Community

The problem with Use Rope in 3.5 is that it was worse than useless. It's very existence got in the way of the game. Want to toss that grappling hook? Did you take use Rope? Well, you can't, you should have taken it. What do you mean that you sunk those points in Swim so you wouldn't drown in three inches of water? Well, them's the breaks. you either take Use Rope and sleep with the fishes, or you accept that you will never be able to propel a metalic object over a wall without the use of a wizard.

Now, the good news was that my group could ignore it... right up until someone started taking the the damned thing. At that point, the DM had to start telling people "No, you can't do that eminently reasonable task, because that would make Ropey McRopington with his twelve ranks feel like an idiot."

The fact that Use Rope existed made every character more incompetent. Somehow, although you're journeying through untamed wilderness in hostile landscapes while forced to hold and transport hundreds of pounds of provisions and equipment, your character never picks up the skill without sinking limited resources into it. It's a marvel that the poor fighter with his 2 + dump stat mod skill points per level could tie his plate armor on in the morning, seeing as he had to put all those points in Jump to negate the -6 armor check penalty.

Now, this is more a rant against 3.x's system. Something where you're only going to ever get a +2 to a check from a skill modifier isn't that bad, and you can have these narrow-use options without making characters failures at anything they don't specialize in. But if you get beyond that, just no.

Nov 23, 2012 -- 4:02AM, Gustaveren wrote:

It is only if it is very difficult walls / cliff faces or situations with a lot of timed pressure were it is really critical you succeed on the first try

Which is where Ropey McRopington ruins everything. Never had to worry about tying ourselves to a pillar to avoid being sucked in that portal until he came along. Before, characters were competent.

But if Ropey McRopington gets a knife in his back, our rope smarts return!

Nov 23, 2012 -- 4:15AM, Gustaveren wrote:

It is not a game mechanic problem that your GM insist on high and not low DC's for that kind of rope use, but in general, the lack of a use rope skill would be a turn off for me regarding new rules

Except that if the GM does not take into account the guy who has a high Use Rope skill, any situation where Use Rope comes into play would make it so easy for him it'd likely *bore* him.

Nov 23, 2012 -- 4:42AM, Gustaveren wrote:

That is a gaming style issue. An easy task will have a low DC in my campaigns, a difficult task will have a high DC no matter what skills the players have.

It still doesn't stop the PC from rendering "high DC" as laughable, but this would result in a roundabout and futile debate anyway.  Let's just say that the way 3E's skill system -- and each edition of D&D in general -- is designed, it catered specifically to a certain style of play.

Nov 23, 2012 -- 3:53AM, CrowScape wrote:

The problem with Use Rope in 3.5 is that it was worse than useless. It's very existence got in the way of the game. Want to toss that grappling hook? Did you take use Rope? Well, you can't, you should have taken it.

Sure you could.  It was an untrained skill and throwing the grappling hook 20 feet was a DC 14 check.  Pretty easy to make even with no ranks in the skill.