Darkvision Ruins Dungeon-Crawling

[GMMichael]

A human and a grue sit at an inn's common room (just go with it), talking about their quests.

H: Hey Gary, did I hear that you also delved the Tomb of Barrymore? How was that for you?
G: Piece of cake. ::Belches::
H: Wha? Huh? "Piece of cake?" Did the troll surprise you?
G: Nope. I saw him coming.
H: But he saw your torchlight first, right? Oh yeah, you have darkvision.
G: Yee-up.
H: Yeah. But those tripwire traps were horrible, right?
G: Pretty obvious, if you ask me.
H: Oh. Remember that impassible gate!? Good god, I had to use my scroll of gaseous form just to get through it!
G: There's a passage that goes around.
H: Passage? What passage?
G: You probably didn't see it. It's in the dark.
H: ::Stews:: Yeah. I didn't re-light my torch after alerting the troll.
G: Yeah.
H: Yeah. Say, did you decipher the runes?
G: Um, what?
H: The runes. That were painted on the ceiling over the mummy's sarcophagus?
G: I didn't see any runes?
H: The ones about the curse? No? Huh. They were pretty obvious after I re-lit my torch.
G: Wait. What curse!?

Mystery is a big part of fantasy. What we can't see is mysterious. We can't see in the dark. Darkvision allows us to see in the dark.

Ergo, darkvision ruins fantasy. Dungeon-crawling, in particular.

Agree or disagree? Does everyone in your party have darkvision? Does your GM remember to enforce darkness rules (if any)?

 

[Reynard]

A human and a grue sit at an inn's common room (just go with it), talking about their quests.

Mystery is a big part of fantasy. What we can't see is mysterious. We can't see in the dark. Darkvision allows us to see in the dark.

Ergo, darkvision ruins fantasy. Dungeon-crawling, in particular.

Agree or disagree? Does everyone in your party have darkvision? Does your GM remember to enforce darkness rules (if any)?

I agree with the statement but not really your reasoning.

Darkvision ruins dungeon crawling because dungeon crawling is basically survival horror, and the darkness is the scariest element of all. It isn't about mystery, it is about fear.

Shadowdark really figured this out and embraced it.

 

[DEFCON 1]

No, it does not, because it just results in the party using light sources... and at a base mechanical level using light sources does not impact anything much more than looking out in the "dim light" of darkness with darkvision. Characters without darkvision and a torch will see things out in the "dim light" just like characters with darkvision and no light source will. The only difference is that the party's light source will "alert" potential enemies out there that see the torch. But then again... even in a party with all darkvision, there will probably be party members who are going to be wearing armor that will preclude using stealth, which means light source or no-- other creatures will usually know where the party is. It doesn't matter if there's a light source to see or not... the sounds of the party will mean they won't be able to sneak their way through the entire dungeon (which I think seems to be the thing that people who hate darkvision always seem to think is going to happen... all the "tricks" of the dungeon are bypassed by the party "sneaking their way" through the entire thing.)

On top of that... attacking someone while hiding or being hidden only gives you advantage on your attack... which means most monsters who are "hiding" out there in the darkness aren't really gaining a whole lot. We don't consider Rogues who hide with their Cunning Action every round and then attacking from hiding to gain advantage to be that big a deal or some overpowered thing... so why would we believe it's such a big deal when monsters can attack from "the darkness" and get advantage? Not to mention the fact that a tremendous number of dungeon creatures that would attack the party are melee creatures and thus have to run up to the characters and their light sources-- thereby leaving their precious "darkness" behind and losing its bonus anyway. Attacking from the darkness isn't really all that big of a gain all things considered.

This idea that the darkness can be "scarier" is true... but only from a narrative perspective. The DM narrating things to fire the player's imaginations to instill some bit of fear. But from a game mechanics perspective... being in the darkness is no different than being invisible or using Dexterity (Stealth), and those mechanics can be annoying to work around-- but work around them we do. And it ends up not being all that big a deal. But if we are talking the narrative perspective of dungeon crawling... then no DM needs to or should be relying on the singular "fear" of being attacked from the darkness as their one way of creeping out the players, because you can only go to that well so many times before the PCs "being attacked by monsters in the darkness" becomes an overused trope and it loses all its power. The DM will need to use their imagination and come up all manner of other ways to make things scary-- and those ways won't be impacted by characters with darkvision or not.

TL-DR: Monsters attacking from "the darkness" is not the end-all-be-all schtick DMs think it is... which means parties made up of nothing but characters with darkvision that reduce the effectiveness of that schtick are actually forcing DMs to be more creative. And that's a good thing.

 

[Reynard]

No, it does not, because it just results in the party using light sources... and at a base mechanical level using light sources does not impact anything much more than looking out in the "dim light" of darkness with darkvision. Characters without darkvision and a torch will see things out in the "dim light" just like characters with darkvision and no light source will. The only difference is that the party's light source will "alert" potential enemies out there that see the torch. But then again... even in a party with all darkvision, there will probably be party members who are going to be wearing armor that will preclude using stealth, which means light source or no-- other creatures will usually know where the party is. It doesn't matter if there's a light source to see or not... the sounds of the party will mean they won't be able to sneak their way through the entire dungeon (which I think seems to be the thing that people who hate darkvision always seem to think is going to happen... all the "tricks" of the dungeon are bypassed by the party "sneaking their way" through the entire thing.)

On top of that... attacking someone while hiding or being hidden only gives you advantage on your attack... which means most monsters who are "hiding" out there in the darkness aren't really gaining a whole lot. We don't consider Rogues who hide with their Cunning Action every round and then attacking from hiding to gain advantage to be that big a deal or some overpowered thing... so why would we believe it's such a big deal when monsters can attack from "the darkness" and get advantage? Not to mention the fact that a tremendous number of dungeon creatures that would attack the party are melee creatures and thus have to run up to the characters and their light sources-- thereby leaving their precious "darkness" behind and losing its bonus anyway. Attacking from the darkness isn't really all that big of a gain all things considered.

This idea that the darkness can be "scarier" is true... but only from a narrative perspective. The DM narrating things to fire the player's imaginations to instill some bit of fear. But from a game mechanics perspective... being in the darkness is no different than being invisible or using Dexterity (Stealth), and those mechanics can be annoying to work around-- but work around them we do. And it ends up not being all that big a deal. But if we are talking the narrative perspective of dungeon crawling... then no DM needs to or should be relying on the singular "fear" of being attacked from the darkness as their one way of creeping out the players. Because you can only go to that well so many times before the PCs "being attacked by monsters in the darkness" becomes an overused trope and it loses all its power. The DM will need to use their imagination and come up all manner of other ways to make things scary-- and those ways won't be impacted by characters with darkvision or not.

TL-DR: Monsters attacking from "the darkness" is not the end-all-be-all schtick DMs think it is... which means parties made up of nothing but characters with darkvision that reduce the effectiveness of that schtick are actually forcing DMs to be more creative. And that's a good thing.

These answers only make sense in the context of 5E D&D. This question is asked in TTRPG general. 5E ruined dungeon crawling with a lot more than dark vision, but that doesn't mean dungeon crawling doesn't work in other games.

 

[zakael19]

Light source availability is one of the primary time-gates on dungeon crawling, as well as tactical considerations and tension. Negating that reduces the decision space. I don't think it's a coincidence that many of the recent dungeon-crawl focused games have lined out the feature entirely (Shadowdark, His Majesty the Worm).

 

[MGibster]

It's a pain in the rear to keep track of lighting conditions when you have a mixed party of characters with and without darkvision. And the pain only intensifies when you account for differences in darkvision range among some species. I'm putting my players through their first dungeon of the campaign this weekend (depending on how Snowmaggedon goes), so I'll try keeping track of lighting conditions and see what does.

 

[TiQuinn]

I think darkvision has reduced the importance of lighting in modern D&D to the point that it’s mostly inconsequential, and easily forgotten to the detriment of none, if that’s what you want out of the game. However, if light is a key component of your adventure design, having character options that completely bypass it are poor design, IMO.

It’s a sacred cow that I’d personally get rid of.

 

[DEFCON 1]

These answers only make sense in the context of 5E D&D. This question is asked in TTRPG general. 5E ruined dungeon crawling with a lot more than dark vision, but that doesn't mean dungeon crawling doesn't work in other games.

Disagree. My comments apply to all versions of D&D and D&D-affiliated games (for which the ability and term "darkvision" would apply and be available). The terminology for the bonuses and penalties might be different (so "advantage" becomes some other bonus in a different D&D game), but the effects are all the same. DMs whose only ability to "scare" players is monsters attacking from the darkness will find that trope woefully unuseful after the fourth, fifth, eighth time trying to do it. There are countless other ways to making dungeon-crawling scary, most of which darkvision will not play a part.

 

[Himbo_Jones]

Light source availability is one of the primary time-gates on dungeon crawling, as well as tactical considerations and tension. Negating that reduces the decision space. I don't think it's a coincidence that many of the recent dungeon-crawl focused games have lined out the feature entirely (Shadowdark, His Majesty the Worm).

This is it right here for me. Torches are a resource that needs to be spent like any other, but it doesn't seem to be in vogue to keep track of those things these days.

The "ten minute turn" exists in dungeon crawling for a reason; it is a tool for the GM (and players) to know the status of their light sources and ongoing effects. It's also why there are upgraded lighting sources even included in places like the PHB. The intent is for players to be eager to get their hands on an oil lamp since they last for 6 hours (or 36 dungeon turns) on a single pint of oil and are more space efficient than carrying bundles of torches around.

I completely understand that the book keeping aspect is not of interest to people and so things like darkvision exist (in my opinion) to take away that aspect and streamline play for those individuals. But for those who do enjoy the resource attrition, it can feel cheap and frustrating to work around.

I really feel that part of the challenge of a mega-dungeon is (and should be) needing to resupply every so often and being cognizant of ones limited resources. That's why the size of them should be such an "oh dang" moment for the players. Not only are there dozens of rooms and hallways that are filled with baddies, but how many torches and lockpicks and rations will they need to go through to explore them all? Maybe they start to consider returning to town, purchasing a mule, and loading that up with supplies to hitch by the entrance so they don't have to go all the way back to town. Or maybe they start to think that it might be worthwhile to establish a more permanent camp around one of the entrances.

As zakael19 said, the tension of limited resources creates interesting avenues for decision making.

And I'm not saying this style of play is impossible so long as darkvision exists, but its existence does remove a little of the pressure that would otherwise be present in a dungeon-crawl style of play.

 

[Bill Zebub]

You can't cast Magic Missile at the darkness if there's no darkness.

Q.E.F.D, Byatch.