[3.5] Travel Devotion - Your Thoughts?

[Donutfiend84]

A question about the 3.5 feat Travel Devotion. I have a player using it in my game, and I'm not sure if we are breaking the ability or not. House rule is usually, if its fun/cool and isn't breaking anything, then go for it, but I think the way we are running this is going to break things, particularly at higher levels.

That being said, how do you guys run this? Does it provoke attacks of opp? Move actions provoke, but swift actions usually don't. What about climbing? (ladders, ropes, or even jumping up a bit at a time, like onto a table, or stacked boxes)

I would hate to run the feat one way, and suddenly change up the rules on it months into the campaign, so I figure Id get your thoughts before giving a final ruling. Currently, I'm pretty lenient on its uses. Is this going to backfire on me later?

[Urpriest]

If it hasn't backfired on you now, it won't later. The feat gets less (relatively) powerful as you go up in level, not more.

That said, I would argue that it still provokes. I've found support that swift action spells don't provoke, but I can't find any ruling that says that swift actions don't provoke in general.

You should be able to use the movement for climbing, jumping, tumbling, and the like, since those are normal parts of normal movement.

[Curmudgeon]

It's not "move actions" that provoke attacks of opportunity: it's just movement out of a threatened square.
Moving out of a threatened square usually provokes an attack of opportunity from the threatening opponent. Because of the way that rule is phrased you need a specific statement that a form of movement (like a 5' step) doesn't provoke, because the default is that movement does provoke. Even moving by some other agency, as for instance being bull rushed, provokes AoOs; in that case you're not taking an action and it isn't even your turn.

So yes, Travel Devotion movement in the form of swift actions provokes just like other movement.

[Answerer]

Yeah, Travel Devotion's movement should provoke. And the feat's not broken; it's actually a huge balancing factor to help bring (non-initiating) martial characters up to par (or, closer, anyway).

[Zaq]

Agreed, TD provokes.

Do you rule it that the swift action it takes to turn the ability on ("Once per day as a swift action, you can activate this ability to move up to your speed as a swift action each round . . .") also lets you move your speed? Or do you rule it that you spend a swift action on round 1 to turn it on, and then you spend your swift actions on rounds 2-11 (or maybe 2-10, not sure) to move? I've always read that as ambiguous.

[Righteous Doggy]

I never rule that it provokes. Someone just spontaneously teleported, how is someone going to strike against that!? and he didn't move out, he just sorta... vanished? Anyways, there are a dozen ways to teleport. I don't see it as too breaking unless a player is deliberately trying to throw the rails to break the game on purpose.

[Curmudgeon]

I never rule that it provokes. Someone just spontaneously teleported, how is someone going to strike against that!? and he didn't move out, he just sorta... vanished?
I believe you're thinking of some other ability, like maybe Abrupt Jaunt. There's no teleportation with Travel Devotion; as the name suggests, you're actually traveling (moving). You're correct that teleportation isn't moving, but that doesn't apply here.

[Righteous Doggy]

I believe you're thinking of some other ability, like maybe Abrupt Jaunt. There's no teleportation with Travel Devotion; as the name suggests, you're actually traveling (moving). You're correct that teleportation isn't moving, but that doesn't apply here.

Ahh, I see. Thats interesting. In that case its even less gamebreaking than say a shadow hand manuever. Trippy though, the idea of someone suddenly moving 30/40/60 ft in a direction in less than a second. I still wouldn't give it an AoO, its limited use and its not as fun to make rolls at every chance against players.

[Answerer]

No specific time is actually given to Swift Actions (or any other action); it's true that they're shorter than Move or Standard Actions, and longer than Free Actions, but that doesn't really tell you a whole lot anyway.

Though, of course, moving that fast is pretty reasonable within the scope of things you can do in 3.5.

As for limited use, it's not very limited (which is why it's so wonderful): (1+Turn Undead uses) times per day, you can activate it to move as a Swift for the next minute. Even with 10 Cha, that's enough to cover all of the standard encounters for a day.

[FMArthur]

The first turn activation actually makes it unappealling on most of the characters I consider it on when building one. It's a great feat but it's not a catch-all solution to melee movement due to its limitations and restricted uses.

[RagnaroksChosen]

I don't know if this is correct but we have always ruled that activating travel devotion doesn't provoke but the movement you get does. A lot of players I've played with generally tumble for the extra movement to not provoke.

Don't know if this is correct or not but I figured I would throw in my 2 cp.

[Donutfiend84]

Seems like a pretty even split of does vs doesn't provoke. As long as it's not going to break anything later, I'll prob keep it the way I've been running it so far. (not provoking)

Just from a flavor standpoint, it seems to make sense to me.

[animewatcha]

I have nearly no knowledge of tome of battle except forums a bit. Specificly, that some manuevers allow AoOs on things that never provoke like 5-foot. Dragon mag has a feat ( was even a fighter bonus feat ) somewhere ( can't remember name off top of head ) that specifically allows AoOs on very specific things like casting a quickened spell or using quickened spell-like ability. So no. Normally, actions done as part of swift ( like the movement of travel devotion ) don't provoke unless feat/ability specificly called it out.

[Namfuak]

I have another question - the text for travel devotion says you "move up to your speed." Does that include extraordinary and magical sources of speed? For example, if I have a burrow speed of 20 ft, and someone casts fly on me, could I choose to burrow 20 ft or fly 30 ft with this swift action?

[animewatcha]

Unless errata somewhere elsewhere, that speed means any speed period. Usually, movement speeds are called out specifically ( land speeds for example ). Just like how monk's unarmored speed bonus increases all speeds.

Odd idea comes to mind for a monk doing bicycle kick or hurricane kick or something at once. Combining swift action with full attack

[Curmudgeon]

As for limited use, it's not very limited (which is why it's so wonderful): (1+Turn Undead uses) times per day, you can activate it to move as a Swift for the next minute. Even with 10 Cha, that's enough to cover all of the standard encounters for a day.
Your memory may be playing tricks on you, because it costs two undead turn attempts for each new use of Travel Devotion. 10 CHA will only get you a second daily use.

[Answerer]

Your memory may be playing tricks on you, because it costs two undead turn attempts for each new use of Travel Devotion. 10 CHA will only get you a second daily use.
Aha, you're right, forgot about that. Still, then you need Cha 16; that's not so hard to get.

[Righteous Doggy]

Aha, you're right, forgot about that. Still, then you need Cha 16; that's not so hard to get.

Well, depending on your class and what you want...

[FMArthur]

Oh I didn't know provoking/not-provoking was still even an issue being discussed. It provokes. You're taking extra movement, and even movements that require no action on your part still provoke. The fact of it being a Swift action is pretty much irrelevant. The precedent set by spells and abilities that also use the same action have nothing to do with the rule about movement provoking.

[ericgrau]

Whether or not something is overpowered depends on your gaming group. "Imbalance" only happens when it is much stronger than everything else, and that depends on everything else. Being able to both move and take full round actions is a bit strong. Swift actions in general are strong compared to having no swift action; it's doing more for free since in combat time is the biggest bottle neck. So there are actually 2 steps here: (1) How many of your players use swift actions for things other than quickened spells (but including "swift" spells)? If everyone's already using swifts then travel devotion isn't as big of a step up from the norm. (2) How does movement, and thus allowing a full round action where it would not ordinarily be possible, compare to the other swift actions that your gaming group uses and allows?

While travel devotion itself doesn't get any stronger at higher levels, the full round actions you can combo it with might get better. Consider which direction the player is going towards and what that will mean for him.

Regardless of what you think of the classes I don't believe that ability tax should ever be used as a balancing method. Give it for free to everyone or don't give it at all. Ability tax forces people to take those options instead of others just to keep up, pigeon holing them into doing one thing. Abilities should only be compared to other similar abilities. Period.

[animewatcha]

I tried pouring through the books and found that there was one or two that 'worded' it a bit differently instead of straight copy and paste all the time. I likely was mixing it up due to such. Sorry.