D&D 5E Toll the Chest

[Hriston]

There's no stealth happening, though. If anything, it would be a deception check and Mimics suck at those.

If there was no stealth happening, then the mimic would not have remained motionless and would have ceased to be indistinguishable from an ordinary chest.

 

[Hussar]

Yeah, I gotta admit, I'd get kinda shirty as a player if I cast Toll the Dead on the chest to see if it was a mimic, it turns out to actually be a mimic, but, it gets a surprise round of actions. I mean, come on, that's a pretty dick move by the DM. Now, if I tolled the chest and the floor in front of the door was the mimic? Fair game. But, when the thing I think is a trap turns out to be the exact trap that I suspect it is, I'm generally not going to be surprised by that fact.

Now, if the chest was a polymorphed dragon that had been polymorphed into a really weak chest and the Toll the Dead shattered the chest, thus released the dragon? Yeah, I might buy that as a surprise round.

But, no, when something you are testing is actually the exact thing you are testing for, I'm going to get a bit annoyed if the DM declares that I'm surprised by being 100% right.

 

[Maxperson]

That's not how surprise works. You can go around ready for things to attack you all day. As a DM, I assume the PCs are always suspicious of their surroundings. You'll still get surprised, though, if you haven't noticed a threat when combat starts.

You keep conflating walking around being "ready" for vague things, with looking at a very specific thing with suspicion of danger as if they are the same. They aren't. Your False Equivalence doesn't become true with repetition.

If, on the other hand, I'm hidden behind a wall, and you notice the wall and perceive it as a threat because you think it might fall on you, you still haven't noticed me!

Nobody is arguing that the Cleric was using x-ray vision. The potential threat was right in front of him and he was ready for it.

It's hidden by its False Appearance just as in the example above I'm hidden by the wall.

No. No it isn't hidden by anything. You're grasping there. RAW literally forbids something from hiding if you can see it, and there is no specific beats general involved, because nothing in the ability specifically mentions hiding or the ability to hide in plain sight.

 

[Maxperson]

It's trying to remain motionless to maintain its False Appearance.

That's not hiding. It's moving(or not moving in this case) silently. Hiding requires the hider to be out of sight, which the Mimic isn't. This would be a deception check, per RAW.

"Typical situations include trying to fast-talk a guard, con a merchant, earn money through gambling, pass yourself off in a disguise..."

 

[Paul Farquhar]

This is D&D. A troll is clearly a threat.

These days, the troll is probably lawful good and in need of rescuing. But even in ye olden days there was always the potential that the troll was a scantily clad princess covered by an illusion.

A troll is certainly a potential threat, as is a chest, and anything else the PCs might see. And it's up to them if they want to attack it, talk to it, ignore it or otherwise interact with it.

However, that does not apply to something that is stealthy. The players can't see it unless they make a perception check, so they can't choose to interact with it. This would be counterproductive for a mimic, which is like an anger fish and depends on its prey seeing the lure.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

That's... not the same thing.

Yet...

A troll is a threat, and it doesn't have False Appearance. Have they noticed it? Then they've noticed a threat.

Here it seems to be. You don't know that a troll is a threat. Nothing in the setting or the rules prevents a non-hostile troll. And of course this applies to any creature. It could be an orc, it could be a human. You don't know they're a threat jus by seeing them. But you might suspect it.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

All @Hriston's argument here is managing is to highlight that 5E's vague and poorly-worded surprise rules can be misinterpreted even more severely than previous editions, always to the detriment of the players.

Obviously in any common sense situation, if the players are suspicious as hell of an object and all staring at it and expecting it to do something, they shouldn't be surprised by it, and any DM that rules-lawyers them into being surprised is a DM who needs to take a long, hard look at themselves in the mirror, frankly.

As to the rest of it, not only do the rules support targeting it as per Xanathar's, it's just time-wasting shenanigans on the part of the DM to disallow it, because what's going to happen, the players are going to ignore the object because the spell wouldn't fire? No. They're going to dig around until they get something else to attack it with.

 

[Hriston]

You keep conflating walking around being "ready" for vague things, with looking at a very specific thing with suspicion of danger as if they are the same. They aren't. Your False Equivalence doesn't become true with repetition.

No, I was referring to specific things. I can decide my character suspects a hidden monster lurks around a specific corner, and then when it turns out there's no monster around that corner, I can decide my character suspects a hidden monster lurks around the next specific corner, and so on until when a monster is revealed to be in a specific place, my character won't be surprised, because I suspected it!

Nobody is arguing that the Cleric was using x-ray vision. The potential threat was right in front of him and he was ready for it.

No. No it isn't hidden by anything. You're grasping there. RAW literally forbids something from hiding if you can see it, and there is no specific beats general involved, because nothing in the ability specifically mentions hiding or the ability to hide in plain sight.

You can't see its true form. Its true mimic form is hidden by its false appearance. If nothing was hidden, the DM would have described a mimic in the middle of the room instead of the chest that was described.

 

[Maxperson]

No, I was referring to specific things. I can decide my character suspects a hidden monster lurks around a specific corner

Then your character will A) be able to see it, and B) be able to name specifically what it looks like and what monster it is. If he can't, it remains a False Equivalence.

and then when it turns out there's no monster around that corner, I can decide my character suspects a hidden monster lurks around the next specific corner, and so on until when a monster is revealed to be in a specific place, my character won't be surprised, because I suspected it!

No..............................that's not what we are describing with the Mimic. Apples and Oranges.

You can't see its true form. Its true mimic form is hidden by its false appearance. If nothing was hidden, the DM would have described a mimic in the middle of the room instead of the chest that was described.

You seem confused by the differences between Deception and Hiding.

 

[Hriston]

That's not hiding. It's moving(or not moving in this case) silently. Hiding requires the hider to be out of sight, which the Mimic isn't. This would be a deception check, per RAW.

"Typical situations include trying to fast-talk a guard, con a merchant, earn money through gambling, pass yourself off in a disguise..."

It’s Stealth.
“Make a Dexterity (Stealth) check when you attempt to conceal yourself from enemies...”