Blindness / Darkness Prevents 5' step?


Rules Questions

Liberty's Edge

5' step isn't allowed in rough terrain. Do effects that limit move to 1/2 also prevent 5' step?


Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber; Starfinder Charter Superscriber

Yes! Now your title suggests that you are asking about this in relation to being blind or in an area of darkness (not just dim light) and the answer is still yes, unless you have something like Blid-Fighting to move normally.

Liberty's Edge

Yep, talking about in the area. Is it clear based upon a rules citation or an interpretation?


Quote:

Take 5-Foot Step

You can move 5 feet in any round when you don't perform any other kind of movement. Taking this 5-foot step never provokes an attack of opportunity. You can't take more than one 5-foot step in a round, and you can't take a 5-foot step in the same round that you move any distance.

You can take a 5-foot step before, during, or after your other actions in the round.

You can only take a 5-foot-step if your movement isn't hampered by difficult terrain or darkness. Any creature with a speed of 5 feet or less can't take a 5-foot step, since moving even 5 feet requires a move action for such a slow creature.

You may not take a 5-foot step using a form of movement for which you do not have a listed speed.

Only difficult terrain and darkness remove the possibility of a 5' step.

Something like a Slow spell, which reduces your speed to half, doesn't remove the possibility of a 5' step. You can still take a 5' step, as it is only difficult terrain and darkness that matter.

Liberty's Edge

Thx all.

Shadow Lodge

Any poor visibility situation forces moving to cost twice as much. It's kind of hard to make a 5 foot step, when moving that 5 feet costs you 10 feet of movement. Remember that being forced to half movement, as per the slow spell, is different than squares costing double movement, like poor visibility and difficult terrain.


Can you take 5-foot step in darkness if you have blind-fight feat?


One of the effects of Blind-Fight is: "You do not need to make Acrobatics skill checks to move at full speed while blinded."

So the "can only take a 5-foot-step if your movement isn't hampered by difficult terrain or darkness" shouldn't apply, because your movement isn't hampered.

There's also a rule: "Blind creatures must make a DC 10 Acrobatics skill check to move faster than half speed." So I'm not sure if making that check would also mean your movement wasn't hampered and you could therefore make the 5-foot step.

Shadow Lodge

Being forced to half movement isn't what prevents the 5ft. step, the squares costing double is.


Serum wrote:
Being forced to half movement isn't what prevents the 5ft. step, the squares costing double is.

By RAW it appears that being "hampered by difficult terrain or darkness" is what prevents the 5ft step. I would imagine that being forced to move at half speed is an example of being hampered. Something like a Slow spell wouldn't count, because that isn't difficult terrain or darkness.

Shadow Lodge

Squares costing double is the exact effect of hampered movement, which comes in a minimum of three flavours (obstacles, difficult terrain and poor visibility). You would be hard-pressed to argue against darkness being considered poor visibility, even with Blindfight. You can't make a five-foot step when the square you're trying to move into costs 10 feet of movement, effects like Nimble Moves notwithstanding. Blindfight canceling out the half-movment limitation doesn't remove the costs of moving around in those squares.


OK, it looks like you're referring to this:

Quote:

Hampered Movement

Difficult terrain, obstacles, and poor visibility can hamper movement (see Table: Hampered Movement for details). When movement is hampered, each square moved into usually counts as two squares, effectively reducing the distance that a character can cover in a move.

If more than one hampering condition applies, multiply all additional costs that apply. This is a specific exception to the normal rule for doubling.

In some situations, your movement may be so hampered that you don’t have sufficient speed even to move 5 feet (1 square). In such a case, you may use a full-round action to move 5 feet (1 square) in any direction, even diagonally. Even though this looks like a 5-foot step, it’s not, and thus it provokes attacks of opportunity normally. (You can’t take advantage of this rule to move through impassable terrain or to move when all movement is prohibited to you.)

You can’t run or charge through any square that would hamper your movement.

Table: Hampered Movement
Condition Additional Movement Cost
Difficult Terrain 2
Obstacle* 2
Poor Visibility 2
Impassable —
*May require a skill check

Are you saying that "Blind creatures must make a DC 10 Acrobatics skill check to move faster than half speed" is in addition to the rule about Poor Visibility doubling the movement cost of squares? I.e., without the Acrobatics check or Blind-Fight feat you would effectively move at quarter speed?

(My feeling is, the people writing the rules were not consistent in their use of 'half speed' and 'double movement cost', since for most purposes they are the same thing.)


Its gets even more fun when you realize the DC 10 acrobatics rule in the strictest sense applies to being blind/in darkness, but does not apply to limited visibility from being in a fog cloud.

So with an acrobatics check I can move at full speed if I'm blind. But that same acrobatics check won't help me if I'm just in thick fog with some vision still remaining to me.

As to the OP, effects that reduce your movement speed, in and of themselves, do not prevent taking a 5' step. Effects that double movement costs do. And the rules are not particularly consistent with using one form or another.


Thanks for the answers

Shadow Lodge

Matthew Downie wrote:

Are you saying that "Blind creatures must make a DC 10 Acrobatics skill check to move faster than half speed" is in addition to the rule about Poor Visibility doubling the movement cost of squares? I.e., without the Acrobatics check or Blind-Fight feat you would effectively move at quarter speed?

(My feeling is, the people writing the rules were not consistent in their use of 'half speed' and 'double movement cost', since for most purposes they are the same thing.)

Yes, I am. A blind creature moves quarter the distance it would if it weren't blind. If it succeeds at the acrobatics check, then it moves half the distance.

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