The invisibility grants the Invisible condition. It has no other specifications.
The invisible condition has three effects:
Surprise. If you're Invisible when you roll Initiative, you have Advantage on the roll.
Concealed. You aren't affected by any effect that requires its target to be seen unless the effect's creator can somehow see you. Any equipment you are wearing or carrying is also concealed.
Attacks Affected. Attack rolls against you have Disadvantage, and your attack rolls have Advantage. If a creature can somehow see you, you don't gain this benefit against that creature.
Notably missing from this is anything actually preventing anyone from seeing you. And, when interpreting RAW, if a rule doesn't say it does something... it doesn't do that thing.
This is a very pedantic interpretation, and at the same time I say nothing prevents the opposite either. It says, if a creature can somehow see you, meaning it must have the ability to do so. There are many ways a creature can see you, and that includes DM ruling as Sillvva mentioned earlier. You say you're interpreting RAW, but you're already making the assumption that nothing prevents anyone from seeing you because the rule doesn't say so, which is incorrect. You're making this assumption in a vacuum, but rules are additive, and they are predicated on the action that enables them; for the Invisible condition, it is the Hide and Invisibility spell.
In the case of the Invisibility spell, it says:
A creature you touch has the Invisible condition until the spell ends. The spell ends early immediately after the target makes an attack roll, deals damage, or casts a spell.
You have only four ways to break the spell per the description: Duration, Attack Roll, Damage, and Casting. Nothing here says roll a Stealth check, that you need 3/4 or full cover, or that an enemy finds you, or loud sounds break it. Neither does it says you have to be out of an enemy's line of sight to gain the Invisible condition..
From the Invisible condition--which you so graciously provided--we have the Concealed and Attacks Affected effects, which require a creature to somehow able to see you to break (meaning, it must have the ability to do so).
Now, combine the enabling action rules and the condition rules, and you get how the spell works: You gain the invisible condition, and it can only break if the duration passes; you make an attack, deal damage or cast a spell; or a creature has the ability to see you through an effect. Neither normal vision or hearing can break this effect per the descriptions, so the only way to break it is with See Invisibility, Blindsight, TremorSense, or TrueSight.
I'm not gonna touch Hide because that's not the point of this post; just the Invisibility spell.
I don't have the full text in front of me, but my guess is that the "Unseen Attacker" rule may have been eliminated.
Someone on reddit checked that. Nope, it's still there.
Another ... 'interesting' feature of the new Invisible is that it doesn't actually prevent someone from seeing you. It prevents them from targeting you with abilities that require vision, but does not actually prevent seeing you (unlike the blinded condition), and since the condition is negated for any creature that can 'see' you... apparently you can counter the invisibility spell by looking at the target.
Once again, you make an assumption of RAW on a rule in a vacuum, and you make the implication that you can break the invisibility spell by just looking at the target because the condition doesn't prevent anyone from seeing you. You're stating this assumption as a fact based on a bad misreading of a rule that once again, is predicated by the enabling action which you leave absent from your response. If you're going to state something as a fact or assessment, you need to present evidence that corroborates your judgment, otherwise it's not a valid argument.
This is a very pedantic interpretation, and at the same time I say nothing prevents the opposite either.
Pedantry is the essence of RAW disputes, because RAW is not concerned with the intent of a rule, it's concerned with what the rule actually says, and the rule simply does not say that you cannot be seen. Since the effect is canceled if an opponent can "somehow" see the invisible target, and the condition does not prevent seeing the target, "somehow" means "normal requirements for seeing something". Which is to say, you look at them.
This is a very pedantic interpretation, and at the same time I say nothing prevents the opposite either.
Pedantry is the essence of RAW disputes, because RAW is not concerned with the intent of a rule, it's concerned with what the rule actually says, and the rule simply does not say that you cannot be seen. Since the effect is canceled if an opponent can "somehow" see the invisible target, and the condition does not prevent seeing the target, "somehow" means "normal requirements for seeing something". Which is to say, you look at them.
No my friend, you are twisting the meaning of the words to fit a very narrow-minded interpretation based on pre-conceived bias.
Let me break this up to you RAW, starting with the definition of Somehow:
Somehow: in one way or another not known or designated (Merriam-Webster dictionary); in a way or by some means that is not known or not stated (Cambridge Dictionary)
Invisible Condition:
Surprise. If you're Invisible when you roll Initiative, you have Advantage on the roll.
Concealed. You aren't affected by any effect that requires its target to be seen unless the effect's creator can somehow see you.
Attacks Affected. Attack rolls against you have Disadvantage, and your attack rolls have Advantage. If a creature can somehow see you, you don't gain this benefit against that creature.
There, we don't know how they see you, but they have to find a way. It is not known, not stated or undesignated how they can see you, based on the definition of Somehow.
Invisibility (spell):
A creature you touch has the Invisible condition until the spell ends. The spell ends early immediately after the target makes an attack roll, deals damage, or casts a spell.
There's no other text, and only three ways to break the invisible condition from the spell (four with duration). If I cast Invisibility in front of an enemy, I gain the invisible condition because nothing in the spell text specifies line of sight breaks it.
Per the Rules Glossary, there are three types of Sight that can see the Invisible condition: Blindsight, Tremorsense and Truesight.
I'm sorry, but there is no textual support for your interpretation specifically in regards to the Invisibility spell, and to continue making this point is arguing in bad faith.
I'm sorry, but there is no textual support for your interpretation specifically in regards to the Invisibility spell. You're instead adding the capability for Normal Sight to see through the Invisible condition when it is not stated so nor does it exist.
Normal sight can see through the invisible condition because the invisible condition does not say it doesn't.
I'm sorry, but there is no textual support for your interpretation specifically in regards to the Invisibility spell. You're instead adding the capability for Normal Sight to see through the Invisible condition when it is not stated so nor does it exist.
Normal sight can see through the invisible condition because the invisible condition does not say it doesn't.
I'm not gonna bother anymore. You're just arguing in bad faith at this point. The text RAW is pretty clear, but you continue to twist it, so I can only conclude you're ignoring it on purpose. These rules don't exist in a vacuum, which you seem intent on forcing.
He is not talking about what it takes to "break" the Invisible Condition. We already know that whichever Feature grants the Condition specifies how that condition is ended.
The point that he is making is that the Condition doesn't actually DO what you think it does. It doesn't actually make you invisible, despite what it's named. That's because it never says that it does.
Compare against the 2014 wording of the Invisible Condition, which starts out like this: "An invisible creature is impossible to see without the aid of magic or a special sense." This makes it clear what the Condition actually DOES for you when you have it. The 2024 Invisible Condition is lacking any text that says anything like this. It's a massive oversight and it needs to be corrected.
The 2014 invisible condition has its own bug, of course: because the bullet points were not connected, being able to see an invisible creature did not negate disadvantage on attacks and advantage on its attacks.
Has anyone with early access actually looked up the wording for the Invisibility spell to see if that has changed? All of this could sort of work if the part about actually being invisible was removed from the Invisible Condition as long as that gets added back into the text for the Invisibility spell. That's not great design though since all other Features that are meant to grant traditional invisibility will have to cut and paste that wording directly into those Features as well instead of just having that wording in one place within the Condition itself.
You also brought up a good point earlier that everything in the game that grants the ability to See Invisibility is not going to work correctly anymore either unless additional wording is added into each and every one of those Features. What a mess.
I posted the description of the Invisibility spell previously (minus the upcast line since its unchanged).
Invisibility (spell):
A creature you touch has the Invisible condition until the spell ends. The spell ends early immediately after the target makes an attack roll, deals damage, or casts a spell.
I posted the description of the Invisibility spell (minus the upcast line since its unchanged).
Yes, that's what the invisibility spell does: it applies the invisible condition and nothing else. The problem isn't with the spell, it's with the condition.
Ah, thanks. I missed that. So, they actually took out the bit about "Anything the target is wearing or carrying is invisible as long as it is on the target's person."? And the spell doesn't actually say that the target creature becomes invisible either?
Wow, this all seems extraordinarily bad, I honestly don't know what they were thinking. And how did this sort of thing get all the way through 8 rounds of playtesting and into the final published material, that's just crazy. This will all require immediate errata.
If there are problems this serious with how some core mechanics of the game were written then it's starting to seem like a decent idea to wait a while before buying the books until they correct these things and reprint them with the inevitable changes.
Ah, thanks. I missed that. So, they actually took out the bit about "Anything the target is wearing or carrying is invisible as long as it is on the target's person."?
That part is included in the invisible condition, so the spell doesn't need it.
Concealed. You aren't affected by any effect that requires its target to be seen unless the effect's creator can somehow see you. Any equipment you are wearing or carrying is also concealed.
Ah, thanks. I missed that. So, they actually took out the bit about "Anything the target is wearing or carrying is invisible as long as it is on the target's person."? And the spell doesn't actually say that the target creature becomes invisible either?
Wow, this all seems extraordinarily bad, I honestly don't know what they were thinking. And how did this sort of thing get all the way through 8 rounds of playtesting and into the final published material, that's just crazy. This will all require immediate errata.
If there are problems this serious with how some core mechanics of the game were written then it's starting to seem like a decent idea to wait a while before buying the books until they correct these things and reprint them with the inevitable changes.
What they removed was the bit from the Invisible condition that said "If a creature can somehow see you, as with magic or Blindsight"; it was in the Playtest all the way through Playtest 8. My point is that they removed it intentionally for the final print.
My guess is they wanted to keep it intentionally vague so that it could apply to both Hiding and magical Invisibility.
If anyone could see Invisible creature under the Invisibility spell, the Invisible condition would be useless. The See Invisibility spell would be useless.Truesight would be useless.
That's evidence for it being badly written, not evidence that it doesn't say what it says.
But the rules you quoted don't say normal senses via Perception let you see someone under the Invisibility spell like you claim.
Invisible means not visible, you can't be seen while invisible, you're concealed from view. So there will be game elements that tells you they can see invisible creature.
If anyone could see Invisible creature under the Invisibility spell, the Invisible condition would be useless. The See Invisibility spell would be useless.Truesight would be useless.
That's evidence for it being badly written, not evidence that it doesn't say what it says.
But the rules you quoted don't say normal senses via Perception let you see someone under the Invisibility spell like you claim.
Invisible means not visible, you can't be seen while invisible, you're concealed from view. So there will be game elements that tells you they can see invisible creature.
Yeah, he is taking an extremely divergent interpretation of the Invisible condition because WotC removed the words "as with magic or Blindsight" from the final publication, so that must mean normal sight can see you. This is the same kind of rules lawyering that leads to goofy interpretations like "an unlit Torch causes Fire damage because the word "Burning" is missing, therefore it doesn't say the Torch has to be burning to cause Fire damage"
Invisible means not visible, you can't be seen while invisible, you're concealed from view. So there will be game elements that tells you they can see invisible creature.
What you guys keep missing here is that "invisible" doesn't mean that in 2024 because it's never defined like that anywhere. There's a condition called "Invisible", and a spell called "Invisibility", and neither of these mention anything about not being visible. Remember, in 2014 the condition had the description that "An invisible creature is impossible to see without the aid of magic or a special sense." This defined what it means to be an invisible creature in a way that aligns with our traditional concept of invisible creatures. The 2024 rules do not currently do this.
Right now, a normal creature with normal vision can look at an invisible creature and see them just fine just as easily as they can see any non-invisible creature. This is likely the intent when it comes to looking at a Hidden creature, but surely not when looking at an invisible creature. It's just a monumentally massive oversight that needs to be corrected. Otherwise, 100% of DMs will be house ruling this.
Invisible means not visible, you can't be seen while invisible, you're concealed from view. So there will be game elements that tells you they can see invisible creature.
What you guys keep missing here is that "invisible" doesn't mean that in 2024 because it's never defined like that anywhere. There's a condition called "Invisible", and a spell called "Invisibility", and neither of these mention anything about not being visible. Remember, in 2014 the condition had the description that "An invisible creature is impossible to see without the aid of magic or a special sense." This defined what it means to be an invisible creature in a way that aligns with our traditional concept of invisible creatures. The 2024 rules do not currently do this.
Right now, a normal creature with normal vision can look at an invisible creature and see them just fine just as easily as they can see any non-invisible creature. This is likely the intent when it comes to looking at a Hidden creature, but surely not when looking at an invisible creature. It's just a monumentally massive oversight that needs to be corrected. Otherwise, 100% of DMs will be house ruling this.
And again, this description was removed on purpose from the final publication, because otherwise the Invisible condition meant Hiding could only be broken by magical means. The Concealed effect already says you cant be targeted by effects which require you to be seen, and how the creature can see you is undefined, so it depends on the scenario and a creature's abilities.
I keep saying, these rules don't exist in a vacuum, and are additive with other rules.
Invisible means not visible, you can't be seen while invisible, you're concealed from view. So there will be game elements that tells you they can see invisible creature.
What you guys keep missing here is that "invisible" doesn't mean that in 2024 because it's never defined like that anywhere. There's a condition called "Invisible", and a spell called "Invisibility", and neither of these mention anything about not being visible. Remember, in 2014 the condition had the description that "An invisible creature is impossible to see without the aid of magic or a special sense." This defined what it means to be an invisible creature in a way that aligns with our traditional concept of invisible creatures. The 2024 rules do not currently do this.
Right now, a normal creature with normal vision can look at an invisible creature and see them just fine just as easily as they can see any non-invisible creature. This is likely the intent when it comes to looking at a Hidden creature, but surely not when looking at an invisible creature. It's just a monumentally massive oversight that needs to be corrected. Otherwise, 100% of DMs will be house ruling this.
As I mentioned earlier in a post, the key for me is the word Concealed and its usual meaning in English. The word itself is part of the rule and must be taken into account.
Concealed. You aren't affected by any effect that requires its target to be seen unless the effect's creator can somehow see you. Any equipment you are wearing or carrying is also concealed.
And then, you need to consider how property was obtained—whether by hiding, spell, or other means.
I agree that you keep saying that. But that doesn't solve the problem with this mechanic in 2024 unless there is another rule somewhere in the new book that addresses this that none of us are aware of yet. Right now, from what has been posted in this thread, an invisible creature can be seen just by looking at it. Otherwise, you are assuming something that is not actually written anywhere. Features only do what they say.
What you guys keep missing here is that "invisible" doesn't mean that in 2024 because it's never defined like that anywhere. There's a condition called "Invisible", and a spell called "Invisibility", and neither of these mention anything about not being visible.
The Invisible condition is self explanatory, mentioning twice ''If a creature can somehow see you'',and notably saying you aren't affected by any effect that requires its target to be seen.
If anyone could see you with normal vision, the condition would be useless.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
This is a very pedantic interpretation, and at the same time I say nothing prevents the opposite either. It says, if a creature can somehow see you, meaning it must have the ability to do so. There are many ways a creature can see you, and that includes DM ruling as Sillvva mentioned earlier. You say you're interpreting RAW, but you're already making the assumption that nothing prevents anyone from seeing you because the rule doesn't say so, which is incorrect. You're making this assumption in a vacuum, but rules are additive, and they are predicated on the action that enables them; for the Invisible condition, it is the Hide and Invisibility spell.
In the case of the Invisibility spell, it says:
You have only four ways to break the spell per the description: Duration, Attack Roll, Damage, and Casting. Nothing here says roll a Stealth check, that you need 3/4 or full cover, or that an enemy finds you, or loud sounds break it. Neither does it says you have to be out of an enemy's line of sight to gain the Invisible condition..
From the Invisible condition--which you so graciously provided--we have the Concealed and Attacks Affected effects, which require a creature to somehow able to see you to break (meaning, it must have the ability to do so).
Now, combine the enabling action rules and the condition rules, and you get how the spell works: You gain the invisible condition, and it can only break if the duration passes; you make an attack, deal damage or cast a spell; or a creature has the ability to see you through an effect. Neither normal vision or hearing can break this effect per the descriptions, so the only way to break it is with See Invisibility, Blindsight, TremorSense, or TrueSight.
I'm not gonna touch Hide because that's not the point of this post; just the Invisibility spell.
Once again, you make an assumption of RAW on a rule in a vacuum, and you make the implication that you can break the invisibility spell by just looking at the target because the condition doesn't prevent anyone from seeing you. You're stating this assumption as a fact based on a bad misreading of a rule that once again, is predicated by the enabling action which you leave absent from your response. If you're going to state something as a fact or assessment, you need to present evidence that corroborates your judgment, otherwise it's not a valid argument.
Pedantry is the essence of RAW disputes, because RAW is not concerned with the intent of a rule, it's concerned with what the rule actually says, and the rule simply does not say that you cannot be seen. Since the effect is canceled if an opponent can "somehow" see the invisible target, and the condition does not prevent seeing the target, "somehow" means "normal requirements for seeing something". Which is to say, you look at them.
No my friend, you are twisting the meaning of the words to fit a very narrow-minded interpretation based on pre-conceived bias.
Let me break this up to you RAW, starting with the definition of Somehow:
Somehow: in one way or another not known or designated (Merriam-Webster dictionary); in a way or by some means that is not known or not stated (Cambridge Dictionary)
There, we don't know how they see you, but they have to find a way. It is not known, not stated or undesignated how they can see you, based on the definition of Somehow.
There's no other text, and only three ways to break the invisible condition from the spell (four with duration). If I cast Invisibility in front of an enemy, I gain the invisible condition because nothing in the spell text specifies line of sight breaks it.
Per the Rules Glossary, there are three types of Sight that can see the Invisible condition: Blindsight, Tremorsense and Truesight.
I'm sorry, but there is no textual support for your interpretation specifically in regards to the Invisibility spell, and to continue making this point is arguing in bad faith.
Normal sight can see through the invisible condition because the invisible condition does not say it doesn't.
I'm not gonna bother anymore. You're just arguing in bad faith at this point. The text RAW is pretty clear, but you continue to twist it, so I can only conclude you're ignoring it on purpose. These rules don't exist in a vacuum, which you seem intent on forcing.
He is not talking about what it takes to "break" the Invisible Condition. We already know that whichever Feature grants the Condition specifies how that condition is ended.
The point that he is making is that the Condition doesn't actually DO what you think it does. It doesn't actually make you invisible, despite what it's named. That's because it never says that it does.
Compare against the 2014 wording of the Invisible Condition, which starts out like this: "An invisible creature is impossible to see without the aid of magic or a special sense." This makes it clear what the Condition actually DOES for you when you have it. The 2024 Invisible Condition is lacking any text that says anything like this. It's a massive oversight and it needs to be corrected.
The 2014 invisible condition has its own bug, of course: because the bullet points were not connected, being able to see an invisible creature did not negate disadvantage on attacks and advantage on its attacks.
Has anyone with early access actually looked up the wording for the Invisibility spell to see if that has changed? All of this could sort of work if the part about actually being invisible was removed from the Invisible Condition as long as that gets added back into the text for the Invisibility spell. That's not great design though since all other Features that are meant to grant traditional invisibility will have to cut and paste that wording directly into those Features as well instead of just having that wording in one place within the Condition itself.
You also brought up a good point earlier that everything in the game that grants the ability to See Invisibility is not going to work correctly anymore either unless additional wording is added into each and every one of those Features. What a mess.
I posted the description of the Invisibility spell previously (minus the upcast line since its unchanged).
Yes, that's what the invisibility spell does: it applies the invisible condition and nothing else. The problem isn't with the spell, it's with the condition.
Ah, thanks. I missed that. So, they actually took out the bit about "Anything the target is wearing or carrying is invisible as long as it is on the target's person."? And the spell doesn't actually say that the target creature becomes invisible either?
Wow, this all seems extraordinarily bad, I honestly don't know what they were thinking. And how did this sort of thing get all the way through 8 rounds of playtesting and into the final published material, that's just crazy. This will all require immediate errata.
If there are problems this serious with how some core mechanics of the game were written then it's starting to seem like a decent idea to wait a while before buying the books until they correct these things and reprint them with the inevitable changes.
That part is included in the invisible condition, so the spell doesn't need it.
What they removed was the bit from the Invisible condition that said "If a creature can somehow see you, as with magic or Blindsight"; it was in the Playtest all the way through Playtest 8. My point is that they removed it intentionally for the final print.
My guess is they wanted to keep it intentionally vague so that it could apply to both Hiding and magical Invisibility.
But the rules you quoted don't say normal senses via Perception let you see someone under the Invisibility spell like you claim.
Invisible means not visible, you can't be seen while invisible, you're concealed from view. So there will be game elements that tells you they can see invisible creature.
Yeah, he is taking an extremely divergent interpretation of the Invisible condition because WotC removed the words "as with magic or Blindsight" from the final publication, so that must mean normal sight can see you. This is the same kind of rules lawyering that leads to goofy interpretations like "an unlit Torch causes Fire damage because the word "Burning" is missing, therefore it doesn't say the Torch has to be burning to cause Fire damage"
What you guys keep missing here is that "invisible" doesn't mean that in 2024 because it's never defined like that anywhere. There's a condition called "Invisible", and a spell called "Invisibility", and neither of these mention anything about not being visible. Remember, in 2014 the condition had the description that "An invisible creature is impossible to see without the aid of magic or a special sense." This defined what it means to be an invisible creature in a way that aligns with our traditional concept of invisible creatures. The 2024 rules do not currently do this.
Right now, a normal creature with normal vision can look at an invisible creature and see them just fine just as easily as they can see any non-invisible creature. This is likely the intent when it comes to looking at a Hidden creature, but surely not when looking at an invisible creature. It's just a monumentally massive oversight that needs to be corrected. Otherwise, 100% of DMs will be house ruling this.
And again, this description was removed on purpose from the final publication, because otherwise the Invisible condition meant Hiding could only be broken by magical means. The Concealed effect already says you cant be targeted by effects which require you to be seen, and how the creature can see you is undefined, so it depends on the scenario and a creature's abilities.
I keep saying, these rules don't exist in a vacuum, and are additive with other rules.
As I mentioned earlier in a post, the key for me is the word Concealed and its usual meaning in English. The word itself is part of the rule and must be taken into account.
And then, you need to consider how property was obtained—whether by hiding, spell, or other means.
I don't expect people to agree with me :)
I agree that you keep saying that. But that doesn't solve the problem with this mechanic in 2024 unless there is another rule somewhere in the new book that addresses this that none of us are aware of yet. Right now, from what has been posted in this thread, an invisible creature can be seen just by looking at it. Otherwise, you are assuming something that is not actually written anywhere. Features only do what they say.
The Invisible condition is self explanatory, mentioning twice ''If a creature can somehow see you'',and notably saying you aren't affected by any effect that requires its target to be seen.
If anyone could see you with normal vision, the condition would be useless.