Ranged Combat At Night

[phindar]

As a general rule of thumb, I'm inclined to treat outdoors, plenty of moonlight as shadowy illumination, or a 20% miss chance for normal vision and no miss chance for low-light. I've never really considered the max range one can see, but its around however big the battlemat is.

Though I see hong has beaten to the punch on that one. Well played.

On a semi-related note, I've always wondered why elves and dwarves haven't come up with "non-magical" darkness spells (if that makes sense), since they would be able to cast darkness that would impair other vision types but that they'd be able to see through. As it is, having the opponents with vision mods (a little SR terminology there) casting darkness spells to cancel out light sources is a pretty good tactic against parties with regular vision types. The goal is to give the other team a miss chance while avoiding one yourself.

 

[Ogrork the Mighty]

On a semi-related note, I've always wondered why elves and dwarves haven't come up with "non-magical" darkness spells (if that makes sense), since they would be able to cast darkness that would impair other vision types but that they'd be able to see through.

Because that's the whole reason for darkness spells being changed. It was too powerful. If they wanted to do what you're suggesting, we could just go back to the old ways of creatures with darkvision being able to see through darkness spells. Hmmm, or am I "misremembering?" In previous editions, drow used to be able to see through their own darkness spells, right?

 

[frankthedm]

In previous editions, drow used to be able to see through their own darkness spells, right?

IIRC No. Almost nothing saw through magical darkness.

Any spell that makes darkness that something can see through at low levels is an extreme danger to game balance.

 

[phindar]

Well, you can already do it, its just a little fidgety. Instead of casting Darkness spells to blanket the party, you cast them on the party's magical light sources to cancel them out, leaving the area bathed in normal darkness and giving the half orcs, dwarves and goblins et al a distinct advantage against the elves, humans and halflings. You pretty much have to have a guy with all Darkness and Deeper Darkness spells on hand, and it helps to have something that can quench non-magical light sources like torches and lanterns (and gods help you if they have a sunrod. Though as people tend to crack them and toss them somewhere, Unseen Servant works pretty well for clearing the battlefield.) Or you can blanket the party with Deeper Darkness spells and use enemies with blindsight. Grimlocks work pretty good, even at low levels.

But my argument isn't so much about Game Balance, which I understand and sympathize with. It's just one of general, in-game logic. If elves can see fine in shadowy illumination, and other people can't, it would make sense for the elven scientists to cook up a spell that would create that type of illumination. As it is, if you rule elves can see fine in moonlight but darkvision only functions out to 60', you can still have elven archers nailing orcs or dwarves from hundreds of feet away with no miss chance, whereas return fire will have at least a 20% miss chance.

Edit: In 2e, specialty priests of Shar could see through magical darkness... or they got a +1 to hit in any darkness which replaced the normal -4 blind-fighting penalty. (I had a GM that was going to let me play a anti-paladin of Shar with that ability, but I never followed through on it.) Isn't there a Blindsight feat somewhere, Blind-Fighting prereq and maybe a 19 Wis? (I could be thinking 3.0 here, Masters of the Wild.) But yeah, its always been pretty rare.

 

[Hypersmurf]

Any spell that makes darkness that something can see through at low levels is an extreme danger to game balance.

The No Light cantrip from BoVD is very nasty underground.

If the PCs are using a Light spell to see, No Light suppresses it, leaving the prevailing light conditions (ie pitch black) in the overlapping area.

If the PCs are using mundane light instead, No Light prevents it illuminating the area - leaving it pitch black.

It's only the combination of magical and mundane light (at low levels) that will leave the PCs able to see.

And, of course, the guy casting No Light is backed up by all his darkvision-capable minions, who can see just fine...

-Hyp.