What are good adventures/modules that play to 5e's strengths?

[Anymage]

I'm particularly looking to crib good ideas about how to enforce the expected rest cycle. Maybe also some with good battle maps (particularly with interesting features and other ways to make use of terrain), since I seem to have found a group that likes minis. Level range shouldn't be too much of a problem since that's easier to fudge around, but I'm looking for good stuff to help inspire some new ideas.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

I'm particularly looking to crib good ideas about how to enforce the expected rest cycle. Maybe also some with good battle maps (particularly with interesting features and other ways to make use of terrain), since I seem to have found a group that likes minis. Level range shouldn't be too much of a problem since that's easier to fudge around, but I'm looking for good stuff to help inspire some new ideas.

The silence in response to this question is deafaning.

However, there are large sections of Out of the Abyss that I think lend themselves to 3d battles. The first chapter in particular is good, as are some of the 4 small 'dungeons' that you can put in anywhere. Sections in each of the places the characters visit also meet your description. I remember adding a few sets of locks to the Darklake section, so I had both water and elevation changes in the battle.
Overall I recommend the mod, particularly the 1st half, and I think it would lend itself to the type of combat you are describing.

So far as the expected rest cycle that's a little tougher. I just DMed Descent into Avernus and it was pretty easy to say, "You just can't have a long rest until you get out of the blazing heat." Given the setting my players did accept it. Our other DM is starting Rime of the Frostmaiden, and I think he is going to adopt a similar policy due to the environment. If they get a Tiny Hut though, it's a tougher argument to make, though I'm sure others have ideas.

[Waazraath]

I'm particularly looking to crib good ideas about how to enforce the expected rest cycle. Maybe also some with good battle maps (particularly with interesting features and other ways to make use of terrain), since I seem to have found a group that likes minis. Level range shouldn't be too much of a problem since that's easier to fudge around, but I'm looking for good stuff to help inspire some new ideas.

As a player, Out of the Abyss worked fine both for the rest cyclus, as being an interesting dugeon with interesting features. I DM'ed the first part of Princes of the Apocalyps, and that worked fine as well. When traveling overland, of course the rest mechanic doesn't work well, more than 1 or 2 encounters on one day feels quickly contreived; but in the dungeons and the sidequest it was ok. Also lots of nice dungeons with good maps. Two dungeons from Tales from the Yawning Portal (Dead in Thay and White Plume Mountain) also were good.

[Unoriginal]

I'm particularly looking to crib good ideas about how to enforce the expected rest cycle. Maybe also some with good battle maps (particularly with interesting features and other ways to make use of terrain), since I seem to have found a group that likes minis. Level range shouldn't be too much of a problem since that's easier to fudge around, but I'm looking for good stuff to help inspire some new ideas.

If it's resting in particular you want, I would say Dungeon of the Mad Mage.

Given that many factions each control or at least occupy a bit of the Dungeon, you usually get to long rest only when you've beaten back a significant chunk of enemies.

[Kane0]

Wasnt princes of the apocalypse a similar multi-dungeon sort of affair, where PCs would need to head back to town to rest without getting interrupted?
Tales from the Yawning portal also has a few solid options, I recently ran lost tomb of tamoachan which does a good job of enforcing getting-a-move-on.

[Unoriginal]

Wasnt princes of the apocalypse a similar multi-dungeon sort of affair, where PCs would need to head back to town to rest without getting interrupted?

I would argue that Dungeon of the Mad Mage handles it more satisfyingly because you can either head back to town or create the appropriate space for a long rest by dealing with the inhabitants (as in, either beat enough of them you've cleared out a space, or make a deal with them).

[Imbalance]

I'll add to the praise for Yawning Portal. Many of those scale easily, and there's a DM who built (https://www.minisgallery.com/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=909&p=23145&hilit=Sunless#p23145) the Sunless Citadel's (https://www.minisgallery.com/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=909&p=23849&hilit=Sunless#p23849) first level (https://www.minisgallery.com/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=909&p=25774&hilit=Sunless#p25774) with WarLock Tiles.

[Kvess]

Unfortunately I suspect the maps provided in many of the 5e adventures were intended to be used for inspiration instead of projected directly onto a battlemap. More than a handful of times I’ve seen large monsters squeezed into small spaces or small monsters who could use hit-and-run tactics stuck in a big open space.

In terms of pacing, I think Dragon Heist’s chase encounters work well. Want to solve the mystery? Each encounter leads to a clue to where the artifact was sent next, but if you rest then it’s going to get further away.

[Unoriginal]

In terms of pacing, I think Dragon Heist’s chase encounters work well. Want to solve the mystery? Each encounter leads to a clue to where the artifact was sent next, but if you rest then it’s going to get further away.

Dragon Heist is good at setting up "can't rest now, things are moving" situations, but those are generally busy moments in the middle of a slower module with lost of downtime, so I'm not sure it's what's OP wants.

[Keravath]

A lot depends on the DM, perhaps even more than the module.

The only modules that will typically lend themselves to the short rest/long rest proportions and number of encounters are dungeon crawls or any other module with linked encounters that encourage the party to continue adventuring typically by not providing safe long rest locations.

Since Tales from the Yawning Portal are all typically longer dungeon adventures these can very easily be adapted to the 2-3 short rest/long rest with 4-6 encounter type pacing. (Hidden Shrine of Tamaochan has a mechanic that pretty much prevents long rests though it can likely be bypassed if the party has access to Leomund's Tiny Hut).

However, most larger modules will only have sections like that.

Tomb of Annihilation is a very good sandbox and a lot of fun to play but it tends to lend itself to 1-3 encounters in a day unless you throw in a lot of random encounters which really aren't that much fun. This is especially true when traveling in the jungle which takes up a significant portion of the module. The smaller encounter sites spread around the map tend to be shorter except for the Tomb at the end and even there the rooms are quite separate.

Curse of Strahd is also more typically one big battle/day unless the DM throws in random encounters. Each of the map locations tends to have one major fight/bad guy or has social encounters plus some smaller discrete type encounters that don't require the party to deal with them without taking a rest.

However, the key here is not so much the content but the DM. The DM can pace the content, add encounters, and add plot/story reasons to keep the party on a schedule and discourage long rests except when absolutely needed.

[Anymage]

However, the key here is not so much the content but the DM. The DM can pace the content, add encounters, and add plot/story reasons to keep the party on a schedule and discourage long rests except when absolutely needed.

While I appreciate the responses so far, I'm going to be a bit ungrateful and say that when I'm asking for help brainstorming how to handle something as a DM, the answer "you're the DM, you can do whatever you like" isn't that helpful. Mechanically, doing whatever I like has too much chance of being either too strong or too weak, and adjusting around that means I wind up just fiating the whole encounter which gets arbitrary and undermines the point of preparation. Plotwise, doing whatever I like is arbitrary and can often feel slapdash. I'd rather have a plan ahead of time so the situation can flow smoothly from the plot.

As for my goal in this? I could certainly fall back to the five minute workday with one big encounter, and likewise have that encounter let everybody get into the position they'd like and then have most of the important round-by-round decisions come down to casters deciding which spells to use when. That encounter type is the norm for a reason. I guess I'm just egotistical enough that I'd like to require more thought both round-by-round and day long.

[Waazraath]

While I appreciate the responses so far, I'm going to be a bit ungrateful and say that when I'm asking for help brainstorming how to handle something as a DM, the answer "you're the DM, you can do whatever you like" isn't that helpful. Mechanically, doing whatever I like has too much chance of being either too strong or too weak, and adjusting around that means I wind up just fiating the whole encounter which gets arbitrary and undermines the point of preparation. Plotwise, doing whatever I like is arbitrary and can often feel slapdash. I'd rather have a plan ahead of time so the situation can flow smoothly from the plot.

As for my goal in this? I could certainly fall back to the five minute workday with one big encounter, and likewise have that encounter let everybody get into the position they'd like and then have most of the important round-by-round decisions come down to casters deciding which spells to use when. That encounter type is the norm for a reason. I guess I'm just egotistical enough that I'd like to require more thought both round-by-round and day long.

To be fair, I think you undervalue Keravath his post - you specifically ask for battle maps and modules that fit 5e's suggested resting schedule (and people provided good examples of those), but next to having modules that are by itself good or not so good suited (and indeed, dungon crawls are well-suited for managing the number of encounters) other choices a DM makes are very relevant, also in these modules.

Let me try to illustrate it with one of the examples I provided, Princes of the Apocalyps. (I'm away from books, so do this by memory so could have details wrong.). Minor spoilers, because examples. A sidequest is 'protect a farmstead against a nightly orc raid. You have a farmstead, a bunch of farmers from which a few can fight, and during a night, you get 3 waves of orc raiders. The party has to come up with a defense (tactics, dig trenches, divide defenders over the buildings, whatever they want). Obviously, long rests are out of the question. But for short rests, that's totally up to the DM - there is no instruction that the part must or must not get 1 or 2 rest short rests. If you want to have the part to have 'em (for instance if the first wave already brings them down to 1/3rd of their hp and depleted a lot of resources), have a lot of time between wave 1 and 2, and have an NPC suggest they can take over their watch duty for a few hours; if you don't want them to have 'em, have some buildings set to fire (which needs to be put out), or have some false alams / mock attacks, or have NPC's demanding attention, whatever. Another example: my party night-raided Riverguard keep, the hq of the water cult. The first part of the keep they invaded (basicly it's 3 or 4 closed of sections) they went in, quickly closed the door, and then combat started. It's a DM call what happens then; do the thick castle walls contain the sound of battle (allowing the party a short rest, cause no alarm was sounded)? Or is the entire keep set off on alarm? And if so, what happens, will searching parties will be send?

And this more or less goes for all dungeons. On the one extreme you have HeroQuest-style, you can treat them as a bunch of isolated rooms which are always the same, no matter how much time is spend, and were everybody stays inside his or her own dungeon room despite hearing combat at the other side of the door. This highly stimulates the 5 min. adventuring day, if a long rest is possible after each room. On the other extreme, once combat starts, somebody sounds the alarm, the entire complex is on alert and no rest at all is possible until all enemies who come rushing from all corners of the dungeon are defeated (they don't need to arrive in one blob, here is pacing possible as well).

Point is: occasionally, you have some information in the books on how to deal with this, but most often you don't. It's a DM call, and I think the best way of dealing with these things is finding a balance between the 2 extremes above, and when making these pacing decisions having 5e's 'standard' resting scheme in the back of your head somewhere.

To be honest, in my experience the "five minute workday with one big encounter, and likewise have that encounter let everybody get into the position they'd like and then have most of the important round-by-round decisions come down to casters deciding which spells to use when." has never been the norm, not in 5e, nor in earlier editions. If your experience is it is the norm, piciking the right module might help aluviate the problem (if you see it as a problem), but I think other aspects of pacing might be even more important.