Everyone always says “make it believable” but I dunno. There’s just something about seeing my players get hyped when I allow the super stupid thing they’re going for and they actually get that 20.
I’ll take that fun “I’m actually a God” moment every time if I can.
For a lot of things, my group will keep it level… But Persuasion is a free for all. And it goes both ways.
PC 1: “My Femme Fatal attempts to seduce the Orc guard.”
nat 1
DM: “You attempt to talk up the muscular green bastard, who doesn’t seem all that impressed. You pester him a few minutes before he snarls, pulls up his sleeve to show you the rainbow flag tattoo on his arm and says ‘Fuck off, lady. I’m gay!’”
PC 2: “…Can my Engineer try to seduce the guard?”
It depends on the type of game you’re running and its an expectation that should be set from the beginning (as is “whether a 20 is a critical skill check at all”)
My games tend to be more grounded, so when I have run critical skill checks, they are a success with a reasonable bonus. A critical persuasion check might have the guard believe your phony story but also accidentally let slip some useful info as you’re passing through the gates because he’s let his guard down.
But in a game where the vibe is more out there and power fantasy-y, heck yeah, let your 20s rewrite reality!
I’m always a fan of “best possible outcome” for 20, and “worst possible outcome that doesn’t immediately kill anyone” for nat1.
If you’re 2ft tall and trying to destroy an iron wall and roll a 20, you successfully scrape some iron off the wall. It doesn’t just collapse spontaneously. If you roll a
01, your attack bounces off and your weapon breaks. Luckily it didn’t rebound and hit you.It makes things more believable, however rule of cool is obviously above that. So if you can do a flip off a cliff onto the back of a dragon and convince it to attack the tarrasque for you before it eats you, and roll a 20 for all that, you better believe that dragon now considers you it’s deity, and will die in a ball of flames, acid, ice, etc, in your name while flying headfirst down the tarrasque’s throat. The tarrasque obviously dies from this, since it’s so epic.
I guess it really depends on the stakes.
As per Sir Terry Pratchett, a Million-to-one chance succeeds nine times out of ten.
