D&D 5E If party short rests in a dungeon room

[Bayonet]

I'd say that's up the DM and the setting itself. If the 'dungeon' in question is a stretch of ruins inhabited by scattered, disorganized beasts, then it makes sense that the party may be able to relax for an hour to heal wounds and grab some food. IN that case, either give them the rest or roll a low Dice check for an encounter.

Now, if the 'dungeon' is a fortress manned by an disciplined Hobgoblin army, and they try to rest in the room they cleared, despite there being 5 more inhabited rooms within earshot, I'd say the PC's are going to get interrupted. Also, kinda dumb.

 

[Uchawi]

The short rest states the party may eat, drink, read or tend to wounds. Any other related activity would need to be interpreted by the DM and would break the short rest, unless it is added to the conditions that may be performed during a short rest.

 

[Hand of Evil]

You should have the answer already; what was your encounter time / rolling timetable when the characters entered the dungeon? That should still be in play.

There are factors that should impact this:

• Party being hunted and has lost the surprise factor and they are known to be in the dungeon.
• Location - major pathway of the dungeon, the heaver usage, the greater the chance on encounter.
• Clean up crew - some forget these, but you leave food out, they will come. At first it is insects, then your rats, then larger animal life, then your cube shaped monsters. Most of the time, they go for the food but sometimes they don't like to have something around them and attack. A ranger in the party should know it is a good time to leave and hope something bigger is not coming down the path they decide to leave down. (by food I mean the dead and blood from combat)

 

[Grainger]

Can they be interrupted? Absolutely. Should it happen often? I'd say no, unless the party foolishly doesn't pick out-of-the-way areas to rest in.

Aside from the excellent advice above, I'd say...

As with everything, it's up to you as DM. There will likely be guidelines in the DMG, but ultimately it's up to you. Even in old-school - whatever makes for a good game. Don't be afraid to bend the rules (in this, and every other area) to make for the best experience for everyone at the table.

 

[Aenghus]

One thing I haven't seen mentioned in this discussion is whether or not there are classes in play that depend on short rests for some of their abilities. The harder it is made to take a short rest the less playable classes depending on a short rest are. Making short rests practically impossible probably darwinises classes dependent on short rests, either by them dying off or players sensing the way things are going and not selecting them.

I'm mentioning this because it's very obvious to me, but I regularly see referees surprised by the logical consequences of players reacting to their decisions.

 

[Grainger]

One thing I haven't seen mentioned in this discussion is whether or not there are classes in play that depend on short rests for some of their abilities. The harder it is made to take a short rest the less playable classes depending on a short rest are. Making short rests practically impossible probably darwinises classes dependent on short rests, either by them dying off or players sensing the way things are going and not selecting them.

I'm mentioning this because it's very obvious to me, but I regularly see referees surprised by the logical consequences of players reacting to their decisions.

Yeah, if you're designing a dungeon, you should always have areas where the party can take short rests safely, if they're sensible (if they decide to camp in a much-used corridor, or right next to an unexplored area, then have at 'em, I say). Actually, a short rest is only 10 minutes, so in many dungeons I imagine even camping in a "well used" area wouldn't see any enemies appearing in that time.

Examples: in my current game, I had an "old" part of the dungeon that the current inhabitants didn't know about. This gave them a safe area (once they had cleared it out of ancient traps and beasties) for the PCs to rest. Later on, they found some Dwarves who were potential allies - again, this (potentially) gave them a safe area they could do short or long rests in.

There's definitely scope to not provide any good place to rest, as part of a scenario to put the characters (and players) under stress, but you do have to remember that the party will be considerably weaker and plan the encounters accordingly (no recharge of even basic things like Second Wind, Action Surge, etc. and no ability to heal with Hit Dice). And it goes without saying that most in campaigns, this would be an out-of-the-ordinary scenario.

Example: perhaps the PCs are being chased through a dungeon (they have escaped from imprisonment?). They can't afford to rest. They might be able to jam doors shut behind them, collapse bridges behind them, or encounter other factions who fight their pursuers, but they're not going to be able to rest until they properly get away - with nowhere to rest or even stop, the 5e system provides an in-game way to put pressure on the players.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

Yeah, if you're designing a dungeon, you should always have areas where the party can take short rests safely, if they're sensible (if they decide to camp in a much-used corridor, or right next to an unexplored area, then have at 'em, I say). Actually, a short rest is only 10 minutes, so in many dungeons I imagine even camping in a "well used" area wouldn't see any enemies appearing in that time.

Actually it's an hour by default.

 

[Grainger]

Actually it's an hour by default.

D'oh, so it is! In that case, you're far more likely to get disturbed (but not inevitably so) in a busy part of a dungeon.

 

[Woas]

Aside from the random encounters others have mentioned, I would personally rule that trying to rest in an unknown and dangerous place for a full hour would be too stressful and nerve-racking to allow the characters to get any peace from sitting down to eat, drink and tend to wounds unless there was a very out of the way space or other circumstantial reason the character's wouldn't have any fear of being ambushed or attacked.

But that's just me.

 

[Grainger]

Aside from the random encounters others have mentioned, I would personally rule that trying to rest in an unknown and dangerous place for a full hour would be too stressful and nerve-racking to allow the characters to get any peace from sitting down to eat, drink and tend to wounds unless there was a very out of the way space or other circumstantial reason the character's wouldn't have any fear of being ambushed or attacked.

But that's just me.

Do you mean that you don't think they can ever rest in a dungeon, or just that they shouldn't be able to rest near an unexplored or busy area? These are meant to be characters who can fight toe-to-toe with the undead on a regular basis; they're pretty brave.

And what if they're deep into a mega-dungeon? After a while (they could be there for weeks!) exhaustion would win out no matter how on edge they were.

Also, it depend son how you envisage a short rest working. Is it a nice sit down, a bit of bandaging and perhaps a snack? If so, they could manage that easily with someone on watch at all times (rotating the watch, of course). I'd even argue that for things like Arcane Recovery, as long as they had someone on watch that they trusted, they could probably manage it, unless they were of particularly nervous disposition.