Critical miss is when your char do something so bad that he end up doing something very stupid. It is known to practically kill other party members in extreme case. I hate archers drawing a critical miss: it invariably mean that one of us will end up eating the arrow in the ... :P Critical miss is also refered as "snake eyes", because it's when you draw the minimum on a dice. With two 6 sided dices, it end up with two ones, thus the reason for the snake eyes name.
It's the opposite to the heroic roll, which is 20 (or the max you can draw with your dices). Very interesting things tend to happen on an heroic roll, the end effect invariably good for you because whatever you were trying to do, you do it like if it you would be doing it everyday. This is in mainly because whatever you do, you always have the tiniest of chance of succeeding. Even a level one trying to push a lance in the hearth of a dragon would succeed with an heroic roll... And you bet it's the only way he could do that, too! For fighters, an heroic roll on a successfull attack often mean that you will basically cut the ennemy in two, or turn it into a pulp... Unless the opponent have the hell of a lot of HP. I think a heroic roll double the damage of an attack.
It can be used for about anything... Let's say you're on a boat and you want to get out by walking on a little plank. The thief who gets the heroic roll would jump out of the boat, do three backflips (with all his equipment, backpacks, etc), and end up on the ground without breaking a sweat. The following dwarf, having a critical miss on his dex roll for the plank, would end up slipping somehow and fall to the water, drowning to death unless someone help him by throwing a rope or diving to save him. :P
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