Wizard spell refresh under variant rest rules

[Estrillian]

In my current 5E game I am using one of the variant rest rules from the DMG. Short rests are easy to get (you aren't limited to 2 a day), but an overnight camp is still only a Short Rest. (You still need to sleep to avoid exhaustion). To get a Long Rest you need to spend a day or more in a place of comfort and safety.

Last night my Wizard player asked me whether their Arcane Recovery reset every actual day, or only when they had a Long Rest. After looking at the text (which definitely says "once a day, after a short rest" and makes no mention of Long Rests) I ruled that yes, they could recover some slots every day. But I am unsure if that was the right call.

Pros :

Barring archetype abilities, Wizards have no short-rest powers. Unlike the party Cleric (gets Divine Inspiration back) or Fighter (gets Action Surge and Second Wind back), they just get weaker and weaker in the 4-5 day periods between Long Rests in the wilderness. Letting them get a few spell slots back might help keep them competitive/happy.

Magic item charges also rest daily (not related to rests), so this isn't out of the realms of plausible, and creates an idea that Arcane Magic has a diurnal cycle of sorts.

Cons :

The ability may have been intended to work on Long Rests (default RAW has long rests = once a day). Getting more slots back could make the Wizard over-powered, especially when Wizard slots are worth more, on average, than a Divine Insp use (for example).

The party Ranger doesn't get anything back on Short Rests either, so is now even further behind by this ruling.

[Giant2005]

Forget the pros and cons. Take a look at the classes of the characters being played in the game and ask yourself if the ruling would piss any of them off (looking at you Warlock!).
If the ruling would piss off 1 or more of the other players, then don't use it. If it wouldn't piss anyone off, then do use it.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Forget the pros and cons. Take a look at the classes of the characters being played players in the game and ask yourself if the ruling would piss any of them off
Fixed that for you.

Is the wizard's player struggling with the limit on long rests? Is he having less fun because he feels like he needs to horde his spells?

[Estrillian]

Fixed that for you.

Is the wizard's player struggling with the limit on long rests? Is he having less fun because he feels like he needs to horde his spells?

Not that I can see, she rarely actually runs out of slots. And I don't have a Warlock in the party either. But you know, like any ruling it seems worth looking back at it afterwards to see if it was done right.

And of course the question isn't 100% about the variant rest rules. Any game could have a sequence of days in which no long rest is possible, and I guess the Wizard gets slots back on every one of them.

[MaxBoguely]

Seems to me like either way could be fine, depending on how you run the campaign. If you are sticking to 6-8 encounters per in-game week (or long rest), then restricting the wizard to one recovery per long rest makes sense. You're basically keeping the encounter pacing the same; you're just changing the length of in-game time between encounters. On the other hand, if you're using "gritty realism" in the sense that most days still bring the possibility of having something to do that might require the expenditure of resources (like spell slots), it's probably a good idea to give the wizard a chance to get a few slots back each day.

If you are running it in the latter style (stuff going on every day, finding a full week to rest is not trivial), the Ranger should be OK. He doesn't have features that say "You cannot do [thing] again until you complete a short rest," but he is still a martial-based class with specific features that make him good at intelligence-gathering and preventing the group from being surprised (which should be important if they are rarely at 100% strength). His class is built such that his at-will, "always on" stuff will be better than a wizard's (or cleric's, or whatever). This just means it's on you to throw enough stuff that needs to be done (whether it's combat or non-combat...hopefully a mix of both!) to make sure that the wizard doesn't always have plenty of slots to dominate all the encounters. Basically you create (strings of) encounters that require the various resources the party has. During those encounters (early in the day, or when there haven't been many issues recently), the casters may shine a bit more. But as the day draws to a close, the frail bookworms are getting tired, and the more soldier-esque members will carry the party until they can find a safe enough place to recharge.

To borrow the old mantra, it's all about building the story so that each character has its moments to shine!

[TheTeaMustFlow]

Fixed that for you.

Is the wizard's player struggling with the limit on long rests? Is he having less fun because he feels like he needs to horde his spells?

horde-ing spells sounds fun. :smalltongue: