Falling Dire Bear

[Dimwhit]

I may be getting this wrong, but I don't think that's possible. If I remember (and 3.5 may have changed this), a Druid in animal form has to change back to his natural form before turning into another animal. I don't think they can go from one animal form to another.

Or am I mistaken?

 

[Altamont Ravenard]

The druid knows he'll take the same damage as the target, right?

Of course not.

The bear takes damage from falling 10'.
The wizard takes damage from having a 6-ton fur monster fall ON him.

AR

 

[silentspace]

I don't know how much real-world physics you want to inject, but switching from bat to bear would take a few seconds, no? Would you be falling during those seconds? If a round is 6 seconds, and and we say the switch takes 3 seconds, then during the time of the switch, you would be falling for quite some distance. 9.8 m/s/s. You'd have to start from pretty high up, and you'd hurt yourself pretty badly in the process.

Edit: During the fall, I'd assume your target would simply take a 5' step to the left and avoid any damage

 

[JiffyPopTart]

Thats why you turn invisible first!


This brings to mind a past adventure I ran. The opponent for the PC's was a GIANT trap door spider. The PC's knew where his trap door was after being led there by some formians and were tasked with killing the spider in return for safe passage through the formian lands.

After about 20 minutes real time of planning on how they would take this spider on, a bystander looked at the NPC wizards spell list (he was guest starring as the NPC wizard that was tagging along with the party) and says "Hey, I can levitate...what is we just drop a big rock on him?"

So, after consulting the tables of how big a rock he could levitate and how high he could drop it from, I realized he didn't even need to roll damage. The poor spider didn't have a chance.

Heavy things dropped from even a small distance are nasty indeed.

DS

 

[silentspace]

We're talking about dropping players, not things! If you fall for 3 seconds while changing form, the falling damage the player takes would be pretty rough, that's all.

 

[Li Shenron]

Actually, I have a rather basic question... When you fall, do you fall immediately? Isn't it that you have to "use" your movement action to fall (at falling speed, not at your land base speed of course), just as you have to "use" a move when jumping a distance?

It has not much to do with the original question, but I am not sure.

Does it make a difference if you fall outside your round? For example, if someone bullrushes you down a chasm, do you start falling immediately or do you start counting the covered fall distance on your initiative? That obviously has to do with the abstraction of rounds, but it could be important to know if some of your allies have any chance to try and grab you before you are gone.

 

[Hand of Vecna]

It gets nastier for Shifters. Ever have a Stone Golem fall on you? Or a Purple Worm? Or a Bone Ooze?

In the game I'm in (Epic Level, I'm playing a Druid 5/Rogue 5/Shifter 17), the DM ruled that, for my "Falling XYZ" attack, I make a touch attack roll, using only my Base Attack Bonus (since I'm shifting mid-fall, I can't use any attribute bonuses since the attributes are changing mid-way). I take damage based on how far I fall (since nowhere have we found any rule saying that heavier creatures suffer more damage from any given fall), and foe takes damage based on how far I've fallen + my new forms weight.

 

[silentspace]

To clarify my earlier posts...

If you want to do this attack, and you want to follow real-world physics in doing so, and you rule that you fall for three seconds while shapechanging, then the distance you fall will be (someone please check this, I can't remember high school physics that well):

(0.5)(32 ft/s/s)(3 s)(3s) = 96 ft. Round that to 100 ft and you, the shapeshifter (not the target) take 10d6 damage.

So it's 10d6 damage and not 1d6.

No doubt you will crush your opponent if you hit it. I don't think anyone has said otherwise.

I would think the three second falling time should give your opponent some sort of bonus on his reflex save, if he is aware of you, since you are free falling (you can't shift directions).

Edit: Your opponent will probably have to be stationary.

Hope this explains my earlier posts.

 

[silentspace]

On a related topic, does anyone think it's broken that any human, no matter how good a fighter, can fall thousands of feet with no fear of death?

Edit:

In game terms, terminal velocity is reached at 200 ft. I think IRL its not that much further, something like 260 ft...? So even if we increase damage to 26d6 (avg damage 91), high level types can survive that no problem.

 

[jgsugden]

When the rules do not specifically cover something, you need to figure out a rule. There are three primary things to consider. Consider them in this order:

1.) Balance: Consider the difficulty and availability of the thing in question. Can low level PCs make it happen? If so, it shouldn't be able to deal much damage. Is it something that can be done repeatedly? Things that can be repeated easily should not be excessively effective.

2.) Consistency: Are there rules in the game that cover similar circumstances? If so, can they be tweaked to cover this area so that new rules do not need to be learned?

3.) Reality: If you can find a 'realistic' method of dealing witht he situation that is balanced, go for it. The key here is that realism must be a lower priority than balance and consistency.

Balance is is the game to keep the game challenging at all levels - and thus make it fun. Consistency reduces the rules arguments and keeps the game fun. Reality does nothing but remind us of the real world ... where getting stabbed by a sword sucks a lot more than erasing a few hit points from a piece of paper. Not so much fun.