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View Full Version : The characters want to take a short break, what happens?



Shinizak
2022-09-10, 12:32 AM
You are the DM. And your characters want to take a short break to reload, regain their spells, change their equipment, or whatever else. You, as the DM have to make this awkward transition relevant.

This is such an awkward moment in the game, like, what are you supposed do with this time? Is there a checklist or a "best practices" for these moments?

I'd love to hear some good rules or personal techniques.

icefractal
2022-09-10, 12:46 AM
How's it awkward? Taking a breather to recover after a situation like a fight isn't unusual - charging tirelessly from battle to battle is what's weird.

As to what to do as the GM? Usually nothing. When traveling, it's usually a single-digit number of events of note for the entire day, so the odds of anything happening in a few minutes rest are rather low. In some circumstances (inside an actively patrolled fortress, say) it may be time to roll for encounters.

What I sometimes see is people forgetting that the time rate in RPGs is flexible. "We're spending too much session time resting, it feels dull" - and then they add stuff like more interruptions or resource tracking that makes the resting take more screen time. Whereas you can handle a rest of any length in a few seconds and get back to the action:
"After a chilly and damp but peaceful night in the forest, you set off the next day. About an hour into your travel ... {something happens}"

Not that roleplaying during rests and/or having things happen during them is bad, of course. It's just not necessary if you don't have anything particular in mind.

False God
2022-09-10, 01:00 AM
Yes there's a sort of checklist:
-Is this an area the players can rest in? (an actively erupting volcano is probably not a good place to rest)
-If it is safe, how safe? IE: Will the players be able to rest, but they must remain on guard?
-What, exactly, do they want to accomplish during this break? Simple effects like regaining spells, patching wounds, etc? Sure. Unlock the secrets of the Black Book of Baphomet? No, probably not.
-Is there some kind of time-limit on their current task? As DM, you'll need to make sure to check off this time.

----
I don't go very deep for simple resting, short, long, that stuff is normal and provided the players are able to do it, I simply mark off that time has passed and then we all carry on.

It gets more complex if players want to do things during that downtime, or want to take multiple days, weeks or even months off. Mostly because it depends on what they want to do, and my experience is there's always someone who wants to do 10 million things and there's always someone who wants to do nothing and there's always someone who waits to the last day to decide they want to do anything at all. Managing that is a skill you develop over time by getting to know who you're playing with and the sort of characters they're playing. There's no real cut-and-dry answer.

I do my best to ensure we go round-robin, on an in-game daily basis. I try to keep people from running off on private adventures (someone almost always does) or otherwise hogging the downtime. I make sure to drop hints that yes, time really is passing and they may be missing out on great adventures. I also try to ensure that the world feels alive and responsive around them, but I also balance that by giving the world limits (ie: your average potion shop does not have unlimited gold to buy all your magic loot). Generally, I try to keep it enjoyable for everyone, but also brief. We are here to adventure and engage the world at large, not putz around in PodunkTown.

Vahnavoi
2022-09-10, 07:06 AM
How is this common-as-dirt situation which usually has codified rules for it right in a game book, so awkward?

Anyways, the way this typically goes is:

1) specify how long the break the takes
2) check if anything notable would happen in the world during that time interval - f.ex., check for wandering monsters
3) ask what the characters will do during the break
4) resolve world event
5) resolve player action
6) resolve effects of rest
7) continue from the following time period

If there is no pressure on the player characters, this typically takes less real time than a normal game turn - f.ex.:

Players: "we wait for 10 minutes."
Game master: "Ten minutes pass without an incident. What do you do next?"

As a comment on what False God above said:

If players desire to act at different rates, there's few ways to do this:

A) The game master sets a limit to actions taken. Nobody gets to make more actions in more detail than the others for the same period of time. If someone wants to pass their turn (ie. do nothing), it's on them and they have to be okay with taking an actual, real time break from the game while actions of others are resolved.
B) the first person in turn order sets pace and limits of actions taken. Nobody gets to take more actions in more detail than the first person. Otherwise same as above.
C) the players negotiate actions of each character amongst themselves and one player forwards the final set of actions for the game master to resolve. The game master may take a nap while the players discuss. The players who are not required to resolve those actions all take a break while the game master goes through the actions.

If people are taking too long to take their turns, there is a simple solution: clock their turns. For short breaks (measured in minutes) a good rule-of-thumb is that players don't get more real time to think through their actions than the break would take in the game. Same goes for any discussion between player characters - when players are acting dialogue, it's reasonable to say their characters aren't taking less time to say the same things.

Beyond that, you need to set up a rate of real time versus game time - this can change based on context, it is common to have different rates for combat versus exploration versus wilderness travel, so on and so forth. This can be framed in terms of what I call operative unit of time - the most common unit of game time that a single player turn represents. For example, for my games, the operative unit of time is day. This means I ask each player what their characters are doing once per each in-game day. If I have six players & give each 2 minutes for their turn, this means a typical day lasts 12 minutes.

Anonymouswizard
2022-09-10, 08:11 AM
1) is there a threat nearby? ('No, you can't take a nap in the middle of combat')
2) is the situation likely to get dangerous soon? ('You do realise the Knight Errant High Threat Response Team is on the way')
3) Is this a really dumb idea? ('Okay, you've sealed yourself in the vault to keep out security...')

If the answer to all of the above is no you can probably skip roleplaying rest time and just give them the benefits.

If the answer to #1 is yes then they can't rest.

If the answer to #2 is yes ask them what safety precautions they're taking

If the answer to #3 is yes then they can rest, but really?

Pauly
2022-09-10, 03:45 PM
As a general rule, if nothing interesting is happening around them fast forward to the next decision point.
As a general rule administrative tasks are boring and I fast forward the players through the process.
A short rest is both “nothing interesting” and “administrative” and unless something really significant is about then it should be fast forwarded.

I find it important to make any fast forwards snappy. If they drag on one of two things will happen. Either the players get bored and zone out, or they take advantage of that time to hyper micro manage.

While I’ve never had this become a serious problem I can see some groups abusing this process. In which case chess clocks, dynamic worlds, limiting player actions and OOC conversations may be in order.
I remember reading a module a year or two back where the guardians of a room were elementals, however they were on a random roster, so if the party looked into the room, saw it was fire elementals then had a short rest to prepare for fire elementals when they kicked open the door they wouldn’t find fire elementals but they might find water elementals, air elementals or earth elementals. After reading this thread think that encounter was specifically designed to counter players taking a short rest before every combat.

Duff
2022-09-15, 05:59 PM
Yes there's a sort of checklist:
-Is this an area the players can rest in? (an actively erupting volcano is probably not a good place to rest)
-If it is safe, how safe? IE: Will the players be able to rest, but they must remain on guard?
-What, exactly, do they want to accomplish during this break? Simple effects like regaining spells, patching wounds, etc? Sure. Unlock the secrets of the Black Book of Baphomet? No, probably not.
-Is there some kind of time-limit on their current task? As DM, you'll need to make sure to check off this time.

----
I don't go very deep for simple resting, short, long, that stuff is normal and provided the players are able to do it, I simply mark off that time has passed and then we all carry on.

It gets more complex if players want to do things during that downtime, or want to take multiple days, weeks or even months off. Mostly because it depends on what they want to do, and my experience is there's always someone who wants to do 10 million things and there's always someone who wants to do nothing and there's always someone who waits to the last day to decide they want to do anything at all. Managing that is a skill you develop over time by getting to know who you're playing with and the sort of characters they're playing. There's no real cut-and-dry answer.

I do my best to ensure we go round-robin, on an in-game daily basis. I try to keep people from running off on private adventures (someone almost always does) or otherwise hogging the downtime. I make sure to drop hints that yes, time really is passing and they may be missing out on great adventures. I also try to ensure that the world feels alive and responsive around them, but I also balance that by giving the world limits (ie: your average potion shop does not have unlimited gold to buy all your magic loot). Generally, I try to keep it enjoyable for everyone, but also brief. We are here to adventure and engage the world at large, not putz around in PodunkTown.

This is a collection of really good advice.
My only addition is to reinforce player and character choice.
"Anyone doing anything noteworthy during the rest?" If the answer's "No" cut straight to the end of rest paperwork and off you go.

Telok
2022-09-15, 07:28 PM
Suddenly... ninjas!

Sorry. Couldn't resist. But I do occasionally throw in a "you've been in your power armor shooting xenos for a couple hours now and you passed a bathroom a couple doors back. Any calls of nature?". Which, of course, is an opening for chaos, lunacy, exploding or haunted toilets, and a roll on the wandering bathroom monster table.

False God
2022-09-16, 07:54 AM
This is a collection of really good advice.
My only addition is to reinforce player and character choice.
"Anyone doing anything noteworthy during the rest?" If the answer's "No" cut straight to the end of rest paperwork and off you go.

I should also add that in addition to time, a DM needs to remember that downtime is a time of spending money instead of earning it.

Now, the players may have more money than Pelor but they're still going to have to spend it, food, lodging, clothes. This can be a heavy task as some players have a love of micro-managing their finances and it's up to the DM to once again, keep it brief in order to ensure that everyone gets their fair amount of time at the table and the game doesn't get bogged down with one guy haggling over his lunch. I try to provide a "poor" "average" and "rich" option for lifestyle expenses in most towns. Usually something like 1gp, 3gp, 5gp/day.

It's not that players can't do side jobs and earn a little coin to cover their expenses, but it's inherently different from dungeon crawling and necessary to balance out the often large hoards of treasure a party can walk away with.

The game gets progressively more "life sim" the longer downtime goes on for. How much of that any group is up for varies, which is something every DM will need to learn to gauge.

Alcore
2022-09-16, 10:33 AM
Awkward? How?

Keeping it relavant? It should always be relevant unless they are mid to high level. They shouldn't be hacking their way through a keep in the Frozen North and sleeping in their palaces in the south; unless they have teleport.

You are using buzzwords and being vague... I don't quite understand how to help you with your problem.



In Play by Post if we have an important rest period (one that is more than a refreshing of spells and health) I will open a separate thread just for camp and ask the needed OOC questions with the usual IC stuff. Twenty four hours later (or the questions dry up) we keep going in the main thread. I keep the camp thread open for the party to RP if they choose to.

KorvinStarmast
2022-09-16, 02:16 PM
What are you supposed do with this time? 1. Make sure that someone hears the drip, drip drip of acid dripping down form the ceiling and onto the floor. If they look, they see the whisps of smoke / steam as the acid eats through the floor ...
2. Create ominous rumbling sounds, and have the room vibrate suddenly.
3. Rocks fall, everybody dies. There are no tears in baseball, and there is no resting in dungeons!
Is there a checklist or a "best practices" for these moments?
See above. :smallwink:
Short answer no: No, but there are some good replies in the other posts.
I'd love to hear some good rules or personal techniques.[/QUOTE]

Suddenly... ninjas! This was the correct answer. :smallbiggrin:

Arutema
2022-09-18, 07:51 AM
You are the DM. And your characters want to take a short break to reload, regain their spells, change their equipment, or whatever else. You, as the DM have to make this awkward transition relevant.

This is such an awkward moment in the game, like, what are you supposed do with this time? Is there a checklist or a "best practices" for these moments?

I'd love to hear some good rules or personal techniques.

Since we're not in a specific system's forums:

Are the PCs in a reasonably safe area where they won't be bothered by enemy patrols or wandering hostile wildlife for X minutes?

No? Consider an encounter with the above if they seem to be having too easy a time.

Yes? "X minutes pass without incident" the system's rules for a short rest kick in. If you've been playing a couple hours uninterrupted IRL, this is also a good time to call a break for players to get snacks or use the facilities.

Tevo77777
2022-09-26, 03:16 AM
I GM a D20 system where short rests don't do anything.

However, short rests are very important. Why? Because breaking bread, cooking, eating, and downtime are important sections of my RPG sessions.

People straight up roll dice to see if they cook food properly, and then later on roll dice to see if they like it or not.

Typically, they have to be safe for this to work, so they can start a fire or whatnot. However, there have been times where they were watching entrances, not looking at each other, and just talking as they ate crackers or something.

Thrawn4
2022-09-30, 01:21 PM
A Rest is a good opportunity for
- In-party banter and roleplaying (you can Provide them with a memory to kick of the conversation, but the players should carry this part)
- downtime for minor Tasks and small solo endeavours (gathering, studying this old tome, hunting...)
- survival experience (find food, watch shifts, securing the perimeter)
- real-life breaks (makes it more real)

If you don't like that you could just add a time limit to the quest. But you would miss out imho.

gbaji
2022-09-30, 07:27 PM
You are the DM. And your characters want to take a short break to reload, regain their spells, change their equipment, or whatever else. You, as the DM have to make this awkward transition relevant.

This is such an awkward moment in the game, like, what are you supposed do with this time? Is there a checklist or a "best practices" for these moments?

I'd love to hear some good rules or personal techniques.

As several people have stated, it depends on where they are and how much time they are taking. Reloading doesn't normally take long to do (what are they reloading?). Regaining spells might take several hours (full rest). Depends on game system. Not sure what "change their equipment" means though. Most games have some rules for time taken to equip/unequip weapons and whatnot. And that's usually only worried about in a combat action accounting way. Out of combat, I have no issue with characters swapping out gear. Just tell me what you are carrying in your hands when you start moving/exploring again.

There should be nothing at all awkward about this. It's normal time management in a game. The players tell you what they are doing and how long it'll take (Assuming that's accurate of course. Correct them if they want to do 10 hours of stuff in 10 minutes). You then determine whether anything interesting happens during that time. As several people have noted, this usually involves a very fast "roll for random encounters if appropriate" followed by "Ok. You rest for X time. Nothing interesting happened. What now?".

I guess the only thing I'd add is that you as the GM do need to be aware of where the characters are and what might be going on around them that may affect them if they spend that time in one place. Even if nothing wanders along and troubles them, other things will be happening. The guards will change shifts in the castle they're wandering around in (if that's the case). Maybe creatures move around in the cave complex they are in. Perhaps there's a change in night/day animals wandering in the woods they are in and that's going to change things. Heck. Just the day/night cycle can affect how they move/act once they are done.

If they just raided the local thieves guild headquarters and stole the mcguffin or something, then go back to the local Inn to rest, maybe have the remaining guild members doing something. Perhaps they've figured out who just stole from them and are planning an attack. Maybe they're bidding their time. Could be a lot of stuff happening that isn't "you get attacked", but that will still have an impact. There's a huge difference between getting out of town immediately, and waiting 8 hours to rest and then heading out on the road. Again, kinda depends on what the PCs were doing right before resting and how much effect/impact that may have on the world around them, and what the likely response to that may be.

I once witnessed a game where the players had assaulted a compound full of evil clerics. They were not expecting clerics, but monks (it was a "monastery", right. And that must be a place where monks live, right?), so their assault wasn't as successful as intended and had to retreat (Seriously. This was a whole series of hilarious epic fail by this group). They literally retreated a whopping 200 feet away from the monastery gate, just inside a nearby woods. Yeah. It went about as well as the Monty Python skit. ("you seem to have chosen an obvious place not to be seen...." boom!).

Never underestimate the ability for players to just assume that the world around them doesn't actually move or think except when they are directly interacting with it. It's shocking sometimes. Going one room away from the NPC enemies/monsters and resting is just as silly, yet seems to be a staple of many player groups. Cause apparently the NPCs just sit in their assigned rooms all day doing nothing at all with their lives except waiting for a group of adventurers to come along and kill them and take their stuff. And let's not get started on the lack of toilet facilities in most dungeons!

Jay R
2022-10-02, 06:50 PM
The ideal method requires good timing. The players arrive at the place they want to take their rest, and we take about 30 minutes or so to deal with anything waiting for them there -- rivals, friends, family, fame from their adventures, creditors from their last trip, etc. This might even include threats, but not necessarily. Then the DM says, "OK, your characters are settled in for your stay. They will be there for X days. This ends today's session. Email me about what you want to buy, or sell, or make, or research. I'll send you your xps by tomorrow, and if you have enough xps to level up, then take care of that, too. Thanks for playing; I'll see you all at the next session."

Then at the start of the next session, start with any relevant occurrences that happen while they are there.

If they are coming back to a place where they are well known, then mine your notes from that session for possibilities. Did they annoy anyone last time? Did they cheat a merchant, or unknowingly sell somebody something with a curse? Did some child who admired them try to follow them and get lost in the woods? After they left last time, did some monster(s) or come looking for them and endanger the village?

[Note that this assumes that you keep good notes about any contacts they made or actions they took.]

Duff
2022-10-02, 08:59 PM
I should also add that in addition to time, a DM needs to remember that downtime is a time of spending money instead of earning it.

Now, the players may have more money than Pelor but they're still going to have to spend it, food, lodging, clothes. This can be a heavy task as some players have a love of micro-managing their finances and it's up to the DM to once again, keep it brief in order to ensure that everyone gets their fair amount of time at the table and the game doesn't get bogged down with one guy haggling over his lunch. I try to provide a "poor" "average" and "rich" option for lifestyle expenses in most towns. Usually something like 1gp, 3gp, 5gp/day.

It's not that players can't do side jobs and earn a little coin to cover their expenses, but it's inherently different from dungeon crawling and necessary to balance out the often large hoards of treasure a party can walk away with.

The game gets progressively more "life sim" the longer downtime goes on for. How much of that any group is up for varies, which is something every DM will need to learn to gauge.

I have done this - the game I GMed for the longest time included it in the rules. Dragonquest from the 80's
I wouldn't do it again. Instead, PCs can sell their skills to support a lifestyle appropriate for their wealth level with the numbers "coincidentally" matching up nicely.
Your sword and board warrior makes a living training others, or body guarding or demanding with threats and menace
The bard is the house minstrel in an inn, or are kept by a local magnate
The clever wizard manages their investments, or cast spells for cash.
Anyone who wants to live more cheaply than their skills might justify in order to get to keep extra cash finds that someone who lives in a cardboard box can't charge a high price for their skills
Or just the OOC "We don't do the paperwork. What you earn will cover what you spend"

Yakk
2022-10-13, 09:58 AM
Build adventures in chunks larger than individual encounters.

Scenes are chains of encounters that, if you take a short rest between them, something happens. What happens? That is what writing a scene is about. Plan.

Chapters are chains of scenes that, if you take a long rest between them, something happens. What happens? That is what writing a chapter is about. Plan.

If someone in the middle of combat said "ok, time for a short rest, I'm sitting down", you have a good idea of what happens right? That is because the encounter has a clear response to one side disengaging or stopping the encounter. Maybe they lose the duel. Maybe the enemy runs away. Maybe the enemy kills and eats or robts the sitting down PC. Maybe the enemy kills the duke, and ignores the sitting down PC. But the encounter has foes with motivations, and when the PC fails to engage in violence, they move along their motivation.

Chaining together multiple encounters into a scene should give you the same kind of fabric to solve this problem, and chaining scenes into a chapter.

So, it isn't "there are 10 orcs, have an encounter", those orcs are here for a reason. Maybe they are huting zombies, maybe they are scouts for a larger force, maybe they are guards and the fight probably raises an alarm. The entire scene is connected to those 10 orcs, who are just one part of it (just like 1 orc is just one part of the encounter of 10 orcs).

A medium difficulty scene should have 3-4 medium encounters. (easy count as 0.5, hard as 1.5, and deadly as 2.0 or more). (easy scene is 2 medium encounters, medium is 3, hard is 4, deadly is 5+).

A medium difficulty chapter should have 3-4 medium difficulty scenes. (easy scenes count as 0.5, deadly as 2.0, etc) (easy chapter is 2, medium 3, hard 4, deadly 5+).

So, suppose we have some cultists trying to complete a ritual.

There is a hidden grove (scene) the ritual is going to occur at midnight, a set of tunnels under the town church (scene), and defenders along the route to the grove (scene).

The grove itself has guards (encounter) and the ritualist themselve (encounter).

The guards have summoned monsters (encounter), warped the forest trees (encounter), and themselves (encounter).

The tunnels are trapped (encounter), have a desecrated shrine (encounter), undead guards (encounter) and a mad prophet (encounter).

Fail to finish the tunnels before a short rest, and sacrifice at the shrine completes, corrupting the town with madness. The mad prophet is dead, but information about where the ritual occurs can still be found (so this isn't a chapter failure).

The guards along the way respond with aggression if you retreat.

The grove itself hurries the ritual to completion if you engage and retreat. This can result in not a full success by the cultists (the head cultist is eaten instead of granted lichdom, for example) if you did it early enough, but bad enough stuff happens for the world.

The fact the event is supposed to happen at midnight is known to the PCs, so they can budget their time and recover with a short rest.

...

But do you see how the question "what happens if the PCs just take a rest" is answered? By writing chapters and scenes instead of encounters, the question is answered as part of the prep. If there is no consequence to taking a rest, then it isn't a chapter or scene! And if the players bypass the problem that taking a rest causes, well, good for them!