Delta said:
PJ, this is one of my favorite posts from you yet. Great stuff.
Thanks! I can't take credit for all the ideas in that musing, though. I drew on some great discussions at Dragonsfoot, the OD&D Forums, and the Knights-n-Knaves forums. The initial post of
this discussion provides a wealth of links on the subject.
The one quibble is what you identify as characters "which normally possess infravision (e.g. elves, dwarves)". In the original set there's nothing indicating that they have infravision...
That's true; my rule on infravision for dwarves and elves is drawn from the special abilities listed in
Chainmail, rather than one of the three little books (I should put that in a footnote). Nevertheless, I think that's a valid approach, even if you're aiming for "by-the-book" (a difficult target in OD&D), since
Men & Magic refers the reader to
Chainmail for more on racial abilities, anyway.
Chainmail lists both elves and dwarves (but not hobbits/halfings) as having "the ability to see in normal darkness as if it were light." In my game, I grant that as infravision.
I think vision is one of those areas in OD&D where there's a lot of room for interpretation. Not only can the referee choose which rules or combination of rules to use (i.e.
Chainmail, three little books, or Supplement I), but even the wording leaves a lot of room. For example, if you're going by
Chainmail, there's nothing that says the special vision of dwarves, elves, et al. is
infravision. Heck, anything imported or translated from
Chainmail allows a lot of referee interpretation.
For me I sort of read that block of OD&D text the other way around and got the impression that simple men working as bandits got infravision if they lived in the dungeon!
That's exactly the way I play it. The dungeon "recognizes its own," somehow. In the case of bandits using the dungeon as a "home base," I'd have them initially need light, but gradually be "accepted" by the place, and be granted the special benefits of an underworld monster.