Versatile Performance, Perform (Dance), and Total Defense

[Balkoth]

If you're using the Versatile Performance Bard Class feature to use Perform (Dance) for Acrobatics and Fly, do you qualify for the 6 AC bonus from Total Defense (rather than the 4 AC baseline bonus)?

[VRMH]

Yes. Versatile Performance replaces the bonus of skills; not just when making a skill check, but across the board.

[Balkoth]

VRMH wrote:

Yes. Versatile Performance replaces the bonus of skills; not just when making a skill check, but across the board.

Acrobatics/Total Defense refers to skill RANKS, not skill bonus:

"Skills If you have 3 or more ranks in Acrobatics, you gain a +3 dodge bonus to AC when fighting defensively instead of the usual +2, and a +6 dodge bonus to AC when taking the total defense action instead of the usual +4."

Hence my concern.

[Matthew Downie]

Versatile Performance wrote:

He can use his bonus in that skill in place of his bonus in associated skills. When substituting in this way, the bard uses his total Perform skill bonus, including class skill bonus, in place of its associated skill’s bonus, whether or not he has ranks in that skill or if it is a class skill.

So, does having the total skill bonus imply having the ranks?

[VRMH]

Balkoth wrote:

Acrobatics/Total Defense refers to skill RANKS, not skill bonus:

Hm. I had not considered that; now I'm not so sure anymore. FAQ'd.

[Saethori]

Perform doesn't help your defense. Versatile Performance says you can use your bonus in your Perform skill instead of the bonus in the associated skills. Not that you use your ranks, but that you use your bonus. The ranks remain unchanged (and, in most cases, unused).

This is one of those instances where the number of actual ranks you have in a skill matters, and therefore it has negative synergy with Versatile Performance. (See Conceal Spell for another example of such a negative synergy.)

[VRMH]

Saethori wrote:

Versatile Performance says you can use your bonus in your Perform skill instead of the bonus in the associated skills. Not that you use your ranks, but that you use your bonus. The ranks remain unchanged (and, in most cases, unused).

Skill ranks do give a skill bonus. But the reverse probably does not apply.

[Chess Pwn]

Saethori wrote:

Perform doesn't help your defense. Versatile Performance says you can use your bonus in your Perform skill instead of the bonus in the associated skills. Not that you use your ranks, but that you use your bonus. The ranks remain unchanged (and, in most cases, unused).

This is one of those instances where the number of actual ranks you have in a skill matters, and therefore it has negative synergy with Versatile Performance. (See Conceal Spell for another example of such a negative synergy.)

+1 to this.