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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Oofta" data-source="post: 7416999" data-attributes="member: 6801845">Right, the elephant is not trying to hide, and there is nothing for it to hide behind.Some of this is just terminology and approach.  For example, I may decide that it's raining.  How heavy the rain is will depend on the scene I'm trying to set or perhaps just a random roll of the dice.  I then decide how is that rain going to affect visibility.  Light rain may not have any effect at all, heavy rain may lightly obscure.  In other words I decide on a scene first, mechanical effects are determined based on the scene.I take the same approach with light.  I may decide that it's a clear night with a full moon overhead ... and then decide what level the light is based on that.  So in this case, it's dim light if the group is out in the open.  If there's no moon, a partial moon or clouds I will adjust based on what I think makes sense all the way up to people without darkvision can't see anything.I also rule that there are some in-between areas the rules don't cover, hence my elephant on the football field. If you were truly blind, you wouldn't know anything was there without hearing it.  But there will be situations where you can see something well enough to target it with disadvantage but wihout your half-orc buddy, you wouldn't necessarily know it's an elephant.  You know approximately where it is even if you do make ranged attacks with disadvantage.If that same elephant is being relatively quiet and it is pitch black, you won't even know it's there.  Someone can tell you where it is of course, but your PC would have to guess the location or have someone instruct you on exact location.I guess you could say I added a stage between lightly obscured and heavily obscured.  There's a point where you go from being just disadvantage to perception checks to disadvantage to hit but you still see an outline and/or shape.  Finally you have "can't see anything".  Moderately obscured?  Creature is effectively blind, but sees something.I do it this way because I know what it's like to be outside at night with a full moon.  I see no reason to use a binary rule that has people scratching their heads.  There are many places where it makes sense for simplicity and the flow of the game to have simple binary conditions (HP and consciousness come to mind), and others where I think the game is better if you acknowledge gray areas.</blockquote>

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