Why is Jump skill so useless?

[Kilroy]

Your DM left out vertical reach.

No he didn't, it was just nearly impossible for me to make the climb checks to do a chin-up with only an average Str. 3 DC 15 Climb checks, 50% chance of falling each of 3 times, another 25% chance of failing to do a chin-up and ending the round. That's not counting all the Balance checks I couldn't make either.

For a situation such as this I'd have asked the DM for two jump checks in order to jump to the first branch (10 feet high). The first to jump off the ground and hit the trunk of the tree (say 5ft jump) and the second to jump from the trunk to the branch (another 5ft jump). I imagine the 2nd jump check would be more difficulty given the precarious purchase the feet might have for jumping on the side of a tree.

This is what the NPC monk did, but the DM said that the tree they used for it was the only one within 10' of another vertical surface in that part of the forest, and that's what's required to do a two stage jump.

 

[Kilroy]

Your character doesn't even have to necessarily clear the branch. Being a monk, he can probably make better use of his vertical momentum by twisting around the branch and using his arm strength, ending up crouched on the 10ft branch preparing to jump to the second.

So, all in all, he would probably have to make two 4 ft jump checks. DC 32 each. And then maybe a DC 18ish balance check. I don't suppose this is too difficult.

I had been hoping to do something like this using Tumble, but the DM said no.

A DC 18 Balance check means I have to roll an 18, so that's not going to happen 3 times in a row. Yay for 3 skill points a level.

It just seemed stupid to me that the only good way a high level party had for dealing with foes 30' up trees was to cut down or blow up the trees, as ended up happening.

 

[Henry]

It just seemed stupid to me that the only good way a high level party had for dealing with foes 30' up trees was to cut down or blow up the trees, as ended up happening.

There's always ranged attacks on the archers, area effect spells, and magic items. If a 13th level party doesn't have at least ONE member who can fly, then it would be practical to make arrangements to gain that ability somehow.

 

[Kilroy]

Let's take a look at what ELSE a +24 Jump skill can do.

With a 20-foot running start and a little prep, you can jump 34 FEET vertically. With no prep but a little luck, you could make up to 44 FEET - about 1/8th of a Football Field.

With NO run and a little prep, you can clear a 17 foot jump easily.

Any of these are figures an olympic athlete would kill for. As it is, he could still on average make a standing jump of 4 feet with no room to run.

Funny how none of those have ever come up.

What's the point of a skill that is never used?

Why did I waste points on this instead of picking a third useful skill to max? Concentration and Tumble come up many times a night, so I'm glad I took them, and I could have taken cross class Spot for the dozen times a night that comes up instead. It just seems stupid that the one time a year my third skill comes up, it's impossibly hard to do anything useful with.

 

[Kilroy]

There's always ranged attacks on the archers, area effect spells, and magic items. If a 13th level party doesn't have at least ONE member who can fly, then it would be practical to make arrangements to gain that ability somehow.

The sorceror tried an area affect spell, did maybe 40 points of damage to some of the 20 archers, and promptly got dropped to negative HP on their next action. Area spells are useless at higher levels, all they do is get the caster killed because they don't do nearly enough damage to even take out minions. Unfortunantly, he was the arcane caster with fly, and I can only cast fly once a day (Travel domain).

Ranged attacks are also useless if a character isn't heavily specilized in them. When each of 20 targets has about 80 hp, and our fighter's arrows only doing d8+4, it will take a long time and an entire quiver of arrows to drop a couple targets. That's why the fighter ended up cutting down trees with her adamantine greatsword - out of game she knew that the archers would each take two dozen arrows to kill, but only a couple sword swings.

My character is a Sacred Fist with a vow of poverty, so magic items and ranged attacks are both out.

Last night's fight just didn't have anything like a fantasy feel. It turned into a min/max munchkinfest, and I really don't like it when we have to do that to survive, because the rules are crippling us when we try to do things in a way that looks cinematic. If we hadn't resorted to nonsensical metagamey actions, it would have been a TPK, and that doesn't seem like a fun way to play D&D.

 

[dcollins]

Are there any eratta that bring back 3.0's Leap of the Clouds type abilities?

Recall that 3.0's "Leap of the Clouds" only enabled the monk to bypass a maximum-jump limitation that has been removed for everyone in 3.5.

 

[Kilroy]

Recall that 3.0's "Leap of the Clouds" only enabled the monk to bypass a maximum-jump limitation that has been removed for everyone in 3.5.

I'm just looking for the "spectacular jumping" abilities that I remember monks having in 3.0, that have been removed for everyone in 3.5.

 

[pvandyck]

I too would be very irritated by a skill that is seldom used eating up my points.

As a DM, I've tried hard to work in Balance, Jump, and Climb (I don't need to try to work in Tumble). I've had to include terrain elements that make it usefull to have points in these skills.

I've rubble on the floor (DC 10 balance check to move normally, fail and you can only move 1/2, fail by 5 and you fall down).

I've had 5' ledges and platforms (DC 10 to jump up as a free action/part of movement, fail and it's a move action all by itself to get up there, fail by 5 and you didn't get up with that move action).

I've had chests and other furniture taking up squares characters want to be in for tactical reasons (DC 10 to jump up as a free action/part of movement, fail and it's a move action all by itself, fail by 5 and you didn't get up there wasting a move action, then I require a DC 10 - 15 balance check to be stable on this object, -2 on attack and defense if fail, fall off if fail by 5 or more).

I've had fights with creatures that have a climb speed (like rats and rat-men), so they can take 10 in combat on climb, in terrain with lots of climbable areas (DC 10-15). Kinda interesting.

Since you can't take 10 in combat, some of this becomes actually a risk. Some of this is by the RAW, some not, I think. But, without my effort as DM thinking up this and other ways to use the terrain, these skills can become pretty useless. I found the terrain and environment sections of the SRD a good read.

On the other hand, in my campaign, Appraise is almost useless. I keep a very tight control on party total GP value (including items) and try to keep it close to the recommendations for average character wealth recommended in the DMG. I require the players to be able to give me their total worth at a moments notice. Consequently, purchasing or selling items is by the book value, almost without exception, in order to keep this system workable. No real haggling with Appraise or Bluff or Diplomacy. Since Bluff and Diplomacy have other uses that I use often, Appraise falls by the wayside. However, I don't screw my players if they end up with points there, I let them shift them.

pvandyck

 

[Darmanicus]

This is what the NPC monk did, but the DM said that the tree they used for it was the only one within 10' of another vertical surface in that part of the forest, and that's what's required to do a two stage jump.

Use another players back or cupped hands.........sorted.

 

[Galbard]

As a DM, I've tried hard to work in Balance, Jump, and Climb (I don't need to try to work in Tumble). I've had to include terrain elements that make it usefull to have points in these skills.

So did I. Balance and Climb have come up regularily IMC. Although since the sorcerer decided that she didn't like to be left behind and took Fly it has become much less of an issue.

I also use a form of Appraise called Barter IMC. It uses your Appraise skillranks but is based of CHA. You get a discount of 1% per point of difference between your roll and the merchant's. But that didn't work very well, since no player took it and it only server to make buying things more expensive and math intensive.

Last night's fight just didn't have anything like a fantasy feel.

I disagree. Chopping down trees with your adamantine greatsword to get at the enemies in them is definitely fantasy IMO, albeit in a Conan/Thrud the Barbarian kind of way.