D&D 5E Why do so many DMs use the wrong rules for invisibility?

Oofta said:

I'm still waiting for a copy of text from the basic rules that conclusively states you always know exactly where someone is if they are not successful at a hide check.

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I believe you'll find that just after the rules for gravity.

Oofta said:

I'm still waiting for a copy of text from the basic rules that conclusively states you always know exactly where someone is if they are not successful at a hide check.

People keep saying "it's the rules" but unless you're talking about 4E, I just don't see it.

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We all agree that characters know the position of anything they can see, right?

So the question is "Do characters know the position of a thing they can't see?"

And if you don't find "...if you make noise, you give away your position" + "the creature's location can be detected by any noise it makes or tracks it leaves" convincing, I don't know that there's anything that might convince you.

But I'm also not especially interested in you being convinced. Run whatever game you want. I'm more strongly suggesting there's gameplay reasons where you might want to run a game that adheres closely to the assumption that any noise gives away your position and telegraphs your location when you can't be seen.

I agree that you can detect a creature you cannot see under many circumstances, no one is arguing differently.

I personally like to run a game that comes close to reality + magic as practical within the confines of simplification for ease of play. If it makes sense that I would know where someone is even though I can't see them then the PCs probably know where they are. If logically I would only have a general idea of direction, or not realize there's anyone out there at all the PCs will get the same result.

But to each his own. One of the biggest reasons I like 5E is that it leaves things like this up to the DM and what works for their group.

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A major point is that trying to figure out what "makes sense" here is often a frustrating exercise in conflicting logical heuristics and lawyeristic interpretation that is, itself, not fun, for me (since it's one of my pet peeves), and probably for more than just me (given the size of this thread already ).

SkidAce said:

Where'd the OP go?

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They could have just dropped in to stir up a hornet's nest. Or, honestly, after the number of people pointing out that they had complained about getting the rules wrong, while themselves making a rules mistake, I can totally understand just walking away and pretending that none of this ever happened.

Saelorn said:

But if he can't see, and you can't see AND you're doubled over in pain from nausea AND you're tangled up in a net AND you're lying on the ground AND there's a huge dragon closing in on you AND you haven't slept in three days, then that probably shouldn't be an equal playing field.

That's the limitation of the dis/advantage system - that one significant circumstance negates the relevance of all other significant circumstances.

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Meh. I'm thinking that situations like this are sufficiently corner case that they really don't need rules. The number of times that characters have multiple sources of advantage AND disadvantage are sufficiently rare that I'm perfectly happy just to ignore them.

Oofta said:

I'm still waiting for a copy of text from the basic rules that conclusively states you always know exactly where someone is if they are not successful at a hide check.

People keep saying "it's the rules" but unless you're talking about 4E, I just don't see it.

/snip

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Because there is a distinction between Hidden (requires a Perception check to locate) and Heavily Obscured (the condition which Invisibility grants).

Granted, it could be spelled out more clearly.

Dausuul said:

Have you ever sat down and tried to write a set of stealth rules that is a) consistent, b) easy to understand, and c) makes sense in play? I've tried, and I am here to tell you, it is bloody hard. It's straightforward to make a rule for any given scenario (invisibility; darkness; sneaky person; et cetera), but to take all those scenarios and create one cohesive system that covers them all... that is a job of work.

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Then maybe the answer is not to try to shoehorn everything into one set of rules, but instead to have a number of different sets of rules (or better yet, guidelines) to cover various common situations and thus give guidance to the DM as to how to handle all the other situations that might arise.

And they did rather box themselves into a corner with advantage-disadvantage and how any instance of one cancels out the other.

ThePolarBear said:

As stated by others Darkness is not irrelevant for other reasons but i will offer a different POV on the advantages of rolling without disadvantage/advantage while in darkness: It reduces the time spent rolling dice and missing. It keeps combat shorter.

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At massive cost of realism and believability. Fact of life: a bunch of blind people fighting each other (assuming nobody has any blind-fighting abilities) is simply going to take longer than if they all could see what they were doing. Adv/disadv can cancel, sure, but there needs to be a flat to-hit penalty imposed along with a risk of hitting the wrong target; and if it means rolling more dice...well, that's what they're for.

Lan-"in the darkness on the edge of town"-efan

But again, is this a common occurrence? How often in a campaign is everyone fighting blind? I'm not saying never but do we really need to nail down every situation?

The rules work well enough most of the time. 5e is not interested in going down the simulation road of having rules for everything.

Is it perfectly believable? Meh, to me that takes a back seat to dice fapping for half an hour just to satisfy someone's sense of realism. Particularly in a game like DND where combat rules are already so abstract.

I'm A Banana said:

We all agree that characters know the position of anything they can see, right?

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Or think they do, what with blur, displacement, illusion, etc.

So the question is "Do characters know the position of a thing they can't see?"

And if you don't find "...if you make noise, you give away your position" + "the creature's location can be detected by any noise it makes or tracks it leaves" convincing, I don't know that there's anything that might convince you.

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I find it perfectly convincing...provided somebody is taking the time to look. Tracks in mud or sand or snow are pretty obvious, as is the crunching of the snow or splooshing of the mud. A "hole" in heavy rain is also quite easy to find if you look for it. Noise in otherwise-quiet surroundings also makes one easier to find, but it's rarely perfect given how easily sound tends to distort.

But noise when there's lots of other noise to mask yours? Or any of the above when in the heat of battle with something else? Much, much less likely.

But I'm also not especially interested in you being convinced. Run whatever game you want. I'm more strongly suggesting there's gameplay reasons where you might want to run a game that adheres closely to the assumption that any noise gives away your position and telegraphs your location when you can't be seen.

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My inference here - and please correct me if I'm wrong - is that those gameplay reasons would involve making things easier for the players and-or faster overall, and those are no more than personal preferences.

Lanefan

Oh yes. Fair enough. It's certainly a preference thing.

Lanefan said:

I find it perfectly convincing...provided somebody is taking the time to look. Tracks in mud or sand or snow are pretty obvious, as is the crunching of the snow or splooshing of the mud. A "hole" in heavy rain is also quite easy to find if you look for it. Noise in otherwise-quiet surroundings also makes one easier to find, but it's rarely perfect given how easily sound tends to distort.

But noise when there's lots of other noise to mask yours? Or any of the above when in the heat of battle with something else? Much, much less likely.

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It's fine to rule that way depending on your group, but that "provided..." is not a caveat you can find in the RAW itself - it doesn't mention any special time or effort devoted to knowing where the creature is above and beyond the general awareness that a character is always assumed to have about it's surroundings. The general condition is "In combat, most creatures stay alert for signs of danger all around," and in as much as that alertness can be presumed to include staying alert for unexpected noises, the general condition presents an assumption of characters basically always hearing what goes on, unless something specifically stops that from happening.

Sure, a battle's a noisy, chaotic place, and that makes some sense, but that's never pointed out to have any particular effects on any of the creatures in a fight. A battle's a noisy, chaotic place, but also our characters are fantasy heroes who are used to battle with strange and unexpected creatures, they're not confused town guards or turnip farmers, and it's not too noisy or chaotic to hear someone whisper a spell as it's being cast (counterspell) or to make a bard's song inaudible or to stop the PC's from having a lively conversation on the battlefield. Arguably, part of what a Dex (Stealth) check represents is your ability to use that noise and chaos to effectively not be heard, because it's not like you can't kick a stone or step on a kobold's tail and make it yelp or whatever. Being silent on a noisy chaotic battlefield involving fantasy heroes isn't an automatic thing that can be easily assumed.

It's in the wording itself - when you try to hide. Hiding isn't something you do without trying.

This is how RAW points to "Invisible != undetectable," not just in certain circumstances, but as a default assumption that needs to be actively changed by something in the world.

Ultimately, though, it IS up to the DM, as always. I think there's also good gameplay reasons why a DM might want to have invisible creatures also be detectable unless they've done something extra.

My inference here - and please correct me if I'm wrong - is that those gameplay reasons would involve making things easier for the players and-or faster overall, and those are no more than personal preferences.

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You say "no more than" like there is some alternative that's more than personal preferences.

That gameplay reason also points at what the RAW's intent is, because when figuring out what 5e's intended design is when it's potentially ambiguous, you can often wager that good designers would like their game to play easier and faster, and would not like their game to turn into 15 minutes of Marco Polo any more than they want their game to turn into 15 minutes of bonus-stacking.

I suppose if someone really likes the Marco Polo-ing, that'd be a counterpoint to that reason for the RAW's intent, but is anyone really a fan of not knowing where the enemy that you're going to have to take out sooner or later is? Or of constantly tracking the "last space we saw you in"? Or of PC's easily avoiding damage thanks to not participating in the fight? Because those are some of the reasons why it's a pet peeve for me - those things are Not Fun.