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Don't ask for rolls if the results don't matter. If they are in combat, then the results of their swim checks matter. If they aren't in combat, or in danger of drowning, or racing a ticking clock, then it doesn't matter.
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So, an interesting RAW observation.By RAW, any time the heroes move through (or under) water they should make three Swim checks each round. For a party of four heroes, that's 120 checks a minute!
The naive suggestion is "don't ask for rolls", but this shafts characters trained in Athletics, who stands to gain a lot of movement because they can hope to score Critic Successes on their Swim checks.
How would you suggest to resolve this? (That amount of die rolling is unacceptable)
Swim Single Action
Move
Source Core Rulebook pg. 243
You propel yourself through water. In most calm water, you succeed at the action without needing to attempt a check. If you must breathe air and you’re submerged in water, you must hold your breath each round. If you fail to hold your breath, you begin to drown (as described on page 478). If the water you are swimming in is turbulent or otherwise dangerous, you might have to attempt an Athletics check to Swim.If you end your turn in water and haven’t succeeded at a Swim action that turn, you sink 10 feet or get moved by the current, as determined by the GM. However, if your last action on your turn was to enter the water, you don’t sink or move with the current that turn.
Critical Success You move through the water 10 feet, plus 5 feet per 20 feet of your land Speed (a total of 15 feet for most PCs).
Success You move through the water 5 feet, plus 5 feet per 20 feet of your land Speed (a total of 10 feet for most PCs).
Critical Failure You make no progress, and if you’re holding your breath, you lose 1 round of air.
Sample Swim Tasks
Untrained lake or other still water
Trained flowing water, like a river
Expert swiftly flowing river
Master stormy sea
Legendary maelstrom, waterfall
The two italicized bits seem to contradict each other, but here's how I read it. If you are in still water you only need a check to swim if the party is aware of an immediate danger such as a monster.
Another RAW observation.
If you need swim checks as part of your exploration, I'd recommend improvising exploration activities to cover them. The encounter mode actions aren't meant to map perfectly to exploration mode, acting like they do just means a whole lot of rolling for no good effect. Another thing to note if you want an underwater dungeon.Improvising New Activities
If a player wants to do something not covered by other rules, here are some guidelines. If the activity is similar to an action someone could use in an encounter, such as Avoid Notice, it usually consists of a single action repeated roughly 10 times per minute (such as using the Sneak action 10 times) or an alternation of actions that works out similarly (such as Search, which alternates Stride and Seek). An activity using a quicker pace, corresponding to roughly 20 actions per minute, might have limited use or cause fatigue, as would one requiring intense concentration.You might find that a player wants to do something equivalent to spending 3 actions every 6 seconds, just like they would in combat. Characters can exert themselves to this extent in combat only because combat lasts such a short time—such exertion isn’t sustainable over the longer time frame of exploration.
Drowning and Suffocation
Source Core Rulebook pg. 478
You can hold your breath for a number of rounds equal to 5 + your Constitution modifier. Reduce your remaining air by 1 round at the end of each of your turns, or by 2 if you attacked or cast any spells that turn. You also lose 1 round worth of air each time you are critically hit or critically fail a save against a damaging effect. If you speak (including casting spells with verbal components or activating items with command components) you lose all remaining air.When you run out of air, you fall unconscious and start suffocating. You can’t recover from being unconscious and must attempt a DC 20 Fortitude save at the end of each of your turns. On a failure, you take 1d10 damage, and on a critical failure, you die. On each check after the first, the DC increases by 5 and the damage by 1d10; these increases are cumulative. Once your access to air is restored, you stop suffocating and are no longer unconscious (unless you’re at 0 Hit Points).
If you haven't given the party water breathing somehow and they don't all have breath control, they probably won't be exploring the underwater dungeon very far.
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Don't ask for rolls if the results don't matter. If they are in combat, then the results of their swim checks matter. If they aren't in combat, or in danger of drowning, or racing a ticking clock, then it doesn't matter.Dont' be dismissive. I didn't start this thread to hear "do nothing everything is perfect as is".
Adding a roll to every move action is cumbersome; possibly getting different results out of each move adds a load of needless clutter to combat.
This is why I am specifically asking about alternatives that makes this simple --> consistent --> fast.
How about you giving your feedback on my suggested simplification? Do you see any issues with it?
You're contradicting yourself. Your second post was talking about exploring an underwater dungeon. Now you're talking about combat. You don't explore an entire underwater dungeon in combat.
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You're contradicting yourself. Your second post was talking about exploring an underwater dungeon. Now you're talking about combat. You don't explore an entire underwater dungeon in combat.I am talking about exploring an entire underwater dungeon. There will be combat, just like in every dungeon. Who said there would be combat every round?
Look, if all you want to do is fight me on my question and never get to the useful part where you help me out, can I ask you for a favor - please just don't reply anymore. I am sure you have better things to do with your time. Cheers!
If you want me to be more explicit about your suggestion: I don't see what it adds. Tell your players not to bother rolling outside of combat because the results don't really matter. During combat, they will have to make a lot of swim checks, but that is pretty much the system working as intended. Swimming is meant to be hard.
If you only roll Swim checks in combat, they really shouldn't be enough of them to bog the game down. Unless you start kiting them with fast swimming enemies or something.
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It's also RAW not to ask for rolls if the results don't matter or if the characters are generally going to succeed the majority of the time, or I believe that was at least the intent of the designers.
I don't remember if it's actually printed in the book or which page it's on but it's been mentioned multiple times.
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I just really don't fathom what the problem trying to be fixed is, or the porpoise of the house rule. It's not that deep.
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If you feel that swim checks are bogging down your game, just do less of them. Whether you are making a check every move or making a check for all your moves once a turn, players built for underwater combat will get the same advantage.
If you'll be exploring underwater, just make Swim an exploration activity that is used for moving from one place to another. This way you only need to do a check every 10 minutes and everyone that doesn't have high athletics can just follow the leader. Then just have the party go the speed of the slowest member. The whole party would benefit from a character having a really good athletics check. Party members could still do other exploration activities before or after swimming.
Alternatively, have Swim just count as part of any exploration activity they choose.
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If you feel that swim checks are bogging down your game, just do less of them. Whether you are making a check every move or making a check for all your moves once a turn, players built for underwater combat will get the same advantage.
If you'll be exploring underwater, just make Swim an exploration activity that is used for moving from one place to another. This way you only need to do a check every 10 minutes and everyone that doesn't have high athletics can just follow the leader. Then just have the party go the speed of the slowest member. The whole party would benefit from a character having a really good athletics check. Party members could still do other exploration activities before or after swimming.
Alternatively, have Swim just count as part of any exploration activity they choose.
Again, you don't need to roll if the consequences don't matter. If you're just exploring with no time constraints, danger, or chance of running out of air, it doesn't actually matter if a character fails a swim check. So just assume they move at a leisurely pace.
Now if you're actually racing against a clock, then your advice on Follow the Expert and exploration activities can be utilized. Have a success count as taking an hour to explore, and a failure means it takes two hours, costing another casting of water breathing for example.
Just going by RAW, exploring an underwater dungeon, you would have an insane amount of DC 10 Swim checks completely bogging down play. Anyone Trained in Athletics will very quickly never fail (unless rolling 1), and score a critical half the time.
Perhaps the easiest solution is to give a number of +5 bonuses based on his or her proficiency:
If Trained, you gain the +5 movement bonus once each round. A regular character (Speed 25) would move 15+10+10=35 feet per round.
This assumes an Athletics of about +7 (crit success a third of the time)
If Expert, you gain the +5 movement bonus twice per round. A regular character (Speed 25) would move 15+15+10=40 feet per round.
This assumes an Athletics of about +14 (crit success two thirds of the time)
If Master, you gain the +5 movement bonus three times per round. A regular character (Speed 25) would move 15+10+10=45 feet per round.
This assumes an Athletics of about +20 (always crit success)
This implies the PCs are spending 3 actions each round to swim in exploration mode, but exploration mode activities state that such a rate is unsustainable over a long period of time. Also, it means the PCs are just moving, not looking for traps or investigating the writing in the halls or sneaking around or anything else. I'd modify it as follows:
If they want to hustle underwater (just moving), set their speed to 200 feet per minute untrained, 225 feet per minute trained, 250 feet per minute expert, and 300 feet per minute master.
If they are swimming and doing something else (sneaking, searching, etc) halve the values above rounding down (100/110/125/150).
These assume speeds of 20-25 feet per round, and uses similar assumptions on bonuses as you have, but gives options for varying speeds while also trying to interact with the underwater environment.
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Don't ask for rolls if the results don't matter. If they are in combat, then the results of their swim checks matter. If they aren't in combat, or in danger of drowning, or racing a ticking clock, then it doesn't matter.Dont' be dismissive. I didn't start this thread to hear "do nothing everything is perfect as is".
He wasn't being dismissive, he was giving you good advice on an alternative course of action.
I just really don't fathom what the problem trying to be fixed isYet you attack the question, polluting the thread, instead of asking for clarifications. Don't expect any replies from me.
You're the only person I'm seeing polluting his own thread with unnecessary hostility. It's perfectly allowed for a person to state that they don't understand. Please take a breath. If you really don't believe a poster is being helpful then just ignore them, or report them and let the moderators sort it out if you really feel it necessary.
If somebody is trolling (and I'm not saying that anyone here is), then engaging them in the manner you seem to be doing is simply feeding into it. Don't ever do that. Often times it's just a baited trap.
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It isn't actually 3 swim checks every round of combat, it is a swim check every time you move. Which is mostly just going to matter for your melee characters. So there are a lot of ways to avoid this being a problem
Don't make the dungeon super big and spread out.
Don't use enemies with ranged kiting tactics.
Encourage your players to invest in some of the varied options available, like Assurance, Sea Touch Elixirs, Quick Swim, potions of swimming... Really Assurance Athletics solves this entirely. It works for any character trained in athletics at any level but is already a great choice for melee types. And they can always retrain it afterwards if they don't want to keep it.
It just seems like there are a lot of options you can use before resorting to convoluted house rules.
In combat swim checks are fine, just use exploration mode activities it is why there are there. 1 check for every 10 minutes to an hour of travel (look at how they handled hiking or stretches of climbing in examples).
Mate,you are saying you want RAW and are throwing out RAW and houserules as an option.
You aren't going to be happy with assurance options because it rules out crit successes for a good while.
You mentioned prerolling, but that has its own issues as a player can easily plan around results.
If your players have trouble seeing the dice, use a mobile roller. As it is a set of static DCs you can just write down the numbers needed to hit them and ignore the modifier.
E.g. a +10 athletics is an auto success on all but a 1 and a crit on a 20 for still waters.
I want to get rid of the Swim checks that you would make up to three times every round of every combat (in a dungeon completely waterfilled). Rolling that many extra dice bogs down combat; not knowing before each action if you're going to get anywhere means decision-making gets more complex, also slowing down combat.
I feel the Swim rules are made for exceptional cases, when rolling a whole truckload of extra dice is insignificant; not when every round of every combat would call for them.
The alternative would be to just give them a Swim speed and be done with it. The alternative is not rolling that many extra dice - PF2 combat is already complex as is.
So I'm gonna ask again...
...if you feel gaining the +5 movement bonus once each round if your Athletics is +7 or lower, gaining the +5 movement bonus twice per round if your Athletics is +13 or lower, and gaining the +5 movement bonus every Stride/Swim action otherwise would work with no unforeseen consequences? Or if you have a better rules simplification that actually cuts down on the die rolls?
1) Give them Potions of Swimming or Sea-Touched Elixirs to use in combat. Gives them a swim speed that'll last until combat is over. If the Athletic-based characters don't wanna use them, that's on them.
2) If your Athletics-based characters are asking to make checks and you don't want to deal with it, tell them it isn't necessary but introduce elements in the dungeon that'll be interesting for the Athletics-based characters to try out (moving objects around, solving a puzzle requiring high Athletics, etc.).
3) Or just limit it to one roll per combat, and if they complain 'cause they wanna fish for crits, tell them you don't want to bog down the game with rolls, and if they want to move more, just drink the Potion/Elixir and be done with it.
It sounds like you need to have an honest conversation with your players about your frustrations with the swimming mechanic, and how everyone needs to agree to a type of compromise. If that's not relevant, then I don't know what you want to hear other than "Sure, that houserule sounds fine."
At DC 10 Assurance crit succeeds at level 6 for an expert or level 8 for a trained character. what level is this anyway? Because if they are casting 3rd level spells they have to be pretty close. Really seems like encouraging players, or at least melee players, to take Assurance solves this to me. Get some swim fins too and you're moving 20 feet an action no rolling involved. Everybody wins. Retrain when you're done.
Give them a free Boon that gives them assurance on Swim checks. It can be crash training for adventure or could be effect of party magic item, or magic seaweed.
Or let them roll swim check at first move. If they succeed at the check they get the success effect. However, for each point over a success they make that many tics. They can mark off a tick each time they move, and not have to roll while they have ticks. If they get a critical success, they get the effects of a critical success for that movement, ten regular movement ticks, and a critical tick for each point they exceeded the needed roll by. You can only spend a critical tick once per round.
This greatly reduces the number of rolls and and increases movement reliabilities, but it sounds like what you want.
Alternately, have them roll once a round. Let them have 5’ less than the rolled effect as a movement option that doesn’t require a swim check for action after first if they want.
Certainly, allow the players to prerogatives their swim checks ahead of time. I don’t know that the meta gaming concern of people choosing to forgo movement if they failed the roll is that serious a problem. True it stops it from eating an action, but it still limits their actions. Note, they wouldn’t be allowed to say use a different second non-move action, when they fail the second roll, and claim they are going to use third roll for their third action.
I think however, the intent was to make people invest in feats or resources, or have to find their movement less reliable in water. It gives a tangible value to getting a resource that will grant you a swim speed. If that isn’t working out fun for you and/or your players, curtail it some by reducing how often you have to roll. But I’d recommend you don’t completely get rid of the rolls completely. But, yes that is just my opinion. :)
If they get a critical success, they get the effects of a critical success for that movement, ten regular movement ticks, and a critical tick for each point they exceeded the needed roll by. You can only spend a critical tick once per round.
I think this needs some clarification.
If the DC is 8 and they roll a 22, how many regular and critical ticks to they get?
As written they would get either 10 or 140 regular ticks and 14 critical ticks. I would have expected 10 regular and 4 critical.
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It doesn't surprise me I managed to make that too ambiguous. I remember thinking about both options. Had thought I'd rewritten it. I'd originally thought about as being 10 and four, but was concerned about what happened if someone exceeded a critical success by 11, they would have less normal tick's than critical, and with the rule of only one critical spent per round they would run out of regular ones before the critical.
So either would be an acceptable interpretation, depending on what works best for your group's needs. However, I had been leaning towards 14 regular ticks, and 4 critical ticks. Alternately, you could rule if when you first rolled you have more critical ticks than normal ticks, it bumps the max number of critical ticks you can spend per round to 2. (alternately, if they are rolling that high, they must have invested in it, just either assure them of critical results, or assure them of normal results as a minimum and don't track ticks for the, just track ticks for number of critical successes)
Oh, and for clarification, I'd allow someone to make independent rolls, but they wouldn't get to re-roll their roll that grants ticks until they use up all what they have. (no rapid fishing/re-rolling until you get a critical success to use a bunch of critical ticks)
Other item that occurred to me, if subjected to a misfortune effect, forcing them to re-roll, they can use a tick for their 'base' first roll, but would have to actually make a roll for that movement. My inclination isn't to allow them to spend two ticks on it.
Again, the purpose being to, as the OP wanted, reduce the number of rolls that are Necessary, but not eliminate them altogether, and try to make turns go by faster.
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I note that so far not a single poster has actually given an on-topic answer.
Eight posters had given you on topic answers. The topic is swim checks, eight posters had engaged with you on that topic when you posted this dismissive statement.. You don't appear to like what they have said to you because everyone has suggested a remedy that differs from your bonus to movement mechanic, but that doesn't make them "off topic."