Lord Von Becker
2019-10-02, 01:53 PM
Revised Resting
A short rest is a period of pause and relative safety during an adventure, usually lasting two to fifteeen minutes. Long enough to stitch a wound, discuss plans, and load up a bit. An archetypical short rest is to barricading oneself in a broom closet or infirmary.
A long rest is a return to routine. A timeskip. A pause-between-adventures. It can happen between stages of a multipart adventure, but it marks a distinct chapter break. It usually takes at least a few hours, but more often several days.
Searching
Scanning for enemies is distinct from searching for clues, traps, and treasure, and naturally, there are times you will want to do each. For purposes of adventuring there are four states of awareness:
Analytical. You have advantage on your Perception checks and disadvantage on your Initiative rolls. You travel at half speed.
Wary. You have advantage on Initiative rolls and disadvantage on Perception checks. If your Initiative roll is higher than another combatant's Initiative and Perception when a fight begins, that creature is surprised.
Cautious. This state gives your Perception and Initiative no bonus or penalty. You automatically assume this state immediately after you roll initiative.
Relaxed. Your Initiative rolls and Perception checks both have disadvantage. Barring special circumstances or a class feature, you must be Relaxed in order to take a short or long rest.
Switching states may be done up to once per turn, but only outside of combat. If all members of a group choose the same state, they may move at twice the speed they would otherwise, and treat rolls their State gives them Advantage on as 20s.
(Reminder: Critical hits and failures are for attack rolls only, by default.)
Commentary: This is designed to be a tradeoff between lootfinding/safety from traps, and time pressure/safety from enemies.
For DMs: I suggest you drop plenty of hints about which pace will be useful where. Use it to keep players engaged, and perhaps train them to follow more subtle cues over time.
In particular, I suggest taking a page from Super Metroid in offering dungeon maps as occasional rewards, inside or outside the dungeon in question.
Passive Initiative
Sometimes, such as on a chase where the enemies are meant as speedbumps, rolling for initiative would make the game slower and less fun.
In these situations, you can use creatures' Passive Initiative, which is equal to 10 plus their Dexterity modifier, plus any other Initiative bonuses or penalties.
For this purpose, advantage is treated as a +5 bonus, and disadvantage as a -5 penalty. (Automatic twenties are treated as a +10 that replaces the other two.)
Stealth and Travel
You are automatically hidden if you are Heavily Obscured. You may attempt the Hide action if you are Lightly Obscured, or have at least half cover which isn't transparent. The following things can reveal your location to an observer:
Making sound within their earshot.
Making an attack. This reveals your location as soon as the attack hits or misses.
Losing the source of cover or obscurement you were using to hide from them.
If you position is revealed on your turn, you may remain hidden by moving to a new hiding place before the end of your turn. You must roll a stealth check to remain hidden while moving, but this does not cost an action.
A short rest is a period of pause and relative safety during an adventure, usually lasting two to fifteeen minutes. Long enough to stitch a wound, discuss plans, and load up a bit. An archetypical short rest is to barricading oneself in a broom closet or infirmary.
A long rest is a return to routine. A timeskip. A pause-between-adventures. It can happen between stages of a multipart adventure, but it marks a distinct chapter break. It usually takes at least a few hours, but more often several days.
Searching
Scanning for enemies is distinct from searching for clues, traps, and treasure, and naturally, there are times you will want to do each. For purposes of adventuring there are four states of awareness:
Analytical. You have advantage on your Perception checks and disadvantage on your Initiative rolls. You travel at half speed.
Wary. You have advantage on Initiative rolls and disadvantage on Perception checks. If your Initiative roll is higher than another combatant's Initiative and Perception when a fight begins, that creature is surprised.
Cautious. This state gives your Perception and Initiative no bonus or penalty. You automatically assume this state immediately after you roll initiative.
Relaxed. Your Initiative rolls and Perception checks both have disadvantage. Barring special circumstances or a class feature, you must be Relaxed in order to take a short or long rest.
Switching states may be done up to once per turn, but only outside of combat. If all members of a group choose the same state, they may move at twice the speed they would otherwise, and treat rolls their State gives them Advantage on as 20s.
(Reminder: Critical hits and failures are for attack rolls only, by default.)
Commentary: This is designed to be a tradeoff between lootfinding/safety from traps, and time pressure/safety from enemies.
For DMs: I suggest you drop plenty of hints about which pace will be useful where. Use it to keep players engaged, and perhaps train them to follow more subtle cues over time.
In particular, I suggest taking a page from Super Metroid in offering dungeon maps as occasional rewards, inside or outside the dungeon in question.
Passive Initiative
Sometimes, such as on a chase where the enemies are meant as speedbumps, rolling for initiative would make the game slower and less fun.
In these situations, you can use creatures' Passive Initiative, which is equal to 10 plus their Dexterity modifier, plus any other Initiative bonuses or penalties.
For this purpose, advantage is treated as a +5 bonus, and disadvantage as a -5 penalty. (Automatic twenties are treated as a +10 that replaces the other two.)
Stealth and Travel
You are automatically hidden if you are Heavily Obscured. You may attempt the Hide action if you are Lightly Obscured, or have at least half cover which isn't transparent. The following things can reveal your location to an observer:
Making sound within their earshot.
Making an attack. This reveals your location as soon as the attack hits or misses.
Losing the source of cover or obscurement you were using to hide from them.
If you position is revealed on your turn, you may remain hidden by moving to a new hiding place before the end of your turn. You must roll a stealth check to remain hidden while moving, but this does not cost an action.