Confusion concerning the Longbow's range

[Willywilliamrtx]

So, I've made my first archer-type character as a backup for my current campaign (currently engaged with 2 air elementals without powerful healing avaiable - ended the session with 8hp left) and I'm confused about the Longbow's range.

My chosen race is Wood Elf, so my vision is 60ft of darkvision. How in the hell do I see targets beyond my vision to fire at - let alone the max range of 600ft that a longbow has?

[Contrast]

RAW you just have disadvantage to your attack roll as you count as effectively blinded when you try to attack a target you can't see.

It is within the DMs purview to decide if a target has total cover from you and in a situation where you didn't have a reasonable expectation of being able to guess their location (600 ft away in the dark?) I would expect most DMs to do so.

Of course the longbow is at its best when you have sharpshooter and aren't in the dark. Shoot a target behind three-quarters cover 600ft away with no penalty? Can do!

[DarkKnightJin]

Darkvision /= normal vision.

Just because you see out to 60ft in darkness, doesn't mean you can't see at all beyond that range in normal daylight.

[Azgeroth]

as dark knight jin says, you can see as far as the horizon in daylight..

in darkness, yes you can see upto 60ft in darkness.. but, heres a trick.

cast light on an arrow, fire it down range, you can now see 100ft radius around that arrow..
(20ft bright, 20ft dim, 60ft darkvision. boom.)

[Contrast]

as dark knight jin says, you can see as far as the horizon in daylight..

in darkness, yes you can see upto 60ft in darkness.. but, heres a trick.

cast light on an arrow, fire it down range, you can now see 100ft radius around that arrow..
(20ft bright, 20ft dim, 60ft darkvision. boom.)

RAW darkvision works 'within 60 feet of you' not within 60 feet of a light source but thats just me being picky as I don't like darkvision. :smalltongue: If your DM did let you do it, its not 20ft+20ft+60ft. You could see out 40ft as bright light, then 20ft dim light then darkness.

[Quoxis]

RAW darkvision works 'within 60 feet of you' not within 60 feet of a light source but thats just me being picky as I don't like darkvision. :smalltongue: If your DM did let you do it, its not 20ft+20ft+60ft. You could see out 40ft as bright light, then 20ft dim light then darkness.

Do you have to see the way of the arrow or just its destination?

If a normal human is sitting in the dark, aiming at an orc standing next to a bonfire, the human doesn't have to be within the area of light - why would he?

As long as there's a light source near the target, you can shoot it without disadvantage. Nonmagical darkness is see-through...

[imanidiot]

Do you have to see the way of the arrow or just its destination?

If a normal human is sitting in the dark, aiming at an orc standing next to a bonfire, the human doesn't have to be within the area of light - why would he?

As long as there's a light source near the target, you can shoot it without disadvantage. Nonmagical darkness is see-through...

RAW if you have 60 darkvision and I'm carrying a lit torch 120 feet away from you in an underground cavern, you can't see me or the torch, the darkness between us obscures what is behind it. Now that is ridiculous and will not be ruled that way the vast majority of the time. But that's the rule.

[DarkKnightJin]

RAW if you have 60 darkvision and I'm carrying a lit torch 120 feet away from you in an underground cavern, you can't see me or the torch, the darkness between us obscures what is behind it. Now that is ridiculous and will not be ruled that way the vast majority of the time. But that's the rule.

I'd personally rule that you could see -something- carrying a torch, but it'd be hard to tell if it's friend or foe.
That said, I would probably bump the AC up a bit, even if the archer has Sharpshooter, simply because they have some trouble making out their target.

[ZorroGames]

I'd personally rule that you could see -something- carrying a torch, but it'd be hard to tell if it's friend or foe.
That said, I would probably bump the AC up a bit, even if the archer has Sharpshooter, simply because they have some trouble making out their target.

One of the frothing at the mouth elements that I restrain is when a DM announced (in dungeon, all darkvision, no light sources,) "You see 3 Orcs in leather, one in Chainmail, one in half Plate, and an Ogre 30 feet down the hall examing a door on the right." All that from shades of grey? How about "4 medium sized and 1 large figure 30 feet down the hall on the right side of the hallway" instead?

Without darkvision it would be general sizes and a major loss of detail. Better hope a hostage is not involved in those figures.

[JackPhoenix]

One of the frothing at the mouth elements that I restrain is when a DM announced (in dungeon, all darkvision, no light sources,) "You see 3 Orcs in leather, one in Chainmail, one in half Plate, and an Ogre 30 feet down the hall examing a door on the right." All that from shades of grey? How about "4 medium sized and 1 large figure 30 feet down the hall on the right side of the hallway" instead?

Without darkvision it would be general sizes and a major loss of detail. Better hope a hostage is not involved in those figures.

You don't need color vision to see the orc looks like an orc, the ogre looks like an ogre, there's a door in the wall, and what are they wearing. You just wouldn't notice if the ogre was, for some reason, purple, and the chainmail was hot pink.

[Contrast]

Do you have to see the way of the arrow or just its destination?

If a normal human is sitting in the dark, aiming at an orc standing next to a bonfire, the human doesn't have to be within the area of light - why would he?

As long as there's a light source near the target, you can shoot it without disadvantage. Nonmagical darkness is see-through...

I think you've misunderstood what I was saying. I was pointing out that with 60ft darkvision you don't get to see 20ft of bright light, then 20ft of dim light then another 60ft into the dark. Thats not how darkvision works if you're holding the torch so why should it work differently if you're looking at a distant light source?

If you read darkvision racial abilities it says they get it out to 60ft from themselves specifically - not from themselves or any other light source they can see. I admit if you're considering darkvision to be representative of just good eyesight if makes sense to extend this to distant light sources as well. If you consider it a magical ability (they can see in complete darkness where there is absolutely no light after all) then it might well be a radius thing around them and not function at a distance. Up to your DM to make a ruling - I would be surprised if many DMs had given it much thought though and would typically expect to be able to use it for distant light sources too.

Also for reference, per the written rules, the Darkness spell uses the same rules as non-magical darkness with the exception that it is not illuminated by non-magical light sources of 2nd level or lower and darkvision doesn't work on it. In theory, non-magical darkness is precisely as see through as magical darkness. I imagine most DMs don't rule it that way.

imanidiot is a little right and a little wrong - an area of darkness creates a heavily obscured area and you are 'effectively blind when you try to see something obscured by it'. That said, as far as I can see RAW it is left up to the DM to determine if something is actually obscured by it. So in the case of a light 'obscured' by darkness, they would probably rule you could see it fine - whereas if there was no light source you probably would be obscured by the darkness. This is much the same as a DM ruling that an area of darkness does not obscure the vision of someone with darkvision. The darkness and heavy obscurement is still there - there are just mitigating circumstances in this case. In the case of a light obscured by another form of heavy obscurement, say being inside a sealed box, I imagine they would rule you can't see it (though all that does is give you disadvantage to hit it due to being effectively blinded unless they also grant it total cover which prevents targeting).

In terms of the Darkness spell, I assume most DMs will simply rule that it does create a heavily obscured area, where regular darkness might not (lets say I'm holding a torch outside of but on the other side of a Darkness spell to you) but that's a judgement call.