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Message: <blockquote data-quote="The Savant" data-source="post: 7221844" data-attributes="member: 2279">Hi,Interesting thread. I found a massive logical conflating of stealth, with hiding, and the Hide Action in combat.Here's my take:1) From the basic movement rules, a party can always use Stealth when moving half rate or less, and they meet the conditions for some level of obscurement. Dim light and darkness count as light and heavy obscurement2) Hiding is a special condition that comes from a Stealth check. It has significance in Combat, but that's it. The DM normally determines when hiding can be attempted3) Successfully hiding gives you the Hidden condition, which confers certain beneficial effects in Combat [attack with advantage, attacked with disadvantage]4) The Hide Action is used in combat to try and gain the Hidden condition when such attempt would be difficult, which it will in most cases. The DMcan still bar you from the attempt if he deems it impossible i.e that stone column is too skinny for your body size to get behind in that bright light5) Even if you can't gain the Hidden condition, Stealth can always be attempted as per point 1) above [otherwise you can't Stealth]6) Invisibility clearly states you may always attempt to hide, regardless. It does not say "by using the Hide Action in combat." So not only can you use Stealth normally, you can gain the Hidden condition as per point 3)So this is how the whole thing works IMHO:The Warlock/Rogue agilely steps around the corner in combat into the moonlight glade away from his attackers. He Moves 15 feet. He takes a Bonus Dash of 15 feet. He then uses his Action to use One with Shadows to become invisible. He is in dim light so he meets the condition. The DM says, okay since you only moved 15 feet instead of 30 feet both times, you can now roll Stealth. I won't ask you to burn your Hide Action to do this, since you were moving slowly enough not to make noise with your heels. Secondly, since you went invisible, I can't bar you from trying to achieve the Hidden condition.His hot pursuers run around the corner looking for him. They fail in their Perception checks. Note that if they were deaf they would automatically fail. Since they failed in these checks, the Warlock/Rogue now has the Hidden condition against all his pursuers, in addition to being Stealthy. If one of his pursuers runs past him out of his threatened area, he could nicely bury his shortsword in the opponent's back with Advantage as a Reaction. However if he took a Reaction he would be now visible. He decides that since he can't kill all of them in one shot, discretion is the better part of valour. Since he is unspotted in dim light, he could continue to Stealth away into the gloom.Note that since the Warlock/Rogue had considerable movement running around the corner his opponents do not know specially which square he is in. Since they failed Perception checks, they can only attack random squares in their pursuit i.e. where exactly did he stop when they lost sight of him. If one of them had heard a foot scrape by making their Perception check he could probably attack the correct square, and he could tip his mates off to the same.The point being, don't conflate the Hide Action as a necessity to being Stealthy. Normally in combat lighting in good, combatants have good line of sight to each other, and they are wary enough to be using active Perception. The DM is going to say to you, you can't use Stealth since everyone is watching you with good light even if you move slowly. So you say, we'll I run behind that large sarcophagus over there, breaking line of sight, and then sneak over the top and drop down on my opponent next round as he turns the corner to look for me. If I were the DM I would say okay, but you are going to have to use the Hide Action here and I allow you to roll a Stealth check, given you make your Athletics check for the climb and you have enough movement to get into position to drop on your opponent next round. If your opponent then fails his or her Perception against that Stealth, you now pick up the Hidden condition with its combat advantages. The very subtle point is the DM barred you from using Stealth in this combat, but you argued a method that allowed for the Hide Action to apply and the DM granted you the hide attempt. Since it was a valid attempt to hide, you got to attempt a Stealth roll when it would not normally be allowed.The other thing I note about Ability Checks is many of them are made during the course of movement and combat. If you go whole hog on RAW, then every time someone does some sort of check, that would be a specific action i.e. "can everyone please pause the battle for two rounds, I have to make my Knowledge and Perception checks." That clearly is -not- RAI. If a door needs a DC15 strength check for the fighter to turn the knob, step through and cut the monster she smoothly does that in one round if she makes the check. Likewise for both Stealth and Perception combinations. I would suspect most DM's only require an action to be used if there is an allowed retry, or the check requires time, or particular attention i.e. an illusion requires a round and an Intelligence check action to focus on seeing through its deception.ta, the Savant</blockquote>

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