iserith
Magic Wordsmith
I said everything "within line of sight". All the things you mention are not within line of sight since they are blocked by something. You are correct, if it is impossible to see something because it is under a carpet or in a desk or a cupboard, you can't see it with your PP.
But often, as people above have said, players will say "I search the room" and then you have to determine if that involves searching under the carpet or in the cupboard.
No - the players have to determine that. The DM should not assume in my view. "I search the room" is not reasonably specific enough for the DM to adjudicate the action properly. My recommendation is that when players say something vague like this that the DM ask them for reasonable specificity as to the things they are doing and how long they spend on the task. This will reveal whether the outcome of the task is uncertain and whether you need to engage the mechanics at all in order to narrate the results of the adventurers' actions. It will also help you avoid situations wherein you assume character action which has negative repercussions and the player objecting because he or she did not establish the character taking that action.
As a side note to this, remember that players shouldn't really want to have the DM ask for checks, passive or otherwise. Being specific means they are more likely to succeed without a check which is far more desirable than rolling or the DM using a passive score. So if players object to being reasonably specific with their actions, I suggest reminding them that the d20 is not their friend and that smart play means trying to succeed without a roll. When it comes to exploration, that means being reasonably specific.
Here's the problem: Some of the written adventures have sentences like "The PCs can find a chest hidden under the bed with a DC 14 Wisdom (Perception) check". In this situation, the chest may or may not be seen because it is under the bed(but part of it could be slightly visible) but the adventure lets Perception represent "how well you search the room" in addition to what you can see. This creates a weird situation where you have to determine whether each Perception check listed in an adventure is one that requires them to search the room or one they spot immediately.
Another good example is one that says "PCs examining the mural can see the following details with a DC 15 Wisdom (Perception) check..." If the PC can see the mural from across the room, does that mean they automatically spot the details or does "examining" require you to be closer or take more time, even with a high PP?
I find it's helpful to read those entries in adventures as trying to convey the uncertainty and difficulty of a specific task under specific circumstances.