D&D 5E Moving out of concealment to attack - when is stealth broken?

[Charlaquin]

It absolutely does. Rather than coming up with cohesive, decisive and clear rules for stealth, they said, "We're going to have the DMs make calls with only rough guidance." That is punting.

It was also the right call.

Eh, I wouldn’t call it punting, but I agree with you otherwise so

By the way - if you have never listened to that interview, I recommend it highly. They address the issue under this thread explicitly at 42 minutes into the interview.

I have, it was pretty good!

 

[DEFCON 1]

For me its either #1 or #2 depending entirely on the story of the scene.

If there is a guard on duty at night in the radius of a lantern... whether or not they notice the rogue sneaking up from behind him will be dependent on the guard's Passive Perception versus the rogue's Stealth check first (to make sure the rogue actually is "hidden" IE "silent" as he approaches)... and then I make a snap second call on the personality of who this guard is. Is he an always-attentive super-guard? Is he a layabout? Is he skittish and always looking in every direction out of fear? Is he focused just on the woods ahead of him and not someone coming up from behind?

Any of these questions will impact my call on whether the rogue's last bit of movement out of the darkness and into the radius of the lantern's light will make him be "seen". Or if I decide not to make up a personality for the guard on the spot... I might decide to roll a Perception check for the guard and the results of that roll tell me whether or not they notice the rogue (if their "active" Perception check is higher than the rogue's Stealth check.)

Or even I might just say to myself "You know, it'd be cool for the rogue and the party to take this guard out silently. So I'm going to just say the rogue does it." And I know this will probably irritate some of the people here... but that guard might very well turn into a Minion at that very moment and the rogue takes him out of commission with a single attack-- his original count of hit points suddenly becoming a mere 1 HP. Because why not? Depending on the story of the group's infiltration up to that point, it might not matter if the guard is taken out or not, so at that point for me the Rule of Cool comes into play. And the rogue taking out the guard silently to let the others advance is cool.

 

[SirMoogle]

I think that it's a good idea to leave rulings to the DM, as circumstances can change the success of the attempt; I would hope that they make it easier to hide and remain undetected if any players are playing Rogues, though.

So I'd tentatively say #1, then #2 unless the DM says otherwise.

 

[tommybahama]

There's a good article here:

Things You Didn’t Know About D&D 5E: Hiding In Combat

The rogue stabs out with his dagger, wounding the dragon. Intent on avoiding the beast’s wrath, he declares that he’s hiding and rolls for Stealth. Except, that’s not how it works.

dmsworkshop.com

The jist is you can't hide if the target can see you clearly, but even dim light offers light obscurement. Attacking out of the shadows is such a common trope in sci-fi/fantasy that I'd hope a DM would at least allow an attempt.

 

[Charlaquin]

There's a good article here:

Things You Didn’t Know About D&D 5E: Hiding In Combat

The rogue stabs out with his dagger, wounding the dragon. Intent on avoiding the beast’s wrath, he declares that he’s hiding and rolls for Stealth. Except, that’s not how it works.

dmsworkshop.com

The jist is you can't hide if the target can see you clearly, but even dim light offers light obscurement. Attacking out of the shadows is such a common trope in sci-fi/fantasy that I'd hope a DM would at least allow an attempt.

I might be more inclined to allow anyone to attempt to hide in dim light, if there wasn’t a feat that explicitly grants the ability to do so (implying that you can’t normally do so without the feat). Ditto for Mask of the Wild and light obscurement, and Naturally Stealthy and half cover.

 

[iserith]

There's a good article here:

Things You Didn’t Know About D&D 5E: Hiding In Combat

The rogue stabs out with his dagger, wounding the dragon. Intent on avoiding the beast’s wrath, he declares that he’s hiding and rolls for Stealth. Except, that’s not how it works.

dmsworkshop.com

The jist is you can't hide if the target can see you clearly, but even dim light offers light obscurement. Attacking out of the shadows is such a common trope in sci-fi/fantasy that I'd hope a DM would at least allow an attempt.

When you first posted it, there was no link and your post just said "There's a good article here:" and I thought that was a great joke in context.

 

[Asisreo]

Hiding in battle would be pretty frickin' useless if it was #1 and Rogues would never do it. Rogues are supposed to get Advantage every turn so it should be at 2 or 3.

I wouldn't say "supposed to get it every turn." Advantage...certainly not. Sneak Attack is a likelier scenario.

Although, I think they meant nothing breaks if a rogue can consistently get sneak attack for free every turn, but likely gets it roughly 80-90% of the time. Just under a full "every turn sneak attack."

So I think having a rogue come out of hiding by moving shouldn't grant the benefits (in combat) but popping up should allow it (but also require them to significantly move to get another unseen attacker benefit).

 

[jgsugden]

.... "It doesn't matter if you rolled a Natural 20. You spit in the king's face and insulted his daughter's character. He's tossing you in the dungeon."

... but because you rolled a 20, you catch him mouthing, "Sorry, Dude... you're totally right but if I don't throw you in the dungeon the Queen is going to eat my liver."

 

[TerraDave]

It is funny, backstabbing was introduced in the first supplement for D&D. This was some time ago. Yet the rules on how it works have never been 100% clear.

For 5e, I think the rule was written to give some flexibility to the DM. Which is always the tradeoff.

 

[auburn2]

Hiding in battle would be pretty frickin' useless if it was #1 and Rogues would never do it. Rogues are supposed to get Advantage every turn so it should be at 2 or 3. You need to spend an action to hide (bonus for a rogue, standard for everybody else) so even if you move back into darkness you're not considered hidden. They can't see you but they know that's where you are so they won't be surprised on the following turn.

Ok a few things.

1. Rogues will never get advantage on every turn by taking hide because they would need to succeed at a stealth check and no Rogue no matter how high his dex is he will not always suceed at a stealth check every time he tries. If you have a 20 in dex and expertise in stealth with a +3 proficiency (+11 total) you can reasonably expect to suceed at stealth about 80% of the time. That is a Rogue who dedicated everything to that one stat and he will still fail pretty regularly. Most Rogues are going to be more like 60% success in hide. Obviously that depends on the specific enemy.

Further even if an enemy successfully hides, the enemy can flat prevent advantage simply by taking the dodge action. If the enemy takes a dodge action or does anythign else to cause disadvantage then it is impossible for a Rogue to get advantage. He can be melee attacking while invisible and hidden using a Barbarian Reckless attack ability against an enemy illuminated by faerie fire who is prone, poisoned, and restrained and he will still not have advantage if the enemy takes dodge action or there is any other condition that applies disadvantage. A single thing that causes disadvantage will cancel all advantages.

2. I think what you meant to say is Rogues are supposed to get sneak attack every turn. I would modify that to say they are supposed to get sneak attack most turns. In my games I am guessing it is about 60% including hide and other ways. It is more for a swashbuckler and it will be more if you allow steady aim at your table. Most posters indicate it is more than 60% in their games.

3. You need to take an action to hide. You do not need to take an action to be unseen and being unseen will give you advantage whether hidden or not. In the original example if the Rogue fired from darkness he has advantage whether he takes the hide action or not (assuming he can see the enemy and the enemy does not have darkvision or he is outside of their darkvision range). In this respect dash is often what will provide the most bang for the buck. If your enemy is lit use a bonus action to dash to an area in darkness or outside their darkvision range and you get advantage. No stealth check required. Steady aim will do the same.

4. I realize this is a major point of controversy, but my understanding of RAW, RAI and sage advice is that you can not be hidden unless you are obscured (barring abilities like mask of the wild, naturally stealthy or skulker feat). In that respect #1 is the correct RAW answer. According to the PHB circumstances can change this at the DM's discretion.