Arcane Spellcasters need only 8 hours of rest?

[gogogome]

Although they only need 8 hours of rest to regain spells, I thought they could still only rest once in a 24 hour period; however, I am failing to find the rules that says so.

The d20srd talks about "daily limit" of spells, and how spells cast in the last 8 hours count towards the next daily limit, but as far as I can tell, "8 hours" counts as a day for arcane spellcasters.

Am I wrong?

[Melcar]

You can rest as often as you want basically. Resting does not mean sleep, but simply quiet, undisturbed relaxation... so you can cast all spells every 9 hours! (8 hours of rest + 1 hour of preparation)!

[The Viscount]

The clause about spells cast in the last 8 hours is also found in the srd section on divine spells.

Divine casters don't need to rest for 8 hours before preparing, but they have a different, more severe limitation. As specified in the srd, divine casters must prepare their spells at a certain time of day, usually dictated by their deity. If there is something preventing them at the correct time they must do it at the earliest opportunity or have to wait until the appropriate time. If you're really going to follow the rules this also means that you cannot prepare at other times during the day.

[KillianHawkeye]

The d20srd talks about "daily limit" of spells, and how spells cast in the last 8 hours count towards the next daily limit, but as far as I can tell, "8 hours" counts as a day for arcane spellcasters.

Am I wrong?

Yes, you are wrong. A day is 24 hours.

[ericgrau]

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicOverview/arcaneSpells.htm#rest

It's a bit fuzzy but it uses both 8 hours of rest and "daily" for arcane spellcasters.

I'm going to have to go with spells per day are spells per day and arcane casters can't actually refresh every 9 hours. They are flexible on when that 8 hours is, but can't get more spells in a single day this way.

Additionally if there's a night attack, any spells cast in that time count against the next day (and the previous day).

[Fouredged Sword]

Ok. Here are the rules.

All casters have a daily allotment of spell slots. Both arcane AND devine casters have requirements to meet before they can refill their spell slots.

Arcane casters must rest fir 8 hours. This means nothing strenuous and nothing that invokes a skill check. Any spells cast during this period count as spells cast the next day and the slots do not get recovered.

This rest period, once finished, flips all used spells or spells leftover from the predvious day uncast back to open spell slots. A prepaired caster can then spend time to fill those slots at any time.

Divine casters are much the same. They trade the ability to choose the 8 hour period and ability to prep spells at any time for the ability to take strenuous actions and skill checks during their 8 hour period when spells count for both days. In return they cannot choose when their spells refresh. They MUST meditate and pray at a specific time unlike a wizard who can prepare spells whenever.

For both the alotment of spells is daily and canot be refreshed more than 1/day.

[Melcar]

Yes, you are wrong. A day is 24 hours.

Right... A day is 24 hours, but a wizard or sorcerer needs only 8 hours of rest (not counting elfs) to have all his spells slots refilled...

[Kelb_Panthera]

This rest period, once finished, flips all used spells or spells leftover from the predvious day uncast back to open spell slots. A prepaired caster can then spend time to fill those slots at any time.

Almost. Prepared spells remain prepared unless the caster wills otherwise.


For both the alotment of spells is daily and canot be refreshed more than 1/day.

This is not explicitly stated anywhere. Some take it as implicit in the term "daily" but that's certainly questionable if not outright wrong. Divines are certainly restricted to once per day by the limitation of only being able to prepare at a specific time but there's no reason to assume there is some arbitrary limit beyond the need for a rested and refreshed mind for arcane casters.


Right... A day is 24 hours, but a wizard or sorcerer needs only 8 hours of rest (not counting elfs) to have all his spells slots refilled...

Elves too. They need only trance for 4 hours but must still spend 4 more in quiet relaxation to regain their slots, just like any other caster. This is reflected in the SRD with the line "If the character does not need to sleep for some reason, she still must have 8 hours of restful calm before preparing any spells," and is explicit in the actual PHB in calling out elves.

[Fouredged Sword]

Daily means daily means once per day. One does not assumeba paladin can rest and recover his daily smites multiple times a day, or a barbarian his rages. Daily means exactly what it means.

[tyckspoon]

Yes, you are wrong. A day is 24 hours.

This isn't actually defined anywhere in the rules that I can think of (the closest you'll get is the 'unless otherwise stated things should be assumed to be like real-world Earth' statement that mostly gets abused to try and create anti-matter bombs and the like), and may vary depending on campaign setting. This is another one of the areas where the 3.0 designers didn't seem to consider the possibility that somebody else could play differently than they did - they pretty consistently assumed that '8 hours rest' = 'sleeping overnight' = 'new day'. That got kind of weird when you see classes with use/day abilities that are not keyed to the 8 hours rest requirement, since there is no given means of determining when those abilities should refresh - is there a universal time when the day ticks over and it's a 'new day'? Are you supposed to keep a rolling tracker of when the last time you used a per day ability was and it recharges 24 hours after that? The rules offer no advice beyond that implicit assumption that sleeping for at least 8 hours means it's a new day.

Later editions have been much more clear about this, with things that are intended to be daily usages keyed to recovering on a 'long rest' and specifying that a character can only benefit from one long rest in a given time period.

[Falontani]

How does all this work with creatures that never get tired. Strenuous activity is no longer a thing for the case of Warforged and Necroplolitans.

I would assume if they go 8 hours without fighting or casting they should be able to prepare their spells. Does this mean that a warforged that has the run feat could run for 8 hours and then take an hour to prepare their spells?

[Kelb_Panthera]

Daily means daily means once per day. One does not assumeba paladin can rest and recover his daily smites multiple times a day, or a barbarian his rages. Daily means exactly what it means.

That's completely arbitrary though. Why should a good night's rest be insufficient to refresh any of those things?

Let's be clear about something; unless they do nothing other than rest for a full 24 hours, nobody with an automatically refreshing mechanic (rage, smite, etc) is going to get more than double the expected amount in any 24 hour period and nobody that has to take any action to refresh a mechanic will ever get more than 2 in a 24 hour period. It's particularly egregious for rage. You could at least justify smite being tied to the same divine source as spells and being refreshed during daily prayer but rage is entirely a function of the barbarian's own body and training.

Imposing the 24 hour restriction on class features doesn't actually do much against the 15 minute adventuring day except double the number of days that an adventure takes.

Bonus points; 24 hours is only -one- definition for "day." The period between dawn and dusk is another and (get this) dictionary.com lists definition 5 as the period of time in a (solar) day allotted to work. Even choosing the definition of day you have is ultimately an arbitrary choice on your part.

[Fouredged Sword]

How does all this work with creatures that never get tired. Strenuous activity is no longer a thing for the case of Warforged and Necroplolitans.

I would assume if they go 8 hours without fighting or casting they should be able to prepare their spells. Does this mean that a warforged that has the run feat could run for 8 hours and then take an hour to prepare their spells?

Nothing that takes a skill check or roll.

[ExLibrisMortis]

Nothing that takes a skill check or roll.
I'm pretty sure Knowledge checks aren't strenuous; more examples can be found, I'm sure.

[ericgrau]

This isn't actually defined anywhere in the rules that I can think of (the closest you'll get is the 'unless otherwise stated things should be assumed to be like real-world Earth' statement that mostly gets abused to try and create anti-matter bombs and the like), and may vary depending on campaign setting.
I tried to read the PHB but I'm not sure what their definition of "the" is.

[PacMan2247]

If you'll look at the "Spell Selection and Preparation" section on page 178 of the PHB, it clearly states that wizards cannot repeat the preparation process to change a prepared spell or refill a slot from a spell already cast that day. The section of the same name for divine spellcasters beginning on page 179 and going into 180 carries the same restriction. The section on bards and sorcerers doesn't have a similar section, only the recent casting limit clause. Still, attempting to prepare spells multiple times in a day by resting for 8-hour periods blatantly disregards the wording "Spells per Day" given in the class descriptions.

[XionUnborn01]

If you'll look at the "Spell Selection and Preparation" section on page 178 of the PHB, it clearly states that wizards cannot repeat the preparation process to change a prepared spell or refill a slot from a spell already cast that day. The section of the same name for divine spellcasters beginning on page 179 and going into 180 carries the same restriction. The section on bards and sorcerers doesn't have a similar section, only the recent casting limit clause. Still, attempting to prepare spells multiple times in a day by resting for 8-hour periods blatantly disregards the wording "Spells per Day" given in the class descriptions.

Yeah but how do we know what a day is man? Like, maybe I use a day from mercury which is shorter or a day from pluto. It couldn't possibly be the common usage of the word.

[PacMan2247]

Yeah but how do we know what a day is man? Like, maybe I use a day from mercury which is shorter or a day from pluto. It couldn't possibly be the common usage of the word.

A day on Mercury is 1,408 hours. That's certainly one way to address the caster/non-caster power disparity.