Vertical Distance - High Jump vs Long Jump: Am I missing something?

[Shin Okada]

Vertical Distance - High Jump vs Long Jump: Am I missing something?

Assuming the PC is making a running start,

High Jump
... A PC can leap up (result of an Athletics check /5) feet.

Long Jump
... Distance Cleared Vertically = one quarter of (result of an Athletics check /5) squares
= (result of an Athletics check /4) feet.

So, a PC can leap higher with a long jump?

 

[teachamath]

I stand corrected.

 

[Alabast]

without looking at the books but only at your math I see an error

1/4 of something divided by 5 seems to be a vertical jump of 1/20 athletics check

Be careful, appropriately named teachamath, he's using squares in some places and feet in others. I made the same mistake at first. I think the math is sound.

 

[Eldorian]

Vertical Distance - High Jump vs Long Jump: Am I missing something?

Assuming the PC is making a running start,

High Jump
... A PC can leap up (result of an Athletics check /5) feet.

Long Jump
... Distance Cleared Vertically = one quarter of (result of an Athletics check /5) squares
= (result of an Athletics check /4) feet.

So, a PC can leap higher with a long jump?

Distance cleared vertically is how far your feet get off the ground. Height of the vertical jump is how much higher you can get your hands.

Basically, the vertical jump is a slam dunk, and the long jump is a hurdle.

If you're trying to jump over something without touching it, you'd need to make a long jump anyways, because the vertical jump has no horizontal component.

 

[Rothe_]

It could work like the OP states, and then you'd just have to have room for the "long" jump, since the highest spot is in the middle of the jump. You could do a "high" jump without much space between the spot you actually leave the groud to the highest spot you need to clear.

It is not really that odd, it is just misleading. Most people would think that the most effective way to jump up is to jump straight up, and only read the high jump part when they have to jump up.

 

[Legildur]

...because the vertical jump has no horizontal component.

Didn't it used to have in 3.5E?

 

[ForbidenMaster]

Never mind.

 

[OakwoodDM]

So, a PC can leap higher with a long jump?

Maybe, but bear in mind that since the vertical component of a long jump is measured in squares, and rounded down to whole squares, a roll of 15 on your check gets you 3 feet up with a vertical jump, but 3 squares along and 0 up on a long jump (15/5 = 3, 3/4 = 0.75, round down to 0)...

 

[Camelot]

But 3 feet is 0 squares, so rounding they're the same thing, but precisely:

3 ft. / 5 ft. = .6 squares compared to .75 squares. The long jump gets you higher.

If you roll a 20 on both checks with a running start, you jump up 4 feet (.8 squares) or you jump 4 squares horizontally and 1 square vertically. Again, the long jump gets you higher.

Why is this? It does seem broken at first glance, but maybe it works because if you want to use a long jump to jump up, you need room, so if the DM wants to make it higher, he doesn't give you enough room to make a long jump to reach the dangling rope.

 

[OakwoodDM]

But 3 feet is 0 squares, so rounding they're the same thing,

Well, yes, but the point I was making is that with the high jump, it's not measured in squares, it's measured in feet, so in theory, you get higher in some circumstances.

Of course, it is wrong that if you were measuring them both on the same scale a long jump would take you higher than a high jump, and also peculiar that the two are measured in different scales, but I suppose it's because heights tend to be measured in feet (a 10 foot high wall) whereas most games will be using tiles or a battle mat, so measuring long jumps is easier done in squares.