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Archives of Nethys

Archives of Nethys

Pathfinder RPG (1st Edition) Pathfinder RPG (2nd Edition) Starfinder RPG

Rules Index | GM Screen | Player's Guide
Core Rulebook / Chapter 9: Playing the Game / General Rules / Perception

Concealment and Invisibility

Source Core Rulebook pg. 467 4.0
The concealed and invisible conditions reflect certain circumstances that can make a creature harder to see.

Concealed

Source Core Rulebook pg. 467 4.0
This condition protects a creature if it’s in mist, within dim light, or amid something else that obscures sight but does not provide a physical barrier to effects. An effect or type of terrain that describes an area of concealment makes all creatures within it concealed.

When you target a creature that’s concealed from you, you must attempt a DC 5 flat check before you roll to determine your effect. If you fail, you don’t affect the target. The concealed condition doesn’t change which of the main categories of detection apply to the creature. A creature in a light fog bank is still observed even though it’s concealed.

Invisible

Source Core Rulebook pg. 467 4.0
A creature with the invisible condition (by way of an invisibility spell or invisibility potion, for example) is automatically undetected to any creatures relying on sight as their only precise sense. Precise senses other than sight ignore the invisible condition.

You can use the Seek basic action to attempt to figure out an invisible creature’s location, making it instead only hidden from you. This lasts until the invisible creature successfully uses Sneak to become undetected again. If you’re already observing a creature when it becomes invisible, it starts out hidden, since you know where it was when it became invisible, though it can then Sneak to become undetected.

Other effects might make an invisible creature hidden or even observed but concealed. For instance, if you were tracking an invisible creature’s footprints through the snow, the footprints would make it hidden. Similarly, throwing a net over an invisible creature would make it observed but concealed for as long as the net is on the creature.