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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6986920" data-attributes="member: 42582">My claim: if that's what he intended, unambiguously, then he is a very poor writer. Because that is exactly what was asked, and at ever point where he could have said "yes", or could have unabmiguously restated the question in declarative rather than interrogative mood, he didn't. Instead he used allusion ("eyes directly staring", "prying eyes", "nearby observers", "vanish behind").Personally, I think he is capable of writing for precsion and certainty if he wants to.No amount of yelling and swearing changes the range of meanings open.Normall, you can't hide while in plain view. So if A is standing behind B, being as still and quiet as s/he can, when C turns the corenr C can neverthless see A without any chance of failure. (Mechaniccally, that is, C's player does not need to make a WIS check.)If A is a halfling, however, then A can vanish behind B. But A is not assured of success in this attempt to vanish. So when C turns the corner, C's player makes a WIS check. If it beats the DEX check made by A's player, C noticed the halfling A. If not, then A did indeed vanish and C doesn't notice A.You'll note that the above is almost a literal restatement of the Sage Advice. (I used the word "however" rather than "though" for purely stylistic reasons - but they are synonyms for present purposes.) That is how I envisage things working. I can make sense of it in the fiction. The mechanical resolution is clear. The benefit conferred by the halfling racial trait is unambiguous.What I have left open is: what counts as "turning the corner"? This is up to GM adjudication, by reference to the idea of "being seen clearly" and "being distracted, at least out of combat". My own inclination is to be fairly liberal about these if C is not expecting to bump into A (eg C is talking to B, the halfing A is coming down a street which has a bit of a crowd, or otherwise is not completely open, and wants to get close to B and C while staying hidden from C), but less so if C has an eye out for A (eg C is talking to B saying "Where is your tricksy halfling friend A?" - in that case I would be disinclined to allow A to just walk down the street and hide behind B - but if A or B could arrange a distraction, so that C doesn't literally see A sneak up behind B, then it would be as if C had turned the corner, and A's character could make the DEX check to hide).I don't thnk any of the above is very unclear.</blockquote>

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