D&D (2024) Thoughts on Stealth and D&D2024

[Bae'zel]

A common bit of advice I've read on RPG blogs and fora over the past decade has been: "rolling to fail; don't ask for too many unecessary rolls; let it Ride". As in, the more times you call for rolls for the same action (eg, make multiple stealth checks in a single location against a single enemy) you're statistically leading to a failure, even with great character skill (the Tyranny of the d20 means rolling a 1 is super common).

It seems like WotC took that advice to heart and tried to reduce the amount of rolling for Stealth. It makes sense to me, but I guess if people don't like that, go for making multiple rolls. Just don't be surprised when the characters eventually fail... unless that is what you're hoping will happen to create conflict and drama.

When I'm a player, I get frustrated at too many dice rolls (eg, roll stealth to approach the farm, roll again to cross the field, roll again to hide from the watchful guard, roll again to enter the window...etc) Like, it felt lilke the DM WANTED me to fail.

I'd have rathered just roll once, let it ride, and only roll again if the situation changed drastically (eg "someone turned on the lights! You're now out in the open, quick, find something to hide behind"). That may be more of a DMing style issue though.

 

[Reynard]

Stealth is the new ranger: something to complain about, disconnected from the actual rules.

I think people tend to make too much of the complexity of Stealth when discussing it, and I imagine in play they just roll Hide versus Seek.

2024 D&D has generally bad organization, with incomplete rules in 3 places between 2 books. But the actual rules are pretty simple and perfectly usable.

All that said,I still would not have used the Invisible condition to define "hidden." It's unnecessary and just invites confusion. And I think it is counterintuitive to say that if any single enemy finds you, thay all magically do.

 

[Hussar]

See, the problem that I think occurs is because they've reused the term "invisible" which old time gamers like myself interpret through the lens of how invisibility was defined in days of yore. Remember, being invisible in 5e doesn't mean they don't know where you are. It just means they cannot see you. It's not like the old "invisibility" spell where you completely vanish from sight. It just means you are not able to be directly seen at this moment.

So, YES, they can target you, presuming that there is some logical, in game reason for them to have a general idea of where you are. They have disadvantage to hit you, true, but, they can still attack you. I'm playing a halfing right now. That means I can hide any time I move through a larger character's space. But, the baddies still know I'm there. They haven't suddenly suffered a stroke and completely erase me from their memory.

Which means they could attack me while I'm hidden. They have a pretty good idea where I am. So, disadvantage on the attack and I can't be targeted by spells that require sight. Seems pretty reasonable to me.

@Bae'zel seems to have the right of it.

 

[Parmandur]

My feeling is that the default mode should be the same as any other skill check, the DM considers what is being attempted and comes up with a DC.

I mean...isn't that basically what this boils down to in practice?

 

[Oofta]

I don't think there ever has been or ever will be perfect stealth rules. There are just far too many variables, too many situations that the rules just can't cover it all. Is that guard bored an on hour 7 of an 8 hour shift when absolutely nothing ever happens, or have they been hearing screams in the distance as their fellow guards are fighting invaders? Is someone trying to move quietly from cover to cover in a location where even a pin dropping would echo through the marble halls or in a busy and chaotic market where people are yelling over each other each other hawking their wares? Trying to hide behind the lone tree on an empty plain or in a forest in the midst of battle?

All of these situations simply come down to DM judgement calls and what kind of game the group wants. I'm okay with most of the new rules, although I will house rule that a stealth check is still based on passive perceptions of the opponents; it should be easier to sneak past a sleeping ogre than a wide awake ancient red dragon. After all it really just comes down to "As a DM do the best you can to run a fun but challenging game."

 

[FrogReaver]

That half of the EN world player base is right… when you read what’s in the PHB. It’s this weird case of the rule being incredibly specific (very technical) and then using the word “find” and assuming we know what that means.

While also using “find” in the previous paragraph and giving it by implication a specific meaning.

Just wait till you read the invisibility spell

 

[Charlaquin]

Yeah I'm getting déja vu here. Like back in the Fall when every sub-Reddit and forum had endless arguments about the new Stealth rules.

Just when I think I've totally nailed it, a new thread pops up and makes me second guess myself, doubt myself.

Gotta note this down once again.

PHB, Pg. 19:

• The Dungeon Master decides when circumstances are appropriate for hiding. (good so far).
• When you try to hide, you take the Hide action. (again, good so far, I interpret "you" as the character, not me as a person because DUH).

PHB, Pg. 368:

• ...you must succeed on a DC 15 Dexterity (Stealth) check (simple enough, base line difficulty),
• while you're Heavily Obscured or behind Three-Quarters Cover or Total Cover, (yep, makes sense, you have to have shadowy or obstructing conditions to hide, can't just vanish into thin air),
• and you must be out of any enemy's line of sight (got it, you can't just duck behind cover or vanish into thin air while someone is looking straight at you);
• if you can see a creature, you can discern whether it can see you (some dialogue between player and DM, good stuff)
• On a successful check you have the Invisible condition (that means you get advantage on initiative checks, can't be targetted by on sight effects from people you're hiding from, and if somehow someone makes an attack at you they get disadvantage, got it)

-Make note of your check's total, which is the DC for a creature to find you with a Wisdom (Perception) check (got it, anyone actively searching for you uses your Stealth check as the DC, makes sense, opposed checks and all, I assume that this applies to Passive Perception checks too)

• The condition ends on you immediately after any of the following occurs (ie, you're no longer 'Hidden" in this scene)
• you make a sound louder than a whisper (got it), an enemy finds you (got it, one of the bad guys finds you, it isn't a stretch of the imagination that their colleagues know too), you make an attack roll (makes sense), or you cast a spell with a Verbal component (yep, magic is loud, unsubtle and vulgar).

So far I don't see where the confusion lies. If anything, it makes me wonder what sorts of class abilities, spells and magic items allow characters (or monsters) to find exemptions from some of these.

I'll have to go back to the start of the thread to find out what is so confusing to people about this. I don't get it, it seems pretty straightforward to me.

Unless this is a "but DM's discretion!! That could be really bad" which is not a game problem, but a people problem.

Then again, if you don't like the rules, I guess it would be pretty easy to change them. Make it work like a video game or Skyrim, where you can stealth "poof" vanish into thin air if you want.

There are two places where ambiguity creeps in: one is in the wording “an enemy finds you,” as it is not explicit how exactly an enemy does this. Do they need to succeed at a Perception check, or does simply looking in your direction while you are unobscured within their line of sight count as finding you?

The other is in the wording of the Invisible condition, which says its effects don’t apply to an enemy that “can somehow see you.” This often gets pointed to in trying to argue that, yes, an enemy looking directly at you when you lack any cover or obscuration would obviously see you, and therefore the effects of the invisible condition don’t apply. However, the problem with this argument is that it would also apply to the effects of the invisibility spell, since nothing in the text of the spell says enemies need special vision to see you.

Basically, neither the hide action nor the invisibility spell explicitly state under what conditions you can or can’t be seen. They both just grant the invisible condition, which also does not state if you can be seen or not, and its effects are worded in such a way that they don’t work if you can be seen. If we assume you can’t be seen while under the effects of the invisible condition then stealth seems more effective than it should be. But if we assume you can be seen while under the effects of the invisible condition, then the invisibility spell doesn’t actually do anything. In order to make both things work the way we intuitively expect them to, we need to insert an unwritten rule to disambiguate the effects of the Hide action from the effects of the Invisibility spell.

 

[Bae'zel]

Basically, neither the hide action nor the invisibility spell explicitly state under what conditions you can or can’t be seen.

I understand it as thus: you are no longer hidden / invisible if:

• you take an action that makes a sound or make an attack
• if the enemy beats your stealth check with a Perception check (active or passive)
• if the situation changes and logic prevails (eg, you are hiding behind a column, and an enemy moves in a way that grants them full direct line of sight on you, or you are hiding in the shadows and someone casts Daylight or Faerie Fire)

Stealth has always relied on a bit of interpretation, even before the 2024 revision.

If it is still ambiguous to so many people, then yeah, it is a problem with the way it was written. I understand it fully and I think it works fine. But clearly this is a big issue for a lot of people, even if I cannot relate at all.

 

[Charlaquin]

I understand it as thus: you are no longer hidden / invisible if:

• you take an action that makes a sound or make an attack

Agreed, that’s explicitly stated.

• if the enemy beats your stealth check with a Perception check (active or passive)

Agreed, that’s explicitly stated.

• if the situation changes and logic prevails (eg, you are hiding behind a column, and an enemy moves in a way that grants them full direct line of sight on you, or you are hiding in the shadows and someone casts Daylight or Faerie Fire)

To me, this is clearly the intent, but it’s not consistent with the wording, especially your example of an enemy moving in a way that grants them full direct line of sight to you. Nothing in the rules for the Hide action says that you lose the invisible condition if an enemy has line of sight to you, and I assume the invisible condition doesn’t normally end under those circumstances since the invisibility spell would be useless if it did.

 

[Sorinth]

I mean...isn't that basically what this boils down to in practice?

Not at all, it's almost always opposed by perception, either with an opposed roll or using the passive score. So the DC of stealth is 100% dependent upon the creature you are trying to hide from and 0% on the "task" at hand. And although a creature's perceptiveness certainly should have an impact, stealth tasks aren't created equally and so a large part of the DC should come from how easy/hard the actual task at hand is, trying to move silently across a room is simply harder to do in an old house with creaky floorboards, that should be reflected in the DC rather then advantage/disadvantage.