How do you measure "Timing"?

[The Crimson Binome]

This is really simple. Timing your jump to occur in a small window is a matter of reflexes. Reflexes are measured by your reflex save.

Still disagree. A reflex save is not used to determine how fast you act, but rather your unconscious bodily response to external stimulus. It's not something you can actively choose to invoke. It's only reflexive, instinctual, before you can process what's happening.

If you're riding a platform and it suddenly drops from under you, then that's a Reflex save to jump to a nearby platform. If you jump to a platform, and that gives out as soon as you land on it, then that's also a Reflex save to catch yourself or roll to safe ground.

Timing your jump to occur in a small window is a matter of perception and spatial acuity. The speed at which you go through the physical motions (probably governed by move speed) is secondary to your conscious decision of when​ to make the jump.

 

[Sunseeker]

The difference between reactive and proactive can be really blurred here. Aren't you reacting to the swinging platform coming near to you?

I think that depends. Are you expecting the platform to perform a repetitive action? Or is the platform movement unpredictable? If we're talking Mario here and the platforms are simply moving nearer and further in a consistent pattern, I don't consider this to be a reaction. You are doing the math in your head while your wait, and then jumping. If we're talking about the lands of chaos where there is no ryhme or reason to the movement, that is definitely reactionary.

If you know that the floor is about to drop away beneath you because you've triggered a trap, aren't you proactively jumping away from it in the sense that you anticipate a problem and actively jumping away and reacting to stimulus all at the same time? Proactive activity is generally defined by its preparation and taking control of the situation. So, tying a rope around your waist and securing it to some belay before you jump is clearly proactive. Digging a foxhole when you aren't yet in contact with the enemy is clearly proactive. Timing a jump to a narrow window is well a very blurry case, but in general I wouldn't define it as being in control of the situation or acting in a preparatory way. A more proactive move might be using a grappling hook to try to alter the motion of the platforms.

Sure, and as I mention later, for several of those situations, your life in not in danger while you are attempting to make the action. And that's the deliniation I attempted to make. If there is a clear and present danger, then your hand is forced and you are reacting. If the danger is vague or distant, then you are proacting.

Checks are more often than not active rather than proactive, and in general the cases here are so blurry that I don't find your distinctions particularly useful.

They don't really have to be I suppose. They make sense in my head and I'm the one using them. As a player at your table, I think there's a potential for me to make an argument based on my current situation as to if I am reacting to proacting.

So suppose that when each platform reached its closest point to the next, it dropped off, which would be defined as something bad happening to you, is it now a reflex save? Suppose you only thought that the platform was about to collapse, what is it?

That depends on when you make your jump. If you are planning your jump to take place at the last minute, it is proactive. If you are making your jump because you didn't realize the platform was dropping off, that is reacting. Again, it's a matter of preparation. When your hand is forced and you cannot take the time to prepare, you are reacting.

Suppose we slightly alter the scenario. You are now running down a collapsing bridge or causeway, leaping from stone pillar to stone pillar, just before the one behind you collapses. Is this now reactive or is it still proactive? It's the exact same ability being used whether or not the pillar you are currently on is going to fall 1 round from now or two or ten.

No, I think that the time you have before collapse certainly makes a difference, as if you have several rounds to make your jump, you have time to prepare, even if the time is limited. If we were to say that the pillar began to collapse the moment you landed on it, and would fall away the next round, that is a reaction. If the pillar began to collapse the moment you landed on it, but it took 5 rounds, that can be pro-acted to.

I find that to be a particularly tedious and situational way to look at things.

I quite like viewing things as situational. It can keep the same concept fresh by having each instance of it treated differently. As with the pillar example above. You can be exploring two different segments of a dungeon, each with collapsing halls and pillars, but because their rate of collapse is different, it makes your treatment of the situation different. Perhaps because the pillars in Room 2 are sturdier and thus take 5 rounds to collapse, you tie a rope around Bob the Ninja, who jumps quickly across and secures the line so that Joe, Jenny and Jimmy can have something to hang on to, even while they jump from pillar to pillar, reducing the DC of their jump check, and providing security in case one of them falls.

The same situation of collapsing halls was now made more pro-active and was resolved completely differently simply because the party had more time to prepare.

I quite like granularity and situationalism. Otherwise the game becomes repetitious or puts an unrealistic demand on the DM to create wholly unique situations when really, a collapsing tunnel would be pretty common in an old dungeon, cavern, mine, tomb or any other unstable structure.

 

[Abraxus]

The rogue is a martial/skill monkey class. It solves problems by applying its skills and leaps nimbly and gracefully from platform to platform.

Spellcasters IMO solve problems by casting spells. In this case, the spellcaster might cast levitate and rise to the ceiling, before walking his way across the ceiling on his hands. Or perhaps they cast Jump to gain a huge temporary bonus on their jump skill. Or Spider Climb, to climb down the pit and up the other side. Or Alter Self to grow wings and slowly fly across. Or he summons a monstrous bat to carry him across.

The fighter gets across by the sheer power of his jumps. Leaping across, grabbing on to the side of the platforms if he misses, and hauling himself up with brute strength - the whole time knowing that if he does fall, he's got the fortitude to handle it. At higher levels maybe he gets across flying on the back of his trained griffin.

But characters are not simply one dimensional cut-outs; they represent actual people with a raft of different abilities represented through ability score points, skill training, feats etc etc.
Wizards can use concentrate however they wish so long as its within the rules, and importantly, if they don't have prepared spells to emulate the abilities they need, then at times they MUST fall back on doing stuff in a mundane manner using a simple skill check.

Concentration (I feel) is key here to be able to judge timing pro-actively in the manner discussed - and is a broad untrained skill that most classes can train in. Since it plays off Constitution (not intelligence) it is quite even handed as its very odd to use Con as a drop stat. You don't need to be smart to be patient and focussed. Even Lars Ulrich can manage basic timing.

I completely agree with the above poster regarding pro-active reflex saves - I don't think they exist either and wouldn't let one of my players do that. The rogue has to concentrate just like everyone else if she wants to jump on a reduced DC over the regularly moving Mario platforms. I might well allow this to run as a Tumble Check though, and would definitely think about raising the synergy bonus provided to Jump through Tumble training in this instance.

 

[Celebrim]

But characters are not simply one dimensional cut-outs; they represent actual people with a raft of different abilities represented through ability score points, skill training, feats etc etc.

I agree, but don't see what this point has to do with anything.

Wizards can use concentrate however they wish so long as its within the rules, and importantly, if they don't have prepared spells to emulate the abilities they need, then at times they MUST fall back on doing stuff in a mundane manner using a simple skill check.

Sure, but why in the world would you choose concentration as opposed to something actually related to reflexes, athletic ability, practice in moving ones body, and the skill of moving quickly?

I mean seriously, concentration is the skill of doing nothing well. It represents training in not reacting, patience, being slow, not noticing, and so forth. It's constitution based for crying out loud. What in the world does it have to do with timing of athletic ability? You could make a better case that Perform has to do with improving your timing than you could Concentration. Make a perform check to time your jump across a varying gap at least has some logic to it. To have good reflexes you have to practice your reflexes. That's why athletes that must perform something with precise timing repeat the thing that they do over and over again. Concentration isn't even a class skill of barbarians, fighters, and rogues. Sure, you could make a case for concentration being used to avoid some distraction penalty when trying to perform a task, but it doesn't at all relate to the skill in actually performing a task.

I completely agree with the above poster regarding pro-active reflex saves - I don't think they exist either and wouldn't let one of my players do that.

Let?? Let??? The reflex save is being imposed as a penalty in this situation.

Let's look at it this way. Suppose the party is in an elevator, and suddenly the cable snaps. The elevator is rapidly descending down a shaft and at the bottom is a lake of lava which it will first smash into and then incinerate. Suddenly, through the open side of the crashing elevator, an open side passage becomes visible. What mechanic is used to determine whether a character can react in the brief window in which the side passage is visible to and alongside the falling elevator and jump into this gap?

Does anyone here quibble about whether this is a reflex save?

So why is it in any other situation where the character must react in a small window of time we are insisting that reacting in a small window of time is a matter of constitution and how much meditative intellectual study you've had, as if we prized college professors and priests for their ability to play ping pong or run routes as NFL slot receivers?

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Does anyone here quibble about whether this is a reflex save?

The difference is a matter of timing. In your scenario, and every other scenario where Reflex applies, the answer to the question of "when to act" is always "NOW!!!1!". In the scenario being posed, the problem is in actually determining how long you need to wait before acting. It's an entirely mental matter, involving perception and math and a whole bunch of other stuff that isn't related to Dex.

 

[Abraxus]

Yes, I think everyone agrees with you...

But that is still a completely different situation to the other one we are discussing which doesn't involve snap reflexes at all; which has been better expressed as "Mario" platforms.
In situation "b" timing is crucial, but you don't have limited time and aren't being situationally forced into a snap reflex (unless something goes wrong).

Conversely, it involves watching a repeating pattern, waiting and timing exactly when to jump, and how far. I don't even see why that needs to run off dexterity at all.

So, sure, I would let characters approach it using Perform Acrobatics or Tumble (which are both about timing jumping and dodging with carefully measured finesse), but I would also let other characters take a "patience and timing check" using the Concentrate skill (trained or otherwise) - followed by a standard Jump.
Its only when the character fails the roll that Reflex save kicks in, which in this instance (IMO) represents either noticing that your timing is out at the last split-second and managing to abort your jump - or grabbing the edge of the other platform in mid-air (DM's fiat here I guess)

But using the reflex save "actively" here seems counter-intuitive to the rules

So why is it in any other situation where the character must react in a small window of time we are insisting that reacting in a small window of time is a matter of constitution and how much meditative intellectual study you've had, as if we prized college professors and priests for their ability to play ping pong or run routes as NFL slot receivers?

Clerics are not priests - they are adventurers with a raft of different abilities, including quite physical ones like being able to use armor and carry a favoured weapon. Wizards are not college professors because they can all fire crossbows and get better at fighting as they train. They are adventurers who can do more than pray and cast spells out of a book. Sorry if I am straw-manning here, but I think your approach to Concentrate is too limited.

Concentrate is also a Monk skill and a Psion skill. I could see them dominating this situation in exactly the manner I explained, even if they didn't benefit from having a high dex and reflex save. I'm totally fne with the wizard and the cleric slipping through on the same mechanic, because when all is said and done, they STILL have to pass the jump check at the end - which will be the real challenge for them.

 

[howandwhy99]

I am wondering how you measure a character's "timing", for example sliding under a closing door or jumping between moving platforms, is it just a case of movement/jump skill and assume the character times it perfectly?

I have considered the "it just doesn't work with D&D mechanics" argument but I was wondering if there was a way

This is exactly the reason why time keeping exists. To know the order of actions of everything occurring in the game.

The default speed in Dungeons & Dragons is human speed, but that covers a wide range of of different time frames. Blocked time exists to assist in tracking these. Fractions of a second, 6-second spell Segments, 1-minute Rounds, 10-minute Turns, Hours, Days, Weeks, and so on.

Actions that take a different period of time are simply finished with the shortest sequences first. Actions that occur in the same period of time require initiative to be rolled.

For example,
Psionic combat was in fractions of a second and skirmish combat was in 1-minute rounds. Psionic combat always completed before skirmish combat began - even if it began in the middle of a combat round. But could the players take actions within the fractions of seconds psionic combat occurs? Of course, but they won't be casting spells or landing blows. There's not much a normal human can do in that period of time.

In my understanding, Initiative is rolled for:
1. Creature vs. Creature
2. Object vs. Object
...but never Creature vs. Object. Those are Saving Throws. The dragon's breath weapon is an environmental effect. The claw attack is the dragon.

For order of actions environmental effects aren't considered to be reactive. Does the bomb go off first or does the mountain fall on it? Only if they occur at the same moment is initiative rolled - a random toss essentially. But against characters the OP's descending portcullis doesn't see them trying to scramble underneath. So environmental effects are understood to complete at the very end of every round (actually block time frame). PCs who fully scramble underneath before the end of the round aren't affected by its dropping. They know by viewing when they have only 1 round left before the portcullis reaches the base (a duration based on its movement stat). But maybe the portcullis is cut and drops in a few seconds? If we are in Rounds, then it occurs on the turn of the player who cut it. Unless a character is standing underneath there is no time to react. Creature acting in opposition to other creatures roll initiative when acting in segments of similar time, usually rounds.

There is no reactivity for objects, but spells occur on spellcaster's initiative when they put them into effect. There a lot of nuances to initiative rules actually, so I won't list them all here. But I don't think this is what you are asking about necessarily.

Traps occur when environmental effects are rigged to be reactive to creature actions. The Traps act first with the creatures affected regardless, but Saving Throws are rolled (by creatures and items) to resist effects.

Ultimately Initiative is not simply about who hits who first, but the order in creatures capable of sensing and reacting their environment act against each other.

Now let's get more complicated. Who builds a wagon first? You could simply look at the time this takes, but that time won't differentiate in a race. It's an average. If this is a race, then how players choose to build the wagon matters. What equipment and materials are on hand? How many people are helping? What do they know about building a wagon? Answering those questions can set the time takes for the NPCs, but player/characters make up their own mind. They tell their actions and as referee you assess the time unit these take. They might spy on the NPCs and learn what they are doing. But the NPCs might see this and spy on the PCs too altering their final completion time too. It might just come to a single initiative check in a single round to know who finishes first. Or maybe the two teams ran for supplies at the same time and initiative is rolled to know who get there first. All sorts of fun can occur when situations become games.

 

[pemerton]

In the scenario being posed, the problem is in actually determining how long you need to wait before acting. It's an entirely mental matter, involving perception and math and a whole bunch of other stuff that isn't related to Dex.

it involves watching a repeating pattern, waiting and timing exactly when to jump, and how far. I don't even see why that needs to run off dexterity at all

It's relatively unusual for me to agree with [MENTION=4937]Celebrim[/MENTION], but on this occasion I find myself in agreement - timing dramatic acrobatic leaps is a matter of reflexes, and 3E/PF seems to have a mechanic for that in the Reflex save. (Or perhaps the Acrobatics skill - I don't have a good handle on those finer points of 3E rules about when its a save and when a check.)

Saelorn and Abraxus, I don't know how athletic of you is, nor how cerebral. I can testify that I'm a fairly cerebral person (by inclination and profession) and the only athleticism I engage in regularly is riding my bike to work. Sometimes I need reflexes - eg to dodge a car door, or to move across several lanes of traffic to get to a turn lane or avoid a freeway entry lane or whatever - and I can tell you that at least in my case this has nothing to do with intellect. Or even meditative contemplation. It is about reflexes (which clearly include an element of perception - you don't dodge a fireball by closing your eyes and going all zen on it, unless you're using the Force or something similar).

 

[Abraxus]

Agreed, but I am talking about a situation like this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqRdT8m1Suo

Yes, you could just run through and rely on reflex saves, but that would be pretty suicidal. In this case, you really need to understand the timing pattern BEFORE you attempt the challenge.

Riding your bike is normally another example of situation "a" that doesn't need this kind of timing and focus, so yes, it does indeed rely on reflexes. There has to be a bigger pattern following a predictable time sequence before it becomes an "active" matter of timing ("b").

It becomes a concentration based "b" exercise if there is a regular routine you need to accommodate for, e,g, planning your journey beforehand to avoid getting caught in peak hour traffic or not getting stuck behind the train tracks when the hourly train comes past. You are seeking to lower the overall DC of your task by concentrating beforehand to optimize your timing.

And actually Celebrim, this is already built in to the Rogue class as part of the Trapfinding class feature, provided they train in Disable Device.

 

[RUMBLETiGER]

This reminds me of the Strength vs Dexterity debate when crossing a river...

Can the OP clarify for the purposes of this discussion: Is the PC in this situation reacting (and therefore reflex) or intentionally taking time to choose when to act (therefore skill or ability check)?