Out-of-Character Chat

[Ziminar]

I’m sort of on vacation the coming week but I’ll try to post a bit

[Green Ice Cream]

Hello all. 🙂 My apologies for asking a simple question, but I'm still learning.

I'm not 100% sure how to calculate the final value of rolling for the 'hide' action. Can anyone assist?

Thanks.

[Kamishiro_Rin]

1 hour ago, Green Ice Cream said:

Hello all. 🙂 My apologies for asking a simple question, but I'm still learning.

I'm not 100% sure how to calculate the final value of rolling for the 'hide' action. Can anyone assist?

Thanks.

Hide

(PHB pg. 192)

   When you take the Hide action, you make a Dexterity (Stealth) check in an attempt to hide, following the rules in chapter 7 for hiding. If you succeed, you gain certain benefits, as described in the “Unseen Attackers and Targets” section in the Player’s Handbook.
Source: PHB, page 192. Available in the SRD and the Basic Rules.

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Chapter 7 for Hiding

(PHB pg. 177)

Hiding

   The DM decides when circumstances are appropriate for hiding. When you try to hide, make a Dexterity (Stealth) check. Until you are discovered or you stop hiding, that check’s total is contested by the Wisdom (Perception) check of any creature that actively searches for signs of your presence.

   You can’t hide from a creature that can see you clearly, and you give away your position if you make noise, such as shouting a warning or knocking over a vase. An invisible creature can always try to hide. Signs of its passage might still be noticed, and it does have to stay quiet.

   In combat, most creatures stay alert for signs of danger all around, so if you come out of hiding and approach a creature, it usually sees you. However, under certain circumstances, the DM might allow you to stay hidden as you approach a creature that is distracted, allowing you to gain advantage on an attack roll before you are seen.

   Passive Perception. When you hide, there’s a chance someone will notice you even if they aren’t searching. To determine whether such a creature notices you, the DM compares your Dexterity (Stealth) check with that creature’s passive Wisdom (Perception) score, which equals 10 + the creature’s Wisdom modifier, as well as any other bonuses or penalties. If the creature has advantage, add 5. For disadvantage, subtract 5.

   For example, if a 1st-level character (with a proficiency bonus of +2) has a Wisdom of 15 (a +2 modifier) and a proficiency in Perception, he or she has a passive Wisdom (Perception) of 14.

What Can you See?

   One of the main factors in determining whether you can find a hidden creature or object is how well you can see in an area, which might be lightly or heavily obscured, as explained in chapter 8.

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Unseen Attackers and Targets

(PHB pg. 194)

   Combatants often try to escape their foes’ notice by hiding, casting the invisibility spell, or lurking in darkness.

   When you attack a target that you can’t see, you have disadvantage on the attack roll. This is true whether you’re guessing the target’s location or you’re targeting a creature you can hear but not see. If the target isn’t in the location you targeted, you automatically miss, but the DM typically just says that the attack missed, not whether you guessed the target’s location correctly.

   When a creature can’t see you, you have advantage on attack rolls against it.

   If you are hidden—both unseen and unheard—when you make an attack, you give away your location when the attack hits or misses.

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Chapter 8

Vision and Light

(PHB pg. 183)

   The most fundamental tasks of adventuring—noticing danger, finding hidden objects, hitting an enemy in combat, and targeting a spell, to name just a few—rely heavily on a character’s ability to see. Darkness and other effects that obscure vision can prove a significant hindrance.

   A given area might be lightly or heavily obscured. In a lightly obscured area, such as dim light, patchy fog, or moderate foliage, creatures have disadvantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight.

   A heavily obscured area—such as darkness, opaque fog, or dense foliage—blocks vision entirely. A creature effectively suffers from the blinded condition when trying to see something in that area.

   The presence or absence of light in an environment creates three categories of illumination: bright light, dim light, and darkness.

   Bright light lets most creatures see normally. Even gloomy days provide bright light, as do torches, lanterns, fires, and other sources of illumination within a specific radius.

   Dim light, also called shadows, creates a lightly obscured area. An area of dim light is usually a boundary between a source of bright light, such as a torch, and surrounding darkness. The soft light of twilight and dawn also counts as dim light. A particularly brilliant full moon might bathe the land in dim light.

   Darkness creates a heavily obscured area. Characters face darkness outdoors at night (even most moonlit nights), within the confines of an unlit dungeon or a subterranean vault, or in an area of magical darkness.

Blindsight

(PHB pg. 183)

   A creature with blindsight can perceive its surroundings without relying on sight, within a specific radius. Creatures without eyes, such as oozes, and creatures with echolocation or heightened senses, such as bats and true dragons, have this sense.

Darkvision

(PHB pg. 183)

   Many creatures in fantasy gaming worlds, especially those that dwell underground, have darkvision. Within a specified range, a creature with darkvision can see in dim light as if it were bright light and in darkness as if it were dim light, so areas of darkness are only lightly obscured as far as that creature is concerned. However, the creature can’t discern color in that darkness, only shades of gray.

Truesight

(PHB pg. 185)

   A creature with truesight can, out to a specific range, see in normal and magical darkness, see invisible creatures and objects, automatically detect visual illusions and succeed on saving throws against them, and perceives the original form of a shapechanger or a creature that is transformed by magic. Furthermore, the creature can see into the Ethereal Plane.

Edited April 27 by Kamishiro_Rin (see edit history)

[ArtamenaV]

@Kamishiro_Rin Don't we go in later being lower on the initiative roll? I'm so confused...?

[Ziminar]

Normally everybody would roll initiative and each will get his or her turn in order of the rolls. To avoid that everybody is waiting on a specific person to post I opted to use group Initiative. The group which rolls the highest average Initiative goes first as a group. The player rolled an average of 12.4 and the monsters rolled an 8, so the players go first as a group. You don’t have to wait on the others in your group, you can post whenever it suits you.

[Cointhief]

I made a mistake with my status bar, my initiative modifier should have been +4. I copy/pasted from another character and forgot to change it.

[Drifter Dwarf]

@Ziminar Looking at the char sheet, Kesh normal attack mod is +4. So looks like he didn't include the Bless d4 just his normal attack mod.

[Kamishiro_Rin]

19 minutes ago, Drifter Dwarf said:

@Ziminar Looking at the char sheet, Kesh normal attack mod is +4. So looks like he didn't include the Bless d4 just his normal attack mod.

DMs can edit die-rolls into players' posts, so Ziminar can do that him or herself for future reference.

[ArtamenaV]

@Ziminar I think I did my attack right? not sure as it is officially my first ever attack (YAY :D)

How do we know when the wolves are dead?

[Kamishiro_Rin]

2 hours ago, ArtamenaV said:

@Ziminar I think I did my attack right? not sure as it is officially my first ever attack (YAY :D)

How do we know when the wolves are dead?

I hate to be the bearer of "bad" news, but the bless die (d4) goes on the attack. In this case, it's purely academic, as you hit with that 22 regardless.

Instead of 12 radiant damage, you only did 9.

For the sake of clarity in your rolls, you might want to label them a wee bit more thoroughly, and you don't need to write the dice expression:

"Guiding Bolt Ranged Spell Attack vs Wolf 4 + Bless" and you can combine the damage rolls into that if you like, or roll separately to see if you hit in the first place (like you did), and then when you roll damage:

"Guiding Bolt Radiant Damage".

My personal style is to do all three rolls at once (the third roll is if you crit, so you roll extra damage dice), as you can see in my example below.

Guiding Bolt Ranged Spell Attack vs Wolf 4 + Bless; Radiant Damage; Crit -> 17; 8; 14.

Here, I probably hit with the 17, so I deal 8 radiant damage. If I had crit, then I'd add the 14 to the 8.

Edited May 3 by Kamishiro_Rin (see edit history)

[Drifter Dwarf]

That is definitely very compact. When I did my rolls, I did the attack role first. Then I saw I had a crit, so when I edited it to add the damage role I knew to add just the crit damage instead of the normal. I suppose there could be a problem if the creature can't be crit, but then I guess you just ignore the extra dice.

[ArtamenaV]

3 hours ago, Kamishiro_Rin said:

I hate to be the bearer of "bad" news, but the bless die (d4) goes on the attack. In this case, it's purely academic, as you hit with that 22 regardless.

Instead of 12 radiant damage, you only did 9.

For the sake of clarity in your rolls, you might want to label them a wee bit more thoroughly, and you don't need to write the dice expression:

"Guiding Bolt Ranged Spell Attack vs Wolf 4 + Bless" and you can combine the damage rolls into that if you like, or roll separately to see if you hit in the first place (like you did), and then when you roll damage:

"Guiding Bolt Radiant Damage".

My personal style is to do all three rolls at once (the third roll is if you crit, so you roll extra damage dice), as you can see in my example below.

Guiding Bolt Ranged Spell Attack vs Wolf 4 + Bless; Radiant Damage; Crit -> 17; 8; 14.

Here, I probably hit with the 17, so I deal 8 radiant damage. If I had crit, then I'd add the 14 to the 8.

What is the attack for Guiding Bolt if not the 4d6 radiant damage? Is there another attack roll I need to add in order to add the d4?

Edited May 3 by ArtamenaV (see edit history)

[Cointhief]

Yes, some spells require a Spell Attack roll similar to a longbow. It's a d20 plus your Spell Attack Modifier, which is the sum of your current Proficiency Bonus and Wisdom Modifier. For example, a level 1 cleric with 14 wisdom would have a Spell Attack Modifier of +4. At level 5, if her wisdom stayed the same, this would increase to +5.

You just have to read the text of the spell closely to know. Or, if you have something like DnDBeyond, it shows it more clearly for you in your spell list.

[Kamishiro_Rin]

7 hours ago, ArtamenaV said:

What is the attack for Guiding Bolt if not the 4d6 radiant damage? Is there another attack roll I need to add in order to add the d4?

Cointhief beat me to it, but yes, Guiding Bolt requires you to roll a Ranged Spell Attack (which you did in your post, so no problem there, I believe!). When I said that Bless (d4) goes on the attack, not the damage, I meant that you add the d4 from Bless to your attack roll: 1d20+4+1d4, not your damage, which remains a straight 4d6 and does not get an extra 1d4.

On your post, you rolled an 18+4=22

Your damage was 1+1+6+1=9

the 1d4 from bless rolled a 3, so your attack roll is actually 18+4+3=25 to hit. That's why I said adding the bless was academic. There are only 8 creatures in the game (ignoring 3rd-party material) that a 22 wouldn't hit. The 3 from bless doesn't turn your die-roll into a critical success, so you just hit more gooder.

Edited Saturday at 02:35 AM by Kamishiro_Rin (see edit history)

[Green Ice Cream]

@Ziminar

So, here's what I posted:

Movement: running to the surrounding trees near the disturbance (Speed- 30 feet)

Action: hiding among trees

Bonus Action: equip shortbow

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My apologies, but I have a few questions...

1. How many feet is each of those little squares on the map? I'm not sure if 30 feet gets me to the trees.

2. My intention was to 'hide' (as an action). I cannot find a definitive answer to what bonuses I add to the roll. Is it 1d20 + 6 (stealth)?

3. Do I even get a bonus action? Not certain.

4. Ideally, I would 'dash' to the trees if I needed extra movement to reach them. Then I would 'hide'. Is that a possibility?

5. Lastly, is equipping my shortbow required, or can I just attack?

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Again, sorry for this. I've been reading guide after guide, but I'm still uncertain. I'd appreciate any help, and I'll do my best to catch on quickly.

Thanks. 🙂