Attacking from darkness

[starwed]

Sixty feet, not ninety.

Oops, I misread it and thought the sixty was in addition to the thirty feet of full light.

More importantly, just because your enemy can see your light, doesn't mean he can see you.

He can see you exactly as well as he could if you were outside in full daylight. Darkness between the ogre and you doesn't make it harder for him to see you. (Although in the case of magical darkness it's not quite clear... but lets avoid that case for now. ^_^)

 

[Stalker0]

Darkness between the ogre and you doesn't make it harder for him to see you.

This is the assumption I'm refering to that's never really clarified in the rules. It goes into length to explain how well a person can see with a light source, but it never goes into discussion on how far you can see another light source.

 

[werk]

This is the assumption I'm refering to that's never really clarified in the rules. It goes into length to explain how well a person can see with a light source, but it never goes into discussion on how far you can see another light source.

You can see it depending on visibility range in daylight, as starwed said.

The darkness does not obstruct your line of sight unless it is magical in nature and specifically says that it blocks LoS.

This is a very old argument that doesn't need rules to support this interpretation. I.e. It is not a problem unless someone tries to make it one.



Bad Paper,
The shooting uphill problem comes from combat modifiers, higher ground...I think. But the table shows that there is a +0 bonus for having higher ground in ranged combat.

 

[Stalker0]

You can see it depending on visibility range in daylight, as starwed said.

The darkness does not obstruct your line of sight unless it is magical in nature and specifically says that it blocks LoS.

Take a lighthouse for example. You can see the lighthouse very far away, much farther than you can see the things around the light, aka the lighthouse and the cliffs.

So while an ogre might see a party's light from very far away, how far away until he can actually see the party itself? The reason this is important is it determines abuse situations in dark places. Can a wizard with darkvision underground target party members from 300' away because the party is using a light spell while the party members won't see the wizards for hundreds of feet yet to come?

 

[starwed]

Take a lighthouse for example. You can see the lighthouse very far away, much farther than you can see the things around the light, aka the lighthouse and the cliffs

Yes, this is true even in the daytime. In game terms, that's taken care of by the -1 penalty to Spot for every 10 feet of distance. So while of course you can see the light from a lighthouse from a mile away, you'll be -50 to see any particular object.

 

[werk]

So while an ogre might see a party's light from very far away, how far away until he can actually see the party itself? The reason this is important is it determines abuse situations in dark places. Can a wizard with darkvision underground target party members from 300' away because the party is using a light spell while the party members won't see the wizards for hundreds of feet yet to come?

OK, I follow. You are suggesting that in darkness, light sources can be spotted from farther away than in daylight, allowing bad guys to sneak in until they are close enough to spot the party members. We've all read about that in novels, right? That is an interesting point, but I don't know anything that would support playing it that way in the rules. Hopefully someone else can help.

I've had arguments where the DM insisted that since we were outside the area of illumination, our party member carrying the torch was not visible at all, even though he was 45' away in an open, dark cavern. No joke.

 

[Demoquin]

I would say that the Ogre would have to make a spot check in order to attack at a particular PC. As others have pointed out that the -1 Spot per 10' applies.So, a move action to make a spot check (if successful) then standard action for one shot.

Or on another note ... If you dont want the Ogre to make spot checks.... have him just shoot the bow in the general direction where he thinks the PC's are located and have the PC's make a REflex save to avoid the arrow.

 

[RigaMortus2]

The big question that's not covered in the rules is, how far can an enemy see your light source.

In "the real world", I've heard that you can see a lit cigarette up to 3 miles away (assuming a straight path, no obstructions and such).