Lure of the Heavens (for Oracles and Shamans) - not a fishing question


Rules Questions


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This is about the oracle of the heavens Revelation and the Heavens Shaman hex of the same name.

Lure of the Heavens wrote:


Your connection to the skies above is so strong that your feet barely touch the ground. At 1st level, you no longer leave tracks. At 5th level, you can hover up to 6 inches above the ground or even above liquid surfaces, as if levitating. At 10th level, you gain the ability to fly, as per the spell, for a number of minutes per day equal to your oracle level. This duration does not need to be consecutive, but it must be spent in 1-minute increments.

The part that has generated debate is in bold. Is this ability meant to allow lateral movement, or are you simply suspended 6 inches above ground when you use this ability (which helps you to...I dunno, reach things on the top shelf)? I've searched and found several threads with diverse opinions, but nothing official. Has there been an official answer somewherethat I've missed?

Alternatively, since none of the previous threads generated enough faq hits individually, could I request that this thread be made the primary thread and everyone with the same question hit the faq button? =)

Dark Archive

Oh interesting. I never noticed that before. Well clearly the intend is that you can move still, but yeah, it makes no mention of that and even calls out levitating which would mean by RAW a heavens oracle will be the one I call the next time i gotta reach something 6 inches higher than usual...

Perhaps tie a rope to one of your teammates?

Also begs to ask the question of whether you take fall damage or not...


Well I reckon it would at least prevent falling damage by arresting your fall at the last moment (when you're within 6 inches of the ground). 6 inches is about the length of most ball-point pens, so the ability is pretty much useless for gaining any real elevation anyway. If this ability is meant to be a step up (hur hur hur) from the 1st-level ability, it should at least do that much.


It doesn't say that it acts like feather fall, so you would still take damage from falling. You would also end up on the ground from trips and the like. What it would do, is allow travel over liquid (say a river) or walk over trapped squares that had pressure plates without tripping them and maybe most importantly, not have to deal with difficult terrain when moving or charging in combat if you were melee oriented.


I was thinking that it would levitate you just before you hit the ground, so you wouldn't actually hit and take damage. But I'm more concerned about whether or not it actually allows you to move laterally whilst floating above ground. Has there been a comment about this by the rules people before?


I allow movement, it is the intent in my mind:)

Dark Archive

Skylancer4 wrote:
It doesn't say that it acts like feather fall, so you would still take damage from falling. You would also end up on the ground from trips and the like. What it would do, is allow travel over liquid (say a river) or walk over trapped squares that had pressure plates without tripping them and maybe most importantly, not have to deal with difficult terrain when moving or charging in combat if you were melee oriented.

I'm not sure about that. Flying creatures cannot be tripped so it would depend on if this 6 inch levitation is a type of flight or not. It's weird that the ability gave no rules for how to handle it so the whole thing seems to be GM interpretation.


Rule Zero. The DM is final arbiter. There is no crunch here, not really. Heck, you could say that since it gives no rules text the ability does nothing. That would be a silly interpretation. Hopefully your DM is imaginative enough to allow you to do cool things with this as it comes up in play.


That Crazy Alchemist wrote:
Skylancer4 wrote:
It doesn't say that it acts like feather fall, so you would still take damage from falling. You would also end up on the ground from trips and the like. What it would do, is allow travel over liquid (say a river) or walk over trapped squares that had pressure plates without tripping them and maybe most importantly, not have to deal with difficult terrain when moving or charging in combat if you were melee oriented.
I'm not sure about that. Flying creatures cannot be tripped so it would depend on if this 6 inch levitation is a type of flight or not. It's weird that the ability gave no rules for how to handle it so the whole thing seems to be GM interpretation.

As has been mentioned, intent is to allow you to move above the ground. It isn't flying (so no immunity to trip) and in general you cannot do anything on someone else's turn (like them bull rushing you off a ledge) so that isn't 'your movement' it is something else causing loss of control that you normally have. Feather fall only works because it specifically calls out a situation that allows its use.

If we want to be really specific, the ability states you can levitate, and levitation doesn't allow for horizontal movement AND requires you to take mounting penalties on attacks while using it. It states nothing about being immune to trips or falling damage.

Granted my inference is going with the intent of the ability, that it allows you to move horizontally but if we are doing that we need to also concede that it is 'intentional' movement. Combat maneuvers are unintentional movement due to outside forces, and no where in RAW does it say they are immune to certain attacks (trips) or falling or able to use the ability when it isn't your turn (as with feather fall).

What it says is that when you move you can do so up to 6" above certain surfaces. I'm obviously not any Paizo Dev/rules person, but we cannot extrapolate further than what it tells us it allows a character to do when it comes to rules conflicts.


Has it actually been confirmed somewhere that the intent is to allow you to move above ground? 'cos that's the main thing I'm hoping to discover. If not, I'll need to hope it gets added to the errata/faq 'cos the hovercraft-movement is the main thing I'm hoping to get out of this ability - cos it'd look uber-cool! XD


FiddlersGreen wrote:
Has it actually been confirmed that the intent is to allow you to move above ground? 'cos that's the main thing I'm hoping to discover. If not, I'll need to hope it gets added to the errata/faq 'cos the hovercraft-movement is the main thing I'm hoping to get out of this ability - cos it'd look uber-cool! XD

To leave tracks you would have to move right? >.>;

Implication being, effects of the ability are when you move.

If you are allowed 3pp look into the elocator from dreamscarred press as well for some flavorful floaty coolness.


I'm not referring to the first level ability. This whole discussion revolves around the 5th level ability.

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