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

[Maxperson]

Someone can be a forward observer but not notice anything because (eg) he's drunk.

Incorrect. Someone can be assigned to be a forward observer, but fail and not be an observer because he is drunk.

Someone can be in an observation balloon yet not notice anything because (eg) it's camouflaged.

True. An observation balloon is intended to allow observing(direct sight of things). Being inside an observation balloon does not make you an observer. Actually observing things does.

"To observe" can mean to see, or to look at. It can also mean "to watch". That is to say, it has both a transitive and an intransitive use. And "observer" is cognate. It can mean a viewer or a watcher. And a watcher can fail. Eg not all bird watchers see the birds. Not all those who are watching for the enemy notice them, because sometimes the enemy sneak past ("They got right past the observation post!" I doesn't cease to be an observation post because the observers in it aren't very good.)

To watch, as in to see. Not, to try and watch for. A watcher who has failed is not an observer. A watcher who succeeds at watching, is.

You are making claims about usage that are not borne out neither by dictionary meanings (eg you are completely disregarding the intransitive use of "observe") nor by native-speaker intuitions about a range of acceptable cases.

Find a dictionary definition that says you can observe something without seeing it, because these don't say that.

http://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/observe

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/observe - note that this one talks about the intransitive verb as "to take note AND to make observations", not to hope you see something.

https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/observe

 

[Xetheral]

I think you're putting a weight on "vanish" that it's idiomatic usage won't bear.

Your familiarity with the idiomatic usage of "vanish" appears to differ from mine. Furthermore, there's no indication that Crawford was using "vanish" idiomatically in the first place. Unless you can clearly identify the idiom in question, I'm going to continue to favor the interpretation that relies on the standard usage. In general, where a standard definition fits gramatically and conceptually, I'm not inclined to hunt for an alternative idiomatic interpretation.

The halfling in my example vanishes, in the sense of "ceases to be visible in an ordinary fashion", upon stepping behind A.

But the halfling stepped behind A at the point when the halfing started being careful (i.e. took the hide action). If the halfling wasnt already behind A when A is noticed, the halfling would automatically be seen. So I'm still not seeing a sense of "vanish" that applies to the Halfling at the point in time when A is seen. (And, as previously discussed, applying the term "vanish" to the point in time when the Halfling started being careful doesn't meet either of the other two conditions necessary to fit Crawford's statement: it's not halfling-specific, and the Halfling wasn't "in full view" at the time.)

Another example of that sort of usage - the sniper or bird watcher who puts on his/her camouflage suit, slips down into the grass/foliage, and vanishes! There is no implication in that description that any person or other animal was watching the event take place.

First, I don't agree that that's a good use of "vanish", idiomatic or otherwise. Second, even if it was, I don't agree that the birdwatcher is "in full view"... something (even if its just distance) is preventing the nearest people and animals from seeing the birdwatcher, just as the walls of the empty room prevent the human in my example from being "in full view" of anyone outside the room. Third, to the extent that "vanish" applies at all here, it applies at the time the birdwatcher "slips into the foliage", not at the later time that a person or animal wanders by.

 

[SkidAce]

I'm going with what I have seen (hehe) work in the realm world.

Activate Mask of the Wild while I am watching you, I can shoot, fireball, or run over and whack you cause I can still see/recognize where you are/went.

Activate it while my back is turned, or before I come into view of where you are, I don't have a clue unless I win perception.

Basically camouflage.

------

A human who lacks the Mask of the Wild ability could do it with special equipment (ghillie suit) , or extra preparation.

 

[Ovinomancer]

[MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION], [MENTION=6787503]Hriston[/MENTION]

It's becoming difficult to actually understand the positions involved. To clarify that, would you please provide answers to the following thought experiment?

Setup:
Tom is a lightfoot halfing. Bob is a human ally of Tom. Chick is a hobgoblin adverse to the existence of Bob and Tom. The are all in an empty, well-lit room, and all can clearly see each other at the start of the thought experiment.

Tom wishes to hide from Chick. Lacking other options, he moves behind Bob (ie, Bob is directly between Tom and Chick), and declares an attempt to hide from Chick.

Questions:
1) Is Tom allowed to make an ability check to hide from Chick?
2) If 1) is yes, and assuming the hide check is higher than Chick's passive perception, what is the result?
3) If 1) is no, why not?
4) If the above questions fail to capture your ruling, please elucidate how you would referee this situation.

 

[pemerton]

Find a dictionary definition that says you can observe something without seeing it, because these don't say that.

These semantic arguments are getting more and more surreal!

Of course you can't observe X without seeing X - that's "observe" in its transitive usage. But you can observe without seeing anything - that's "observe" in its intransitive usage. "Observer" is cognate. It means (among other things) watcher - as in, one who watches. One can watch without seeing. Which brings us back to the intransitive use of "observe" - eg dictionary.com gives "to act as an observer", which is "someone who observes". So "to observe" includes "to act as someone who observes". There need not be anything actually observed.

 

[Caliban]

These semantic arguments are getting more and more surreal!

Oh, the irony.

 

[Corwin]

Nevertheless, the natural language meaning of the idiom in view is "within range of vision".

I think this is the real crux of the disconnect here. These attempts to jargonize "natural language." When the devs decided to write the game this way, *specifically* to allow each table to read it in a way that makes sense for *them*, you can't then try to speak to everyone else's reading of the rules by "defining" what it means for them. WTH? As soon as you stop telling others how they should interpret something, designed intentionally to *be* interpreted, you will be much better off, IMO.

 

[pemerton]

[MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION], [MENTION=6787503]Hriston[/MENTION]

It's becoming difficult to actually understand the positions involved.

As far as I'm concerned, I suggest you read my posts 898, 905, 909 (at least, that's their numbering for me).

Setup:
Tom is a lightfoot halfing. Bob is a human ally of Tom. Chick is a hobgoblin adverse to the existence of Bob and Tom. The are all in an empty, well-lit room, and all can clearly see each other at the start of the thought experiment.

Tom wishes to hide from Chick. Lacking other options, he moves behind Bob (ie, Bob is directly between Tom and Chick), and declares an attempt to hide from Chick.

Questions:
1) Is Tom allowed to make an ability check to hide from Chick?
2) If 1) is yes, and assuming the hide check is higher than Chick's passive perception, what is the result?
3) If 1) is no, why not?
4) If the above questions fail to capture your ruling, please elucidate how you would referee this situation.

In the circumstance you describe I don't think that Tom can hide because Chick can see where he goes and hence keep track of him.

If Tom's player want to make a DEX check to see how still and quite Tom can be behind Bob, I've got not problem with that. But it won't make any difference to Chick's ability to see Tom.

(If someone - eg Bob - distracted Chick, it would be a different matter. The adequacy of distraction is a matter for GM adjudication, though presumably a CHA check would be one way to do it, or throwing a flash powder grenade, or something similar.)

I am guessing that [MENTION=6787503]Hriston[/MENTION]'s view is similar to what I've outlined. What causes me confusion is that others are confused by the view. (Which is separate from whether or not they share it.) The conception of the fiction strikes me as very straightforward - if a halfling or an elf is actually being seen by someone, stepping behind a person or behind a rain drop won't change that, because those things don't block vision and the viewer can track the halfling or elf's movement.

However, if a halfling or elf is not actually being seen then s/he can vanish behind a person or a raindrop and then when s/he comes into someone's field of vision will not be noticed unless s/he isn't still or quite enough, which will occur (i) if the potential observer succeeds in a WIS vs DEX check, or (ii) the halfling or elf performs the sort of movement, or makes the sort of noise, that automatically makes him/her noticable (the canonical instances of this are attacking and shouting).

 

[Ovinomancer]

These semantic arguments are getting more and more surreal!

Of course you can't observe X without seeing X - that's "observe" in its transitive usage. But you can observe without seeing anything - that's "observe" in its intransitive usage. "Observer" is cognate. It means (among other things) watcher - as in, one who watches. One can watch without seeing. Which brings us back to the intransitive use of "observe" - eg dictionary.com gives "to act as an observer", which is "someone who observes". So "to observe" includes "to act as someone who observes". There need not be anything actually observed.

While I agree with you that the semantics are out of control (on both sides), I think it's a far stretch to say that ' to observe' doesn't actually mean something is observed. That kinda makes the word useless; I mean, if I say I observed something what that mean was that I may or may not have actually seen the something, just that I was looking out for it, then it renders the meaning of the word completely moot. "Observe" is not a possibility. True, once you get into the nouns, like 'observer' you run into situations where they may not have done the job they were meant to, but if something is 'observed' it is seen, not possibly seen.

And "observation post" certainly doesn't imply that all things will be observed from such a post, but that the post's function is to enable better observation. That use just designates purpose; it doesn't imply outcomes.

 

[Caliban]

As far as I'm concerned, I suggest you read my posts 898, 905, 909 (at least, that's their numbering for me).

In the circumstance you describe I don't think that Tom can hide because Chick can see where he goes and hence keep track of him.

Completely ignoring their racial ability and the Sage Advice. I'm not confused by your view, it's just wrong. You can run it that way in your game if you want, and that's fine. Whatever works for you.

Trying to pretend that your view is what the game designers actually intended, with your attempts at re-interpreting everything to mean the opposite of what they are saying is what is confusing (and now just plain annoying). There was no ambiguity in the Sage Advice answer, but you don't let that stop you. You take things out of context, redefine them, or flat out pretend they didn't say it (your "from someone is redundant and therefore doesn't mean anything" claim). It's gotten old.

Hriston is just plain surreal with his "a hypothetical observer is all that is needed to prevent stealth" argument.