Feather Fall in Rules Compendium?

[NewJeffCT]

On page 125 of my Rules Compendium, it states that the spell Feather Fall is now an immediate action because it can be taken when it's not your turn. In the 3.5 PHB, it was a free action, and it has always been played as a free action in previous editions as well.

When you look at the definition of immediate actions on Pg 7 of the Rules Compendium, however, the last line of the Immediate Action paragraph states: You can't use an Immediate Action when you're flat-footed.

That seems to imply that if the bad guys surprise you on a mountain path and bull rush you off the ledge, you would not be able to cast Feather Fall because you're flat-footed from surprise. Heck, you're flat-footed even if they beat you in initiative and don't surprise you.

Is this a mistake in the Rules Compendium, or did they just seriously change Feather Fall as a spell? You can fall quite a distance in 6 seconds.

 

[Alzrius]

It's not a mistake. Feather fall is an immediate action now. It's more useful that way because then you don't have to wait for your turn to come up in initiative order to cast it, free action or no. As you said, you can fall really far in 6 seconds.

You may not be able to use it when flat-footed, so just make sure you don't get bull-rushed off a cliff in a surprise round; wait for normal combat to start first.

 

[Shin Okada]

IIRC, that revision was first introduced in Psionics Handbook. And WotC defined that a character can't take an immediate action while flat-footed.

By the way, I am not sure when you fall a round-worth distance in that case.

Will you fall immediately after the opponent has bull-rushed you?

Will you fall at the start of your turn?

Or at the end of your first turn?

Or at the same initiative count as the bull-rushed opponent in the next round?

 

[NewJeffCT]

IIRC, that revision was first introduced in Psionics Handbook. And WotC defined that a character can't take an immediate action while flat-footed.

By the way, I am not sure when you fall a round-worth distance in that case.

Will you fall immediately after the opponent has bull-rushed you?

Will you fall at the start of your turn?

Or at the end of your first turn?

Or at the same initiative count as the bull-rushed opponent in the next round?

well, with a normal bull rush, you'd be deposited 5+ feet back immediately on the bull rusher's turn. However, if there was no ground there, I'd think you'd immediately start falling.

 

[Vegepygmy]

It's not a mistake. Feather fall is an immediate action now. It's more useful that way because then you don't have to wait for your turn to come up in initiative order to cast it, free action or no. As you said, you can fall really far in 6 seconds.

That would make a lot of sense, except that you could already cast feather fall when it wasn't your turn; the spell description explicitly said so.

I think it's pretty obviously a mistake. They didn't think about the implications of the no-immediate-actions-when-flatfooted rider, and now by RAW you can't save yourself with feather fall if you're pushed off a cliff by an opponent who surprises you, but you can if you just happen to fall off the same cliff all on your own outside of combat.

That makes no sense, so I have to conclude it was unintentional.

 

[Starbuck_II]

That would make a lot of sense, except that you could already cast feather fall when it wasn't your turn; the spell description explicitly said so.

I think it's pretty obviously a mistake. They didn't think about the implications of the no-immediate-actions-when-flatfooted rider, and now by RAW you can't save yourself with feather fall if you're pushed off a cliff by an opponent who surprises you, but you can if you just happen to fall off the same cliff all on your own outside of combat.

That makes no sense, so I have to conclude it was unintentional.

Just have great Initiative: if you roll Initiative as soon as you fall it is your turn and you can cast it now (you can cast immediate actions on your turn as a swift action).

What wizards doesn't have good Init?

 

[Alzrius]

That would make a lot of sense, except that you could already cast feather fall when it wasn't your turn; the spell description explicitly said so.

I think it's pretty obviously a mistake. They didn't think about the implications of the no-immediate-actions-when-flatfooted rider, and now by RAW you can't save yourself with feather fall if you're pushed off a cliff by an opponent who surprises you, but you can if you just happen to fall off the same cliff all on your own outside of combat.

That makes no sense, so I have to conclude it was unintentional.

Hm, good point.

Maybe you could just say that once you start falling, you're no longer flat-footed. After all, there's nothing under your feet anymore!

 

[irdeggman]

Maybe you could just say that once you start falling, you're no longer flat-footed. After all, there's nothing under your feet anymore!

This is how I rule it because all distance you travel occurs on your turn in the intiative order (bull rush not withstanding - since actually both parties are moving). Despite common sense you don't continuously fall throughout the round, all movement you make (or distance your traverse) is calculated on your turn in the initiative order.

So I rule that if you fall in a trap on a surprise round (since initiaitve should start immediately then) you don't "start" to fall until your turn in the intiative order to be consistent with the way all movement is handled.

 

[cheshire_grin]

I think it's pretty obviously a mistake. They didn't think about the implications of the no-immediate-actions-when-flatfooted rider

Most free-action spells were errata-d to become immediate actions as soon as immediate actions were introduced, AFAIK. I don't see any worthwhile reason you should be able to cast feather fall when surprised, just because you might possibly be falling off a cliff at the time.

 

[Shin Okada]

I think it's pretty obviously a mistake. They didn't think about the implications of the no-immediate-actions-when-flatfooted rider, and now by RAW you can't save yourself with feather fall if you're pushed off a cliff by an opponent who surprises you, but you can if you just happen to fall off the same cliff all on your own outside of combat.

Thinking about Nerveskitter spell in Spell Compendium, which is an immediate action spell meant to cast when a caster rolls his initiative, I guess at least some of the designers in WotC did not have the implication of the no-immediate-actions-when-flatfooted in mind.

When rolling one's initiative, he is flat-footed....