Lighting Conditions

Be Afraid of the Dark

Being in absolute darkness is meant to be chaotic, stressful & dangerous. The intent of these rules are to provide that sense to the party. The longer you’re in pitch black, the more disorientated each character (& player) will become. Unless you have a light source that fills the room, some weird magic, or dark vision as a racial bonus – Darkness should be treated as a threat to the whole party.

When any character is in absolute darkness, they get the Blind status applied to them. When any character is blind:

• They may not do actions or use skills that require sight. Such as reading, setting or detecting traps, tracking, etc. If it seems reasonable to do an action by touch alone, or if you can find a video of a blind person doing it online – It should probably be allowed. Ask your GM.

• They may only make attacks within their normal unarmed melee range. Including attacks with projectile & 2 handed melee weapons.

• If another character comes into their space (any adjacent tile), they will be aware of each others presence there. However, they cannot identify them unless they use senses other than sight to do so. This requires 1 non-contested action. If they do not have any remaining actions, they are left to wonder until their next turn unless the other character uses an action to identify them & somehow let’s them know it. Sound, touch, smell, … hopefully not taste. Performing the action of identifying another may alert others in the area because of sounds being created in the process. (It depends. Your GM will have to decide how to deal with any additional sounds on a case by case basis. & whether or not you sniffing that other person alerts others in the area. I’m simply not making a rule for this. It’s a story driven outcome.)

• They may orient on others using other senses available to them – primarily sound. Such as a pair of other characters fighting across the room, or the guy in full plate tripping & smashing into the wall.

• If it is because of darkness (as opposed to having your eyes jabbed with a cayenne pepper): if there is a light in the distance that does not illuminate the area around them, they may use that light to orient themselves. They can see & identify those within the illuminated area. Characters within the illuminated area may be targeted with range & projectile weapons from characters inside the darkness, but not vice versa.

• If any character is inside an illuminated area, they are still treated as being under the Blind status versus any character or object completely in the darkness.

• When moving, if they cross paths with an obstacle or hit a wall, they take damage equal to the total number of tiles they intended to move with that action & make loud noises that may be heard & oriented on by others. This does not necessarily identify them as friend or foe. This damage does not ignore armor. They forfeit the additional tiles they would have moved with that action.

• All other characters automatically (for free, without rolling, & without using an action – & even if they are also blind) gain the Stealth bonus against them. This means the Blinded character may not track their movements for their end of turn orientation (instead they may declare to turn to 1 of 8 directions based on their current orientation or toward a sound or some other sensory input). More importantly, they all gain the ability to declare a Stealth bonus attack against them; which is a free action. The free Stealth attack gained this way may only be used one time each round. Any subsequent Stealth checks in the same round must be done in a normal fashion — meaning they must both roll a normal stealth skill check against each other of: 1d20 + Stealth + Prs versus the defender’s 1d20 + Stealth + Prs.

Let the Chaos Begin

When darkness falls upon you, your GM will make a small map to track the movements & orientation of all creatures in the area & mark any obstacles. Only the GM & any characters that are not effected by the Blind status effect may see the map.

When a Blind player character moves, they may only declare the intended distance & one of 8 directions as: forward, left, right, backward, diagonally forward left, diagonally forward right, diagonally backward left, & diagonally backward right. They may request that their orientation at the start of their turn be toward some sound (or other queue) from the previous round. (They may also chose not to move at all or do some other action that makes sense to them at that time.)

When a Blind NPC moves, unless they are moving toward a sound or other queue, the GM will roll 1d20 to determine their action. If they move twice on their turn, they roll for each of them.

• 1-2: diagonally forward left
• 3-4: forward
• 5-6: diagonally forward right
• 7-8: right
• 9-10: diagonally backward right
• 11-12: backward (they turn around)
• 13-14: diagonally backward left
• 15-16: left
• 17-18: quietly remain in place
• 19-20: call out! so friends (& foes) may identify them, or make light from a source in their inventory, or load a crossbow – any action other than moving or remaining quiet.

As all the Blinded characters move around the room, the GM will mark their start point, their end point (with directional orientation), & a line between them. In each round, each time a line is crossed by another, they will have bumped into each other while moving. After any exchanges occur, they will continue to their previously declared end point on the map (even if they crawl there with their last breath). Then, at the end of the turn, each character involved in a crossing event that turn may declare a new end of turn orientation in response to the new event.

Characters that are not Blind may:
• Move around the room as normal.
• Choose if crossing a path line from a Blind character would cause an event. – However, if the Blinded character ends a movement action on an adjacent tile, attacks may be declared.
• Use a free stealth attack against any Blinded character each round.
• Roll defense normally if a Blind character attacks them or tries to use any stealth attack against them – Even if the Blind character won a stealth roll against them.

Low Light Conditions

Low Light is not as scary. Honestly, not even worth mention… but people will ask, & some GM’s may wish to employ it. So here it is…

When a character is effected by low light conditions it falls on a gradient. Generally it will be represented as a scale of 1-100. These numbers reflect how far you can identify a target in tiles. The lower the number, the darker it is. Even “Low Light 1” will at least let you identify your allies before you typically swing on them with a melee weapon.

“Low Light 0” on this scale is treated as total Darkness.

The bonus for characters rolling stealth in low light is: +1 added to their roll for each tile beyond the Low Light value they are versus their target.

You can make range & projectile attacks at twice (2x) the declared Low Light level without penalty. So there is still room for hasty mistakes. But if you’re in “Low Light 20” or higher, generally you’ll know who you’re shooting at. Some races may get Low Light immunity as a bonus. Races that have Dark Vision are immune to Low Light effects.

The penalty for attacking a target greater than 2x the Low Light [Level] will be: The defending character will get a bonus added to their roll of 1 for each tile past the threshold they are.

Example: Environment is Low Light 2. At 2 tiles you can identify other characters. The unpenalized range is 4 tiles. Player A is 15 tiles from Player B. The range of the Bow is 15 tiles. Player A shoots an arrow at Player B. Player B adds (15-4) 11 to their defense roll against the incoming projectile. Player A misses. Player B viciously mocks Player A.

Light Sources

A lit campfire, torch, or candle will project a 5-tile radius of bright light and a secondary 10-tile radius of Low Light 1. A candle without a lamp is susceptible to being put out from wind, or attacks, or many other clever ideas allowed by your GM. The campfire, torch, & candle housed in a hurricane lamp would be much more difficult to put out (possibly taking several rounds).

The graph below shows a typical light spread from a light source. LS = Light Source, BL = Bright Light, L1 = Low Light: 1, AD = Absolute Darkness.