D&D 5E Do you know a creatures location if they are in heavy concealment but not actively hiding and other location questions

[Ovinomancer]

Out of curiosity, is there a reason one must be pinned to a position? Not everyone takes a hardline stance on a subject, and those who are open to different interpretations tend to use words like "Could", "would", and "maybe". For example, I could take a hardline stance, and maybe I would, if it were not for the fact that the discussion subject is so open to interpretation. Does the lack of being "pinned" to a position somehow make me a lesser person?

Absolutely. I've no issues with stating there are other possibilities. My issue arises when you use weasel words to escape responsibility for providing a possible by pointing out you used the weasel word.

 

[Imaculata]

Nah, I'll just block you. I'm pretty sure that I had you blocked before, but it got lost in the re-boot.

Ugh, that is just unpleasant.

I didn't say that you were wrong to play how you play; only that it's not worth consideration. If you're going to ignore whatever rules you feel like and just make stuff up, then that's fine if your players are okay with it, but it still doesn't leave us with anything to talk about.

All he said, as I understood it, is that DM's are free to apply or not apply the rules to npc's as they see fit. That seems reasonable to me.

If a bad guy falls into the lava, I declare him dead. If a player falls into the lava, I roll for damage and check if it actually kills them. Is that unfair? I don't think it is.

Same with perception and stealth checks. If I decide that an npc guard does not notice the players, I don't roll at all, and they sneak by unnoticed. If I decide the npc guard spots them regardless of their high stealth, then that would be kind of unfair, and I'd probably never do that. But you could, if you wanted to.

In fact, I once had a big fight in my campaign between evil NPC wizards and allied NPC paladins, and I didn't roll a single die. I simply declared how many of each side survived in the end, and the players fought the rest, just to simplify a huge battle.

Let me check what Aaron said again...

I'm not saying that none of the rules ever apply to any NPCs - I am saying that the determination of something like whether one NPC (an orc) sneaked through the forest unnoticed by another NPC (a peasant) is not inherently required to have the DM determine a full array of relevant game traits for each, decide their specific actions in the scenario, and then roll out every action that the rules mention a roll for.

The DM can, and is actually encouraged to, just decide on that being what did or did not happen, reserving dice rolls and the rules behind them for those moments when they can only enhance the game experience - like when determining whether that one NPC (an orc) sneaked through the forest unnoticed by a PC or NPC cohort/henchman/hireling there-of (even if a peasant, which is usually not the case).

Yap.... that seems to be what he is saying. Does not sound unreasonable to me.

 

[Imaculata]

Also, I noticed this little gem:

Ovinomancer: When is a character running?

Aaron: When the player declaring the actions of that character says they are.

Ovinomancer: Oh, good, so as long as I don't use the word "running" or its conjugates, I'm good to go with my triple dashing rogue.​

You know, it's not unreasonable for a DM to say that a player character is not running, unless they say that they want to take that action. You have to bend backward pretty far to twist that into a negative, which is what Ovinomancer seems to be doing here.

You can't convince me that you don't know exactly what he means. I bet everyone else in this thread does. You don't need to read between the lines to understand that Aaron does not make assumptions about a player's actions, unless they explicitly say they want to take a particular action.

That doesn't mean that players are encouraged to use any other word than the word "run" to circumvent the rules, OBVIOUSLY!

This includes, "getting the hell out of dodge", "getting the heck outa there", "make like the wind", "move as fast as my legs can carry me", and every single other way you can express the same action. It's about the player clearly stating his intent, not which exact word he uses. And Aaron even further clarified this later on... which I would not even have bothered to do, since it is so painfully obvious what he means.

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[Ovinomancer]

It could be a quiet sound. A vase can be knocked to the ground and shatter with a loud sound, or it can simply topple, making a moderate noise. Or maybe a player merely bumps into it, and it wobbles.

The writers simply provide an example of "a noise". Whether it is a loud noise, is up to the DM to decide.

Following that chain of thought, it could make no sound at all. This just runs down the silly hall, though. A knocked over vase immediately conjures the sound of breaking glass or pottery. You have to think to get to a vase falling on thick carpet and just going 'tink.'

What you seem to be calling "weasel words", I consider a position of not absolute certainty. Does every rule have to be pinned down and so narrowly defined? Wasn't the whole point of 5th edition to not do that?

Who's talking about rules? I'm talking about how you represent you positions.

I get the impression that Aaron simply doesn't want to force his opinion on other DM's. There's plenty of room for interpretation of the rules, and he seems to respect the fact that his interpretation is not the only interpretation.

To me that sounds extremely reasonable. So... why are you making it out to be something negative?

I respect that other have different opinions ions and there's lots of ways to play. So, no, that's not my issue or what I'm talking about. Every time Aaron presents his maybe, though, and I call out something I find odd, his immediate response is that he doesn't think that, he's just presenting what someone else might think. The thing is, I don't really need him or others to present their guesses of how hypothetical others might hypothetically think. I'm not discussing hypothetical with hypothetical other people, I'm trying to discuss things with you. So I care what you tbink, not what you imagine others could possibly think. And so, if a conversation with Aaron has never trying to constantly figure out if a given possibility is one he thinks or supports or one he thinks someone else might think, it's a barrier to continued or constructive discussion. Add on top of that his paranoia about being misunderstood and his willingness to jump to negative assumptions of why he is misunderstood, it's a real pain.

 

[SkidAce]

Ultimately, it's all DM calls. But it is clear to me that the default is "you know where it is," and being unable to see the creature doesn't change that default. My ruling presumes that every creature is pretty much always making a baseline "talky volume" audible out to 60 feet, simply by interacting with it's environment (even if it's invisible and holding its breath of whatever). "Actively trying to be quiet" essentially means taking the Hide action. Don't do that, and it's clear to everyone where you are, even if you're invisible.

I like a lot of your thoughts, but I cannot agree with that blanket statement.

Its a tough call, in many cases, since people are so visually dependent, if the invis person/creature is far enough away (arbitrary I know) I give advantage to stealth.

In other cases, I give them hidden for free. And in other cases, (tremorsense boots) they can't hide even when invis.

 

[SkidAce]

Absolutely. I've no issues with stating there are other possibilities. My issue arises when you use weasel words to escape responsibility for providing a possible by pointing out you used the weasel word.

None of us are trying to "win" a conversation however.

 

[Oofta]

I haven't read the thread past the first pages. Have there been any new arguments posted or is it the same as all the other threads about stealth and hiding?

LOL. This thread reminds me why I've more or less given up on these boards.

Pretty much the same arguments, the same endless bickering back and forth. I've fallen into the same pattern myself in the past.

If I kept track of names I could have pretty much predicted how this thread would go.

For me, the rules are a start, not the end and that overly-literal interpretation of the rules gets in the way of the game and there are times when common sense applies. Especially where the rules are fuzzy.

But then when I pose a scenario of "You may not know the exact location of a person you can't see 50 feet away even if you can hear them" I get a response along the lines of "Then why even have stealth rules at all?"

Taking the scenario to the extreme much?

Ahh well. I'll just go back to ignoring threads that go past a couple of pages.

 

[Hriston]

To give an example from a somewhat recent game, the party was fighting two mages who had cast greater invisibility on themselves. The fight took place in a cellar, and the mages didn't need to Hide every turn, allowing them to cast fireball and cone of cold instead. They were effectively hidden until they cast a spell, at which point the characters would see and hear the point of origin and surmise the mages' general location. Also, when the mages moved, they rolled Stealth checks, with a failure indicating that the player sensed their movement and knew their general whereabouts. This meant that melee players were blundering around the room, swinging at empty squares, desperately trying to hit something.

None of this is by the rules, of course, but it was a lot of fun.

The most important thing is that you're having fun, but I think the rules support this narrative quite well without any significant changes actually. First, I'm not sure what you mean by, "need to Hide every turn". Normally, a Dexterity (Stealth) check remains in effect until the hiding creature is found or gives away its position. In your narrative, the mages give away their positions when they attack or when they fail Stealth checks just like in the normal rules (not sure why these checks are asked for, but that's a separate issue). The difference is that you've given them the ability to immediately become hidden again, apparently with no die roll. Under the normal rules, this could be a special ability assigned to these particular NPCs. You could accomplish something very similar by giving them the ability to hide as a bonus action, which seems to be a common enough ability that it doesn't strain credibility that a mage might have acquired it. It's unclear from your example whether all creatures have this ability to auto-hide when unseen, or if it's only these NPCs or only creatures with invisibility cast on them. From your previous posts, it seems that you're of the opinion that it's more fun if unseen creatures are automatically hidden, but I'm not sure why you think it would be less fun if they had to re-hide with a bonus action whenever they gave their location away. They could still do pretty much everything you're having them do, but it would give PCs with high Perception a better chance of locating them, which might be fun for the players as well.

Unfortunately, if you use the RAW for invisibility and Hiding, then invisibility just becomes a slightly better version of blur (attackers have disadvantage against you), which takes all the fun out.

I don't see this. One of the main benefits of becoming invisible is that you can hide under any circumstance. Blur doesn't do that for you, so why does it spoil the fun if invisibility doesn't automatically make you hidden?

 

[Imaculata]

Following that chain of thought, it could make no sound at all.

Technically a vase could fall completely silently. But that was not what the example was about. The example was about 'a noise'. Not specifically a loud noise, not specifically a soft noise, but something audible.

A knocked over vase immediately conjures the sound of breaking glass or pottery.

Yes, to me it does as well. But the way it is phrased does not suggest that the noise has to be as loud as breaking pottery. It's just 'a noise'. It could be of any loudness. The vase is but an example.

Add on top of that his paranoia about being misunderstood and his willingness to jump to negative assumptions of why he is misunderstood, it's a real pain.

Gee, I wonder where he gets THAT idea(!)

Could it be because of...

Ovinomancer: When is a character running?

Aaron: When the player declaring the actions of that character says they are.

Ovinomancer: Oh, good, so as long as I don't use the word "running" or its conjugates, I'm good to go with my triple dashing rogue.
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Or perhaps because of:

Ovinomancer: I've no issues with stating there are other possibilities. My issue arises when you use weasel words to escape responsibility for providing a possible by pointing out you used the weasel word.

Or because of:

Ovinomancer: Then it's impossible to hide unless you make no noise at all? Interesting.

It's not just the replies themselves which seem antagonistic and unfriendly. But the way they are phrased also comes across as not very pleasant. I could see how that may be viewed as if you are deliberately misunderstanding what he's saying. Especially that first one, sheesh!

 

[Prakriti]

From your previous posts, it seems that you're of the opinion that it's more fun if unseen creatures are automatically hidden, but I'm not sure why you think it would be less fun if they had to re-hide with a bonus action whenever they gave their location away.

Either way, it wouldn't be following the official rules.