D&D 3E/3.5 [3.5] Boots of springing and striding.

[Lord Pendragon]

IIRC, the price of the boots listed in the 3.0 DMG (2,500) got errated to 6,000 a while ago. So in 3.5 they even got 500 cheaper .

Yes, but the 3.0 boots still doubled your movement. Cutting "double movement" down to +10 ft. is worth a heck of a lot more than a 500gp discount, IMO. What I'm trying to get across is, had the boots still been 2000gp, then cutting their effect to be more in-line with that cost would work for me. But since they already bumped up the cost to be in-line with the effect, dropping the effect now makes the item seriously underpowered.

 

[Ravellion]

Yes, but the 3.0 boots still doubled your movement. Cutting "double movement" down to +10 ft. is worth a heck of a lot more than a 500gp discount, IMO. What I'm trying to get across is, had the boots still been 2000gp, then cutting their effect to be more in-line with that cost would work for me. But since they already bumped up the cost to be in-line with the effect, dropping the effect now makes the item seriously underpowered.

I doubt whether it is underpowered actually. Hard to prove such a thing of course.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

I think the item is great for a fighter wearing full-plate who wants to use Spring Attack. It's also great for a rogue who wants to use Spring Attack - especially halfling rogues.

 

[Datt]

Well let's see if we can break this down.

The boots add +10' to your movement
and
the add +5 Compentance bonus to your Jump skill.


The +5 to Jump alone is 2,500 by the new rules.
That means the +10' to movement is 3,000.

Or if you go by the 2 abilities you have to double one rule then:
+5 to Jump is 2,500 x 2 for being higher priced 5,000
+10' to movement is only 500.

 

[Lord Pendragon]

I think the item is great for a fighter wearing full-plate who wants to use Spring Attack. It's also great for a rogue who wants to use Spring Attack - especially halfling rogues.

I'm not sure I see where you're coming from on this one. A fighter in full plate has a 20' move. So once engaged, that's 10' in, spring out 10'. How is 15' in 15' out any better? You're still preventing your foe from full-attacking in either case. The additional 5' is worthless.

The answer: It's not. Only when fighting reach opponents will the additional 5' be worth anything, and only when fighting reach opponents with only a 10' reach at that.

The same is true with a human rogue spring attacking. 10' just isn't worth much. You can get the same effect from a 0th-level psionic power. Granted, that's only for 1 round, but a constant effect still isn't worth 5500gp.

At 6000gp, the errata'ed Boots of S&S were fine, so long as you didn't try and abuse them by adding in other effects that increased movement, such as barbarian/monk movement bonuses, spells, cleric domains, etc. If the designers were worried about that abuse, they should have made the Boots grant a flat +30' enhancement bonus to movement (non-stackable with any other form of movement enhancement) and that would have done the job.

That, or made their new boots cost 2500gp again.

 

[Tessarael]

I believe they also give a +5 bonus to Jump. That's where the rest of the cost goes.

 

[Madfox]

Well, the enhancement bonus to movement from the boots do not stack with the enhancement bonus to movement from spells and the monk's class ability. So the limitation of movement stacking is already there.

In any event, the dwarven cleric in full plate still hase the seem speed in 3.0 as in 3.5 with the boots. They still think the boots are worth those 5500 gp. A +10 bonus to movement is quite good when you think about it. That is 20 feet per round of movement or even 40 feet when running. It is just that the boots have become a lot less useful to useless for a set of previous users and I don't regret it.

Side note - barbarian's movement bonus is still unnamed.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

I'm not sure I see where you're coming from on this one. A fighter in full plate has a 20' move. So once engaged, that's 10' in, spring out 10'. How is 15' in 15' out any better? You're still preventing your foe from full-attacking in either case. The additional 5' is worthless.

It depends on your foe's reach, and how fast your foe is moving. I wasn't trying to create a detailed analysis.

The answer: It's not. Only when fighting reach opponents will the additional 5' be worth anything, and only when fighting reach opponents with only a 10' reach at that.

Generally speaking, Spring Attack is only useful when fighting opponents with reach, and even then, only if they multiple natural attacks. It's especially effective against creatures that can grapple you as an AoO. You might get hurt more trying this against a titan (I need to test that out *wicked grin* ).

Then again, there are lots of creatures in the MM with 10-ft. reach and multiple natural attacks.

The same is true with a human rogue spring attacking. 10' just isn't worth much. You can get the same effect from a 0th-level psionic power. Granted, that's only for 1 round, but a constant effect still isn't worth 5500gp.

Think flanking When you're a rogue, you want to dish out sneak attacks past the surprise round. That means either flanking or invisibility. If you can Tumble behind your opponent, and your fighter ally gets him from the front, you get another sneak attack. For this to work, you need to be significantly faster than the fighter - hard to do if you're a halfling.

 

[Lord Pendragon]

It depends on your foe's reach, and how fast your foe is moving. I wasn't trying to create a detailed analysis.

Fair enough.

Generally speaking, Spring Attack is only useful when fighting opponents with reach, and even then, only if they multiple natural attacks. It's especially effective against creatures that can grapple you as an AoO. You might get hurt more trying this against a titan (I need to test that out *wicked grin* ).

I'm not sure about this one. I had a 13th-level rogue who used Spring Attack all the time, every time. Against undead, against giants, against pretty much anything. The reason? When the giant sees you jump in and attack, then move away, he's more likely to move over and start beating on the druid, who can't move away.

Think flanking When you're a rogue, you want to dish out sneak attacks past the surprise round. That means either flanking or invisibility. If you can Tumble behind your opponent, and your fighter ally gets him from the front, you get another sneak attack. For this to work, you need to be significantly faster than the fighter - hard to do if you're a halfling.

This is true, and for that one character, it may be worth the 5500gp price tag. But why make it useless for 90% of characters, just so 1 character is paying what he should? I'd rather the halfling rogue get a deal and the fighter/wizard get an item that he finds useful and not very, very overpriced.

 

[drnuncheon]

Let's see if we can figure out why the boots are priced as they are.

First, the competence bonus to Jump: 2500.

Second, continuous first level spell (longstrider) with a duration measured in hours/level: 2000 x 1 x 1 = 2000.

That gives us 4500. If the more expensive part was doubled, then it would be 7000. If the less expensive part was doubled, it'd be 6000. So either way, the boots are a bargain.

Strangely, boots of expeditious retreat are not very expensive, if your DM allows them. They'd be 4000 gp - but since they'd be better all around than the current boots of striding and springing (+30 to move and an effective +12 to jump, as opposed to the BoS&S' +10 and +9, respectively), a DM would have to be pretty foolish to use that price for them.

J