Superleap, or what jump skill do I need to duplicate those John Carter jumps

[sunbeam]

It was in the original books of course, but it seems like they are playing it up and exaggerating things in the movie trailers.

Okay, let's set the stage:

(Bear in mind this has not a thing to do with Martian gravity, only duplicating the effects.)

I'm estimating he jumps at least 50 feet horizontally and 30 or 40 feet vertically in some of those shots.

It appears from a read of the jump rules (under acrobatics)

"The base DC to make a jump is equal to the distance to be crossed (if horizontal) or four times the height to be reached (if vertical). These DCs double if you do not have at least 10 feet of space to get a running start."

He usually appears to get a running start in the previews, so we'll ignore that.

Let's also ignore the horizontal portion (I think it is subsumed by the "vertical" portion as near as I can gather) and assume John Carter needs to be able to make a 40 leap.

"4 feet 16 dc"

"Greater than 4 feet +4 (dc) per foot"

Okay, let's ignore the height of the jumper for a moment.

If I have read this correctly, then we have a dc of 16 to get to 4 feet.

To get the other 36 feet you need 36*4 = 144.

For a total dc of 160.

Let's say you are a 20th level something. You get 20 skill ranks for level 20, 3 for it being trained (I'm sure there is some trait somewhere that will give acrobatics as a class skill).

That is 23. 30 for Jump spell (we have a 9th caster level jump spell somehow for our purposes).

Acrobatic gives us +4 if we have 10 ranks, good.

Skill focus gives +6 if we have 10 ranks, another good.

We have a total of 23 + 30 + 4 + 6 = 63 for an acrobatics check.

Now we add our dex (hmmmm I didn't think I would miss this being strength). What is a good dex if you focus on it (which most fighters, the class I would think John Carter would be) would have? 20 maybe?

+5 for dex.

Total of 68.

So how can my John Carter wannabe make those kinds of leaps?

And yes, being able to do this is in total accordance with my view of a 20th level fighter.

Anyone got any ideas?

Assuming a 10 on our skill check, we get a value of 78. Round it up to 80, just cause. That mean our prospective John Carter can reasonably hope to jump onto a (80 - 16)/4 + 4 foot tall surface, or 16 + 4 = 20 foot tall surface.

Now in the real world this would be outstanding, incredibly mind boggling even. But in my personal fantasy world I want a little more, you know? I want to leap onto a cackling wizard hovering 40 feet in the air.

So how do I get there?

[blue_the_wolf]

the movie JCM jumps more like the original super man.

he literally jumps like a quarter mile.

the jumping to and from the boat made it clear that no form of phisics were involved.

in this game.... the only way to copy john carter is an at will ability to fly for like 3 or 4 rounds at a time.

[Azten]

Cast fly? That's all I can think of.

[Mark Moreland]

Check out Distant Worlds for rules on adventuring in low- or high-gravity environments. One of the ways it impacts a creature is by multiplying the distance and height of jumping.

[Eric Tillemans]

Every 10' of base movement rate greater than 30' gives a +4 on jump checks, so increasing your speed will help. Ways to increase speed and/or jump:
- 1 level in barbarian (10' movement bonus -> +4 to jump)
- boots of striding & springing (total of +9 to jump from move and magic bonuses)
- 5 levels in monk will allow you to spend a ki point for a +20 bonus on jumps
- The Run feat grants a +4 jump bonus
- The Fleet feat grants 5' movement bonus, so that's another +4 bonus for every 2 times you take this feat.

[Black Powder Chocobo]

Be a Monk and get boots of Springing & Striding. Burn a Ki point for +20 to your Acrobatics and, for S&G's, have someone cast Expeditious Retreat on you. At level 6 with ER on you, that's +40 between Ki and speed alone, not including any skill ranks, abilitiy modifiers, and class skills tossed in.

I had a gnome monk in my campaign who jumped from the rooftops like that for scouting; the idea of a 3 foot guy jumping 13' up and over 40' across made me giggle. Didn't work out so well when the party 6'4 human fighter in breastplate thought that was cool and tried the same thing...

Edit: Darn you ninja Eric!!!! /shakefist

[LazarX]

Originally, as first written Superman did not have the power to fly. He was able to leap tall buildings "in a single bound" because Krypton was described as being a superheavy gravity planet.

[Chobemaster]

LazarX wrote:

Originally, as first written Superman did not have the power to fly. He was able to leap tall buildings "in a single bound" because Krypton was described as being a superheavy gravity planet.

Which makes about 1,000,000x more sense, for whatever sense is worth in comics.

[Black Powder Chocobo]

Chobemaster wrote:

LazarX wrote:

Originally, as first written Superman did not have the power to fly. He was able to leap tall buildings "in a single bound" because Krypton was described as being a superheavy gravity planet.

Which makes about 1,000,000x more sense, for whatever sense is worth in comics.

2 retcons and an Aquaman #3.

[MacGurcules]

If you weren't deadset on Fighter, you could go 20 levels into Monk. That'd get you another 64 on top of what you've got there. You get 20 from from High Jump adding in your Monk level, 20 for spending a point of Ki from the same, and 24 for having +60 ft movement rate. One level of Barbarian to get another 10 feet of movement would net you another +3.

John Carter doesn't seem too far off of monk. Always jumping about, not a lot of armor, punches dudes straight dead. Very monkish.

[Kolokotroni]

Dont do it with a 20th level fighter, john carter was faster, and quicker too, and i do believe he didnt wear armor. Somehow a barbarian 1, Monk 19, seems to suit him better and it helps our purpose.

Boots of striding and springing +5 to acrobatics and +10 ft to movement
Monk 19 +60 to movement, high jump ability (always runing jump dcs and +19 to acrobatics)
Barbarian +10ft to movement

With the speed boost giving you +4 per 10ft over 30, thats +32
That brings the total to 124. You also have a handful of ki points you can spend to give yourself a +20 bonus to jump for 1 round. That brings you to 144 right from the start, easily making the 40ft vertical leap and if you want more, you can take the feat fleet 2 times each for another +4 bonus.

[MacGurcules]

Kolokotroni wrote:

Dont do it with a 20th level fighter, john carter was faster, and quicker too, and i do believe he didnt wear armor. Somehow a barbarian 1, Monk 19, seems to suit him better and it helps our purpose.

Boots of striding and springing +5 to acrobatics and +10 ft to movement
Monk 19 +60 to movement, high jump ability (always runing jump dcs and +19 to acrobatics)
Barbarian +10ft to movement

With the speed boost giving you +4 per 10ft over 30, thats +32
That brings the total to 124. You also have a handful of ki points you can spend to give yourself a +20 bonus to jump for 1 round. That brings you to 144 right from the start, easily making the 40ft vertical leap and if you want more, you can take the feat fleet 2 times each for another +4 bonus.

You're four points too high. Striding and Springing and Monk speed are both enhancement, so they don't stack.

[Kolokotroni]

Edit: misunderstood your post, you were talking speed not the individual bonuses, ok, throw 2 fleet feets in there for good measure just to hit the 144.