Question on Skill Mastery

[Ichabod]

Tried searching for a discussion of it but didn't find.

It says that the thief's Skill Mastery ability allows for taking 10 "... even if stress and distractions would normally prevent him from doing so." Do people believe that this includes during combat?

It seems kind of abusable (in the sense that a D20 feature is the ability to fail or succeed at things randomly) to allow Tumble to be used without a roll, but that's the only one that I could see being common enough to be bothersome.

 

[Clovenhoof]

Yes, Skill Mastery is applied for combat as well. The whole _idea_ of it is that it can be used in combat. For instance, to open a lock or disable a trap while your companions are warding off the baddies coming from the other side.

Tumble? So what, let him tumble. At level 10, a Thief is likely to have Dex 22 or so, and can have 13 ranks in Tumble, for a total skill of 19. Not counting Specializations. The base Tumble DC is 15, which mean automatic success anyway. Even if the Thief tumbles through occupied squares, the DC is 25, which makes for a ~75% success chance even without skill mastery.

Secondly, as per D20 rules, it is entirely possible to have infallible skill checks. You don't auto-fail on a natural 1 if your check total meets the DC.

Thirdly, at level 10+, characters are _supposed_ to be competent. And Thief's primary, if not _only_ use in combat is getting in sneak attacks. And after the surprise round, the best way to get in sneak attacks is to flank the target. And naturally, to flank someone, the thief needs to get on the far side. And _that's_ what Tumbling is there for. ^^