De acordo com D & D 3.5 FAQ , um personagem pode distinguir contraste com visão no escuro .
Does darkvision allow a character to read and write in the dark? Can he see his reflection in a mirror?
Darkvision is described as the “ability to see with no light source at all” (DMG 292). This suggests that a character with darkvision can read, write, and otherwise perform a normal range of actions despite being in complete darkness.
The simplest answer to the mirror question is yes. To avoid delving too deeply into real-world physics—something it’s best to resist, particularly in fantasy gaming—it’s easiest to treat darkvision as allowing a character to perceive anything that a normal person could see with light.
Houve uma idéia por aí durante a corrida de 3e que os anões não conseguiam ler pergaminhos com visão no escuro porque não podiam discernir as cores. Esta ideia pode vir de edições anteriores, em que a infravisão era literalmente visão térmica. Por exemplo, na primeira edição do AD & D:
They do not "see" things which are the same temperature as their surroundings. Thus, a room in a dungeon might look completely blank, as walls, floor, ceiling and possibly even some wooden furniture within are all of the same temperature.
AD & D 2ª edição manteve isso como uma regra opcional:
...characters can see the degrees of heat radiated by an object as a glowing blob translated into colors like a thermagram... Does the ink of a page radiate heat differently enough from the paper to be noticed? Probably not.