Shadowdancer's Hide in plain Sight

[Aluvial]

What about Spring Attack?

IF you have Spring Attack, what is the penalty to Hide (while moving)?

Are you able to move from hiding, get an attack, and then move back into the shadows, all in the same turn?

And a side note, what about the shadow companion. Obviously his pressence is great for flanking, but do you allow a character to control his shadow on his turn without an action, (I suppose a free action to communicate with it), and have the Shadowdancer and his shadow work in concert?

Sorry, I hope I haven't hijacked this one.... the questions are relevent.

Aluvial

 

[Thanee]

With Spring Attack you are able to split your movement. You still do a move action (move) and a standard action (attack).

When you move while hiding, your Hide check is done at -5, unless you only move at half your speed.

So you could start hidden and 10 ft. away from an opponent, then move the 10 ft. using Spring Attack to attack and afterwards move back, while hiding at -5.

Of course, opponents will still know (approximately) where you are and thus can attack you much like an invisible creature (with area effects, or just attacking the square they think you are in).


And yes, I would allow to "command" the shadow companion as a free action, much like a druid's animal companion. It should be enough to give the shadow some verbal commands, it's not like Handle Animal, the shadow itself has a human (even tho somewhat low) intelligence and will follow the commands to the best of its abilities.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Sheng Long Gradilla]

Well, lets see, HiPS specifically for the Shadowdancer is labeled "Su", and for the Ranger it's labeled "Ex".

Supernatural Abilities (Su): Supernatural abilities are magical but not spell-like. Supernatural abilities are not subject to spell resistance and do not function in areas where magic is suppressed or negated (such as an antimagic field). A supernatural ability's effect cannot be dispelled and is not subject to counterspells. See the table below for a summary of the types of special abilities.

Extraordinary Abilities (Ex): Extraordinary abilities are nonmagical. They are, however, not something that just anyone can do or even learn to do without extensive training. Effects or areas that negate or disrupt magic have no effect on extraordinary abilities.

Ok, so for the Shadowdancer it's magical in nature... make your conclusions

 

[Thanee]

The ranger's ability is kinda silly, tho.

They also really should have given it a different name to avoid confusion (above only the shadowdancer's ability is meant).

Bye
Thanee

 

[UltimaGabe]

So, there you have the list of things, True Seeing does not. Also no listing of HiPS. So it neither does nor does not see through the ability according to the spell description.

Your logic appears to be faulty. No spell, in all of D&D, with the exception of Wish and Miracle, is open-ended. If the spell doesn't say it does something, it doesn't do it. If a spell says, "This spell causes X to occur", then that's ALL it does. Even if it provides a list of things that the spell does NOT do, that by no means say that it does everything except those in the list. True Seeing, for example, provides no clause saying, "True seeing does not cause a fireball to appear in front of the caster." Therefore, by your own apparent logic, a DM could rule that it DOES cause a fireball to appear in front of the caster, simply because it isn't included in the list of things it DOESN'T do. My point is that it provides a strict list of things it DOES do, and Hide in Plain Sight by no means qualifies as any of those. Even if it isn't included in the list of things that it DOESN'T do, that means nothing- as there's an infinite number of things not included on such a list. The spell description doesn't say it penetrates Hide in Plain Sight, and therefore, it doesn't.

True Seeing gives you the ability to see all things as they actually are.

Completely and totally flavor text. Game-mechanic-wise, it does not do that at all. True Seeing does not let you see things as they actually are. If a man is wearing a mundane disguise to look like a woman, the spell simply tells you there's a woman standing in front of you. The person, however, is actually a man. Why didn't True Seeing show that man as what he really was, if that's what the spell claims to do? Not only that, but you'll note that True Seeing sees through even non-magical darkness. How is that showing you things as they actually are? It's actually dark- but the spell still penetrates it. (In fact, before they introduced that feature in 3.5, my DM would always say, "Okay, you cast True Seeing. It's Truly Dark.") Therefore, that line of flavor text has no place in this discussion.

To me, there is only one reasonable conclusion, that True Seeing allows to see someone hiding in plain sight. Because there is nothing hindering the spell from working at all.

Except that nowhere does it say that True Seeing does that. If you're taking True Seeing as an open-ended spell, telling yourself "True Seeing does everything except what's listed in this description", then you're going to believe that no matter what- but it's a faulty line of logic. There's nothing hindering the spell, of course- but there's nothing compelling it either. If nothing gets it going, nothing needs to stop it.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

You can move up to one-half your normal speed and hide at no penalty. When moving at a speed greater than one-half but less than your normal speed, you take a –5 penalty.

That's interesting. I never really looked that closely at Hide before. Does this imply that you can move while hiding, or that you can move and then hide, only becoming hidden at the end of your move? It never really made much sense that a rogue could hide over in the corner behind a pillar, and then move across the open chamber to sneak attack someone, but the rules aren't clear on whether that's possible or not.

It says you can move up to one-half your normal speed and hide. But it doesn't say whether this means you can move while hiding, or if it means you can merely move and then hide using the same move action, becoming visible each time you move from hiding spot to hiding spot.

 

[Thanee]

UltimaGabe, the problem is, that True Seeing does neither of that. It gives a general description of what it does and then goes on to describe what that means in an exemplaric fashion by listing things it does and does not, all of these are related to the first line, which gives the broad ability granted by True Seeing, some give examples of what is included and the others place restrictions on it, by giving more examples.

It's nigh impossible to make a finite list of all situations, which True Seeing applies to by listing specific examples, especially once you branch out into all those myriads of spells and special abilities presented in the other books and future books as well.

For example, if there was a spell, which was similar to Blur or Displacement, but not exactly the same, then it would not work on that, just because it's not listed specifically?

Therefore it's completely within the realms of DM decision, what this means in the end, because the rules do not and cannot cover every eventuality.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Thanee]

That's interesting. I never really looked that closely at Hide before. Does this imply that you can move while hiding, or that you can move and then hide, only becoming hidden at the end of your move?

Action: Usually none. Normally, you make a Hide check as part of movement, so it doesn’t take a separate action. However, hiding immediately after a ranged attack (see Sniping, above) is a move action.

Of course, you can only hide in a place with cover or concealment, so the rogue would not be able to cross the open room and hide meanwhile. You can, however, move inside terrain, which provides enough concealment to hide, for example.

Bye
Thanee

 

[UltimaGabe]

UltimaGabe, the problem is, that True Seeing does neither of that. It gives a general description of what it does and then goes on to describe what that means in an exemplaric fashion by listing things it does and does not, all of these are related to the first line, which gives the broad ability granted by True Seeing, some give examples of what is included and the others place restrictions on it, by giving more examples.

No, you seem to be confusing Flavor text with game mechanics. Most of the spells in the PHB give a short flavor text description of what it does, and then goes on to state the game mechanics. If something isn't listed as a game mechanic, then it simply doesn't do that- plain and simple. Like I said, True Seeing is NOT open-ended. No spell, with the exception of Wish or Miracle, can do anything not stated in the spell description. If an ability came out that was like Blur or Displacement, but not Blur or Displacement, it would NOT be up to the True Seeing description to decide whether or not it was bypassed- it would be up to the description of the ability itself. The True Seeing description does not give "some examples" of what it does- it states specifically what it does. As I said, it does NOT show things as they truly are, because it can't see through mundane disguises. That alone shows that the first line is purely flavor text, and therefore does not have any place in this description.

As I've said several times, the spell is NOT open-ended. If the description gives specific examples of what it does, then it does not do anything beyond the description. If it said something along the lines of, "The True Seeing spell also bypasses effects not listed in this description, as up to the DM," then what you're saying would be true- but it doesn't.

 

[Thanee]

No, you seem to be confusing Flavor text with game mechanics. Most of the spells in the PHB give a short flavor text description of what it does, and then goes on to state the game mechanics.

See, and to me the so-called flavor text is part of the rules. Just that in some cases the game mechanics cannot completely describe what the spell does, or take every eventuality into consideration.

To me, that part here (taken from the short description, but no real difference) is the spell effect:

Lets you see all things as they really are.

The remainder just tries to explain what that actually means by listing some examples and especially by placing some restrictions on this powerful ability (again in an exemplaric fashion).

Seeing a shadowdancer hiding in plain sight is well within these limits to me (and just to restate that, this is just how I see and play it, I do not consider the rules clear enough to say that this is the one and only truth out there ).

DESCRIPTIVE TEXT
This portion of a spell description details what the spell does and how it works.

It's not that I do not see where you are coming from and it's certainly a valid viewpoint, but there simply is no such clear line between flavor and mechanics.

Bye
Thanee