That should not be a controversial argument. I mean, it's printed in plain English in the PHB. "An invisible creature can always try to hide" isn't exactly latin.
The player says, my invisible character tries to hide.
The DM says, Fine but it will fail because you're being grappled.
That should not be a controversial argument. I mean, it's printed in plain English in the PHB. "An invisible creature can always try to hide" isn't exactly latin.
The player says, my invisible character tries to hide.
The DM says, Fine but it will fail because you're being grappled.
That's a perfectly valid thing for a DM to choose to do, deciding not to follow the printed RAW rule for Hiding in PHB 7, but to instead implement a houserule. Totally fair, and I'm sure that most DMs probably houserule Hiding to some extent or another!
But the RAW approach would be more like: "fine, but your stealth check will have disadvantage because you're being grappled/grappling" or "fine, but the enemy will have advantage to their check to find you/+5 to their passive perception to set the DC because you're being grappled/grappling"... or even "fine, but after becoming hidden, you will pretty much immediately give away your position and come out of hiding if you maintain the grapple."
I'm not saying that an Invisible creature can't be found after it hides. I'm saying, while a DM can RAW prevent you from ever even taking the action to attempt to Hide by telling you the situation isn't appropriate to allow the attempt, for an Invisible creature, the DM should RAW allow you to at least make the attempt to become hidden, even if it will be difficult/impossible to stay hidden.
The sky is not falling, there are no undesirable outcomes to be found here. I'm just pointing out that the PHB is very clear that an Invisible creature is entitled to always be allowed to attempt to Hide.
That should not be a controversial argument. I mean, it's printed in plain English in the PHB. "An invisible creature can always try to hide" isn't exactly latin.
The player says, my invisible character tries to hide.
The DM says, Fine but it will fail because you're being grappled.
That's a perfectly valid thing for a DM to choose to do, deciding not to follow the printed RAW rule for Hiding in PHB 7, but to instead implement a houserule. Totally fair, and I'm sure that most DMs probably houserule Hiding to some extent or another!
But the RAW approach would be more like: "fine, but your stealth check will have disadvantage because you're being grappled/grappling" or "fine, but the enemy will have advantage to their check to find you/+5 to their passive perception to set the DC because you're being grappled/grappling"... or even "fine, but after becoming hidden, you will pretty much immediately give away your position and come out of hiding if you maintain the grapple."
I'm not saying that an Invisible creature can't be found after it hides. I'm saying, while a DM can RAW prevent you from ever even taking the action to attempt to Hide by telling you the situation isn't appropriate to allow the attempt, for an Invisible creature, the DM should RAW allow you to at least make the attempt to become hidden, even if it will be difficult/impossible to stay hidden.
The sky is not falling, there are no undesirable outcomes to be found here. I'm just pointing out that the PHB is very clear that an Invisible creature is entitled to always be allowed to attempt to Hide.
You're correct, but the rule is obviously stupid/not working as intended/whatever adjectives you like, because this is still true even if all the enemies in the room have truesight. Or they've cast See Invisibility. Or they use blindsense. Or all of those things at once, for some reason.
The only explanation for the fact that an invisible character is entitled to a Hide attempt regardless of any other elements (such as something to hide behind) and regardless of the invisibility-proof senses of his opponents is, to my mind at least, that the rule was designed for some other purpose than for rationality/suspension of disbelief/realism/whatever you want to call it. Given what we've been told about the design intentions of the game, I would suppose that the reason motivating this rule has something to do with ease of use or ease of understanding. I wouldn't say it's succeeding at that, but an argument could be made that since things like truesight are relatively rare, it's cleaner to leave it out and to expect DMs to rule in the obviously reasonable way if and when it comes up, than to waste the mental energy of everyone, most of whom won't have any need for that information. I don't buy that argument, but it's theoretically sound.
I would very much not agree with an argument that the motivation for the rule has anything to do with balance, or, frankly, that the rule is intended to stay unmodified when it does actually come into contact with things like truesight.
There's an interesting discussion to be had about the concept of specific rules that are designed to be altered (as opposed to rulesets that are designed generally to be altered, as the D&D rules claim to be). But this isn't really the place for that. Maybe I'll start a thread somewhere.
That should not be a controversial argument. I mean, it's printed in plain English in the PHB. "An invisible creature can always try to hide" isn't exactly latin.
The player says, my invisible character tries to hide.
The DM says, Fine but it will fail because you're being grappled.
That's a perfectly valid thing for a DM to choose to do, deciding not to follow the printed RAW rule for Hiding in PHB 7, but to instead implement a houserule. Totally fair, and I'm sure that most DMs probably houserule Hiding to some extent or another!
But the RAW approach would be more like: "fine, but your stealth check will have disadvantage because you're being grappled/grappling" or "fine, but the enemy will have advantage to their check to find you/+5 to their passive perception to set the DC because you're being grappled/grappling"... or even "fine, but after becoming hidden, you will pretty much immediately give away your position and come out of hiding if you maintain the grapple."
I'm not saying that an Invisible creature can't be found after it hides. I'm saying, while a DM can RAW prevent you from ever even taking the action to attempt to Hide by telling you the situation isn't appropriate to allow the attempt, for an Invisible creature, the DM should RAW allow you to at least make the attempt to become hidden, even if it will be difficult/impossible to stay hidden.
The sky is not falling, there are no undesirable outcomes to be found here. I'm just pointing out that the PHB is very clear that an Invisible creature is entitled to always be allowed to attempt to Hide.
So someone invisible can hide, even when somebody else in the room is using See Invisibility?
Of course there's a discussion to be had about what "countered" means for conditions in general, or for a condition like Invisible in particular, but if you want to have that discussion feel free to look up the one that already wrapped up on that subject, or start a new one. It's beyond the bounds of this topic, other than to point out, if you feel that See Invisibility should negate the benefits of being Invisible, then there are mechanisms to accomplish that which do not involve pretending that the Invisible condition does not ordinarily permit an Invisible creature to always attempt to Hide against creatures that treat it as Invisible.
Pretending that you can dismiss an entire printed rule, because of one edge case interaction (which other rules already exist to address) is some kind of slippery slope strawman fallacy or another. We're not just talking about what makes sense for creature hiding from special senses, we're talking about the entire subject of hiding from a creature that you are grappling, or grappled by. We're talking about:
What would be permitted in normal lighting conditions?
What would be permitted in lightly obscured conditions, like dim light, light fog, or light foliage?
What would be permitted in heavily obscured conditions, like total darkness, heavy fog, or dense foliage?
What would be permitted if one creature is Blinded (either normally, or treated-as due to HO)?
What would be permitted if one creature is Invisible?
The fact that you think an Invisible creature should not be "always" permitted to hide from a creature with Truesight, a special circumstance that Appendix A already suggests might be one where Invisible is being "countered" and not in effect, should hardly be treated as an excuse to presume that the same ruling should apply for the other 5 scenarios.
To recap, from my position:
No one may attempt to Hide unless conditions are appropriate, and normal light while you're 5 feet away from an enemy that you're actively in combat with and in fact are grappling... would not normally be appropriate. There's nothing about Grappled or the Grapple action which categorically excludes hiding, but overall, that doesn't sound like a reasonably appropriate situation to try to Hide because you're probably being "seen clearly."
No one may attempt to Hide unless conditions are appropriate, and while dim light that you can still see in poorly can be an appropriate thing to hide in, the context where you're 5 feet away from an enemy that you're in combat with and are grappling would not normally be appropriate.
Exception: Unless you have Skulker or a similar racial trait, which turns Lightly Obscured into a sufficient condition to always permit a Hide attempt. It may not create conditions sufficient for you to remain hidden, or to hide you very effectively when they look for you, but if for some reason its important for you to try to Hide... Skulker allows you to hide whenever you are Lightly Obscured, as a special ability above and beyond what other creatures may reasonably attempt.
No one may attempt to Hide unless conditions are appropriate. Heavy Obscurement is a classic setup for trying to hide and is almost always appropriate to allow an attempt. If you're only 5 feet away, and in active combat, and indeed are touching the enemy because you or they are Grappled, the DM could consider that to not be appropriate... but need not make that decision, and one can easily imagine a situation where one is grabbed and struggling but has to guess from which direction that is coming.
See #3; hiding from a Blinded enemy is almost always appropriate to attempt. Your DM could consider that to be not appropriate instead due to close proximity and contact... but need not make that decision, and one can easily imagine how a Blinded creature might be confused about whether they're grabbed from the front, side, or back and have to resort to selecting a square to attack at random.
Invisible is an exception to the general rule; an Invisible creature may always attempt to Hide, even if the conditions would not ordinarily be appropriate. Even if you're only 5 feet away, and in active combat, and touching the enemy, etc. such that the DM would not allow you to hide against a Blinded enemy, the Invisible condition provides that you may nevertheless try to Hide.
Exception: If your Invisible condition is somehow "countered," which is a term that the DM will need to interpret, such that you are not being treated as Invisible versus that enemy... then you would not retain the benefit that being Invisible provides you to "always" try to hide from that enemy. Straightforward enough, other than debating about what it takes to "counter" Invisible short of actually ending the condition... a discussion for another thread, not this one.
Has been the subject of many threads in its own right, and is probably too problematic to warrant going into too much depth. Blindsight, Tremorsense, and Truesight all permit you to "see" or "detect" or "perceive" creatures within a radius. None of them say that a creature cannot Hide from you (and the Blind Fighting fighting style implies that you can Hide within the radius of Blindsight, at least), but I'm sure everyone would agree that they certainly generally would render a hide attempt "inappropriate" absent something special. If the idea of an Invisible creature hiding from one with Blindsight bothers you, by all means, rule that Blindsight "counters" Invisible and you'll resolve any tension you might be feeling without needing to ignore that [un-"countered"] Invisible in general "always" allows you to attempt to Hide.
There are no undesirable outcomes to be found here by following the RAW in PHB Chapter 7 that:
Lightly Obscured is brought up as a context that can make hiding appropriate
Nothing is written suggesting that being close to, or even touching, an enemy disqualifies you from hiding (if the context is appropriate)
If you're stunned or unconscious, you can't ty to hide even when invisible. You can't attempt to , try to or anything like that as you can't take actions. The invisible condition in this case is not countered, but the ability to try altogheter. Like i said, we shouldn't get too hung up on the sentence "an invisible creature can always try to hide" and take it out of context to assert it like a blanket statement as it's just a support to the sentence that preceed it where it says "You can’t hide from a creature that can see you clearly".
While hiding's wording strongly rely on sight to establish condition to try to hide, perceiving in return does not. It uses words like "notice" or "detect"
So the fundamental question is; can a grappling creature automatically notice or detect the presence of an invisible creature trying to hide from it? How can it cease to notice or detect it's presence while it has a hold of it?
Hiding: When you try to hide, make a Dexterity (Stealth) check...contested by the Wisdom (Perception) check of any creature that actively searches for signs of your presence...When you hide, there’s a chance someone will notice you even if they aren’t searching. To determine whether such a creature notices you, the DM compares your Dexterity (Stealth) check with that creature’s passive Wisdom (Perception) score.
Wisdom: Your Wisdom (Perception) check lets you spot, hear, or otherwise detect the presence of something.
It depends on what you're trying to do, because as others have pointed out, while grappled your grappler knows your position because it knows the position of its own arm, and furthermore it can certainly feel you. But hiding does more than just try and fail to counter those.
For example, I have an Arcane Trickster with the Skulker feat, named Beall. If Beall were to be grappled by a Roper, which is sapient (Int 7!), in the dark, they might decide they wanted to use their action to protect a party member from the Roper by casting Minor Illusion to block the Roper's gaze. But the Roper is as entitled as anyone else to an Arcana check to identify the spell as it's cast, which could ruin the plan - but Minor Illusion is S+M component only, so if you're unseen, you can cast it and no-one can tell what spell you cast. So Beall, in that situation, would Bonus Action Hide to become unseen, and then cast the spell to create something for their party members to hide behind, safe in the knowledge that the Roper won't be able to tell Minor Illusion is the spell that just occurred. The Roper would still know Beall's location and would still feel Beall, but wouldn't be able to see Beall.
You apply the rules as written until another rules trumps it. Let's look at a simple example in the following rule block:
Your Turn
On your turn, you can move a distance up to your speed and take one action. You decide whether to move first or take your action first. Your speed — sometimes called your walking speed — is noted on your character sheet.
The most common actions you can take are described in the "Actions in Combat" section later in this chapter. Many class features and other abilities provide additional options for your action.
The "Movement and Position" section later in this chapter gives the rules for your move.
You can forgo moving, taking an action, or doing anything at all on your turn. If you can't decide what to do on your turn, consider taking the Dodge or Ready action, as described in "Actions in Combat."
Let's look at that first sentence. "On your turn, you can move a distance up to your speed and take one action." Well, you can do that provided that nothing is stopping you. Things like being Grappled, Incapacitated, Paralyzed, Petrified, Restrained, Surprised, Stunned or Unconscious. Wow, that's a lot of exceptions from that list either costing your movement, your action or both. It seems pretty fair to say that the context of this sentence assumes a situation where nothing is interfering with your ability to take your move and action.
Applying that basic logic to a the question at hand: Can you always hide while invisible because the rules say you can? Sure but, if it is completely semantical(as in, you tried and failed due to X circumstance) and only done to satisfy someone's sense of RAW, what true value does this provide over simply saying that the statement is made as an absolute as most rules seem to be, yet we already know that Specific beats General when it comes to rules.
Specific Beats General
This book contains rules, especially in parts 2 and 3, that govern how the game plays. That said, many racial traits, class features, spells, magic items, monster abilities, and other game elements break the general rules in some way, creating an exception to how the rest of the game works. Remember this: If a specific rule contradicts a general rule, the specific rule wins.
Exceptions to the rules are often minor. For instance, many adventurers don’t have proficiency with longbows, but every wood elf does because of a racial trait. That trait creates a minor exception in the game. Other examples of rule-breaking are more conspicuous. For instance, an adventurer can’t normally pass through walls, but some spells make that possible. Magic accounts for most of the major exceptions to the rules.
Being grappled does not tell you what square you are being grappled from. It just... never says that it does that, anywhere.
I'm all for it providing an advantage on checks to figure that information out, or all for it creating a context where it is harder to hide where you are when you're grappling someone, but as anyone who has ever been in a fight and had their shirt pulled over their head can tell you... it is very easy to lose track of where your enemy is when you can't see them, even (especially?) if they're hitting or grabbing you at the same time.
Put aside the invisible creature issue, go back to two combatants in the dark, and it remains true that you can be grabbed by something you can't see and have a hard time knowing from where. 5E does not include a concept of the grappler being partially in the grappled creature's square and partly in their own where you can just "follow the arm".
Being grappled does not tell you what square you are being grappled from. It just... never says that it does that, anywhere.
Nowhere in the rules does it say you can see what square other creatures are in either. The game assumes you know how sight works. It also assumes you know how touch works.
Grappling requires physical contact, and barring special circumstances, if someone is touching me, I can tell if they’re doing it from in front of me, behind me, whatever.
Now maybe they’re trying to be tricky and do a (completely non-sexual) reacharound or something to conceal their actual position while grappling, but that sounds like the Hide action to me (and also something that would make the grapple significantly more difficult).
The PHB: "an invisible creature can always try to hide."
vs.
Plaguescarred: "an invisible creature CAN'T always try to hide."
Well, one of those statements is RAW....
The operative word in that PHB excerpt is TRY, C_C.
As in, "You can certainly try..."
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So I was thinking about this in terms of other rules earlier. Rules do what they say they do, and nothing more. We say that a lot, and of course it's true. But there's more to it than that. If a rule says it does something, we have to assume that the thing it does should act more or less like it does in real life unless something in the rules says otherwise. Kind of like how the game never talks about gravity, but we know it's a thing, except for where rules specifically treat it differently.
The idea of confirmation by omission (hidden = unseen and unheard, therefore touch doesn't prevent hiding) is literally RAW, but it may not be the whole truth. When you grapple someone, you kind of have to assume that it acts like you would expect it to act, except for where the rules say otherwise. And part of that would mean you know where someone is even if you cannot see them or hear them because you have hands (or tentacles) on them.
But it also kind of doesn't matter. If you can attempt to hide right in front of someone, you must be unseen and unheard at a minimum. And if you are unseen, then being hidden doesn't really confer any advantages upon you that you don't have just by being unseen without being hidden--especially if you have the grappled condition.
If a rule says it does something, we have to asume that the thing it does should act more or less like it does in real life unless something in the rules says otherwise.
Source? Because hit points aren’t real, armor class isn’t real, Magic isn’t real, sequential-6-second-turns-that-somehow-are-the-same-6-second-round aren’t real, Darkvision isn’t real, LO and HO aren’t real… nothing in the D&D world works any way other way then how the rules tell us, it's a game. Seeking recourse to an unwritten “Rule 0” that the explicit rule text can be superseded by your own inability to imagine how a blind grappler might lose track of an enemy that has a hold of them is… not a rule, it’s a cop out.
Now maybe they’re trying to be tricky and do a (completely non-sexual) reacharound or something to conceal their actual position while grappling, but that sounds like the Hide action to me (and also something that would make the grapple significantly more difficult).
So.... you agree with me, that a grappling creature can attempt to Hide, but that it might be more difficult?
Hiding ain't easy, and grappling makes it harder, but not impossible in the right circumstances. In the wrong circumstances, it is. Why do you feel the need to argue with me when I say that, when you clearly actually believe it yourself?
The operative word in that PHB excerpt is TRY, C_C.
As in, "You can certainly try..."
This is literally my argument, glad to have you on board!
Right, you try and fail because what you are attempting is impossible. Glad that's settled.
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Right, you try and fail because what you are attempting is impossible. Glad that's settled.
If you tell your player "you can certainly try...", and they try, and roll well, and you say "well actually you fail because its impossible, you can't try."... you're a bad DM and a liar. The DC of skill checks only goes up to "nearly impossible," if you're allowing for checks for things that have no DC and are impossible, you're betraying the trust underlying the player-DM relationship.
Right, you try and fail because what you are attempting is impossible. Glad that's settled.
If you tell your player "you can certainly try...", and they try, and roll well, and you say "well actually you fail because its impossible, you can't try."... you're a bad DM and a liar. The DC of skill checks only goes up to "nearly impossible," if you're allowing for checks for things that have no DC and are impossible, you're betraying the trust underlying the player-DM relationship.
You lied to me, feels bad man :(
Nothing says a character trying to do something requires a roll.
EDIT: Nor does something being impossible mean you can't try to do it. It just means failure is guaranteed.
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
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The player says, my invisible character tries to hide.
The DM says, Fine but it will fail because you're being grappled.
That's a perfectly valid thing for a DM to choose to do, deciding not to follow the printed RAW rule for Hiding in PHB 7, but to instead implement a houserule. Totally fair, and I'm sure that most DMs probably houserule Hiding to some extent or another!
But the RAW approach would be more like: "fine, but your stealth check will have disadvantage because you're being grappled/grappling" or "fine, but the enemy will have advantage to their check to find you/+5 to their passive perception to set the DC because you're being grappled/grappling"... or even "fine, but after becoming hidden, you will pretty much immediately give away your position and come out of hiding if you maintain the grapple."
I'm not saying that an Invisible creature can't be found after it hides. I'm saying, while a DM can RAW prevent you from ever even taking the action to attempt to Hide by telling you the situation isn't appropriate to allow the attempt, for an Invisible creature, the DM should RAW allow you to at least make the attempt to become hidden, even if it will be difficult/impossible to stay hidden.
The sky is not falling, there are no undesirable outcomes to be found here. I'm just pointing out that the PHB is very clear that an Invisible creature is entitled to always be allowed to attempt to Hide.
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You're correct, but the rule is obviously stupid/not working as intended/whatever adjectives you like, because this is still true even if all the enemies in the room have truesight. Or they've cast See Invisibility. Or they use blindsense. Or all of those things at once, for some reason.
The only explanation for the fact that an invisible character is entitled to a Hide attempt regardless of any other elements (such as something to hide behind) and regardless of the invisibility-proof senses of his opponents is, to my mind at least, that the rule was designed for some other purpose than for rationality/suspension of disbelief/realism/whatever you want to call it. Given what we've been told about the design intentions of the game, I would suppose that the reason motivating this rule has something to do with ease of use or ease of understanding. I wouldn't say it's succeeding at that, but an argument could be made that since things like truesight are relatively rare, it's cleaner to leave it out and to expect DMs to rule in the obviously reasonable way if and when it comes up, than to waste the mental energy of everyone, most of whom won't have any need for that information. I don't buy that argument, but it's theoretically sound.
I would very much not agree with an argument that the motivation for the rule has anything to do with balance, or, frankly, that the rule is intended to stay unmodified when it does actually come into contact with things like truesight.
There's an interesting discussion to be had about the concept of specific rules that are designed to be altered (as opposed to rulesets that are designed generally to be altered, as the D&D rules claim to be). But this isn't really the place for that. Maybe I'll start a thread somewhere.
So someone invisible can hide, even when somebody else in the room is using See Invisibility?
"A condition lasts either until it is countered (the prone condition is countered by standing up, for example) or for a duration specified by the effect that imposed the condition."
Of course there's a discussion to be had about what "countered" means for conditions in general, or for a condition like Invisible in particular, but if you want to have that discussion feel free to look up the one that already wrapped up on that subject, or start a new one. It's beyond the bounds of this topic, other than to point out, if you feel that See Invisibility should negate the benefits of being Invisible, then there are mechanisms to accomplish that which do not involve pretending that the Invisible condition does not ordinarily permit an Invisible creature to always attempt to Hide against creatures that treat it as Invisible.
Pretending that you can dismiss an entire printed rule, because of one edge case interaction (which other rules already exist to address) is some kind of slippery slope strawman fallacy or another. We're not just talking about what makes sense for creature hiding from special senses, we're talking about the entire subject of hiding from a creature that you are grappling, or grappled by. We're talking about:
The fact that you think an Invisible creature should not be "always" permitted to hide from a creature with Truesight, a special circumstance that Appendix A already suggests might be one where Invisible is being "countered" and not in effect, should hardly be treated as an excuse to presume that the same ruling should apply for the other 5 scenarios.
To recap, from my position:
There are no undesirable outcomes to be found here by following the RAW in PHB Chapter 7 that:
That's the RAW. I don't see any reason to conclude it isn't RAI, either.
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You can’t hide from a creature that can see you clearly, (PHB, p. 177)
So they would have to go behind cover just like anyone else.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
If you're stunned or unconscious, you can't ty to hide even when invisible. You can't attempt to , try to or anything like that as you can't take actions. The invisible condition in this case is not countered, but the ability to try altogheter. Like i said, we shouldn't get too hung up on the sentence "an invisible creature can always try to hide" and take it out of context to assert it like a blanket statement as it's just a support to the sentence that preceed it where it says "You can’t hide from a creature that can see you clearly".
While hiding's wording strongly rely on sight to establish condition to try to hide, perceiving in return does not. It uses words like "notice" or "detect"
So the fundamental question is; can a grappling creature automatically notice or detect the presence of an invisible creature trying to hide from it? How can it cease to notice or detect it's presence while it has a hold of it?
Hiding: When you try to hide, make a Dexterity (Stealth) check...contested by the Wisdom (Perception) check of any creature that actively searches for signs of your presence...When you hide, there’s a chance someone will notice you even if they aren’t searching. To determine whether such a creature notices you, the DM compares your Dexterity (Stealth) check with that creature’s passive Wisdom (Perception) score.
Wisdom: Your Wisdom (Perception) check lets you spot, hear, or otherwise detect the presence of something.
It depends on what you're trying to do, because as others have pointed out, while grappled your grappler knows your position because it knows the position of its own arm, and furthermore it can certainly feel you. But hiding does more than just try and fail to counter those.
For example, I have an Arcane Trickster with the Skulker feat, named Beall. If Beall were to be grappled by a Roper, which is sapient (Int 7!), in the dark, they might decide they wanted to use their action to protect a party member from the Roper by casting Minor Illusion to block the Roper's gaze. But the Roper is as entitled as anyone else to an Arcana check to identify the spell as it's cast, which could ruin the plan - but Minor Illusion is S+M component only, so if you're unseen, you can cast it and no-one can tell what spell you cast. So Beall, in that situation, would Bonus Action Hide to become unseen, and then cast the spell to create something for their party members to hide behind, safe in the knowledge that the Roper won't be able to tell Minor Illusion is the spell that just occurred. The Roper would still know Beall's location and would still feel Beall, but wouldn't be able to see Beall.
You apply the rules as written until another rules trumps it. Let's look at a simple example in the following rule block:
Let's look at that first sentence. "On your turn, you can move a distance up to your speed and take one action." Well, you can do that provided that nothing is stopping you. Things like being Grappled, Incapacitated, Paralyzed, Petrified, Restrained, Surprised, Stunned or Unconscious. Wow, that's a lot of exceptions from that list either costing your movement, your action or both. It seems pretty fair to say that the context of this sentence assumes a situation where nothing is interfering with your ability to take your move and action.
Applying that basic logic to a the question at hand: Can you always hide while invisible because the rules say you can? Sure but, if it is completely semantical(as in, you tried and failed due to X circumstance) and only done to satisfy someone's sense of RAW, what true value does this provide over simply saying that the statement is made as an absolute as most rules seem to be, yet we already know that Specific beats General when it comes to rules.
Being grappled does not tell you what square you are being grappled from. It just... never says that it does that, anywhere.
I'm all for it providing an advantage on checks to figure that information out, or all for it creating a context where it is harder to hide where you are when you're grappling someone, but as anyone who has ever been in a fight and had their shirt pulled over their head can tell you... it is very easy to lose track of where your enemy is when you can't see them, even (especially?) if they're hitting or grabbing you at the same time.
Put aside the invisible creature issue, go back to two combatants in the dark, and it remains true that you can be grabbed by something you can't see and have a hard time knowing from where. 5E does not include a concept of the grappler being partially in the grappled creature's square and partly in their own where you can just "follow the arm".
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I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
Nowhere in the rules does it say you can see what square other creatures are in either. The game assumes you know how sight works. It also assumes you know how touch works.
Grappling requires physical contact, and barring special circumstances, if someone is touching me, I can tell if they’re doing it from in front of me, behind me, whatever.
Now maybe they’re trying to be tricky and do a (completely non-sexual) reacharound or something to conceal their actual position while grappling, but that sounds like the Hide action to me (and also something that would make the grapple significantly more difficult).
The operative word in that PHB excerpt is TRY, C_C.
As in, "You can certainly try..."
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
So I was thinking about this in terms of other rules earlier. Rules do what they say they do, and nothing more. We say that a lot, and of course it's true. But there's more to it than that. If a rule says it does something, we have to assume that the thing it does should act more or less like it does in real life unless something in the rules says otherwise. Kind of like how the game never talks about gravity, but we know it's a thing, except for where rules specifically treat it differently.
The idea of confirmation by omission (hidden = unseen and unheard, therefore touch doesn't prevent hiding) is literally RAW, but it may not be the whole truth. When you grapple someone, you kind of have to assume that it acts like you would expect it to act, except for where the rules say otherwise. And part of that would mean you know where someone is even if you cannot see them or hear them because you have hands (or tentacles) on them.
But it also kind of doesn't matter. If you can attempt to hide right in front of someone, you must be unseen and unheard at a minimum. And if you are unseen, then being hidden doesn't really confer any advantages upon you that you don't have just by being unseen without being hidden--especially if you have the grappled condition.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
Source? Because hit points aren’t real, armor class isn’t real, Magic isn’t real, sequential-6-second-turns-that-somehow-are-the-same-6-second-round aren’t real, Darkvision isn’t real, LO and HO aren’t real… nothing in the D&D world works any way other way then how the rules tell us, it's a game. Seeking recourse to an unwritten “Rule 0” that the explicit rule text can be superseded by your own inability to imagine how a blind grappler might lose track of an enemy that has a hold of them is… not a rule, it’s a cop out.
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I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
This is literally my argument, glad to have you on board!
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I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
So.... you agree with me, that a grappling creature can attempt to Hide, but that it might be more difficult?
Hiding ain't easy, and grappling makes it harder, but not impossible in the right circumstances. In the wrong circumstances, it is. Why do you feel the need to argue with me when I say that, when you clearly actually believe it yourself?
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I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
Right, you try and fail because what you are attempting is impossible. Glad that's settled.
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
If you tell your player "you can certainly try...", and they try, and roll well, and you say "well actually you fail because its impossible, you can't try."... you're a bad DM and a liar. The DC of skill checks only goes up to "nearly impossible," if you're allowing for checks for things that have no DC and are impossible, you're betraying the trust underlying the player-DM relationship.
You lied to me, feels bad man :(
dndbeyond.com forum tags
I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
Nothing says a character trying to do something requires a roll.
EDIT: Nor does something being impossible mean you can't try to do it. It just means failure is guaranteed.
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)