Can you teleport vertically?

[On Puget Sound]

Here is how I handle it:
My teleporting fluff (that justifies the rules crunch - or rather the lack of *CRUNCH!!*):

From the moment an Eladrin child is born, its parents are faced with a challenge that dwarfs anything a human mom or dad has to deal with: a teleporting baby. Eladrin babies are never where you left them. Some wealthy families use magical Toddler Anchors, but many Fey child development specialists believe unfettered experimentation with teleporting is essential to a child's maturation.

Why, then, do so many eladrin survive these dangerous years? Because of an interesting property of teleporting. Any attempt to teleport one's self or others fails unless the arrival point will support the subject's weight. How this process works, how the magic "knows" whether a teleport is safe, was not understood until the gnomish artificer and optician Bauschenlomb observed a teleport through time dilation goggles.

As it turns out, teleporting does not happen all at once, but from the bottom up and very rapidly. The subject disappears and appears in tiny layers like skin scrapings, starting with the soles of his or her shoes (assuming the subject is right side up and has shoes) and progressing to the top of the head in less than an eyeblink. As each layer disappears from the origin point, it appears at the destination point stacked on the preceding layer.

This goes fine...unless the first layer has fallen, sunk or otherwise moved out of place by even a hair's breadth. If any layer cannot stack on and adhere to the previous one, the teleportation effect stops. The subject feels nothing, and even if barefoot rarely suffers as much a foot rash, the amount of tissue lost is so slight.

The teleport will also fail if the destination space is dangerous enough to instantly destroy the first layer of deposited matter, such as lava or strong acid.

A sufficiently strong wind (hurricane force) might theoretically also move the layers fast enough to prevent teleportation, though this has not been observed.

 

[mvincent]

For reference (if desired), from the WotC Rules board FAQ:
Can you teleport someone into the air? Strictly by the current rules, you can teleport someone vertically and there is no saving throw (discussed here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here). However, some DM's have their own ruling on this, and some authors have recommended allowing a saving throw to grab a nearby ledge after being teleported (Draconomicon p.223). Also, WotC has stated (here) that there will be an update for this: "forced teleportation will function as other forced movement (providing a saving throw before teleporting a creature off that cliff)".

 

[Shaftinuri]

entertainment vs rules...

Obviously way late to the thread, but this came up in our game last night...

We just started playing 4e after a hiatus of 10+ years, and not familiar with all the "rules" yet. The group (all first-levels) encountered a spine devil that was raining hell on them, flying safely near the 30-foot high ceiling. The party's heavy hitters, a paladin and a barbarian, found themselves effectively sidelined, unable to reach. With the cleric quickly taken down by successfully volleys, things were starting to look bleak...

So the Eladrin wizard, while completely capable of effective ranged attacks, decided to be the hero and asked to fey step by the devil and attempt a grappling attack, with the hope of taking it down with him. Was that "legal"? No one new. Courageous? Yes. Stupid? You bet. The DM let him attempt it, and the player actually rolled a 1. The DM described how the wizard fell flat on his face, bloodying himself in the process. For good measure (and with the general approval of pretty much everyone around the table), the DM granted the devil an opportunity attack and the devil scored another volley in the wizard's posterior, nearly killing him.

It could well have played the other way. Difference between a hero and a zero? About two inches...

My point is the rules are one thing, but this remains a game. Think of it as writing a book or a movie script together. This fight was the climax of the evening, and everyone will remember that wizard years from now. If it's not worth retelling, it probably wasn't worth playing...

 

[Jester David]

Checking the updates I saw this:
Maelstrom of Chaos
Page 170: In the power’s Range entry, replace “10” with “5.” This update brings the power’s damage yield in line with other powers and limits the ability to teleport targets vertically.

And there's this:
Teleportation
✦ Destination: Your destination must be a space you can occupy without squeezing. If arriving in the destination space would cause the target to fall or if
that space is hindering terrain, the target can make a saving throw. On a save, the teleportation is negated.

 

[Unwise]

This came up in a game I was playing in. My Eladrin was knocked prone, I teleported away, but 10 feet up in the air. I asked the GM for an acrobatics roll to try to land on my feet, thus getting out of the prone position. He allowed it and it made for a pretty cool manauver.

Would you allow people to do this in your game regularly?

In a game I was GMing, my wife's Eladrin charge-monkey was next to a guy with no room to get away and charge. She teleported up above him and fell down, which I allowed as a charge with - to hit and + damage. The hit sure hurt, but the resulting acrobatics roll saw them both knocked prone.

 

[Lalato]

Unwise... Not only would I allow that... I would encourage it. For the majority of a campaign the teleport is only once per encounter.