D&D 3E/3.5 Does Glitterdust (3.5) shed light? Does it require ambient light to work?

[pemerton]

No. It covers stuff with sparkly dust which blinds them. Nothing there has anything to do with light.

"Sparkly" = "tending to sparkle", and "sparkle" = "to issue in or as if in little sparks, as fire or light". So I would have thought sparkly has a lot to do with light.

I'd visualize it glowing with a bright but very self contained light. So if you cast it in complete darkness, you pretty much see a bunch of gold dots on a black shadow. You wouldn't see anything else in the area

What happens if the target is standing with his/her back to the wall, and their is a fresco or mosaic on the wall. Can you read it?

The spell does not provide any illumination, unless you count outlining the target as "illuminating" it.

The spell says "A cloud of golden particles covers everyone and everything in the area . . . visibly outlining invisible things for the duration of the spell. All within the area are covered by the dust, which cannot be removed and continues to sparkle until it fades."

Given that faerie fire, which does outline things in a glow, has the [light] descriptor, I would infer that Glitterdust does not create glowing particles, and that the dust only sparkles when light falls on it (and so is reflective rather than itself illuminating). That's different from TwoSix's interpretation. I think I'm agreeiing with [MENTION=7706]SkidAce[/MENTION] and [MENTION=7808]Deset Gled[/MENTION].

 

[delericho]

I agree with Cyclone_Joker. The spell does exactly what it says, and no more - the target is blinded (Will negates), it suffers a -40 penalty to Hide checks, and if it was invisible it is now outlined.

And that's it.

 

[TwoSix]

Given that faerie fire, which does outline things in a glow, has the [light] descriptor, I would infer that Glitterdust does not create glowing particles, and that the dust only sparkles when light falls on it (and so is reflective rather than itself illuminating). That's different from TwoSix's interpretation. I think I'm agreeiing with [MENTION=7706]SkidAce[/MENTION] and [MENTION=7808]Deset Gled[/MENTION].

With the lack of a [Light] subtype, I'm pretty comfortable with this interpretation as well. It's a super-sparkly bag of flour, rather than a cloud of sticky LED dots. The only corner case where it has an impact is in natural areas of no light. Darkness and deeper darkness would negate the effect for either interpretation by blocking line of sight.

The only other corner case I can think of is whether a character with darkvision can still see glitterdust with no ambient light in the area.

 

[Ragmon]

I agree with Cyclone_Joker. The spell does exactly what it says, and no more - the target is blinded (Will negates), it suffers a -40 penalty to Hide checks, and if it was invisible it is now outlined.

And that's it.

Exactly.

IMO, It has nothing to do with real life physics since its a spell as in magic. Thus it is sparkling in a magical way, tell logic to come back later once your done playing D&D.

 

[SkidAce]

Exactly.

IMO, It has nothing to do with real life physics since its a spell as in magic. Thus it is sparkling in a magical way, tell logic to come back later once your done playing D&D.

Didn't say it wasn't sparkly via magic. Just that it had to be sparkly and glittery.

 

[delericho]

Didn't say it wasn't sparkly via magic. Just that it had to be sparkly and glittery.

I really think you're trying to read it too literally.

Try this: the spell is named for glitter, yes? And glitter sparkles, yes?

Okay, now get a friend, and cover him in glitter. See how he sparkles!

Now put him in a darkened room. That's the effect of casting glitterdust in an area of darkness.

 

[Dandu]

I really think you're trying to read it too literally.

Try this: the spell is named for glitter, yes? And glitter sparkles, yes?

Okay, now get a friend, and cover him in glitter. See how he sparkles!

Now put him in a darkened room. That's the effect of casting glitterdust in an area of darkness.

We must be sure. Do you have any friends we can borrow?

 

[SkidAce]

I really think you're trying to read it too literally.

Try this: the spell is named for glitter, yes? And glitter sparkles, yes?

Okay, now get a friend, and cover him in glitter. See how he sparkles!

Now put him in a darkened room. That's the effect of casting glitterdust in an area of darkness.

I was actually trying to keep it simple.

Using the d20 SRD:

A cloud of golden particles covers everyone and everything in the area, causing creatures to become blinded and visibly outlining invisible things for the duration of the spell. All within the area are covered by the dust, which cannot be removed and continues to sparkle until it fades.

Any creature covered by the dust takes a -40 penalty on Hide checks.

So are you saying that since we cant see the glitter in the darkness....there is no -40 penalty?


I just go with it glitters until it fades, fog, daylight, rain, etc...it glitters and you can see it.

 

[Dandu]

So are you saying that since we cant see the glitter in the darkness....there is no -40 penalty?

If it is dark enough that you cannot see glitter, and you do not have Darkvision, there is no need to make hide checks since you cannot see the thing trying to hide.

 

[delericho]

We must be sure. Do you have any friends we can borrow?

Not since the incident with the fireball experiment...

So are you saying that since we cant see the glitter in the darkness....there is no -40 penalty?

Strictly speaking, the penalty is still there - it's just that in cases of total concealment (as in full darkness), there's generally no need to roll to Hide. But if the other person had Darkvision (or could otherwise see in the dark), the penalty would still apply. Of course, then they'd also be able to see the glitter.

(It's perhaps also worth noting that invisbility gives a +40 bonus to Hide checks. I think that's where glitterdust's penalty comes from - it's in place to cancel the previous bonus.)