A straight reading of the movement rules notes that you stop your current Stride/Climb/Fly/Burrow when you want to change movement types (crb 463). However, uneven and difficult terrain do not specify an end to your current Stride. It would seem that if you can clear the narrow or Uneven terrain in a single Stride you get to ignore the Balance check altogether. For instance if there is a 20ft long narrow ledge and you have 30ft of movement you can walk across the ledge and make it to the other side without ever balancing.
For uneven ground it says "Uneven ground is an area unsteady enough that you need to Balance (see Acrobatics) or risk falling prone and possibly injuring yourself, depending on the specifics of the uneven ground. You are flat-footed on uneven ground. Each time you are hit by an attack or fail a save on uneven ground, you must succeed at a Reflex save (with the same DC as the Acrobatics check to Balance) or fall prone." Narrow surface reads similarly. You'll note that it lacks enabling language to force a balance check when entering the terrain type. I could see a GM ruling that you either stop and have to make a balance check or you get a free balance check and finish your Stride. Seems a very ambiguous rules situation regardless.
Looks more like the terrain does trigger it. 'Unsteady enough that you need to Balance ... or risk falling prone. ... ' looks like the check is set when you go into it. Step into the oil slick and you're rolling for Balance. Ice patch? Balance. Ground turns into rail? Balance. Think of it as that the terrain gets unlimited reactions to force anyone stepping in them to roll Balance checks.
Which is probably what makes it appealing to drop that oil slick in front of a charging barbarian.
There isn't enabling language like there is for other terrain types and there are specific rules for what ends a movement. It wouldn't really be an issue if Balance didn't have the requirement that you were starting a movement in uneven or narrow terrain.
The Acrobatics skill has it covered if you want to try 'enabling language'. Requirements: You are in a square that contains the fun stuff.
Like it says to do, see Acrobatics. Page 240 of my version.
Look very carefully, it says "Risk falling prone". Because it says risk you don't immediately fall prone if you don't do a Balance action. Compare the language of Narrow Surfaces and Uneven terrain to Inclines.
"An incline is an area so steep that you need to Climb using the Athletics skill in order to progress upward. You’re flat-footed when Climbing an incline."
If there's still movement left in a Stride, there's nothing that says your stride stops when entering either of the two terrains that require Balance checks. Inclines trigger the rules for changing movement type (climb vs walk/run), but these rules seemingly do not apply to Narrow Surfaces and Uneven Ground.
I did. The risk is measured by the Balance check. After all, you might succeed. Someone with a +10 to Acrobatics is risking less than someone with a -1. If you choose to not make your Balance check, then you fail it and take its consequences. You are choosing to fall on your rump when you slip on the ice, or fall off the rail instead of balancing.
You're now going into the 'too good to be true' realm. Never forget this bit from page 444: 'Sometimes a rule could be interpreted multiple ways. If one version is too good to be true, it probably is.'
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The risk of falling prone is in the Balance actions. It's not saying "Use the Balance action or fall prone." It's saying "The use of the Balance action has the risk of falling prone."
You would need to stride into the uneven ground, stop the stride, and start Balancing. Balance allows you to Stride as part of the action, so as long as they succeed they will continue moving.
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I think the idea is (but it's not wonderfully well-articulated), that on terrain where you need to Balance, you can't safely stride without Balancing.
Narrow Surfaces
A narrow surface is so precariously thin that you need to
Balance (see Acrobatics on page 240) or risk falling. Even
on a success, you are flat-footed on a narrow surface.
Each time you are hit by an attack or fail a save on a
narrow surface, you must succeed at a Reflex save (with
the same DC as the Acrobatics check to Balance) or fall.Uneven Ground
Uneven ground is an area unsteady enough that you need
to Balance (see Acrobatics on page 240) or risk falling
prone and possibly injuring yourself, depending on the
specifics of the uneven ground. You are flat-footed on
uneven ground. Each time you are hit by an attack or
fail a save on uneven ground, you must succeed at a
Reflex save (with the same DC as the Acrobatics check to
Balance) or fall prone.
So what happens if you move in without trying to Balance? Looks like you automatically fall. (Which, going off the Balance Failure entry, probably ends your turn.)
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Balance is a move action. I would say if you don't balance you don't make a skill check and immediately crit fail and fall. Steady Balance makes balance easier and removes Flat Footed.
A crit success on Balance lets you move normally. Steady Balance makes Successes into crits.
A success lets you treat it as difficult terrain. This can be mitigated by abilities or items that let you ignore difficult terrain.
A fail means you start slipping but catch yourself, making no progress.
A crit fail means you fall.
If you make no attempt to Balance, you're going to lose your footing and fall. The action is meant to represent your ability to keep your footing when moving over uneven ground and should not be ignored.
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The presence of the action icon leads me to believe that, upon entering unstable terrain, you need to stop your Stride and then spend an action to transition to a Balance action, much like climbing or swimming.
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The presence of the action icon leads me to believe that, upon entering unstable terrain, you need to stop your Stride and then spend an action to transition to a Balance action, much like climbing or swimming.
Or you begin your Balance action before you hit the terrain, depending on which will give better progress. Jumping can often be the best bet too, especially w/ the free leaping distance in PF2. Jump over that quagmire.
And I think it'd be best to have them roll once and apply the results to each terrain/balance issues as it arises.
Or you begin your Balance action before you hit the terrain, depending on which will give better progress. Jumping can often be the best bet too, especially w/ the free leaping distance in PF2. Jump over that quagmire.
And I think it'd be best to have them roll once and apply the results to each terrain/balance issues as it arises.
Alas, the action requires you to start your turn in the narrow/uneven terrain. Which is why I raised the question in the first place. If you start 5 feet out from a ledge, you have to essentially waste an action stepping onto the ledge/uneven terrain, which is just ludicrous. If the rules are too bad to be true, we surely must be doing something wrong. Uneven cobblestones could in theory stop you if you start down a street with shoddy maintenance.
That is strange. There will be instances where you'll be faster because you began in an awkward square. :/
Also it doesn't address multiple terrains w/ different DCs very well.
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Also it implies that if you can't Balance first to enter a problematic area, that you're always first gonna faceplant after using a regular Stride/Step to walk in, and only then can stand up and gingerly continue.
Looks like this skill use is defective. There are some possible interpretations that fix it:
1) You're allowed to start Balancing outside problematic areas. You move at the modified speed in any (suspected) problematic terrain and must make the check as soon as you actually move in problematic terrain. Balancing isn't a Stride or Step, it's its own special type of move action. Effectively, we drop/relax the Requirements line in the action. If you have enough movement to move from one type of problematic terrain into another using one action, we should probably re-evaluate your success based on the DC of the new terrain entered.
2) Balancing isn't an action of its own, but a modification to a Step or Stride. If your Stride or Step or other kind of movement would take you into a problematic area, you need to start Balancing. This does mean that you could use Balance inside activities like Sudden Charge.
Overall I think 1) is much closer to the design intent.
Thread necro! Having decided that as written you all were probably correct about stopping movement as much trouble as I have with that thought. It came up today with a grease spell.
There, if you're moving into the grease you must "attempt either a Reflex save or an Acrobatics check to Balance". This is a terrible choice to use the acrobatics. It's possible that your acrobatics is better, but enough to lose an action over? Seems to me that another solution is to make balance a free action. That way you can start it whenever you need to.
Phrased that way it sounds like the movement in triggers the save or check, not that one must separately spend an action to move in or on. This doesn't sound like it breaks a Stride at all. More like it's in the Reaction category in that it interrupts, not that it's requiring an actual Reaction. Plus there's PF2's non-lawyerly phrasing, where Paizo may be assuming we're reading this straightforward rather than rigorously parsing it. PC moves into difficult terrain so makes a save/check, and with no mention of spending another action to do so, the PC doesn't.
Also, think of all the shenanigans if there's difficult terrain that one can't discern, i.e. invisible detritus. Or worse, there could be sentient plant roots that hinder you only after you move 5', not when you stand still. So technically you aren't in difficult terrain to qualify to begin Balance, so enter difficult terrain once you move, burning 2 actions every movement, making it worse that greater difficult terrain. If there's a different difficult terrain after that first 5', it may also ask for a check/save and it'd be silly to burn one's third action there.
I think heroes should be able to Sudden Charge in such conditions, if they're agile enough to maneuver through the terrain that is.
Well, maybe, but then we should probably remove the action symbol from Balance and make it a modifier on Stride. Right now it's its own special kind of move.
Yes, because how it is now could lead to immense differences in how far one progresses over comparable terrain (et al) depending on when one hits that terrain (and not by how much of that terrain they'll traverse).
Though I could see it keeping its action tag, yet also having a notation about mid-Stride activation.
The prereq bugs me too, makes it better in many cases to start one's move action (perhaps intentionally) within a more difficult situation in order to go further.
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I really think the requirement is wrong.
If you're required to already be on uneven terrain to start Balancing, it means you can't be Balancing when you enter it. But as far as we're able to determine, the idea is that entering uneven terrain without trying to Balance should cause you to faceplant.
So how are you supposed to actually get into uneven terrain to start Balancing?
I really think the requirement is wrong. I think they did intend you to have to use a special move action to Balance, not just modify a Stride. Uneven terrain should be usable to block people from charging you.
In the PF1 sense of charge, I agree uneven terrain should work. Except PF2 lacks the language re: running & charging other than Sudden Charge. Yet Sudden Charge is hardly running straight at your opponent anymore, since you can spiral around them, move in a wiggly line through banks of their defenders, or be hampered by severe movement penalties to where you can barely move. And those are all "charges" in their own way, even if using Mobility or other ability that modifies Stride (passively, not as a separate action).
I do not know if Paizo is trying to mirror the "no running or charging" aspects of certain PF1 terrain/obstacles. I've been wondering due to potential conversions of PF1 APs.
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I really think the requirement is wrong.I'm not sure that's the issue. The main problem IMO is that the movement=action system is clunky when dealing with the environment. Stuff like switching movement types or opening a door or most anything ends your current move action even if you have movement left.
This is hard to avoid without making the action even more granular. It used to be much worse in 1E where you could only move up to a door and open it - now you could move up to a door, open it, and step through all in one turn. Because we're now using 3 basic actions instead of the 1.5 basic actions we had in 1E.
OTOH, overly granular systems where some actions cost 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 actions make it harder to learn what everything costs. The idea that almost everything you do with an object is 1 Interact action really simplifies things.
Not sure why you've determined that tbh, I see nothing in the rules that supports that.If you're required to already be on uneven terrain to start Balancing, it means you can't be Balancing when you enter it. But as far as we're able to determine, the idea is that entering uneven terrain without trying to Balance should cause you to faceplant.
So how are you supposed to actually get into uneven terrain to start Balancing?
The Balance action requires you to be in problematic terrain to activate it.
Problematic terrain says bad things will happen if you move into it without Balancing.
This is a chicken and egg problem.
Phrased that way it sounds like the movement in triggers the save or check, not that one must separately spend an action to move in or on. This doesn't sound like it breaks a Stride at all. More like it's in the Reaction category in that it interrupts, not that it's requiring an actual Reaction. Plus there's PF2's non-lawyerly phrasing, where Paizo may be assuming we're reading this straightforward rather than rigorously parsing it. PC moves into difficult terrain so makes a save/check, and with no mention of spending another action to do so, the PC doesn't
That is the biggest problem with grease's language. It doesn't include a comma before the or, so the reflex save could be a special balance action; it could also ignore the action requirement and simply be done during the stride. Balance is capitalized though making it the single-action skill use, no getting around that.
By the way, the appendix about uneven terrain and narrow terrain says that you must balance to cross the terrain. So at least there it's definitive.
Phrased that way it sounds like the movement in triggers the save or check, not that one must separately spend an action to move in or on. This doesn't sound like it breaks a Stride at all. More like it's in the Reaction category in that it interrupts, not that it's requiring an actual Reaction. Plus there's PF2's non-lawyerly phrasing, where Paizo may be assuming we're reading this straightforward rather than rigorously parsing it. PC moves into difficult terrain so makes a save/check, and with no mention of spending another action to do so, the PC doesn'tThat is the biggest problem with grease's language. It doesn't include a comma before the or, so the reflex save could be a special balance action; it could also ignore the action requirement and simply be done during the stride. Balance is capitalized though making it the single-action skill use, no getting around that.
By the way, the appendix about uneven terrain and narrow terrain says that you must balance to cross the terrain. So at least there it's definitive.
The trouble with the appendix is PCs can't Balance until in the terrain they need to Balance to cross. Balance's prereqs (and perhaps the action-tag) need some clarification or an addendum.
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The Balance action requires you to be in problematic terrain to activate it.
Problematic terrain says bad things will happen if you move into it without Balancing.
This is a chicken and egg problem.
It really doesn't. And I'm not sure why you would think so.
It says you need to balance or risk falling so do that, why make it more difficult than it need to be?
Look at Balance:
Balance Single Action
Move
Requirements You are in a square that contains a narrow surface, uneven ground, or another similar feature.
You can't begin the Balance action unless you meet the requirements. So you have to already be in problematic terrain.
So the problem is, how do you get in there when you're not allowed to Balance first?
So the problem is, how do you get in there when you're not allowed to Balance first?
Nothing is stopping you from jumping into it. ;)