D&D 5E Resting and the frikkin' Elephant in the Room

[Tony Vargas]

I do think dealing with rests would be easier if combat interrupting rest forced you to start the rest over.

Might help. Might also help the DM at times if it didn't as a hard rule. It (can you get back your CS Dice, Ki Points, & slots or not, given the time spent resting and the conditions you were resting under) seems like exactly the kind of thing that should be left to the DMs judgement, not just because it gives him the flexibility to apply a critical balance-imposing factor (which'd be more than enough, by itself), or because any hard-and-fast rule (like the one we have, or its 'gritty' alternative) is going to clash with the fiction at time, but because it's 5e, and the DM's s'posed to be all Empowered...

As to the metric I was talking about, I'm simply saying that every combat should be interesting, not just the last one the day and that can be accomplished as well through illusion as it can through hitting the actual mechanical number required.

I agree, though maintaining that illusion is helped by hitting - and even exceeding - the guideline.

Maybe I'm not clear on what you consider the elephant to be.

The ol' "elephant in the room" idiom is not so much about exactly what the elephant is, as the fact it's being willfully ignored/denied/minimized by folks who don't want to deal with it. That can include a fair amount of obfuscation and feigned ignorance. "What about the Elephant in the room?" "What Elephant?" "That Elephant, right there." "Are you sure it's an elephant? I've never actually met an elephant, in person, have you? Can you tell the difference between an African and an Asiatic Elephant? It could be a shaved mastodon, y'know..."

OTOH, we are prettymuch getting exercised over the Elephant in the Room, when it's been there for 40 years, and the sign outside the room says "Welcome to the Elephant Room."

I've been under the assumption that those who perceive an elephant believe that the game is critically flawed due to it and must be fixed to allow the game to function.

5e is designed to be very DM-Empowering and DM-customizeable. Part of that, rather trivially, is that until you have a DM, it really isn't functional. So saying," XOMG, this or that sub-system of D&D is non-functional, that's a critical flaw!" is something of an over-reaction. What makes the rest-recharge rules stand out is that they don't lean as heavily on DM judgement as many other 5e rules, even though they're critical to his domains of imposed-class-balance and encounter-difficulty.

 

[Harzel]

Could I suggest taking a closer look at the Adventuring Day section?

Heh. I was going to snarkily reply, "Could I suggest taking a closer look at what I wrote?", but in one critical place I see I failed to say (fully) what I meant. My main (intended) point was that there is nothing in the DMG to suggest that amongst all the combinations of encounters that meet the XP budget, those combinations containing 6-8 encounters are in any way preferred, recommended, or better for the game. On the basis of this section, the most that one can say about the number of encounters is that it needs to be at least three in order for the paragraph on short rests to make sense.

The XP budget is for one "adventuring day" covers 6-8 medium to hard encounters. It then states that 2-3 short rests are expected in an "adventuring day" i.e. over that number of encounters. Implicitly, the "day" ends with a long rest i.e. there is one long rest per adventuring day.

Yes.

Regarding class balance, those guidelines amount to a clear suggestion of the design intent, e.g. an ability that recovers on a short rest (like Warlock spell slots) will be usable 3-4x per "adventuring day" (use, rest 1, use, rest 2, use, optional rest 3, use) while one that recovers on a long rest will be usable only once (use, end of day long rest).

Yes, except

1. Other than that the number of encounters needs to be at least 3, this says nothing about the number of encounters, which was what I was talking about.
2. There is nothing in the DMG about an "optional rest 3". It mentions 2, that's it. People do throw around the 2-3 thing a lot, but I'm not sure where it comes from. Seems like another case of reading into this section things that aren't there. It would be arguably fair to say that 2 is an approximation, but then 1-2 or 1-3 would be just as good as 2-3 as guesses as to an intended range.

It's true that we have to do some work to understand the design intent, as we have to breakdown the "adventuring day" XP and realise it pays for the specified number of encounters. Take the example in the book - 3x 3rd PC, 1x 2nd PC. Their Medium is 550XP and Hard is 825XP. Their "adventuring day" XP budget is 4200XP (3x1200 + 1x600). That pays for 7 medium or 5 hard encounters. 3 deadly or 15 easy encounters would also do it. The designers don't seem concerned with playing "exactsies", but for each combination of PC levels the "adventuring day" XP pays for about the guideline number of encounters. Generally about one encounter less than the guideline (skewing the game toward the "easy" difficulty setting that appears to have been the design intent).

Yes, and to reiterate, there is nothing in the DMG to say that one of these should be preferred over the others.

 

[clearstream]

Yes, except

1. Other than that the number of encounters needs to be at least 3, this says nothing about the number of encounters, which was what I was talking about.
2. There is nothing in the DMG about an "optional rest 3". It mentions 2, that's it. People do throw around the 2-3 thing a lot, but I'm not sure where it comes from. Seems like another case of reading into this section things that aren't there. It would be arguably fair to say that 2 is an approximation, but then 1-2 or 1-3 would be just as good as 2-3 as guesses as to an intended range.

Hmm. On DMG84 "The Adventuring Day" opens with "...most adventuring parties can handle about six to eight medium or hard encounters in a day." I believe the "day" in that sentence is the same day referred to throughout this section i.e. an adventuring day. So I believe that section is saying parties can handle 6-8 medium or hard encounters per adventuring day. One could moot that was a passing comment with no connection to anything - just words. But I believe it more reasonable to read it as a statement about the design intent. Especially as later in that section it states that the XP values provide a rough estimate of "encounters the party can handle before the characters will need to take a long rest." Thus I believe it does say some quite concrete things about the number of encounters.

That's odd, I had thought I read the two to three short rests range in the text below the "Adventuring Day XP" table, but there it only states "two short rests". Thanks for drawing my attention to that, it makes things simpler.

Yes, and to reiterate, there is nothing in the DMG to say that one of these should be preferred over the others.

I'm not certain what you mean here? Are you saying that, notwithstanding that the DMG gives an XP budget designed to pay for roughly 6-8 medium or hard encounters and tells you that a party should be able to handle about that many encounters per "day", it fails to say that range should be preferred? Is it right that you believe it should contain words like "The preferred number of encounters is..." or "We recommend you use..." to have that meaning? For me that is demanding an extraordinarily literal reading of the language, and I'm a hard-core literalist in my rules interpretations. If it doesn't mean to recommend 6-8 medium to hard encounters per adventuring day, it contains a lot of wordings that might trick people into believing it does. Are you open to a possible alternative view here?

 

[Maxperson]

Hmm. On DMG84 "The Adventuring Day" opens with "...most adventuring parties can handle about six to eight medium or hard encounters in a day." I believe the "day" in that sentence is the same day referred to throughout this section i.e. an adventuring day. So I believe that section is saying parties can handle 6-8 medium or hard encounters per adventuring day. One could moot that was a passing comment with no connection to anything - just words. But I believe it more reasonable to read it as a statement about the design intent. Especially as later in that section it states that the XP values provide a rough estimate of "encounters the party can handle before the characters will need to take a long rest." Thus I believe it does say some quite concrete things about the number of encounters.

That's odd, I had thought I read the two to three short rests range in the text below the "Adventuring Day XP" table, but there it only states "two short rests". Thanks for drawing my attention to that, it makes things simpler.

I'm not certain what you mean here? Are you saying that, notwithstanding that the DMG gives an XP budget designed to pay for roughly 6-8 medium or hard encounters and tells you that a party should be able to handle about that many encounters per "day", it fails to say that range should be preferred? Is it right that you believe it should contain words like "The preferred number of encounters is..." or "We recommend you use..." to have that meaning? For me that is demanding an extraordinarily literal reading of the language, and I'm a hard-core literalist in my rules interpretations. If it doesn't mean to recommend 6-8 medium to hard encounters per adventuring day, it contains a lot of wordings that might trick people into believing it does. Are you open to a possible alternative view here?

The point he's trying make is that it then goes on to say, "If the adventure has more easy encounters, the adventurers can get through more. If it has more deadly encounters, they can handle fewer.". That indicates that the 6-8 range is an average, not a recommended number. It's more of a "Start with 6-8 and modify as you see fit within the range of what they can handle.".

 

[Ovinomancer]

The point he's trying make is that it then goes on to say, "If the adventure has more easy encounters, the adventurers can get through more. If it has more deadly encounters, they can handle fewer.". That indicates that the 6-8 range is an average, not a recommended number. It's more of a "Start with 6-8 and modify as you see fit within the range of what they can handle.".

That still sounds like a recommendation, though.

 

[clearstream]

The point he's trying make is that it then goes on to say, "If the adventure has more easy encounters, the adventurers can get through more. If it has more deadly encounters, they can handle fewer.". That indicates that the 6-8 range is an average, not a recommended number. It's more of a "Start with 6-8 and modify as you see fit within the range of what they can handle.".

Ahem, isn't a "Start with 6-8..." a recommendation? I mean, to say it isn't seems to be splitting semantic hairs... Hmm... okay, let's say it's not a "recommendation". Let's call it just words that tell us what the average number is expected to be. I'm fine with that

 

[OB1]

Ahem, isn't a "Start with 6-8..." a recommendation? I mean, to say it isn't seems to be splitting semantic hairs... Hmm... okay, let's say it's not a "recommendation". Let's call it just words that tell us what the average number is expected to be. I'm fine with that

It tells you what the average should be if you are using medium and hard encounters. If you are using deadly or easy, the average is different.

Secondly, it tells you what the PCs can be expected to handle, not how the DM must design the adventure. This is a crucial distinction as it gives tremendous power to the DM in designing the world, while also giving tremendous agency to the players to interact with that world. In a system where recovery is based on a set number of encounters, the rules of the world restrict both PCs and DMs.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Heh. Over 1500 posts in, and this thread is still worth reading...

The point he's trying make is that it then goes on to say, "If the adventure has more easy encounters, the adventurers can get through more. If it has more deadly encounters, they can handle fewer.". That indicates that the 6-8 range is an average, not a recommended number. It's more of a "Start with 6-8 and modify as you see fit within the range of what they can handle.".

"There's no Elephant in this Room. It's not a Room, it's a chamber, and it's not an elephant, it's a loxodonta africana."

Ahem, isn't a "Start with 6-8..." a recommendation? I mean, to say it isn't seems to be splitting semantic hairs... Hmm... okay, let's say it's not a "recommendation". Let's call it just words that tell us what the average number is expected to be. I'm fine with that

"OK, then, can we talk about the loxodonta africana in the chamber?"

 

[Tony Vargas]

Secondly, it tells you what the PCs can be expected to handle, not how the DM must design the adventure.

Thus 'guideline' or 'recommendation,' yes. But, it's not just 'what the PCs' can handle in a "don't cross this line, it could be too much" sense, it's also what the 'PC's can handle' in the "get up close to this line pretty consistently or the PCs won't be challenged" sense.

And, challenging the PCs isn't just about the challenge, itself, because class designs use very different resource mixes, and encounter difficulty is dependent upon attrition.

This is a crucial distinction as it gives tremendous power to the DM in designing the world

The DM has that power, no matter what. The game can't dictate to the DM, who is, afterall, free to change it's rules. What the guideline does, however, is point out a range of ways to run the game in which the mechanical considerations of class balance and encounter difficulty will be more stable. It's a fairly narrow range, so, if you want to avail yourself of that feature, it places substantial constraints on your campaign.

, while also giving tremendous agency to the players to interact with that world.

It does give some 'player agency' (or 'entitlement'), in that it allows for meta-gaming/system-mastery of a fairly basic sort that can fairly easily result in the characters tackling more dangerous encounters, for more exp, and at less risk - and allow certain character types to consistently outshine others.

The interaction with the world is more a matter of DM-Player dynamics, since the DM mediates the player experience of his imagined world.

In a system where recovery is based on a set number of encounters, the rules of the world restrict both PCs and DMs.

Recovery based on a set number of encounters is used to good effect in 13A. Like the 6-8 encounter guideline, it's a way of imposing class balance and consistent encounter difficulty in spite of a system that uses inherently imbalance as a way of differentiating class designs. It's a solid way of doing so, and it has less of an impact on the DM's 'storytelling' efforts. 13A also retains player agency (to the extent that resting early to try to trivialize the next encounter is an example of player agency), by allowing the option or retreat and/or early rest with a 'campaign failure' consequence.

Both solutions are constraining to the DM, and place meta-game/system-mastery considerations before the players. But each has it's own advantages, as well.

 

[TwoSix]

Of course they have encounters. Have you read any D&D novels? Drizzt encountered hook horrors, orcs, giants, assassins, and many more creatures. That's how he gained his levels. The same with Elminster. All of those other high level NPCs also had their encounters in order to level up to where they are at. Unless one of them has some special origin where a god created him at 18th level, none of them fell out of the sky at that level.

From the standpoint of the players (that is, the RL humans playing the game), all of those NPCs fell from the sky. The DM creates them and gives them stats, with as much or as little reference to the books as he/she desires.

In game, the DM can create backstory for those NPCs as fits his/her vision, again, with as much or as little recourse to the books as desired. The DM can create NPCs that mimic PC progression, or NPCs that completely violate it, and that creation is completely within the DM's purview. As a player, you can infer systemic considerations (the 83 NPCs killed in a desert were more likely killed by a blue dragon than a green dragon, for example), but the DM is never obliged to consult any rules reference to put something into the world.