A monster with blindsight can perceive its surroundings without relying on sight, within a specific radius.
Creatures without eyes, such as grimlocks and gray oozes, typically have this special sense, as do creatures with echolocation or heightened senses, such as bats and true dragons.
If a monster is naturally blind, it has a parenthetical note to this effect, indicating that the radius of its blindsight defines the maximum range of its perception.
"A creature with blindsight can perceive its surroundings without relying on sight, within the listed radius. Using this sense, it can ignore the effects of darkness and dim light on its perception, as well as visual illusions and invisibility. For some creatures, this sense is limited to another (such as hearing or smell), as listed in their statistics. This sense cannot be used to perceive through total cover.
If a monster is naturally blind, it has a parenthetical note to this effect, indicating that the radius of its blindsight defines the maximum range of its perception."
Ok, the original above, rewrite below it. I think this effectively covers the range of the sense that I found by looking through stat blocks. As well as allowing PCs to have it.
A monster with blindsight can perceive its surroundings without relying on sight, within a specific radius.
Creatures without eyes, such as grimlocks and gray oozes, typically have this special sense, as do creatures with echolocation or heightened senses, such as bats and true dragons.
If a monster is naturally blind, it has a parenthetical note to this effect, indicating that the radius of its blindsight defines the maximum range of its perception.
"A creature with blindsight can perceive its surroundings without relying on sight, within the listed radius. Using this sense, it can ignore the effects of darkness and dim light on its perception, as well as visual illusions and invisibility. For some creatures, this sense is limited to another (such as hearing or smell), as listed in their statistics. This sense cannot be used to perceive through total cover.
If a monster is naturally blind, it has a parenthetical note to this effect, indicating that the radius of its blindsight defines the maximum range of its perception."
Ok, the original above, rewrite below it. I think this effectively covers the range of the sense that I found by looking through stat blocks. As well as allowing PCs to have it.
I like that better yeah...
Overall you are adding much needed context but not making it overtly crunchy. Kudos!
"A creature with blindsight can perceive its surroundings without relying on sight, within the listed radius. Using this sense, it can ignore the effects of darkness and dim light on its perception, as well as visual illusions and invisibility. For some creatures, this sense is limited to another (such as hearing or smell), as listed in their statistics. This sense cannot be used to perceive through total cover.
I would change "darkness and dim light" to "visual concealment", as it can probably also see through fog, stinking cloud, etc. Also clarify that it is immune to Blinded, and that you ignore penalties for being unable to 'see' a target, and can use abilities that require you to 'see' a target.
"A creature with blindsight can perceive its surroundings without relying on sight, within the listed radius. Using this sense, it can ignore the effects of visual concealment on its perception, as well as visual illusions and invisibility. This sense ignores the Blinded condition, and qualifies as sight for the purposes of targeting and abilities. For some creatures, this sense is limited to another (such as hearing or smell), as listed in their statistics. This sense cannot be used to perceive through total cover.
If a monster is naturally blind, it has a parenthetical note to this effect, indicating that the radius of its blindsight defines the maximum range of its perception."
Think this works? It is about 40 words longer than baseline, but that is 2nd draft with codification. A little more refinement and it could be about as long as baseline.
Going over it again, I don't think all the language of that last draft was needed, so I shortened it to the following, let me know if this seems to miss something:
"A creature with blindsight can perceive its surroundings without relying on sight, within the listed radius. The use of this sense ignores all visual effects and penalties. This sense qualifies as sight for the purposes of targeting and abilities, and is blocked by total cover. For some creatures, this sense is limited to another (such as hearing or smell), as listed in their statistics.
If a monster is naturally blind, it has a parenthetical note to this effect, indicating that the radius of its blindsight defines the maximum range of its perception."
While we're at it, it would be nice to know what tremorsense is actually supposed to do. Given the monsters its given to I assume the point is so they can reliably burrow out of the ground, do a popup attack, and eat someone, but I have no idea if a Bulette doing a chomp-by on an invisible target has disadvantage on its attack (a Purple Worm has Blindsight so the question is moot there).
Going over it again, I don't think all the language of that last draft was needed, so I shortened it to the following, let me know if this seems to miss something:
"A creature with blindsight can perceive its surroundings without relying on sight, within the listed radius. The use of this sense ignores all visual effects and penalties. This sense qualifies as sight for the purposes of targeting and abilities, and is blocked by total cover. For some creatures, this sense is limited to another (such as hearing or smell), as listed in their statistics.
If a monster is naturally blind, it has a parenthetical note to this effect, indicating that the radius of its blindsight defines the maximum range of its perception."
Overall a better version of what we got in the PHB...I will likely defer to this one to describe blindsight as I feel its more accurate.
And, in terms of rules, boundaries should not be set by examples. For me, that is the one great problem with all this discussion. Some of you absolutely want all the rules for all the types of blindsight set in just one place, so that no one can ever interpret any type of blindsight in a different way than "this law".
No, we just want it so when a monster's writeup says Blindsight and has no other traits that would modify it, we know what that means. Most monsters do not have a type of blindsight. They just say 'blindsight' with no further information. Giving monsters a description of how their blindsight works would be a nice to have but adds far more word count than anything we've been talking about.
Detect Sentience. The intellectdevourer can sense the presence and location of any creature within 300 feet of it that has an Intelligence of 3 or higher, *regardless of interposing barriers*, unless the creature is protected by a mind blank spell.
This monster is blind, only able to "see" with blindsight out to 60 feet. But, it has an extra sense with range 300 feet, which explicitly works through barriers.
The only reason for the extra sense to have its own range and call out ignoring barriers is if **blindsight itself cannot ignore barriers**.
Overall just give the creature the sight you want that is just clearly defined so its easy to run. If you want to waver from that for thematic reasons its easy to do but otherwise its there if you need it to help as a guide.
Or, more simply, don't put imagination-dampening boundaries in the general case, which require more words in the general description plus even more words in each monster description.
If you find clear rules imagination-dampening, you have failed to realize the true power of a DM. If I want monsters to do something special, I just give them a 'does something special' trait or action. All clear rules do is tell you what the author is talking about.
Huh... Why does the fact that the monster has a special power that does not allow him to SEE another creature (just the presence and location and therefore pinpoint) and that can ignore wall impose anything on its OTHER sense of blindsight, which actually allows him to SEE ?
I have to agree with that. I don't see any link between its blindsight and its detect sentience ability.
Going over it again, I don't think all the language of that last draft was needed, so I shortened it to the following, let me know if this seems to miss something:
"A creature with blindsight can perceive its surroundings without relying on sight, within the listed radius. The use of this sense ignores all visual effects and penalties. This sense qualifies as sight for the purposes of targeting and abilities, and is blocked by total cover. For some creatures, this sense is limited to another (such as hearing or smell), as listed in their statistics.
If a monster is naturally blind, it has a parenthetical note to this effect, indicating that the radius of its blindsight defines the maximum range of its perception."
I like this, but would ask a few questions:
Does blindsight distinguish color or non-texture based visual items (like letters on a page)? I generally don't know the consensus (my default is no, but others mileage may vary)
Does blindsight override the blinded condition? (this may be what you mean by penalties, but that word is not generally used to describe conditions so it could be confusing). It doesn't hurt to add examples like "visual effects (light, smoke, illusions) and penalties (being blinded)..." for additional clarity. Alternately for the last one, you could change the second paragraph to say after the current text "...unless stated otherwise in their stats or abilities, a creature can use their blindsight even when under the effects of the blinded condition."
I'd also say, rather than the sense being blocked by total cover, that it is blocked by "solid objects". Because darkness and heavy obscurement from fog/smoke are total cover, there will be confusion, as well as the tricky rules-lawyer that will say they can see through a low wall because "it isn't total cover".
Does blindsight distinguish color or non-texture based visual items (like letters on a page)? I generally don't know the consensus (my default is no, but others mileage may vary)
Does blindsight override the blinded condition? (this may be what you mean by penalties, but that word is not generally used to describe conditions so it could be confusing). It doesn't hurt to add examples like "visual effects (light, smoke, illusions) and penalties (being blinded)..." for additional clarity. Alternately for the last one, you could change the second paragraph to say after the current text "...unless stated otherwise in their stats or abilities, a creature can use their blindsight even when under the effects of the blinded condition."
I'd also say, rather than the sense being blocked by total cover, that it is blocked by "solid objects". Because darkness and heavy obscurement from fog/smoke are total cover, there will be confusion, as well as the tricky rules-lawyer that will say they can see through a low wall because "it isn't total cover".
I would rule that blindsight is also incapable of perceiving purely visual effects such as colors. As far as blinded goes, that's more with sloppy wording on the condition than an issue of blindsight per se -- it should really be noted that the advantage/disadvantage effects are a byproduct of being unable to see, so anything that allows 'sight' without vision negates it.
The funny part is that when WotC does exactly what you (not you specifically) say they should do and they go back and clearly define exactly what blindsight is, the immediate response is, "Well yeah, but is that REALLY what they are saying? How can we be sure?"
The funny part is that when WotC does exactly what you (not you specifically) say they should do and they go back and clearly define exactly what blindsight is, the immediate response is, "Well yeah, but is that REALLY what they are saying? How can we be sure?"
I have no objection to the definition in TCoE, but it would be good to clarify that the definition is generic, not something specific to the blind fighting style.
Look guys, at this stage, I think I see what you would like but honestly if the discussion has proven anything it's that there are actually many types of blindsight. They all share the common description of the MM, but after that, there are many specificities.
If you just take the TCoE version as baseline, all of those are minor traits
Echolocation: add a trait 'blocked by effects that stop hearing'. Note that bats already have a trait like that.
Psionic: if it penetrates barriers, add a trait to that effect -- but there's no particular reason to think it does so. An intellect devourer's barrier penetrating sense isn't its blindsight.
Smell: add a trait 'blocked by effects that stop scent'. Grimlocks already have a trait to that effect.
Pressure Sense: I have no idea why you think that wouldn't be stopped by barriers. No extra notes required.
Extraordinary senses: no extra notes required.
Tremor Sight: just give the monster tremorsense as well as blindsight, whether a creature can target through barriers pretty much doesn't matter.
The problem is that I don't like the TCoE version (you see, I don't like everything the 5e designers do :D ). In particular, I still can't really get my head around the second sentence. Moreover, I would really prefer if the global version was as light as possible and would not get contradicted by specific traits, just enhanced upon.
I would prefer not adding more specific traits than are needed, so the global version should cover the most common case.
The problem is that I don't like the TCoE version (you see, I don't like everything the 5e designers do :D ). In particular, I still can't really get my head around the second sentence. Moreover, I would really prefer if the global version was as light as possible and would not get contradicted by specific traits, just enhanced upon.
I would prefer not adding more specific traits than are needed, so the global version should cover the most common case.
The generic language example provided already in this thread is better than the PHB version anyway...it did not take long to improve either.
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"A creature with blindsight can perceive its surroundings without relying on sight, within the listed radius. Using this sense, it can ignore the effects of darkness and dim light on its perception, as well as visual illusions and invisibility. For some creatures, this sense is limited to another (such as hearing or smell), as listed in their statistics. This sense cannot be used to perceive through total cover.
If a monster is naturally blind, it has a parenthetical note to this effect, indicating that the radius of its blindsight defines the maximum range of its perception."
Ok, the original above, rewrite below it. I think this effectively covers the range of the sense that I found by looking through stat blocks. As well as allowing PCs to have it.
I like that better yeah...
Overall you are adding much needed context but not making it overtly crunchy. Kudos!
I would change "darkness and dim light" to "visual concealment", as it can probably also see through fog, stinking cloud, etc. Also clarify that it is immune to Blinded, and that you ignore penalties for being unable to 'see' a target, and can use abilities that require you to 'see' a target.
"A creature with blindsight can perceive its surroundings without relying on sight, within the listed radius. Using this sense, it can ignore the effects of visual concealment on its perception, as well as visual illusions and invisibility. This sense ignores the Blinded condition, and qualifies as sight for the purposes of targeting and abilities. For some creatures, this sense is limited to another (such as hearing or smell), as listed in their statistics. This sense cannot be used to perceive through total cover.
If a monster is naturally blind, it has a parenthetical note to this effect, indicating that the radius of its blindsight defines the maximum range of its perception."
Think this works? It is about 40 words longer than baseline, but that is 2nd draft with codification. A little more refinement and it could be about as long as baseline.
Going over it again, I don't think all the language of that last draft was needed, so I shortened it to the following, let me know if this seems to miss something:
"A creature with blindsight can perceive its surroundings without relying on sight, within the listed radius. The use of this sense ignores all visual effects and penalties. This sense qualifies as sight for the purposes of targeting and abilities, and is blocked by total cover. For some creatures, this sense is limited to another (such as hearing or smell), as listed in their statistics.
If a monster is naturally blind, it has a parenthetical note to this effect, indicating that the radius of its blindsight defines the maximum range of its perception."
While we're at it, it would be nice to know what tremorsense is actually supposed to do. Given the monsters its given to I assume the point is so they can reliably burrow out of the ground, do a popup attack, and eat someone, but I have no idea if a Bulette doing a chomp-by on an invisible target has disadvantage on its attack (a Purple Worm has Blindsight so the question is moot there).
Overall a better version of what we got in the PHB...I will likely defer to this one to describe blindsight as I feel its more accurate.
Just add appropriate traits to the monster. e.g.
No, we just want it so when a monster's writeup says Blindsight and has no other traits that would modify it, we know what that means. Most monsters do not have a type of blindsight. They just say 'blindsight' with no further information. Giving monsters a description of how their blindsight works would be a nice to have but adds far more word count than anything we've been talking about.
"And, in terms of rules, boundaries should not be set by examples."
Exactly! The problem is, 5e sets the boundaries for blindsight by example.
"What about seventh-sense type blindsight that goes through walls?"
Easy, put a trait on the creature like Echolocation, which gives an exemption.
"What about the effect of silence on echolocation-type of blindsight?"
Already obvious, Echolocation does not work if the creature cannot hear, and Silence makes the creature not hear.
"I was speaking about general boundaries, which is what you are trying to do by setting limits about seeing through walls."
Except you obviously did not look at the monsters I linked, or you would understand the point about walls (total cover) and examples:
Intellect Devourer https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters/intellect-devourer
Detect Sentience. The intellect devourer can sense the presence and location of any creature within 300 feet of it that has an Intelligence of 3 or higher, *regardless of interposing barriers*, unless the creature is protected by a mind blank spell.
This monster is blind, only able to "see" with blindsight out to 60 feet. But, it has an extra sense with range 300 feet, which explicitly works through barriers.
The only reason for the extra sense to have its own range and call out ignoring barriers is if **blindsight itself cannot ignore barriers**.
Overall just give the creature the sight you want that is just clearly defined so its easy to run. If you want to waver from that for thematic reasons its easy to do but otherwise its there if you need it to help as a guide.
If you find clear rules imagination-dampening, you have failed to realize the true power of a DM. If I want monsters to do something special, I just give them a 'does something special' trait or action. All clear rules do is tell you what the author is talking about.
I have to agree with that. I don't see any link between its blindsight and its detect sentience ability.
I like this, but would ask a few questions:
Does blindsight distinguish color or non-texture based visual items (like letters on a page)? I generally don't know the consensus (my default is no, but others mileage may vary)
Does blindsight override the blinded condition? (this may be what you mean by penalties, but that word is not generally used to describe conditions so it could be confusing). It doesn't hurt to add examples like "visual effects (light, smoke, illusions) and penalties (being blinded)..." for additional clarity. Alternately for the last one, you could change the second paragraph to say after the current text "...unless stated otherwise in their stats or abilities, a creature can use their blindsight even when under the effects of the blinded condition."
I'd also say, rather than the sense being blocked by total cover, that it is blocked by "solid objects". Because darkness and heavy obscurement from fog/smoke are total cover, there will be confusion, as well as the tricky rules-lawyer that will say they can see through a low wall because "it isn't total cover".
I would rule that blindsight is also incapable of perceiving purely visual effects such as colors. As far as blinded goes, that's more with sloppy wording on the condition than an issue of blindsight per se -- it should really be noted that the advantage/disadvantage effects are a byproduct of being unable to see, so anything that allows 'sight' without vision negates it.
The funny part is that when WotC does exactly what you (not you specifically) say they should do and they go back and clearly define exactly what blindsight is, the immediate response is, "Well yeah, but is that REALLY what they are saying? How can we be sure?"
"Not all those who wander are lost"
I have no objection to the definition in TCoE, but it would be good to clarify that the definition is generic, not something specific to the blind fighting style.
If you just take the TCoE version as baseline, all of those are minor traits
I would prefer not adding more specific traits than are needed, so the global version should cover the most common case.
The generic language example provided already in this thread is better than the PHB version anyway...it did not take long to improve either.