The Process of Fixing Jump

[IGTN]

Principle 1: Jump needs to be a worthwhile way of getting around, and not a waste of skill points past about level 5.

Principle 2: A 1st level character should be able to manage a realistic jump.

So, let's set our baseline: A running long jump roll of 20 by a 1st level specialist (4 ranks, 18 str, and +5 from feats, total modifier +13) should match the world record. Since I don't care to go and actually look for a source I don't already have, I'll use this one, giving a world record just short of 30 feet.

So that gives 30 feet on a roll of 33. This is actually worse than in the PHB, so let's recalibrate so that we're designing a Jump skill that is clearly magical. Let's give the world record to a realistic 1st level monk PC. He doesn't put STR first, instead putting a 14 in it. He didn't put feats into his Jump skill, instead taking feats that made him better on the ground. This gives him a total modifier of +6.

To make the math easier, let's use a baseline DC of 25, for a jumping distance of 30 feet.

Now we need to scale it: The current system of linearly scaling it is, quite frankly, insulting. Each skill point you put in Jump is an extra foot you can clear with a running long jump. Are we seriously supposed to believe that obstacles are supposed to grow by only one foot in width per level?

Not to mention that epic characters can't even attempt truly epic jumps without having several feats to double their jumping distance and stacking them like crazy.

So, let's integrate that into the base skill. For every 5 points your check result increases by, your jumping distance doubles. Get rid of everything that doubles your jumping distance, and keep the old 3.0 rule about limiting your jumping distance by your height out.

Scaling this down, though, makes your jumps unrealistically short. So let's fix that, too, by not throwing away the SRD linear rule (Jumped distance = 1 foot * check result; count only complete squares). It turns out that the linear rule is better up to a result of 24, although at 23 they're about even.

Then, of course, all you need is the exponential table:
For a skill result of 23 to 32, your jumping distance is (30 feet) * 2^((check-25)/5). For a check result greater than 30, you take the last digit of your result and look up a match, then multiply by 4 for every 10 in the difference.

So, the table's first draft. Square values (the results you care about) are given in parentheses; these are rounded normally, not always down, since D&D never expects players to calculate exponential functions at the table; the actual distances are more relics than anything else:
24 26 feet (5 squares)
25 30 feet (6 squares)
26 34 feet (7 squares)
27 39 feet (8 squares)
28 46 feet (9 squares)
29 52 feet (10 squares)
30 60 feet (12 squares)
31 68 feet (14 squares)
32 80 feet (16 squares)
33 92 feet (18 squares)

Use square values, not actual distances, when computing jump distances for check results above 30.

---
This does what we want, but it's a bit clumsy for the game, considering that it has a look-up-the-last digit table that runs from 24 to 33.

So, let's fix this, by taking away the concrete distances and abstracting it further. As an added bonus, we can get rid of that pesky exponential function from the definition:

A Jump result of 20 or less jumps a number of squares equal to the check result divided by 5. A Jump result between 20 and 30 jumps 4 squares, plus one square per two points by which the jump check exceeds 20 (putting a 25 at a jumping distance of 6 squares, which is still what we wanted). A Jump result greater than 30 jumps 9 squares, plus one square per point by which the jump check exceeds 30; each additional 10 doubles the number of squares per point on the check.

Let's make the math even more convenient and assign a jumping distance of 9 squares to 29, and 10 squares to 30.

The results then look like this:
1-20: 1 square per 5
21-27: 4 squares, plus one square per 2 above 20
28-40: 1 square per 1 above 20
41-50: 20 squares, plus two squares per point above 40
51-crazytown: See 41 to 50, and double for every 10 above 40.

Doubling might be too crazy; instead, one could just add one square per point per 10 points (making it quadratic, rather than exponential); a jump result of 50 still covers 40 squares, but each additional point would be 3 squares (until a result of 60 covers 70 squares).

Other jumps are almost fine (jumping distance is halved, not the check result, for a standing jump), when based on the running long jump, except that high jumps that take you no higher than the peak of an equivalent long jump are insulting. To fix this, a high jump is straight up, and its height is 1/2 (not 1/4) the distance of an equivalent long jump. A running high jump includes a horizontal distance equal to either 1/2 of the vertical distance or the speed used to get a running start (a character with a land speed of 6 squares who moves 4 and jumps 24 squares into the air or more still moves 6 squares horizontally; the distance moved is irrelevant, only the speed used to do it is), whichever is less.

The distance travelled by a jump in its primary direction is a maximum; a jumper can voluntarily make a shorter jump. Kinda obvious, but not stated, and it avoids DM dickery.

Let's also add secondary direction reduction; a jumper might want to, for instance, hurl themselves directly forward, when, for example, they have a low ceiling above them. By taking a -4 penalty on the jump check (before making the check), a jumper can halve the distance covered in the secondary direction; each additional halving is a -2 penalty, and they stack in the normal way. So it's possible, at a penalty, to clear a chasm 40 feet across in a room with 10-foot ceilings (Assuming a vertical distance maximum of 2.5 feet, the penalty would be -6, so clearing the chasm would take a jump check of 34. A 20-foot chasm has a penalty of only -4, and so only takes a check result of 24).

Now that we have suitable epic jumping distances, we need to change the action type. Making it be part of a move, and eat movement speed, is insulting. There's no reason to jump at all unless something is in the way, and having points put in to "unless something is in the way" is horrible.

Jumping is a standard action, and allows you to move your jumping distance. A running jump is a full-round action, and allows you to move your land speed, plus your jumping distance. Jumping counts as running, but people with at least 5 ranks in Jump keep their dex to AC, and, if they have 5 ranks in both skills, can tumble at no penalty.

A jumping charge is just like a normal charge, except instead of a double move, you make a running jump.

Abilities that hand out obscene bonuses to Jump checks now have to get toned down, of course, since they were only balanced when they gave bonuses to a skill that made bonuses meaningless. Let's start with the Jump spell. Let's drop it to either one of:
A +CL bonus to Jump checks
or
A +5 bonus to the target's next jump check if running; or the target's next jump counts as running if standing.

Comments? Better fixes? Fixes for the rest? I was typing this to post as I thought of it, so you just read the entire revision and editing process for it.

---

Current version of the fix:

Jump (Str, Armor Check Penalty)

Check
You use the Jump skill to make jumps. The DC depends on the distance you want to cover and the kind of jump you are attempting.

Jumping is easiest with a running start; the DCs here assume a running start. A jump attempted without a running start suffers a -8 penalty.

If you succeed on your jump check, you land standing. If you land on difficult terrain, you must beat the DC to jump that distance by at least the factor by which it impedes movement (2 for normal difficult terrain, 4 for doubly difficult, and so on) and be trained, or land prone.

Long Jump
A long jump is a horizontal jump, made across a gap like a chasm or stream. At the midpoint of the jump, you attain a vertical height equal to one-quarter of the horizontal distance. A long jump must be made in a straight line.

When you decide to jump, you declare your destination, then roll your check. If you make the DC to jump to that destination, you land there; otherwise, you fall short, travelling the furthest distance possible with your check result.

If you fall one square short when clearing a pit, chasm, canyon, or similar obstruction, you may grab the edge with a DC 15 reflex save; this ends your turn. Getting up requires a DC 15 Climb check; attempting to do so is a move action; while hanging you are considered to be climbing.

Long Jump Distance Tables:
Check Result: Maximum Distance
1-20: 1 square per 5
21-27: 4 squares, plus one square per 2 above 20
28-40: 1 square per 1 above 20
41-50: 20 squares, plus two squares per point above 40
51-crazytown: See 41 to 50, and double for every 10 above 40.

Maximum Distance: DC
1-4 squares: Distance x5
5-8 squares: 12 + Distance x2
8-20 squares: 20 + Distance
21-40 squares: 30 + Distance/2 (round up)
41+ squares: Divide distance by 2 and round up repeatedly to get a number of squares less than 40, use that DC, add 10 for each doubling.

If you have a speed of 40 feet, increase these jumping distances by 1 square. If you have a speed of 45 feet or more, increase them by 2 squares for every 15 feet above 30.

High Jump
A high jump is a vertical leap made to reach a ledge high above or to grasp something overhead. The DC is the eight higher than for a long jump to clear the same distance.

If the check succeeds, you travel along the same horizontal line as you used to get a running start (if you did not have one, you land where you started) a distance equal to 1/2 of your jump height or your speed (of the type used to get a running start), whichever is greater.

Obviously, the difficulty of reaching a given height varies according to the size of the character or creature. The maximum vertical reach (height the creature can reach without jumping) for an average creature of a given size is shown on the table in the SRD entry. (As a Medium creature, a typical human can reach 8 feet without jumping.)

Quadrupedal creatures don’t have the same vertical reach as a bipedal creature; treat them as being one size category smaller.

Hop Up
As part of a normal land move, you may jump onto an object with a height equal to or less than the vertical reach of a character one size category smaller than you. This counts as 10' of movement and requires a DC 10 jump check, running start or no. A check result of at least 20 cuts the cost down to 5', and a check result of 25 removes the cost entirely.

Jumping Down
If you intentionally jump from a height, you take less damage than you would if you just fell. The base DC to jump down from a height is 15. You do not have to get a running start to jump down, so the DC is not doubled if you do not get a running start.

If you succeed on the check, you take falling damage as if you had dropped 10 fewer feet than you actually did. For every 5 by which you beat the DC, you can count the fall as being 10' shorter. This stacks with the reduction provided by Tumble. Even if you fail the check, the first 1d6 damage you take from jumping down is nonlethal. Your own jumps only cause fall damage for the difference in height between the start and endpoints, and only if the endpoint is lower (you may Jump Down as part of a regular jump to reduce this damage).

Jumping Straight
In some circumstances, a jumper may wish to make a jump straight ahead (for instance, when dealing with a dangerous ceiling), or straight up. By taking a -4 penalty on the jump check (before making the check), you can halve the distance covered in the secondary direction (vertically for long jumps, horizontally for long jumps); each additional halving is a -2 penalty, and they stack in the normal way (two halvings reduces it to 1/4, three to 1/8, and so on).

Action
A long or high jump can be made as a move action or as part of a move. Such a jump is considered Standing unless it is made with a running start of at least 20' in a straight line before the jump. A jump made as a move action clears the total distance of the jump; horizontal movement during a jump made as part of a move counts as movement speed (the height of a high jump made to clear an obstacle does not count as movement). If a jump action (a jump longer than would be allowed by movement speed) and a normal move are made in the same round, the movement given by the normal move may be distributed on either or both sides of the jump (i.e., a barbarian with 50' of movement can get a running start, jump 60' across a chasm as a move action, and then finish his original move on the other side).

A Hop Up is part of a move; it is not an action of its own, although it costs movement. Jumping down is likewise part of a move; it is automatic and free whenever your move takes you to a circumstance where using it would be advantageous.

Any turn in which you jump is counted as though you were running for purposes of fatigue.

Try Again
Circumstantial. A failed jump check (one that does not allow you to travel your target distance) indicates that you fall short; if untrained, you also fall prone. If trained, you only fall prone if you fail and roll a natural 1 on your check, or if you land in circumstances different from those you intended to land on, such as landing on rubble or in a pit that you failed to clear, or impacting a wall you attempted to jump over. You may, however, attempt to jump again if your landing site permits it.

Synergy
If you have at least 5 ranks in Tumble, you gain a +2 bonus to Jump checks and can attempt to tumble as part of a jump; this does not reduce your jumping distance.
If you have at least 5 ranks in Swim and Jump, you can attempt to jump while swimming on the surface of a liquid, at a -4 penalty.
If you have at least 5 ranks in Jump, you gain a +2 bonus to Tumble checks.

[Elennsar]

The main thing I can think of to protest is the idea that it should not be superior to jump about unless we specifically want people jumping about to walking.

Being able to jump well should take effort and bother.

So:

1) Make it so that being able to jump is actually relevant at level 6+.

2) Does not translate into "world record maximum".

If we wanted or needed a system where jumping beat moving on the ground, this looks interesting, but just making it useful to jump...really, we do not need to make Jump a skill you regret not puting points into.

[IGTN]

Jumping counts as running for purposes of exhaustion under this system; it beats walking in the same way as running does, and under more restricted circumstances; maybe I should have given that bit more than a single, potentially ambiguous sentence.

[Elennsar]

Fair enough. Still, it seems that a good part of the problem with the rules as they stand are that there's not much benefit in being a good jumper, not that jumpers make bad jumps.

[Ice9]

I can see three possible uses for jumping:
1) Move faster, quickly get over floor obstacles in combat.
2) Cross chasms and such.
3) Jumping combat stunts.

Now use #2 is eventually going to be irrelevant because of flying and wall-walking and such. And I'm not willing to remove fun things like flight just to justify high ranks in one skill.

So we have #1, which is what the above solution does, and we have #3, exemplified by feats like Leaping Charge, Raptor School, and Battle Jump (probably the only feat that actually makes 40+ Jump checks relevant).

Perhaps a tome-style feat, based on ranks of Jump obviously, that merged the abilities from those feats? Or give Jump an inherent combat use like Tumble.

[Elennsar]

If you want people to take jumping seriously, then having ways that make it useless (even "only in some respects") is uncool.

Spells should not render skills irrelevant.

[IGTN]

If you want people to take jumping seriously, then having ways that make it useless (even "only in some respects") is uncool.

Spells should not render skills irrelevant.

I'm talking D&D 3.5 here; that bridge was burned, smashed, washed away, eaten by a whale, killed by whalers, burned for lamp oil, taken up by a tree, cut down, rebuilt, repeated, then swallowed by an earthquake, emmited by an undersea vent, and eaten by a giant squid a long time ago. Knock, Comprehend Languages, and so on are here to stay. The solution, then, is to make skills give options that spells don't.

[Elennsar]

And I'm pointing out that the reason for the problem is that the bridge was destroyed and you are trying to find a way to justify -having- Jump when it is made irrelevant at what it does by spells.

If the spells are here to stay, the skills they render irrelevant should not be taking up space on the sheet.

[Ice9]

Ok fine, then axe Jump - fold it into Athletics like 4E does. Flying characters are more iconic than someone whose only ability of note is jumping really far.

But for that matter, "crossing gaps" is not the only purpose that Jump can have, and just because one aspect of a skill becomes obsolete, doesn't mean the entire thing does.

[TarkisFlux]

I can see three possible uses for jumping:
1) Move faster, quickly get over floor obstacles in combat.
2) Cross chasms and such.
3) Jumping combat stunts.

1) If this counts as running and we're still limited to counting squares you jump against your move in this round (or next when you land), then this isn't any more effective at moving quickly than simply running unless you're also clearing obstacles or difficult terrain. I thought there were other non-item ways of ignoring those already, but I can't think of any off hand. It's a useful option in any case, even if it isn't the most effective.

2) A small enough chasm or moat might be worth crossing with this just to save charges on the flight item you're still likely to be stuck with, and this might be faster anyway. It also works anywhere unless there's a(Su) or (Sp) tag on it I missed. It's not an awesome bonus, but it's better than nothing and could even be relevant.

3) Potentially interesting if you wanted to pull in the falling object damage rules, but you're right that feats already exist that do this and are probably less complicated. High jump rules would certainly be useful though, especially if it only cost a move action regardless of height, so you could hop onto the strafing dragon or to stab the giant in the eye. I don't actually care if that replaces straight vertical wall walking, since wall walking is still useful in plenty of other situations.

And I'm pointing out that the reason for the problem is that the bridge was destroyed and you are trying to find a way to justify -having- Jump when it is made irrelevant at what it does by spells.

If the spells are here to stay, the skills they render irrelevant should not be taking up space on the sheet.

You may recall that people who have those spells don't waste space on their sheet with this skill.

If the classes that bothered with this skill already had a class feature that was being duplicated here I'd be inclined to agree with you. But they don't; they have items that give them limited access to the spells you're talking about. All this suggestion does is make a skill more useful over all levels for those who could choose to bother with it, spellcasters certainly aren't going to be bothering with it anyway so their access to stuff is irrelevant. Plus, all the classes that might bother with it are mobility item dependent, which this alleviates in some small measure; I'm in favor of anything that makes non-casters less item dependent. Some people get to fly, some people get to jump far and can leap moats in anti-magic zones of dickwitery.

[IGTN]

Tarkis: Once again, an important rule was buried in the middle; the Jump action allows you to move your entire jumping distance. The only downside is that in this revision it's a standard action unless you charge, although I could change that; what I have posted is prewrite quality, not even first draft.

There's no tag you missed; this works even in dead-magic zones.

A standing high jump gets you up 1/4 of the distance that a running long jump takes you horizontally, so if you have to go up 20' to get to a strafing dragon, that's a DC 36 jump check under this revision. Better than in core (where it's something like DC 160) but still not good, especially since a dragoon is supposed to jump onto strafing dragons and skewer them; that's kinda what they do (and harder than a monk jumping up and climbing on a dragon). So, I need to make high jumps easier.

It does need a jump attack feat to go with it, but right now is too early to write that.

I agree that folding Climb, Jump, and Swim together is a good idea; here I'm focusing on the Jump aspect, so that change is irrelevant; making Climb, Jump, and Swim one skill won't make jumping not absolutely horrible, which I'm trying to accomplish here, so it's not really relevant unless Climb and Swim also become awesome enough that folding them into one skill becomes overpowered.

I'll see about getting a good draft written so that we have something clearer to discuss here.

Elennsar: What I'm trying to do here is make Jumping into a viable combat option; different enough from flying that a good jumper would prefer jumping in some circumstances and flying in others, in this case, by allowing good jump checks to have you cover crazytown distances in one action.

[Elennsar]

Which, if we were playing a game where it wouldn't just make more sense to merge Jump with Climb and Swim anyway (because being able to jump was supposed to be special), would be alright.

But when magic is rendering it a bad skill, either we need to fix the magic or make it necessary to use Jump (as opposed to flying) more.

I'm not objecting to Jump as a good skill, but I don't like feeling that I'm missing something useful by not wanting to jump like some wuxia martial artist when the reason the skill was set to that was to compensate for mundane jumps being irrelevant.

[IGTN]

Well, I have the write-up
First version, for posterity

Jump (Str, Armor Check Penalty)

Check
You use the Jump skill to make jumps. The DC depends on the distance you want to cover and the kind of jump you are attempting.

Jumping is easiest with a running start; the DCs here assume a running start. Halve the distance jumped if a jump is attempted without a running start.

If you succeed on your jump check, you land standing. If you land on difficult terrain, you must beat the DC by at least the factor by which it impedes movement (2 for normal difficult terrain, 4 for doubly difficult, and so on) and be trained, or land prone. If you beat the DC of your jump check by enough to jump an additional square, you may choose to overshoot, retroactively increasing the DC of your Jump check.

Long Jump
A long jump is a horizontal jump, made across a gap like a chasm or stream. At the midpoint of the jump, you attain a vertical height equal to one-quarter of the horizontal distance.

The DC of a long jump is given on the DC table. If you do not have a running start of at least 20', the DC is as though you were attempting to jump twice the distance.

If your check succeeds, you land on the far end. If you fall one square short when clearing a pit, chasm, canyon, or similar obstruction, you may grab the edge with a DC 15 reflex save; this ends your turn. Getting up requires a DC 15 Climb check; attempting to do so is a move action; while hanging you are considered to be climbing.

Long Jump Distance Table:
Check Result: Maximum Distance
1-20: 1 square per 5
21-27: 4 squares, plus one square per 2 above 20
28-40: 1 square per 1 above 20
41-50: 20 squares, plus two squares per point above 40
51-crazytown: See 41 to 50, and double for every 10 above 40.

High Jump
A high jump is a vertical leap made to reach a ledge high above or to grasp something overhead. The DC is the same as for a long jump to clear twice the distance.

If the check succeeds, you travel along the same horizontal line as you used to get a running start (if you did not have one, you land where you started) a distance equal to 1/2 of your jump height or your speed (of the type used to get a running start), whichever is greater.

Obviously, the difficulty of reaching a given height varies according to the size of the character or creature. The maximum vertical reach (height the creature can reach without jumping) for an average creature of a given size is shown on the table in the SRD entry. (As a Medium creature, a typical human can reach 8 feet without jumping.)

Quadrupedal creatures don’t have the same vertical reach as a bipedal creature; treat them as being one size category smaller.

Hop Up
As part of a normal land move, you may jump onto an object with a height equal to or less than the reach of a character one size category smaller than you. This counts as 10' of movement and requires a DC 10 jump check, running start or no.

Jumping Down
If you intentionally jump from a height, you take less damage than you would if you just fell. The base DC to jump down from a height is 15. You do not have to get a running start to jump down, so the DC is not doubled if you do not get a running start.

If you succeed on the check, you take falling damage as if you had dropped 10 fewer feet than you actually did. For every 5 by which you beat the DC, you can count the fall as being 10' shorter. This stacks with the reduction provided by Tumble. Even if you fail the check, the first 1d6 damage you take from jumping down is nonlethal.

Action
Standing long jumps or high jumps are move actions that can be attempted once per round. Running Long or High jumps are full-round actions; you make a land move ending with at least 20' in a straight line and then a jump as part of the action; if you cannot move at least 20' due to speed limitations or space constraints, you cannot make a running jump. Jumping charges are also possible; they consist of a standing high or long jump and attack as a partial action or a running jump and attack as a full-round action.

You may also attempt a long jump as part of a land move. In that case, however, your jumping distance counts against your speed, and you may not attempt a jump that would result in you moving more than you would normally be allowed.

A Hop Up is part of a move; it is not an action of its own, although it costs 10' of movement. Jumping down is likewise part of a move; it is automatic and free whenever your move takes you to a circumstance where using it would be advantageous.

Any turn in which you jump is counted as though you were running for purposes of fatigue.

Try Again
Circumstantial. A failed jump check indicates that you fall short; if untrained, you also fall prone. If trained, you only fall prone if you fail and roll a natural 1 on your check, or if you land in circumstances different from those you intended to land on, such as landing on rubble or in a pit that you failed to clear, or impacting a wall you attempted to jump over. You may, however, attempt to jump again if your landing site permits it.

Synergy
If you have at least 5 ranks in Tumble, you gain a +2 bonus to Jump checks and can attempt to tumble as part of a jump; this does not reduce your jumping distance.
If you have at least 5 ranks in both Swim and Jump, you can attempt to jump while swimming on the surface of a liquid, at a -4 penalty (you may use a Swim speed in place of a land speed wherever mentioned).
If you have at least 5 ranks in Jump, you gain a +2 bonus to Tumble checks.
--

I dropped it to a move action available once per round, although I'm not sure how good of an idea that is. I also dropped the bit where it cost you your dexterity bonus to AC. I've also added in a clause where you can attempt a long jump as part of a move, using the old mechanic (except that you can't end your turn in the air when using it); except for things that are now unbalancing, I think it's fixed so that there'd be no reason to miss the old mechanic from the perspective of a player with points in it.

Second version:

Jump (Str, Armor Check Penalty)

Check
You use the Jump skill to make jumps. The DC depends on the distance you want to cover and the kind of jump you are attempting.

Jumping is easiest with a running start; the DCs here assume a running start. A jump attempted without a running start suffers a -8 penalty.

If you succeed on your jump check, you land standing. If you land on difficult terrain, you must beat the DC to jump that distance by at least the factor by which it impedes movement (2 for normal difficult terrain, 4 for doubly difficult, and so on) and be trained, or land prone.

Long Jump
A long jump is a horizontal jump, made across a gap like a chasm or stream. At the midpoint of the jump, you attain a vertical height equal to one-quarter of the horizontal distance.

When you decide to jump, you pick a direction and a target distance, then roll the check. If your target distance is less than 1/2 of the indicated distance, then you travel your target distance. If your target distance is between your the indicated distance and half of the indicated distance, you may travel any distance up to your maximum distance rolled, and less than one-half your maximum distance rolled.

If you fall one square short when clearing a pit, chasm, canyon, or similar obstruction, you may grab the edge with a DC 15 reflex save; this ends your turn. Getting up requires a DC 15 Climb check; attempting to do so is a move action; while hanging you are considered to be climbing.

Long Jump Distance Tables:
Check Result: Maximum Distance
1-20: 1 square per 5
21-27: 4 squares, plus one square per 2 above 20
28-40: 1 square per 1 above 20
41-50: 20 squares, plus two squares per point above 40
51-crazytown: See 41 to 50, and double for every 10 above 40.

Maximum Distance: DC
1-4 squares: Distance x5
5-8 squares: 12 + Distance x2
8-20 squares: 20 + Distance
21-40 squares: 30 + Distance/2 (round up)
41+ squares: Divide distance by 2 and round up repeatedly to get a number of squares less than 40, use that DC, add 10 for each doubling.

High Jump
A high jump is a vertical leap made to reach a ledge high above or to grasp something overhead. The DC is the eight higher than for a long jump to clear the same distance.

If the check succeeds, you travel along the same horizontal line as you used to get a running start (if you did not have one, you land where you started) a distance equal to 1/2 of your jump height or your speed (of the type used to get a running start), whichever is greater.

Obviously, the difficulty of reaching a given height varies according to the size of the character or creature. The maximum vertical reach (height the creature can reach without jumping) for an average creature of a given size is shown on the table in the SRD entry. (As a Medium creature, a typical human can reach 8 feet without jumping.)

Quadrupedal creatures don’t have the same vertical reach as a bipedal creature; treat them as being one size category smaller.

Hop Up
As part of a normal land move, you may jump onto an object with a height equal to or less than the vertical reach of a character one size category smaller than you. This counts as 10' of movement and requires a DC 10 jump check, running start or no.

Jumping Down
If you intentionally jump from a height, you take less damage than you would if you just fell. The base DC to jump down from a height is 15. You do not have to get a running start to jump down, so the DC is not doubled if you do not get a running start.

If you succeed on the check, you take falling damage as if you had dropped 10 fewer feet than you actually did. For every 5 by which you beat the DC, you can count the fall as being 10' shorter. This stacks with the reduction provided by Tumble. Even if you fail the check, the first 1d6 damage you take from jumping down is nonlethal. Your own jumps only cause fall damage for the difference in height between the start and endpoints, and only if the endpoint is lower (you may roll to reduce this damage).

Action
Standing high jumps are move actions that can be attempted once per round. Running high jumps are full-round actions; you make a land move of at least 20' and then a jump as part of the action.

A long jump is either a move action or part of a move. If it is made as a move action, it behaves as a high jump. If made as part of a move, it counts as land movement covering the same distance as the jump covers. A long jump is considered to have a running start if made at the beginning of your turn and you have moved at least 20' in the same direction as the jump as your last action on your previous turn.

A Hop Up is part of a move; it is not an action of its own, although it costs 10' of movement. Jumping down is likewise part of a move; it is automatic and free whenever your move takes you to a circumstance where using it would be advantageous.

Any turn in which you jump is counted as though you were running for purposes of fatigue.

Try Again
Circumstantial. A failed jump check (one that does not allow you to travel your target distance) indicates that you fall short; if untrained, you also fall prone. If trained, you only fall prone if you fail and roll a natural 1 on your check, or if you land in circumstances different from those you intended to land on, such as landing on rubble or in a pit that you failed to clear, or impacting a wall you attempted to jump over. You may, however, attempt to jump again if your landing site permits it.

Synergy
If you have at least 5 ranks in Tumble, you gain a +2 bonus to Jump checks and can attempt to tumble as part of a jump; this does not reduce your jumping distance.
If you have at least 5 ranks in Swim and Jump, you can attempt to jump while swimming on the surface of a liquid, at a -4 penalty.
If you have at least 5 ranks in Jump, you gain a +2 bonus to Tumble checks.

[TarkisFlux]

Which, if we were playing a game where it wouldn't just make more sense to merge Jump with Climb and Swim anyway (because being able to jump was supposed to be special), would be alright.

But when magic is rendering it a bad skill, either we need to fix the magic or make it necessary to use Jump (as opposed to flying) more.

I'm not objecting to Jump as a good skill, but I don't like feeling that I'm missing something useful by not wanting to jump like some wuxia martial artist when the reason the skill was set to that was to compensate for mundane jumps being irrelevant.

I really don't know what to make of your first paragraph. Jump is supposed to be special, that's the whole damn point of this thread (see design principle 1). Probably not any more special than flight magic, but certainly not much less either. If you don't want it to be any less mundane than other skills, merge it in your games and move on. Jump, climb, and swim can be a mundane skill that isn't worth taking past level X because they scale linearly while the rest of your challenges scale quadratically or whatever. Characters will remain gear/spell dependent and you can enjoy the games that result from that.

There's really two ways to look at this, because there's two power scaling curves here, and I'll go with yours first. You can say that magic is rendering it a bad skill, and if I were interested in having magic scale like the skills and non-casters scale I'd agree with you. Fixing spells and the scaling of magic in general would work if you wanted mundane linear scaling as the measure of your game. I don't want that, and I don't think IGTN does either.

So, from the other side, magic is not rendering it a bad skill: its design is rendering it a bad skill. It scales like the rest of the mundanes scale, and that's ass and doesn't keep up and needs to be fixed (they all need to be fixed, but one thing at a time). If you don't think it does enough to keep up with magic at similar character levels, which seems to be the intent of IGTN's fix, then that's one thing, but that's not what your saying. I think you're trying to say that the intent is bad, and that this fix misses the real problem: magic. Forgive the presumption, but from that reading and the rest of your posts I'm going to guess that you prefer lower magic games (with the accompanying decrease in need for wuxia or whatever) and this isn't going to be an interesting or useful tweak for you. Why you're not playing games that do that like The Burning Wheel instead of 3.x DnD is quite beyond me.

So, overall tweaking magic is out by OP intent (beyond the spells that directly affect jump checks) and the other half of your dichotomy of solutions doesn't work. I don't see a single reason it's necessary to make people use jump more in place of other magics as you suggest. People who get jump will use it if it's a useful option, and if it isn't (like now) then that's something that needs to be fixed (like IGTN's trying). The goal isn't to make casters say "Gee, I wish I could jump like that. All this flying around just isn't useful enough," it's to make two movement abilities similar in function and equivalently useful but available to very different character archetypes.

So yeah, I see plenty of "useful" here. I don't think you're interested in the same issues this is intended to correct, however, so you're not missing anything "useful" by not wanting Jump to be awesome. I imagine your definition of "useful" is going to be very different from mine.

[Elennsar]

Okay, then to translate:

If we were playing a game where Jump was supposed to be special, instead of just a part of the Athletics skill, what IGTN is doing would make more sense.

In a game where it is just a part of athletics and magic is making what it specifically does irrelevant, then drop the "and I can fly, so jumping about is useless unless I make people jump like in wuxia movies." idea....there's no need for jumping to be specifically awesome (and if magic makes Athletics in general irrelevant, then why are you not fixing the spells so that they stop making skills useless.).

Insisting that you want people to have things making jumping unnecessary and have the Jump skill doesn't make sense.

As for why I'm not using a different game:

My preference for lower magic is another story, I'm observing and commenting as I am as someone who finds house rules interesting, and as someone who thinks it would be a lot simpler to not try and have Jump be viable if you're determined to keep Fly working as it does.

"I want to avoid magic, but be able to keep up with high powered magic" is just a little too absurd for me.[/i]

[Cynic]

Elenssar, fixing the skill is a lot easier than fixing a dozen or more spells across all the splatbooks.

At least logistically.

[Elennsar]

Dropping the skill (or not...its not like it costs you resources you can spend on fly to learn Jump, so even if Jump is underpowered it can be used) is even simpler.

Presumably, that heads into 4e's land of simple to the point of boring, but it is "simpler".

In more positive news, kudos for it not costing your Dex bonus to AC (which is a WTF? idea to begin with).

[TarkisFlux]

Actual Jump thoughts time IGTN:

The long jump could probably be worded differently. You might say instead that you make a check, determine max distance jumped, halve it if you didn't have a running start, and then pick a point within that distance to land in. Unless I'm up in crazy town, where double the distance is just a +10 and easy to figure out, I really don't want to determine what double the distance is if I'm not taking a running start (unless you want to redo your equation to DC as a function of Distance instead of the current Distance as a function of DC). To accomodate the untrained in this setup, you fall if you go the whole distance of your jump, and land standing if you go one or more less.

Actually, since you're basically just doubling the distance gained for every group of 10, you could just give a standing jump a -10 penalty (approx half the distance) and be done with it instead of doing distance math. It's a bit low in low end of each group though, so -5 or -8 or whatever might work better over the whole range, but whatever.

I'm also concerned about the use of actions with this revision as well. You could probably combine the full round long jump action with the regular one in the following way:

"A jump may or may not take up a move action. A standing long jump is a move action regardless of distance moved. If you have a running start and your jump does not exceed your base speed, the running jump is a free action included in your move action. If your running jump covers a distance that would exceed your base move, your long jump counts as a single move action regardless of distance covered. If you land standing you can finish the move you used to get the running start."

In other words, if you only take a single move action you can't run and jump further than your base speed. If you take a double move, your total run and jump distance is equal to your base speed + big jump or double base speed, whichever is greater. It's a lot more flexible than currently written, but it should be if you expect it to compete in any way with flight spells or taking a simple run action. Plus, it allows easy hop skip jumping from pillar top to pillar top instead of wacky movement stuttering, momentum killing stuff.

---

And now on to Elennsar's tangent

In a game where it is just a part of athletics and magic is making what it specifically does irrelevant, then drop the "and I can fly, so jumping about is useless unless I make people jump like in wuxia movies." idea....there's no need for jumping to be specifically awesome (and if magic makes Athletics in general irrelevant, then why are you not fixing the spells so that they stop making skills useless.).

Insisting that you want people to have things making jumping unnecessary and have the Jump skill doesn't make sense.

Of all the people spending time in this thread, this seemingly only doesn't make sense to you, presumably because your head is stuck so far up your own preferences you can't see anyone else's. Which is fine on these boards, you've got plenty of company here.

Like Cynic said, fixing the spells is a bitch, but it's not even the point. I tried to make the point a post ago, and seemingly failed. The point was that the spells are the damned rubric by which other powers are measured. If other powers don't keep up, you don't fix the fvcking ruler, you fix the other powers and leave the fvcking spells. That's the whole damn point of the Tome series, and was the point of this thread.

But if you want a justification for having both something that makes a skill unnecessary and keeping the skill relevant, I'll attempt to accomodate you once more. You've already discounted the idea that giving two seperate groups access to similar but different travel abilities works, so we'll move away from the mechanics reasons. The reason that you keep both is because both are equally magical: one is the product of intense training and basically a Charles Atlas Superpower made possible because there is fvcking magic in the world, and the other is some really smart jerk cheating at magically augmented physics.

I expect you'll reject that one as well though, because your default mental setting doesn't include that much magic in it.

Dropping the skill (or not...its not like it costs you resources you can spend on fly to learn Jump, so even if Jump is underpowered it can be used) is even simpler.

Presumably, that heads into 4e's land of simple to the point of boring, but it is "simpler".

It is certainly simpler, potentially better from a resource standpoint for the classes that could benefit from it (depending on other issues), and no less boring than keeping it seperate so long as it still has discrete uses (who cares about a rename). I'm not debating any of these, but it's not like rolling it in precludes also making it not suck. Aside from your preference, you still haven't added any reason not to make it better even if you did do this. You're ignoring the presented adjustment here and attacking one of the premises without anything other than your preference.

[Elennsar]

Making everything magic power level would be fine...if it was actually magic-by-any-other-name. Spells? Not necessary. But if it functions as well as an ability disrupted in an antimagic field, why it should continue working in one is a touch bizzare.

Nothing wrong with Charles Atlas Superpowers, but don't claim that it is somehow something that works when supernatural abilities don't.

"He worked really hard and even though his abilities require magical physics to function he can function in an area where magic and ki and psionics don't because he isn't using any of those, honest." is hurting my ability to take it seriously as a plausible thing.

AS for "Similar but different"...if you're determined to have everyone get the equivalant of fly, then give everyone the equivalant at 5+ and leave jumping without the enhancement of "Great Jump" at the level it works out at without this (maybe tweaked a bit if the skill is underpowered compared to other skills).

As for the ruler:

My problem if it isn't obvious is with using the ruler that I dispute using it as a ruler to begin with. You pick "crazy high power" as the benchmark to survive and you eliminate stuff that doesn't reach that far.

As for dropping it, what I meant was dropping it entirely. You may describe a fighter's Ignore Pits and Chasms ability (granted to all characters at level 5 just like they get an ability score bonus every 4 levels) as jumping, but regular "make a check and roll d20+skill ranks+ability mod+other stuff" goes away and we just say that at 5+ "one way or another you get across the pit. Now, what cool and awesome thing do you do?"

Folding it in needs to be edited to remove suck as much as anything else, but it doesn't need to compare to anything other than other skills unless somehow learning Jump prevents you from using Fly as well as a wizard or whoever.

So congradulations, wuxia jump makes it so anyone who wants to play someone who is most comfortable with their feet firmly planted on the ground is screwed by anyone who meets the competent benchmark.

Also, I'd rather not have to keep track of how 21-26, 28-40, etc. all use different calculations of what is maximum distance.

That's not to say the the distances are bad (other than as discussed above), my problem here is that "4 squares, plus one for every two I got above twenty, and that was a twenty six, so seven." is not going to stick in my brain when 1-20 is "1 square per 5 points of the check result." and 28-40 is '1 square, +1 for every point over 20."...remembering which applies will take effort that I'd rather not spend on this skill (or any other that isn't meant to involve a lot of thinking).

And as stated, yay for not losing Dex to AC. Same with other clearer statements and definitions (never knew how much hop up should be before looking at this, good).

Pardon the lack of quotes, since this is responding to most of your post I wasn't sure how much they'd help.

[TarkisFlux]

Making everything magic power level would be fine...if it was actually magic-by-any-other-name. Spells? Not necessary. But if it functions as well as an ability disrupted in an antimagic field, why it should continue working in one is a touch bizzare.

Nothing wrong with Charles Atlas Superpowers, but don't claim that it is somehow something that works when supernatural abilities don't.

Hey, that's an actual reasonable complaint that isn't based on preference! Rad. It's somewhat biased by my half assed justification, so I'm not really sure where the issue lies, but you totally have a consistency point and it's clearly stated even. Sure, kill it in anti/dead-magic zones if you want, or adjust the out-of-my-ass worldview that's causing an issue.

As for dropping it, what I meant was dropping it entirely. You may describe a fighter's Ignore Pits and Chasms ability (granted to all characters at level 5 just like they get an ability score bonus every 4 levels) as jumping, but regular "make a check and roll d20+skill ranks+ability mod+other stuff" goes away and we just say that at 5+ "one way or another you get across the pit. Now, what cool and awesome thing do you do?"

[...]

So congradulations, wuxia jump makes it so anyone who wants to play someone who is most comfortable with their feet firmly planted on the ground is screwed by anyone who meets the competent benchmark.

I wish you'd just come out and expanded on your "drop it" idea like you did here way earlier. It doesn't cover the other uses that IGTN was going for, because you're ignoring the movement portion of things and focussing on the avoidance, but it covers the gap thing nicely and lets you move on to other interesting things, which the default jump skill is not. It runs into problems in chase scenes as well, since a big pit doesn't actually mean anything different to different people. Still, if the movement thing is unworkable it's not a bad second plan (the avoid thing, not the super jump thing).

As for the wuxianess of it, well, if you do give this or your super jump thing to absolutely everyone then that's what you get. Since you're tossing around the giving it to everyone and no one else is, just don't do that. Done. Even if you do adjust the skill as IGTN's suggesting here, it's not like everyone will be taking it as a class skill so this isn't going to be an automatic get for the whole group. This doesn't totally eliminate the need for fly or flight items, it just reduces it for characters who spend their skill points in a previously useless skill.

And characters who are happy with their feet on the ground have been screwed by the Monster Manuals and their scaling opponents since shortly after the time fly comes into it, so complaining that wuxia jumping someone makes them feel even more like ass rings a bit hollow. Those characters have been barely competant based on item selection and charity of friends for a while now anyway, this is just helping some of their friends up a bit.

Also, I'd rather not have to keep track of how 21-26, 28-40, etc. all use different calculations of what is maximum distance.

Yeah, it is a bit wierd, and the sort of thing you're probably going to have to refer to the book on. It's borderline overly complicated for the benefit (not that I can come up with a way to change it, though a straight 0+, 20+, 30+, grouping might be a bit clearer).

[IGTN]

Tarkis: Noted, thanks. Changes are in the new version. I've made multi-jumping better, and fixed the rule for jumps with penalties.

I kept a target distance in and made it work better, so that you couldn't run to 10' from the edge of a pit, roll, fail, and decide you only wanted to jump to the edge of the pit and not over it. Only relevant during the early levels, but since my current game is early levels, it's relevant to me.

I'm not sure if I actually have distances I want here; a character who can leap tall buildings in a single bound is making ridiculous checks (DC 50 for a running long jump that peaks at 50 feet up; a decent non-overspecialized jumper might have a modifier of 12 + 2.5 x level (with magic), with all of the speed bonuses gone; that doesn't add up to a +40 modifier until 19th level); maybe I should increase the distances.

Elennsar:
Martial characters have Charles Atlas Superpowers that work when magic doesn't. An 11th level barbarian can work himself into a rage and smash through a brick wall with his fists in six seconds, beat up whatever's on the other side, and then recover from a spear wound through his stomach in under two minutes. A Thief-Acrobat can run up to you from across the street and cut off your nose without you seeing them. A Samurai can cut you six times in the time while you're still in the middle of a single strike. All of these abilities work in an antimagic field; if those characters have a super jumping power too, then they should be able to use that under the same circumstances.

Jump doesn't compete with fly, but if flying is always better than jumping, then Jump is not competitive with other skills.

Wuxia jump doesn't make the people who want to stay on the ground suck; flight proliferation did that already.

The different maximum distance calculations are unfortunate, but here to stay. The only ways to change them I can see are to give up exponential progression entirely (and then we're back to square one, where it sucks), expect calculators at the table, or write the entire table, rather than the abbreviated form here, which I don't want to do for a draft.

Except for 29, they do line up into ranges that end on 10s (1-20, 20-28, 28-40, 40-50), and the ends of each range overlap; 29 is different to make the high-end numbers round.

--
I am planning on writing a feat or two for this, so that a jump specialist can be expected to have good combat mobility (including things like wall-jumping, double-jumping, and so on); I don't want to require it to make the skill good, but I can see a feat for people like dragoons (who need to be able to jump up and drop onto passing dragons to skewer them) and ninja (who need to be able to ascend a chimney by wall-jumping), who use jumping as the major part of their maneuverability.

I also need to put the secondary distance reduction back in to the skill write-up, and make it play nice with the Monk's jumping powers.

The new version was written up based on a text file on my computer; I may have made a couple of last-minute changes to the old version that are not reflected in the new, but I didn't see any differences when I scanned through.

[Elennsar]

Nothing wrong with indicating that one does not support something as a matter of preference, unless this thread was dedicated to otherwise.

Principle #1 can be met without making the skill particularly epic (since resources spent on Jump do not have any impact on those spent on Fly), and principle #2 definately can be met without it.

But moving on.

Sure, kill it in anti/dead-magic zones if you want, or adjust the out-of-my-ass worldview that's causing an issue.

The "worldview" is that if it is a supernatural ability, something that screws with supernatural abilities should screw with it...applying the "even though it works as well as a spell it doesn't suffer from the limitations" tag is a bit strained.

I wish you'd just come out and expanded on your "drop it" idea like you did here way earlier.

Since its a "If you're determined to make it so that we don't have a reason to care for merely mundane jumps" suggestion, which is itself (making mundane jumps irrelevant) not something I like, I'm not in favor of it. I'd be willing to discuss it as a relevant bit of discussion, I've said my piece on disliking this solution, but that's why it was timed as it was.

It doesn't cover the other uses that IGTN was going for, because you're ignoring the movement portion of things...

Intentionally. I don't like the idea that running and jumping are how characters move as a "normal move" at all. So fixing jump so it works for that would be like fixing Craft so you could make (minor) artifacts (in terms of being desired).

As for the wuxianess of it, well, if you do give this or your super jump thing to absolutely everyone then that's what you get. Since you're tossing around the giving it to everyone and no one else is, just don't do that. Done.

No, not done. Done would be allowing people who want to have their feet on the ground not given yet another round of abuse, this time by most characters instead of a few.

The wuxianess problem is making it so that you are better off jumping or flying than being on terra firma. Jumping charge, jumping over obstacles, jumping to move faster...is there any reason not to jump when you can (and saying "you can't always do it" doesn't help)?

Martial characters have Charles Atlas Superpowers that work when magic doesn't. An 11th level barbarian can work himself into a rage and smash through a brick wall with his fists in six seconds, beat up whatever's on the other side, and then recover from a spear wound through his stomach in under two minutes. A Thief-Acrobat can run up to you from across the street and cut off your nose without you seeing them. A Samurai can cut you six times in the time while you're still in the middle of a single strike. All of these abilities work in an antimagic field; if those characters have a super jumping power too, then they should be able to use that under the same circumstances.

And the point is that it makes no damn sense that they're not as (su) as spells and the like. I don't like the Samurai stunt you just mentioned very much either. Having people who are supposedly not using magic in a world where magic is that dominant is almost as unbelievable as trying to make an Indian's longbow equal to my arquebus (or vice-versa) so that both are viable options. (Note, this is hypothetical, anyone who argues with me on the relative merits will be at if they don't do it in another thread or by PM).

The different maximum distance calculations are unfortunate, but here to stay. The only ways to change them I can see are to give up exponential progression entirely (and then we're back to square one, where it sucks), expect calculators at the table, or write the entire table, rather than the abbreviated form here, which I don't want to do for a draft.

Except for 29, they do line up into ranges that end on 10s (1-20, 20-28, 28-40, 40-50), and the ends of each range overlap; 29 is different to make the high-end numbers round.

Its not so much the ranges or the math in any given range as remembering that 20-28 is different math than 29-40, for instance.

But that aside, the math is fine. So don't worry about changing it.

[TarkisFlux]

Tarkis: Noted, thanks. Changes are in the new version. I've made multi-jumping better, and fixed the rule for jumps with penalties.

I kept a target distance in and made it work better, so that you couldn't run to 10' from the edge of a pit, roll, fail, and decide you only wanted to jump to the edge of the pit and not over it. Only relevant during the early levels, but since my current game is early levels, it's relevant to me.

I hadn't considered that use, but it's funny.

Why don't you scrap the slightly complicated half distance stuff and just make them pick a point and roll for it? If they meet or exceed the roll for that distance they make it. No more retroactively increasing or decreasing the jump distance.

I'm not sure if I actually have distances I want here; a character who can leap tall buildings in a single bound is making ridiculous checks (DC 50 for a running long jump that peaks at 50 feet up; a decent non-overspecialized jumper might have a modifier of 12 + 2.5 x level (with magic), with all of the speed bonuses gone; that doesn't add up to a +40 modifier until 19th level); maybe I should increase the distances.

I think your math is bad. A 50 check is, by your table, 40 squares or 200 feet. Since high jumps are just half that now instead of quarter, it's 100 feet straight up. If that's still not enough, well, I dunno. High jumps as 3/4 maybe? I worry that it breaks your reasonable lvl 1 guy doing a mundane high jump though.

Oh, and I missed the lack of speed bonuses. That strikes me as a bit problematic actually, though a simple bonus would be bad in this new setup. Maybe bonus squares instead?

---

Elennsar:

Mundane jumping actually does remains relevant over the mundane levels (1-5) with this because the bonus sizes are small. Up to 10 if you're bothering with Jump as a cross class skill. It's not until after those that you might have a big enough bonus to start regularly getting jump checks that are better than a regular move. Until that point you're gambling with a full move or run action, and it's not a particularly good bet.

This is not as good as fly. You can't use this to remain aloft or end the round over thin air, you can't turn in mid air, you have to use a full round action to get decent results with it, you can't use this all day because it tires you out, you can't clear really large distances quickly and without encountering ground based threats, etc. This is without question better than not having jump, and in a world where you simply got to choose to have this or to not, I imagine most people would. It's not that simple though, since the skill points you're putting into this skill don't get to go into other skills. You're choosing not to have something else if you choose to have this, and if that something else is so much weaker that it really isn't a choice then it needs to be adressed as well (*cough* climb, swim, perform).

You can voice your dislike of something based on preference and that's totally fine. Even if it wasn't, it's not like you'd abide by the request (as you haven't in other threads). Aside from some minor nitpicks about the check DC setup and other stuff, you're just complaining about the way he's gone about meeting the goals of this tweak without offering rationales that matter to the rest of us or alternatives that could be much better. I'm not convinced that the growth he's got here is the only or best way to do it, but it does make the skill remain useful over all levels and ranks. If you really think you can hit the two design goals without also making mundane jumping irrelevant after level 5, then do it. Contribute an alternate solution that doesn't make your eyes bleed or strain your comprehension.

[IGTN]

I suppose just making it "pick a distance, roll for it, and then see if you make it or fall short" works better. Since trained jumpers don't fall prone from falling short in normal circumstances, that does pretty much the same thing in normal terrain (just aim for a natural 20)

For jump heights, I was using the peak of a long jump, not the height of a high jump, since if you're trying to leap a tall building in a single bound, you probably want to get more horizontal distance than a high jump will give you.

I'm not sure if I want to put the speed bonuses back in; if I do, they'll be in as bonus squares. Being slow already gives difficulty in getting a running start, and being fast makes it easier, so there is something.

[TarkisFlux]

Gotcha. Well, you can allow people to combine their high jump with their ground movement as a full round action. You move up to your base rate from your starting point (including running start) and make one high jump in there as well, allowing you to clear a single really high obstacle or land atop it. And climb mountains fairly fast (though running starts on slopes >45 degrees should be impossible under current rules).

After kickin it around, I think bonus squares are a good call actually. 1 bonus square for each 5' faster than 30' sounds fine to me, with no penalties for slower creatures. I was kicking around ways to adjust the running start portions of it instead (so less or more massive creatures need varying start distances and get bonus distance in other ways), but couldn't come up with something that wasn't yet another table to add.