Honeyed Words
2014-08-07, 03:58 PM
I'm playing a Rogue Tiefling with a long, thin tail.
Reloading With a Tail?
The character uses a hand crossbow, a few daggers, and a jacketed sap. My question is, if i have the Prehensile Tail feat, can i use said tail to reload the hand crossbow as a 'free' action instead of a move-equivalent action? The grounds being that a hand crossbow can be reloaded with one free hand... I keep a bolt case on my hip that assumedly the tail could draw bolts from and nock the crossbow. Fairly certain the answer is no, but seeing as the tail acts as a "third arm," it could very well be acceptable.
"Quickdraw" and Quickswapping?
Or perhaps, I could implement the tail to perform a sort of "quick swap" in combat. Example: I use a full round of combat to both fire, and reload my crossbow. When i announce my reload, i specify, too, that my tail is drawing a dagger from my belt. Upon next turn i pass the crossbow to my off hand and grasp the "tail-item", the dagger, as a free action since the tail (a 'third arm') is technically already wielding it. This would eliminate the need to take the Quickdraw feat for live combat situations, assuming i specified the action during the previous turn. I would still have to draw on a surprise round or if I was otherwise not prepared for combat.
Other Tall Tail Tales?
The tail would also come in handy for many other things, which is why i see it as a balanced trade off of the quickdraw feat.
For instance, a slight of tail check (a slight of hand check with a limb that my opposition was unaware of) would likely have bonuses.
Using the tail to loosen or even untie a restraint would lower the DC of an escape artist check or bypass it altogether. It already lists the prehensile tail's boost to climb and balance and other such acrobatics checks. The tail is quite helpful, if you're clever, but what sort of rules are in place to either improve or reduce these kinds of innovative role playing decisions?
Improved Trip, and My Tail?
I had once played a homebrew where a PC possessed a long thin tail, much like my own current tail. He used it to trip someone in a session. The DM called for a use rope check instead of your typical roll, against his touch. Upon success, the enemy rolls either a STR or a DEX like he typically would. At the time noone cared to analyze the semantics of the action, and we just let the house rule. Upon reflection, though, i felt that there must be a ruling on the "proper way" to handle this kind of character innovation. Firstly, this roll was too situational, in my opinion-- a tail gets half your STR and rolls with all the modifiers that implies when implemented. To trip someone with your tail ought to be the same roll as normal but with the reduced STR modifier in mind, and a failure wouldn't merit an attempt on the enemies part to trip YOU (seeing as he couldn't kick your tail out from underneath you). But in this case, he beat his DC by a landslide, having several ranks of use rope. The DM mentioned that using a tail of that nature required more of a "lasso and tug" than a "swing" and that made enough sense at the time. But, for the character i'm playing such an action would be strategic, if i can determine a check that makes sense.
Thusly, i was hoping someone could give me a ruling on this:
How the hell would i go about tripping someone with my prehensile tail?
Reloading With a Tail?
The character uses a hand crossbow, a few daggers, and a jacketed sap. My question is, if i have the Prehensile Tail feat, can i use said tail to reload the hand crossbow as a 'free' action instead of a move-equivalent action? The grounds being that a hand crossbow can be reloaded with one free hand... I keep a bolt case on my hip that assumedly the tail could draw bolts from and nock the crossbow. Fairly certain the answer is no, but seeing as the tail acts as a "third arm," it could very well be acceptable.
"Quickdraw" and Quickswapping?
Or perhaps, I could implement the tail to perform a sort of "quick swap" in combat. Example: I use a full round of combat to both fire, and reload my crossbow. When i announce my reload, i specify, too, that my tail is drawing a dagger from my belt. Upon next turn i pass the crossbow to my off hand and grasp the "tail-item", the dagger, as a free action since the tail (a 'third arm') is technically already wielding it. This would eliminate the need to take the Quickdraw feat for live combat situations, assuming i specified the action during the previous turn. I would still have to draw on a surprise round or if I was otherwise not prepared for combat.
Other Tall Tail Tales?
The tail would also come in handy for many other things, which is why i see it as a balanced trade off of the quickdraw feat.
For instance, a slight of tail check (a slight of hand check with a limb that my opposition was unaware of) would likely have bonuses.
Using the tail to loosen or even untie a restraint would lower the DC of an escape artist check or bypass it altogether. It already lists the prehensile tail's boost to climb and balance and other such acrobatics checks. The tail is quite helpful, if you're clever, but what sort of rules are in place to either improve or reduce these kinds of innovative role playing decisions?
Improved Trip, and My Tail?
I had once played a homebrew where a PC possessed a long thin tail, much like my own current tail. He used it to trip someone in a session. The DM called for a use rope check instead of your typical roll, against his touch. Upon success, the enemy rolls either a STR or a DEX like he typically would. At the time noone cared to analyze the semantics of the action, and we just let the house rule. Upon reflection, though, i felt that there must be a ruling on the "proper way" to handle this kind of character innovation. Firstly, this roll was too situational, in my opinion-- a tail gets half your STR and rolls with all the modifiers that implies when implemented. To trip someone with your tail ought to be the same roll as normal but with the reduced STR modifier in mind, and a failure wouldn't merit an attempt on the enemies part to trip YOU (seeing as he couldn't kick your tail out from underneath you). But in this case, he beat his DC by a landslide, having several ranks of use rope. The DM mentioned that using a tail of that nature required more of a "lasso and tug" than a "swing" and that made enough sense at the time. But, for the character i'm playing such an action would be strategic, if i can determine a check that makes sense.
Thusly, i was hoping someone could give me a ruling on this:
How the hell would i go about tripping someone with my prehensile tail?