I am trying to work out exactly how to use blindsight. Logically, it would be the same as regular sight, but with a limited range and no regard for darkness etc.
But I can't see anything explicitlay stating how it works - if there's a door in the way, making the enemy hidden from view, but the blindsight creature (in this case a player) is within 60ft of them, do they know they're there?
RAW, usually. Blindsight itself - which is only sometimes hearing, and solids transmit sounds better than gases do - is defined as perceiving its surroundings without sight, so things that block sight don't matter, like doors. When it *is* hearing, it can't "see" through the Silence spell or hard vacuum, since those can't be heard through, but you can hear things through a door.
I think I'm going to be inclined to treat it as normal sight, but with a 60ft range and no care for darkness or obscuring fog. I don't like the idea of blindsight seeing through things, to be honest. Unless anything comes up that proves it one way or another!
The short, boring, but accurate answer is that what the Player's Handbook and Monster Manual give you is you what you get. It's simply the ability to "see" without using your eyes. Make of that what you will.
The most conservative interpretation is that it's equivalent to having a second set of eyes that aren't affected by darkness or being blinded. If you browse through monster stat blocks, though, you'll find that it's used as a catch-all for different kinds of non-visual senses, ranging from real life ones like echolocation and a snake's ability to "see" by smelling their surroundings to vague, handwavey and magical ones like a flying sword's ability to see despite being a chunk of metal.
You or your DM may or may want to rule differently on the corner cases (like fog) based on the details. For instance, I've read that bats can't distinguish a fog bank from a solid obstacle, but that's not going to be relevant to a flying sword.
It essentially just fills the role of regular visual perception without being hindered by obscured (or non-existent) vision. Blindsight doesn't let you see through obstructions (walls, doors, ceilings, floors, trees, etc), does not let you see things which are Invisible, does not let you distinguish illusions from reality, does not mitigate the effects of cover, nor does it override targeting requirements. It's really just "okay, you can perceive things like a creature normally would" out to the range of the sense.
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You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
Blindsight functions as normal sight without using vision.
It doesn't specifically see invisibility or ignore illusions and darkness, but that is a natural consequence of those things being visual in nature. It can't see through creatures or objects, and isn't even super hearing able to hear heartbeats.
Blindsight allows you to see when blinded. Heavy obscurement applies blinded to anyone looking into the area, and is thus negated by blindsight. Invisible causes the target to be interpreted as heavily obscured, and is thus also negated by blindsight.
RAW defines total cover as 'completely concealed by an obstacle', but 'concealment' is not defined. Is it the same as obscurement? Who knows?
Personally, I make blindsight blocked by any significant barrier, but I can't point to any rules that say yes or no.
Snakes don't see by smelling, they see via infrared (heat), the smelling is just like any other creature smelling the air, picking up scents.
I hate that your correction is wrong.snakes can pick up infrared rays by absorbing them through, a special organ on the roof of their mouth that collects them like an eye collects visual light. however, is not sent to brain in a similar fashion and the snake must flick their tongue through the organ to release the stored elcetromagenetic pulses.Furthermore,this secondary visual sense is effectively black in white seeing in scale and effectively (not really no eye rods are within the special organ) having only rods.
I hate that your correction is wrong.snakes can pick up infrared rays by absorbing them through, a special organ on the roof of their mouth that collects them like an eye collects visual light. however, is not sent to brain in a similar fashion and the snake must flick their tongue through the organ to release the stored elcetromagenetic pulses.Furthermore,this secondary visual sense is effectively black in white seeing in scale and effectively (not really no eye rods are within the special organ) having only rods.
Best to actually be correct when you correct someone. Picking up infrared is not a general property of snakes (only pit vipers and boas have it) and it involves pits located on the nose, not anything in the mouth. Snake tongue flicking is a component of their sense of smell.
Invisiblecauses the target to be interpreted as heavily obscured, and is thus also negated by blindsight.
That's only applicable to hiding (which is still important for sure), but it does not allow you to detect things that are invisible by default. Blindsight isn't Truesight. You'd still have to make a perception check, but probably without any disadvantage that would normally be applicable to the roll.
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You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
An invisible creature is impossible to see without the aid of magic or a special sense. For the purpose of hiding, the creature is heavily obscured. The creature's location can be detected by any noise it makes or any tracks it leaves.
Blindsight is obviously a special sense, and the whole point of it is that you can "see" even if you can't see (some creatures only have blindsight and are blind beyond their blindsight radius.) You can't invisible your way out of being echolocated. You're still solid. Crawford has also confirmed it's intended to foil invisibility several times.
There's no disadvantage to Perception rolls when searching for an invisible creature. Any perception check based on sight is going to automatically fail and their invisibility is irrelevant to your ability to hear them. At best there might be disadvantage if you ask to search for indirect visual clues like footsteps, but that's up to the DM, not something the rules enforce.
Truesight still differs in multiple significant ways. It enhances your normal vision so you can still be blinded if you're not immune to that condition and don't have blindsight to fall back on. It also sees through shapechangers and into the Ethereal Plane.
Tl;dr blindsight doesn't rely on your eyes, truesight lets your eyes see the unseen.
Invisiblecauses the target to be interpreted as heavily obscured, and is thus also negated by blindsight.
That's only applicable to hiding (which is still important for sure), but it does not allow you to detect things that are invisible by default. Blindsight isn't Truesight. You'd still have to make a perception check, but probably without any disadvantage that would normally be applicable to the roll.
Blindsight negates their obscurement, and therefore hiding automatically fails unless they have another effect that permits them to hide.
There's no disadvantage to Perception rolls when searching for an invisible creature. Any perception check based on sight is going to automatically fail and their invisibility is irrelevant to your ability to hear them. At best there might be disadvantage if you ask to search for indirect visual clues like footsteps, but that's up to the DM, not something the rules enforce.
Disadvantage is one way for the dm to handle it. If a rogue goes into the bushes and hides another character may use their action to search for them, if they succeed it might be because they heard the rogue or it might be because they saw a bit of his hat between the branches. If a creature is invisible they will not be seen so, arguably the perception check is more difficult and in those circumstances the dm can impose disadvantage.
It relates to one of the things I do not like about d&d is creatures or items that impose advantage on perception checks using a particular sense. Many perception checks involve multiple senses, if I am looking for a hidden doorway I might see a crack in the wall, hear sounds from the other side, feel a flow of air coming from it or even smell something on the other side (particularly for creatures with excellent scent such as a dog). If I have eyes of the eagle and I search for a secret door do I have advantage? Am I limited to only using one sense which I have to specify or do I do a separate search for each sense?
It's a special sense, but it's not a special sense that says you can detect an invisible creature/object by virtue of simply having the sense. That's a huge distinction that I would expect to be written explicitly in the description. Darkvision is also a special sense, so we can't really say "special sense" is analogous to "automatically detects invisible things", particularly when Truesight explicitly does do that.
Without regard to narrative flavor, Blindsight fills the mechanical role of vision, whether it is based on a different distinct sense or just "I have no eyes, but I can still 'see' because reasons". An invisible creature fools the sense, but it is not harder to detect them as (I think) the invisible creature would not count as heavily obscured within range of the blindsight sense. I don't believe the intent of Blindsight is to function as omniscience; it just removes penalties to vision (including total lack of visual organs) associated with adverse environmental conditions.
It also does not inherently mean any non-visual senses are any more potent than normal. Creatures with heightened senses may have blindsight, but those senses are distinct from blindsight itself. If a creature actually does have superior senses/echolocation, that's listed in the stat block. For instance, the basic Bat has Blindsight, Echolocation, and Keen Hearing. Echolocation simply means blindsight cannotfunction while deafened, not that their hearing is any better than normal, or that their blindsight doesn't still fill the function of a visual sense; it's just based on their hearing instead of eyesight (which the bat does have as well). Keen Hearing is what denotes the creature as having a (specific) superior sense, granting advantage on perception checks relying on hearing.
A bat trying to locate an invisible creature still has to make a perception check, but it can make that check with advantage based on their hearing.
You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
It's a special sense, but it's not a special sense that says you can detect an invisible creature/object by virtue of simply having the sense.
That's because it's not a quality of the sense, it's a limitation on invisibility. Being invisible only affects vision, so any sense that is not vision can detect invisible creatures.
And utilizing blindsight mechanically fills the role of a visual sense, and nothing more. Consider the Gray Ooze: it has blindsight, is entirely blinded beyond blindsight range (60ft), has no heightened senses, and does not indicate its blindsight as being tied to any other type of sense. It is quite literally just "vision" without eyes, so I fully expect invisibility to have an interaction with "vision".
For what it's worth, I take "An invisible creature is impossible to see without the aid of magic or a special sense" to mean "an invisible creature is possible to see with the aid of magic or a special sense", not "an invisible creature is automatically seen/located with the aid of magic or a special sense". Blindsightis a form of sight, regardless of narrative description. It is not auto-detection.
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You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
And utilizing blindsight mechanically fills the role of a visual sense, and nothing more. Consider the Gray Ooze: it has blindsight, is entirely blinded beyond blindsight range (60ft), has no heightened senses, and does not indicate its blindsight as being tied to any other type of sense. It is quite literally just "vision" without eyes, so I fully expect invisibility to have an interaction with "vision".
For what it's worth, I take "An invisible creature is impossible to see without the aid of magic or a special sense" to mean "an invisible creature is possible to see with the aid of magic or a special sense", not "an invisible creature is automatically seen/located with the aid of magic or a special sense". Blindsightis a form of sight, regardless of narrative description. It is not auto-detection.
It's equivalent to 'sight that is unaffected by mechanics that are specific to vision'. As invisible is a vision-specific mechanic, you simply ignore it when considering blindsight. That doesn't mean automatic detection, it's possible to fail to detect visible objects, but that's generally because they have cover.
And utilizing blindsight mechanically fills the role of a visual sense, and nothing more. Consider the Gray Ooze: it has blindsight, is entirely blinded beyond blindsight range (60ft), has no heightened senses, and does not indicate its blindsight as being tied to any other type of sense. It is quite literally just "vision" without eyes, so I fully expect invisibility to have an interaction with "vision".
For what it's worth, I take "An invisible creature is impossible to see without the aid of magic or a special sense" to mean "an invisible creature is possible to see with the aid of magic or a special sense", not "an invisible creature is automatically seen/located with the aid of magic or a special sense". Blindsightis a form of sight, regardless of narrative description. It is not auto-detection.
It's equivalent to 'sight that is unaffected by mechanics that are specific to vision'. As invisible is a vision-specific mechanic, you simply ignore it when considering blindsight. That doesn't mean automatic detection, it's possible to fail to detect visible objects, but that's generally because they have cover.
Agree to disagree. I say it's equivalent to "sight that is specifically vision, unaffected by however you decide to explain having it" 🤷♂️ Better than Darkvision, and not as good as Truesight
You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
There are scenarios where blindsight is better than truesight. Blindsight would be able to work with most heavy obscurity that would be caused by environmental effects, like fog or dense foliage.
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I am trying to work out exactly how to use blindsight. Logically, it would be the same as regular sight, but with a limited range and no regard for darkness etc.
But I can't see anything explicitlay stating how it works - if there's a door in the way, making the enemy hidden from view, but the blindsight creature (in this case a player) is within 60ft of them, do they know they're there?
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RAW, usually. Blindsight itself - which is only sometimes hearing, and solids transmit sounds better than gases do - is defined as perceiving its surroundings without sight, so things that block sight don't matter, like doors. When it *is* hearing, it can't "see" through the Silence spell or hard vacuum, since those can't be heard through, but you can hear things through a door.
https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/basic-rules/monsters#MonsterStatistics
However, the blind fighting fighting style explicitly *is* blocked by total cover, despite being blindsight, so that one is blocked by doors.
I think I'm going to be inclined to treat it as normal sight, but with a 60ft range and no care for darkness or obscuring fog. I don't like the idea of blindsight seeing through things, to be honest. Unless anything comes up that proves it one way or another!
Make your Artificer work with any other class with 174 Multiclassing Feats for your Artificer Multiclass Character!
DM's Guild Releases on This Thread Or check them all out on DMs Guild!
DrivethruRPG Releases on This Thread - latest release: My Character is a Werewolf: balanced rules for Lycanthropy!
I have started discussing/reviewing 3rd party D&D content on Substack - stay tuned for semi-regular posts!
The most conservative interpretation is that it's equivalent to having a second set of eyes that aren't affected by darkness or being blinded. If you browse through monster stat blocks, though, you'll find that it's used as a catch-all for different kinds of non-visual senses, ranging from real life ones like echolocation and a snake's ability to "see" by smelling their surroundings to vague, handwavey and magical ones like a flying sword's ability to see despite being a chunk of metal.
You or your DM may or may want to rule differently on the corner cases (like fog) based on the details. For instance, I've read that bats can't distinguish a fog bank from a solid obstacle, but that's not going to be relevant to a flying sword.
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Minor correction to what you wrote:
Snakes don't see by smelling, they see via infrared (heat), the smelling is just like any other creature smelling the air, picking up scents.
It essentially just fills the role of regular visual perception without being hindered by obscured (or non-existent) vision. Blindsight doesn't let you see through obstructions (walls, doors, ceilings, floors, trees, etc), does not let you see things which are Invisible, does not let you distinguish illusions from reality, does not mitigate the effects of cover, nor does it override targeting requirements. It's really just "okay, you can perceive things like a creature normally would" out to the range of the sense.
You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
Some other people have said it:
Blindsight functions as normal sight without using vision.
It doesn't specifically see invisibility or ignore illusions and darkness, but that is a natural consequence of those things being visual in nature. It can't see through creatures or objects, and isn't even super hearing able to hear heartbeats.
Blindsight allows you to see when blinded. Heavy obscurement applies blinded to anyone looking into the area, and is thus negated by blindsight. Invisible causes the target to be interpreted as heavily obscured, and is thus also negated by blindsight.
RAW defines total cover as 'completely concealed by an obstacle', but 'concealment' is not defined. Is it the same as obscurement? Who knows?
Personally, I make blindsight blocked by any significant barrier, but I can't point to any rules that say yes or no.
I hate that your correction is wrong.snakes can pick up infrared rays by absorbing them through, a special organ on the roof of their mouth that collects them like an eye collects visual light. however, is not sent to brain in a similar fashion and the snake must flick their tongue through the organ to release the stored elcetromagenetic pulses.Furthermore,this secondary visual sense is effectively black in white seeing in scale and effectively (not really no eye rods are within the special organ) having only rods.
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Best to actually be correct when you correct someone. Picking up infrared is not a general property of snakes (only pit vipers and boas have it) and it involves pits located on the nose, not anything in the mouth. Snake tongue flicking is a component of their sense of smell.
That's only applicable to hiding (which is still important for sure), but it does not allow you to detect things that are invisible by default. Blindsight isn't Truesight. You'd still have to make a perception check, but probably without any disadvantage that would normally be applicable to the roll.
You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
Invisibility is a purely visual phenomenon.
Blindsight is obviously a special sense, and the whole point of it is that you can "see" even if you can't see (some creatures only have blindsight and are blind beyond their blindsight radius.) You can't invisible your way out of being echolocated. You're still solid. Crawford has also confirmed it's intended to foil invisibility several times.
There's no disadvantage to Perception rolls when searching for an invisible creature. Any perception check based on sight is going to automatically fail and their invisibility is irrelevant to your ability to hear them. At best there might be disadvantage if you ask to search for indirect visual clues like footsteps, but that's up to the DM, not something the rules enforce.
Truesight still differs in multiple significant ways. It enhances your normal vision so you can still be blinded if you're not immune to that condition and don't have blindsight to fall back on. It also sees through shapechangers and into the Ethereal Plane.
Tl;dr blindsight doesn't rely on your eyes, truesight lets your eyes see the unseen.
The Forum Infestation (TM)
Blindsight negates their obscurement, and therefore hiding automatically fails unless they have another effect that permits them to hide.
Disadvantage is one way for the dm to handle it. If a rogue goes into the bushes and hides another character may use their action to search for them, if they succeed it might be because they heard the rogue or it might be because they saw a bit of his hat between the branches. If a creature is invisible they will not be seen so, arguably the perception check is more difficult and in those circumstances the dm can impose disadvantage.
It relates to one of the things I do not like about d&d is creatures or items that impose advantage on perception checks using a particular sense. Many perception checks involve multiple senses, if I am looking for a hidden doorway I might see a crack in the wall, hear sounds from the other side, feel a flow of air coming from it or even smell something on the other side (particularly for creatures with excellent scent such as a dog). If I have eyes of the eagle and I search for a secret door do I have advantage? Am I limited to only using one sense which I have to specify or do I do a separate search for each sense?
It's a special sense, but it's not a special sense that says you can detect an invisible creature/object by virtue of simply having the sense. That's a huge distinction that I would expect to be written explicitly in the description. Darkvision is also a special sense, so we can't really say "special sense" is analogous to "automatically detects invisible things", particularly when Truesight explicitly does do that.
Without regard to narrative flavor, Blindsight fills the mechanical role of vision, whether it is based on a different distinct sense or just "I have no eyes, but I can still 'see' because reasons". An invisible creature fools the sense, but it is not harder to detect them as (I think) the invisible creature would not count as heavily obscured within range of the blindsight sense. I don't believe the intent of Blindsight is to function as omniscience; it just removes penalties to vision (including total lack of visual organs) associated with adverse environmental conditions.
It also does not inherently mean any non-visual senses are any more potent than normal. Creatures with heightened senses may have blindsight, but those senses are distinct from blindsight itself. If a creature actually does have superior senses/echolocation, that's listed in the stat block. For instance, the basic Bat has Blindsight, Echolocation, and Keen Hearing. Echolocation simply means blindsight cannot function while deafened, not that their hearing is any better than normal, or that their blindsight doesn't still fill the function of a visual sense; it's just based on their hearing instead of eyesight (which the bat does have as well). Keen Hearing is what denotes the creature as having a (specific) superior sense, granting advantage on perception checks relying on hearing.
A bat trying to locate an invisible creature still has to make a perception check, but it can make that check with advantage based on their hearing.
You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
That's because it's not a quality of the sense, it's a limitation on invisibility. Being invisible only affects vision, so any sense that is not vision can detect invisible creatures.
And utilizing blindsight mechanically fills the role of a visual sense, and nothing more. Consider the Gray Ooze: it has blindsight, is entirely blinded beyond blindsight range (60ft), has no heightened senses, and does not indicate its blindsight as being tied to any other type of sense. It is quite literally just "vision" without eyes, so I fully expect invisibility to have an interaction with "vision".
For what it's worth, I take "An invisible creature is impossible to see without the aid of magic or a special sense" to mean "an invisible creature is possible to see with the aid of magic or a special sense", not "an invisible creature is automatically seen/located with the aid of magic or a special sense". Blindsight is a form of sight, regardless of narrative description. It is not auto-detection.
You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
It's equivalent to 'sight that is unaffected by mechanics that are specific to vision'. As invisible is a vision-specific mechanic, you simply ignore it when considering blindsight. That doesn't mean automatic detection, it's possible to fail to detect visible objects, but that's generally because they have cover.
Agree to disagree. I say it's equivalent to "sight that is specifically vision, unaffected by however you decide to explain having it" 🤷♂️ Better than Darkvision, and not as good as Truesight
You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
There are scenarios where blindsight is better than truesight. Blindsight would be able to work with most heavy obscurity that would be caused by environmental effects, like fog or dense foliage.