I recently saw Severlin mention in a thread that he wasn't aware that the expanded critical range from the Paladin holy sword spell would be doubled by the feat Improved Critical. I remember having a kensei back before the enhancement pass, and i can confirm that at that time, the +1 critical range was definitely NOT doubled in effect by the improved critical feat.

When the enhancement pass came, many of the trees gained competence bonuses to the critical profiles of weapons they used. All of these become doubled when the improved critical feat is applied to them. The barbarian critical rage enhancement is not a competence bonus, and this doubling effect does not happen, at least with melee weapons.

I"m not a technical person, so my best guess is that the older enhancements, and the barb one apply the bonus to the character, whereas the competence bonuses apply it to the weapon. It has to do with where the bonus lies in the formula to determine the overall critical profile of the weapon.

So here is my idea. Let's fix it so that it doesn't do this anymore. Fix it for all the effects that are doubled by improved crit. I suspect the designers of these effects never intended for them to be quite as powerful as they turned out to be.

Any thoughts about this?