Blatant abuse of the five foot step?

[Squire James]

It seems to me that the action described (5' step off an edge to get a "free ride" down, knowing he has enough HP to survive the fall) is blatant metagaming. My reaction to a PC trying this would be "You reflexively flinch at the idea of stepping off the edge, so you can't do it as a free action. You can do something else if you wish, or use a move action to step off the edge. What do you do?"

I'm sure there's DM's who have players who call this "taking control of their characters", but fortunately my crew is reasonable about this. Frankly, I like to occasionally remind the players that their characters, no matter how many Lightning Bolts they can throw, dodge, and/or withstand, are still living and breathing PEOPLE with involuntary reactions!

 

[Nail]

Nicely written post.

The issue here is not about the letter of the rules forbidding such an action; I do not see anyone saying that at all. What I *do* see is people protesting that the action does not pass the "sniff test"; that it is a blatant attempt to exploit an area where the rules are weak. ........

 

[apesamongus]

1: The player is using his knowledge of game mechanics to decide that his character has enough hit points to easily survive the fall. The *character* does not know that.

Why wouldn't a character know that? My characters are usually smart and observant enought to notice obvious and blatant facts about their world.

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

and here I thought it was a blatant attempt to emulate Sharky's famous fall from the balcony....

A 20' fall is generally survivable.. been there, done that.. a number of times. Could end up with a nasty knock to the noggin or a broken bone, but usually just getting the wind knocked out of you and bruises that hurt for weeks.
...and I have no idea how many 'hit points' I have.

Now, would I want to do it on purpose? nope. But thats just cause I am a chicken and not some high speed Hero dude.

Still not sure why this is abuse. There are so many other things to worry about in the swiss cheese ruleset called D20.

Silveras, thanks for that reminder.. I keep forgetting that rule.

 

[Hypersmurf]

1: The player is using his knowledge of game mechanics to decide that his character has enough hit points to easily survive the fall. The *character* does not know that. Without magic like levitate or fly, most *characters* should expect that they are risking being killed or are at least quite likely to break one or more bones.

Let's say we have a character, Bob the Unfortunate. Bob is a 5th level barbarian, with 50 hit points. He has fallen into several hundred 30-foot pit traps in the last six months. And his evaluation is that "It hurts, but only as much as getting tagged by a mook orc with a greataxe. I've had worse."

Now, Ned the Knife-Thrower has been hit by a mook orc with a greataxe on several occasions, and lived to tell about it. After hearing Bob's story (and having witnessed Bob fall down several of these pit traps first-hand), why should Ned think he risks being killed or breaking bones falling only twenty feet?

The rules define the physics of the world. The physics of world say that an experienced adventurer can easily survive a twenty foot drop, and there are thousands of historical accounts of experienced adventurers doing exactly that. Not an occasional freak Guinness-worthy accident, but an easily observable, repeatable phenomenon.

If thousands of adventurers have fallen down holes and walked away with a Cure Moderate Wounds worth of bruises, what does Ned have to be afraid of?

-Hyp.

 

[Hypersmurf]

Note that any such movement invoked deliberately is considered a Jump. It seems pretty clear that Falling is involuntary.

How so?

As I read it, a Jump that is deliberate reduces the damage, and is distinguished from slipping or falling. It doesn't state "anything deliberate is a jump"; a deliberate slip or a deliberate fall, or even an accidental Jump, would not benefit from the reduced damage.

-Hyp.

 

[azhrei_fje]

My take on it?

Terminal velocity is somewhere around 1700 feet/s (caught this on a Discovery show last week, MythBusters -- cool show, in case you haven't see it).

Doing the math indicates roughly 500 feet in the first 6 seconds.

So here is why I wouldn't allow the "5-ft step and full attack":

The 5-ft step is hazardous terrain and requires a full round action (hence, no attack).

The full attack requires 6 seconds and that means falling at least 500 feet. Since the drop was closer to 15-20 feet, the PC would go SPLAT as the first dagger was thrown.

Falling is still movement. The PC would be caught in a Matrix-like fall, as described by the FAQ when discussing how the Jump skill works (if you Jump but don't have enough movement to finish it this turn, you're stuck in the air until your next turn). To people who think this isn't "realistic", GET A LIFE! This is a game, after all. Beside, all actions are happening simultaneously. So stopping your PC in mid-air is simply a way of allocating time to your PC. When the other PCs have taken their action, your movement will continue. But there is no discontinuity in time because all actions are simultaneous.

Last, the player is trying to subvert the intent of the rules by moving further than the rules allow and still making a full attack. All by itself this is reason to disallow this action.

HTH.

 

[Silveras]

Why wouldn't a character know that? My characters are usually smart and observant enought to notice obvious and blatant facts about their world.

Hit Points are a game mechanic. Characters know how much they get hurt, approximately, but they have no idea that they have 32 of 40 hit points at the moment. They can approximate how many hits they can take from a given enemy, just as the player does, but the player gets there knowing how many hit points the character has and how many hit points the attacks do on average. The character gets there by judging the experience of being hit and knowing how s/he feels.

That is very different from the Player knowing the fall can only do 2d6 damage, 12 at most, and the character gets a Jump check to make that 1d6. Even if the player fails the roll, s/he knows the character can take it easily because it has 32 hit points.

The rules define the physics of the world. The physics of world say that an experienced adventurer can easily survive a twenty foot drop, and there are thousands of historical accounts of experienced adventurers doing exactly that. Not an occasional freak Guinness-worthy accident, but an easily observable, repeatable phenomenon.

If thousands of adventurers have fallen down holes and walked away with a Cure Moderate Wounds worth of bruises, what does Ned have to be afraid of?

In those many falls, how many of those pits had the remains of other adventurers who did not survive, but whose remains were there to tell a cautionary tale ? In earning his way to 5th level, how many times did Bob or Ned fall down into a pit and wake up with the Cleric or Druid finishing a cure spell ?

The rules do not merely define the physics of the world. They provide a resolution system for actions, which encompasses representing the physics of the world and goes beyond it. I am not arguing that the character cannot survive the fall; nor am I am arguing that the character cannot estimate that the fall is unlikely to produce significant harm.

What I am saying is that the character, who does not have exact numbers, cannot have the same certainty as the player, who does have exact numbers. Certainly it is very heroic to take the chance, and by itself it is not something to protest.

What I am protesting is its combination with a Full-Attack action. The player certainly seems to be trying to squeeze an extra action from the situation, to get a free move AND the full attack action. The issue is how likely even a very heroic person would be to choose the more damaging option of throwing 2-3 daggers and falling 20 feet (to take some damage and land awkwardly) vs. throwing 1 dagger and jumping 20 feet (with a good chance of taking little or no damage) when both are viable options.

 

[Silveras]

How so?

As I read it, a Jump that is deliberate reduces the damage, and is distinguished from slipping or falling. It doesn't state "anything deliberate is a jump"; a deliberate slip or a deliberate fall, or even an accidental Jump, would not benefit from the reduced damage.

-Hyp.

Obviously, your mileage is varying from mine. As I read the quoted sentence, I see the rules making a distinction between deliberate actions (Jump) and accidental circumstances (Fall). In applying that, any player in my games who suggested that his/her character was going to "deliberately fall" any distance would be adjudicated as having Jumped.

 

[Lord Pendragon]

Still not sure why this is abuse. There are so many other things to worry about in the swiss cheese ruleset called D20.

I agree 237%.