How good is Sudden Leap (Tiger Claw maneuver) at higher levels?

[danzibr]

I'm looking for things to swap out in my current Warblade build (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=229656), and I currently plan on switching out Sudden Leap, but is it something I should hold onto? I've never played a Warblade at high levels.

[Greenish]

On higher levels, your full attack may well do more damage than most any of your strikes. Full attack, obviously, requires you to have the enemy within reach. Sudden Leap is swift action movement.

[Tavor]

It is a nice low level maneuver. However, it does use a swift action. Alot of magic items need those to be activated. You also have Leap Attack and Pouncing Charge, so jumping while attacking is covered already.

If you are desperate for mobility you might want to pick up one of the Shadow Hand maneuvers with a feat, your build should be able to squeeze that in. But I do not think you will need that, especially not if you get supported or already picked magic items which will allow for swift action movement.

My verdict ist you will not miss Sudden Leap at high level.

edit: Greenish brings up a valid point. This depends on the metagame a bit: How many enemies that matter are you going to attack/combat? How will your team aid you with mobility? I already tackled the magic item movement above.

[Heliomance]

Combine with Battle Jump from Unapproachable East, so that whenever you drop from 5 feet above your opponent's head (doable with a good enough jump check) you get a free charge. Add pounce by any of various methods, and you've got two full attacks in one round!

[DeAnno]

Depends on your want for full attacks and your swift action dependency. If you are mainly based on strikes, boosts and counters, it will not be very good. Sudden Leap is usually better for mixed Warblades which are more about trying to enable normal melee.

[Eurus]

Frustratingly, your Sudden Leap will usually count as a non-running jump, which doubles the DC unless I'm forgetting something. So it's actually pretty tough to get much movement out of it.

[Seharvepernfan]

Frustratingly, your Sudden Leap will usually count as a non-running jump, which doubles the DC unless I'm forgetting something. So it's actually pretty tough to get much movement out of it.

Yeah, that's been my problem with it. Even with a +30 to jump, if you roll a 10 thats still only 20ft.

[HunterOfJello]

It can still be good. It's one of the few that can still be very useful at high levels. Jump is a very easy skill to boost up and getting 10-15ft of movement from a swift action can be very useful at any level. Since full-attacks get better at higher levels, Sudden Leap becomes even more useful then than at lower levels.

[FMArthur]

Being a Goliath, taking the Leap of the Heavens feat or simply using the Leaping Dragon Stance are easy ways to get Sudden Leap and other Jump-related maneuvers up and running without any running required. There might be a magic item for it, but I'm not sure. Ninja level 4 also grants it, and while that's obviously for a different type of character, there are probably some other classes that grant runless running jumps in the same way.

With any of that, or just with an obscene Jump check like Thri-Kreen get, you can be jumping well in excess of your ordinary movespeed with this one Swift action maneuver at high levels. I almost always take Sudden Leap and keep it when I make Warblades; it's useful at low level for quick short moves, mid-level for subbing for a regular move, and at high level for traversing the battlefield in addition to those. Proper mobility is one of the keys to a melee class being effective overall.

Because maneuvers are expended when you use them and you'll still want to move on to new targets after using your movement maneuver, it's still useful to keep Sudden Leap even when you've got Pouncing Charge (which is the worse maneuver in the end if you ask me) so that you can use both before refreshing.