Is a Feat really better than Darkvision?

[2D8HP]

I often see posts that say things like:

"I do find one problem with feats is that it makes V. Human way too appealing relative to other races.."




Usually, in my experience, the need for light makes humans very handicapped compared to most races, and a Feat at first level doesn't compensate.

What Feats are better than Darkvision?

How so?

[JellyPooga]

Magic Initiate: Wizard (Dancing Lights, Light, Detect Magic)

Now you don't need to be able to see in the dark because you have at-will light (bright or dim, your choice) AND you can find magic stuff.

[clash]

The rules for light and dark are pretty finicky and usually not well understood. In my experience most dms just handwave light rules and say that areas are well enough lit to see or failign that just carrying a light source like a torch or a single caster having the light cantrip will avoid most issues. The game is setup not to require darkvision and the rules for it dont usually come into play anyways.

[ProsecutorGodot]

It's only a problem if no one in your party is willing to make/carry a light source for you. If it's that much of a problem and you can't just make some light, someone in your party is bound to be a spellcaster and they can cast Darkvision on you.

Now that I understand that Darkvision only changes darkness into dim light for those who have it my estimation of it has gone from "very good" to "it's nice to have, but a light cantrip works too"

Feats are enough fun for me that I can deal with having my party members drag me around in the dark, and they don't usually mind because a Vhuman tears it up in a fight.

[the secret fire]

Short answer: many feats are better than darkvision because stealth/lighting/vision is probably the single worst-implemented and worst-understood part of 5e's game mechanics.

Long answer: if played according to the rules, darkvision is quite powerful, and pretty much a necessity for any character who plans on being stealthy. Carrying sources of light draws attention to the party and grants creatures normal attacks against the party due to bright light while the party may be attacking at disadvantage due to dim light, or worse...the monsters may have advantage because they are completely unseen. Getting attacked by, let's say, a bunch of goblins with shortbows who stay outside of the standard 40' torch or Light spell radius is the sort of scenario that gets lethal fast.

Imo, the game hands out darkvision so generously and so many DMs hand-wave a lot of the lighting/vision mechanics because not doing so moves the game quickly in the direction of horror, and that's just not the mood most people want from their D&D.

[Pex]

I think dark vision is over rated. It's a good ability, but it's not a must have else you're The Suck. The value of it is paranoia. Some players don't want to use a light source in dark places like caves and the Underdark because they fear (not stupidly) they will be ambushed since the bad guys know they're coming. It is a consideration to consider seriously, but the question is how often will it be something to worry about. That will be campaign dependent.

There's nothing wrong with a DM creating an adventure in a dark place where the party is mostly non-dark vision people and using a light source can be a vulnerability. If the campaign will mostly to always be in dark places then the DM needs to let the players know. A non-dark vision race character might pick it up by some means such as a class feature.

If a character not having dark vision is becoming a major problem for the campaign, at some level > 1 where class features are significant enough such that racial abilities have become ribbons it would be nice of the DM to have a goggles of night in a treasure hoard or patron reward.

[Armored Walrus]

All my D&D currently is done on Roll20 and on these forums (with the battlemaps on Roll20) and I've subscribed to get dynamic lighting. IMCs darkvision is far more important, IMO, than in the average campaign. Having a system that handles those mechanics for you, even though it has a few drawbacks, does add a lot to the experience. When I drop a human character on to a dark map, the dismay is real.

That being said, if your party is a paladin, war priest, barbarian and wizard, you aren't likely trying to sneak anywhere without magical aid anyway.

In my experience, darkvision is either the most important trait to determine your race for rolling up a rogue, or it literally doesn't matter because light and vision will never be brought up.

A quick note to the poster above me; dim light doesn't impose disadvantage on attacks, only on Wisdom(Perception) checks that rely on sight.

Edit: Wow, ninja'd hard. A note to the poster three posts above me...

[Specter]

Depends on your party.

If nobody has darkvision, then you having it won't change much, since everybody will still be using light and torches.

But if everyone has it, then try not to be the a-hole ruining the party's stealth with your little light.

[MaxWilson]

Most people miss the point of Darkvision, as you can see from this thread. Yes, you can carry a torch instead, but that just paints you with light so that enemies outside the light radius get advantage on their ranged attacks against you. What Darkvision, especially party-wide Darkvision, does is allow you to be stealthy in the dark without taking any penalties. It also enables powerful combinations such as a Skulker rogue (or rogue dip) who can effortlessly hide anywhere in the dark from anything that lacks truesight/blindsight/devil's sight, gaining advantage on his attacks and being very difficult to attack back. If you try that kind of thing when someone in the party is relying on torches, you'll just divert the attacks onto them; ergo, you don't want them relying on torches.

Darkvision is fairly short-ranged usually (60'), so it's not like it completely obviates torches anyway, but the way you want to use torches is as NARC beacons: you want all of your ENEMIES to be illuminated so you attack them at advantage, but you want PCs to be in the dark (beyond enemy darkvision range). Darkvision is just insurance so that if an enemy does close the distance with you, you're not at disadvantage to attack them and they don't have advantage to attack you. (Note: long-range darkvision such as drow and svirfneblin have, or from stacking Goggles of Night on regular darkvision, functions similarly to illuminating enemies in terms of giving you advantage under vanilla 5e rules.)

Darkvision is however fairly easy to acquire: any druid or Shadow Monk can Darkvision you for 8 hours with no concentration cost (2 ki or one 2nd level spell slot), and so can some wizards. The good feats are NOT that easy to acquire.

Conclusion: Darkvision is a nice fringe benefit, worthy of consideration in any campaign where fighting in the dark is likely to happen. But there's a definite opportunity cost in foregoing that feat.

[randomodo]

Also, despite the name of the game, many campaigns aren't focused on gigantic underground labyrinths.

As with most race/feat/class/skill/spell combinations, the nature of the campaign is key to whether something is necessary/useful/useless

[Spiritchaser]

While this is obviously campaign dependent, I would argue that in any campaign I’ve played in or DM’d any “optimized” character has to have a source of Darkvision or similar, and race is the most straightforward source.

The opportunity for stealth comes up a LOT

Full darkness can (in my experience usually does) come up very frequently

If you have to light a light, you just guaranteed that you will be seen by anything that might be “looking” in the conventional sense

Darkvision et. al. are such a huge potential advantage that the races without it are, in my experience, regularly and significantly troubled by the lack.

I can recall 5 or 6 encounters where relatively powerful combat NPCs travelling with the party hindered more than they helped simply because they required torches.

Now... goggles of the night ARE a thing, so it’s not insurmountable.

[Tetrasodium]

I often see posts that say things like:

"I do find one problem with feats is that it makes V. Human way too appealing relative to other races.."




Usually, in my experience, the need for light makes humans very handicapped compared to most races, and a Feat at first level doesn't compensate.

What Feats are better than Darkvision?

How so?

there are races other than human that lack darkvision (not many, but some). Variant human is not so over represented & appealing among players is that you can bring a feat dependent concept online 4 levels earlier than other races and put your stat bonuses where they most benefit you and very few of the other races have a stat+benefit combo that outweighs the ability to start with your choice of PAM/Mobile/gwm/sentinel/warcaster/etc with no downside. Yes there are racial abilities that are very useful, but very few of those are the sort of game changing thing that any of the above mentioned feats can be.

As to what feats are better, if you look at pretty much any of the class guides people have written, anything in cyan or blue is almost certainly better & anything in black is probably better. Then finally for reasons I'll go into, anything in red or purple might be better.


I make that last point about feats generally considered bad or a trap because unless your role within the group requires you to sneak off in the dark uinknown to scout ahead you aren't really hindered by the lack of darkvision. Not only are you not often going to be affected by it, the over the abundance of darkblind races compared to everything else ensures that you probably will not be the odd man out so allowances will be made. Not only is it certain that allowances will willing;y be made for the handicap of the night blind majority... but the rules themselves make efforts to minimize the exceptional minority races capable of seeing in the dark with darkvision.
[list][*]Devils sight works the same for a human as a race with darkvision or superior darkvision. every mundane light source sheds bright light, with the exception of the bard soekk dancing lights, light spells all shed bright light, magic items that shed light all shed bright light. spells that snuff out light tend to drop it straight to either no light because the torch is out or magical darkness. The only magic items that seem to even consider (superior) darkvision are the moontouched blade (sheds moonlight so won't blind your sunlight sensitive friend to give your darkblind ally when it sheds bright light) & goggles of night (gives everyone else darkvision to 60 feet or darkvision races an extra 30 feet of darkvision). For almost every class, you are more likely top be hindered by sunlight sensitivity in a dungeon crawl heavy game than a lack of darkvision. Even though dark vision having races combined are a slight majority over the rest, the lack of light sources designed to allow them to leverage their darkvision limits the usefulness.

[GorogIrongut]

I'm a firm believer that Darkvision is vital in a character. As a DM, I warn my players that I do implement the dark/light rules and while I try not to be harsh, I do enact consequences to being able to not see in the dark/see better than other characters in the dark. These consequences won't be fatal but they will be realistic.

As such, I'm firmly in the camp that human characters aren't worth my time. Just look at a dwarf. You get so much being a dwarf before you even take into account dark vision. The free feat isn't worth it and... if I'm DM'ing, clues me in to the fact that the player is trying to enact a specific build without looking at well rounded gameplay. When I DM I like well rounded game play. People who fly should be able to cope in situations where flying isn't an option. People who are antisocial should be able to cope (somewhat) in the social element of a game. The same goes for those players who go V Human because they want they're Frontliner to have GWM at level 1. I'm not going to just send encounters of things for them to use their axe against. There'll be magic and intrigue and more. Because giving you something to hit with your axe is good in small doses, but bores me as a DM in large doses and doesn't help the player stretch and grow.

p.s. I even have a hard time playing a halfling because they don't get darkvision. Usually I'll play a Gloom Stalker if my character is from a race that doesn't get dark vision.

[Tetrasodium]

I'm a firm believer that Darkvision is vital in a character. As a DM, I warn my players that I do implement the dark/light rules and while I try not to be harsh, I do enact consequences to being able to not see in the dark/see better than other characters in the dark. These consequences won't be fatal but they will be realistic.

As such, I'm firmly in the camp that human characters aren't worth my time. Just look at a dwarf. You get so much being a dwarf before you even take into account dark vision. The free feat isn't worth it and... if I'm DM'ing, clues me in to the fact that the player is trying to enact a specific build without looking at well rounded gameplay. When I DM I like well rounded game play. People who fly should be able to cope in situations where flying isn't an option. People who are antisocial should be able to cope (somewhat) in the social element of a game. The same goes for those players who go V Human because they want they're Frontliner to have GWM at level 1. I'm not going to just send encounters of things for them to use their axe against. There'll be magic and intrigue and more. Because giving you something to hit with your axe is good in small doses, but bores me as a DM in large doses and doesn't help the player stretch and grow.

p.s. I even have a hard time playing a halfling because they don't get darkvision. Usually I'll play a Gloom Stalker if my character is from a race that doesn't get dark vision.

I take a similar stance when gm'ing by including good-lights & light gems giving off 10-20 feetof dim light & no bright light that can be had so cheaply that shopkeepers will frequently try to include one or more for free to make a sale of one more $whatever that a player was uncertain about taking. The end result is that the sneaky types pop theirs in a pocket/pouch when going off to scout ahead & the darkvision having races grumble at their human/whatever ally for giving their position away with that silly bright floodlight. You only need to say things like "Yea, they saw joe's bright torch coming a thousand yards away & setup that ambush while you were three curves back in that tunnel." once or twice before they start making joe keep his stupid light cantrip'd pebble in his pocket until after fights have started

[jas61292]

Dark vision is both over and under valued, depending on the group and the situation. In my experience, when played by the rules, it is sometimes invaluable, but far more often a false security blanket.

In places the players are familiar with and when they suspect that they know everything they will encounter, dark vision is incredible. Sneaking into a castle at night where you know where he guards are posted and everyone inside will have a light if they are awake? Forgoing light and relying on dark vision is by far the best way to do things.

But, when it comes to exploring dungeons or other adventure sites that you know little about, relying on your dark vision is a folly. The disadvantage on perception is simply not worth the risk. Yeah, bringing light will let things see you easier, but you have to remember, anything that lives in a lightless dungeon will be able to perceive things in the dark. And probably better than you can. By forgoing light, you are just making it more likely that you will run into traps, miss secret passageways, and let enemies sneak up on you.

So, all in all, what I'm saying is that dark vision is a nice utility to have, but far more situational than a lot of people would have you believe. Too me it is the equivalent of a weak feat or half feat. No where near as good as the variant human's feat.

Of course, my table bans the variant human anyways, so its a moot point for me.

[JellyPooga]

Most people miss the point of Darkvision, as you can see from this thread. Yes, you can carry a torch instead, but that just paints you with light so that enemies outside the light radius get advantage on their ranged attacks against you. What Darkvision, especially party-wide Darkvision, does is allow you to be stealthy in the dark without taking any penalties.

As you can see from this thread, most people miss the point of Darkvision. Yes, you can attack without penalty in total darkness if you have Darkvision, but you cannot operate without penalty. Disadvantage on Perception checks is a big deal, especially when using Passive Perception. Most characters that have Darkvision will want a light source anyway. If they don't have one they risk falling prey to traps and ambushes, as well as missing opportunities for finding hidden details, secret doors and so forth, not to mention the consequences for any party members that don't have it.

Darkvision combined with the Skulker Feat is a combo every bit as powerful as you'd want it to be.
Darkvision with a Dim light source is the next best thing.
Darkvision with a Bright light source is probably necessary for your darkblind friends, but it's better than no light at all.
Darkvision on its own, without a light source, is a fools gamble.

[the secret fire]

But, when it comes to exploring dungeons or other adventure sites that you know little about, relying on your dark vision is a folly. The disadvantage on perception is simply not worth the risk.

Which is why the Skulker feat is so underrated.

[Armored Walrus]

Most characters that have Darkvision will want a light source anyway. If they don't have one they risk falling prey to traps and ambushes, as well as missing opportunities for finding hidden details, secret doors and so forth, not to mention the consequences for any party members that don't have it.

Just a minor quibble, ambushes - if the enemy has darkvision and isn't using a light source, then you have equal chance of noticing each other. Traps, though, that's also campaign-dependent. Published modules tend to have traps in them, but I'm under the impression that there's a pretty big crowd of DM's out there that think traps are cheap shots at player (I'm not in this camp, FYI, but it exists, whether it's wrong or right) and therefore don't use traps at all in their campaigns. If you're running with one of these DMs, there's less pressure to have darkvision. If you're running with a DM who both doesn't like traps, and can't be bothered to figure out the vision mechanics, then darkvision is probably less important than anything else on your sheet.

In my campaigns, though, all your points are solid.

[MaxWilson]

Just a minor quibble, ambushes - if the enemy has darkvision and isn't using a light source, then you have equal chance of noticing each other.

Aside:

Due to the shape of the d20 curve and the fact that PCs typically have more trained skills than monsters do, a fight in the dark is likely to favor the PCs: it is very, very difficult for even dark elves to spot PCs hiding in the darkness. However, this doesn't mean the Dark Elves just lay down and die. What tends to happen IME is that it turns into a game of readied actions and geometry: the first guy to attack lands his attack and then gets pasted with a dozen readied crossbolt bolts/ranged attacks from the other side, so before he attacks he tries to spot as many hiding enemies as he can and maneuver to a position where as few of them as possible can see him. It's very exciting, like Kriegspiel (the chess variant), but like Kriegspiel it is hard to run without a neutral referee or computer support. (If the DM is running both the monsters and the action resolutions for everyone, the DM does not count as a neutral referee--you need a separate person or a computer.)

This is yet another reason I want to turn 5E into a CRPG. It's an exciting and fun tactical scenario which isn't easy to run at the table.

[Armored Walrus]

Aside:
This is yet another reason I want to turn 5E into a CRPG. It's an exciting and fun tactical scenario which isn't easy to run at the table.

This is why I ponied up the $100 to enable dynamic lighting in my Roll20 campaigns. It removes at least one instance of bias from the DM. As I tell my players, "If you can see it, you can see it." It doesn't cover perceiving by means other than sight, but it at least narrows things down.

[nickl_2000]

Yes and here is my reasoning.

Darkvision can be replicated easily for 8 hours with 1 second level spell that doesn't require concentration (and that is only needed to be cast when you are out at night or in a dark dungeon). On the other hand, you can't replicate GWM, SS, PAM, Healer, Warcaster, Resilient Con, Crossbow Expert, or most of the other powerful feats you get with 1 second level spell.


It may not be worth it if you are going level 20 fighter, but for many other classes that feat makes a huge difference

[MaxWilson]

Darkvision can be replicated easily for 8 hours with 1 second level spell that doesn't require concentration (and that is only needed to be cast when you are out at night or in a dark dungeon). On the other hand, you can't replicate GWM, SS, PAM, Healer, Warcaster, Resilient Con, Crossbow Expert, or most of the other powerful feats you get with 1 second level spell.

+1. This is huge.

[JellyPooga]

Just a minor quibble, ambushes - if the enemy has darkvision and isn't using a light source...

Just to minor quibble your minor quibble (double-quibble? re-quibble?), why would your darkvision possessing foe not use a light source themselves? Drow and Orcs like being able to see what they're doing in their own homes, so they have little incentive to be walking around in pitch darkness, or douse the lights if the PC's are taking a stealthy approach and have not been detected upon entry. If the PC's have been detected and the enemy are setting up a good ambush, they're going to use light as part of that; the cunning foe should set up the light source in an unsuspicious manner, a less than cunning foe might just put a lone torch somewhere in the dark (though that can be cunning in itself; curiosity is a powerful lure...). Anyway, the point being that a good ambush in the dark can very well involve light, whether or not you have Darkvision; springing the trap at the opportune moment. All Darkvision does is change the level of light required.

[Errata]

allow you to be stealthy in the dark without taking any penalties.

So you didn't actually read the rules, but you think other people are the ones who miss the point? You take penalties. You're at disadvantage to perception. Darkvision isn't what players from previous editions might be thinking. Unless you like stumbling around in dim light and blundering into traps or bumping into an enemy you didn't even notice, you still have reasons for light.

Good luck with your no light source darkvision when you go up against that young red dragon with blindsight, not to mention high perception and a larger darkvision radius than you.

And this idea of an entire party of ninjas doesn't just rule out anyone in the party having a non-darkvision race. It also rules out playing a heavy armor strength-based martial character. Nobody is stealthing in heavy armor. And if you have your whole party trying to stealth, someone is inevitably going to roll a very low number and mess it up. In a realistic party you're almost always going to have someone splitting off if you want stealth, because the entire party as a whole isn't likely to accomplish much with it, without magical assistance.

Stealth is fine in certain situations, but there are a lot of caveats, and in most campaigns it's only really going to be applicable for a small minority of encounters anyway. Not crucial enough to mandate that nobody in the party should play any of the non-darkvision races.

[Easy_Lee]

It depends. Answer the following questions:

Do you use stealth? If not, carry a torch, lantern, or other lightsource. There are few situations where a lantern won't work.
Does your DM worry about lighting? If not, darkvision isn't very useful.
Is there a shadow monk in the group? If so, you might want darkvision just so situations where he excels (night time, dark caves) don't handicap you without you having to counter the darkness with light.

Group composition and DM-awareness are important.

[mephnick]

If I wished to be a stealthy character I'd pick a race with Darkvision, but the penalty on Perception hurts, hence the Skulker feat. If I'm not a stealthy character it really doesn't matter unless I'm the only one in the group without it. Even PCs with Darkvision should light a torch most of the time unless you're really afraid of ambushes.

[Tetrasodium]

+1. This is huge.

Yea the darkvision spell being an 8hr duration & no concentration for a mere level 2 spell slot with is another example of how racial darkvision's potential value is minimized at every turn.

[Errata]

Yea the darkvision spell being an 8hr duration & no concentration for a mere level 2 spell slot with is another example of how racial darkvision's potential value is minimized at every turn.

And even with that, a lot of parties don't bother having anyone learn the darkvision spell. Which shows you that while the game caps the value of the racial ability as at most comparable to a single level 2 spell slot, in practice most players would value having darkvision lower than that, most of the time. It does come in handy situationally for those times when you absolutely need to stealth the entire party through a difficult spot.

If there was a level 2 spell that gave the target any feat you wanted for 8 hours, you can bet that more people would learn it than the darkvision spell.

[Boci]

Magic Initiate: Wizard (Dancing Lights, Light, Detect Magic)

Now you don't need to be able to see in the dark because you have at-will light (bright or dim, your choice) AND you can find magic stuff.

But the enemies can also see.

[JellyPooga]

But the enemies can also see.

Let's face it; like 90% of a typical adventuring parties enemies have Darkvision anyway, so yeah, they can see either way.