dungeons and dragons

Exploration

Exploration involves delving into places that are dangerous and full of mystery.

Adventuring Equipment: As adventurers explore, their equipment can help them in many ways.  For example, they can reach out of the way places with a Ladder, perceive things they wouldn’t otherwise notice with a Troch or another light source, bypass locked doors and containers with Thieves tools, and create obstacles for pursuers with Caltrops.

Vision and Light: Some adventuring tasks – such as noticing danger, hitting an enemy, and targeting certain spells – are affected by sight, so effects that obscure vision can hinder you.

Obscured Areas: An area might be Lightly or Heavily Obscured.  In a Lightly Obscured area – such as an area with Dim Light, patchy fog, or moderate foliage – you have Disadvantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight.

A heavily obscured area – such as an area with Darkness, heavy fog, or dense foliage – is opaque.  You have the blinded condition when trying to see something there.

Light: The presence or absence of light determines the category of illumination in an area.

Bright Light: lets most creatures see normally.  Even in gloomy days provide Bright Light, as do torches, lanterns, fires, and other sources of illumination within a specific radius.

Dim Light: also called shadows, creates a lightly Obscured area.  An area of Dim Light is usually a boundary between Bright Light and surrounding Darkness.  The soft light of twilight and dawn also counts as Dim Light.  A full moon might bathe the land in Dim Light.

Darkness: creates a Heavily Obscured area.  Characters face Darkness outdoors at night (even most moonlit nights), within the confines of an unlit dungeon, or in an area of magical darkness.

Special Senses: Some creatures have special senses that help them perceive things in certain situation.

Blindsight, Darkvision, Tremorsense, Truesight.

Hiding: Adventurers and monsters often hide, whether to spy on one another, sneak past a guardian, or set an ambush.  The Dungeon Master decides when circumstances are appropriate for hiding.  When you try to hid, you take the hide action.

Interacting with Objects: Interacting with objects is often simple to resolve.  The player tells the DM that their character is doing something, such as moving a lever or opening a door, and the DM describes what happens.  Sometimes, however, rules govern what you can do with an object.

What is an object: For the purpose of the rules, an object is a discrete, inanimate, item, like a window, door, sword, table, chair, or stone.  it isn’t a building or a vehicle, which are composed of many objects.

Time Limited Object: When time is short, such as in combat, interactions with objects are limited: one free interaction per turn.  That interaction must occur during a creature’s movement or action. Any additional interactions require the Utilize action.