How to avoid natural 1 disaster on UMD?

[ayvango]

I know about warlock. But 4th level is too deep to dip. Exemplar could take 10, but not on UMD. Is there any other way to get steady UMD? Maybe some magic items.

[TalonOfAnathrax]

There's always Luck feats, or the Luck Domain.

[Kaleph]

Lucky rerolls would help - you wouldn't always automatically succeed, but statistically you're quite confident about the result.

You can buy a mantle of second chance, and/or take some lucky feats from the complete scoundrel (there's even a magical location that provides one for free). The granted power of the lucky domain is also an option.

The best way to avoid sucking when rolling a natural 1, anyhow, is to boost your UMD modifier so that you activate the object also wirh a roll of 1.

[MisterKaws]

Yep, other than Warlock and Artificer your only choice is rerolls.

Actually, there's also Stance of Perfect Order, but that's a level 6 Crusader-only stance and requires Lawful alignment, so even more of an investment.

[Piggy Knowles]

Hardened Criminal from City of Stormreach might do the trick. Requires Iron Will as a pre-requisite.

[ayvango]

The best way to avoid sucking when rolling a natural 1, anyhow, is to boost your UMD modifier so that you activate the object also wirh a roll of 1.
UMD differs from other skills. It always fails on natural 1 and make using item impossible for 24 hours. So if you are going to use item heaps of times then you inevitable would get screwed.

[Kaleph]

UMD differs from other skills. It always fails on natural 1 and make using item impossible for 24 hours. So if you are going to use item heaps of times then you inevitable would get screwed.
This is a common misunderstanding. "If you ever roll a natural 1 while attempting to activate an item and you fail, then you can’t try to activate that item again for 24 hours.". Emphasis mine.
So, if you roll a natural 1 and you succeed, you suffer no ill effect.

[Mr Adventurer]

This is a common misunderstanding. "If you ever roll a natural 1 while attempting to activate an item and you fail, then you can’t try to activate that item again for 24 hours.". Emphasis mine.
So, if you roll a natural 1 and you succeed, you suffer no ill effect.

This.

Rogue Special Abilities at 10th and then every three level,s includes Skill Mastery as an option. It's a lot of levels but maybe you're already a rogue.

[Zaq]

This.

Rogue Special Abilities at 10th and then every three level,s includes Skill Mastery as an option. It's a lot of levels but maybe you're already a rogue.

Some people, including me, argue that it’s not “stress or distraction” that prevents taking 10 on UMD but rather a clause in the skill itself, so skill mastery doesn’t work on UMD unless you’ve got a special clause like the one warlock does. That said, the RAW can be a bit murky on this one, so I’ll concede that there’s room for discussion and for GM interpretation.

You can also look at Hardened Criminal in City of Stormreach (pg. 95), which has somewhat broader language than the standard skill mastery ability. It costs two feats, but that’s sometimes cheaper than the number of levels it might cost to get skill mastery.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

A skill check does not automatically fail on a natural 1, that's only for attack rolls and saving throws.

UMD itself has in the Try Again that if you roll a natural 1 and fail you can't activate it again for 24 hours. So just have a high enough overall bonus that even on a natural 1 you'll succeed.

Get an Item Familiar (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/magic/itemFamiliars.htm) and use invest skill ranks to add a bonus to UMD equal to your current ranks in it, and keep it at max ranks every level.

[Eldariel]

While boosting to a no fail zone is the easiest option, Artificer also bears mentioning. A heckuva level investment, yes, but as Artificer can literally be the best at everything, that isn't that big of a deal.

[the_david]

By not using UMD in the first place?

Okay, it's not the answer you're looking for, but you're trying to optimize UMD. That's not much of a build, and you might want to be effective in other things if you want something that's fun to play.

You could just go for a cleric, take the magic domain and now you can activate scrolls, wands and magic items with spell completion or spell trigger activation as a wizard of half your cleric level. It's not the same as UMD, but it's pretty good.

[King of Nowhere]

well, several DM houserule that a natural 1 is a failure also in skill checks, so assuming that you cannot avooid the failure just by having a high enough modifier...

you could just try having multiple copies of critical items. if you fail to activate one, you can always pick up the next.
Our party was without cleric for a while, and had to rely on a rogue UMDing wands. we just bough three wands, and it never happened that all 3 went inactive for 24 hours.
of course this may not be doable for the most expensive items, but should give you some reliability at least with the small stuff.

[Crake]

well, several DM houserule that a natural 1 is a failure also in skill checks, so assuming that you cannot avooid the failure just by having a high enough modifier...

This is a terrible rule and any DM that utilizes it should feel bad.

If this rule were the case, one in 20 olympic level swimmers would drown during competitions.

[ayvango]

That's not much of a build, and you might want to be effective in other things if you want something that's fun to play.

Maxing UMD is tiny part of build. It could be achieved easily with magic item. I has false assumption that natural 1 is always fail. But I was showed it is not really. So improving skill with roll should be enough.

Magic item of multiple bonuses (multiply lesser 1.5x for merging and multiply 2x for uncommon source):
+10 competence: 10k
+5 morale: 1.5 x 2 x 2.5k
+5 sacred: 1.5 x 2 x 2.5k
+5 luck: 1.5 x 2 x 2.5k
+5 insight 1.5 x 2 x 2.5k
total +30 bonus for 40k gold.

[the_david]

Maxing UMD is tiny part of build. It could be achieved easily with magic item. I has false assumption that natural 1 is always fail. But I was showed it is not really. So improving skill with roll should be enough.

Magic item of multiple bonuses (multiply lesser 1.5x for merging and multiply 2x for uncommon source):
+10 competence: 10k
+5 morale: 1.5 x 2 x 2.5k
+5 sacred: 1.5 x 2 x 2.5k
+5 luck: 1.5 x 2 x 2.5k
+5 insight 1.5 x 2 x 2.5k
total +30 bonus for 40k gold.
Sure, you could do that. If your DM is okay with that. And at level 10 that would leave you with about 9000 gold for all your other stuff. Jup. Great choice.

[King of Nowhere]

This is a terrible rule and any DM that utilizes it should feel bad.

If this rule were the case, one in 20 olympic level swimmers would drown during competitions.

the rule is sound if used by reasonable DM. your example is just an example on how to NOT apply that rule.

a better example would be that one in 20 olympic swimmers are going to have a cramp. Or 5% of the times a professional will perform much below his usual level.
"failure" doesn't need to mean "the worst thing that's remotely possible happens". Also, if you think there should be no realistic chance of failure, you should not ask for a skill check in the first place.

Personally, though, my favourite rule variant is that a natural 20 is a 30 and a natural 1 is a -10. Gives the chance to do real great stuff or real blunders every once in a while, but still rules out the most outlandish outcomes.

[Crake]

the rule is sound if used by reasonable DM. your example is just an example on how to NOT apply that rule.

a better example would be that one in 20 olympic swimmers are going to have a cramp. Or 5% of the times a professional will perform much below his usual level.
"failure" doesn't need to mean "the worst thing that's remotely possible happens". Also, if you think there should be no realistic chance of failure, you should not ask for a skill check in the first place.

Personally, though, my favourite rule variant is that a natural 20 is a 30 and a natural 1 is a -10. Gives the chance to do real great stuff or real blunders every once in a while, but still rules out the most outlandish outcomes.

Except that failure on a swim check indicates that you sink below the surface of the water. People don't have cramps one in twenty competitions. The +10/-10 rule is equally as bad, and the variant rule you're referencing is specifically for checks that would otherwise pass/fail on a natural 20/1, such as attack rolls and saves, not skill checks. Using that rule, someone with +14 swim, someone who could normally swim in rough waters without even having to roll on the dice, is now able to sink below the water on a natural 1 in calm waters. On the other hand, rolling a natural 20 in the same circumstance leads him to absolutely no benefit whatsoever, thus the rule is terrible because far more often you'll be worse off rolling a 1 than you will be better off rolling a 20. UMD is another particular example of why this is terrible, because you go from needing +19 to auto-activate wands to needing +29, concentration is another, where you now need an extra +10 to auto-pass defensive casting checks, and so on.

Don't use this rule unless you're happy for your PCs to experience three stooges syndrome.

[Thurbane]

Personally, though, my favourite rule variant is that a natural 20 is a 30 and a natural 1 is a -10. Gives the chance to do real great stuff or real blunders every once in a while, but still rules out the most outlandish outcomes.

We used that rule in our group for a while - even though it was intended for saves and attacks, we found it works pretty well with skills.