As a DM how would you handle this?

[sasigns]

So in last weeks adventure the party found them selves in a basement where the only light Source was a lantern. The lantern was knocked out and the room was plunged into complete darkness. Here is my question in the image below you have 3 people once monster deep dwarf and two player characters. Zerus the water Genasi warlock moves up next to Eko the dragon born fighter. He casts burning hands.at the dwarf. My issue is that Zerus does not have dark vision and both the dragon born and the dwarf had moved to their locations in the darkness. How would he know other than player knowledge where to aim to only get the dwarf... I kinda failed and didnt catch this until after it was done. We are going to be moving to Out of the Abyss after this adventure and seeing that this is an under dark adventure I am sure it will come up again in some fashion or another.

14368

[rhammer2]

I do not allow an AOE spell to exclude anyone in melee with a primary target, unless the caster has a special ability to exclude individuals from the AOE. So with or without light, the dragon born would have been in the attack.

For those friendlier, the caster could have moved next to the fighter and should have gotten enough of a sense of the combat to have allowed the fighter to have had advantage on the save and no damage if he made it.

- Robert

[Callum]

I would set the monster token to invisible before I moved it. Then the PC can take a guess at where it is, if they like, and possibly try to listen for its movement.

[Zacchaeus]

In complete darkness a character without any Darkvision suffers the blinded condition. So any attacks are at disadvantage. Doesn't help much since there's no attack roll for Burning Hands.
To cast a spell the character must have a clear path to the target. You could argue that in compete darkness a non Darkvision character doesn't have such a path and so couldn't cast it at that target at all.
Of course despite not being able to see the character could still possibly hear the movement of the enemy and have a rough idea of where it is.
My own view would be that the character couldn't target the enemy with any proper sense of exactly where it is; but could cast the spell in the general direction. So in this kind of situation I'd get the dice out. Despite there not being a targeting requirement for Burning Hands I'd say that the caster would have to roll a dice of some kind to see if he hit the correct target. So let's say you decide that there's a 50% chance roll a d20 and on a 1-10 he misses and hits his ally and on at 11-20 he gets it right.
The other thing you could do is make the NPCs invisible to the players (click the eye icon on the CT) before moving them. That will simulate the darkness. The players will still be aware of where they are and where their allies are (They could be talking or shouting to one another) but they wouldn't be able to tell where the enemies were.
Another thing you could do is put the invisible effect on the enemy. Again attack rolls have disadvantage and although it doesn't says so you could give them an advantage on their saving throw against the Burning Hands spell.

Rhammer2 - The PC can easily direct burning hands away from his ally by properly directing the cone (at least if I'm reading the graphic right). I agree that you can't exclude an ally from an AoE attack that would definitely hit them unless you have the ability to do so. However a properly directed spell can avoid allies without that ability.

[sasigns]

I would set the monster token to invisible before I moved it. Then the PC can take a guess at where it is, if they like, and possibly try to listen for its movement.

The only issue is that some can see others can not. is there a way to make tokens visible to some but not others?

[JohnD]

So I would hide any enemy tokens immediately upon the light going out.

The spellcaster knows where the dwarf was when the light went out, but he moved... that won't be in a straight line over unfamiliar ground - even 5' worth he likely deviated a foot or two either to the right or the left.

So he casts his spell but he isn't quite sure exactly where he is. Nor does he know where the dwarf is/was/whatever. Nor strictly speaking does he know exactly where his fighter companion is; he has a general idea, but it's all likely off by as much as 5' in any direction even if he's the only one that moved.

I would ask him to draw his cone and then use the splash damage table to figure out just how much deviation in any direction there is on the targeting - this may result in both being in the AoE, just the dwarf, just the fighter or neither.

[LordEntrails]

Perception check. Probably two, one for each creature, (unless they ally was talking or otherwise telling his friend where he was).

[Zacchaeus]

The only issue is that some can see others can not. is there a way to make tokens visible to some but not others?
Nope.

[Nickademus]

In Pathfinder, there was a way to use the Perception skill to location an invisible creature as a move action. Does 5e have an action like this?

The section on Wisdom (Perception) says:
Your Wisdom (Perception) check lets you spot, hear, or otherwise detect the presence of something. It measures your general awareness of your surroundings and the keenness of your senses.

For example, you might try to hear a conversation through a closed door, eavesdrop under an open window, or hear monsters moving stealthily in the forest. Or you might try to spot things that are obscured or easy to miss, whether they are orc s lying in ambush on a road, thugs hiding in the shadows of an alley, or candlelight under a closed secret door.
I'd allow the warlock to make a Wisdom (Perception) check as a bonus action to try to pinpoint the square both the duergar and the fighter are in. Success (against each of their passive or active Stealths) would locate each and allow the player to justify targeting based on the player-knowledge of the associated token.

[leozelig]

I wouldn't have thought off this at the time probably, but after reading the other posts, I would make the monsters invisible and also lock the PC tokens . The rest of combat would be run theater of the mind, so PCs with darkvision can tell you they want to move with the monster, but the other PCs don't necessarily know where that is.

With a perception check, "blind" PCs could get an idea - "to your left about 10' away, you hear the sounds of a scuffle" or something like that depending on the check. Make it in the tower and a low result might mean they mistake their allies for the monster or misjudge the distance/direction (but the players don't know that).

you could use whispers to tell the PCs with darkvision where things are in more detail if necessary, but I would maintain a general feeling of confusion and disorientation for the others.

So in that case, yes they can cast burning hands, but would have to give a general direction ("towards the sound of scuffling") and not know what's there. It's your call whether you include allies in the AoE, but if it's a risky move, I would create consequences. You should be prepared for allies to shout a warning if they end up being targeted. Maybe darkvision PCs could, maybe, but not blind PCs.

[Zacchaeus]

The other thing of course is that someone could light a torch :)

[Wonderbringer]

I would of immediately hidden the token once it was dark and then whispered to anyone who can see as to what they see. All could still hear though and a dwarf shuffling around in combat is a low enough DC for a passive Wisdom (Perception) that no action would be needed to hear what's going on, so I'd tell everyone something as to that. Even though, unless someone who can see says they are verbally directing the genasi in some way or the genasi says they are doing whatever they can to avoid hitting their companion (possibly fumbling up to him in the dark and putting a hand on him to know his exact location before blasting in whatever direction), I would have some chance that the one, the other, or both get caught in the fiery spray.

Another way you could of handled this is to un-share the map, re-share with those that can see for now, and have those who can't see use their imagination for awhile - something that sometimes get lost when people constantly rely on images, maps, and tokens.

[Full Bleed]

For this particular scenario, in order to reduce the complexity, I'd probably rule that as the caster casts the Burning Hands spell, fire builds around their hands (providing light)... first as candle light, then building up to torch light illumination... giving them enough time to properly target (if the target is within torch light). And then, of course, there probably would be some residual light from flammable items on the target(s) to last for a round or two... certainly enough for most targeting in normal darkness.

[Nylanfs]

Seeing as it's an area effect I would have no problem with adjusting the cone about 2 squares either way. If it was a targeted spell (as opposed to one that is part of a melee attack) you'd have disadvantage.

[giveup]

Along what wonderbringer was saying... How can you unshare a map with a specific player? If so you could go a step further and just hand draw the room/party tracker for the blinded characters and just have them target empty squares. Assuming you think this will happen often. Although I agree that this particular spell could easily grant him sight/targeting given the fact it is fire and his sighted ally could easily be calling out directions.

[damned]

Unshare the map for all and then reshare only for those that have darkvision....

[epithet]

You're missing a big issue here: Did the dwarf hide? Being effectively invisible, the dwarf can take a hide action wherever he wants to. Until he does, though, the PCs should still have a pretty good idea where he is. If he takes the hide action (and I would probably give him advantage on that, which would cancel the disadvantage he'd have from his scale mail armor) you can compare his dex check to the passive perception scores of the PCs.

I would leave the token invisible, even if certain PCs know where the creature is, until and unless all the PCs know where it is. If none of the PCs know where the creature is, consider un-sharing the map. Describe to the players the information available to their characters via other senses, and move their tokens appropriately for them. Let them roll attacks onto the chat pane, then apply them as appropriate by dragging the to-hit and damage rolls onto the combat tracker. Remember that they have disadvantage even if they know where the dwarf is, because they can't see him.

With regard to the burning hands spell, I would have the caster describe where his character was moving and the direction he was casting the spell in. Be fair. Put his token where he says he wants to go, and draw a cone for the spell effect. If the duergar is in the area of effect, he gets to save normally (no advantage.) If he's not, the PCs hear a sneering chuckle echo from the walls, maddeningly useless for pinpointing the duergar's location.

As soon as you have a PC that can see, share the map again. Assume that the characters can and will whisper a reasonably accurate description of their surroundings to characters that are still blind. Until then, enjoy shaking things up by keeping the entire map hidden (not shared.) There's no better way to drive home the characters' inability to see.

[JohnD]

A Tarrasque would resolve all these issues quickly.

[epithet]

But they would eventually come back up again with the new characters, and it's not much fun to Tarrasque two parties in a row.

[damned]

But they would eventually come back up again with the new characters, and it's not much fun to Tarrasque two parties in a row.

Not fun for the players anyway!

[Jerric]

Would it be possible to create multiple instances of the same place and time?

A map for any blinded characters who are aware of only their respective positions. The other map for characters with darkvision, aware of all characters including the blinded ones.

As a GM I would give each blinded character a bonus Perception check per turn to see if they can get a fix on the other PCs and NPCs in the area.

[epithet]

I would rule that any creature that isn't hiding will be giving its position away to any other creature that can hear. If it is hiding, then a creature knows where it is if its passive perception beats the stealth roll. A creature that is effectively blind should have disadvantage to perception, meaning a -5 to passive perception. Certain characters (like the Inquisitive Rogue from the Unearthed Arcana article on gothic characters) can make an active perception check as a bonus action, but I wouldn't be having everyone making a check every round, especially to detect creatures that are not hiding.

Even if a creature knows where its target is, attacks will be at disadvantage if the attacker cannot see the target (excepting blindsense, tremorsense, etc.)

[Nickademus]

If none of the PCs know where the creature is, consider un-sharing the map. Describe to the players the information available to their characters via other senses, and move their tokens appropriately for them.

There's an idea. Unshare the map and then reshare it with those that can see (by dragging the image link to their portrait). Now the blind person can see the tokens and the others can.