Aerial assault - awesome concept, potentially impractical?

[Defade]

Out of all the champion abilities, Aerial Assault has to be my absolute favorite in terms of flavor. A character jumping impossibly high to take down a smug wizard gloating 50 feet above the ground, introducing said wizard's face to the gravel - that's certainly something only mythic characters can do.

However, the core rulebook has laid down the DCs for high jumps as roughly the amount of feet you want to jump x 4. A champion 10 gets a 100 circumstance bonus to his acrobatics modifier, and even if we assume his base acrobatics modifier to be a generous +30, that still puts his average roll at 1d20 + 130 = roughly 140. That's 35 feet on average, which translates to about 3d6 extra damage to your attack, or 1d6~2d6 damage to opponents you drag down from the air. At mythic tier 10, when characters are practically demigods, both this extra damage and jump height seems rather non-sequential, especially since it requires one use of your mythic power.

Of course, being able to cover 140feet in horizontal distance is pretty mythical, but I don't think that's quite the point of this ability. :)

Thoughts?

[Dukai]

Maybe make it an extra 10ft jumped per mythic tier (clarify that this bonus can exceed your movement speed). If that's too much, drop it to ~5ft per tier rather than a bonus to acrobatics check.

[deuxhero]

Also of note is that it doesn't interact well with a lance, screwing the iconic user this ability. Make it so it counts as a mounted charge for lances (Spirited Charge optional) on top of making it not take multiple turns and it would be cool.

[Rynjin]

Would be fun for a Monk.

Wondering if it would work with burning Ki to jump higher?

Basically turn a Monk into a Dragoon.

[Defade]

Dukai wrote:

Maybe make it an extra 10ft jumped per mythic tier (clarify that this bonus can exceed your movement speed). If that's too much, drop it to ~5ft per tier rather than a bonus to acrobatics check.

Extent of bonuses aside, I applaud this suggestion for the very fact that it removes the need for calculating high jump DCs and determining how much you jumped each time. (I had to pull out a calculator when I made the post)

[johnlocke90]

The issue is that things can fly well above 35 feet. I would like for this to be usable from the air to bring down both yourself and a flying enemy.

[Rats Archive]

I wanted to see what the absolute maximum result to actrobatics could be, and I came up with 237 for a lvl 20 Monk/MT 10 Champ:

Max Ranks: +20
Class Skill: +3
Dex 46 (18 base, +2 racial, +6 Enhancment, +5 Inherent, +5 Level, +10 Mythic): +18
High Jump class ability static bonus: +20
High Jump ki bonus: +20
Fast Movement (speed enhancement bonus): +24 (racial bonus)
Skill Focus (acrobatics) feat: +6
Acrobatic feat: +4
Aerial Assault champion mythic ability: +100 (circumstance bonus)
Acrobatic (mythic) feat static bonus: +2
Acrobatic (mythic) feat auto 20 bonus: 20

End result: 59.25 feet straight up. Or a 235 foot charge across a chasm.

I like the idea of it being a skill check over a flat bonus, because it lets you add your other bonuses into the result. While I can see a need for a piece of scratch paper for first figuring out your bonus, in game it's fairly easy to add 100 and then divide a result by 4 if you already have the normal bonus to jump recorded on your character sheet.

The 235ft distance charge seems epic enough, but the high jump does seem lackluster. Perhaps Aerial Assault could also change the DC when it's used? If the DC to high jumps was also halved, we'd get 119.5 feet up, which feels more epic. The downside to increasing the height too much from a game balance point of view however, is a pretty signifigant increase to damage.

[Talynonyx]

How is a lance user the "iconic" user of this ability? Aside from that, yes, it could use a little tweaking, but it's a really awesome ability.

[deuxhero]

I can't really think of any other character from fiction famed for their leaping strikes (nearest I can think of is Jack's "Jump Good", which wasn't really combined with attacks) other than FF's Dragoon/Lancer.

[Lord Embok]

There's also

Fate/Stay Night:

Lancer(Cú_Chulainn) who does a nice big fancy jump attack.

[Reckless]

Must build Tetori leaping grapplemancer chokehold specialist.....

[Defade]

Rats Archive wrote:

I wanted to see what the absolute maximum result to actrobatics could be, and I came up with 237 for a lvl 20 Monk/MT 10 Champ:

Max Ranks: +20
Class Skill: +3
Dex 46 (18 base, +2 racial, +6 Enhancment, +5 Inherent, +5 Level, +10 Mythic): +18
High Jump class ability static bonus: +20
High Jump ki bonus: +20
Fast Movement (speed enhancement bonus): +24 (racial bonus)
Skill Focus (acrobatics) feat: +6
Acrobatic feat: +4
Aerial Assault champion mythic ability: +100 (circumstance bonus)
Acrobatic (mythic) feat static bonus: +2
Acrobatic (mythic) feat auto 20 bonus: 20

End result: 59.25 feet straight up. Or a 235 foot charge across a chasm.

I like the idea of it being a skill check over a flat bonus, because it lets you add your other bonuses into the result. While I can see a need for a piece of scratch paper for first figuring out your bonus, in game it's fairly easy to add 100 and then divide a result by 4 if you already have the normal bonus to jump recorded on your character sheet.

The 235ft distance charge seems epic enough, but the high jump does seem lackluster. Perhaps Aerial Assault could also change the DC when it's used? If the DC to high jumps was also halved, we'd get 119.5 feet up, which feels more epic. The downside to increasing the height too much from a game balance point of view however, is a pretty signifigant increase to damage.

Being able to jump 60feet and upwards is more of what I expected from this path ability, but as you've resourcefully shown, the requirements(a number of feats that could've probably been put to better use, all ability bonuses being assigned to dex, a specific class that gives bonuses to jump etc.) are somewhat disproportionate when seen in this context.

Imagining this monk whose only purpose in life is to jump charging across a 235 foot chasm is quite epic, but I digress.

[Reckless]

You could probably get higher with a Ninja with

High Jumper (Ex): When a ninja with this trick makes a high jump, the DC for that jump is half the normal DC. The ninja must have the acrobatic master trick before taking this talent.

[Rats Archive]

Reckless wrote:

You could probably get higher with a Ninja with

High Jumper (Ex): When a ninja with this trick makes a high jump, the DC for that jump is half the normal DC. The ninja must have the acrobatic master trick before taking this talent.

Ah, you are quite right; in fact we can go even farther: The ki pool ability of the Ninja also cuts the DC for jumps in half. With High Jumper and the Ninja Ki Pool, the DC becomes a grand total of 1 per foot. So for a lvl 10 Ninja/10 Monk/MT 10 Champ:

Max Ranks: +20
Class Skill: +3
Dex 46 (18 base, +2 racial, +6 Enhancment, +5 Inherent, +5 Level, +10 Mythic): +18
High Jump class ability static bonus: +10
High Jump ki bonus: +20
Fast Movement (with Monk's Robe for extra movement), (speed enhancement bonus): +20 (racial bonus)
Skill Focus (acrobatics) feat: +6
Acrobatic feat: +4
Aerial Assault champion mythic ability: +100 (circumstance bonus)
Acrobatic (mythic) feat static bonus: +2
Acrobatic (mythic) feat auto 20 bonus: 20

End Result: 223 Feet horizontal/vertical. A much more mythic distance, and you get 20d6 extra damage on the charge. That's good with or without a lance.

[Rynjin]

Rats Archive wrote:

Ah, you are quite right; in fact we can go even farther: The ki pool ability of the Ninja also cuts the DC for jumps in half. With High Jumper and the Ninja Ki Pool, the DC becomes a grand total of 1 per foot. So for a lvl 10 Ninja/10 Monk/MT 10 Champ:

Max Ranks: +20
Class Skill: +3
Dex 46 (18 base, +2 racial, +6 Enhancment, +5 Inherent, +5 Level, +10 Mythic): +18
High Jump class ability static bonus: +10
High Jump ki bonus: +20
Fast Movement (with Monk's Robe for extra movement), (speed enhancement bonus): +20 (racial bonus)
Skill Focus (acrobatics) feat: +6
Acrobatic feat: +4
Aerial Assault champion mythic ability: +100 (circumstance bonus)
Acrobatic (mythic) feat static bonus: +2
Acrobatic (mythic) feat auto 20 bonus: 20

End Result: 223 Feet horizontal/vertical. A much more mythic distance, and you get 20d6 extra damage on the charge. That's good with or without a lance.

Holy hell.

New character concept ahoy. Even disregarding combat applications, who needs rope or the Climb skill?

Just leap over most things. Or jump up there, grab on, and you've halved the distance at least.

[Defade]

That is absolutely disgusting and I applaud you, my good sir.

[Rats Archive]

Crap, forgot a line in the lvl 10 ninja ki pool:

Pathfinder OGC wrote:

At 10th level, she also reduces the DC of Acrobatics skill checks made to jump by 1/2 (although she still cannot move farther than her speed allows).

I guess that means that we could only go 160 feet max in any direction? I don't see that rule anywhere else, but I can understand limiting the distance to your max distance on a normal charge.

EDIT: Oh, and in the distance above, I forgot that the dc would get reduced for long jumps as well, so technically if it wasn't for the normal movement range limit, it would have been 669 ft. lol

EDIT 2: Changed 180 to 160, forgot we had to give up 10 ft of base movement by giving up monk levels.

[Jason Nelson]

I don't recall - does the ability say you have to jump UP to the target? Can you not also be flying (or leap from a flying mount or elevated place) and tackle-bomb someone into the ground?

[Epic Meepo]

Jason Nelson wrote:

I don't recall - does the ability say you have to jump UP to the target? Can you not also be flying (or leap from a flying mount or elevated place) and tackle-bomb someone into the ground?

I just reread it, and you certainly can jump onto something from above. The falling damage dealt by grappling your opponent seems to be limited by the distance you jump (not the total distance you fall), but the falling damage you gain for empowering your charge instead of grappling is limited by the total distance you fall (not the distance you jump).

[Rynjin]

So let's say you climb a 500 foot cliff, jump 233 feet above that, and drop on the guy?

Does he take 733 feet worth of falling damage (while you take 500 feet's worth I assume, easily mitigated by Boots of the Cat or Feather Fall) or just 233?

[Quath]

Falling damage caps at 20d6 anyway... so going more than 400 feet doesn't matter.

[Realmwalker]

Rats Archive wrote:

End result: 59.25 feet straight up. Or a 235 foot charge across a chasm.

The 235ft distance charge seems epic enough, but the high jump does seem lackluster. Perhaps Aerial Assault could also change the DC when it's used? If the DC to high jumps was also halved, we'd get 119.5 feet up, which feels more epic. The downside to increasing the height too much from a game balance point of view however, is a pretty signifigant increase to damage.

How does leaping roughly 60 feet straight up seem lackluster? That is SUPERHUMAN... just sayin'

[cp]

Rats Archive wrote:

I wanted to see what the absolute maximum result to actrobatics could be, and I came up with 237 for a lvl 20 Monk/MT 10

This is not the maximum. There are several creatures that can sprint at 10x speed - which with the rules for +1/4 adds roughly 120 to your jump score.

Much of the rest of your logic will also stack, since your animal companions can use mythic properties.

I personally think the jump ability is pretty fine as is. I think being able to jump and grapple a caster 40 feet in the air is fine. I think the idea of someone jumping 200 feet in the air removes versimilitude; additionally it competes with people that have taken flying as a focus - those that fly by shapechange, racial ability or what have you.

[Jackissocool]

Yeah, be a catfolk to increase your speed while charging and take the run feat in there somewhere. You'll actually have an additional boost to your result with the higher speed, an additional +4.

[Reckless]

cp wrote:

I think the idea of someone jumping 200 feet in the air removes versimilitude (1); additionally it competes with people that have taken flying as a focus(2) - those that fly by shapechange, racial ability or what have you.

(1) Removes verisimilitude? The thing trying to be replicated is the deeds of Mythical beings, not Everydayman. If anything, it should break your concept of verisimilitude even more.

(2) By design. Its express purpose is for your melee guy to be able to jump up and knock those cretins out of the air. So he can roar "Immune to melee at level 5, my ass!!!". It must be able to accomplish this design goal, and we are looking for ways to make it do that.

[Jason Nelson]

Reckless wrote:

cp wrote:

I think the idea of someone jumping 200 feet in the air removes versimilitude (1); additionally it competes with people that have taken flying as a focus(2) - those that fly by shapechange, racial ability or what have you.

(1) Removes verisimilitude? The thing trying to be replicated is the deeds of Mythical beings, not Everydayman. If anything, it should break your concept of verisimilitude even more.

(2) By design. Its express purpose is for your melee guy to be able to jump up and knock those cretins out of the air. So he can roar "Immune to melee at level 5, my ass!!!". It must be able to accomplish this design goal, and we are looking for ways to make it do that.

I'd agree on both counts. :)

[Orthos]

Reckless wrote:

cp wrote:

I think the idea of someone jumping 200 feet in the air removes versimilitude (1); additionally it competes with people that have taken flying as a focus(2) - those that fly by shapechange, racial ability or what have you.

(1) Removes verisimilitude? The thing trying to be replicated is the deeds of Mythical beings, not Everydayman. If anything, it should break your concept of verisimilitude even more.

(2) By design. Its express purpose is for your melee guy to be able to jump up and knock those cretins out of the air. So he can roar "Immune to melee at level 5, my ass!!!". It must be able to accomplish this design goal, and we are looking for ways to make it do that.

I have a dwarf in desperate need of ground-to-air assault capability. >=)

[Rats Archive]

Jackissocool wrote:

Yeah, be a catfolk to increase your speed while charging and take the run feat in there somewhere. You'll actually have an additional boost to your result with the higher speed, an additional +4.

Ok, well that would get us up another 8, nice finds. And if we assume your max distance is limited by your base speed as the Ninja class suggests, that would let us get up to 200 max.

Realmwalker wrote:

How does leaping roughly 60 feet straight up seem lackluster? That is SUPERHUMAN... just sayin'

Yeah, and if this wasn't a mythic ability I'd be saying it goes a bridge to far. But it is a mythic ability, with just about everything else I could think of added on to help it be even more legendary, so yeah, I want to see fireworks with it. The thresholds I'd like to be able to hit is ~75 ft with a notable investment of short and long term resources, and at least 120 with significant amount of resources. The reason being, that if 75ft is short range for a high level spellcaster, it should be within the threat range of this ability. and if a full move straight up (120ft) is enough to make the average mage feel safe, they should be able to get surprised by someone who has literally build their character to do that.

Reckless wrote:

cp wrote:

I think the idea of someone jumping 200 feet in the air removes versimilitude (1); additionally it competes with people that have taken flying as a focus(2) - those that fly by shapechange, racial ability or what have you.

(1) Removes verisimilitude? The thing trying to be replicated is the deeds of Mythical beings, not Everydayman. If anything, it should break your concept of verisimilitude even more.

(2) By design. Its express purpose is for your melee guy to be able to jump up and knock those cretins out of the air. So he can roar "Immune to melee at level 5, my ass!!!". It must be able to accomplish this design goal, and we are looking for ways to make it do that.

This. In particular, I don't see flying being a difficult thing that needs heavy investment for some classes. Spellcasters fly, and can do so from an early level, with little cost in both short and long term resources. If everyone had to play a Aasimar, take 2 feats and wait til level 10, or everyone had to play a particular class to get flying, I might have more sympathy for balancing the concerns. This is a tool to help give melee characters, a chance to compete.

[gbonehead]

Orthos wrote:

Reckless wrote:

cp wrote:

I think the idea of someone jumping 200 feet in the air removes versimilitude (1); additionally it competes with people that have taken flying as a focus(2) - those that fly by shapechange, racial ability or what have you.

(1) Removes verisimilitude? The thing trying to be replicated is the deeds of Mythical beings, not Everydayman. If anything, it should break your concept of verisimilitude even more.

(2) By design. Its express purpose is for your melee guy to be able to jump up and knock those cretins out of the air. So he can roar "Immune to melee at level 5, my ass!!!". It must be able to accomplish this design goal, and we are looking for ways to make it do that.

I have a dwarf in desperate need of ground-to-air assault capability. >=)

Holy crap!

Now THAT is something I have to work into one of my mythic playtest sessions - a mythic NPC who launches himself via catapult at one of the flying players to knock them out of the sky.

THAT is mythic :)

[+5 Toaster]

gbonehead wrote:

Orthos wrote:

Reckless wrote:

cp wrote:

I think the idea of someone jumping 200 feet in the air removes versimilitude (1); additionally it competes with people that have taken flying as a focus(2) - those that fly by shapechange, racial ability or what have you.

(1) Removes verisimilitude? The thing trying to be replicated is the deeds of Mythical beings, not Everydayman. If anything, it should break your concept of verisimilitude even more.

(2) By design. Its express purpose is for your melee guy to be able to jump up and knock those cretins out of the air. So he can roar "Immune to melee at level 5, my ass!!!". It must be able to accomplish this design goal, and we are looking for ways to make it do that.

I have a dwarf in desperate need of ground-to-air assault capability. >=)

Holy crap!

Now THAT is something I have to work into one of my mythic playtest sessions - a mythic NPC who launches himself via catapult at one of the flying players to knock them out of the sky.

THAT is mythic :)

Please let that npc be an oread.

Player makes a perception check
you "you see a giant rock hurtling towards you"
Player "no problem it's just a rock"
You (readies roll for grapple)

[Squeakmaan]

I love the idea behind this ability, but as it is, I have to agree with the posters above. The DC's for high jumping make even a +100 at Tier 10 just not that important, having to dedicate so much of your character to just get 60 ft up doesn't feel Mythic to me. Perhaps combine this ability with something to cut the DC like the Ninja ability.