How strict with Hide checks?

[Vegepygmy]

Last night, one of my players made a move silently check to open a door into a room quietly and a hide check to hide and moved slowly into the room. The room was an empty 3x4 square room with a chest in the far corner and 6 dretches. They attacked him and he was kind of upset that he didn't get to hide.

<facepalm>

IMO, he doesn't get the hide check because there is no cover to hide behind. He argues that an improved hide skill gives you the ability to hide behind next to nothing.

There are rules for moving between two points of cover and for sneaking up on someone after emerging from a hiding place in the Rules Compendium. Perhaps he was thinking of those?

So I'm just curious how strict you guys are about hide checks and having cover, or is that part of the rule you just ignore?

I do not ignore that part of the rules, nor have I met anyone who does.

 

[Ashtagon]

Hey, guys! I'm curious how strict you guys are with hide checks with regards to having appropriate cover to hide behind.

Last night, one of my players made a move silently check to open a door into a room quietly and a hide check to hide and moved slowly into the room. The room was an empty 3x4 square room with a chest in the far corner and 6 dretches. They attacked him and he was kind of upset that he didn't get to hide.

IMO, he doesn't get the hide check because there is no cover to hide behind. He argues that an improved hide skill gives you the ability to hide behind next to nothing. He does not have HIPS.

So I'm just curious how strict you guys are about hide checks and having cover, or is that part of the rule you just ignore? Thanks.

A 3x4 room with 6 dretches? How far did he get into the room before he noticed it was half-full of dretches/ Last time I checked, dretches don't have hide in plain sight or invisibility. What's good for the goose is good for the gander after all.

If I were playing fair, those dretches would have been plainly obvious the moment the door was opened.

 

[Dandu]

To me, it sounded like the player knew the drenches were there and went in anyways...

 

[slwoyach]

Magic is indeed perfectly logical in the world of Dungeons and Dragons, as is the ability to hide in plain sight.

After all, you are playing a game with monstrous spiders (how do they breath?), giant, flying, energybreathing lizards (can't even begin to point out everything wrong with that statement), and supernatural monsters some of whom can indeed hide in plain sight.

Monstrous spiders breathe the same way real spiders do, dragons are special, and all supernatural monsters who can hide in plain sight do so through camouflage or magic. Standing alone in the middle of a 20x20 room and attempting to hide is never going to work without the aid of magic.

 

[Dandu]

Monstrous spiders breathe the same way real spiders do

[URL="http://galileoandeinstein.physics.virginia.edu/lectures/scaling.html"]In which case they would suffocate.
[/URL]

dragons are special and all supernatural monsters who can hide in plain sight do so through camouflage or magic.

And Shadow Dancers... don't?

 

[Jimlock]

Hey, guys! I'm curious how strict you guys are with hide checks with regards to having appropriate cover to hide behind.

Last night, one of my players made a move silently check to open a door into a room quietly and a hide check to hide and moved slowly into the room. The room was an empty 3x4 square room with a chest in the far corner and 6 dretches. They attacked him and he was kind of upset that he didn't get to hide.

IMO, he doesn't get the hide check because there is no cover to hide behind. He argues that an improved hide skill gives you the ability to hide behind next to nothing. He does not have HIPS.

So I'm just curious how strict you guys are about hide checks and having cover, or is that part of the rule you just ignore? Thanks.

To be able to judge the situation correctly it would be nice to know whether the rogue was moving through an area of shadowy illumination (hence: concealment).
Without concealment, or cover in respect to the enemy, or HIPS, this is impossible no matter how high his Hide is.

Another issue is whether a character is allowed to open a door silently, merely by using his move silently skill. By RAW he is not allowed. Perhaps you allowed it in order to facilitate things but i would side with RAW on this one.
The noise a door makes does not depend on the "move" silently of the opener, although... the openers skill in opening it silently does play a role. While it might sound easier to use the skill and be done with it, in the long term this rule turns broken for the simple reason that a rogue's move silently can get so high, that its completely unnatural that he opens cranky old doors, rusty portcullises and stone dungeon doors without making any noise.
Because of that, in my games i set door DCs and roll Listen checks for anybody prone to hear them being opened. The DCs tend to be relatively low, for it is not an easy job to open such doors without others hearing it (Its the middle ages remember! Craftsmen might have been good at the time... still everything was pretty cranky back then!) A stone door for example can have a DC as low as 5... or you can even rule that its impossible, yet a low DC is better than nothing, for distance (-1 per 10 feet) can facilitate things. Example: while it is impossible to open a stone door seamlessly and a person standing behind it will certainly hear it, the same sound might fade off in the cave and people at larger distances might not hear it. What can be interesting, if you don't mind the complexity, is that you can increase or decrease those DCs according to player actions. Do they grease it? Do they lift and turn, so as to loose the noise from the hinges etc. etc...
While this might sound complicated at first. it really isn't. Its a single roll like before, only that the DC is not the Move Silently of the opener but the door's own DC. Of course in order to not penalize the rogue, for he certainly knows better, you can rule that a Rogue grants a +5 or a +10 to the Doors listen DC, or you can somehow relate the bonus to his HD (1/2 his HD) or his MS skill (1/3 of the skill). Actually its really simple, and at the same time it challenges the player's creativity, provided you have, or come up with, some description for the door at hand.
While it may sound that i made a big deal out of this, remember that one of the most difficult tasks in real life trespassing and break in, is indeed passing through doors and windows.


Now as far as hiding goes... RAW is not enough so as to cover the situation you described.
If the area your rogue moved in (before and after the door), provided concealment (shadow illumination), by RAW, the rogue could hide, open the door, move in and remain hidden... even if the enemy witnessed the door opening in the shadows! What's crazy is that while shadow illumination is not complete darkness, and the baddies can see the door opening in the gloom, the rogue is entitled "invisibility" due to concealment!
So...since we cannot follow rules to the letter in this case... i suggest two ways out of this. Either you rule that the rogue is considered "observed" due to passing through an opening that has the full attention of the enemies, thus making it impossible for him to hide once the door opens, or you can rule the "move between cover". In this case, I would count the 5 square feet before and after the door as an area without cover, even if its an area of shadow illumination. Moreover i would impose another penalty of a -20 on the check. This i do because even though "move between cover" has a penalty of its own, in this case, the enemies have their full attention on the portal due to door movement. The rogue has to be standing diagonally to the door, on one side or the other, and you can rule that he can push open the door from this position. Then he can attempt his hide and move.
Even though this might sound ridiculous, i tend to favor almost impossible tasks getting a chance of happening, no matter how small that chance, for a high level rogue with adequate ranks in Hide should have a real, if small, chance of such an impressive feat.

 

[Jhaelen]

Monstrous spiders breathe the same way real spiders do

Tracheae only work up to a certain size. Spiders larger than, say, two feet would have to use a different or supplementary method of supplying their system with oxygene.

 

[Hassassin]

Even for impossible tasks the Hide & Move Silently rolls are appropriate IMHO.

Then on a high enough roll you can be: "Your experience suggests the rusty hinges are unlikely to open silently no matter how slowly you open the door. Will you still try?"

Or: "A quick peek confirms there is no cover in the adjacent room, but you pull your head back before anyone notices you. You'll need magic or a distraction to pass unseen."

The success becomes not attempting the task.

 

[Jimlock]

Even for impossible tasks the Hide & Move Silently rolls are appropriate IMHO.

Then on a high enough roll you can be: "Your experience suggests the rusty hinges are unlikely to open silently no matter how slowly you open the door. Will you still try?"

Hmmm... and what is the DC for such a roll? It can't be opposed to Listen checks, cause that wouldn't make any sense. Even in this case you have to set a DC for the door, which in your case would be a DC for the Rogue's MS.

Ok.. and say you set a door DC, and the Rogue rolls and beats it, and comes to the above conclusion...

Then what happens when the rogue in question (or perhaps another character) attempts to open the door anyway?
You can't have him roll with the same DC... cause not only that would't make any sense but also because the Listening Skill of anyone behind the door comes into play...... .......

I agree that a roll to determine a task's difficulty can be allowed. However resolving the task cannot be done with the same roll and the same DC...

Or: "A quick peek confirms there is no cover in the adjacent room, but you pull your head back before anyone notices you. You'll need magic or a distraction to pass unseen."

While, IMO this is valid for the specific situation, it can complicate things in the long term.

The rogue isn't always aware of the people who might see him. Therefore, i feel that a rogue would exploit that, by using his Hide skill instead of his Spot skill. Let me explain.

Imagine a corridor with a rogue (R1) hidden in some niche. Another Rogue (R2) wants to pass through that same corridor unnoticed.

Let's assume that's its quite impossible to pass in front of R1 without being noticed, but R2 does not know this because he failed his Spot check Vs R1's Hide. By "The success becomes not attempting the task."... i assume that if R2 rolls a high enough Hide check he would some how notice R1, and thus he wouldn't attempt to pass before R1 while hidden?
Doesn't that substitute Spot with Hide?

It can get tricky...

 

[Hassassin]

Hmmm... and what is the DC for such a roll? It can't be opposed to Listen checks, cause that wouldn't make any sense. Even in this case you have to set a DC for the door, which in your case would be a DC for the Rogue's MS.

How hard is it? Noticing a very rusty door will probably not be quiet is easy - DC 5 tops. If there is something special about the door it may be a harder task to anticipate whether it makes a sound.

To use you "door Listen DC" idea, you might actually say that if the Rogue rolls below the DC in Move Silently that is the actual DC. If he goes over by 5 or whatever he notices something will make a sound and gets to choose if he wants to risk it. *Shrug* Works for me - I just mean that a stealthy Rogue should know when to open a door.

The rogue isn't always aware of the people who might see him. Therefore, i feel that a rogue would exploit that, by using his Hide skill instead of his Spot skill. Let me explain.

Sure, I just assumed the ones in the next room weren't hiding. Special circumstances would of course lead to a different conclusion. Maybe the guys next door would still get a Spot to notice the Rogue if they were actively guarding the room etc.

I think you are over-thinking it.