After running a mock combat between the demo Troll Slayer and a gor/ungor duo, I had a couple of questions.

• Is a skill test that is based on a particular attribute considered a test of that attribute as well? Had 2 Minor Nuisance crits, one for Strength checks and one for Agility checks. Does a Weapon Skill (St) test v. Defense count as a Strength test? Or would it only effect tests of Strength, like moving a tree out of the road? Which I suppose would be an Athletics (St) test; so maybe the answer is yes.
• By extension, is rolling for Initiative considered an Agility check?
• The CR on a weapon, if triggered, represents "critical damage" which is different from "+1 critical". "Critical damage" no matter where it comes from, can only be triggered once?
• To ever get more than one crit in an attack, you have to trigger "critical damage" as well as a "+X critical" effect? Triggering a "+X critical" by itself does not grant crits? (The book says '+1 critical' is cumulative with any other critical effect; but if you did not trigger "critical damage" then there's nothing to add it to.)
• If your attack misses due to insufficient hammers, boon effects are still triggered. What if your boon effect is "+3 damage, +1 critical"? I would say the boon effects cannot be applied, but it was related to the above, so I thought I'd bring it up.

Mordenthral said:

1) Yes. If it uses the dice for the characteristic, it counts as a test of that characteristic.
2) Yes, Initiative is an Agility test since it is base don Agility (assuming it isn't a Social Encounter initiative)
3) I believe that the CR of a weapon counts as +1 Critical, and thus is cumulative. I'm a bit fuzzy. Anyway, if it is a "inflicts a critical" it isn't cumulative, but if it is treated as a "+1 critical" it is cumulative. I'll try to look, but my off-the cuff remembrance is that it is a "+1 critical".
4) No. Any "critical" words without a plus are non-cumulative criticals. Anything with a plus is cumulative. So, two "inflicts criticals" will only cause 1 critical. Two "+1 critical" will inflict 2 criticals. A "inflicts critical" and a "+1 critical" will also cause 2 criticals.
5) Boon effects do not apply if they are in directly relyant on a successful hit. If you miss, you have no potential damage, thus you cannot increase the potential damage nor change any wounds inflicted by the attack into criticals. If the action gave you a free maneuver, for example, you could still get that boon effect.

Edit: After checking #3 ... the rules say it "converts a wound into a critical" rather than "inflicts a critical". I interpret this as a cumulative critical effect, like a "+1 critical"

dvang said:

Ah, well spotted. I only asnwer the second part of the question, without noticing the incorrect assumption in the first part

Teasing the info out of some of these posts is more difficult than finding the info in the rulebook!

dvang said:

Actually, it is NOT cumulative. Ynnen posted in another post:

You can trigger any number of criticals assuming each critical effect comes from a different source.

Your weapon's critical rating, an action card, special circumstance, ability, spell effect, or other game element may provide you opportunities to trigger a critical. However, each individual "side effect" (such as a boon or bane effect listed on a card or ability) can only be triggered once per check. (WFRP p45: Effect Triggering Limits and p50: Side Effect Triggers).

Thats not what he is saying, he is saying lets say you attack with an action that says:

[HAMMER]Deal normal damage

[HAMMER][HAMMER] as above but attack inflicts critical damage

and you use a hand weapon (CR3)

You roll 2 hammer, 3 boons, no challenges, no banes, no comet, no chaos stars.

you choose to go with the 2 success line and use the 3 boons to activate the CR of your weapon. Do you do 1 or 2 criticals.

IF the crit rating of the weapon counts as "+1 critical" you would do 2, if it counts as "this attack inflicts critical damage" you would do 1.

*I* believe it "inflicts critical damage" and you would do 1, however I do not have a book with me to review so I'm probably wrong.

I believe the way the rule is intended is that the effect of "inflicts critical wounds" no matter how many of those you can activate is just intended to allow ONE wound dealt to be converted into a critical wound.

The effect of "+1 critical" is intended to be the only one that can add upon itself or the "inflicts critical wounds".

The clarfication might be needed for does the effect "+1 critical" convert a critical wound if "inflicts critical wounds" is never chosen?

-ashe-

Here's a paste of a long conversation, else where in this forum, where a lot of these things were covered. Though we haven't had an official response yet, no one has corrected the solutions that follow. As a side note, I sent several questions to FFG. I got a reply back stating that mine and many other questions were being compiled into a FAQ as we speak. YEA!

[PASTE]

The Question is:
Can you trigger boon and bane effects on an action card, even if you fail to succeed during the action roll?

dvang said:
Quote: "Conversely, a character might fail to accomplish his action, but still trigger some beneficial side effect from boons."
This says exactly that, if you miss (fail the attack action) you can still trigger boons from the side effect lines.

This is where I had problems; ‘beneficial side effect’ could mean the reduction of stress or fatigue available at all times (and not on a card at all), or effects from talents or conditions. Thus, it could be saying, “Conversely, a character might fail to accomplish his action, but still trigger some beneficial side effect from boons such as the regeneration of fatigue or stress.” However, I think it is saying, “Conversely, a character might fail to accomplish his action, but still trigger some beneficial side effect from boon results on the action card or elsewhere.”

dvang said:
There is no "minimum of 1 wound to use a critical".

No, there’s not, but it’s an incidental effect of the process. If you hit and do zero or less wounds, the ‘1 wound minimum’ kicks in. Consequently, this same ‘condition’ causes crits to be converted to wounds. So, if you hit and you do zero or less wounds, there is a minimum of 1 wound. If, during this resolution, you generate crits from card effects or from weapon CR ratings, those crits would be converted to normal wounds and added to the total. So, ‘A successful attack that generates zero or few wounds = Minimum 1 wound, +1 wound per critical generated’.

Summary:

• If you fail to achieve at least one ‘success’ during an action card resolution roll, negative or beneficial boon and bane side effects on the card, or from other sources, may still be activated.
• ‘Effects’ are defined as lines that are not ‘Success Lines’, or simply Boon, Bane, Comet, or Chaos Star effects as well as standard effects like fatigue and stress reclamation, or boon and bane effects from talents, conditions, and other sources.
• Damage is defined as any amount of damage (damage potential minus mitigation), positive, negative, or zero in value. Failure to do damage, due to a failed action card roll for example, would be considered NULL damage, or no damage.
• If the damage of a successful attack is zero or less than zero, the attack still generates a minimum of 1 wound.
• If the damage is not NULL, but is equal to zero or less, and critical effects are generated, those crits are converted to standard wounds and added to the minimum 1 wound for a total damage done to the target. Note: This is post damage mitigation calculation so toughness and soak have already been considered.
• If you fail to generate a success during an action card resolution roll, and so have NULL or no damage, any crits generated have no effect and are ignored.

I hope I didn’t muddy things up trying to logic this problem into submission (yeah, I used logic as a verb).

Short Answer:
Question: Can you trigger boon and bane effects on an action card, even if you fail to succeed during the action card roll?
Answer: Yes. This would also apply to other effects listed on the action card such as a Comet or a Chaos Star.

Short Answer:
Question: If you fail to hit, can you still spend boons on crits and do damage anyway.
Answer : Technically, you can buy them, but they have no effect. You can only ‘convert crits to damage’ on a successful hit in which the total damage is zero or less.

Thanks to dvang for helping me bounce this around.

The Asgardian said:

Exactly this. Do you have to trigger critical damage before "+1 critical" has any effect?

The Asgardian said:

I was thinking this as well, but in answering the question about Coordinated Strike it seems to be the opposite. You activate the critical rating of two different weapons in the same attack. What would be the point of that if they didn't stack?

Edit: In light of that knowledge, Thunderous Blow moves into the stack of actions that can deal 3 crits.

So essentially, the rules would be much clearer if all critical wound effects stacked?

-ashe-

No. Ynnen answered in a post discussion about critical hits. If your action succeeds, and you get a "+1 critical" result (whether from success line or boon line) you cause 1 critical. If it says "inflicts a critical" that means a non-cumulative critical. Non cumulative criticals do not stack with each other. You could have 50 "inflicts critical wound" results from various sources, and still only inflict a single critical wound. Any critical results with a plus, are cumulative. They add with any and all other critical results.

Twenty "inflicts critical" rresults will only cause a single critical.

An "inflicts critical" result as well as a "+1 critical" will cause 2 criticals, because the +1 critical is cumulative.

Two "+1 critical" results will result in two criticals, as both are cumulative. They do not require a "inflicts critical" result.

Activating a weapon's CR says that it "converts a wound into a critical". The non-cumulative terminology has been "inflicts a critical wound". It seems to me that "convert" equates into a plus, and make the weapon CR a cumulative critical effect, just like saying "+1 critical". This is borne out by looking at the Coordinated Strike card, which allows you to activate the CR of both weapons with 2 successes. That would be absolutely pointless if their criticals weren't cumulative/stackable.

dvang said:

Until this is officially clarified, I'm just house ruling that anything that says 'critical' stacks, so I don't become strained.

After all, another possibility is that weapon CR are non-cumulative and it's just the special allowance from the Coordinated Strike that allows you to activate (and stack) both.

Fine.

Criticals clarified offically here:

www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_foros_discusion.asp

Updates to 'Summary' based on this thread. The last 3 bullets were added:

• If you fail to achieve at least one ‘success’ during an action card resolution roll, negative or beneficial boon and bane side effects on the card, or from other sources, may still be activated.
• ‘Effects’ are defined as lines that are not ‘Success Lines’, or simply Boon, Bane, Comet, or Chaos Star effects as well as standard effects like fatigue and stress reclamation, or boon and bane effects from talents, conditions, and other sources.
• Damage is defined as any amount of damage (damage potential minus mitigation), positive, negative, or zero in value. Failure to do damage, due to a failed action card roll for example, would be considered NULL damage, or no damage.
• If the damage of a successful attack is zero or less than zero, the attack still generates a minimum of 1 wound.
• If the damage is not NULL, but is equal to zero or less, and critical effects are generated, those crits are converted to standard wounds and added to the minimum 1 wound for a total damage done to the target. Note: This is post damage mitigation calculation so toughness and soak have already been considered.
• If you fail to generate a success during an action card resolution roll, and so have NULL or no damage, any crits generated have no effect and are ignored.
• Any "critical" words without a plus are non-cumulative criticals. Anything with a plus is cumulative. So, two "inflicts criticals" will only cause 1 critical. Two "+1 critical" will inflict 2 criticals. A "inflicts critical" and a "+1 critical" will also cause 2 criticals.
• Boon effects do not apply if they are in directly reliant on a successful hit and a success is not generated. If you miss, you have no potential damage and thus cannot change wounds into criticals. If the action gave you a free maneuver, for example, you could still get that boon effect.
• This is an assumption, needs official statement: If the rules say it "converts a wound into a critical" rather than "inflicts a critical", it is a cumulative critical effect, like a "+1 critical". Note: The fact this is an assumption also means it is also unclear if a triggered weapon critical stacks with other crits. A weapon’s CR ‘converts a wound into a critical’. This implies that it is a +1 crit and thus will stack (though it can only be triggered once, like other triggers).

Note: While the last line is an assumption, I believe it to be correct.