Obviously this wouldn't be called "Righteous Fury," as it does not reflect the Emperor's favor, but it would count as a critical hit none the less.

I had a player fight me tooth and nail that the horde he was involved against should not be able to have rolled extra damage after rolling a natural ten for damage against him.

My argument is that it is GM discretion who can and does get to score criticals. In an effort to make the game more challenging, I have allowed my enemies to do so.

Thoughts?

Pg. 245 of the CRB was brought up but it does not specifically relegate critical attacks to the players only.

Of course enemies can score righteous fury, personally, I never even considered that there could be a question over this. Just tell him to stop whining, what's the point in playing if you're doing it on EZ mode?

Yes. GM has full discretion on what can inflict righteous fury and for his whining you should have thrown a Carnifex at his face.

Although it says that only characters or profiles with fate points and "touched by the fates" can righteous, I disagree with this as it cam make it way too easy. Besides other groups will have other things (Blessings of the Dark Gods, Guidance of the Hive Mind, Essence of the Greater Good etc) which while not written would surely guide them to greatness.

I tend to reserve the benefit of inflicting criticals though for major NPCs and plot characters. Critical hits represent spectacularly painful punishing wounds and moments that could really change a battle. Only the elites have that level of power as it helps them stand out against their lesser minions. If a number of XV-8 battlesuits are firing at you and one of hem drops down and unleashes a hellish plasma volley causing some serious damage, it'll make you rethink quickly enough which is the threat. Meanwhile lower level creatures and hoards, I use some variant of the BC rules on crits and if they happen to get a critical, inflict a fixed amount of damage on the player ignoring armour/toughness. Not a lot, usually just 1 to 2 points of damage. This signifies that they just got lucky but doesn't take the thunder away from the rest.

Yes. GM has full discretion on what can inflict righteous fury and for his whining you should have thrown a Carnifex at his face.

Although it says that only characters or profiles with fate points and "touched by the fates" can righteous, I disagree with this as it cam make it way too easy. Besides other groups will have other things (Blessings of the Dark Gods, Guidance of the Hive Mind, Essence of the Greater Good etc) which while not written would surely guide them to greatness.

I tend to reserve the benefit of inflicting criticals though for major NPCs and plot characters. Critical hits represent spectacularly painful punishing wounds and moments that could really change a battle. Only the elites have that level of power as it helps them stand out against their lesser minions. If a number of XV-8 battlesuits are firing at you and one of hem drops down and unleashes a hellish plasma volley causing some serious damage, it'll make you rethink quickly enough which is the threat. Meanwhile lower level creatures and hoards, I use some variant of the BC rules on crits and if they happen to get a critical, inflict a fixed amount of damage on the player ignoring armour/toughness. Not a lot, usually just 1 to 2 points of damage. This signifies that they just got lucky but doesn't take the thunder away from the rest.

This made me LOL. But yes, I normally was going to keep the criticals for - like you said - Elites and Masters. But I am a total fan of the underdog and that was what was happening here. Let me explain:

This Ork Horde had been decimated through chainswords, heavy bolter rounds, and finally psychic fire. They had 1 magnitude left and in 6 rounds had not scored a single wound on any marine. So, with 1 mag left they charge the librarian and roll a 2 for the attack! Incredible. So, I figure with such a low magnitude they couldnt possibly deal any damage, I rolled damage and got me a natural 10. So, I thought it would make a really awesome comeback write-up (we play PbP).

Of course this is where the disagreement occurred. However, I did mess up in that I did not roll to confirm their RF. In our game we have been playing RF auto-confirms to speed up the process (pbp after all takes a long time) and it must have slipped my mind.

I agree with everything you said.

See in that context, a bit of creative licence can go into play:

GM: "Ok, considering that the ork hoard has been massacred, a few still remain. Filled with the utter ork fury of seeing their kin beaten down you hear the lead ork cry"
Ork: "WAAAAAAAARGH! CHOPPIFY THE HUMIE!"

Basically expressing at this point their utter frustration about having most of their numbers cut down and now getting surprisingly irate.

GM: "The Ork strikes, with quite a lot of force. If the Emperor smiles on you guys sometimes, Gork and Mork were smiling on these...before reverting to punching each other in the face and stopping blessing or watching some basic ork."

Whining Player: "What do you mean he's getting righteous fury? That's way too much damage!"

GM: "One, you are a space marine, you'll live. This is why you have fate points, power armour and plenty of wounds. Two, you lot have just mown down dozens of his allies. Do you really think he wont be a little bit irate about that and want to issue some serious punishment? Answer, no. These things are around the same size as one of you and probably the same strength. When they hit you you'll feel it either way."

I personally only allow special enemies to score critical hits. The grunts, either Imperial or enemies, don't.

I have an odd way of handling NPC RF: Those with Touched by the Fates do get RF and (versus Unnatural Toughness) individual troop level NPCs as well as hordes of troop-levels with Mag < 10. This representes the off-chance that a lone individual can occasionally to some damage. (And let's be honest: a lasgun will struggle to do damage with RF against Unnatural Toughness.)

I have run combat with 3 single Hormagaunts against a PC, hoping to score some RF and do at least some damage. It keeps a minimum amount of thrill for the players.

Alex

Like most of these replies, I limit the potential to inflict Righteous (or Nefarious) Fury to major NPCs who have the Touched By The Fates Trait.

Yeah, we are all on about the same page regarding this. I appreciate everyone's replies.

Personally I go one step further, everyone can RF and RF auto confirms (for PCs as well). On the other hand I explain this to my group at the begining of the campaign.

What is more concerning is the PC not accepting a GMs ruling. There shouldn't really room to fight you tooth and nail over this. The conversation should be very polite but ultimatly can be as simple as saying

'I understand what you have said but I think for game balance in the story I want to tell I am changing the rules in the core book, and I am afraid we now need to move on with the game'.

I auto confirm as well to speed the process up.

Personally I go one step further, everyone can RF and RF auto confirms (for PCs as well). On the other hand I explain this to my group at the begining of the campaign.

What is more concerning is the PC not accepting a GMs ruling. There shouldn't really room to fight you tooth and nail over this. The conversation should be very polite but ultimatly can be as simple as saying

'I understand what you have said but I think for game balance in the story I want to tell I am changing the rules in the core book, and I am afraid we now need to move on with the game'.

I agree wholeheartedly. You are the GM. If a player wants to dispute a ruling you made, state that they are encouraged to just continue for the sake of game play and they can discuss it privately with you afterwards. Holding up the game just to whine about a rule affects all players.

Not that it matters but 'fighting tooth and nail' was posting 'bad guys don't normally get Righteous Fury'. It's a play-by-post and I was planning on discussing it with the GM via IM later. When I brought it up I was shut down before I even explained my question.

After that, I was upset that I didn't have a chance to even discuss the rule or even find out if the GM was aware that we weren't 'by the book'. Even when I did 'throw a fit' it was mostly around potential concerns with changing enemies mid-fight due to some honest mistakes on calculating Horde Damage.

So, in short, I appreciate everyone's feedback on how they use Righteous Fury, but don't worry about tips on dealing with a problem player. The GM (and I) both got frustrated over a lack of communication, but I think we're good on that front going forward.

Play by post is always going to be difficult communication wise because it is slower and tone is more difficult to ascertain.

Play by post is always going to be difficult communication wise because it is slower and tone is more difficult to ascertain.

And yet, I find it the most rewarding. The rich narrative and character backgrounds that we are able to create and expand upon through prose is much, much deeper than my current sit-down RPG experience (which is of course much faster with much more immediate XP and character reward).

PbP allows the GM to be MUCH more attentive to rules and detail, for obious reasons.

Obviously this wouldn't be called "Righteous Fury," as it does not reflect the Emperor's favor, but it would count as a critical hit none the less.

You don't need to fluff it that way if you don't want to. And it's just semantics regardless.

The Touched by the Fates trait already exists to give, for example, Tyranid Warriors the ability to RF.

I pretty much let anyone but Hordes RF, and there are rules that allow SOME Hordes to RF (gauss weapons for Necrons come to mind). But I also use the BC critical rules, finding status infliction much more fun than flat +damage.

Obviously this wouldn't be called "Righteous Fury," as it does not reflect the Emperor's favor, but it would count as a critical hit none the less.

You don't need to fluff it that way if you don't want to. And it's just semantics regardless.

The Touched by the Fates trait already exists to give, for example, Tyranid Warriors the ability to RF.

I pretty much let anyone but Hordes RF, and there are rules that allow SOME Hordes to RF (gauss weapons for Necrons come to mind). But I also use the BC critical rules, finding status infliction much more fun than flat +damage.

I enjoy fluffing it. As it is PbP, I have much more time and freedom to write up detailed posts. I do not mind letting the players know that Gork and Mork were behind a particularly nasty blow.

I am not familiar with the BC critical rules. Would you please enlighten me?

DDMW and I have come up with a nice compromise for enemy criticals that isn't necessarily an exploding damage stack that the Emperor's chosen get. It should spice things up without overbearingly ramping up the chance of a TPK during any large-scale battle.

I am not familiar with the BC critical rules. Would you please enlighten me?

You roll a d5 and it inflicts the appropriate critical effect for the damage type and location. But it doesn't give actual crit damage, just the effect (Fatigue, stun, knocked prone, blinded, etc.)

I played a game of Nobilis once PbP. Not sure if you have come across that game? It is quite...abstract.

In a nutshell you effectively play gods personifying a concept in the universe. It is diceless and you succeed at pretty much anything automatically unless someone of comparable power attempts to oppose you and then there is a bidding process to see who succeeds. I think it was once described as the best unplayable game written.

The source book is georgeous but the mechanics heavily relying on the players having a clear idea of who their character is and what their motivations are which makes it quite difficult for casual RPers i.e everyone who isn't a professional actor with training in improvisation hence the unplayable bit.

Anyway PbP, because everyone had time to take time over what they wanted to say and do actually made it playable and really good fun.

Re: Nobilis: I think the new edition does a better job of playability.