D&D 5E Can you see when you're Blinded?

[skotothalamos]

My brain hurts and I feel sorry for you.

Both parts of the sentence are true and a lack of a comma does not nullify the statement before it. What a confusing language that would be.

Next time, ask them if they want to come over and play D&D. Then when they show up, ask them how they knew where to go. According to their logic, you only asked if they wanted to play D&D.

 

[Paraxis]

Do the players remember that being Blinded means that other creatures are now functionally invisible to them? Its effectively the reverse description of the invisible condition.

But invisible doesn't mean people can't target you.

Invisible
1.An invisible creature is impossible to see without the aid of magic or a special sense.
2.For the purpose of hiding, the creature is heavily obscured.
3.The creature's location can be detected by any noise it makes or any tracks it leaves.
4.Attack rolls against the creature have disadvantage, and the creature's attack rolls have advantage.

Part 1, is pure fluff for the most part. Why, see the other 3 parts.
Part 2-3, what this means is if unless you hide people can still locate you unless you take the hide action.
Part 4, so unless the target is hidden from you and you can't target it attacks against it are at disadvantage.

Don't forget that disadvantage doesn't stack, so an invisible target a blind & poisoned attacker at long range with a weapon attack the area where the target is which is automatic unless the target took an action to hide the only penalty is disadvantage. Spend inspiration and just make a normal attack roll.

 

[Celtavian]

Well, I note "dead" isn't a condition in the Basic Rules

But, let us look at those others - Prone mentions that the character can only crawl (and crawling is defined). Grappled mentions that the character's speed is reduced to zero.

Blinded does not make any claim on movement.

Did they just *forget* to mention it on Blinded, do you think? When they thought with enough detail to note that a grappled person can't go anywhere, they failed to tell you that a blind person could not go anywhere. You are going to assume the blinded person can't move anyway?

I thought the underlying assumption of 5E was a return to the roots of D&D rules simplicity, while still allowing a DM latitude to improvise.

Though movement is not restricted while blinded, the character in question might be disoriented. Any time he tries to move in a particular direction, you might require him to make an intelligence or dexterity check with disadvantage. If he fails, he falls or runs into an obstacle causing himself minor damage or some other effect. The advantage/disadvantage mechanic was built for easy adjudication of just about any situation the DM dreams up with a single roll.

 

[Grainger]

Aside from the players' counter-intuitive interpretation of "blinded", I don't understand how the lack of an Oxford comma changes the interpretation of that sentence, unless one thinks that utterly mangled grammar is a valid way to read it. To put it another way, if the sentence isn't a list, then it doesn't make any sense whatsoever.

Even without the lack of "common sense" in this interpretation, this is a ridiculous interpretation of the rules: your players are either munchkins, or have seriously questionable reading comprehension...

Add in common sense interpretation (it's obvious what the game designers meant) and it's beyond silly.

 

[Grazzt]

My brain hurts and I feel sorry for you.

Both parts of the sentence are true and a lack of a comma does not nullify the statement before it. What a confusing language that would be.

Next time, ask them if they want to come over and play D&D. Then when they show up, ask them how they knew where to go. According to their logic, you only asked if they wanted to play D&D.

Or when they arrive, ask them to close their eyes. Explain to them that's what the blinded condition is. Then throw the DMG (1e, because it's nice and heavy) at them. Ask them why if they can see when blinded they didn't see the DMG flying at their heads.

 

[was]

Or when they arrive, ask them to close their eyes. Explain to them that's what the blinded condition is. Then throw the DMG (1e, because it's nice and heavy) at them. Ask them why if they can see when blinded they didn't see the DMG flying at their heads.

or whenever they have to "go" blindfold them and see if they can make it to the bathroom and hit the toilet.

 

[Kalshane]

Or when they arrive, ask them to close their eyes. Explain to them that's what the blinded condition is. Then throw the DMG (1e, because it's nice and heavy) at them. Ask them why if they can see when blinded they didn't see the DMG flying at their heads.

Why would you abuse your DMG like that?

When we were younger, my players learned to fear my accuracy with a thrown roll of paper towels, though. (Non-harmful, but the impact when applied directly to the forehead is enough to get your attention.)

 

[Tormyr]

I don't recall anyone bringing this up earlier, but it could be useful if anyone else has to deal with something like this in the future. The little character sketch in the conditions section of the PHB for the blinded condition shows a guy wearing a blindfold.

 

[Leatherhead]

Disadvantage is about -4 to -5 to hit, but it is weird to be able to get anywhere near a target 100 feet away that you cannot see (or hear for that matter, it's not like an enemy archer at 100 or 200 feet away is shouting).

The 60% to 80% chance of hitting most foes (AC dependent) drops to 36% to 64%. Those are really good odds. That's not a real substantial drop based on what we are talking about.

I totally get that if you can see the tree that you are aiming for and there is an invisible foe there, but if you are blind, your odds of hitting anything at 100 feet should basically be maybe 1% tops. Your odds of firing in the wrong direction and missing your mark by 10 feet or more should be fairly high.

It's only weird because you are so used to dice based combat. In video games, for instance, aiming where you think the enemy is going to be is the default way of doing things. Which is why things like stealth powers are common, but still foiled by higher level play in shooters.

 

[KarinsDad]

It's only weird because you are so used to dice based combat. In video games, for instance, aiming where you think the enemy is going to be is the default way of doing things. Which is why things like stealth powers are common, but still foiled by higher level play in shooters.

In video games, you can see the terrain that you are firing at. In that case, I think that normal disadvantage works fine.

Try doing that in a video game when the screen is totally pitch black. We are talking the case where the PC cannot see at all.


Have you ever fired a weapon with a blindfold on? There is a major difference between firing at a spot next to a tree 100 feet away that you can see and firing at a spot next to a tree 100 feet away when you cannot see anything at all.

But, prove it for yourself. Go take a dartboard outside and put it in an old chair. While standing at the chair, put on a blindfold, walk 8 feet away, turn 180 degrees and knowing the elevation of the dartboard, throw a dozen darts at the inner circle of the board. See how many hit the inner circle. See how many miss the dartboard completely.

Now do the same thing, but cover the dartboard with a large sheet of paper and do not put on the blindfold. How hard is it to hit the inner circle when you can see the edges of the dartboard, but you cannot actually see the inner circle?


When one is estimating where an opponent is and firing at the estimation point that the PC (or NPC, the rules should work the same for both) can see, the disadvantage rule works good. When a PC is totally blind, the disadvantage rule works good if the foe is in melee, or if the foe is making enough noise that the PC can generally pinpoint his approximate location.

But if a PC is blind and he cannot really hear a given foe at range over the noise of combat, the normal disadvantage rule gives him way too much of a chance to hit his foe. So yeah, I'm totally ok with my DM putting in a house rule for this scenario.