D&D 5E New Errata "Vision"

[Agamon]

Obscured is obscured. Anything directly behind something else that's obscured must, logically, also be obscured.

That's how it reads to me, too.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

A prone gelatinous cube? I don't think I could handle that. It wouldn't make sense.

Might want to avoid 4e then; "prone gelatinous cube" was one of the salvos of the edition war. The way I see it, any being which is both mobile, and capable of choosing the direction it moves, can be put into a state where it is in some way discombobulated and unable to properly choose the direction it moves. Even if it has no discernible brain matter or preferred "up" direction, it can still be put in a state where mobility is suppressed. Perhaps, as a visual, being bound to the ground by two surfaces at once, so that all its normally-cube-y edges are all bent out of shape.

Edit:
And to be clear, I logically understand that being inside the area of a darkness spell (or pea-soup-thick fog) would be obscuring to everything. But the way the so-called "natural" language reads, it's only things that are actually inside such obscuration (e.g. inside the fog) to which one is "effectively" blind. Things not inside it aren't--which makes total sense for when you're outside, looking in, but the meaning of the words used (which is what I had always thought "natural language" meant) doesn't say anything at all about when you're inside, looking out--and, therefore, those things could be plausibly read as "visible."

I don't actually think they are visible. That would be stupid. My point is that, instead of just making a nice, clear description, we have this weird (and still pretty jargon-y--"effectively blinded") circumlocution that *still* leaves something simple, and important, unsaid. Unless I'm forgetting other things from the context of where the errata would appear in the book, which I freely admit is possible; I have a memory like a sieve.

 

[Hriston]

The problem (which still exists) is that they are trying to treat areas of darkness the same as other heavily obscured areas. Perhaps the errata should have gone further and drawn a distinction between areas which are obscured due to lack of lighting (darkness) and those which are obscured due to what is essentially an opaque barrier (fog, foliage, or anything else you can't see through). You can see through darkness into areas of lighting. That's what sets darkness apart.

My house-rule, not that one is especially needed for anyone with enough common sense but here it is anyway, is that creatures within an area heavily obscured by darkness are not blinded when attempting to see into a lighted area, but that creatures in an area heavily obscured by opaque fog, dense foliage, etc. are blinded when attempting to see out of that area.

 

[Hriston]

I think I figured out what the reason for the errata.

Before Darkness/Fog doesn't give you anything since you get disadvantage for not seeing the enemy, but since he also counts as blind you get advatage to attack him .. which cancels out and you could attack with no modifier .. which is unlogical.

To me this is perfectly logical. Both the attacker and the target are unseen, so no one has a particular advantage. Why would either deserve to have an advantage, or a disadvantage?

Now only the active Character counts as blind and therefore get disadvantage to attack someone which he cannot see, but since the target doesn't count as blind for the moment you do not gain advantage. So the net-effect is dissadvantage against targets you cannot see.

I don't think so. Nowhere in the errata is it suggested that the advantage for an unseen attacker has been taken away. I'm not sure where you're getting that. If they are both in the darkness, sans darkvision, they are both blinded when trying to see one another.

But that leads to another problem. If you can see the target (Darkvision) but he does not see you, you don't get advantag against him, except if you sneak first .. which takes away your action.

No, you still get advantage for being unseen. You don't need to use stealth to be unseen when you are in darkness because the target is effectively blinded when trying to see you.