i don't know if light management is really all that crucial for dungeons? it's something that was a part of original dungeon crawls but the game's changed alot in that time, just because dungeons and light management was correlated doesn't mean they're essential together, before i got into DnD my biggest source of comparible locales was legend of zelda and final fantasy, where the entire thing is well lit (unless light and darkness explicitly tied into the puzzles of said dungeon) but still manages to be an interesting brain teaser.
Mostly, I think light management acts as a proxy for time management. If you have to rely on torches to see, and they only last so long, and you can only carry so many of them, then there is always a source of time pressure, even when there aren’t wandering monsters to worry about. And I do think time management is a very important element of dungeon crawling. Time pressure gives weight to every action, and creates meaningful tradeoffs between expediency and caution; things that aren’t as relevant in the context of a game like Zelda where you’re much more constrained in how you can interact with the world and deal with challenges. Link doesn’t have the option to pick a lock or break down a door in a dungeon, so the player doesn’t have to weigh the costs and benefits of taking the time to find a key, or making noise battering the door, or breaking one of a limited number of picks. Zelda also has the benefit of being played in real time. Players usually don’t go around checking every wall for hidden bombable spots because doing so takes time and would get boring, but in D&D everything happens at the speed of narration. Unless time is a limited resource, there’s no reason not to scour every inch of every dungeon for secrets and traps. Light management is an easy way to create a reason not to do that.
Light sources in 5e are dramatically better, Compare the lanterns
Source Radius Burning time
Beacon lantern 240 ft.* 30 hrs./pint
Bonfire 50 ft. 1⁄2 hr./armload
Bullseye lantern 60 ft.* 2 hrs./pint
Campfire 35 ft. 1 hr./armload
Candle 5 ft. 10 min./inch
Continual light 60 ft. Indefinite
Hooded lantern 30 ft. 2 hrs./pint
Light spell 20 ft. Variable
Torch 15 ft. 30 min.
Weapon** 5 ft. As desired
* Light from these is not cast in a radius, but rather in
a cone-shaped beam. At its far end, the cone of
light from a beacon lantern is 90 feet wide. A bulls-
eye lantern has a beam 20 feet wide at its far end.
** Magical weapons shed light if your DM allows this
optional rule.
Lantern — —
Beacon 150 gp 50 lbs.
Bullseye 12 gp 3 lbs.
Hooded 7 gp 2 lbs.
Lanterns:
A hooded lantern (30-foot radius of light) is a
standard lantern with shuttered or hinged sides. It is not
directional, as its light is cast equally in all directions. A bulls-
eye lantern (60-foot beam of light) has only a single shutter,
the other sides being highly polished to reflect the light in a
single direction. Both hooded and bullseye lanterns can be
carried in one hand. A single flask of oil (one pint) burns for
six hours in either.
The beacon lantern (240-foot beam of light) is a much
larger affair and must be mounted on the prow of a ship, the
bed of a wagon, or other large structure. It operates like the
bullseye lantern but illuminates to a greater distance. The bea-
con goes through oil quickly, burning a flask every two hours.
Torch. A torch burns for 1 hour, providing bright light
in a 20-foot radius and dim light for an additional 20
feet. If you make a m elee attack with a burning torch
and hit, it deals 1 fire damage. Lamp. A lamp casts bright light in a 15-foot radius and dim light for an additional 30 feet. Once lit, it burns
for 6 hours on a flask (1 pint) of oil. Lantern, Bullseye. A bullseye lantern casts bright
light in a 60-foot cone and dim light for an additional 60
feet. Once lit, it burns for 6 hours on a flask (1 pint) of oil. Lantern, Hooded. A hooded lantern casts bright light
in a 30-foot radius and dim light for an additional 30
feet. Once lit, it burns for 6 hours on a flask (1 pint) of
oil. As an action, you can lower the hood, reducing the
light to dim light in a 5-foot radius.
When nearly every PC is certain to have darkvision that extra dim light perfect vision makes an enormous difference. I can (and do) limit vision through FoW range in a VTT while I'm running the game but darkvision is such an extreme range in the scale of normal d&d play that pretty much 100% of the time when darkness might matter darkvision ensures it never will. Even if it does matter I have 5 players sharing one screen & they can all see what is on it, things start looking rather adversarial if I start hiding tokens & getting cutesy with "you can't see it".
I like the idea of low light vision, but I don’t like 3e’s execution very much. Doubling the effective range of light sources is both not how night vision really works, and cumbersome to deal with in play (except on VTTs). I think what I would do for night vision would be to upgrade dim light to bright light and leave it at that.
I agree but plot armor levels of risk insulation combined with near universal darkvision and overly good light sources is a bad combo. Earlier someone mentioned how players would need to hug the torchbearer to see with that light but the light+darkvision is so good that they don't need to bother with even considering things like that.
There are other ways to obscure sight. Creatures with Darkvision would almost certainly employ concealing terrain, sight line baffles, and so on, if simply so they can get things dark enough to sleep.
There are other ways to obscure sight. Creatures with Darkvision would almost certainly employ concealing terrain, sight line baffles, and so on, if simply so they can get things dark enough to sleep.
I like the idea of low light vision, but I don’t like 3e’s execution very much. Doubling the effective range of light sources is both not how night vision really works, and cumbersome to deal with in play (except on VTTs). I think what I would do for night vision would be to upgrade dim light to bright light and leave it at that.
I don't disagree but in the context of 3.x specifically there was a lot more cruinch that's just gone now & some of that gave players very good reasons to keep their hands occupied with stuff (shield dual wield 2h weapons ranged weapons etc). The only characters who could carry a torch easily (ie most squishy casters & iirc maybe some rogues) tended to be the ones with a laundry list of reasons why they didn't want to be a glowing beacon begging to get shot at.
There are other ways to obscure sight. Creatures with Darkvision would almost certainly employ concealing terrain, sight line baffles, and so on, if simply so they can get things dark enough to sleep.
The trouble there is you push the players into reacting as if they are playing in tomb of horrors. Darkness works because it doesn't take anything special to setup, it's just an absence of anything creating light so there is no reason to assume it's a trap.
Yes, but all this meant was that you still had a few levels where you could make people crawl around in the dark blindly. And you could control if a Wizard could get the spell. And even if there's a 5th level Cleric in the game, well, at the same level the spell appears, dispel magic and continual darkness exist to counter it, so if the DM wants, he can have you go up against Drow elves or something to return the game to the status quo if it bothers them.
