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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Xetheral" data-source="post: 8262393" data-attributes="member: 6802765">(Note: I'm going to be discussing my understanding of other poster's previously expressed rulings in this post. If I have misinterpreted how you would rule, please let me know so that I can better understand your perspective.)The current turn in the conversation relates back to the point I raised earlier, about whether one chooses to view the (quite simplistic) lighting and obscurement rules as defining the physics of light in the game world, or if one chooses to view the rules as an abstraction of how light works in the real world.Because the light and obscurement rules are so simplistic, when run as the physics of light in the game world, they create places where the outcome deviates from what would be expected in real life, such as the dog being able to see the "unobscured" bunny in [USER=7025508]@Crimson Longinus[/USER]'s example.Also, even if the rules are treated as defining the physics of light in the game world, the rules are so simplistic that a DM would still need to make judgement calls. For example, the full cover rules don't include anything about affecting light levels, only the obscurement rules do. If one reads the obscurement rules as only affecting light levels in the square the obscurement is in, then in that game world light can't be blocked by intervening objects because there is no rule to do so. A creature standing outside at night would be lit, because it was in either the bright or dim light radii of the sun and the heavy obscurement provided by the earth only affects creatures in the same squares the earth occupies. (Whether the creature would be in bright or dim light depends on whether the bright light radius of the sun intersects with the earth or extends past it). No, I don't think anyone actually runs their games this way, but it means than even those (implicitly) arguing that the rules define the physics of light in the game world are unconsciously making choices that deviate from the text (i.e. letting full cover and/or heavy obscurement affect light levels behind it) to better match how light works in the real world. So it isn't even a binary choice: instead, how much each DM chooses to treat the rules as defining the physics of light in the game world vs an abstraction of the real world is a spectrum.For example, unlike [USER=7025508]@Crimson Longinus[/USER], in [USER=6787503]@Hriston[/USER]'s whiteroom example, I would treat the intervening squares as darkness. Unlike [USER=6787503]@Hriston[/USER], however, I would rule that a creature in that darkness is not heavily obscured to a particular observer if that creature directly occludes the torch from that observer's perspective. I do that because the creature would be visible as a silhouette in the real world, and the observer "effectively suffering from the blinded condition" with respect to the creature in darkness shouldn't suddenly make the creature transparent. If I instead ruled that the observer effectively suffered from the blinded condition with respect to the creature occluding the torch, and therefore couldn't see a silhouette, I would need to make the same ruling if the creature in the darkness were instead an object, like a wall. Not letting the observer see the wall's silhouette would let them see the torch beyond. Based on previous posts, I understand [USER=6787503]@Hriston[/USER] uses a different method to avoid that unrealistic outcome, ruling that the silhouette is seen, but that the creature itself still gets the benefits of being Heavily Obscured, despite being seen as a silhouette. That works too, but just like my approach it's a deviation from treating the rules as defining the physics of light in the game world in favor of realism.Nothing in the text of the rules requires treating the rules as defining the physics of light in the game world. That's good, since I don't think anyone here is taking it to the logical extremes described above. We're all, to differing extents, at least partially treating the rules as an abstraction of the real world and ruling accordingly. [USER=6787503]@Hriston[/USER] is ruling that the benefits of being Heavily Obscured apply to creatures whose locations can be seen as a silhouette; I'm ruling that creatures visible as a silhouette aren't Heavily Obscured; [USER=7025508]@Crimson Longinus[/USER] is ruling that squares in which creatures could cast silhouettes aren't in darkness from the perspective of observers who could see silhouettes. It's impossible to objectively identity a point on this spectrum as the dividing line between RAW and not-RAW. To the extent that which is which even matters, the question of which is which only has subjective answers, because the rules are too simplistic to be run as-is as a description of the physics of light in the game world: rulings will be required, at every table. In other worlds, the RAW itself for vision and obscurement is not well-defined.As for how this same analysis affects the interpretation of the Darkness spell, I stand by what I said in my very first post this thread:</blockquote>

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