I'm playing an Ardent and I have psionic points to augment my at-will powers. My weapon is a Falchion, a high crit weapon. If I augment for example "Psionic Shield" with 2 psionic points and then roll a crit: What exactly is the damage?
Here the relevant three quotes from the Player's Handbook:
High Crit weapon: A high crit weapon deals more damage when you score a critical hit with it. A critical hit deals maximum weapon damage and an extra 1[W] at 1st–10th levels ... This extra damage is in addition to any critical damage the weapon supplies if it is a magic weapon.
Maximum Damage: Rather than roll damage, determine the maximum damage you can roll with your attack. This is your critical damage. (Attacks that don’t deal damage still don’t deal damage on a critical hit.)
My impression: The word "attack" implies that the full power damage is used for the maximum damage part. Am I right with that impression?
Extra Damage: Magic weapons and implements, as well as high crit weapons, can increase the damage you deal when you score a critical hit. If this extra damage is a die roll, it’s not automatically maximum damage; you add the result of the roll.
My impression: Here, there's neither the word "weapon", nor the words "attack" or "power" ... this makes it quite unclear to me what I'm supposed to do ...
The "normal" damage of my augmented Psionic Shield is 4d4 + 4 (=2[W]+Ch-Bonus) but the basic weapon damage is 2D4 (I have no magic weapon, no Str bonus). What value do I use for the damage in this case?
Is it the maximum of the power, because that's the current weapon damage? Or the maximum of the pure physical weapon?
The maximum could be either:
- 4d4+4 = 20
or
- 2d4 = 8
And do I roll the damage as listed in the power? Or do I roll the pure weapon damage?
That could be either:
- 4d4+4
or
- 2d4
As you see the damage differences are quite big. And in case it's always just the physical weapon without the applied power, it's even more efficient for me to forget about the crit and throw the dice as described in the power - see here:
Without crit:
- average of 4D4+4 = 14
or
- with crit, but both addends just for physical weapon: 8+ (average of 2D4 = 5) = 13
Or is it even a mixture of both? The maximum from the power, the extra from the weapon? And does that apply to powers as well if I do not augment them?