Darkness.
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Yeaaaah. Daylght as a spell kind of sucks. The light level would be darkness. At least Darkvision still works in the overlap.
Pretty much everyone who wants to understand the light/darkness rules should read A Practical Guide to Light and Darkness.
Eh, daylight is still useful. I mean hopefully you have another source of light or darkvision. If you don't have darkvision you really should have a light spell, an ioun torch, or at least a sunrod. Any backup light you have will work.
Daylight is not a spell that you use for everyday lighting, so if you need light, you need a backup apart from Daylight so the fact that it counters darkness is not *that* much of an issue.
Eh, daylight is still useful. I mean hopefully you have another source of light or darkvision. If you don't have darkvision you really should have a light spell, an ioun torch, or at least a sunrod.That's the big and as far as I know unanswered question: Within the "temporarily negated overlap" are other sources of light still shut down?
No. At least not by my reading.
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I don't think so either, but I've seen good arguments for the other side, so without a ruling, I consider it an open question.No. At least not by my reading.Eh, daylight is still useful. I mean hopefully you have another source of light or darkvision. If you don't have darkvision you really should have a light spell, an ioun torch, or at least a sunrod.That's the big and as far as I know unanswered question: Within the "temporarily negated overlap" are other sources of light still shut down?
In the guide that MrRetsej linked upthread, I pointed this out as one area of ambiguity. I personally interpret "so that the otherwise prevailing light conditions exist" to mean "the light conditions that would be prevailing if the negated effects weren't there", which would include your other light sources. "Darkness" is not the light conditions that would be "otherwise prevailing". Some GMs say otherwise.
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"This spell has no effect in an area that is already dark." -- Darkness
Darkness cannot create a supermagical darkness (one step below darkness where darkvision turns off), meaning the prevailing area is still darkness. Now add in Daylight. Daylight is a higher level spell so as Darkness dictates, it still raises the light level. The light level is now dimly lit.
Both of these spells make concessions. Daylight says when brought into an area of magical darkness prevailing light conditions exist. But Darkness says if the light spell is a level higher, it still raises the light level by 1. Eirgo Daylight is going to actually take precedence here.
Perhaps the more interesting case is Deeper Darkness which lowers by 2 steps so it can create magical darkness were darkvision turns off.
However since Daylight and Deeper Darkness are of equal level, Daylight does not continue to raise the light level as it did before. However, Deeper Darkness also does not lower the light level by 2 steps in areas overlapping with Daylight because again from daylight: "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." Meaning the area is Darkness.
However, in the ever increasing spell level arms race of light you can one-up Deeper Darkness again with a higher level light spell. For example: Wandering Star Motes. Which will set light in a 30ft radius around the target to normal light (note it doesn't elevate, and cannot exceed normal light in this radius) and then elevates it by 1 step beyond that in the next 30ft. And why shouldn't it? It's a higher level light spell, darkness (and by proxy deeper darkness) state that higher level light spells still increase light.
It's worth mentioning that Daylight is special however, and so while it negates equal level darkness effects, others such as wandering star motes do not have this special quality.
Another reading would be that when _Daylight_ refers to "magical darkness", it means deeper darkness. That would be consistent with the level language in _Darkness_.
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Now add in Daylight. Daylight is a higher level spell so as Darkness dictates, it still raises the light level.
Except that daylight has its own special rule where it does that mutual-negation thing any time it's overlapping with magical darkness. Specific trumps general, so the magical darkness effect and daylight are both negated in the overlap.
Both of these spells make concessions. Daylight says when brought into an area of magical darkness prevailing light conditions exist. But Darkness says if the light spell is a level higher, it still raises the light level by 1. Eirgo Daylight is going to actually take precedence here.
Nope, specific trumps general. Daylight shedding light is the general rule, while mutual negation in the specific circumstance of overlapping with a magical darkness effect is the specific rule.
However since Daylight and Deeper Darkness are of equal level, Daylight does not continue to raise the light level as it did before. However, Deeper Darkness also does not lower the light level by 2 steps in areas overlapping with Daylight because again from daylight: "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." Meaning the area is Darkness.
Once daylight enters the picture, spell levels no longer matter.
It's worth mentioning that Daylight is special however, and so while it negates equal level darkness effects, others such as wandering star motes do not have this special quality.
Daylight's special mutual-negation ability is not dependent on spell level in any way.
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Another reading would be that when _Daylight_ refers to "magical darkness", it means deeper darkness.
If it meant that, it would have either referenced the spell by name or referred to an area that is supernaturally dark (a term already existing in the rules).
But it doesn't say that. It says "magical darkness".
Is it darkness?
Is it magical?
Then daylight is talking about it.
That would be consistent with the level language in _Darkness_.
It doesn't need to be consistent with that. Two different spells with their own unique mechanics don't need to synch up with each other. If they were both referencing a pre-existing mechanic, sure, they would need to be in line with each other. But darkness shutting things down and daylight doing its negation thing don't need to be consistent with each other, because they're unique mechanics that are unrelated to each other.