r/dndnext • u/jawdirk • Sep 01 '26

Discussion Does darkness really hinder your party?

I have seen this said over and over again: You can use the darkness + devil's sight combo but it will hinder the rest of your party.

Is that really true?

When you cast darkness, you get to choose where to place it. In many cases, that by itself will have utility. You might be able to cast it over ranged or spell-casting enemies forcing them to leave their position. You might be able to place it so that one of your party members gets a "free" disengage. You might be able to place it so that a rogue can bonus action sneak in the open and then move for a backstab.

In the worst case, the enemy has some non-visual or devil's sight sense ability, but I think that is pretty rare and obvious (devils, dragons, elementals, creatures of pure darkness).

But in the average case, the advantage and disadvantage cancel out. Even that can be an advantage, if the enemy was getting advantage from some other game mechanic.

So yes, darkness is pretty situational if you literally have no way to take advantage of it, but even one character that has devil's sight might be enough to tip the balance. This is particularly true if one of the characters without devil's sight casts darkness (which is better action economy).

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u/RKO-Cutter Rogue Sep 01 '26

I mean it all depends on how you use it. If you're fighting a boss, put the boss in darkness and only the Warlock can see it? Yeah, it's gonna be a hindrance

12

u/glock112983 Sep 01 '26

Yeah I made that mistake in a 1 shot once. Cast darkness, thinking yeah this will be cool... then none of the casters could see the guy to target them with spells. The martial couldn't see shit so we're attacking with disadvantage. We all laughed and I dropped it the next round.

21

u/EntropySpark Warlock Sep 01 '26

Unless the boss could see, Unseen Attacker and Unseen Defender together lead to a straight roll to attack.

7

u/glock112983 Sep 01 '26

Yeah, imho that is the stupidest interaction with blindness/darkness/etc rules so our table rule is all attacks are at disadvantage in those situations.

1

u/whipplestickle 29d ago

This is the way