Fly skill - Overly complex. A better flight suggestion...

[Swordslinger]

Really I realize that the fly skill is supposed to simply maneuverability categories, but I just don't see the point. Having to make random checks just to move is a bad idea, because it really slows the game down. And there are also a lot of complex rules to memorize. Most players just don't want to deal with that.

I advise just getting rid of the fly skill and going back to maneuverability categories but simplify them quite a bit. Forget about the turning radius, because quite simply, it's just too complicated to figure out in play and it makes even less sense in a game that doesn't even have facing rules.

Further just about every group I've ever played with has ignored the maneuverability class rules in the DMG, and I suspect that they'll ignore the fly skill checks as well. It's just too much work trying to figure out how fast you turn in midair and how many movement points you're spending to turn in place or what not. I don't think most groups even want to deal with that. It's clunky and it's cumbersome.

Here's what I would do. Three maneuverability categories: poor, average and good.

Poor: Your standard action becomes a move action while flying and thus you can only use it for move action related tasks. You cannot make attacks of opportunity while flying. While flying, your space (But not your size), doubles. So a 15x15 creature takes up a 30x30 space while flying. If it must squeeze to enter an area, then it crashes.

Average: You cannot make attacks of opportunity while flying. While flying, your space (But not your size) doubles. So a 15x15 creature takes up a 30x30 space while flying. If it must squeeze to enter an area, then it crashes.

Good: Your space while flying is equal to your normal space. If you enter an area where you must squeeze, then you crash.

And that's it. As far as crashing goes, you'd have basic damage assigned for hitting an object, and possibly have some feats that allow you to avert crashes (or maybe even keep the fly skill specifically for that purpose). So you might get scenes where a creature is flying in tight quarters and must make a check each round to avoid a crash if you want those sort of close quarters cinematic tense crash scenes.

I feel like my presented system is something that most groups are going to use, instead of the ignored maneuverability class rules, and I suspect the new PF flight rules, which are just too complex for most groups to care about.

[Eric Tillemans]

Swordslinger,
I'm in complete agreement about the fly skill and the 3.5 maneuverability rules - clunky and cumbersome. Simplifying is definitely the way to go.

[Pendagast]

Im against the fly skill, why do arcane spellcasters get this as a class skill,what does a 1st level sorceror know about flying? because they can cast the spell lateron, they are good at it?

and if u are riding a hippogriff, do you use fly, ride,orboth?

[Crimson Jester]

and though I know that this 'skill' will never go away I too must give my 2 cp and say that i do not agree with the need for the fly skill.

[Black Tom]

I kind of like the fly skill, even if it hasn't seen that much use in my game yet. It was really funny when we had 1 HD flying monkeys crashing all over the place because of their poor fly skill.

[Kyrinn]

Which, I would think, would be a good indication of how poor a choice making the entire manoeuvring of a flying creature/caster be dependent upon the current PF Flight rules.

Flying creatures fly with at least as great ease as land creatures walk or slither, and water creatures swim, etc. If PCs had to make Walk or Run checks each time they moved I think the novelty of the spasmatics would quickly fade.

YMMV, though.

[Jack Townsend]

Oh yeah, get rid of this dark brother of use rope.

[xorial]

I already ignore it's existence. I have a hard time seeing a flying creature needing this skill. Just as I see no need for a character to use a "Walk" skill. If I need to make some kind of check, I imagine it would be an acrobatics skill check. If there is a need for anything related to flying, I imagine a Fly Feat could be used to allow a character to use acrobatics for the check. I still am not in favor of that.

[Swordslinger]

Yeah, the fly skill is:

• Not backwards compatible
  
• Just as complex as the old system
  
• Requires more rolls than the old system and is thus a bad system in play.
  

Really I don't see why it isn't thrown away entirely.

[Dance of Ruin]

I, too, don't like the new Fly skill (but I suppose it will be changed in the final PFRPG book anyway).

Here's how once might simplify flying IMO:

A) The more complex method

- All creatures that can fly (magically or because of wings etc.), just do. No need for checks.

- However, to keep the current maneuverability categories intact and to account for the advantages natural fliers might have over 'magical' fliers, make certain actions check-dependent. This might be tied into the Acrobatics skill, with natural fliers/perfect maneuverability having no negative modifier, and increasing penalties to these maneuvers for creatures with less 'skill' at flying.

However, I don't know if there really IS a need for any flying maneuvers if you ignore all that depend solely on moving and changing face.

So, might as well eliminate this completely:

B) The simple method

- All creatures can fly in any direction with no checks of any kind necessary. Everything a flying creature can do under the 3.5 rules (hover, whatever) becomes flavor. Maneuverability categories are represented by movement speeds only (poor = slow, perfect = much faster than normal).

Personally, I would hope for B), but I can hear the traditionalist gamer outcry from here ;-).

[jreyst]

I too ignore the Fly skill. Gotta love Jason and all, but this is one added complexity I don't need.

[Sueki Suezo]

I personally like the Fly skill. It makes sense that people that spend time how to Fly are capable of taking the skill and are better at it then people that are untrained. I don't think we should fold Fly into Athletics any more then we should fold Swim into Athletics.