Monstrous Compendium Vol. 1: Spelljammer Creatures
Frozen Sick
D&D Beyond Basic Rules
Basic Rules (2014)
Sign in to view your library & saved favorites.
Sign in- Marketplace
Monstrous Compendium Vol. 1: Spelljammer CreaturesFrozen SickD&D Beyond Basic RulesBasic Rules (2014)Sign in to view your library & saved favorites.
Sign in
Rules that are very clear and simple are not heavily debated! I don't consider Hide to be very clear and simple rules, its cross-referenced in PHB and DMG, rely on criteria and conditions and is subject to DM's consideration. It's among the things some players don't like in fact.
If a hidden Halfling obscured by a larger creature comes into enemy's line of sight, it can be found with a Wisdom (Perception) check just like for someone hidden behind Three-Quarters Cover.
You don't necessarily need to move to attack, many times you can attack from the location you hide while obscured by a larger creature, Heavily Obscured or behind Three-Quarters Cover or Total Cover clear edge.
Okay, and do you want the DM to start deciding when the party's PCs are sufficiently distracted that an enemy can reliably come out of hiding, make attacks with advantage, and then move away so that they can't be easily counter-attacked every turn?
And it's a stretch to say they're "working at it" because they rolled a d20, particularly because as I've previously outlined in other threads taking the interpretation that the usual 360 awareness of the field applied during combat doesn't count for Hide means Rogues are getting the equivalent of a Very Rare to Legendary magic item effect as a 2nd level class feature so long as they have Stealth expertise, and especially once they get Reliable Talent.
To my understanding as soon as one enemy find you, you're no longer hidden and loose the Invisible condition.
As Sage Advice say: If a creature finds you, you’re no longer hidden and lose that condition
People don't like them because at the extreme, they break verisimilitude and don't make any sense.
If you follow the idea that the list to become unhidden is exhaustive, and that the only way to find something is to perform the Search Action, a non-spellcasting rogue with a really high roll to hide in the area of a silence spell cannot unhide unless they make an attack! Choosing to not hide anymore is not on the list of things that cause you to lose the invisible condition.
Look, I'm perfectly happy allowing a rogue to sneak up on someone from behind, and even doing so using the Stealth roll they got when initially hiding (as long as sneaking was part of the stated intention), but I'm going to lean very heavily on "the DM decides..." language for hiding and remaining hidden. Essentially, in my session 0 I will explain the Hide rules thusly:
They are as written with the following additions -
1. Choosing to stop hiding is a way to stop being hidden.
2. If a creature is unseen at the start of its turn, it can benefit from the unseen attacker rules, even if it loses that during the course of its turn.*
3. The DM can dictate if circumstances allow a creature to remain hidden as well as to hide in the first place. (for example, invoking a movement penalty to remain hidden while moving)**
I acknowledge that this is houserules, but I'm trying to strike a balance where hiding is a boon to classes that want to rely on it, while also providing some actual sense to the rules.
*This one I'm going to have to playtest a bit, but it works fine on TT Wargames...
**This is probably the biggest point of contention in the arguments about the Hide rules. I actually think this is already a part of the rules, but others do not. I'd want to make this explicit in Session 0.
So, I decided to just poll people: who actually prefers the 2024 hide rules?
Every rule is hotly debated, especially in these forums.
Consensus is impossible and irrelevant.
If you have problems, either figure them out yourself, or ask for help. People here refuse help just to argue with it, or to stop other people from getting help. It's the nature of the internet.
Eh, most achieve a general consensus with a few holdouts for one reason or another. I can't really think of another instance where there's so many sustained differing positions on the issue.
There's Darkness & Nick that also generate a lot.
While Nick (and Dual Wielding) were debated a lot in the beginning, I think the dust has mostly settled on that one. Darkness, however, I think is in the same boat as Hide: the rules don't seem to make a whole lot of sense when taken at face value, and it's not even a problem of "DnD is not a physics simulator". It's the fact that, by RAW, you can't see the moon at night...
They move so the hidden rogue no longer has the prerequisites for stealth. They use an ability that defeats invisibility.
Except it doesn't call for a Search Action, which would seem to be a simple and logical bit of text to include if the intention was that an enemy absolutely must spend action economy to locate you.
The argument that the enemy somehow can instantly track well enough to, say, take a Legendary Action against anyone on the field in the infinitesimal gap of time at the end of a turn or respond to spell cast from "behind" them as you describe it, but cannot perceive a character because they stood behind a crate- potentially for just a moment- because they've been "distracted" is getting into players narrating NPC agency for a favorable outcome.
While my example was meant to really highlight the absurdity, the same logic applies to someone with a torch more than 40ft away. You can't see them (or the torch) without darkvision.
...but this thread (and the 3-4 other recent ones) is about Hide.
I'm sure this has been said ad infinitum elsewhere, but might as well go down the rabbit hole...
Depends on your interpretation, but I think the wording definitely leans more towards you being able to.
Darkness:
"An area of Darkness is Heavily Obscured. See also “Heavily Obscured” and “Playing the Game” (“Exploration”)."
Heavily Obscured:
"You have the Blinded condition while trying to see something in a Heavily Obscured space. See also “Blinded,” “Darkness,” and “Playing the Game” (“Exploration”)."
This could be read as either "when you are in" or "that is in," but given the phrasing (and obvious Intent) the latter makes far more sense.
Obscured Areas:
"A Heavily Obscured area—such as an area with Darkness, heavy fog, or dense foliage—is opaque. You have the Blinded condition (see the Rules Glossary) when trying to see something there."
There isn't much ambiguity to this one; you are trying to "see something there," it's a huge stretch to read this as "when you are there."
You being in a Heavily Obscured area doesn't automatically Blind you to everything; rather, you have the Blinded condition towards something you're trying to see that is, itself, in a Heavily Obscured area (such as Darkness). If something is in light, you can see it, even if you're in a Heavily Obscured area.
Technically you can't say that RAW, because:
"Passive Perception is for when you're actively looking" is a wild sentence.
Noooooo, don't do it. Trust me.
(I agree with you, btw)
Turn away from this path. It only leads to suffering.
No, this makes having high perception nearly useless against stealth; because search takes an action, it's almost never actually worth using in combat.
It does indeed make having a high Passive Perception nearly useless in combat. Which I personally have... very mixed feelings about. Outside combat, it's still useful, which I went into some detail about recently in this comment.
If the players have actively said they are "going cautiously" and "checking for traps and ambushes" and you don't let them roll a perception check... what are you even doing??
No, that is what an active Wisdom(Perception) check is for.
... Dude, what? Player-forward actions - such as the Search action - are things players make; not something the DM makes for them. That's why the wording of them is "when you take the ... action." DM's do not decide you are taking actions for you. Passive Perception does not in any way touch the Search action.
Passive Perception is for when you have not told the DM that you are actively trying to detect something, as well as what you're trying to detect. This is why the Search action specifically says "The Search table suggests which skills are applicable when you take this action, depending on what you’re trying to detect."
If the party (or a character) says they are actively looking for traps, then that is what they take the action for. If enemies are sneaking up on them at the same time, then the DM would use their Passive Perception.
Rulings as to whether Advantage/Disadvantage would apply can then be taken into consideration based on the situation, but there's no blanket rule for when they do, and you most certainly do not apply Disadvantage (-5) to a character's Passive Perception because they aren't actively taking the Search action. That's not how any of this works.