Party in the darkness

[Dausuul]

I was toying with the idea of a party that specialized in blinding their enemies with the spell darkness, and looking for ways to allow the party to see in such darkness. I know it could be done with the true seeing spell, but that's not available till level 11 and even then it only works for one person, one hour, once per day. I'm more interested in what can be done at levels 1-10.

What I've come up with so far:

• Shadow sorcerer (can cast darkness with sorcery points, and can see through a darkness spell so cast)
• Warlock with Devil's Sight
• Moon druid (can turn into a giant spider, giant constrictor snake, or giant scorpion, granting blindsight)

Honorable mention goes to the Alertness feat, which grants partial benefits; you're still blind, but your enemies have disadvantage to hit you and you don't have disadvantage to hit them. The beast sense spell could theoretically work if someone has an animal ally with blindsight granted by hearing (e.g., a bat familiar), but there is a strong argument to be made that you should still have disadvantage when you can't see through your own eyes.

What else am I missing?

 

[aco175]

I think that there is a magic item- goggles of night maybe. These may just give you darkvision and not let you see in magical darkness though. I could see something similar for the same power though since it is kind of rare, but you could force it.

 

[Dausuul]

I think that there is a magic item- goggles of night maybe. These may just give you darkvision and not let you see in magical darkness though. I could see something similar for the same power though since it is kind of rare, but you could force it.

Yeah, goggles of night just give you darkvision. Darkvision is extremely common among monsters, so it's no great advantage if the PCs have it too. The power of the darkness spell is that it blocks darkvision as well as normal vision; to see through it, you need truesight, blindsight, or an ability that specifically ignores magical darkness.

Though, now I think of it, there is a rare item, the gem of seeing, that gives you truesight for 10 minutes up to 3 times per day. So that's an option if the party can get hold of one.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

I think goggles of night are more useful on characters who already have darkvision, since they increase the range and might give the party a chance to see the monsters before they see you.

I can't think of any official D&D races with tremorsense. Starfinder has one. If I was going to add it, it could possibly be an alternative animal feature for a simic hybrid from Ravnica.

I did experience an encounter where my character was guided through magical darkness by his bat familiar, in effect playing in 3rd person mode. Disadvantage on attacks, but can still use AoE spells...

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

What you need is some kind of device that emits ultrabright, blinding light to toss or place in the magical darkness.

That way, when the party- or the creatures in the darkness-affected area- drop the darkness spell, those in the area will be blinded. I mean, the odds that their eyes won’t be wide open with their pupils fully dilated is infinitesimal. At the very least, they should have a penalty against protecting their eyes from the suddenly revealed light source.

 

[TwoSix]

Warlock
Sorlock
Pallylock
Bardlock

Problem solved.

 

[Eltab]

Invent a magic item. In a world where so many monsters hunt at night or live in caves, humans who want to get rid of the dangerous pests have to have thought of something - some gear to accomplish the trick. Of course when word gets out, "These four guys want Visors of Night Sight" you can be sure all the intelligent folk around will mark them as Villain's Enemy Number One (or as "Preferred Tool To Eliminate Dark-Dwelling Pests" if Good / Neutral).

 

[TwoSix]

Warlock
Sorlock
Pallylock
Bardlock

Problem solved.

As amusing as it is, it would actually be a pretty strong party, and even pretty thematically coherent if everyone picked the same patron.