Monstrous Compendium Vol. 1: Spelljammer Creatures
Frozen Sick
D&D Beyond Basic Rules
Basic Rules (2014)
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Monstrous Compendium Vol. 1: Spelljammer CreaturesFrozen SickD&D Beyond Basic RulesBasic Rules (2014)Sign in to view your library & saved favorites.
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I mean, RAW is itself mostly useless if you try to rule out GM interpretation.
Sometimes, what the text says is either inconclusive, or specifically says "ask the DM".
Just to clarify some things from my original question for both room for more discussion and a bit more clearness (because it honestly seems like you guys forgot about some parts about the initial statement)
1) I am a DM. This question was originally about "Could I use features of the Shadow Dragon to give them Advantage on an attack roll?".
2) I wasn't asking this for roguish intentions, because as I previously stated, I am a DM. While these posts certainly apply to players, I am asking this while under the effect of the forever-DM curse.
Besides those two things, the sheer amount of input has been insane. Never in my life would I have imagined one question lead to over 200 responses. to those of you who are still in this discussion, please continue as you were previously but keep in mind that no, my intentions are not pickpocketing the wall (yes, that's something one of my players did but that's not relevant).
1) Yes if the Shadow Dragon successfully Hide in Dim Light or Darkness, it can make an Attack Roll with Advantage. It could also have Advantage to attack those who can't see in Darkness by merely standing there.
2) As The DM can also decide that circumstances grant Advantage or impose Disadvantage.
Yes. Attacking may break hiding, but only after the attack is made.
There's an additional question as to whether the advantage applies to all the attacks in a multiattack, or just the first, and that, like much of the hiding rules, is unclear, and up to DM discretion. It probably only goes for the first, but applying to all is not unreasonable. (Just be consistent in how you apply it to both players and monsters.)
Unfortunately, you hit on one of the worst-written bits of the 5.5e rules, and one where many people have very strong opinions, which they are sure the text supports.
To me it's clear if you have multiple attacks with your action; you stop being hidden immediately after you make an attack roll and thus not be hidden anymore for subsequent attacks.
The rule says the condition ends after you make an attack roll, so if you are a Fighter with Extra Attack and you roll for all of your attacks at once (instead of one after the other), then the advantage gets applied to all of them. *wink
Because you may think that I disagree with you just to disagree with you; this was never my intended position. I do not and have not maintained the position that the instant you step from cover you are found.
My position is, and has been, that Stealth works as you have generally proposed it. A rogue takes cover somewhere, pops out, and attacks someone and they absolutely should get Advantage to their attack. Battlefields are confusing spaces and people proficient in Stealth know how to exploit that to their advantage.
The vast majority of the time, in my opinion, it is going to work exactly like how you think it should work.
However, I also maintain the position that the Invisible Condition is not the same as actually being invisible. It is a mechanical effect rather than a truly descriptive one and if someone tries to use it like true invisibility (e.g., approaching down a long hallway with inadequate cover and expecting not to be seen, holding up a sheet of wallpaper so that they have cover and then dropping it after they make their roll and expecting the NPCs to not be able to see them, etc.) then it isn't going to work.
And if I am DMing and I make such a decision, then I expect you to accept it and not accuse me of ignoring rules or creating my own house rule any more than if I were to say 'No' to a peasant railgun. It is simply an interpretation of the concept of the rogue 'being found'.
As jl8e said, "you hit on one of the worst-written bits of the 5.5e rules".
If you think 211 posts (and counting) are insane, take a look at this: Explaining the 2024 Stealth Rules. It's COOL!, it has 1358 answers xD
I'm not so sure it is one of the worst written bits, but it definitely has some extremely entrenched camps.
And like most of the time when that happens, it seems like there are very few people actually on either of the extreme ends (one end being Stealth making someone fully invisible, the other end being that it is practically impossible to attack from Stealth since you have to break cover and are immediately 'found'). Most of us seem to be more toward the middle of the argument (generally you can use Stealth and attack from it, but it is not full invisibility and does have very real limits).
Yeah, maybe "worst-written" is putting it too strongly. I agree, but we still don't have any guidance on the gaps/doubts/questions in the rules that have led to so many threads about this topic :-/
Could be the rules for Heavily Obscured beat it :)
This seems to be the critical error that a lot of folks are making when trying to interpret the rules for hiding.
I went into this in more detail in a previous post, but in summary, the text for the Hide action never says this. Taking the Hide action does NOT cause you to acquire any sort of "hidden" pseudo-condition at all. Instead, the action provides a method and procedure for trying to conceal yourself. Whenever the word "hidden" is used in this text, it's used as a reference to the concept of being hidden, which is defined elsewhere.
In the first case, the term "hidden" is listed as a prerequisite for having the benefit of the Hide action. In other words, the text does NOT say, "upon successfully taking this action, you become hidden". What it DOES say: On an ongoing basis, IF you ARE hidden, you have the listed benefit.
In the second case, certain events cause you to stop being hidden immediately. Again, this is a reference to the concept of being hidden, which is NOT the action that was taken. It's written this way because if something causes you to be "not hidden", then you automatically lose this particular Invisible condition as per the previous paragraph. And again, these are not the only ways that you can stop being hidden -- this text never says that either.
This is the second critical error. In the case of the Invisible condition given by the Hide action, it's explicitly the other way around. This Invisible condition does not "make" you unseen. Instead, being unseen (and unheard) in the first place enables you to "have" the Invisible condition and its associated benefits.
They could have used a lot more words to write it like this:
. . . While your location is unknown to your enemies due to being unseen and unheard, when you roll initiative, you have advantage on your roll and also, you aren’t affected by any effect that requires its target to be seen unless the effect’s creator can somehow see you and any equipment you are wearing or carrying is also concealed and also, attack rolls against you have Disadvantage, and your attack rolls have Advantage, however, if a creature can somehow see you, you don’t gain this attack roll related benefit against that creature.
But instead of writing it like that, they wrote it like this:
As for the claim that nothing else in the text for the Hide action makes you unseen -- at the moment that the action is taken you are definitely unseen because that's a requirement for success. That text says, "while you’re Heavily Obscured or behind Three-Quarters Cover or Total Cover, and you must be out of any enemy’s line of sight; if you can see a creature, you can discern whether it can see you."
However, after the action has already been taken previously, and on an ongoing basis, is there text within the Hide action that makes you unseen? NO!!! There isn't! And that's the entire point! It is up to the character to go through the trouble of remaining unseen! The Hide action doesn't do that for you.
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As an important reminder, the main function of the Stealth skill in this game is to become unheard by your enemies, NOT unseen. It's the skill of becoming and remaining unusually quiet, especially while moving.
As for the part about Stealth being used when hiding behind things, that implies that you are . . . um . . . behind things. This is basically a note that it is used by the Hide action. The Hide action is an attempt to conceal yourself, which has two parts: Locate yourself in an unseen position AND try to become and remain quiet, which is what the Stealth check does for you. That portion of the above skill description can be read as: "Stealth: While behind things, hiding." In other words, being stealthy involves becoming and remaining quiet while behind things. That's also how it's used within the Hide action.
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I wanted to respond to some other comments but I'm out of time for now. Looking forward to catching up on the rest of this thread soon since it's an interesting and useful discussion.
The original text of Hide did not do that. The errata'd version does. Oddly, the D&D Beyond tooltip for Hide is pre-errata, but if you follow the link it includes the errata.