D&D 5E DM Help! My rogue always spams Hide as a bonus action, and i cant target him!

[Flamestrike]

Replies to Hriston's posts

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The fact that you refute proof does not mean it was not proven.

Except that for that to be true you have to change the sentences, the article and the ruleset. Then your reading is consistent, because it's no longer a reading, it's a modification. Which , yet again, IT'S FINE, it's just not an interpretation, AND THAT IS ALL I'M SAYING.

It does not until you refuse to understand that TRY TO applies to both "remain out of sight" (withhold) and "go where i'm not seen - disappear" (withdraw) And both meanings are to be included and must be considered and not discarded because no matter how much you want to try to means ALL OF THAT, not just PART OF IT.



As other have said vanish implies a change. Nevertheless, so does hide.

''Normally, you can’t hide from someone if you’re in full view. A lightfoot halfling, though, can try to vanish behind a creature''

becomes

"Normally, you can't escape from or remain out of sight if you are in full view. A lightfoot halflling, though, can try to disappear from sight behind a creature."



DON'T. You should read a phrase not to support a statement, but for what and how is written.



Then if you think that it works, and it works for everything else: why your reading should be better, if it's more limited and requires to change the words on what it's written for it to work?
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Replies to Flamestrike's posts

[sblock]


Sigh. No, those are open for DM ADJUDICATION. There's no difference in interpretation "open"ness that the rest of the rules. There's no more "attention, from here to here it's going to be really up to you to guess what we meant" in the hiding rules than everywhere else.

So do i. This does not make any "interpretation" automatically logical, fun, realistic or, in the case we are discussing, interpretation at all.

If you want to play how you play, do it and have fun. I do not find your approach any realistic, fun or a valid interpretation to begin with.
You want to read "you can't hide with red pants"? Go ahead.

Your RULING or HOUSERULE, not interpretation - and that's why:

You read that to hide you need to "go into hiding", and hiding is actually a part of a greater attempt that spans all of your actions (be them lower or upper cased), both taken before or after the actual mechanical attempt: You can't hide behind a pillar since you are seen while going behind a pillar, no matter when you make the attempt to hide, given that to hide you need to not be clearly seen and that getting to not be clearly seen is part of the hiding.

Problem is that the rules do not have such a distinction. And it's clear: You can't hide if you are clearly seen, not if you "were". Once you reach the pillar, you are no longer seen. Thus you can hide.

But: You say that your location is known... Except that for hiding whether your location is known or not does not matter at all, and neither is true that your location is actually known: It's only known UNTIL YOU HIDE and if the creaure(s) can actually perceive your location in some way, otherwise is only assumed - guessed. The fact that i'm behind a tree with no way to get away does not matter to the person hiding: It's still there, not making sounds and not being seen and true location unknown. It might be digging very silently for all the creature(s) he is hiding from know. Or climbing. Or simply have slipped under their radar, somehow.
If this wasn't true it would lead to the situation where you can't EVER hide once you get out of sight UNTIL YOU ALSO GET OUT OF HEARING RANGE, since with just hearing you can pinpoint the location of a creature. And again, that your location is unknown is not a requirement.

Thus you need to change 2 requirements to hide in order for your rulings to be "interpretations". Nothing wrong inherently... it's just not an intepretation.



It's just that the OP hasn't used the its power to determine weather a player can hide or not... DM's ADJUDICATION.



And then end up applying a "you can't go into hiding from a creature that could see you clearly enough" rule instead, somehow.



Neither do i, but apparently using the full spectrum of what hide means is only reserved to specific reading: "going out of sight" and " remaining out of sight" get selectively applied at necessity for argument sake, instead of applying them ALWAYS and see if even one applies. And this is somehow "gamist rules jargon". Right.

I CAN and DO say that the rules do not support your interpretation. I go ahead and went ahead in saying that your interpretation is illogical, irrealistic and that i find it unfun. I also went ahead to say that you are completely free to row your boat as you wish in the first post i made where i disagreed with you. I also say that yours is not an interpretation because it does something that an interpretation must not do: Change the meaning.

I can. But i'm not going to... it's no interpretation for me.

Respectively No, and YES.

Not that could see, or does know your location. So why are you applying those requirements to hide?

But that's not what the rule says: You can't hide from a creature that can see you clearly. If you see me moving before hiding it's not important. You can't see me while HIDING. Going is not part of the rule. Ergo there's no ergo. It stops before the attempt, even before the action, or you go all the way, action tracking or not.

There's no DC. I do not hide against a DC, i roll and the value is compared to passive perception. DC is not contemplated.

Prehaps passive perception was enough, prehaps not.. but this does not changes that:
... since you are not stupid and if you happen to not see a creature get out from behind a tree and do not hear anything strange coming from there you assume that the thing you were looking at it's still there. You know, your loved OBJECT PERMANENCE. Weather the creature it's still there or not it's another issue.

Yes, you can... you can try and read the things you are writing objectively, and see that are not consistent one row with the following one. Then reread the RAW applying both meanings of hide, try to see how it would work with each applied in each situation and choose what you prefer: Using it as is or changing something to fit your liking, even if the result is again what you are using now. You'll realize you NEED to constrict specific meanings to words and add rules to what it's there, or at least always prevent some possible use of hiding each time they present.

You'll realize that what you are doing is not interpreting the text but changing it to your liking, which is COMPLETELY FINE. It's just not what an intepretation is.

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Replies to pemerton's posts:

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Both, those two phrases are not in opposition, nor do contradict one another. One assumes there's no one looking, the other assumes at least one person looking. If you are not seen at all, anyone can hide anywhere. If you are seen, that specific situation is restricted to halflings

Which was clear and is still based on depriving words of meaning.

It isn't. It's clear. I do not agree and up to this we are all fine. What you are missing is the "INTERPRETATION" part, or the part where you say that your ruling is this way because that's how it's written that the problem comes from.

Exactly like Halflings. Or WE. Or prehaps they disappear. Or become chameleons, but only for people who aren't observant enough. And guess what? It does not matter, since that's up to the specific DM, and that does not change how the rule is written.



No, unless the elf and the human are trying to hide. If they are paying attention to what they do they both are spotted. And even then, it's up to the DM to actually rule if the human or the elf are clearly seen or not, not you nor me. The elf player has the advantage (not capital A) to an ability to show the DM to say "see? I can!", while the human cannot. But if the DM rules that both are hidden, then both are hidden.



Problem is what that coherency comes from, and what mechanical PoV. It's not from a RAW PoV since the meaning of all the instances of hide and vanish have to be changed for that reading to work and it's not working mechanically, since you have a single roll until you are discovered but in your reading you should roll each time someone tries to spot you. That is a contradiction and something you do not account for. Even the fact that you have to take something into account because it does not work should show you that's not how it works, if there's an interpretation that mechanically and with respect to word meaning fits.
RAI you have to destroy english to prove that a specific instance of a rule that overrides another actually fits your castle.

Again, you can say that you play that way, that it's better to play your way, that's more fun or realistic. This is opinable and up to preference, really. What you should not do is saying that your rules are an interpretation of what it's written: It's not. You are simply causing confusion.
[/sblock]

Cool man, but you're wrong.

You read that to hide you need to "go into hiding", and hiding is actually a part of a greater attempt that spans all of your actions (be them lower or upper cased), both taken before or after the actual mechanical attempt: You can't hide behind a pillar since you are seen while going behind a pillar, no matter when you make the attempt to hide, given that to hide you need to not be clearly seen and that getting to not be clearly seen is part of the hiding.

Problem is that the rules do not have such a distinction. And it's clear: You can't hide if you are clearly seen, not if you "were". Once you reach the pillar, you are no longer seen. Thus you can hide.

Again, youre wrong. My intepretation of the passage differs from yours.

Sook all you want, but thats just how it is. Your intepretation is as much a houserule as mine is.

 

[kalil]

I wonder if wizards will ever get around to making an unambiguous statement on how stealth is supposed to work. It has a pretty significant impact on how effective combatants rogues are in organized play

 

[Corwin]

I wonder if wizards will ever get around to making an unambiguous statement on how stealth is supposed to work.

They have. They said the DM is in charge. The DM makes the call. Its intentional. A feature, not a bug. You may not like it. But it's what it is.

 

[tk32]

I'm a DM (Rise of Tiamat and home made scenarios) right now and the Rogue in my group is level 8 going on 9. I've only had a couple situations so far where the rogue declared "That monster can't see me to attack me."

And in those situations, at best, I gave the rogue cover (+2 or +5 to ac depending on the cover) if the monster tried to target through the obstruction. For the most part, there's only been a few times where the rogue tried to sneak for an actual sneak attack. Instead.... The stealth attack rules were simplified. If a monster is engaged (in melee) by an ally of the rogue, the rogue is considered flanking and gets sneak attack. Since there's no facing in 5th edition. This was simplified. This rogue, moves in if the creature is engaged by someone else, does his sneak attack, and then as a bonus action, uses disengage to move out of melee (assuming he has movement left). Then, moves out of engagement taking cover behind someone bigger than him. He then hides behind another player. He hasn't called cover and I haven't given him cover for hiding behind another player. Though technically that's allowed I believe.

And in most cases if he gets hit it's an AOE attack. Dragons are great for eliminating Rogues. A breath attack is a 60 foot cone. Doesn't matter where the rogue is hiding for the most part, AOE spells or effects / abilities can take a rogue down very quickly. The Rogue in my group anyways, is usually towards the front of the group, 10-15 feet away so he can attack and disengage and still have 5 or 10 feet of space between him and the monster, but it's close enough for any type of even narrow breath attack such as a half dragon breath attack, etc.

I wouldn't focus so much on seeing the rogue. And focus more on monsters that can move through the front line do so, and others, use their abilities to decimate the front lines. The problem with my group is that I have two clerics, a rogue, a wizard, and a ranged fighter. The clerics are the tanks, and the ranged fighter does on average 25 - 40 points of damage a round.... at level 8... But, he can't take any hits really. Low AC and lower HP. Which, at levels above 10 will bite him in the ass... Be happy you have a rogue that hides a lot and not two clerics that keeps everyone at full HP all the time!

 

[seebs]

Yeah, it's intentional that a great deal of it is DM call, because the DM can adapt stealth to "what my table thinks seems reasonable" within a pretty broad range.

 

[Hriston]

I don't think the statement is (intentionally) ambiguous. I think he assumed readers would perceive that the word "though" between two claims is intended to contrast those claims, and he contrasted "can't hide while being observed" with "can hide while being observed if you have one of these two abilities which have no purpose but to allow you to transition from unhidden to hidden while being observed".

No, he contrasted "can't hide while in full view" with "can hide while in full view". From your paraphrase I can tell we disagree about what the possible meanings of "in full view" are in this statement. The meaning of "in full view" is not restricted to, or even very well glossed as "being observed" or "clearly seen", but rather as "clearly visible" or "within an unobstructed range of vision". That is how I'm interpreting the phrase. No actual viewer is required to be immediately present for someone to be in full view, only that vision to their location is not blocked. So as long as they are not heavily obscured or behind a large enough obstruction, they are in full view.

The purpose of the abilities, then, is to allow wood elves and lightfoots to hide themselves under a circumstance in which they are not heavily obscured or behind such an obstruction. The abilities, as I read them, do not otherwise make them unseen under those circumstances without first being hidden (which is in contrast to how [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] has said he imagines wood elves as having an always-on camouflage in the proper settings, allowing them to hide because unseen), so for example, I wouldn't give a lightfoot unseen attacker advantage on an attack from behind a larger creature unless already hidden.

The problem is, your "ambiguity" relies on never, ever, looking at the whole claim at once. When we're talking about hiding while directly observed, you say "oh, but it could mean remaining hidden". When the word "vanish" is pointed out, you jump to "oh, but it could mean while not being observed". But we're talking about a single thing being given as an example; vanishing while being directly observed.

And yet oddly enough he never says that. If Jeremy Crawford had wanted to make an unambiguous statement about the ability to vanish while directly observed, he could have done that just as easily as you just have.

But... Why would you ask him to "nullify the ambiguity"?

I thought you were asking me to have him confirm that my preferred interpretation was what he intended exclusively. Thanks for clarifying.

You wouldn't. You'd ask him to confirm that he intended that ambiguity, and if he said "yes, I was trying to be ambiguous there", you'd win, and if he said "no, it absolutely meant that these powers allow a character to transition from unhidden to hidden while being directly observed", you wouldn't.

I'm not really interested in "winning".

And I have drawn the obvious inference that you think he'd answer the same way I think he'd answer, by confirming that there was no intended ambiguity. Conveniently, if I'm wrong, it's stunningly easy to demonstrate that I'm wrong.

It would be just as easy for you to demonstrate the opposite. Why haven't you?

 

[Xetheral]

No actual viewer is required to be immediately present for someone to be in full view, only that vision to their location is not blocked. So as long as they are not heavily obscured or behind a large enough obstruction, they are in full view.

If no one else is immediately present, isn't everyone's vision by definition blocked by walls, or objects, or distance, or even the curvature of the world (if applicable)?

Let's say a human is alone in an empty room. He wants to take the hide action so that any future passers-by in the hallways outside the empty room will not hear him. Are you saying you would not let the human hide because he's "in full view" within the empty room? Or perhaps you're saying you'd require him to be adjacent to the wall with the corridor in order to try to hide? Neither makes any sense to me. Why can't he remain quiet (i.e. hide), and/or why should it matter where in the empty room he is?

Instead, it makes more sense that "in full view" is defined in relation to specific observers. If others were in the empty room, the human wouldn't be able to hide from them, because he'd be "in full view" of them. However, because he's alone in the room, he's not "in full view" of anyone, and thus can try to hide. If anyone enters the room it won't do him any good, but it will make him harder to notice (by hearing) until someone does.

 

[Caliban]

That is how I'm interpreting the phrase. No actual viewer is required to be immediately present for someone to be in full view, only that vision to their location is not blocked. So as long as they are not heavily obscured or behind a large enough obstruction, they are in full view.

Yeah, this strikes me as nonsensical and very much not a "natural language" meaning.

By that reasoning, hiding is impossible, since you are going to be "in full view" of some hypothetical vantage point, even if it's not a vantage point anyone is going to actually be able to use.

"Sorry Bob, your halfling rogue cannot hide in that bush. It is possible for a mole to burrow up and see you, therefore you are in full view."

"Nope, your elf can't hid behind that tree. An invisible halfling might be watching from the branches above."

"Nope, you can't hide in that magical Darkness spell. You could be in full view of a warlock with Devil's Sight who might be watching from the Ethereal Plane."

"Are any of these observers actually present?" "No, but all I require is that they could be."

Madness.

 

[ThePolarBear]

And all of this is disregarding the fact that the phrase is "Normally, you can’t hide from someone if you’re in full view". That "from someone" somehow keeps disappearing, even if it's in full view of anyone that reads that phrase.

But that certainly must mean that someone you are trying to hide from is in another castle, and not a WE or a LH. Sorry Mario.

Have to add: Attempt at humor, the mood is really heavy here.

 

[Hriston]

If no one else is immediately present, isn't everyone's vision by definition blocked by walls, or objects, or distance, or even the curvature of the world (if applicable)?

If vision to a creature's location is blocked by obstruction, or if the location is heavily obscured, then that isn't in full view. Whether a creature is present, however, is a matter of encounter distance.

Let's say a human is alone in an empty room. He wants to take the hide action so that any future passers-by in the hallways outside the empty room will not hear him. Are you saying you would not let the human hide because he's "in full view" within the empty room?

Not necessarily. It depends primarily on the audible distance involved, dictated most likely by the human's noise level. If audible distance extends beyond the room, then the room is not in full view because the walls of the room provide an obstruction. On the other hand, if the human is trying to remain quiet and is more than 20 to 60 feet away from the hall, or if there is an intervening door, then the room is in full view.

Instead, it makes more sense that "in full view" is defined in relation to specific observers. If others were in the empty room, the human wouldn't be able to hide from them, because he'd be "in full view" of them. However, because he's alone in the room, he's not "in full view" of anyone, and thus can try to hide. If anyone enters the room it won't do him any good, but it will make him harder to notice (by hearing) until someone does.

If there's a chance he will be heard from outside the room, that expands the encounter area beyond the room, which is not then in full view.