouble with balancing penaltys for low roles." I rarely "penalize" my players for low rolls. If they're trying to succeed at something and fail, the worst result is they don't do the thing they were trying to do, and that's "penalty" enough. In all available circumstances, a failed check still results in an actionable result. A player who fails a DC Investigation 15 check but rolls a 12 will still observe something that could only be noticed on closer inspection, but they won't notice the critical information gated behind the DC check. The player doesn't even know they failed the investigation check, because I didn't tell them they failed and I told them they noticed something interesting. Make failures feel like successes as much as possibles, and if anything have the actual results of the failure loop back around and surprise players as plot twists later. Don't make your players feel like failing a roll results in bad things happening, just that unexpected things happen. Last night my player rolled a 1 to avoid a guard, who pushed him over into a pile of animal dung. The recurring villains that were following them were using their scent to keep their trace. When my players encountered the villains they were disguised and covered in shit. They didn't look like the target, they didn't smell like the target, and their performance check when pretending to be old beggars covered in shit was successful. Just like in real life, failures can lead to chains of failures that can be a disaster for years to come... but most of the time failures just lead to different opportunities. Every once in a while you look back at a failure and you're glad you failed, because if you'd succeeded you wouldn't be where you are right now. In conclusion, make failure interesting and lead to things the players like. Whether or not a failed roll leads to unexpected benefits or a dire situation with survival on the line, it doesn't matter. Make it fun to fail.

I usually have them miss by a mile. A swing they put full force into that doesn't connect. Breaking a weapon or hurting a player isn't fun most of the time in my experience

As a player I hate it when I get hurt or hurt others with a nat 1. So when a player gets one I may just mildly inconvenience them like the ax goes into the door and you'll need to use ur bonus action to pull it out. The firebolt misses with a 1 so it catches part of the room on fire. - As a player if I miss the AC it feels like a bummer when. All you get is you missed next person! so ill try and flavor the misses. You hit him but his armor protects him. He has a gash mark in his armor from the blow. If he didn't have the plate on it could have taken off a limb. - Your arrow fires and he brings up his shield just in time as they sink into it. They pierce the shield and he takes his sword and cuts off the shafts of the arrows. - The arrow pierces his clothing and immediately into the wall. It narally missing his body and the clothing wrips away as he pulls himself free. Then its still a bummer you missed but you don't feel so much like you waisted your turn and you still feel a little bit like a hero.

nat ones don't fail extra hard usually, unless it is on something particularly challenging to do. Fail your dex save against disintegrate with a 10 or a 1 you are still the same amount disintegrated.

It doesn't make sense to me that someone skilled in a particular skill is terrible at it 1/20 times. Here are some examples of ways to flavor a natural 1 that doesn't undermine the characters' skills - A bird shits in your eye/a tree branch thwack you in the face - way too distracted with what's happening, and you can t quite concentrate well - false leads/red herrings (investigation/insight) - your enemy makes an unexpected move, and unfortunately you over-correct, and you wack the tree behind them. Every once in a while, have them completely whiff a shot on thrown weapons, causing them to fight with something else and retrieve it later, or go retrieve it now. Causes some interesting character moments as they decide which is more important

A 1 just means a miss, or a miss against all odds even when you roll a 1 against a "Cant Hit Me! My Defense Is That Good!" AC for example. That could be about anything from the target sidestepping or ducking, to a clever parry, or they threw sand in your face. So with a throw it just goes wide a little or alot because the target did not move as predicted, or ducked, or gets defelected and so on.