Thoughts on gritty realism?

[Rfkannen]

Considering using the gritty realism rules from the dmg. What do you think of them?

[Yunru]

They suck all the fun out of certain spellcasters unless you also alter the duration of their spells.

For instance, Hex (and Hunter's Mark, I believe): Designed to last 1 battle, and when upcast, 1 rest, then 1 day.
Under gritty realism, that becomes 1 battle, 1 battle, and 1 rest.

And that's just the most obvious one(s).

Basically, don't implement it as written, think about what you're trying to do: You're making a short rest become a day and a long rest become a week. So scale everything that's ongoing proportionally too.

[Tanarii]

It depends on how you play.

If you jump from 'scene' to 'scene', it works okay. You just space out the encounters 1-2 a day, several days apart, with a total of roughly two short rests between each encounter. (Not I'm not saying you have to actually control resting that tightly. But you can plan encounter density for the adventure accordingly.)

If you play every moment of every day and encounters are daily once a day, short rests are too frequent, unless they're Deadly encounters. And a week long Long Rest is probably needed after 3-4 days if they're Deadly, maybe 5 at the outside. Also, most people find a week too long for a long rest in this case.

The variant rule is fine, but as with the base game, you need to think about how you're handling passage of time and resting agency in general, and how you expect the flow to go.

For example, I wouldn't hesitate to use it in a straight wilderness crawl with daily encounter checks for a Deadly encounter, and session ends when the players successfully make it back to town for a weeks rest. But for smallish exploring wilderness and dungeons, it's obviously not appropriate. (For large dungeons even standard resting is too slow.)

[stoutstien]

It does allow for more gameplay to take place in the the social pillar and more downtime activities. A few all day spells and effects become 1-2 encounter duration but the balance of how much a party can handle per rest cycle remains approximately the same. Short rest become day > long rest become week.

[loki_ragnarock]

It's useful for when you are trying to play on a longer scale.

Gritty realism doesn't make a lot of sense for kicking in the door of a dungeon, killing the 7 orcs inside, and then doing that 8 more times that day.

Gritty realism makes a lot more sense for something like:
Day One: Investigate the mystery of the PC's missing children, find the threads, rough up the gang members that witnessed events (combat encounter), discover the ten orcs slavers that have been kidnapping them, fight the orcs (combat encounter), discover they've already sold the children downriver.
Day Two: Still sore from the gang and orcs, pursue the slaveship, fight some river sahuagin (combat encounter), battle river pirates who say they've seen the ship pass by after the battle and let the party know about a smugglers den where the slavers are likely to pull in for the day (combat encounter)
Day Three: Aching from two days of fighting, discover the smugglers cove and descend upon the slavers (tough combat encounter), learn from the newly freed slaves the children had already changed hands and were sold to a cult, follow on foot inland to find cultists using their tracking skills, lose them. Regroup at a nearby village as the sounds of howling wolves fill the night.
Day Four: Look into the cult by questioning the locals at length (social encounter), find out there have been odd happenings at night at the Manse on Ludar Hill. Pursue into the hills, meet the wolves from the other night ((combat encounter)), arrive very late.
Day Five: Infiltrate the Manse on Ludar Hill, fight the cultists (combat encounter), fight the being the cultists summoned (hard combat encounter). Recover the PC's children. Go back to the village to rest and recover from your five days of worry, hurry, and fighting. Figure out how to get back home from here while you bury the people who died along the way.

It's like putting together a dungeon; each sequence is mechanically like kicking open another door and seeing what's inside. Just with more time between each step. Every encounter has to be something that moves your narrative along; no filler fights, no finding things out after the first floor of the dungeon, no random encounters. Things have to be very tightly scripted to work out well.

And people who play long rest classes will bitch and moan the whole time. So brace yourself for that.

[redwizard007]

I play in an episodic campaign with gritty realism and it fits well. In a 4-5 hour game once each month, we rarely have time for a short rest and never take long rests except for between sessions. Before switching from standard rules the DM had to throw exclusively deadly encounters at us and even those were rarely challenging. Now we get a much better range of encounters and it is a lot more fun.

[LordCdrMilitant]

Considering using the gritty realism rules from the dmg. What do you think of them?

I don't think it's particularly gritty or realistic.

That said, it serves one function, and it is good at it: to empower short-rest characters. If you have a campaign where there's only 1 serious expenditure of resources per day of adventuring, long-rest characters will be more powerful than expected relative to short-rest characters. If you want to invert that, you basically eliminate the ability to take long-rests efficiently so that the party can't use the 15 minute adventuring day to stay at full power.


As a side note, at least in my mind, gritty and realistic aren't necessarily linked.
If you want to achieve "gritty", it's a matter of atmosphere. You can achieve gritty in a campaign under regular rest rules, and a campaign with "Gritty Realism" wouldn't be gritty unless you decided to make it so.
Same for realism.

If you just want your game to be gritty, you can take your color palette and general themes from an artist's impression of the western front of WWI. Mud, rain, blasted earth, shattered buildings, overwhelmingly brown, all that good stuff. You can make house-rules like HP being capped at level one HP, have unpleasant things like wounds getting infected, etc. This can be as over-the-top as you like.

If you want your game to be realistic, you can make sure that "reality ensues" when players and NPC's do things, with rational behaviors, as well as having descriptions of things inspired by well, historical techniques, architecture, and events. You can also make house rules about things to reflect the way things were actually done.

[JellyPooga]

As others mention, care must be taken.

Your campaign design will boil down to two options;

1) It'a Gritty. The campaign progresses at much the same pace as your standard D&D adventure, only now the pressure is that much higher. If the expectation is for the adventurers to have the same or similar number of encounters in the same time period, then this is essentially like putting the game on Hardcore mode. Resources are much more limited, death beckons around every corner. Certain expectations will change about certain classes; long rest resources may not be replenshed over the course of entire adventures, while short rest resources will become comparatively much more available. You may wish to consider certain roleplaying restrictions on classes that benefit especially out of this (e.g. Warlocks gain a lot feo. gritty realism of this sort).

2) Nothing happens except time scales change. You still peg 2-3 encounters per short rest and 6-8 encounters per long rest, creating a 3 days on/7 days off cycle of adventuring. Otherwise things dpnxt change much except that "dungeons" (whatever their form) become mich smaller by necessity to accomodate the encounter period.

[Tanarii]

1) It'a Gritty. The campaign progresses at much the same pace as your standard D&D adventure, only now the pressure is that much higher. If the expectation is for the adventurers to have the same or similar number of encounters in the same time period, then this is essentially like putting the game on Hardcore mode. Resources are much more limited, death beckons around every corner. Certain expectations will change about certain classes; long rest resources may not be replenshed over the course of entire adventures, while short rest resources will become comparatively much more available. You may wish to consider certain roleplaying restrictions on classes that benefit especially out of this (e.g. Warlocks gain a lot feo. gritty realism of this sort).
This could work well if most encounters were Easy or less, and the players primary goal was to avoid encounters completely, or resolve them while circumvented any 'expected' resource use. But in that case, as a DM you'd probably want to introduce more sources of XP, like milestone XP for accomplishing goals.

Although thinking about it, I already am not a fan of the default way non-combat challenges that don't use resources are considered Easy. Even if they might be challenging to the players, and have failure states with character or campaign consequences. And that's why the DMG has the Milestone XP rule, a DM can reward them as Major Milestones and reward as a Hard encounter. It just never clicked in my head before.

[Zhorn]

My main issue with the gritty realism rules is just the time-scale stretch. Like how Yunru says, unless you all tweak the mechanics of spell casting, it just adds more pain to some classes and saps their fun. If everyone plays short rest classes it can work out fine, but casters are generally screwed over by it.

I'm considering if I were to try a gritty realism variant, it would just be on hit point and hit die recovery, leaving all other aspects intact.
Example: Long rests do not heal you to full; you regain HP equal to your CON modifer x Level (minimum 1 hp per level).
You can refresh a number of Hit Die equal to your CON modifier on a long rest (minimum 1)
You can only spend 1 Hit die per short rest, long rests you can spend a number of hit dice up to half your level.

Hearken back to AD&D a little where recovery was 1 hp per day, only not be THAT level of brutal.

[Pex]

How long a rest is in game world time is irrelevant. Use whatever fits your campaign style. What matters is how many rests per game session players get. Personal opinion players should have a long rest no worse than one per two game sessions. Anything worse and the fun of conservation of resources becomes frustration of scarcity. A player might not use his long rest resource when he should because he won't get it back three game sessions later where he thinks he may need it more in future sessions. If he does use his long rest resource by the third session he's running on fumes doing the simplest unexciting things because he has nothing left to use. Players want to use their stuff. That's the fun of playing along with the roleplay. Denying them rests takes away that fun. If your campaign needs a long rest to be a game world week, fine, but make sure players get that week off within two game sessions.

[ad_hoc]

It's a useful narrative device.

Use it if it is narratively appropriate. Stop using it when it isn't.

[Pex]

And people who play long rest classes will bitch and moan the whole time. So brace yourself for that.

Not if they get the long rest within two game sessions. If the whole game week is played in one game session, session ends on a long rest, players start next game session refreshed of everything, players are fulfilled they used their stuff and can do it again. When the adventure is bit excitingly rough such that the game session can't end on a long rest because they're in the middle of something important, that's still fine because they haven't exhausted themselves of stuff to do. The excitement is concluded next game session, mop up, then long rest.

This philosophy holds true even with normal rest times. Certainly don't have 15 minute adventuring days, but that doesn't mean no rests at all.

[ad_hoc]

Not if they get the long rest within two game sessions. If the whole game week is played in one game session, session ends on a long rest, players start next game session refreshed of everything, players are fulfilled they used their stuff and can do it again. When the adventure is bit excitingly rough such that the game session can't end on a long rest because they're in the middle of something important, that's still fine because they haven't exhausted themselves of stuff to do. The excitement is concluded next game session, mop up, then long rest.

This philosophy holds true even with normal rest times. Certainly don't have 15 minute adventuring days, but that doesn't mean no rests at all.

I'm with you on the 1 long rest every 2 sessions.

People often think they need to cram in 1 long rest every session (or more!) even if their sessions are short or run at a slower pace.

I agree that more than 2 is probably too much.

Our table pretty consistently hits the 1 long rest/2 sessions mark and we are quite happy with it.

[Segev]

I will say that Gritty Realism would make the exploration part of Tomb of Annihilation perhaps more of a challenge, and feel more like a hazardous duty to my players. As-is, under standard rules, the encounters they have are largely guaranteed victories, with no lasting costs or consequences unless they get a disease or permanent affliction. There's no wearing-down as they travel, no need to avoid nova-ing. Short rests are largely meaningless.

They've entered a dungeon, now, however, and we'll see how they fair there. It's a short one, but it has a number of encounters in it.

I'm tempted to shift to Gritty Realism while on the "overworld map" and back to standard when in a dungeon environment, but I feel like that's very artificial. And that...displeases me.

[Fable Wright]

I run it. I enjoy it. I do make two changes, though:

1. Multiply all > 1 minute spell durations by 10.
2. Allow Clerics to expend a Channel Divinity to get a spell slot back (level 1 until character level 8, then level 3 at character level 16).

Land Druids and Wizards recover spells on a short rest each day. Clerics recover Bless and Healing Words at the end of each day. Warlock have slots each day. Paladins can no longer nova without care. Sorcerers I thankfully have not had to deal with, but I'm sure some short rest recovery could be granted.

[Tanarii]

Not if they get the long rest within two game sessions. If the whole game week is played in one game session, session ends on a long rest, players start next game session refreshed of everything, players are fulfilled they used their stuff and can do it again. When the adventure is bit excitingly rough such that the game session can't end on a long rest because they're in the middle of something important, that's still fine because they haven't exhausted themselves of stuff to do. The excitement is concluded next game session, mop up, then long rest.

This philosophy holds true even with normal rest times. Certainly don't have 15 minute adventuring days, but that doesn't mean no rests at all.


I'm with you on the 1 long rest every 2 sessions.

People often think they need to cram in 1 long rest every session (or more!) even if their sessions are short or run at a slower pace.

I agree that more than 2 is probably too much.

Our table pretty consistently hits the 1 long rest/2 sessions mark and we are quite happy with it.
Personally I have a rule that the 3 hr session with optional 4th must always end with retreat from the adventuring area and a long rest. That's largely required by the pickup nature of my campaign, but even so most groups manage well over an adventuring days worth of encounters.

Of course, that's with a pretty heavy focus on combat encounters. Non-combat encounters can easily eat up a disproportionate amount of table time relative to the difficulty. As can non-encounter exploration time. Although personally I've been known to build adventuring site exploration as 'extended' non-combat encounters that overlap around other (combat and non-combat) encounters, a la skill challenges.

[Eldariel]

Currently playing a Wizard in a campaign with 8 hour short rest and 24 hour long rest only in a safe environment with no interruptions. The meaningful difference is that spells like Mage Armor lose much of their luster as they eat deep into your spell slots except when you know to expect combat. That is to say, you'll probably only cast them when going on an offensive operation as opposed to all-day stuff. Ritual casting is all the more important (don't be a fool and play a caster without ritual casting, please) as are cantrips (so far I've got Minor Illusion, Prestidigitation, Friends and Mold Earth). I generally do stuff with my free resources and only use spells when absolutely necessary (Shield/Absorb Elements defensively, Sleep/Fog Cloud/Suggestion/Levitate as offensive effects). Playing a Diviner, Portent is really strained by the rule but it's still potent. It's fun to play a caster under these rules if you're resource management -oriented. Wouldn't know about mundanes, they're dull regardless of the rule set.

[Knaight]

It's a perfectly functional variant - though you're not getting the feel of either grit or realism out of 5e's rules without changes a little more dramatic than rest frequency.

[DeadMech]

I don't believe in the gritty realism variant. It doesn't actually solve the problem most people try to solve by using it. Imbalance between short and long rest classes. Absolutely new players might take too many long rests when a short rest would have been fine. Or maybe they blow through their resources faster than they should. This is true. But at the end of the day it's not how long a rest takes that determine when players want them. It's how confident they feel that they have enough resources to go forward.

[etrpgb]

Considering using the gritty realism rules from the dmg. What do you think of them?

The game is well balanced for two short rests per long rest. If you feel that is too many encounters per day, gritty realism is the answer as you should play with just few encounters per week.

Really, at the end of the day this is the point. If you in your game style you like to say stuff like:
"You have to wait a couple of days so the king comes back..." and the king comes back there is an encounter; the gritty realism is probably working fine.


If you think to work with the gritty realism but with the normal number of encounters the game won't work.

[Arkhios]

It's a perfectly functional variant - though you're not getting the feel of either grit or realism out of 5e's rules without changes a little more dramatic than rest frequency.

FWIW, it's a Gritty Realism Rest Variant, not "Gritty Realism Variant for the whole game" :smalltongue:

[MrStabby]

Not if they get the long rest within two game sessions. If the whole game week is played in one game session, session ends on a long rest, players start next game session refreshed of everything, players are fulfilled they used their stuff and can do it again. When the adventure is bit excitingly rough such that the game session can't end on a long rest because they're in the middle of something important, that's still fine because they haven't exhausted themselves of stuff to do. The excitement is concluded next game session, mop up, then long rest.

This philosophy holds true even with normal rest times. Certainly don't have 15 minute adventuring days, but that doesn't mean no rests at all.

Casters are more powerful when they are spending resources. Martials are more powerful than casters when casters are not spending resources. I would suggest, rather than aiming for rests on a per session basis you should be aiming for rests such that martials and casters spend similar amounts of time on top.

I don't punish players for rationing resources - I would never set adventuring days on the basis of when players run out of resources. What I do do is keep track of how many actions casters take that don't use spell slots; I find this works better. As long as casters spend enough time each day/week dodging, casting cantrips or making weapon attacks I know that there is space for the martial characters to shine and to have fun as well.

I see gritty realism as a way to help this. It avoids days being too combat focused to retain this balance; there can be some fights followed by talking and exploration rather than a day being a constant battle with a mound of corpses at the end.

[BurgerBeast]

I have personally struggled with trying to create a gritty realism game in 5e because of (I think) the relatively-high power levels of low-level PCs.

Maybe it’s just me, but any attempt to create a gritty setting is overwhelmed by the idea that 1st-level wizards can spam cantrips, or that 1st level clerics can cast healing spells.

The only thing I’ve been able to come up with is adding levels below level 1 to the experience table, inserting new levels into the progressions, or slowing spell progression so that level 6 spells are the highest level. (Slowing progression would obviously affect casters-only, hence the other ideas.)

I’ve homebrewed changes to the experience table where Level 1 becomes the new Level 7 (for example) and I take the starting character abilities and spread them out over the first 6 starting levels. (It’s surprising how far you can stretch them when you break up racial ability modifiers, skills, racial traits, class features, and perhaps throw in an ASI to the progression.

In the end, it’s probably way more effort than it’s worth, as opposed to playing a system designed to be grittier.

[JellyPooga]

I have personally struggled with trying to create a gritty realism game in 5e because of (I think) the relatively-high power levels of low-level PCs.

Maybe it’s just me, but any attempt to create a gritty setting is overwhelmed by the idea that 1st-level wizards can spam cantrips, or that 1st level clerics can cast healing spells.

The only thing I’ve been able to come up with is adding levels below level 1 to the experience table, inserting new levels into the progressions, or slowing spell progression so that level 6 spells are the highest level. (Slowing progression would obviously affect casters-only, hence the other ideas.)

I’ve homebrewed changes to the experience table where Level 1 becomes the new Level 7 (for example) and I take the starting character abilities and spread them out over the first 6 starting levels. (It’s surprising how far you can stretch them when you break up racial ability modifiers, skills, racial traits, class features, and perhaps throw in an ASI to the progression.

In the end, it’s probably way more effort than it’s worth, as opposed to playing a system designed to be grittier.

While I tend to agree that 5ed is generally pretty bad for trying to model a "gritty" game and that you might be better off playing something else, it does depend on what you're looking for out of that "grit".

- Is it a more challenging playstyle? In this case, then 5ed can be very gritty; harder challenges, lower rewards...the gritty realism rest variant can help here too, as I outlined in my previous post.

- Is it a pacing thing? The slower rate of healing offered by both magic and rests when using gritty realism can make things feel a little more "realistic" than literally recovering from "deaths door" one day to "Full Action Hero" the next...every single day.

- Is it a less "magical" world? Gritty Realism offers us a world where cantrips might be ubiquitous and used frequently, but "true" magic (i.e. anything that costs a spell slot) is something horded jealously and to be used only at the direst need. The same can be said for any grand feats of physical prowess or whathaveyou that require a long rest to recharge. The in-game expectations of those "big gun" abilities are that they come with less frequency and are, perhaps, worth more for it. Barbarians aren't flying into a bloodthirsty Rage every day, Paladins are Smiting only those that truly deserve divine justice and so forth. This can make people, even PCs, feel a little more homogenous and as such a little more normalised compared to one another; in itself an aspect of a "gritty" setting.

[MrStabby]

While I tend to agree that 5ed is generally pretty bad for trying to model a "gritty" game and that you might be better off playing something else, it does depend on what you're looking for out of that "grit".

- Is it a more challenging playstyle? In this case, then 5ed can be very gritty; harder challenges, lower rewards...the gritty realism rest variant can help here too, as I outlined in my previous post.

- Is it a pacing thing? The slower rate of healing offered by both magic and rests when using gritty realism can make things feel a little more "realistic" than literally recovering from "deaths door" one day to "Full Action Hero" the next...every single day.

- Is it a less "magical" world? Gritty Realism offers us a world where cantrips might be ubiquitous and used frequently, but "true" magic (i.e. anything that costs a spell slot) is something horded jealously and to be used only at the direst need. The same can be said for any grand feats of physical prowess or whathaveyou that require a long rest to recharge. The in-game expectations of those "big gun" abilities are that they come with less frequency and are, perhaps, worth more for it. Barbarians aren't flying into a bloodthirsty Rage every day, Paladins are Smiting only those that truly deserve divine justice and so forth. This can make people, even PCs, feel a little more homogenous and as such a little more normalised compared to one another; in itself an aspect of a "gritty" setting.

I think I would totally enjoy a game like that. Whilst it might make the PCs seem more mechanically homogeneous it will make the enemies seem more special - that one enemy that does drive you into a rage or that one enemy that is worthy of the divine smiting from your god. It would need a shift in expectation and my desire for mechanical complexity might need to come from elsewhere but I could see it being a really good fun game.

[Anymage]

I have personally struggled with trying to create a gritty realism game in 5e because of (I think) the relatively-high power levels of low-level PCs.

"Gritty realism" probably wasn't the best name for it. Still, the idea of changing pacing by redefining rests has a lot of promise, as is shown by the number of threads asking about the variant.

[Grey Watcher]

Call me crazy, but don't things like increasing spell durations and spacing out encounters to be less frequent defeat the purpose of using the GR variant? I can accept the idea that it's not a well-designed rule, sure, but isn't the point to force long-rest dependent (henceforth abbreviated to LRD) characters to be more judicious about using their powers, since they know they won't be getting them back for a week, but the monsters and traps and other challenges are still coming at you multiple times a day? To make a Wizard's Fireball or a Paladin's Compelled Duel all the more significant because you get them so infrequently that you want to be absolutely sure they're going to count?

Even non-instantaneous spells like Leomund's Tiny Hut or Locate Object: Hut no longer means "you always have a safe place to rest," but instead becomes an emergency shelter for when you simply cannot find a decent one by more conventional means. Locate Object is now much more a short term ping rather than a much more constant compass, so you'll want to narrow it down with more conventional investigation such that you can finish the job within the 10 minutes of the spell, because you really can't afford to spam it multiple times a day in most situations.

EDIT: OK, Tiny Hut's a bad example, since you can just Ritual cast it as often as you like.

Like I said, I can see the arguments that it's overly simplistic, or nerfs LRDs too hard, or any of the other critiques. But reformatting spells and adventures to compensate for it just seems to defeat the purpose of using the rule in the first place. (Kinda reminds me of the Free Parking = Free Money variant of Monopoly: it's a mechanic that prevents player elimination in game whose win condition is "eliminate all other players." It deliberately extends the length of the game, but people use the rule and then complain the game takes too long to finish. Yes, there's also a lot more wrong with Monopoly, but still.)

[JellyPooga]

Call me crazy, but don't things like increasing spell durations and spacing out encounters to be less frequent defeat the purpose of using the GR variant?

You're not crazy. But then you'll get a bunch of posts arguing that GR shouldn't change the base expectations of adventure design (i.e. the 2-3 encounters per Short Rest and 2-3 SRs per Long Rest), otherwise it throws the balance of the entire game into disarray (as if that wasn't the point).

[Tanarii]

I don't believe in the gritty realism variant.
In Soviet Russia, gritty realism variant doesn't believe in you!


It doesn't actually solve the problem most people try to solve by using it. Imbalance between short and long rest classes. Absolutely new players might take too many long rests when a short rest would have been fine. Or maybe they blow through their resources faster than they should. This is true. But at the end of the day it's not how long a rest takes that determine when players want them. It's how confident they feel that they have enough resources to go forward.
When it's suggested for fixing an imbalance between LR and SR classes, it's because DMs are already running a game with only one, maybe two, encounters per in-game day.

If the players are running the game so it only has one encounter per in game day, then sure, gritty realism isn't going to fix that problem.

[Segev]

You're not crazy. But then you'll get a bunch of posts arguing that GR shouldn't change the base expectations of adventure design (i.e. the 2-3 encounters per Short Rest and 2-3 SRs per Long Rest), otherwise it throws the balance of the entire game into disarray (as if that wasn't the point).

I would argue that its purpose is more to handle sparse encounter situations. As mentioned, for example, exploration of Chult in Tomb of Annihilation.

The expected adventuring posture is 1-3 encounters per short rest, and 2-3 short rests per long rest. Random encounters while exploring tend to be no more than 1 per day. 3 is the absolute maximum, if you follow the RAW in ToA for determining them (one morning, one afternoon, one night). With standard resting, that generally means the party takes an hour to short rest after any given encounter, because they're not in a rush that an hour's break will actually hinder. Even with ToA's soft time limit, adding an extra 3 hours to the day's journey (when they came from resting earlier in the day) isn't going to do much to slow the actual daily travel.

With encounters greater than 1 being rare, nova-ing on the first one is fine and dandy for the most part. And it's very hard to wear down a party during exploration when they recover all their HP every night, on top of everything else.

Gritty Realism resting would make this a little more doable: they'd have to essentially find a camp site, set it up to be heavily defensible, and avoid overly strenuous activity (such as violent encounters) for a full day. This slows their exploration in a meaningful fashion, adding an entire day to their journey each time. At a minimum. Because they could have to take longer if a random encounter occurs that breaks their long rest period. Short rest classes still refresh nightly, but they're not refreshing after every encounter, so 2-3 encounter days (rare as they are) stress them, too.

It's less about increasing parity between short and long rest classes, though, and more about encounter pacing. With GR resting, an encounter a day is actually draining and stressful.

[Pex]

Casters are more powerful when they are spending resources. Martials are more powerful than casters when casters are not spending resources. I would suggest, rather than aiming for rests on a per session basis you should be aiming for rests such that martials and casters spend similar amounts of time on top.

I don't punish players for rationing resources - I would never set adventuring days on the basis of when players run out of resources. What I do do is keep track of how many actions casters take that don't use spell slots; I find this works better. As long as casters spend enough time each day/week dodging, casting cantrips or making weapon attacks I know that there is space for the martial characters to shine and to have fun as well.

I see gritty realism as a way to help this. It avoids days being too combat focused to retain this balance; there can be some fights followed by talking and exploration rather than a day being a constant battle with a mound of corpses at the end.

That's all fine and dandy for game world play time if it suits your campaign. Not every game day will be a slugfest. However, I'm talking about game sessions. Players wants to use their stuff, and if they don't get to use it for three game sessions in a row after because the DM absolutely refuses to let them rest, regardless of how long it takes in gameworld time, 8 hours, a day, a week, a year, that's where plays get antsy, frustrated, and whiny. Players will conserve, but they might conserve too much - refusing to use their ability because they might need it later and won't get it back until a month or more real world time to use again so they only "I attack" or "Cast Cantrip" for the game session. If they do use it they just "I attack" or "Cast Cantrip" for several game sessions in a row starting next game session because they have nothing else. It could be "I attack/Cast Cantrip" for the first two hours of the game session, Use Resource Excitement for one round, then go back to "I attack/Cast Cantrip" such that they get one round of Use Resource Excitement per game session for 4 game sessions, spending 4 game sessions minus 4 rounds of only doing "I attack/Cast Cantrip". There's nothing wrong with "I attack/Cast Cantrip" as a concept. It helps to conserve resources, but it shouldn't be the majority of game play for a game session.

I can think of and have experienced a scenario where players won't necessarily mind going three game sessions before a long rest. Once in a while by on purpose DM design or happenstance of player initiative a game session is all roleplay. No die gets rolled that game session or maybe once or twice for a skill check. Players aren't using their resources due to no need or don't want. They're not exploring. They're talking to NPCs and each other. Everyone is into the Campaign/Character Personal Story having a blast. For me this an acceptable exception to one long rest per two game sessions.

[Keravath]

I play in an episodic campaign with gritty realism and it fits well. In a 4-5 hour game once each month, we rarely have time for a short rest and never take long rests except for between sessions. Before switching from standard rules the DM had to throw exclusively deadly encounters at us and even those were rarely challenging. Now we get a much better range of encounters and it is a lot more fun.

The interesting thing I find about this comment is that nothing has changed mechanically. All that has changed are perceptions (and a few long duration spells that usually don't impact things much).

The characters are the same, the resources are the same. However, by telling the players that short rests take a day and long rests are longer. The players don't take short or long rests. They play through multiple encounters presumably due to some feeling of time pressure which means they don't feel comfortable taking significant time for rests.

The party could have been doing this all along but somehow the time pressure of 1 hour/1 night for short/long rests wasn't psychologically sufficient to motivate the players to minimize rests.

Anyway, if it works for your group that is great but because the change is generally not mechanical but psychological, it won't work the same way for everyone.

[Keravath]

I would argue that its purpose is more to handle sparse encounter situations. As mentioned, for example, exploration of Chult in Tomb of Annihilation.

The expected adventuring posture is 1-3 encounters per short rest, and 2-3 short rests per long rest. Random encounters while exploring tend to be no more than 1 per day. 3 is the absolute maximum, if you follow the RAW in ToA for determining them (one morning, one afternoon, one night). With standard resting, that generally means the party takes an hour to short rest after any given encounter, because they're not in a rush that an hour's break will actually hinder. Even with ToA's soft time limit, adding an extra 3 hours to the day's journey (when they came from resting earlier in the day) isn't going to do much to slow the actual daily travel.

With encounters greater than 1 being rare, nova-ing on the first one is fine and dandy for the most part. And it's very hard to wear down a party during exploration when they recover all their HP every night, on top of everything else.

Gritty Realism resting would make this a little more doable: they'd have to essentially find a camp site, set it up to be heavily defensible, and avoid overly strenuous activity (such as violent encounters) for a full day. This slows their exploration in a meaningful fashion, adding an entire day to their journey each time. At a minimum. Because they could have to take longer if a random encounter occurs that breaks their long rest period. Short rest classes still refresh nightly, but they're not refreshing after every encounter, so 2-3 encounter days (rare as they are) stress them, too.

It's less about increasing parity between short and long rest classes, though, and more about encounter pacing. With GR resting, an encounter a day is actually draining and stressful.

Honestly, in Tomb of Annihilation, different parts of the map are pretty much intended for different kinds of pacing.

Random encounters are something like one in the morning and one in the afternoon/day plus slogging along. This is because, in general, traveling through the jungle from A to B is neither stimulating nor interesting. Yes, the party will generally have all their resources for these encounters but some of these encounters are quite challenging so that isn't a bad thing.

However, when you reach a destination there are often a large number of encounters grouped. This is where the DM doesn't allow the characters to retreat and rest part way through without consequences. The module even specifies in several cases when natives might have showed up at the exit from the location the party is exploring, resulting in possible encounters when the characters try to exit.

ToA has several areas with quite different pacing (as do most campaigns). As a result, trying to use gritty realism for the whole adventure might not work very well.

P.S. ToA is one of the better designed sandbox modules I've played through. It was a lot of fun. The biggest issue I found when I played through it was the random jungle encounters and the general lack of good content deep in the jungles. Most of the more extensively developed content (outside Omu) is on the periphery of Chult which makes it difficult to encounter them all and still stay on the limited death curse time line.

[MrStabby]

That's all fine and dandy for game world play time if it suits your campaign. Not every game day will be a slugfest. However, I'm talking about game sessions. Players wants to use their stuff, and if they don't get to use it for three game sessions in a row after because the DM absolutely refuses to let them rest, regardless of how long it takes in gameworld time, 8 hours, a day, a week, a year, that's where plays get antsy, frustrated, and whiny. Players will conserve, but they might conserve too much - refusing to use their ability because they might need it later and won't get it back until a month or more real world time to use again so they only "I attack" or "Cast Cantrip" for the game session. If they do use it they just "I attack" or "Cast Cantrip" for several game sessions in a row starting next game session because they have nothing else. It could be "I attack/Cast Cantrip" for the first two hours of the game session, Use Resource Excitement for one round, then go back to "I attack/Cast Cantrip" such that they get one round of Use Resource Excitement per game session for 4 game sessions, spending 4 game sessions minus 4 rounds of only doing "I attack/Cast Cantrip". There's nothing wrong with "I attack/Cast Cantrip" as a concept. It helps to conserve resources, but it shouldn't be the majority of game play for a game session.

I can think of and have experienced a scenario where players won't necessarily mind going three game sessions before a long rest. Once in a while by on purpose DM design or happenstance of player initiative a game session is all roleplay. No die gets rolled that game session or maybe once or twice for a skill check. Players aren't using their resources due to no need or don't want. They're not exploring. They're talking to NPCs and each other. Everyone is into the Campaign/Character Personal Story having a blast. For me this an acceptable exception to one long rest per two game sessions.

The decision on when to use resources and when to conserve them is up to the players not the DM. If PCs burn their resources too quickly then that is their choice. It isn't for the DM to babysit them. If they burnt all their spells in a previous session then this session they might be a bit less awesome - sure it sucks but they can do things differently next time. The DM has a duty to let everyone at the table shine which cannot happen if 70%+ of the time casters are able to do more awesome stuff than other players because they are burning spell slots. As I DM I have a duty to players of casters but also to everyone else at the table to prevent them being overshadowed.

I think that this is the benefit of gritty realism. It lets the periods of combat where a conservative or depleted caster will not shine be interspersed by more hours of stuff that isn't combat where they can shine. Its harder to fit in 5 days of stuff about town between 8 combats in a day, but easier between 8 combats over a week

[Pex]

The decision on when to use resources and when to conserve them is up to the players not the DM. If PCs burn their resources too quickly then that is their choice. It isn't for the DM to babysit them. If they burnt all their spells in a previous session then this session they might be a bit less awesome - sure it sucks but they can do things differently next time. The DM has a duty to let everyone at the table shine which cannot happen if 70%+ of the time casters are able to do more awesome stuff than other players because they are burning spell slots. As I DM I have a duty to players of casters but also to everyone else at the table to prevent them being overshadowed.

I think that this is the benefit of gritty realism. It lets the periods of combat where a conservative or depleted caster will not shine be interspersed by more hours of stuff that isn't combat where they can shine. Its harder to fit in 5 days of stuff about town between 8 combats in a day, but easier between 8 combats over a week

It still matters how often players get long rests per game session. Conservation of resources is a good thing. It's a skill new players need to and should learn to match the pace of the game, but if the DM refuses to let them long rest for four game sessions in a row because they just cannot get a game week off to gritty realism rest, then that's the DMs fault. Conservation can only go so far you will deplete because it's another combat or you never use because you're always worried about the next combat and you won't get it back for a long time after you use it.

It's the same using normal rest rules doing a dungeon crawl. If the players can never find a safe room to rest for four game sessions, the same depletion/never use problem arises despite long rest being the normal 8 hours. Going to the fourth game session in a row doing that same bloody dungeon, you're out of all your stuff, and you still can't rest and have to go through another series of skirmishes will PO your players.

[Tanarii]

I'm inclined to agree with Pex. (Pauses for gasps of shock and horror.) The pacing of regular resting and resource expenditure is about right for a Long Rest every session or two. Assuming you do longish sessions of 3-4 hours each. If you start pushing past that regularly, you're likely to get players wondering when the heck they'll get their resources back.

If you do shorter or more frequent sessions, or have players who are far from the norm in terms of expected pacing and patience, YMMV.

[Yakk]

The game is designed around 1-1.5x "deadly" xp spread over 1-3 "encounters" per short rest, and ~2 short rests per long rest, if I remember right.

With gritty realism, an entire dungeon should be have the budget of "between short rest". A dungeon larger than that cannot be reasonably cleared without retreating.

If you have to travel to get there (2 days, 2-3 encounters, total budget 1.5x deadly), clear the dungeon (1.5x-2x deadly, broken up into 2-4+ encounters, some multiple room), get back (2 days, 1-2 encounters, total budget 0.75x-1.5x), that'll be a nasty bit of work.

[ad_hoc]

The game is designed around 1-1.5x "deadly" xp spread over 1-3 "encounters" per short rest, and ~2 short rests per long rest, if I remember right.

With gritty realism, an entire dungeon should be have the budget of "between short rest". A dungeon larger than that cannot be reasonably cleared without retreating.

If you have to travel to get there (2 days, 2-3 encounters, total budget 1.5x deadly), clear the dungeon (1.5x-2x deadly, broken up into 2-4+ encounters, some multiple room), get back (2 days, 1-2 encounters, total budget 0.75x-1.5x), that'll be a nasty bit of work.

The game is designed for dungeons, so yes, a variant would make it bad for that.

Gritty Realism is good for games that are on a different narrative timeline.

[JellyPooga]

You're not crazy. But then you'll get a bunch of posts arguing that GR shouldn't change the base expectations of adventure design (i.e. the 2-3 encounters per Short Rest and 2-3 SRs per Long Rest), otherwise it throws the balance of the entire game into disarray (as if that wasn't the point).
The game is designed around 1-1.5x "deadly" xp spread over 1-3 "encounters" per short rest, and ~2 short rests per long rest, if I remember right.

With gritty realism, an entire dungeon should be have the budget of "between short rest". A dungeon larger than that cannot be reasonably cleared without retreating.

If you have to travel to get there (2 days, 2-3 encounters, total budget 1.5x deadly), clear the dungeon (1.5x-2x deadly, broken up into 2-4+ encounters, some multiple room), get back (2 days, 1-2 encounters, total budget 0.75x-1.5x), that'll be a nasty bit of work.Sometimes I think I'm prescient :smallbiggrin:

Gritty Realism isn't supposed to have the same assumptions. Gritty Realism is supposed to make the likes of dungeon delving a dangerous activity that is most certainly not to be taken lightly; go in well prepared or don't go in at all. Gritty Realism, for me, makes dungeons make sense. Invading the home of dangerous creatures and expecting to come out, not only alive, but laden with treasure? That's...arrogant, to say the least. Adventurers should be scared going into a dungeon and GR facilitates that fear by limiting resources. Does it make your traditional dungeon harder? Absolutely! It's supposed to encourage a more considered approach than the kick-in-the-door, big-damn-hero style of the standard rules. That's not to say GR can't be exciting or can't feature epic encounters; of course it can...just not in the same way.

Then there's assumptions about random encounters. Players expect to have an encounter or two on the road because that's how the game is set up, but when you change the basic assumptions of how the game is functioning, you need to change the other assumptions of the game dynamic...including the obligatory random encounter.
For me, a classic example of a Gritty Realism session might look something very akin to the concluding chapters of the Arnie "Conan the Barbarian", after he's rescued from the Tree of Woe. The PCs invade the dungeon using stealth and fight their way out. The next day, they lay a trap for Thulsa Dum and kill his Lieutenants. The day after that, Conan goes back for Dum himself, using stealth (again) to infiltrate the palace and kill Dum in front of his subjects, to win the day.

If that wasn't a Gritty Realism campaign, instead using the standard rules, the PCs would likely have fought their way in, scoured the dungeon for Thulsa Dum, fighting their way to his lair, then killed him there and then. Is that necessarily worse? No, nor is it better. It's a different style. If Conan and co had tried the latter approach under GR, they'd have probably died or failed. The dungeon is the same dungeon in both cases, but the methods used to take them on is entirely different.

[Anymage]

Sometimes I think I'm prescient :smallbiggrin:

Gritty Realism isn't supposed to have the same assumptions. Gritty Realism is supposed to make the likes of dungeon delving a dangerous activity ... For me, a classic example of a Gritty Realism session might look something very akin to the concluding chapters of the Arnie "Conan the Barbarian", after he's rescued from the Tree of Woe. The PCs invade the dungeon using stealth and fight their way out. The next day, they lay a trap for Thulsa Dum and kill his Lieutenants. The day after that, Conan goes back for Dum himself, using stealth (again) to infiltrate the palace and kill Dum in front of his subjects, to win the day.

First, unless we see another solid go at the skill challenge idea, stealth and subterfuge in D&D are still going to hinge on the fact that a d20 is still a huge honkin' amount of randomness. Especially in 5e's bounded accuracy system. Barging into the enemy's fortified encampment should be suicide in a GR system, but the DM will need to work with the players to make evading mooks more engaging than straight stealth rolls. Similarly, the mooks should be understood as minor resource drains where you could take a patrol easily if things went south, but you wanted to avoid them to prevent draining resources you'd rather spend on the big bad.

Second, for me the archetype of GR games is every D&D game I've ever played where either the DM had a hard time justifying a full day's worth of encounters in one 24 hour period, or where players made every effort to get a full night's rest every time they novaed their resources. Time pressures that only allow a handful of days start to feel contrived very quickly. It changes the feel and tone of a campaign, but ideally should do so to make them better reflect the math.


It still matters how often players get long rests per game session. Conservation of resources is a good thing. It's a skill new players need to and should learn to match the pace of the game, but if the DM refuses to let them long rest for four game sessions in a row because they just cannot get a game week off to gritty realism rest, then that's the DMs fault. Conservation can only go so far you will deplete because it's another combat or you never use because you're always worried about the next combat and you won't get it back for a long time after you use it.

It's the same using normal rest rules doing a dungeon crawl. If the players can never find a safe room to rest for four game sessions, the same depletion/never use problem arises despite long rest being the normal 8 hours. Going to the fourth game session in a row doing that same bloody dungeon, you're out of all your stuff, and you still can't rest and have to go through another series of skirmishes will PO your players.

Have to agree with this. If I as a DM want to wear down my players resources, I can just have things keep attacking them and never giving them a rest. Eventually, PCs will run out. Of course, if I want to do this, I might as well just have an asteroid obliterate the campaign world's planet and not bother with rolls.

I want my players to feel awesome. Pacing is just a lever I have to help spread the spotlight around more effectively.

[Knaight]

Call me crazy, but don't things like increasing spell durations and spacing out encounters to be less frequent defeat the purpose of using the GR variant? I can accept the idea that it's not a well-designed rule, sure, but isn't the point to force long-rest dependent (henceforth abbreviated to LRD) characters to be more judicious about using their powers, since they know they won't be getting them back for a week, but the monsters and traps and other challenges are still coming at you multiple times a day? To make a Wizard's Fireball or a Paladin's Compelled Duel all the more significant because you get them so infrequently that you want to be absolutely sure they're going to count?

Not really - it's more a matter of facilitating a campaign pacing where what happens in setting isn't "the party gets in about 6 fights a day, every day". That opens up a lot more room for different structures with more intermittent conflicts and a lot more going on that isn't part of the encounter mill.

[Tanarii]

Gritty Realism isn't supposed to have the same assumptions. Gritty Realism is supposed to make the likes of dungeon delving a dangerous activity that is most certainly not to be taken lightly; go in well prepared or don't go in at all. Gritty Realism, for me, makes dungeons make sense. Invading the home of dangerous creatures and expecting to come out, not only alive, but laden with treasure? That's...arrogant, to say the least. Adventurers should be scared going into a dungeon and GR facilitates that fear by limiting resources. Does it make your traditional dungeon harder? Absolutely! It's supposed to encourage a more considered approach than the kick-in-the-door, big-damn-hero style of the standard rules. That's not to say GR can't be exciting or can't feature epic encounters; of course it can...just not in the same way.Or dungeons are just far far below what would normally be considered a PCs weight class in a classic dungeon. Cave full of goblins with a final boss could be a multitude of well-below-Easy encounters, followed by a single Hard encounter, followed by an overnight Short rest.

Not that I think many people would be interested in playing that, given the attitude many have towards even doing 5-6 Medium encounters as 'cleaning trash' and not worth the table time.

[Slipperychicken]

I haven't run it, but it's an answer to the "but we only have one fight per day" problem

As long as the same amount of adventuring encounters are spread out over a short/long rest, then mechanically it doesn't matter how long it is

[JellyPooga]

First, unless we see another solid go at the skill challenge idea, stealth and subterfuge in D&D are still going to hinge on the fact that a d20 is still a huge honkin' amount of randomness. Especially in 5e's bounded accuracy system. Barging into the enemy's fortified encampment should be suicide in a GR system, but the DM will need to work with the players to make evading mooks more engaging than straight stealth rolls. Similarly, the mooks should be understood as minor resource drains where you could take a patrol easily if things went south, but you wanted to avoid them to prevent draining resources you'd rather spend on the big bad.
Or dungeons are just far far below what would normally be considered a PCs weight class in a classic dungeon. Cave full of goblins with a final boss could be a multitude of well-below-Easy encounters, followed by a single Hard encounter, followed by an overnight Short rest.

Not that I think many people would be interested in playing that, given the attitude many have towards even doing 5-6 Medium encounters as 'cleaning trash' and not worth the table time.

Making non-combat encounters engaging isn't a problem with GR except where it encourages more of them. This applies as equally to social or exploration encounters as much as it does to stealth, combat or any other. That's a GMing skill regardless of what resting rules are being used. Additionally, there's no reason why the "mook encounters" should necessarily be understood to be a minor drain or easy, any more than they should be when using regular rest rules. For GR to be doing its job, encounters and adventures should be exactly as hard as they would be under regular resting rules otherwise all you achieve is making the game easy and as a result, dull. In the example of the Cave o' Goblins, it should be a real threat to the PC's that if they're discovered or otherwise botch things up and end up fighting everyone, they're in for a really hard time of it. Like, "spend all your resources, maybe even lose a fellow PC or two" hard, i.e. "We're going to need a week-long rest after this" hard. Given that PC's, even without a specific time pressure, aren't going to want to take weeks of downtime after every "botched" encounter/adventure, GR done this way encourages a more creative play-style than just blowing all your long-rest resources every day to overcome challenges. It encourages Players to use resources other than the ones their race/class/feats offer on a platter for use and reuse, because the longer their characters can keep adventuring without a massive holiday, the more creative, resourceful and generally badass they're going to feel. Especially when a time-sensitive quest does come along and force them to push their limits even further.


Second, for me the archetype of GR games is every D&D game I've ever played where either the DM had a hard time justifying a full day's worth of encounters in one 24 hour period, or where players made every effort to get a full night's rest every time they novaed their resources. Time pressures that only allow a handful of days start to feel contrived very quickly. It changes the feel and tone of a campaign, but ideally should do so to make them better reflect the math.

For me, GR isn't about alleviating that "encounter squeeze" or extending time scales, so much as about creating a certain less heroic, more dangerous tone (you might almost say grittier and more realistic...) that encourages players to think further than just booting the door in to the next fight (because almost every encounter is a combat) as well as opening up greater scope to include the use of Long and Short rest resources more frugally on those non-combat encounters that have a longer timescale involved (e.g. intrigue, politics and so forth). Granted, that's not the case for everyone; at least three different reasons for using GR have been given in this thread alone, but from my perspective if you're using it to fix a perceived problem with the rules (e.g. casters are too powerful compared to mundanes, or the PC-Nova conundrum), then you're using it for the wrong reason and going about your fix in the wrong way.

[MrStabby]

Making non-combat encounters engaging isn't a problem with GR except where it encourages more of them. This applies as equally to social or exploration encounters as much as it does to stealth, combat or any other. That's a GMing skill regardless of what resting rules are being used. Additionally, there's no reason why the "mook encounters" should necessarily be understood to be a minor drain or easy, any more than they should be when using regular rest rules. For GR to be doing its job, encounters and adventures should be exactly as hard as they would be under regular resting rules otherwise all you achieve is making the game easy and as a result, dull. In the example of the Cave o' Goblins, it should be a real threat to the PC's that if they're discovered or otherwise botch things up and end up fighting everyone, they're in for a really hard time of it. Like, "spend all your resources, maybe even lose a fellow PC or two" hard, i.e. "We're going to need a week-long rest after this" hard. Given that PC's, even without a specific time pressure, aren't going to want to take weeks of downtime after every "botched" encounter/adventure, GR done this way encourages a more creative play-style than just blowing all your long-rest resources every day to overcome challenges. It encourages Players to use resources other than the ones their race/class/feats offer on a platter for use and reuse, because the longer their characters can keep adventuring without a massive holiday, the more creative, resourceful and generally badass they're going to feel. Especially when a time-sensitive quest does come along and force them to push their limits even further.



For me, GR isn't about alleviating that "encounter squeeze" or extending time scales, so much as about creating a certain less heroic, more dangerous tone (you might almost say grittier and more realistic...) that encourages players to think further than just booting the door in to the next fight (because almost every encounter is a combat) as well as opening up greater scope to include the use of Long and Short rest resources more frugally on those non-combat encounters that have a longer timescale involved (e.g. intrigue, politics and so forth). Granted, that's not the case for everyone; at least three different reasons for using GR have been given in this thread alone, but from my perspective if you're using it to fix a perceived problem with the rules (e.g. casters are too powerful compared to mundanes, or the PC-Nova conundrum), then you're using it for the wrong reason and going about your fix in the wrong way.

I think that the alternative resources is a good point. One thing I like about DMing a gritty realism type game is that I can give my players consumable resources like potions and wands and for these to be cherished rather than just catalogued and never pulled out again. Now a cute potion that heals for d8 damage and provides +1 to con saves for 24 hours is seen as pretty cool - if nothing else HD recovery is just that little bit harder.

[Yakk]

I've been messing around with encounter building budgets.

Suppose a dungeon should be cleared in a day, as once you leave it will fortify or flee (with the treasure).

Under fast-rest rules, you can get multiple short rests, but no long rests.

Under default assumptions, you cannot really get a short rest. I mean, an hour break in a hostile dungeon?

Under gritty assumptions, you cannot get a short rest.

In every case except fast-rest, this means a dungeon has 1x to 2x a single deadly encounter's budget. Under fast-rest, it has 3x-4x a single deadly encounter's budget.

If the dungeon is static (ie, you can come back other days), the differences between the above become a matter of 15 minute adventuring days and meta-plot timelines.

If there is no time pressure, then all 3 variants are the same. If there is time pressure, which of the 3 give a better experience from the DM's side of the table?

Fast-rest means any time pressure has to be on the matter of minutes (some short rests allowed) to hours (some long rests allowed).

Standard-rest means any time pressure has to be on the matter of minutes (no rest), hours (some short rests allowed) to days (some long rests allowed).

Gritty-rest means any time pressure has to be on the matter of minutes (no rests), days (some short rests allowed) to weeks (some long rests allowed).

[LordCdrMilitant]

For me, GR isn't about alleviating that "encounter squeeze" or extending time scales, so much as about creating a certain less heroic, more dangerous tone (you might almost say grittier and more realistic...) that encourages players to think further than just booting the door in to the next fight (because almost every encounter is a combat) as well as opening up greater scope to include the use of Long and Short rest resources more frugally on those non-combat encounters that have a longer timescale involved (e.g. intrigue, politics and so forth). Granted, that's not the case for everyone; at least three different reasons for using GR have been given in this thread alone, but from my perspective if you're using it to fix a perceived problem with the rules (e.g. casters are too powerful compared to mundanes, or the PC-Nova conundrum), then you're using it for the wrong reason and going about your fix in the wrong way.

It doesn't do that though, at all. It's not inherently gritty, and absolutely not more realistic [there's no actual standard for realism at all since nothing rest rules pertain to have any basis in reality in the first place]. A campaign with GR rest rules can be a heroic if you want, with dragonslayers in shining armor with waving banners and keen lances, and a regular rest rules game can be as gritty as you want with mud up to your knees, trench-foot, shell-shock, etc.

It purpose is to increase the number of short rests taken [for example, my parties using normal rest rules never take short rests], to affect the balance between the short and long rest casters. I believe that is does this well, and if this is what you want for your game, you should use it, but that if you're looking for a grim and gritty atmosphere then it shouldn't be your first stop.

I don't really use it anymore, because it has some carry-down effects to the GM how I arrange dungeons and encounters. I either have to be tolerant of what would be a 15 minute adventuring day so that they can retreat/secure their position and take short rests during the dungeon, or I have to tone things down with fewer and smaller encounters and I can't run them as ragged as hard.


As a side note, I think that the normal rest rules are actually better at creating an atmosphere of despair where the party's on the back foot and running out of resources, because their salvation is just barely within reach but to stop and rest would be conceding defeat or bring powerful counterattacks upon them in their time of least readiness. Under GR rest rules, it was so far off, they were always planning on not having it during the duration of the adventure, and there's not much to look forward too off a short rest.

[CNagy]

The only time I've had unambiguous success with the gritty realism rest rules is in "war" campaigns. Unit-based operations, skirmishes, larger-scale battles, sieges; all of it plays a bit better when you're trying to save major resources for planned important encounters (attacks on the enemy camps/fortifications/positions) and responding to unexpected circumstances (night raids, scouting encounters, hostile flora and fauna).

[JellyPooga]

It doesn't do that though, at all. It's not inherently gritty, and absolutely not more realistic [there's no actual standard for realism at all since nothing rest rules pertain to have any basis in reality in the first place]. A campaign with GR rest rules can be a heroic if you want, with dragonslayers in shining armor with waving banners and keen lances, and a regular rest rules game can be as gritty as you want with mud up to your knees, trench-foot, shell-shock, etc.

It purpose is to increase the number of short rests taken [for example, my parties using normal rest rules never take short rests], to affect the balance between the short and long rest casters. I believe that is does this well, and if this is what you want for your game, you should use it, but that if you're looking for a grim and gritty atmosphere then it shouldn't be your first stop.

I don't really use it anymore, because it has some carry-down effects to the GM how I arrange dungeons and encounters. I either have to be tolerant of what would be a 15 minute adventuring day so that they can retreat/secure their position and take short rests during the dungeon, or I have to tone things down with fewer and smaller encounters and I can't run them as ragged as hard.


As a side note, I think that the normal rest rules are actually better at creating an atmosphere of despair where the party's on the back foot and running out of resources, because their salvation is just barely within reach but to stop and rest would be conceding defeat or bring powerful counterattacks upon them in their time of least readiness. Under GR rest rules, it was so far off, they were always planning on not having it during the duration of the adventure, and there's not much to look forward too off a short rest.

The unambiguous fact that the rule is literally called "Gritty Realism" and not "Short-Long Rest Balance" disagrees with your interpretation of the rules' purpose.

Yes, you can have epic heroic battles with knights fighting dragons using GR and of course you can have gritty, drawn out "true" warlike adventures using the standard rules, but that doesn't change how the different rules will affect the general feel of a campaign, assuming you are using them in the intended way (i.e. allowing the rule to fill its purpose instead of conpensating for it). Using GR, the knight isn't able to fight a dragon every day, where he can using standard rests and conversely, the trench-bound soldier just gets a handy Cure Disease from the Cleric every day and never suffers the effects of trenchfoot, whilst the GR Cleric has to actually consider whether to save that spellslot. The basic assumptions of the game change drastically when you change the rest rules without changing anything else.

Put it this way, the more frequently the PCs have the opportunity to rest (short or long) the more they can utilise their "big gun" abilities and the more "heroic" the campaign will be. Likewise, the less they can use those features, the less "heroic" the campaign (or to put it another way, from a different viewpoint, the grittier it is).

To put it in its mkst simple terms, if you're toning down your adventures/encounters to compensate for the GR rest rules...you are literally using the rule counter to its purpose. If you disagree, I invite you to read the rules name again.

[Yakk]

Omg wrongfun!

[LordCdrMilitant]

The unambiguous fact that the rule is literally called "Gritty Realism" and not "Short-Long Rest Balance" disagrees with your interpretation of the rules' purpose.

Yes, you can have epic heroic battles with knights fighting dragons using GR and of course you can have gritty, drawn out "true" warlike adventures using the standard rules, but that doesn't change how the different rules will affect the general feel of a campaign, assuming you are using them in the intended way (i.e. allowing the rule to fill its purpose instead of conpensating for it). Using GR, the knight isn't able to fight a dragon every day, where he can using standard rests and conversely, the trench-bound soldier just gets a handy Cure Disease from the Cleric every day and never suffers the effects of trenchfoot, whilst the GR Cleric has to actually consider whether to save that spellslot. The basic assumptions of the game change drastically when you change the rest rules without changing anything else.

Put it this way, the more frequently the PCs have the opportunity to rest (short or long) the more they can utilise their "big gun" abilities and the more "heroic" the campaign will be. Likewise, the less they can use those features, the less "heroic" the campaign (or to put it another way, from a different viewpoint, the grittier it is).

To put it in its mkst simple terms, if you're toning down your adventures/encounters to compensate for the GR rest rules...you are literally using the rule counter to its purpose. If you disagree, I invite you to read the rules name again.

I've read the rule's name [obviously], and I am stating that whatever it's named and "intended effect is", it doesn't achieve that. It doesn't matter what it's name is, that's just fluff for the rule, it matters what it's effect is, which isn't producing "gritty realism". It does combat the 15 minute adventuring day [and very effectively, too], but it doesn't make it gritty or realistic.

If I want it to feel desperate, tough and uncompromising, and requiring courage and resolve ["gritty" as defined by Google], I don't turn to the "gritty realism" rule set. I turn towards making the average statline of enemies equal to or better than that of the players, enemies often conducting powerful counterattacks at inconvenient times and laying ambushes to catch the party in bad situations, the party failing objectives [in understandable and realistic ways] due to choices they made and the way they approach problems, etc. I do deny them the opportunity to rest, but not by saying you have to wait for the end of the week, but instead by making the cost of stopping for eight hours being mission failure and/or intense counterattacks against them when they're at their weakest.

[MaxWilson]

The game is designed around 1-1.5x "deadly" xp spread over 1-3 "encounters" per short rest, and ~2 short rests per long rest, if I remember right.

1x Deadly not 1.5x, and for some levels it's more like 0.98x.

But personally I think you're basically right, planning for 1.5x to 2x Deadly several times a day is fine, for a daily total of around 150% to 200% of the XP budget. Of course it's up to the players whether they actually do more or less fighting or resting than this, in any particular day. Players never do what you expect when you expect.



Gritty Realism isn't supposed to have the same assumptions. Gritty Realism is supposed to make the likes of dungeon delving a dangerous activity that is most certainly not to be taken lightly; go in well prepared or don't go in at all. Gritty Realism, for me, makes dungeons make sense. Invading the home of dangerous creatures and expecting to come out, not only alive, but laden with treasure? That's...arrogant, to say the least. Adventurers should be scared going into a dungeon and GR facilitates that fear by limiting resources. Does it make your traditional dungeon harder? Absolutely! It's supposed to encourage a more considered approach than the kick-in-the-door, big-damn-hero style of the standard rules. That's not to say GR can't be exciting or can't feature epic encounters; of course it can...just not in the same way.

Not *enough* harder though unless you also boost encounter difficulty. If you stick to Xanathar's guidelines or DMG Medium/Hard it is still too easy to defeat monsters using at-will abilities and consumable equipment, which means no real resource drain. Put no resource drain together with no actual danger of dying, and now you've got no dramatic stakes, just tedium.

If you're going to use Gritty Realism to make dungeons feel deadly, at least also use a wide range of difficulties, sometimes including Deadly+.

[Tanarii]

Of course it's up to the players whether they actually do more or less fighting or resting than this, in any particular day.Thats not a given. It can be up the DM. Or partially up to the DM and partially up to the players. And the methods for who it is up to can vary from direct decision making to consequential.

Couple of example:
1) Many AL tables and modules, you either complete the module by the end of session, or the table disbands and you're effectively abandoned the adventuring site for a long rest. Short rests vary from dictated by the module to player choice based on circumstances within them.
2) random wandering monster checks that can interrupt long or short rests allow player choice but have potential consequences. If they know the exact odds they can calculate, otherwise they may be WAGing.
3) DM determined wandering monsters translate to DM-fiat determined. If you're a player in one of these campaigns, you either depend on DM whim, or learn to just ask the DM if it's safe to rest. Or ask the DM to just tell you outright when to rest.
4) DMs can just tell the players when they can rest. Usually called "narrative driven" or the like.

[ad_hoc]

3) DM determined wandering monsters translate to DM-fiat determined. If you're a player in one of these campaigns, you either depend on DM whim, or learn to just ask the DM if it's safe to rest. Or ask the DM to just tell you outright when to rest.


Our table has settled on this.

I love random monsters in general. But people don't like being interrupted when trying to rest, there is just a rhythm to it that feels cumbersome.

So I just tell the players if it is a safe place to rest or not.

We played an adventure once where the party was in a corrupted town which was overrun with evil spirits. The party decided to take a rest in a haunted mansion. Then there was an encounter. After that a player said 'well what are the odds there will be another one'. So they tried to rest, and there was another one. Each time they said, well surely at this point there can't be anymore right?

The reality was that the undead don't stop. The land was corrupted by evil (actually the fault of the players earlier in the game but I digress) and the evil will always find them if they rest too long.

So that session was a slog. After that the table came to an agreement that I would just tell them if it was safe.

[Tanarii]

Yup, it makes sense at some table.

Also apparently my subconscious bias is against such a process. Rereading example #3 it's awfully judge-y the way I wrote it. My bad.

[MaxWilson]

Thats not a given. It can be up the DM.

Clarifying: when I said that I was speaking of my own experience. Players = my players, DM = me.

Not saying everyone runs games this way, just saying IME planning for 150-200% of the adventuring day budget is perfectly fine, challenging but not insanely hard.

[JellyPooga]

I've read the rule's name [obviously], and I am stating that whatever it's named and "intended effect is", it doesn't achieve that.
This post...

or I have to tone things down with fewer and smaller encounters and I can't run them as ragged as hard.
...and this are contradictory. GR increases the challenge of encounters/adventures by limiting resources, but only if you don't "tone down" the adventure. Of course it'a not going to have the intended effect of feeling gritty or challenging if you're making the game easier as well.


Not *enough* harder though unless you also boost encounter difficulty. If you stick to Xanathar's guidelines or DMG Medium/Hard it is still too easy to defeat monsters using at-will abilities and consumable equipment, which means no real resource drain. Put no resource drain together with no actual danger of dying, and now you've got no dramatic stakes, just tedium.

If you're going to use Gritty Realism to make dungeons feel deadly, at least also use a wide range of difficulties, sometimes including Deadly+.

That's a call to be made at a given table, though. What one group will find a cakewalk, another will find insurmountable. As GM, that's your call to make, but I would tend to agree thay whether you're using GR or not, you still need a range of encounter difficulties to make an adventure interesting and challenging. What I'm trying to say is that when using GR, GMs should not be making encounters easier to compensate for the lower frequency of rests because doing so is counter to the point of using GR in the first place.

If you want a more challenging game, don't try and balance the difficulty; tip the scale.

[MrStabby]

This post...

...and this are contradictory. GR increases the challenge of encounters/adventures by limiting resources, but only if you don't "tone down" the adventure. Of course it'a not going to have the intended effect of feeling gritty or challenging if you're making the game easier as well.



That's a call to be made at a given table, though. What one group will find a cakewalk, another will find insurmountable. As GM, that's your call to make, but I would tend to agree thay whether you're using GR or not, you still need a range of encounter difficulties to make an adventure interesting and challenging. What I'm trying to say is that when using GR, GMs should not be making encounters easier to compensate for the lower frequency of rests because doing so is counter to the point of using GR in the first place.

If you want a more challenging game, don't try and balance the difficulty; tip the scale.

Yeah, GR makes less hard encounters much, much more interesting. In a "normal" game the outcome of an easy encounter is basically Win or Lose and Lose is a pretty remote possibility because it is easy. GR means the outcomes are Win, Lose or Win But Spent Resources Needed to Survive an Encounter Later in the Week. It adds interest to what otherwise would be a bland affair.

[Tanarii]

This post...

...and this are contradictory. GR increases the challenge of encounters/adventures by limiting resources, but only if you don't "tone down" the adventure. Of course it'a not going to have the intended effect of feeling gritty or challenging if you're making the game easier as well.Yup.

MaxWilson you have a history of considering anything below Deadly a cakewalk, so I'm unsurprised to see you also considers they effectively don't use resources. I know you personally theorycraft maximum tactical optimization, but it sounds like your players have high levels of both build optimization and tactical optimization.

My players use no significant build optimization beyond the absolute minimum (since it's single class and no feats), and use reasonable tactical optimization. A medium challenge uses some resources. Even Easy ones will slowly drain Hit Points.