How do you see Darkvision?

[Miar]

Darkvision is always something I've had a problem with. First in terms of fluff is there anything besides it being a type of magical site? How do you deal with hiding with darkvision. It seems to kill it on one hand but I aways picture creatures skulking around the underdark. Many of these creatures have darkvision and a bonus to hide. This would seem to be useless to them if there hiding from each other or other creatures in the underdark. (oh there is a race in one of the races books -I forget which- has camouflage that works against darkvision).

On a similar note the plane of shadow is all shades of gray and from my understanding the light is at a constant level. Where does the light come from? Does it create more shadow? If so how do creatures with darkvision which is black/white see the shadow. -I see someone with darkvision looking from a lighted area to an area of darkness seeing the color of lighted area slowly turn to grays the farther into the darkness they look. On the plane of shadow everything would be grays to begin with.. arrgg! So what am I missing here.

 

[MerricB]

You can hide if you have *concealment* or *cover*.

Darkvision will negate concealment from shadows (as you see everything within 60' as in light), but cover still works.

The Plane of Shadow is shadow made manifest; the shadowlight is part of the plane. Black & White is basically shadows anyway... so they see grays as normal.

Cheers!

 

[Miar]

hmm I was looking for something a little beyond cover and concealment. One thought was letting those using something that gave them camouflage such as the spell or an item hide from those using darkvision (probably take a feat). As for the plane of shadow.. I would never say that things that are black and white are basicly shadows. A room that is all gray partially in shadow is much different than that room in full light. If the plane of shadows is all shadow how does that work with shadow jump. Also a person with one eye is a lot worse off without shadow because it's one of the key things they use to judge distance. It just feels like something is missing here but I'm not sure what..

You can hide if you have *concealment* or *cover*.

Darkvision will negate concealment from shadows (as you see everything within 60' as in light), but cover still works.

The Plane of Shadow is shadow made manifest; the shadowlight is part of the plane. Black & White is basically shadows anyway... so they see grays as normal.

Cheers!

 

[Klaus]

Darkvision is like those special nightvision goggles we see in movies and TV, with the exception that they're black-and-white instead of black-and-gray, the range is 60 feet and they're not hampered by bright light. So a creature with darkvision looking at a partially lit room will see the entire room, but some of it (the shadowed part) will be gray, and some (the lit part) will be colorful.

As for things skulking about in the Underdark, remember that the range of darkvision is 60', which is pretty short (unless you're a drow or a dragon). So creatures in the Underdark would be skulking from cover to cover, not trusting the shadows to conceal them.

As for the Plane of Shadow, its in a state of perpetual twilight, as if the sun was about to rise... somewhere. There are no "hard" shadows, like those we cast in a sunlit day, just a perennial gloom, as if it was eternally 4 AM. For creatures with darkvision, the area around them would seem "lit" as if they carried a light source (even if the colours are a bit muted).

 

[Gez]

On a similar note the plane of shadow is all shades of gray and from my understanding the light is at a constant level. Where does the light come from? Does it create more shadow?

If there was no light, it would be the plane of darkness, but it's the plane of shadow instead.

 

[robberbaron]

In the old days, before Low-Light and Darkvision, we had Infravision (Dwarves and most other things that could see in the dark) and Ultravision (Elves).

Infravision pushed into the Infrared, allowing some vision in darkness where there were heat sources.
Ultravision pushed into the Ultraviolet and was a bit like starlight scopes.

Now, all this is my recollection of stuff from some years ago, and may have been our group's interpretation but it made sense to us.
Perhap, Low-Light and Darkvision are similar?

 

[Kristian Serrano]

How do I see it? I don't, but it'd be cool if I did!

Kidding aside, I envision it as how the aliens in Pitch Black saw things.
'
Edit: To elaborate further, the creatures saw black and white up to a limited depth. Everything beyond that was just blurred beyond any visibility.

 

[Tonguez]

I've always equated dark vision with Ultra-vision (whereas lowlight is just normal vision with more rods).

Does UV light exist in total darkness? Doesn't matter. All objects give off some kind of EM radiation and creatures with darkvision might simply have evolved eyes which perceive it. (of course this should mean that colour vision is reduced)

 

[Delta]

In the old days, before Low-Light and Darkvision, we had Infravision (Dwarves and most other things that could see in the dark) and Ultravision (Elves).

No, all the player races just had Infravision (other than humans and halflings). In fact, the usage of Ultravision is astonishingly small. The only uses I can find to it in 1E AD&D are the following -- devils (bone & ice devils) and artifacts (Baba Yaga's Hut, Eye of Vecna, Table I Minor Benign Powers).

The mechanics are pretty close to Infravision ~ Darkvision (useful underground) and Ultravision ~ Low-Light Vision (useful above ground at night).

 

[Delta]

Darkvision is like those special nightvision goggles we see in movies and TV, with the exception that they're black-and-white instead of black-and-gray, the range is 60 feet and they're not hampered by bright light. So a creature with darkvision looking at a partially lit room will see the entire room, but some of it (the shadowed part) will be gray, and some (the lit part) will be colorful.

That's an interesting description, because it highlights that actual "nightvision goggles" function more like low-light vision than darkvision (not that that was your point, but it made me pursue it). Underground in total darkness, I must admit that the only thing that makes sense to me personally is for darkvision to work like thermal imaging (infravision), and in fact lots of IR cameras in fact have black-and-white displays.

http://www.inhs.info/sub.aspx?id=459

But before crew members could begin using the night-vision equipment, which amplifies ambient light from dim light sources such as the moon or stars, modifications had to be made...

http://www.infrared-cameras.org/thermal_weapon_sight/scope.htm

Unlike NVG's, bright lights (street or headlights) and no moon conditions do not affect the visual output of the SPI THERMAL scope. Bright as day visual images are always displayed on the users 320x240 LCD eyepiece...