What Tumble variant do you use?

[Shard O'Glase]

Actualy you can't tumble througha gleatinous cube, they even use it as an example for what you can't tumble through. Basically if their isn't room, their isn't room. So you can block a doorway, put up a bunch of tower shields, and a bunch of other tactics to block the path so people just can't tumble past you since their isn't room.

 

[Roland Delacroix]

And you probably use Harm as is right???


Everyone is allowed and opinion without being called a munchkin... and besides there are multiple "Published" alternatives... the poll is trying to find out which is the most popular.

I think the primary misunderstanding here comes from the fact that this board did not translate my 'smiley-with-tounge-out' p), which was meant to indicate some levity in the previous post. Munchkins are welcome.

 

[Junkheap]

Shard O'Glase: Actualy you can't tumble througha gleatinous cube, they even use it as an example for what you can't tumble through. Basically if their isn't room, their isn't room. So you can block a doorway, put up a bunch of tower shields, and a bunch of other tactics to block the path so people just can't tumble past you since their isn't room.

Um, can you tell me where it says this? I can't see this in the phb. I agree with this wholheartedly, but then who really wants anybody to tumble through him? If you corner somebody, you are trying to keep him in a corner, but he can still tumble away. You cant say you ready an action to block the tumbler from getting out of the corner because no matter what the DC is still 25.

A rogue benefits from this ability the most, and it is also the easiest for a rogue to max tumble out due to his skill points. The ceiling of 24 is not really that hard to achieve.

If the DC's were up by 10 to 15, it would still give the rogue problems even at 12-14 lvl, but higher i wouldnt care, because he spent time to do it. A rogue doesnt deserve this ability at 8-10th level!

Like i said, it either should have been raised by 10-15 or should have been made a feat. It is already better tan most feets out there.

 

[mmu1]

First of all, I don't think there's anything drastically wrong with tumble being used as per PHB. If you use the reccommended ability values, any character that can have great Tumbling skills - Rogues and Monks, basically - will need all the help they can get to survive in combat, and game balance is not in danger.

The fact that you can Tumble through anyone even if you fail your check is a bit of an irritation, but that one's so easily fixed it hardly bears talking about - like someone said, have a failure by 5 or more have negative consequences...

This doesn't mean that Tumble can't be improved, though... If I were to make a change over the PHB, I'd either go with opposed Tumble checks, or the Reflex Save variant, rather than use BAB or an attack roll, for two reasons:

1. Since when does someone's BAB have anything to do with how quickly you can react to something? That's what Dex rolls, Reflex saves or Initiative rolls are for...

2. If you choose to use BAB or an attack roll, you end up making huge lumbering creatures like giants or beasts that get a large portion of their attack bonus from their great brute strength unreasonably good at stopping small, nimble tumblers... Should trying to get past an agile rogue with reflexes lik a rattlesnake be easier than darting between a dull-witted giant's legs?

 

[Junkheap]

That is why i add the creatures dex BONUS to the tumble check if going through him. The more dextrous the harder it is.

 

[Shard O'Glase]

Check PH pg 130 passing through, designated exceptions. Some creaturres break the above rules. For example a gelatinous cube, fills the area it occupies to a height of 10'. A creature can't move through an area occupied by a cube, even with the tumble skill or similar special ability.

Basically since that is an example, maybe the most obvious one, but an example of where you can't tumble through these situations can occur. And that is where the DM comes in. For example when I use wizards as the big bads, at lower levels I give them an honor guard of dorks who all carry tower shields. They then block the corridor with tower shields, and unless you can high jump 6' and still clear the goons distance wise, tumble just isn't an option. Basically the party has to resort to missile fire, hah I got protection from arrows up, spells this could hurt, or fight there way through the bad guys the old fashioned way, which isn't easy when they got tower shields, even though they usually are suckers. Meanwhile Mr. Evil in the background a higher than party level wiz/sor giggles insanley as he pummles the party with spells. And guess what tumble then means nothing in this fight.

Tumble isn't some secret mystery so enemies preparing for it isn't far fetched. And if you prepare for it, tumble really isn't that potent. Tumble only really effects things in my games, either where I don't care enough to get the enemies to prepare(variious goon and mook groups whose tactics aren't much the issue), a surprise encounter, or when the players come up with something really clever.

 

[Liminal Syzygy]

Many good points made here.

I agree that Tumble may be a bit overpowered at the mid levels (haven't really experienced enough high level combat to comment).

However, I really have a problem with the "opposed roll" solution as you are *considerably* increasing the chances of failure, and making it a useless skill. With Strength bonuses added in, even some second and third level enemies can get up to +8 to attack, and when you get up to mid level creatures you are talking +15 or so as a main attack, thus raising the average roll alone from 15 to 25. And more than just the average, the 1 to 20 variation in results alone creates significantly more danger for the tumbler.

I probably wouldn't bother to spend points on the skill with the opposed check variant. Actually I probably wouldn't choose to play a tumbling type class in a campaign using that rule. (I'm sure it isn't completely related to tumble, but notice that there are no pure Rogues in Monte's Ptolus campaign. My guess would be that they don't tumble a lot.)

I think the BAB +10 for a tumble past, and BAB+20 for a tumble through is the best solution.
1) It addresses the concerns that tumbling becomes automatic at certain skill levels and that it should be harder to tumble through experienced opponents.
2) It doesn't increase the difficulty of tumbling too steeply, and nerf the skill into uselessness.
3) It is elegant as it only requires a single roll. (The one drawback to this solution is you have to spend a second to reverse-calculate the BAB for monsters and stat blocked characters.)

 

[IceBear]

I just use Reflex Save to set the DC as this models slow lumbering giants, vs quick cats better (the giant will probably have a higher BAB, but the cat would be quicker to react), but BAB +10/20 works for me too (as it reflects combat experience which can offset natural deficiencies).

IceBear