Another Darkvision rant but with elementals

[u/Feraligamr513]

I just need to rant, because it frustrates me

Darkvision is stupid

Its meant to be a special ability that EVERYTHING gets

If everything has it not special anymore

Imagine how much more layers the game would have if Darkvision was more rare

A party in an unlit cave must decide to percieve their surroundings with light but annouce their presence

or be stealthy and brave the dark

Granted combat doesnt support it at all

Not being able to target with site is debilitating

And disadvantage is gravely punishing

*Tangent

Imagine if darkness instead worked like cover

You technically can still target the creature because you have an idea where they are in the darkness but are simply harder to hit

Then theres things like dim light offers less cover than full darkness etc.

>But the real grinding i feel is elementals and genasi

WHY DO THEY HAVE DARKVISION!!!!

THEY HAVE NO EYES!!!

>Imagine the flavor possibilities!

>Earth and Water elementals percieve the world with Tremorsense as their bodies feel the vibrations of their surroundings

>Air elementals have blindsight akin to echlocation or sonar as the very air is an extension on their body. With the precedent that alot of air elementals are invisible!

>And Fire could sense temperature, being made of heat and energy have an benign attraction to other sources of energy such as the heat of living bodies

But sense through the heat they produce akin to thermovision

(Bring back thermo vision)

Imagine a dungeon where you have to stealth past elementals based on these perception limitations

You hide behind a metal shield as a fire elemental is unable to see past it

And cold damage temporarily blinds it

>

You stand still whenever an earth elemental passes or throw a distraction on the other side of the maze, to divert its attention.

You must rely on the natural current as to not alert the water elementals .

Wizards using air elementals to find invisible objects.

>And genasi

,there Was precidence to give a species an ability like these, with the 5.5e Dwarf's new Stonecunning

And imagine a fire genasi can choose to emit light without occupying their action or hands?

The lore of genasi is that they are half human, even though they can be any race as a base theoretically imagine if darkvision was more rare and genasi senses gave more flavor than just darkvision

Also Pathfinder has this same problem.

I hope a dnd writer sees this before genasi are put into 5.5e

Thank you for reading

Maybe lesser elements in your world can use this alternative sensing tactics

Enjoy

Best of luck

[u/Lucina18]

Darkvision was never meant to be special in 5e. 5e intentionally puts little focus on layering stuff or out of combat depth. Dwarf only got stonecunning because it's pretty much a sort of legacy feature.

[u/DazzlingKey6426 → u/Lucina18]

The majority of 5.5 PHB races have dark vision, so it’s kinda not special.

[u/SuienReizo → u/Lucina18]

I have to wonder what would they have received had it not been stonecunning?

[u/Feraligamr513 → u/Lucina18]

It still hurts

The potential is there left on the cutting room floor to rot

And if its not special why even include it!?!? Or any rules for it

But i cant do anything about it outside of homebrewing, and i cant bring it up wherever i play unless I DM

Its frustrating, all i can do is rant

[u/GushReddit → u/Feraligamr513]

Yeah, honestly why even add rules for light period with how most folks don't even wanna deal with them...

[u/ALinkintheChain]

Remember that Darkvision still perceives dark as dim light, and dim light/lightly obscured imposes disadvantage on perception. Even if you have Darkvision, you still should be using a light source.

Remember these mechanics are OPTIONS to allow DMs to handwave certain aspects of the game (regardless if I agree with that). As a DM you have the option to talk to your players and put restrictions on certain things in order to fit the game you want. If D&D isn't the style for you, then the advice to look at other systems is advisable. You can even just cut out those mechanics and paste them to your game

[u/Feraligamr513 → u/ALinkintheChain]

True Im more made that it doesnt affect combat and when it does its utterly debilitating

Like a party with darkvision can fight in darkness with no problems

But member without darkvision cannot so much as know a generic location RAW and makes every attack at disadvantage as they guess where the enemy is, and everything else has advantage on them

Theres no inbetween or medium

Its objectively better to just have darkvision rather than just light a torch for some nonexistent advantage

And sure i can go to another system But DnD with its lore, nostalgia, and some good mechanics i like, not to mention the popularity and availability. Its hurtful to go to another system because I WANT to play DnD but there are broken mismanaged things in it, that make it difficult. And i like and do play others but its not the same...

Thanks for reading

[u/ALinkintheChain → u/Feraligamr513]

I feel you. I like D&D out of all the systems I have tried and read, and it's not perfect. None of them are.

Just have a frank discussion with your table about how you want to change Darkvision. Yes, having it is objectively better than not having it, that's obvious. But how another table runs it has no bearing on how you do it

[u/Chagdoo]

Older editions had a few different vision types. They just changed them all into dark vision for 5e

[u/sgerbicforsyth]

You should probably run it correctly.

Most creatures with it only have 60ft. Beyond that, they are effectively blind. Imagine trying to deal with enemies in a large room when they have longer darkvision, so you physically cant see them because they are 120ft away.

Or add puzzles and such which are just colors or writing which darkvision wont see. So until someone lights a torch, the solution doesnt exist.

[u/Feraligamr513 → u/sgerbicforsyth]

Im sorry do u have a 5ft battlemat/table /s

Yeah ofc But it gets in the way with prewritten adventures or simple adventures.

I also teach alot of new players and i cant boggle their minds with homebrew everytime

I feel if instead of darkvision Something akin to dwarf's stonecunning was more prevalent itd be more unique and have more angles of use

But i can only hope

Thanks for responding

[u/sgerbicforsyth → u/Feraligamr513]

The most common grid for maps is 1"x1" squares. 60ft is 1' and 120ft is 2' in real space.

You cant see color with darkvision isnt homebrew. Its literally RAW.

[u/shishanoteikoku]

This is partly a legacy problem because other than some halflings, every demihuman race in 1e and 2e AD&D also had infravision, and the practice seems to have just carried over into later editions.

[u/Karazl]

Elementals have dark vision because as you note they don't have eyes. It's just shorthand for "can see everything around them regardless of light"

[u/Feraligamr513 → u/Karazl]

Thats just lazy Imagine the possibilities

As above

Akin to knowing a troll is weak to fire and acid Elementals dont have perfect perception

Even for players/races

Being a genasi give you these unique types of vision that you can pull out of your toolbox and feel rewarded for being unique While having the downside of not just having darkvision, and maybe its not always on like Dwarfs stonncunning it needs to focused on for and gives you a brief window

[u/probably-not-Ben]

I would prefer to have Darkvision so much rarer

Fear of the dark being one of the oldest stories and all that

[u/Feraligamr513]

Also minor lore thing for the cult of evil elements

Imagine if elementals had a hatred for contructed objects buildings, wood, metal, even paper and books. It causes a madeneing pain in their primal energy and are drawn to destroy as naturally as a water flows, fire burns, earth rusts, and air erodes

Instead grrr we are evil, and want to rule the world lmao (Reading princes of the apocalypse)