Enforcing the adventuring day

[Clumsyninja23]

Hey all, I've heard again and again about the game being balanced around 6-8 encounters a day (with 2-3 short rests). I understand all the balance concerns and everything like that. My problem is enforcing that adventuring day. I know a few basic stuff, like having some kind of "Doom Clock" to keep everything moving, but I can't do that all the time or it will seem forced.

I don't want to ruin players being careful, especially in creative ways or using resources (barricading themselves in a room, Tiny Hut, using a secret room for camp, etc), but with players as crafty as mine, they almost always find a reasonable way to rest safely. Does anyone have any tricks for this? (Or can point me to a thread/page that already exists? Didn't find one with a quick search)

[clash]

The easiest around all the rest issues is to make rests a resource. Short rests one kind of resource and long rests are another then players never take to many rests and if you remove side of the time restrictions they don't take too few either.

[EvilAnagram]

Hey all, I've heard again and again about the game being balanced around 6-8 encounters a day (with 2-3 short rests). I understand all the balance concerns and everything like that. My problem is enforcing that adventuring day. I know a few basic stuff, like having some kind of "Doom Clock" to keep everything moving, but I can't do that all the time or it will seem forced.

I don't want to ruin players being careful, especially in creative ways or using resources (barricading themselves in a room, Tiny Hut, using a secret room for camp, etc), but with players as crafty as mine, they almost always find a reasonable way to rest safely. Does anyone have any tricks for this? (Or can point me to a thread/page that already exists? Didn't find one with a quick search)

Two things:

1 - Remember that you can only benefit from a long rest once/day. If they've been adventuring for two hours and decide to pop a tiny hut, they get an eight hour nap, no long rest, and they have trouble sleeping that night so they once again get no long rest at the end of the day.

2 - The longer rest variant is really useful. It makes a short rest an overnight sleep, while a long rest is a week of downtime.

[Clumsyninja23]

@Clash: What exactly do you mean by this? Like literally saying "You have 4 long rests and 10 short rests for this adventure"? Or what?

[Clumsyninja23]

@Evil: I didn't remember that first one! That'll be handy. Not too keen on longer rest periods, but I'll keep that in my back pocket.

[imanidiot]

Hey all, I've heard again and again about the game being balanced around 6-8 encounters a day (with 2-3 short rests). I understand all the balance concerns and everything like that. My problem is enforcing that adventuring day. I know a few basic stuff, like having some kind of "Doom Clock" to keep everything moving, but I can't do that all the time or it will seem forced.

I don't want to ruin players being careful, especially in creative ways or using resources (barricading themselves in a room, Tiny Hut, using a secret room for camp, etc), but with players as crafty as mine, they almost always find a reasonable way to rest safely. Does anyone have any tricks for this? (Or can point me to a thread/page that already exists? Didn't find one with a quick search)

I tune my encounters under the assumption that the PCs will be at full strength for the encounter even if its their 2nd or 3rd of the day. Too often even low level combat becomes boring because the DM doesn't want to be a "killer DM" and makes it too easy. If you never have a TPK you're not making it hard enough to be challenging. (Now if challenging isn't what you're going for that's another story)

I tend to use the same type of tactics that my PCs use. Every hostile group always tries to surprise them and if they can't they most often try to retreat and regroup. This tends leave a lot of stragglers shadowing the PCs ready to ambush them if they are weakened by another encounter or try to rest.

My suggestion is to remember that your monsters aren't static bots that wait patiently for the PCs to come to them. They patrol their territory. They have guards posted. And if those guards don't check in they go find them, and they bring the heavies when they come. If your PCs try to sneak in a long rest when you need them to keep moving, you punish them. Bonus points if they burned up all their spell slots first.

Nothing in the PHB is a secret to everybody. Your PCs are not clever. Monsters can find secret rooms and Dispel secret huts just like the PCs can. In fact, they probably already know about the secret room, they live in the dungeon.

Taking a long rest in a dungeon should be a last resort, not Plan A. There is no reasonable way to rest "safely" in a dungeon. The PCs shouldn't ever be safe. Professional dungeoneering is an inherently unsafe activity.

The PCs want to win. Mostly, they even want you to let them win. But they want it to seem like you're fighting back at least. And if no one ever dies it doesn't seem dangerous no matter what else you do.

The PCs rest when you say they rest. If they break the rule, let them. Let them get away with, several times. Then ambush them in the middle of the night with a gang of bugbears. Or a ghoul drags off and eats whoever they left standing watch. Or drow do any number of drowy things to them.

[KorvinStarmast]

Nothing in the PHB is a secret to everybody. Your PCs are not clever. they may be clever, but there aren't the only clever ones

Monsters can find secret rooms and Dispel secret huts just like the PCs can. In fact, they probably already know about the secret room, they live in the dungeon. Yeah, but some don't.

Taking a long rest in a dungeon should be a last resort, not Plan A. There is no reasonable way to rest "safely" in a dungeon. The PCs shouldn't ever be safe. Professional dungeoneering is an inherently unsafe activity. Needs to be written in the PHB's next release ...


The PCs rest when you say they rest. If they break the rule, let them. Let them get away with, several times. Then ambush them in the middle of the night with a gang of bugbears. Or a ghoul drags off and eats whoever they left standing watch. Or drow do any number of drowy things to them. A real DM. Cool! :smallbiggrin:
If there is no chance to fail, there is no success.

[mgshamster]

Remember that the 6-8 figure is for medium encounters. Is can be anywhere from 2-32, depending on the difficulty (fewer deadly encounters, more easy encounters).

You should mix them up. Sometimes having few encounters, sometimes many. Sometimes none.

So long as ~50% of your adventuring days (not every day, just adventuring day) have many encounters, your players will never know when to expend resources and when not to. And then they won't nova and do a 5 minute adventuring day.

It also depends on your PCs. If you don't have any short rest dependent classes, it's less important to have short rests. But if you have even one, then it is important to spread out the challenges and give them short rests.

[Armored Walrus]

Remember that the adventurers live in a living world. While they are taking 4 days to go through that dungeon, stuff's happening. Just because the module you're using or the adventure you wrote has this monster here, that one there doesn't mean it's realistic to assume that if the PC's hang around for 8 hours that they won't move around in the meantime. If they're all sitting in a tiny hut, a goblin patrol is going to find it, alert the rest of the clan, and surround the thing with bows.

Can you do that every single time? Probably not, but it should only take one time.

Edit: Ok, so they react to that by leaving the dungeon completely, go back to town, and rest there. First, the innkeeper's going to give them a look, "thought you were going to go delve that dungeon. Some adventurers..." Second, while they're gone, the goblins find their dead comrade, and the PC's come back to find the place booby trapped and abandoned, with all the loot gone. Or walled off and manned by goblins sitting behind arrow slits. Or filled with the goblins' big brothers, the hobgoblins, that were fetched via runner as soon as the PCs left the dungeon.

[mephnick]

Just say "you only get the benefits of 2 short rests per long rest, deal with it. "

Yeah it's gamey but people are too afraid to lay down rules that will help their game. If it were a boardgame no one would bat an eye at a restriction like that.

Yeah, yeah "immersion", whatever.

[Armored Walrus]

Yeah, yeah "immersion", whatever.

Honestly it would break immersion more for me if I could just nap anytime I felt like it in a hostile environment with no consequences.

[LordVonDerp]

Two things:

1 - Remember that you can only benefit from a long rest once/day. If they've been adventuring for two hours and decide to pop a tiny hut, they get an eight hour nap, no long rest, and they have trouble sleeping that night so they once again get no long rest at the end of the day.

Taking a long rest doesn't require sleeping.

[CantigThimble]

Honestly, what I see more often than players trying to interject short rests where they don't belong is that once you pop any sort of doom-clock on PCs they will push themselves basically to death because they feel a sense of urgency. Unless you get to the point where you literally can barely stand then taking a 1 hour break in a high-stress time dependent situation just doesn't make any sense.

I think the most effective way to run things would be to make short rests 5 minutes, but only let them take 2 per day. But that exacerbates the immersion problem.

[Waterdeep Merch]

I'm gonna echo everyone saying that taking that many rests outside of civilization should be an innately dangerous plan. A great doom clock that won't feel forced is "All of the monsters know you're here now. They've made plenty of preparations thanks to the four full rests you decided to offer them".

Plan for reinforcements that will arrive at the dungeon if they keep dragging their feet. Traps that get laid once the monsters know they're coming. Ambushes that are going to mess up the rogue since they've gotten plenty of time to realize there's a scout. Anti-magic strategies and traps to stop that wizard. A plan to deny the fighter his sword. Let the place spike in danger the longer they remain, possibly culminating in the more intelligent foes up and leaving if they feel like there's no reasonable way they can stop the PC's.

Then once they leave, they collapse the whole place on their heads. Leomund's Tiny Hut has limits.

[MarkVIIIMarc]

If they lock themselves in a secret room to sneak in a rest, roll a dice.
Next time they do it, roll another dice and have someone come to the secret room to get the mop, or old paint, or mortar, telescope or whatever out. That will start a running encounter.

[Sigreid]

IMO you don't really have to enforce it. What you have to do is make it clear that the players are not in total control of how many fights are going to occur per rest. In a dungeon, in particular, it is very likely that if you try to take even a short rest you will find yourself engaged.

If the players get used to the idea that there may be more fights than they have planned for, they'll start truing to maximize their resources. some days they won't use all of them. Some days they'll be running on empty. Such uncertainty is what adventures are made of.

BTY, a few things about LTH. It's fun to have strong opponents stack heavy things on top of it. And by RAW, anything the party shoots out of the hut the mobs can shoot back into it. They may be at disadvantage, but why wouldn't they.

[BestPlayer]

I'm not clear on why you need to enforce this number of encounters? Unless there is some reason why the characters have to rush around, why can't they take their time if they want? Run it organically. Resting and taking more time doing things however results in more food eaten, things perhaps happening in the background, like reinforcements arriving or dungeons restocking and more random encounters. If things are too easy for them when they are allowed to take their time, make those encounters they do have more challenging.

[SharkForce]

i think it bears repeating that you don't *force* the full load of encounters every day no matter what. if they find a way to avoid an encounter that doesn't involve combat, don't force it on them just for the sake of balance. if they're not in a situation where there should be 6-8 encounters per long rest, don't force that either (there might even be days where there are no encounters at all sometimes).

let your players be creative and inventive... but remember that the monsters are fighting for their lives too; this is their home, and they're going to fight dirty to protect it, as has already been said. once they notice the presence of an invading force, expect them to make it as hard for that invading force as they possibly can. expect them to stop sending scouts in groups of two, and start traveling in groups of ten. traps that might normally not be active for the sake of convenience should be active. ambush positions should be set up. patrols should be out looking for the PCs, and trackers should be trying to find out where they rest. perhaps important resources will be poisoned or otherwise made useless. fortifications should be manned much more faithfully, stuff that the monsters have been saving for when they need it should no longer be saved (like that potion of giant strength that was in the armory waiting for a fight that needed it), if they can call for help expect them to do so, and so on. if there are ways the monster can expend resources that might otherwise be treasure in such a way as to make it harder for the party, expect the monsters to do so. in extreme situations where the party takes a long time clearing a dungeon (like, several days) but nothing the inhabitants do seems to work, expect the inhabitants to take everything they can, and run away while the party is resting. if they're fighting small creatures, expect large open passageways that the creatures don't need to be made as unusuable as possible (the stairs have been greased, but a small 1.5 foot diameter hole at the top and bottom of the stairs is connected by a tunnel that most of the party would need to use the squeezing rules to get through... but the kobolds they're facing can fight in it much more comfortably, and without facing the entire group at once, not to mention the person in the back won't be able to turn around to defend themselves except by kicking...). if the monsters are large, expect them to set up obstacles that are harder for small creatures to deal with (heavy objects block ing the way, or the tools needed to easily bypass an obstacle are in plain sight but 15 feet off the ground). have the monsters in the dungeon plan for when they're attacked as well; when they know there's someone stalking the halls killing small groups, expect them to set up a system to call for help, or retreat to those fortified positions they've set up. and they should be prepared for that; each group should carry something to sound an alarm, and have something to delay people chasing them (marbles, caltrops, burning oil flasks, whatever). if the monsters have spellcasters, expect them to make use of them... instead of facing a typical monster manual drow mage, the mage has changed up spell lists based on what information has been gathered about the party (and that's another thing... try to have some monsters escape. they can fight again later, and perhaps most importantly, they can let the other monsters know what they're up against). and especially if that mage has access to some spells that can be used during downtime to help, then do so... magic mouth spells that announce their presence, glyphs of warding, planar bound elementals, whatever it takes. bonus points if some of the treasure is kept in the form of expensive material components that are consumed by those spells, which the monsters don't set up under normal conditions because 100 gp to fry the next runaway slave that tries to get past the guard post is not a good investment of resources when the guards could have just re-captured that slave :P

a dungeon should not be on high alert all the time. but it should have a low alert, and a high alert status, and if the PCs give them enough time to realize what they're up against, expect the dungeon to be on high alert status. but the key there is to make sure that there is that low alert status as well as the high alert status... nobody should be living in a place where a single mistep can easily kill you 24/7, but when they're under attack, expect them to arm every trap that is normally not armed, build barricades that are taken down for convenience sake when not needed, retract the retractable bridge, and so on. think dwarf fortress; you'd be crazy to put an always-on trap in a main hallway, but you'd almost be crazy to *not* put a trap that can be turned on and off so that you can retreat all of your dwarves to safety while the main hallway trap is turned on to kill that ridiculous half-octopus firebreathing steel giant that just showed up.

if you want more ideas, try setting up an adventure every now and then where the party has the chance to prepare a position against an attack... let them know a small army of goblins (more than they could handle in a straight-up fight) is going to be raiding the town in a week or whatever, give them the support of the town's craftpeople and a workforce of semi-skilled labourers, and see what kind of tricks the party thinks up to even the playing field.

[Psikerlord]

This is a fundamental design problem of 5e. The eastiest "fix" is to use the 1week long rest and 8 hr short rest variant. This has the downside of changing the balance of the classes however, making long rest classes significantly weaker. Still, it's better than the default. The short answer is this isnt easily fixed. I find the game works ok with 8 hr long rest if you throw 2-3 really big fights at them each day, but this gets a bit samey, and is unrealistic for wilderness treks and most city adventures.

LFG solved this problem by making short rests 5 mins, 3/24 hrs max with a check required (ie no automatic recoveries), 1d6 day long rests (1d4 in an inn or similar) and a diminishing Luck mechanic. All LFG classes have the same refresh mechanic, ie all classes benefit from short/long rests in a similar way. Combined with random encounters, this setup enables and encourages the PCs to push on with an adventure, not look for a place to camp/refresh.

[Malifice]

Hey all, I've heard again and again about the game being balanced around 6-8 encounters a day (with 2-3 short rests). I understand all the balance concerns and everything like that. My problem is enforcing that adventuring day. I know a few basic stuff, like having some kind of "Doom Clock" to keep everything moving, but I can't do that all the time or it will seem forced.

I don't want to ruin players being careful, especially in creative ways or using resources (barricading themselves in a room, Tiny Hut, using a secret room for camp, etc), but with players as crafty as mine, they almost always find a reasonable way to rest safely. Does anyone have any tricks for this? (Or can point me to a thread/page that already exists? Didn't find one with a quick search)

Doom clock (as you mention above) is one method:

You must [slay/ capture/ recover] the [BBEG/ Mcguffin] by [time X] or else [bad thing Y] happens

For a variant of the above, instead of a punishment for failure, use a reward for success:

If you [slay/ capture/ recover] the [BBEG/ Mcguffin] by [time X] you get [reward Y].

Both of these methods are fantastic, and the put the PCs on advance notice of what the [succeed/ fail] conditions of the quest are. But even in quests where the PCs have no advance knowledge of the above, still turn your mind to this question. Just like in real life, the clock should amost always be ticking.

Consider reactive BBEG's. What does the BBEG do if/while the party rest?

Remember, he (the BBEG) probably isnt stupid. If his minions report that dungeon rooms 1-5 hve been attacked by adventurers, who have now left, expect him to do something about it. This ranges from reinforcing those rooms with more monsters, come looking for the PCs, or even simply leave the dungeon (resulting in a quest auto-fail).

At mid to high level (when the PCs develop more methods to rest safely via Leomunds and Mordekainens hut/ mansion) the BBEG is likely a caster himself (or has one 'on staff'). He can use divination magic to locate the PCs, and Dispel magic to interrupt their rest with a rude surprise!

Also; have the PC's previously pissed off a powerful (demon/ devil/ caster/ evil church/ necromancer)? No PC can get to high level without making a large number of very powerful enemies. Have those guys show up (plane shifting into the PCs magnificent mansion or dispelling their precious hut) and hit them hard.

Also dont be afraid to hand out some single or 1-3 encounter adventuring days (often ones that feature 'deadly' encounters) from time to time of course. This gives your Wizards, Casters, Barbarians and Paladins the chance to shine.

OTOH every now and then design an encounter that gives the PCs waves of encounters throughout the day, with opportunities to short rest, but no opportunities to long rest (push 10+ encounters on them, within several hours). This gives Fighters, Warlocks and Monks the chance to shine.

Finally; throw them a curveball once every now and then. Set up what looks like its only a single encounter day (they'll probably nova the hell out of it), and THEN put a quest in front of them that requires another 6 encounters they didnt plan for.

Using a combination of the above techniques (surprise longer adventuring days, reactive enemies, putting them on the clock, mixing things up) mean your players will naturally self regulate (holding spells, rages and smites in reserve) never knowing if there is another ancounter around the corner.

You'll 'know' when you get it right. You'll see players thinking about what the BBEG is up to, pushing themselves to finish the quest while low on resources, being reluctant to rest, and holding back on nova strikes to keep some petrol in the tank.

Its more of an art than a science.

[Malifice]

I'm not clear on why you need to enforce this number of encounters?

Because the game is balanced around a median 'adventuring day' of 6-8 encounters, and 2-3 short rests.

The adventuring 'day' doesnt need to be a day. Its just the span of time between two long rests. Your DM could be using the 'gritty realism' variant which makes a long rest a whole week in town (for example). The latter makes the adventuring 'day' likely last a whole month of actual game time.

If your ampaign 'meta' allows fewer short rests between long rests, then fighters and warlocks suck. If your 'meta' gives fewer encounters between long rests, paladins, barbarians and full casters are too strong. If you do both (1-3 encounter adventurng days, with few if any short rests) then casters (and barbarians and paladins) rule the roost, and encounters are waaaay too easy (because the PCs can safely nova the crap out of them).

DnD is (at its core) a resource management game (hit points, hit dice, spell slots, rages, action surge, superiority dice, channel divinty, charges, ki points, sorcery points, xp, gp etc). The DMs job is to ensure the players are challenged while not being routinely overwhelmed nor having too easy a time of it. That being true, one of the central jobs of the DM is to police PC resource use (police the adventuring day). If you as DM dont do it, you mess with class balance and encounter difficulty (and also turn your game into rather boring 'rocket tag', where many classes are invalidated).

[mephnick]

I tried to change to the gritty realism variant for Storm King's Thunder Ch.3 so I didn't have to run 12 combats every time they walked to a new village to balance out the classes.

They said no.

Well I didn't really feel like playing SKT for 20 years, so now I dump the entire day's XP into every single encounter and someone almost dies every day and the short rest classes are complaining they never get short rests.

They'll figure it out eventually.

[mgshamster]

I tried to change to the gritty realism variant for Storm King's Thunder Ch.3 so I didn't have to run 12 combats every time they walked to a new village to balance out the classes.

They said no.

Well I didn't really feel like playing SKT for 20 years, so now I dump the entire day's XP into every single encounter and someone almost dies every day and the short rest classes are complaining they never get short rests.

They'll figure it out eventually.

Alternatively, you can change all short rest features to 3/LR features (or multiply by 3, in the case of monk and warlock , and then remove short rests from the game.

[mephnick]

Alternatively, you can change all short rest features to 3/LR features (or multiply by 3, in the case of monk and warlock , and then remove short rests from the game.

Also an idea I've floated around various forums and am downvoted to hell for (if there are downvotes to vote). The short rest/long rest class design of 5e is its weakest moment. God forbid I try to work around it.

[mgshamster]

Also an idea I've floated around various forums and am downvoted to hell for (if there are downvotes to vote). The short rest/long rest class design of 5e is its weakest moment. God forbid I try to work around it.

I'm planing to play TofYP as a way to test out variant rules.

I want to play one chapter each with the two rest variants. And then also one where I eliminate short rests. See what happens, ya know? Lots of stuff I want to try.

[Malifice]

I tried to change to the gritty realism variant for Storm King's Thunder Ch.3 so I didn't have to run 12 combats every time they walked to a new village to balance out the classes.

They said no.

I'd say: 'Its gritty realism, or find another DM. Your move players.'


Well I didn't really feel like playing SKT for 20 years, so now I dump the entire day's XP into every single encounter and someone almost dies every day and the short rest classes are complaining they never get short rests.

No offence, but thats pretty lazy DMing. Its your job to police the Adventuring day.

Is there any reason you cant just say 'No' or 'You can rest, but you get nothing back' when they want to rest?

You've kind of chosen to police the adventuring day by letting the players dictate to you the campaigns rules (first mistake), then crammed a full days XP into a single encounter knowing it will kill PCs, create rocket tag, and screw over half your players who choose short rest classes (second mistake) in the hope that they will 'learn' their folly with such punishment and beg you to implement the gritty realism variant.

If you cant be bothered enforcing the 6-8 encounter/ 2-3 short rest adventuring day under the games default resting rules (and its your job to do this as DM) then you are well within your rights to implement the gritty realism variant, regardless of what the players think about it.

If all else fails, sit down with your players and tell them (dont ask them, tell them) that you are implementing a milestone system where they get long rests after every 6th encounter, and short rests every 2 (or whatever method you want to use to police the adventuring day). You re doing so in the intrests of class and encounter balance (and to respond to player complaints and frequent deaths).

If they complain, shrug your shoulders and offer one of them to DM. Its non negotiable. Its your campaign man; dont let the players dictate to you what the rules are.

[Psikerlord]

Alternatively, you can change all short rest features to 3/LR features (or multiply by 3, in the case of monk and warlock , and then remove short rests from the game.

I agree putting everyone onto the same refresh rate will work better. Then adopt 1 week = long rest.

[Decstarr]

I agree with everything Malifice said.

Why don't you just talk to your players before you start a session? When we played the LMoP and were all newbies, we used all our resources and took a rest. CONSTANTLY. The DM - himself a beginner - just asked us not to do that anymore and talked about resource management and from that point on, taking ANY kind of rest outside of our main base was a total no-go and never happened again.

My players took one rest in a dungeon ONCE. Happened to have been a mission in which they were supposed to save a few children from a ritual to turn a dragon into a dracolich. They overcame the really hard dungeon, were outside the ritual chamber, heard the chants and got scared since they blew almost everything on the dungeon. So they went for a quick rest in an easily defensible position - they had killed EVERYONE who wasn't part of the ritual and I figured the BBEG was to busy becoming a lich to pay much attention, so they got away with the rest. The owned that last encounter - fighter had saved Action Surge and got all his BM maneuvers back - but surprise, all the children were dead. That made for a pretty emotional moment when they returned to the village and had to talk to the parents. That was the last time my players ever took a rest in a dungeon. And they also talk about opening up an orphanage in their main city, which made the evil DM tear up just a little bit...

What I'm trying to say is: Talk to them and be creative to discourage rests during dungeons and/or award not resting/finishing quests quickly. I feel like reasoning with the players or awarding them is almost always a better way to get them to behave than flat out punishing them. After all, encounter balance is balanced around the number of rests which means if they rest more often, you will have to up the difficulty which in turn will lead to an increased risk of them biting the dust. I'm sure most players should understand.

Then there's the point of gritty realism that was mentioned before that you simply might need to tell your players about: Put yourself in your PCs shoes. You just killed half a mansion worth of Kobolds, you know there's a supposedly super strong spell caster somewhere, would you really just lock yourself in a room and sleep for X hours? I don't think ANYONE would do that unless some of their friends are about to die from their wounds and need to be looked after maybe.

And if this all fails, you have 2 choices: You either let them - its your game after all and therefore your decision - or you devise some nice plans to show them that even leomund's isn't as save as they think. It is a dangerous world and unless they're really high level already, there is a lot of things way way stronger than they are that might want to come and hurt them. Personally, I don't see the harm if they enjoy being crafty in their rests as long as you manage to keep the encounters dangerous and interesting, I don't really see a problem. If the players are happy and the DM isn't unhappy, that's a pretty decent scenario in my book :-)

[Malifice]

I agree with everything Malifice said.

Why don't you just talk to your players before you start a session? When we played the LMoP and were all newbies, we used all our resources and took a rest. CONSTANTLY. The DM - himself a beginner - just asked us not to do that anymore and talked about resource management and from that point on, taking ANY kind of rest outside of our main base was a total no-go and never happened again.

My players took one rest in a dungeon ONCE. Happened to have been a mission in which they were supposed to save a few children from a ritual to turn a dragon into a dracolich. They overcame the really hard dungeon, were outside the ritual chamber, heard the chants and got scared since they blew almost everything on the dungeon. So they went for a quick rest in an easily defensible position - they had killed EVERYONE who wasn't part of the ritual and I figured the BBEG was to busy becoming a lich to pay much attention, so they got away with the rest. The owned that last encounter - fighter had saved Action Surge and got all his BM maneuvers back - but surprise, all the children were dead. That made for a pretty emotional moment when they returned to the village and had to talk to the parents. That was the last time my players ever took a rest in a dungeon. And they also talk about opening up an orphanage in their main city, which made the evil DM tear up just a little bit...

What I'm trying to say is: Talk to them and be creative to discourage rests during dungeons and/or award not resting/finishing quests quickly. I feel like reasoning with the players or awarding them is almost always a better way to get them to behave than flat out punishing them. After all, encounter balance is balanced around the number of rests which means if they rest more often, you will have to up the difficulty which in turn will lead to an increased risk of them biting the dust. I'm sure most players should understand.

Then there's the point of gritty realism that was mentioned before that you simply might need to tell your players about: Put yourself in your PCs shoes. You just killed half a mansion worth of Kobolds, you know there's a supposedly super strong spell caster somewhere, would you really just lock yourself in a room and sleep for X hours? I don't think ANYONE would do that unless some of their friends are about to die from their wounds and need to be looked after maybe.

And if this all fails, you have 2 choices: You either let them - its your game after all and therefore your decision - or you devise some nice plans to show them that even leomund's isn't as save as they think. It is a dangerous world and unless they're really high level already, there is a lot of things way way stronger than they are that might want to come and hurt them. Personally, I don't see the harm if they enjoy being crafty in their rests as long as you manage to keep the encounters dangerous and interesting, I don't really see a problem. If the players are happy and the DM isn't unhappy, that's a pretty decent scenario in my book :-)

Spot on mate.

Just talk to your players. Tell them that the game works best around X encounters per adventuring day, and that you would appreciate it if everyone could come to an agreement that they dont try and game the system.

A gentlemans agreement is all it takes.

And if that doesnt work for some reason, you have deeper problems at your table.

[MrStabby]

I run a doom clock, but at the strategic level. The PCs know they can often take more rests and trivialize a dungeon. I am fine with this. As days go by the world is going to hell and if they waste time then the world is getting much tougher.

[mephnick]

I'd say: 'Its gritty realism, or find another DM. Your move players.'

If they complain, shrug your shoulders and offer one of them to DM. Its non negotiable. Its your campaign man; dont let the players dictate to you what the rules are.

In my home campaign, yes, I do this. My way or the highway. Unfortunately we all chipped in for the book so people are getting uppity.



If you cant be bothered enforcing the 6-8 encounter/ 2-3 short rest adventuring day under the games default resting rules (and its your job to do this as DM) then you are well within your rights to implement the gritty realism variant, regardless of what the players think about it..

If you haven't run SKT, it is literally impossible to run under the default rules and have more than one encounter per long rest during a majority of the game unless you want to play forever.

I guess I'll just have to put my foot down and either save or kill the campaign.

[Malifice]

If you haven't run SKT, it is literally impossible to run under the default rules and have more than one encounter per long rest during a majority of the game unless you want to play forever.

Why cant you impose time limits on the various chapters, and on the various mini-dungeons in the module?

I mean there is a BBEG for the whole book, and 'mini' BBEG's for each chapter or so, plus a fair few 'zoomed' in dungeon areas (where 6-8/2-3 is easily enforced).

When you're planning during the week (and every DM should be doing at least 2 hours mid week to plan for the weekends session) turn your mind to a time limit for the session. Then put the PCs on the clock. Also design a few encounters so the PCs ger 2-3 encounters in a row (instead of just the one).

Put them on the clock and mix it up by surprising them.

If there is a dungeon they need to hit at some point (and I assume there are many in SKT) then have a 'random' encounter trigger the dungeon. Then contrive a reason to get the PCs to the dungeon and have to deal with another 7-8 encounters before (time X) or else bad thing Y (the 'end-game BBEG powers up, or shows up to do bad things for example) happens.

Push an 8+ encounter day on them (with plenty of opportunity for short rests, but none to long rest). Do this every now and then and they will naturally withold from nova strikes.


I guess I'll just have to put my foot down and either save or kill the campaign.

I havent read SKT but I'm sure it features many (at least half a dozen) 'dungeons' or zoomed in areas featuring monsters packed reasonably close together. During the week when doing your planning, contrive a time limit for those areas (they need to [kill the BBEG/ save the NPC/ recover the macguffin] by [time X] or else [bad thing Y] happens). Its super easy to do.

For example, Im running Age of Worms (converted to 5E) with a few old school modules thrown in. Some examples:

1) Encounter at Blackwall keep: Defend the keep from a siege at night featuring waves of monsters and no long rests (part 1), and then save the captured NPC sorceress by midnight or else the Lizard folk eat her (part 2).
2) White plume mountain: You have 24 hours to get to the mountain and recover the three weapons... before the Archmage Keraptis returns! (The mountain is designed to be reachable in 19 hours, giving the PCs 5 hours to locate all three weapons. Put them on the clock - they have time for 2 hours of adventuring and 3 short rests... if they hurry! Every minute spent figuring out the puzzles or going slow in the trap rooms leads to less opportunity to short rest...

Etc, etc etc.

[mephnick]

Why cant you impose time limits on the various chapters, and on the various mini-dungeons in the module?

The chapter which is mostly travel (which basically takes up half the campaign) pretty much says "let them explore the sword coast at their leisure" and would have to be completely rewritten to impose any meaningful time limits, though I could think of a few sidequests where I could throw some in for sure and have been where I can. (competing parties going for the same wanted man etc..)



I havent read SKT but I'm sure it features many (at least half a dozen) 'dungeons' or zoomed in areas featuring monsters packed reasonably close together.

No spoilers, but as written there are actually only 3 (though you can do more of the optional ones if you want to extend the campaign) and the first is the prologue and the third doesn't really count if you do it right. So 90% of the game is not easily enforceable exploration areas.

Again, I have no problem enforcing the adventuring day in my own games. Mostly my players have never DM'd, don't understand how the system is balanced and got scared because the first real fight was pretty tough. So when I said I was switching the rest system I got shut down.

I just find SKT is completely at odds with how WotC designed their game. It's got some great ideas, but I'll probably never buy another campaign book. I can run D&D better than they can.

[Malifice]

The chapter which is mostly travel (which basically takes up half the campaign) pretty much says "let them explore the sword coast at their leisure" and would have to be completely rewritten to impose any meaningful time limits, though I could think of a few sidequests where I could throw some in for sure and have been where I can. (competing parties going for the same wanted man etc..)

Sidequests or multiple encounters in a day (and maybe even one or two at night disrupting a long rest) are an effective method of putting multiple encounters in an adventuring day.

Remember. Its totally fine to have the occasional single encounter adventuring day. You want to mix it up and give the paladins, barbs and casters a chance to shine. Youre also not trying to ram 6-8 down their throats every day. You just need to create the atmosphere that there might be another encounter coming (to make them hold back a bit on nova strikes). When they do nova strike; dont be afraid to throw another (harder) encounter at them straight away.

IMG I attacked a 15th level party with half a dozen advanced Bulettes as a random encounter. Then (as they were finished and were about to head off) an Ancient Green Dragon (which was hunting the land sharks) swooped down to attack from the skies.

That caught them totally by surprise.


No spoilers, but as written there are actually only 3 (though you can do more of the optional ones if you want to extend the campaign) and the first is the prologue and the third doesn't really count if you do it right. So 90% of the game is not easily enforceable exploration areas.

Only 3 'dungeons' or 'dungeon like' areas in the whole AP taking you to 15th?

Wut?

[Malifice]

The green dragon encounter resulted in a TPK (barring the swashbuckler) by the way.

Next time they'll be holding something back.

[mephnick]

Only 3 'dungeons' or 'dungeon like' areas in the whole AP taking you to 15th?

Wut?

Well it really only takes you 5-12 if you skip the prologue. It's a travel campaign with milestone leveling. There are big setpiece fights and a couple dungeons, but it's mostly travel. Like I say, you could easily place
3-8 encounters on every day..if you want 40 encounters between every town and have the campaign last 5 years of your life.

It's an ok adventure if you're fine with nova encounters, but I can't believe not one review mentioned that the design is completely at odds with 5e's balance design.

[Malifice]

Well it really only takes you 5-12 if you skip the prologue. It's a travel campaign with milestone leveling. There are big setpiece fights and a couple dungeons, but it's mostly travel. Like I say, you could easily place
3-8 encounters on every day..if you want 40 encounters between every town and have the campaign last 5 years of your life.

It's an ok adventure if you're fine with nova encounters, but I can't believe not one review mentioned that the design is completely at odds with 5e's balance design.

You're not supposed to have half a dozen or so encounters every day. Probably only around 50% of the time.

[Grod_The_Giant]

"Doom clocks" have always struck me as a poor solution to the "15 minute workday" problem.

Keeping careful track of time is a pain in the ass for DMs who already have enough to do-- but if you don't keep careful track, you're basically just throwing out an arbitrary "delay too much and bad things will happen" threat.
Once in a while makes sense, but if literally every problem is "you have X days to do this before Y thing happens," it'll get real obvious real fast.
They're finicky to set up, because you have to figure out how long it'll take your players to clear the challenges. Too little leeway and one mistake can ruin everything (quite possibly several weeks down the line); too much and the whole point collapses.
The whole idea is railroady-- you're basically telling your players "no, you will do my adventure right now, or there will be ConsequencesTM."


If rests are an issue, I very much suggest fiddling with the mechanics, instead of trying to play the "doom clock" game. One very easy and very classic option is to say that you can get the benefits of a Long Rest while in a town (or other safe place). Boom, no more sleeping in the dungeon. Make sure your adventure sites are more than a few hours' travel away, and now you pretty much have to do the whole thing in one go. You can even include travel and wilderness encounters as part of the 6-to-8 structure.

Removing short rests in one form or another is another smart move, I think. I see why WotC structured the game the way they did, with different classes refreshing at different rates, but I get the sense that "improper rest/encounter" balance is the root cause of most 5e balance problems out there. Tripling all short rest powers is perhaps not the best idea, though, as it can lead to horrific novas. Instead, I suggest "Adrenaline Surges"-- twice per long rest, when not in combat, you can get the benefits of a short rest. Everyone gets the right number of rests, and no-one has to fight about when to take them.

[Coffee_Dragon]

Where were all these anti-clock and pro-agreement people when I was getting piled up on in the Leomund's Tiny Hut thread?

[mgshamster]

Where were all these anti-clock and pro-agreement people when I was getting piled up on in the Leomund's Tiny Hut thread?

Well, you see, that's part of the risk of using a tiny hut - enemies will pile on around you.

[mephnick]

I suggest "Adrenaline Surges"-- twice per long rest, when not in combat, you can get the benefits of a short rest. Everyone gets the right number of rests, and no-one has to fight about when to take them.

Yep, in my Dark Souls ripoff campaign I just made short rests Estus Flasks with 2 charges. You drink and get the benefits of the short rest and it recharges overnight. Worked very well and I'll probably just end up making it a permanent ruling for 5e in general.

[MarkVIIIMarc]

There are too many variables here.

Consider one long trying encounter, day done.

Heck, let them try to rest and disturb them with some more enemies they should have hunted.

Sometimes its neat to fight one really challenging enemy instead of fighting 8 waves of bandits in between every town.

Rule 1, have fun.

Mixing up the rest schedule with interrultions or reasons not to rest would seem like it would freshen up your game. Let us know how it works before rule lawyers make every day the exact same thing.

[CaptainSarathai]

I run a variant of the Gritty Realism, where short rests are 8hrs and Long Rests are 24hrs.
This helps a lot, and also provides characters with opportunities to enjoy downtime activities as another avenue of character development.

If the players start taking more rests than they should, then you need to boost the encounter difficulty following that rest. Example - you plan 3 Medium Encounters, a Short Rest, and then 3 more Medium Encounters.
Your party gets through the first 2 encounters and thinks that now is the ideal time for a rest. Okay, cool. Now they either have a stretch of 4 encounters without a rest (because you remove the opportunity) or you need to upgrade the extra encounter to a Deadly encounter and force them back onto schedule (holy $*** we almost died, take a rest)

Also, ironically, the answer to a party wanting to take lots of Short Rests, is to throw them fewer encounters later on. Too many Short Rests per Long, favors the short rest classes. If you throw a few instances of short adventure days with fewer over-all encounters, you're giving the Long Rest guys a chance to shine.
The only problem with this, is that you need a way to convince you Long Rest guys to go fully nuclear and not save anything for later.

[Malifice]

"Doom clocks" have always struck me as a poor solution to the "15 minute workday" problem.

Actually they're an amazing idea that should be used more.

Boring is the session that I turn up to and I'm presented with a quest with no immediate time pressure to complete, and no consequences for [success/ failure].

Its not only boring, but also totally unrealistic.

Imagine reading/ watching a fantasy novel or movie where the protagonists have all the time in the world to complete the quest, and suffer no consequnces for failing it even if they take years or dont bother doing it at all?

Having to storm the dungeon, slay the [High priest of Orcus] before [midnight] when he [completes his foul ritual and summons a Demon host to the mortal world] is much more entertaining than 'go to the ruins, blow some monsters to bits, fall back, sleep the night, forget why we are even here, who cares anyway'

[mgshamster]

Actually they're an amazing idea that should be used more.

Boring is the session that I turn up to and I'm presented with a quest with no immediate time pressure to complete, and no consequences for [success/ failure].

Its not only boring, but also totally unrealistic.

Imagine reading/ watching a fantasy novel or movie where the protagonists have all the time in the world to complete the quest, and suffer no consequnces for failing it even if they take years or dont bother doing it at all?

Having to storm the dungeon, slay the [High priest of Orcus] before [midnight] when he [completes his foul ritual and summons a Demon host to the mortal world] is much more entertaining than 'go to the ruins, blow some monsters to bits, fall back, sleep the night, forget why we are even here, who cares anyway'

Now I'm envisioning all the Avengers movies with no time pressure on any of their quests.

"We need to stop the invading aliens!"

"Don't worry; they're on a different time dimensions than us, and won't arrive for a few thousand years. Take as much time as you need."

[Saiga]

You can have that narrative without having to use mechanics to simulate it. You just need for the player characters not to have reasons/excuses to daudle (abusing rest mechanics, retrying skill checks,etc)

After, in fiction the heroes almost always arrive at the perfect time when it really matters.

[Malifice]

Now I'm envisioning all the Avengers movies with no time pressure on any of their quests.

"We need to stop the invading aliens!"

"Don't worry; they're on a different time dimensions than us, and won't arrive for a few thousand years. Take as much time as you need."

Exactly.

Imagine if the Avengers hit a room of Lokis lair (for no apparent reason other than 'stealing valuable stuff to become better at being Avengers')... then fell back to Starks house to sleep for the night, before coming back the next day and hitting another room and blasting a few more mooks. And so on.

Till about a week or two later, they finally stumble on Loki. Who for some absurd reason is still living in the final room of the lair, with the macguffin in hand.

Before you stop and consider how boring and unrealistic this sounds, remember this is actually how many DnD campaigns are run.

Zero time pressure or urgency, and no reason to do the current quest that day other than 'loot'.

Now imagine it as if the Avengers had to stop Loki before he uses [the macguffin] to summon in a horde of Chitari through a dimensional gate, threatening all of NYC (millions of innocents, and many people loved by the Avengers). Every second they waste, the gate opens wider.

Which sounds more realistic, less boring and a hell of a lot more fun?

[SharkForce]

Exactly.

Imagine if the Avengers hit a room of Lokis lair (for no apparent reason other than 'stealing valuable stuff to become better at being Avengers')... then fell back to Starks house to sleep for the night, before coming back the next day and hitting another room and blasting a few more mooks. And so on.

Till about a week or two later, they finally stumble on Loki. Who for some absurd reason is still living in the final room of the lair, with the macguffin in hand.

Before you stop and consider how boring and unrealistic this sounds, remember this is actually how many DnD campaigns are run.

Zero time pressure or urgency, and no reason to do the current quest that day other than 'loot'.

Now imagine it as if the Avengers had to stop Loki before he uses [the macguffin] to summon in a horde of Chitari through a dimensional gate, threatening all of NYC (millions of innocents, and many people loved by the Avengers). Every second they waste, the gate opens wider.

Which sounds more realistic, less boring and a hell of a lot more fun?

there's a rather substantial difference between the avengers vs loki and some random people that the BBEG has never heard of before in his life attacking some random stronghold that he's not currently living in that the party has isolated specifically so that they can do those sorts of things. yes, the world is alive and will take reasonable responses to PC actions. no, that doesn't mean that everything of importance is always going to happen with a doomsday clock ticking somewhere, and no, it doesn't mean you should cram 6-8 adventures per day down the group's throats whether they want it or not, especially when there is no reason for the encounters. if the group hits a goblin lair and kills half the goblins, but none escaped and thus the goblins don't have any intel, that doesn't mean you just arbitrarily announce that the goblins tracked the flying party, brought all the exact resources needed to interrupt their long rest guarded by whatever precautions they've set in place, and ambush them in the middle of their long rest.

the goblins will do what they can... which might range from traveling in larger groups to sending for help (which might take days *if* any help ever comes at all) to even running away... but there doesn't need to be a doomsday clock. the goblins don't all need to be on the brink of transforming into hill giants if you take too long. they can just be goblins, living in their lair, conducting raids every now and then, and maybe when your group kills half of the tribe their immediate response shouldn't involve starting up some random doomsday ritual at midnight just because the party happened to leave.

[Psikerlord]

Doom clock works in small doses just fine. Using it all the time is ime very artificial, unrealistic and simply undesirable. Sometimes the PCs should be able to take their time - esp when they are pursuing their own quests.

And what has just struck me, actually, is that 5e is not really made for sandbox style campaigns. You need a doom clock to make 5e work properly, and doom clocks dont go with sandboxes - where the PCs can often wander about, exploring/delving the unknown as they please, pursuing their own goals/side treks. Of course the occasional doom clock adventure/more classic adventure will also be involved -but they certainly arent required.

Older d&d didnt need a doom clock because one resource - hps - recovered notoriously slowly (1 hp per day, something like that - albeit spells refreshed overnight, and you could use spells to heal, but at least in the early levels this wouldnt work all that well). Because you had manage your precious HPs, the game remained dangerous and did not require a doom clock or other urgency.

But in 5e, everything refreshes overnight. HPs, spells, abilities. The devs, quite frankly, simply designed the game to be too easy. and I can kinda understand why from a somewhat cyncial perspective. They wanted new players, whose PCs could do cool things and not die straight away. But for more expreienced players, it all becomes too easy. From wotc point of view however, it probably doesnt matter if more experienced players move onto other things. They've bought the books, played a campaign or two, and moved on. Bring on the next bunch of new players.

[Sigreid]

You could always have the party under a divine curse such that if they're short on battles outsiders spawn and attack them. :smallbiggrin:

[Malifice]

Doom clock works in small doses just fine. Using it all the time is ime very artificial, unrealistic and simply undesirable.

I agree. No one is suggesting you use them all the time. Many adventuring days will feature only 1-3 encounters with no time constraints at all.


Sometimes the PCs should be able to take their time - esp when they are pursuing their own quests.

Do you have all the time in the world to do your own thing?

If so, I want to be you.

[SharkForce]

Do you have all the time in the world to do your own thing?

If so, I want to be you.

my day job doesn't pay me enough in a good weekend to live comfortably off of the income generated for a year or more. i'm guessing neither does yours.

but that isn't terribly uncommon for moderately high level adventurers.

[Jamesps]

Instead, I suggest "Adrenaline Surges"-- twice per long rest, when not in combat, you can get the benefits of a short rest. Everyone gets the right number of rests, and no-one has to fight about when to take them.

I use almost this exact rule in my campaigns and I can confirm it works like a charm. I do make them take 5 minutes for their surges to prevent the aforementioned novas (no short resting in combat), but otherwise this ensures short-rest based characters have the amount of resources they're supposed to without any restrictions on my adventure writing style.

Before I enacted this rule I was running a campaign where the party took a total of two short rests. I felt so bad for the warlock of the group as one of his primary class features went entirely unused for something like 20 sessions.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I use almost this exact rule in my campaigns and I can confirm it works like a charm. I do make them take 5 minutes for their surges to prevent the aforementioned novas (no short resting in combat), but otherwise this ensures short-rest based characters have the amount of resources they're supposed to without any restrictions on my adventure writing style.

Before I enacted this rule I was running a campaign where the party took a total of two short rests. I felt so bad for the warlock of the group as one of his primary class features went entirely unused for something like 20 sessions.

I ended up giving one of my parties "Short-rest-in-a-can" items--the equivalent of an energy drink + crack cocaine. Single use items that (when combined with about 5 minutes of rest) count as a short rest. They can take normal short rests when time isn't pressing, but have a couple in reserve (and can decide when to use their immediate rest capabilities). It works well.

[Demonslayer666]

Doom clock works in small doses just fine. Using it all the time is ime very artificial, unrealistic and simply undesirable. Sometimes the PCs should be able to take their time - esp when they are pursuing their own quests.

And what has just struck me, actually, is that 5e is not really made for sandbox style campaigns. You need a doom clock to make 5e work properly, and doom clocks dont go with sandboxes - where the PCs can often wander about, exploring/delving the unknown as they please, pursuing their own goals/side treks. Of course the occasional doom clock adventure/more classic adventure will also be involved -but they certainly arent required.

Older d&d didnt need a doom clock because one resource - hps - recovered notoriously slowly (1 hp per day, something like that - albeit spells refreshed overnight, and you could use spells to heal, but at least in the early levels this wouldnt work all that well). Because you had manage your precious HPs, the game remained dangerous and did not require a doom clock or other urgency.

But in 5e, everything refreshes overnight. HPs, spells, abilities. The devs, quite frankly, simply designed the game to be too easy. and I can kinda understand why from a somewhat cyncial perspective. They wanted new players, whose PCs could do cool things and not die straight away. But for more expreienced players, it all becomes too easy. From wotc point of view however, it probably doesnt matter if more experienced players move onto other things. They've bought the books, played a campaign or two, and moved on. Bring on the next bunch of new players.

I don't think 5th requires the doom clock. It helps, yes, but there is also varying the difficulty, which I lean on a lot. I make them face a tougher encounters so the challenge is higher, taking the focus away from resource expenditure.

If I were to tweak the rest system, I would make HP recovery take longer. A week of rest with light activity to fully heal, and spend HD when taking a long rest. I really dislike the idea of nerfing wizards to regaining spells only once a week.

[Malifice]

my day job doesn't pay me enough in a good weekend to live comfortably off of the income generated for a year or more. i'm guessing neither does yours.

but that isn't terribly uncommon for moderately high level adventurers.

Money doesn't buy time. All the money in the world doesnt buy me freedom from temporal constraints.

Everyone has to be somewhere by [time x] to do [thing y] or else [consequence z].

Money helps though.

[Malifice]

I don't think 5th requires the doom clock. It helps, yes, but there is also varying the difficulty, which I lean on a lot. I make them face a tougher encounters so the challenge is higher, taking the focus away from resource expenditure.

Actually you're doing the opposite.

Solo tough encounters (Deadly++) heavily favor long rest based classes (casters, barbarians and paladins) who can (indeed must) nova the encounter with long rest resources (high level spells, rages and smites). This has the added effect of invalidating short rest classes (fighters, monks and warlocks) who only have short rest resources to blow (although they can still nova those).

Doing this regularly makes long rest based classes more potent than short rest classes, favors nova builds, encourages (mandates even) nova strikes, removes any resource management by the players (turns the game into 'mash the power button; repeat') and makes the game swingy (rocket tag ensues, and TPKs are always a threat).

Doing this every now and then is OK (desirable even). But you need to mix it up with longer adventuring 'days' (encounters between long rests) to give the fighters, monks, rogues, and warlocks a chance to shine, and to ensure no one 'build' is optimal at the expense of another. It also increases tactical variety and highlights decisions by the players (Such as: Do I blow that big boom spell now... or save it for later on?). It also highlights these abilities - using your big spell, raging, smiting or action surge really stands out and is a meaningful player choice instead of an auto mash the button go-to.

[Demonslayer666]

Actually you're doing the opposite.
...
Doing this regularly... ...removes any resource management by the players....

...

That's what I said.

And I do mix it up. I simply offered this as an another alternative to the doom clock.

[Psikerlord]

I don't think 5th requires the doom clock. It helps, yes, but there is also varying the difficulty, which I lean on a lot. I make them face a tougher encounters so the challenge is higher, taking the focus away from resource expenditure.

If I were to tweak the rest system, I would make HP recovery take longer. A week of rest with light activity to fully heal, and spend HD when taking a long rest. I really dislike the idea of nerfing wizards to regaining spells only once a week.

Yeah I've found it works pretty allright if you basically use 2-3 powerful fights. Still that gets a bit samey after a while. The problem with 5e is there's no attrition game, so little by the way fights are meaningless and easily nova'd.

[BeefGood]

Well it really only takes you 5-12 if you skip the prologue. It's a travel campaign with milestone leveling. There are big setpiece fights and a couple dungeons, but it's mostly travel. Like I say, you could easily place
3-8 encounters on every day..if you want 40 encounters between every town and have the campaign last 5 years of your life.

It's an ok adventure if you're fine with nova encounters, but I can't believe not one review mentioned that the design is completely at odds with 5e's balance design.

This has been my impression of SKT. Lots of travel which you can easily spice up with one big encounter. However, more than one or two random encounters on a given day would be unrealistic and tedious. And when the party is traveling from X to Y, its similarly tedious to have encounters every day of a week-long trip. Also I agree that if the characters follow the intended storyline they will not visit all the dungeons.
So I'm having the same issue with SKT; almost every encounter is a singleton that permits the party to Nova. I do like SKT despite this. I'm looking forward to the party entering a dungeon fairly soon.

[Malifice]

This has been my impression of SKT. Lots of travel which you can easily spice up with one big encounter. However, more than one or two random encounters on a given day would be unrealistic and tedious. And when the party is traveling from X to Y, its similarly tedious to have encounters every day of a week-long trip. Also I agree that if the characters follow the intended storyline they will not visit all the dungeons.
So I'm having the same issue with SKT; almost every encounter is a singleton that permits the party to Nova. I do like SKT despite this. I'm looking forward to the party entering a dungeon fairly soon.

Trick the PCs. This is what I would do if I were you:

Give them an encounter they think is a single wandering monster (A deadly fight). Let the PCs Nova the crap out of it. Then later that day (after a short rest) hit them again with a second encounter (an ambush by a recon/ scouting party of bandits/ slavers who are trying to capture people to sell them off). Then (before they can rest) hit them again with a third and more difficult encounter (the main force of bandits/ slavers checking in on the dead bandits from encounter 2).

After encounter 3 the PCs rescue from those bandits a cart containing NPC escaped women and children slaves from the bandits. The women and kids tell the PCs that their husbands/ sons are in a camp 2 hours travel away, and the bandits intend to sell them into slavery to (a bad demon cult) in 4 or 5 hours time at midnight. They implore the PCs to rescue them.

The PCs then travel to the bandit/ slaver camp (after a short rest) and take on the bandit/slavers. The bandits are camped out in an old barrow. This is encounter 4.

After dealing with the bandits and rescuing the slavers the PCs can explore the Barrow if they want (it contains Wraiths/ Wights/ Undead) to trigger Encounter 5 (and some nice loot).

At some stage the (bad guy demon cultists) turn up (the guys whoe were going to purchase the slaves - remember them?) and this triggers encounter 6.

Now make encounter 6 is the hardest encounter of the lot! Cultist mooks, a caster or two, a few 'heavies' like summoned demons or reskinned Knights or similar 'big damage high HP, high AC heavies'.

Do stuff like this to the PCs every now and then, and I assure you they will hold back and refrain from 'nova-ing' encounters. They will never know exactly just how many encounters you'll be throwing at them so will hold back accordingly.

[SharkForce]

Money doesn't buy time. All the money in the world doesnt buy me freedom from temporal constraints.

Everyone has to be somewhere by [time x] to do [thing y] or else [consequence z].

Money helps though.

money doesn't buy time, but having money in sufficiently large quantities removes the need to buy money with your time, which is not that far different.

seeing as how that is probably by far the largest case of everyone needing to be somewhere by time X to do thing Y or else consequence Z, practically speaking having boatloads of money (perhaps literally in some cases, PCs can end up with a truly absurd amount of loot) means that the number of things you need to do are a lot fewer, and often makes the "somewhere" fairly irrelevant... if you have enough money to buy an RV and go exploring, for example, your need to be at home when it is time to sleep and eat is considerably reduced. sometimes you can even use your money to have someone else meet your obligations (for example, if you're rich enough you can probably pay for a private tutor to homeschool your children if you have any, thus removing the need to get your child to school at a specific time and place).

so while your statement is technically true, it's quite misleading. having large sums of money doesn't literally buy time, but it does allow you to avoid selling the majority of your waking hours to handle basic survival needs, and it results in you having a lot more time available to do what you want. whether you bought it or simply didn't have to sell it is little more than a semantic difference.

[ad_hoc]

I use almost this exact rule in my campaigns and I can confirm it works like a charm. I do make them take 5 minutes for their surges to prevent the aforementioned novas (no short resting in combat), but otherwise this ensures short-rest based characters have the amount of resources they're supposed to without any restrictions on my adventure writing style.

Before I enacted this rule I was running a campaign where the party took a total of two short rests. I felt so bad for the warlock of the group as one of his primary class features went entirely unused for something like 20 sessions.

I had a group that didn't want to bother with short rests because most of the group's characters didn't rely on them.

They changed that behaviour after the TPK.

Now they all want every member of the party to have as much power as they can at all times because they want to succeed at their goals.

[Xetheral]

It also increases tactical variety and highlights decisions by the players (Such as: Do I blow that big boom spell now... or save it for later on?). It also highlights these abilities - using your big spell, raging, smiting or action surge really stands out and is a meaningful player choice instead of an auto mash the button go-to.

Emphasis added. Personally I don't consider the bolded decision to be interesting, tactical, or even particularly meaningful. I'm much more interested in how my players make use of their abilities to affect the game world than I am in making them squirm trying to decide when to use those abilities. Frankly, if a player feels the need to avoid doing something awesome because they're terrified that they might need that resource more later, I think my game is worse for it. (With limited exceptions for survival/horror plot threads or other situations where attrition is an active theme.)

This is probably why I so fervently disagree wth you that D&D is inherently a resource-management game at its core. Sure, it can be played that way, but it doesn't need to be. At my table, D&D is a roleplaying game at its core, with a resource management component that plays a comparatively small part.

(For reference, I use 8 hour rests: short in the field, and long in town. The party usually stays in the field for a couple in-game weeks at a time, with 0-2 combat encounters per trip. Usually there are more *potential* combat encounters, but my players' characters tend to prefer to avoid or defuse combat when possible, often avoiding spending any resources in the process. They usually have resources left when they get back to town. The style of my games tends towards Combat-as-War over Combat-as-Sport. The adventures are largely player-initiated and only occasionally have a pressing in-game clock. I've never had a problem with five-minute workdays--largely because even when it's a feasible option, the players roleplay their characters as not wanting to waste time.)

[Malifice]

money doesn't buy time, but having money in sufficiently large quantities removes the need to buy money with your time, which is not that far different.

And you got that money by pissing off evil cults, thieves guilds, fanatical cults, demons and so forth.

With enemies like that, how on earth do you have all the time in the world to do what you want.

For example, go out and annoy ISIS, the Mafia, the CIA and your local Biker gang.

See if that doesnt affect your free time.

[Malifice]

Emphasis added. Personally I don't consider the bolded decision to be interesting, tactical, or even particularly meaningful.

Its much more interesting, tactical and meaningful player choice when to use that 1 6th level slot, than simply mashing it on round 1 of every combat, then mashing the 5th level slot buttons and so forth.

If your barbarian is raging on round 1 of every combat, or your paladin is smite nova-ing, or your Sorcerer is dumping his highlevel slots and SP there are no decision points there. There are no tactics.

Its just rocket tag. Its boring and requires zero though (beyond building a specific nova build like a Sorc-aladin) at the expense of all other classes and ideas.


Frankly, if a player feels the need to avoid doing something awesome because they're terrified that they might need that resource more later, I think my game is worse for it. (With limited exceptions for survival/horror plot threads or other situations where attrition is an active theme.)


They're not avoiding doing something awesome - they're holding it in reserve for when it best can be used. Do I fireball (and end the encounter) now, or save it for later on (and be limited to cantrips if things get tough)?

[Xetheral]

Its much more interesting, tactical and meaningful player choice when to use that 1 6th level slot, than simply mashing it on round 1 of every combat, then mashing the 5th level slot buttons and so forth.

If your barbarian is raging on round 1 of every combat, or your paladin is smite nova-ing, or your Sorcerer is dumping his highlevel slots and SP there are no decision points there. There are no tactics.

Its just rocket tag. Its boring and requires zero though (beyond building a specific nova build like a Sorc-aladin) at the expense of all other classes and ideas.

If that was the only alternative, I might agree with you, but that's not how my players approach combat. Instead, for the spellcasters, they usually pick the spell that is most suited to the situation, and cast it at the lowest slot available. Sure, the Barbarian rages each combat until she's out (sometimes she uses a rage for non-combat purposes, so she runs out after a single combat), and the Druids wildshape right away if they have any left, but I don't have a problem with that: Rage and Wildshape are both central features to the respective characters, and as a DM I want to see them get used as often as possible. That's what they built their characters to do. The interesting decisions come as the players decide how to make best use of the tactical advantages those abilities give them.


They're not avoiding doing something awesome - they're holding it in reserve for when it best can be used. Do I fireball (and end the encounter) now, or save it for later on (and be limited to cantrips if things get tough)?

Fireball isn't awesome just because it's Fireball--not all uses of the spell are equally awesome. What makes it awesome is the use to which the spell is put... catching a fleeting concentration of enemies and roasting them all at once, leading the enemies into a choke point to create such a concentration, threat diplays to try to intimidate others into avoiding combat, using it to ignite flammable materials over a wide area, etc.... When such a situation arises, I want my players to use the spell to full effect, not wait out of fear that it might be needed more later in a different encounter. Heck, there often isn't another combat encounter, let alone an encounter with an equally-awesome use. (Also, absent exceptional circumstances, Fireball is rarely an encounter-ender at my table. It doesn't deal that much damage.)

My point is only that we run very different games, but they're both D&D. What we find interesting, tactical, and meaningful likewise varies. Resource management happens to be critical in your style, and only a minor part in mine. Similarly, policing/enforcing the adventuring day isn't needed (or wanted) at my table. Treating it like a universal requirement doesn't seem warranted.

[EvilAnagram]

Yeah I've found it works pretty allright if you basically use 2-3 powerful fights. Still that gets a bit samey after a while. The problem with 5e is there's no attrition game, so little by the way fights are meaningless and easily nova'd.

There's an attrition game if you enforce the standard encounter number. My third level party just retreated from a kobold lair's entrance because little guys were eating through their resources sp efficiently. They're resting through the night, but it's a longer rest variant game, so they still won't have many spells between them next session.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Its much more interesting, tactical and meaningful player choice when to use that 1 6th level slot, than simply mashing it on round 1 of every combat, then mashing the 5th level slot buttons and so forth.

If your barbarian is raging on round 1 of every combat, or your paladin is smite nova-ing, or your Sorcerer is dumping his highlevel slots and SP there are no decision points there. There are no tactics.

Its just rocket tag. Its boring and requires zero though (beyond building a specific nova build like a Sorc-aladin) at the expense of all other classes and ideas.
Lots of little encounters are boring. They require zero thought-- just mash the attack/cantrip button until it goes away, then spend a few hit die or healing spells to recover. Fewer-but-harder encounters are (or at least should be) more interesting, because

Fewer encounters means the DM can put more time into each one, resulting in more unique setups
Dangerous foes create serious threats-- not in the band-o-kobolds, "grumble grumble another 2 HD and a spell slot used up," sense, but in the desperate, "holy crap, the Warlock is trapped and at single-digit hit points" sense.
While you can take an easy attrition-encounter head on without too much trouble, a hard one ought to chew you up and spit you out if you just charge in. Danger requires tactics. Tactics which tend to be more interesting when you have spells and other limited resources to spend in different ways-- many classes, at least, are more nuanced than a binary "go nova or no nova?" question like you're insinuating.



They're not avoiding doing something awesome - they're holding it in reserve for when it best can be used. Do I fireball (and end the encounter) now, or save it for later on (and be limited to cantrips if things get tough)?
Speaking personally, I hate that sort of thing. I always wind up holding back more than I should, and it's frustrating and not very narratively satisfying.

[SharkForce]

And you got that money by pissing off evil cults, thieves guilds, fanatical cults, demons and so forth.

With enemies like that, how on earth do you have all the time in the world to do what you want.

For example, go out and annoy ISIS, the Mafia, the CIA and your local Biker gang.

See if that doesnt affect your free time.

if there are enough of them still around to threaten them, the party did a lousy job. i am an ordinary person. i lack the resources to grab 4 of my friends and go stomp all over the local biker gang. for a reasonably high level adventuring party, that's just tuesday. i lack the capability to destroy ISIS. a D&D adventuring party quite possibly has those resources, and i don't mean "destroy one cell", i mean they have the tools to extract information from uncooperative people, probably even after those people die, use that to find the next group, eliminate them, and repeat.

[Vogonjeltz]

I don't think 5th requires the doom clock. It helps, yes, but there is also varying the difficulty, which I lean on a lot. I make them face a tougher encounters so the challenge is higher, taking the focus away from resource expenditure.

If I were to tweak the rest system, I would make HP recovery take longer. A week of rest with light activity to fully heal, and spend HD when taking a long rest. I really dislike the idea of nerfing wizards to regaining spells only once a week.

I tend to eschew the idea of the doom clock except for specific scenarios, and I'd advise modification on a case by case basis.

i.e. Exploring a Goblin Hideout: If you try to rest inside without a full exploration, what are the chances someone wanders in from one of the nearby areas?
If you leave, what are the chances the above essentially happens leading to the remainder of the hideout being on high alert/or leaving entirely?

Sometimes exploring a given location is a once in a lifetime opportunity. Either you continue on, or you never find the things you thought you might. Sometimes the location allows for a more leisurely pace (i.e. a tomb with no living creatures in it might just sit there undisturbed until the party returns...then again maybe someone else locates it in the meantime creating competition).