Clarification on Superior Cover

[Samir]

Ally can grant superior cover for a stealth check, but you simultaneously need a non-ally source of concealment/cover to stay hidden.

Sure, this follows the RAW. Although, let me make sure I understand your new proposition. You are saying:

1) Allies can grant you superior cover (PHB 280), and thus allow you to make a stealth check.
2) If you have no other sources of cover or concealment besides allies, you immediately lose your hidden status, because you can't use another creature as cover to remain hidden (PHB 188).
3) If you, however, have some other source of cover or concealment, as well as superior cover from an ally, you can make a stealth check, and if it succeeds, the non-creature source of cover or concealment will allow you to remain hidden (PHB 188).

If this is what you are submitting, then yes, I agree completely.

 

[fuzzlewump]

This has exactly been my point all along...allies aren't the same as static obstacles, so the cover (for the purposes of stealth) that you get from them is only for the initial moment.

In that moment, you must be stealthy enough hide yourself in a bush let's say (ie. the stealth check w/terrain concealment). But when you are hidden, it would be unrealistic to allow the character to just move from ally to ally as if they are obstacles. Which is where the "to remain hidden" rule comes in.

Doesn't this all make sense?

It certainly checks out rules wise, but the weird issues with getting superior cover really hinder it for me. It seems clear to me that just being a certain angle shouldn't give you superior cover. That may take a good bit of house ruling, but I'm thinking based on the examples for superior cover they give in the book, that positioning alone shouldn't be able to do it. I'd say, if there are two allies in the way of your drawing of imaginary lines, plus you have concealment, then stealth is cool. Come to think of it, it should apply to obstacles as well. The exact positioning of the lines doesn't matter all that much as long as those lines, as a whole, touch 2 allies at some point. I could definitely see a case for realism if two people are between you and someone else and it's dark. Maybe 3, but don't want to become too restrictive.

So, a single creature or a non-solid object can only ever provide "cover," but 2-3 of them, if touched (as in, the line goes through or along their squares) by the imaginary lines, provide superior cover. And, of course, things like windows and arrow slits provide superior cover as normal. Just a random house rule; for the most part our group just eye balls it and adjudicates. That's why the diagonal case seems so wrong to me, because it would never pass the "eye-ball it" test.

But hey, it's RAW, and more importantly, whatever floats your boat.

 

[CajunAzn]

To Samir:

1) Allies can grant you superior cover (PHB 280), and thus allow you to make a stealth check.
2) If you have no other sources of cover or concealment besides allies, you immediately lose your hidden status, because you can't use another creature as cover to remain hidden (PHB 188).
3) If you, however, have some other source of cover or concealment, as well as superior cover from an ally, you can make a stealth check, and if it succeeds, the non-creature source of cover or concealment will allow you to remain hidden (PHB 188).

If this is what you are submitting, then yes, I agree completely.

Yes, that is exactly my reasoning. Ok, great so it seems it's safe to say this is the RAW everyone has settled on.

Now to address the RAI some more...

Draco to address your point about allies wanting to survive, so they won't stay still:

What I find halarious, is the argument at all that allies, who are themselves not eager to be shot, could act as cover as effective as an immobile 10 by 10 brick wall. When your cover itself has a goal of surviving and not getting killed to death, relying on it to hold still for any reason is somewhat of a failure.


Now... had anyone in this argument made a case for concealment perhaps there'd be a different story.

Believe it or not, you are actually arguing against the rules for cover granted from ranged attacks, not stealth. For stealth, all that is required is your ally block the lines of sight, for a brief moment, while the halfling slips into a shadow. The ally isn't sacrificing his body, because (hopefully) the enemy isn't shooting lasers out of his eyes.

In the case of ranged attacks, I still believe an ally body 'moving-on-the-spot' but still blocking 3+ lines, still serves as a pretty good shield. And remember, in the case of the 10x10 brick wall, the enemy wouldn't even be able to attack you at all, whereas it still could if it's just an ally is in the way.

To fuzzle:

So, a single creature or a non-solid object can only ever provide "cover," but 2-3 of them, if touched (as in, the line goes through or along their squares) by the imaginary lines, provide superior cover. And, of course, things like windows and arrow slits provide superior cover as normal. Just a random house rule; for the most part our group just eye balls it and adjudicates. That's why the diagonal case seems so wrong to me, because it would never pass the "eye-ball it" test.

For me it's the opposite, the horizontal cases, sometime look like they should grant superior cover, but because of the "ally-edges-don't count as blocking" rule, it ends up just being cover. I actually think your "2+ alllies in the way = superior cover" would make for a pretty good house rule. Certainly makes it alot easier to eye-ball.

===

As a conclusion, I'm going to be preparing somemore 'battle-maps' to show what cases grant superior cover RAW, which I'll add at the end of the OP.

 

[kugelkj]

Cover (-2 Penalty to Attack Rolls): The target is around a corner or protected by terrain. For example, the target might be in the same square as a small tree, obscured by a small pillar or a large piece of furniture, or behind a low wall.

Superior Cover (-5 Penalty to Attack Rolls): The target is protected by a significant terrain advantage, such as when fighting from behind a window, a portcullis, a grate, or an arrow slit.

Creatures and Cover: When you make a ranged attack against an enemy and other enemies are in the way, your target has cover. Your allies never grant cover to your enemies, and neither allies nor enemies give cover against melee, close, or area attacks.

Keep Out of Sight: If you no longer have any cover or concealment against an enemy, you don’t remain hidden from that enemy. You don’t need superior cover, total concealment, or to stay outside line of sight, but you do need some degree of cover or concealment to remain hidden. You can’t use another creature as cover to remain hidden.

1) Neither rules entry for cover or superior cover mention allies... at all

2) The entry for creatures and cover tells us enemies provide other enemies cover in the case of ranged attacks

3) Stealth rules clearly state creatures do not provide cover

My conclusion: Allies to not provide for cover except in the case of a ranged attack. Therefore, you cannot use allies to gain superior cover to hide.

 

[CajunAzn]

I`ve added the WAR update to the beginning of the thread, see if I`ve made any mistakes, but I think it should adequately explain it.

Kudgel, you neglected to quote the actual rules for determining cover, and just used your own RAI reasoning to draw your conclusion.

Here is the rule for determining cover:

PH(p280) Determining Cover: To determine if a target has cover, choose a corner of a square you occupy (or a corner of your attack’s origin square) and trace imaginary lines from that corner to every corner of any one square the target occupies. If one or two of those lines are blocked by an obstacle or an enemy, the target has cover. (A line isn’t blocked if it runs along the edge of an obstacle’s or an enemy’s square.) If three or four of those lines are blocked but you have line of effect, the target has superior cover.

Since, in stealth, the enemy is the one drawing lines to your sqaure, it treats it's enemies (ie. your allies) as blocking lines. Depending on the number of lines blocked, you have cover or superior cover.

Just because the examples for what is cover and superior cover don't explicitly mention allies, doesn't mean that you can ignore the rules for how to determine cover.

Just read Samir's last post and it explains exactly the RAW for allies and stealth.

 

[kugelkj]

The rules I quoted specifically exclude your allies from counting as objects that block lines for determining cover except when your enemy makes a ranged attack against you.

You are reading that this means your allies provide cover against your enemies in other situations... which the explicitly don't... RE: creatures and cover.

Allies can NEVER provide superior cover.

 

[kugelkj]

Additionally, to answer your original question:

"How do you gain superior cover to hide in combat?"

Answer: Use terrain.

 

[Oldtimer]

@Oldtimer: the picture on page 280 shows lines drawn from someone's square to corners of other creatures squares. Notice, how if you draw lines from that corner to every corner of the troll in the back's square, that he "should" have superior cover. Because 3 of them are blocked. But, he only has cover.

Well, the text "trace imaginary lines from that corner to every corner of any one square the target occupies" would suggest that the attacker in the picture can choose the troll's lower right square and there seems to only be one blocked line when tracing to the corners of that square. The troll would probably want to choose the lower left square (since that would give him superior cover), but the text seems to indicate that the attacker gets to choose which square to trace lines to.

So, to me that picture just shows that the troll has cover, as he should, since only one line is blocked. How do you find three blocked lines?

 

[fuzzlewump]

Well, the text "trace imaginary lines from that corner to every corner of any one square the target occupies" would suggest that the attacker in the picture can choose the troll's lower right square and there seems to only be one blocked line when tracing to the corners of that square.

Good call, I missed that "any one square" part. I thought it was drawing lines to every corner of the target's space. So the picture is correct, after all. Thanks.

 

[fuzzlewump]

Huh, well kugelkj does bring up an interesting interpretation. Maybe cover from allies is only meant to apply from ranged attacks. He's certainly right that the "Creatures and Cover" section applies specifically to ranged attacks.

But, determining cover section is not nearly as clear.

PH(p280) Determining Cover: To determine if a target has cover, choose a corner of a square you occupy (or a corner of your attack’s origin square) and trace imaginary lines from that corner to every corner of any one square the target occupies. If one or two of those lines are blocked by an obstacle or an enemy, the target has cover. (A line isn’t blocked if it runs along the edge of an obstacle’s or an enemy’s square.) If three or four of those lines are blocked but you have line of effect, the target has superior cover.

Emphasis mine.

The first point is that it doesn't explicitly say that you only determine cover when you make a ranged attack. It would have said "to determine if a target has cover from an attack" or something along those lines. That's not to say that that wasn't their intention, but just looking at it, nothing here comes out and says not to determine cover for anything else besides ranged attacks.

However, the second point is that, in the section I bolded, it implies that you are only determining cover as the result of an attack. "your attack's origin square" If the rules were meant to be for anything, namely stealth, then I feel that would have been worded differently, without the assumption that an attack is being made. Something like "choose a corner of a square you occupy (or, if you are making an attack, a corner of your attack's origin square)"

The stealth errata for maintaining cover, however, makes it a bit more confusing. Saying 'you can't maintain stealth from the cover of an ally' implies that it was possible until they specifically stated you couldn't for the purposes of stealth. That is, if cover from allies only applied for ranged attacks, then stating that you can't stealth behind allies is pointless/redundant. If it only applies for ranged attacks, of course you can't stealth behind them. The clause could be there because it was possible until the errata, or it could be there for clarification (in which case redundancy isn't necessarily a problem.

I don't think allies should provide superior cover either, but it's certainly not crystal clear.