Possibly. Or possibly not, depending on the answer to the question I linked (the thread of which you commented in just a minute ago).
My interpretation is that a heightened continual flame of sufficient level would successfully raise the light level to "normal" within 20ft, even within the radius of darkness (deeper or otherwise). However, it's not 100% clear in the text. I recommend FAQing the thread over in Rules Questions if you haven't already; I imagine the ruling would end up being as you want and as I suspect.
What happens if the HCF is present in the area before darkness is cast? Does it dampen it?
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I think the darkness would still lower the light level of the first 20' of light at least. Here is how I interpret it:
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Light Levels:
5 - Bright
4 - Normal
3 - Dim
2 - Dark
1 - Supernaturally Dark
Room starts at light level 3(Dim)
Darkness is cast, lowers light one step to level 2(Dark)
First 20' Continual Flame sets, not increases, the light level to level 4(Normal)
Beyond 20' Continual Flame increases the light level to level 3(Dim)
Darkness interacts with the first 20' of continual flame and lowers the light level to level 3(Dim)
Room starts at light level 3(Dim)
First 20' Continual Flame sets, not increases, the light level to level 4(Normal)
Beyond 20' Continual Flame increases the light level to level 4(Dim)
Darkness is cast, lowers the first 20' Continual Flame to level 3(Dim)
Darkness lowers the light level beyond 20' to level 3(Dim)
My interpretation scares me as this means the only answer to a deeper darkness is a daylight spell.
Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area South & West
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There is no reasonable way to justify a 3rd level spell being able to trump a 4th level spell.
IMO there is no reasonable way to consolidate the existing patchwork of rules, exceptions, light type classifications, etc. into a simple, predictable, consistent, and easy-to-understand system. From the previous discussion it did look as though there might be such a way of interpreting the rules, but the recent FAQ postings put paid to that.
RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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How so? I think we're making fantastic progress.
Relatedly, please flag THIS POST for FAQing. Thanks!
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11) Hand of Glory: See Invis and Daylight 1/day + an extra ring slot
Nice idea, as long as you are willing to give up your neck slot for it.
I do have a PC who has done that, but he is a ranged combatant, so having an Amulet of Natural Armor was more-or-less optional for him.
It also requires some flexibility in the PC, since you are wearing the cut-off hand of a criminal around your neck. And can, depending on the GM, cause some negative responses from the random NPCs encountered during a game...
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11) Hand of Glory: See Invis and Daylight 1/day + an extra ring slotNice idea, as long as you are willing to give up your neck slot for it.
I do have a PC who has done that, but he is a ranged combatant, so having an Amulet of Natural Armor was more-or-less optional for him.
It also requires some flexibility in the PC, since you are wearing the cut-off hand of a criminal around your neck. And can, depending on the GM, cause some negative responses from the random NPCs encountered during a game...
I have a Barbarian with one. Its great. I get some great utility that most don't expect from a barbarian, I an extra ring slot which will soon have a ring of blink on it, and I get to where a hand around my neck.
Besides....AC is way way way way way way way overrated.
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11) Hand of Glory: See Invis and Daylight 1/day + an extra ring slotNice idea, as long as you are willing to give up your neck slot for it.
I do have a PC who has done that, but he is a ranged combatant, so having an Amulet of Natural Armor was more-or-less optional for him.
It also requires some flexibility in the PC, since you are wearing the cut-off hand of a criminal around your neck. And can, depending on the GM, cause some negative responses from the random NPCs encountered during a game...
I have a Barbarian with one. Its great. I get some great utility that most don't expect from a barbarian, I an extra ring slot which will soon have a ring of blink on it, and I get to where a hand around my neck.
Besides....AC is way way way way way way way overrated.
Against the primary attack, yes. Against iterative attacks? Not so much.
Then again, I remember one game where my PC had gotten an enemy made a potential critical against him, which had me worried, missed the confirmation by one (rolled a 4, needed a 5 to confirm), then wound up with the damage being 1d4. In a Tier 5-9 scenario. Came out as a bit anti-climactic.
But, yes, Daylight[i], [i]See Invisibility and an extra ring slot are all nice. Except this PC hasn't needed either spell since he got the Hand of Glory, and still only has two magical rings....
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Heightened daylight does nothing that regular daylight doesn't already do. The text of this spell is very, very strange.
Heightened continual flame does function as one would expect, but its still not known what the order of operations is:
Ambient -> apply deeper darkness -> apply continual flame
OR
Ambient -> apply continual flame -> apply deeper darkness
Also, we need to know if mundane light effects operate in an area where darkness spells and daylight overlap.
So these issues are still unresolved.
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Did this get settled?
Define "this". ;)
We got the basics of how to apply a darkness effect in the first place (HERE), which is a huge step itself given the variety of interpretations (as well as "interpretations") that existed before. We also got a pretty relevant side-question answered HERE.
Last I checked, though, the questions of which order you apply a darkness effect and a higher-level magical light source and whether daylight's special negation clause kicks in with any darkness radius or only supernaturally-dark areas, have not been answered.
Unfortunately, weird as it is, there's no ambiguity on the fact that heightening daylight will not remove lines from daylight's text.
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OK, so does that special clause ("Daylight brought into an area of magical darkness (or vice versa) is temporarily negated, so that the otherwise prevailing light conditions exist in the overlapping areas of effect.") in Daylight mean that it negates even heightened Deeper Darkness in overlapping areas, even though the Daylight is of lower level since the clause doesn't mention that either the magical darkness or the Daylight have to be of a certain spell level/strength?
Correct.
If that seems off, remember that the reverse is also true: a 9th-level Heightened daylight doesn't perform any better when that negation clause is involved than a normal 3rd-level version does. Neither spell's level is involved in that clause.|
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Seeing lots of people running a mechanic differently than the rules say is not an indication that the designers' intent is closer to those GMs' version than to what the designers themselves published.
People usually mean what they say. That includes the intelligent human beings who wrote the rules with the express purpose of communicating their intent through the text. Sometimes things aren't clear, but to suggest that a person wanted something to work one way and tried to communicate it by writing the opposite? That's a theory that needs waaaaay more evidence than "a bunch of random people who were not involved in the design or writing process are doing it differently".
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Actually, its usually GMs letting daylight completely trump level 2 darkness because daylight is level 3.
You are probably right Jiggy, I have just seen it played incorrectly so much that I'm not sure of anything regarding this topic. And I'm tired of slowing down tables when trying to educate GMs. Many GMs really don't like it at all. I'm slowly coming to accept that this is a YMMV game, but that makes it really hard to plan out a character.
I've had GMs claim that the acrobatics roll to avoid AOOs must be made for every square, just not every opponent. The time and effort to argue this is just prohibitive.
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To me, that's a major flaw in the game experiences given how often its coming up now in the scenarios. I made the case at Origins for them to totally rewrite the lighting rules, but I don't think the powers that be were that interested in it. It was amusing when I tried to explain these questions we had about them and one of the judges didn't even understand what I was asking without the other judge literally drawing a picture for him. The other judge, to his credit, knew *exactly* what my question was and why it is crazy confusing.
Often, the party can't get away from darkness effects if the NPCs have cast it on a weapon and keep moving towards the PCs for melee attacks. Then how these effects are adjudicated are literally life or death. That's why I feel its unfair for this to be a YMMV situation."
Fliers with access to darkness are especially grim, because they can't even be randomly hacked to death by melee guys in the dark.
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I've had GMs claim that the acrobatics roll to avoid AOOs must be made for every square, just not every opponent. The time and effort to argue this is just prohibitive.
For that one, you could just carry a printout of the FAQ on the subject. Should be nice and quick/efficient.
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It's funny; if I'm sitting at a table with some friends playing MtG or Rune Age or Scrabble or Game of Thrones or Dominion or Fluxx or Bananagrams or Monopoly or Agricola or Carcasonne or pretty much anything else, and someone makes an error, someone who recalls the applicable rule will make a simple comment (i.e., "actually, you can't X" or whatever) and the only response it gets is a friendly "Oh, that's right, I forgot" and the action is corrected.
It's only when the game is an RPG and the person being corrected is the GM that suddenly you run the risk of them getting downright offended and angry.
Kinda makes you wonder what's different about GMing an RPG that takes the same friendly corrections that happen all the time in every other social tabletop game on the planet and makes it a cardinal sin.
Venture-Lieutenant, Florida—Melbourne
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There is no reasonable way to justify a 3rd level spell being able to trump a 4th level spell.
See Invisibility (2nd) trumps Greater Invisibility (4th)
True Strike (1st) trumps Blur (2nd)Resist Energy (2nd) trumps Fireball (3rd)
Dispell Magic (3rd) trumps everything
Not sure I see the problem here.
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Venture-Lieutenant, Florida—Melbourne
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It's funny; if I'm sitting at a table with some friends playing MtG or Rune Age or Scrabble or Game of Thrones or Dominion or Fluxx or Bananagrams or Monopoly or Agricola or Carcasonne or pretty much anything else, and someone makes an error, someone who recalls the applicable rule will make a simple comment (i.e., "actually, you can't X" or whatever) and the only response it gets is a friendly "Oh, that's right, I forgot" and the action is corrected.
It's only when the game is an RPG and the person being corrected is the GM that suddenly you run the risk of them getting downright offended and angry.
Kinda makes you wonder what's different about GMing an RPG that takes the same friendly corrections that happen all the time in every other social tabletop game on the planet and makes it a cardinal sin.
Unlike the other people we play games with, DMs are in a position of authority. Some people interpret questioning a ruling as questioning their authority. I personally don't see it that way. I would rather get the rule right (and be the wiser for it next time) than simply say "I am the DM so I am always right." but I'm not everybody.
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There is no reasonable way to justify a 3rd level spell being able to trump a 4th level spell.See Invisibility (2nd) trumps Greater Invisibility (4th)
True Strike (1st) trumps Blur (2nd)
Resist Energy (2nd) trumps Fireball (3rd)
Dispell Magic (3rd) trumps everythingNot sure I see the problem here.
Okay, I didn't think about those examples. See? Open to correction. However, I still say the light and darkness rules are a nightmare to implement and keep the game running smoothly.
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My only problem with the "wait till after" approach is if a missed FAQ ruling is getting the party killed *now*.This is for when I, as the GM, believe that a player is not correct. It has been my experience that when this happens, usually the player errs in their favor. Actual examples which spring to mind:
• Halfling Rogue who didn't realize they were not proficient in staff sling.
• Gunslinger with a double-barrel pistol trying to use Dead Shot with both barrels.
• Magic Jar being used without requiring a chance of possessing a party member.If I felt the player was shorting themselves, I'd speak up in the moment.
My concern is that inconsistent GM application of light/darkness rules will get parties TPKed and the players won't even realize that one of the GMs was playing it wrong. Of course, then there are the tables where half the players have darkvision and just want to hand-wave the whole thing and leave the humans blind for the whole fight.
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I can recall back when I was trying to work thru the Take 10 rules, and the way they worked at each judges table, trying to come up with a set of questions to hand each judge to find out how it worked in his game. And being told by several multi-star judges that even suggesting doing that was grounds for having my actions watched, so they could "figure out what I was trying to pull". The fact that I had the rule printed on a T-shirt was grounds to have me barred from the table... as I was being "confrontational"...
Yeah, this game seems to attract Players with problems with authority figures (thus they "fight against the Judge") and with Judges who have problems with authority - what we in HS would call "the petty tyrant complex".
I often call both of these player types (and yes, I consider the judge a player to, esp. when I'm the judge): Type A Players, or Confrontational Players. To them a game is "Them against Me" or "PCs vs. Judge". They have to play games "against" someone they can see.
I just want fair and consistent application of a rule set across all tables. Nothing more, nothing less. I want pissing contests, confrontations, or any of that. But, yes, there is some of the "petty tyrant syndrome" out there. When I GM, I'm working *with* the players as much as I can. Yeah, I try to make things as dramatic as possible, but ultimately, I'm often handcuffed by the scenario anyway. There's no reason for me to be a petty tyrant or a jerk. I have basically no skin in the game; I didn't write these scenarios.
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Even when your correct and have a quick and efficient means of showing it, a lot of GMs will take it badly. I have seen GMs refuse to take 10 seconds and read a printed FAQ.even after a game, when presented in a respectful way...
Most GMs are much more open to correction after a game. However, some times, as a player you would like to have a correction at the time of the error. Most of the time I just bite my tongue and let it play out, only stepping in if things go way down hill.
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Even when your correct and have a quick and efficient means of showing it, a lot of GMs will take it badly. I have seen GMs refuse to take 10 seconds and read a printed FAQ.even after a game, when presented in a respectful way...Most GMs are much more open to correction after a game. However, some times, as a player you would like to have a correction at the time of the error. Most of the time I just bite my tongue and let it play out, only stepping in if things go way down hill.
I do not understand this attitude at all. I prefer to be corrected as a GM on the spot to limit the impact of my mistake.
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As a GM, I avoid "judgment calls" whenever possible. However, others seem to try to shoehorn their judgment in, even when an FAQ or clarification exists on a given topic.
The latest FAQs have made darkess and deeper darkness incredibly powerful, particularly for PCs with no darkvision. It is critical that the solutions for these spells is kept consistent from table to table to avoid the inevitable problems that will follow if every GM is allowed to make stuff up on the fly regarding these arguably OP spells now.