D&D (2024) New One D&D Playtest Document: 77 Pages, 7 Classes, & More!

There's a brand new playtest document for the new (version/edition/update) of Dungeons of Dragons available for download! This one is an enormous 77 pages and includes classes, spells, feats, and weapons.

Unearthed Arcana Playtest

Unearthed Arcana Playtest Materials Get Unearthed Arcana playtest content, try it out in your game, and provide feedback! Check back regularly for ...

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In this new Unearthed Arcana document for the 2024 Core Rulebooks, we explore material designed for the next version of the Player’s Handbook. This playtest document presents updated rules on seven classes: Bard, Cleric, Druid, Monk, Paladin, Ranger, and Rogue. This document also presents multiple subclasses for each of those classes, new Spells, revisions to existing Spells and Spell Lists, and several revised Feats. You will also find an updated rules glossary that supercedes the glossary of any previous playtest document.

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[tetrasodium]

See this is theorycraft thinking, not real game thinking.

I mean, it's not that you're wrong-wrong. If we carefully analyze every possible Short Rest situation, we will probably find that yes, most of the time, with metagame knowledge and so on, it didn't actually matter if it was 10 or 60.

But in-game, it often feels completely insane to just stop some busy adventuring day to hang out in a room (often in the middle of a dungeon or w/e) for an ENTIRE HOUR, and is thus just narratively bizarre. I've seen this with various groups - not just ones I've been in, even - people know that, mechanically, they should Short Rest, but dramatically/narratively the idea of stopping for an entire bloody hour seems just totally inappropriate. When you take that time down to 20 minutes, suddenly that changes dramatically. It's much more something people can reasonably buy, dramatically/narratively.

Why is it insane for the players to do it by RAW? The gm probably won't tpk the party or throw out the adventure declaring the bad guys up and left too often. Once you go beyond that the "middle of the dungeon" pretty much only needs to meet a bar of not imposing a DoT in order for the party to complete a rest provided they still exist an hour after the last patrol got stomped.

 

[Hussar]

Again, sure I agree that there are times when it might make a difference. But most of the time? You’re outdoor exploring for example. No reason not to take an hour. In town? Probably can take an hour. A travel scenario that isn’t on a strict countdown? Sure take an hour.

I dunno. Must be a perception thing. A “rest” is a rest. Since we’re never tracking time all that closely anyway, it just doesn’t really matter.

 

[Minigiant]

See this is theorycraft thinking, not real game thinking.

I mean, it's not that you're wrong-wrong. If we carefully analyze every possible Short Rest situation, we will probably find that yes, most of the time, with metagame knowledge and so on, it didn't actually matter if it was 10 or 60.

But in-game, it often feels completely insane to just stop some busy adventuring day to hang out in a room (often in the middle of a dungeon or w/e) for an ENTIRE HOUR, and is thus just narratively bizarre. I've seen this with various groups - not just ones I've been in, even - people know that, mechanically, they should Short Rest, but dramatically/narratively the idea of stopping for an entire bloody hour seems just totally inappropriate. When you take that time down to 20 minutes, suddenly that changes dramatically. It's much more something people can reasonably buy, dramatically/narratively.

In fiction, your typically out of shape cleric and wizard need a 10 minute break to sit and sip some water after a big battle whether you want to stop or not.

The 10 minute short rest is mostly just ducking into somewhere to stop moving. You technically don't need to find a place to do it. Just stop moving and stop tensing up for 10 minutes.

The 60 minute short rest is a quick fortification to hunker down for a moment. The area more or less needs to provide a place to do it.

 

[rooneg]

Why is it insane for the party to do it by RAW? The gm probably won't tpk the party or throw out the adventure declaring the bad guys up and left too often. Once you go beyond that the "middle of the dungeon" pretty much only needs to meet a bar of not imposing a DoT in order for the party to complete a rest provided they still exist an hour after the last patrol got stomped.

It’s not insane for the party to do it, because the players know what the meta game of D&D 5e looks like. It’s insane for the characters to do it, because they don’t have that sort of knowledge and should be like “umm, we’re totally going to get eaten by some giant monster if we just hang around in this room for an hour”. That cognitive dissonance is the problem with the 1 hour short rest.

 

[mamba]

It’s not insane for the party to do it, because the players know what the meta game of D&D 5e looks like. It’s insane for the characters to do it, because they don’t have that sort of knowledge and should be like “umm, we’re totally going to get eaten by some giant monster if we just hang around in this room for an hour”. That cognitive dissonance is the problem with the 1 hour short rest.

only if they then are not being eaten, which they definitely should be

The whole point of a 1h rest is that you cannot do it everywhere and anytime. If you reduce it so far that this goes away, you are back to per encounter abilities by a different name

 

[Hussar]

It’s not insane for the party to do it, because the players know what the meta game of D&D 5e looks like. It’s insane for the characters to do it, because they don’t have that sort of knowledge and should be like “umm, we’re totally going to get eaten by some giant monster if we just hang around in this room for an hour”. That cognitive dissonance is the problem with the 1 hour short rest.

But, there's no real dissonance here. Unless the area is so densely populated that giant monsters are passing by on an hourly basis, most of the time, it's not unreasonable to find somewhere to hunker down. It really isn't. Even if you are rolling random encounters, it's not that big of a risk and there's all sorts of ways to mitigate it from mundane (we found that room behind a secret door that no one's been inside for hundreds of years, let's hunker down there) to magical (out comes the various spells and whatnot to make camp for an hour).

If you can sit down and rest for 20 minutes, you probably can rest for an hour. It's not like there's this huge time difference. Or, in a situation where it's so busy in the area that you cannot rest for an hour, you probably can't rest for 20 minutes either.

I guess I'm just not really feeling the dissonance here. Long rests? Sure, I can see that being a bigger issue. I get that. There's lots of times you can't rest for 8 hours. That's long. It's reasonable that something might wander by you once a day. But, is it really reasonable that that thing is going to wander past you every hour?

 

[tetrasodium]

It’s not insane for the party to do it, because the players know what the meta game of D&D 5e looks like. It’s insane for the characters to do it, because they don’t have that sort of knowledge and should be like “umm, we’re totally going to get eaten by some giant monster if we just hang around in this room for an hour”. That cognitive dissonance is the problem with the 1 hour short rest.

Agreed. It's really quite inexcusable that we haven't seen one change floated in the ones&d ua rest mechanics to do anything about that disconnect. Wotc ignoring it actually makes it harder for the gm to change it or give a hard no when players say "yea whatever lets take a rest" after being told they have reason to be concerned that resting here will put them in a situation where they are "going to be eaten by some giant monster" if they just hang around.


There is some indications of cognitive dissonance between players and PCs sure, but The rules on resting death resource attrition and gains from completing a rest all combine to ensure that the Vulcan logic screams "lets take a long/short rest".

 

[Autumnal]

"Enemy stronghold on alert"? That really doesn't even fit within the scope of all that many of the 5e HC adventurers alone.

Could we maybe stick to the needs of d&d rather than trying to design a buff for ammo restricted runners doing a dive on a target corp in shadowrun?

Hmm. Each of the Giants modules has it, and at least the first to Descent Into The Depths Of The Earth series. More recently, Out Of The Abyss has opportunities for it at several points. Seems relevant to me. Did some particular part of the phrasing send your imagination jumping into other genres. I have far too many derailing points like that myself.

 

[Remathilis]

But, there's no real dissonance here. Unless the area is so densely populated that giant monsters are passing by on an hourly basis, most of the time, it's not unreasonable to find somewhere to hunker down. It really isn't. Even if you are rolling random encounters, it's not that big of a risk and there's all sorts of ways to mitigate it from mundane (we found that room behind a secret door that no one's been inside for hundreds of years, let's hunker down there) to magical (out comes the various spells and whatnot to make camp for an hour).

If you can sit down and rest for 20 minutes, you probably can rest for an hour. It's not like there's this huge time difference. Or, in a situation where it's so busy in the area that you cannot rest for an hour, you probably can't rest for 20 minutes either.

I guess I'm just not really feeling the dissonance here. Long rests? Sure, I can see that being a bigger issue. I get that. There's lots of times you can't rest for 8 hours. That's long. It's reasonable that something might wander by you once a day. But, is it really reasonable that that thing is going to wander past you every hour?

How many SWAT teams stop mid raid at a terrorist hideout to have lunch?

The problem with short rests isn't that they are 5 minutes, 15 minutes, an hour, or the length of a Hollywood blockbuster, it's that they are assumed to be needed at all. D&D should be based on resources per long rest and short rests should give you a quick tidemeover until you can really rest, especially if you had a string of bad luck in earlier encounters (bad dice rolls, etc.)

A monk should have at least double the di points per day, but only get a few back on a short rest. A warlock should have additional spell slots (in reality, it should be a half-caster like packet 5, but I don't want to litigate that) and only recover some during a rest ala arcane recovery. A fighter should have multiple action surges and get only one back per day via short rest. Rogues and rangers and sorcerers should also get something back for short rests, (or able to swap something out like swap a spell or a weapon mastery). They way, if you need a short rest, you can go through the hassle of taking one but if the adventure at hand has a time limit, you aren't penalized for not taking it.

But I feel the only thing we're getting is some "recharge you abilities in 1 minute 1/day" and "use a spell slot to recharge" bandaids.

 

[Parmandur]

A monk should have at least double the di points per day, but only get a few back on a short rest.

The Monk gets the same Spell point equivalent as a Paladin, Artificer, or Ranger if they get both Short Rests. They are a Half-Caster with Spell Points who uses a Short Rest recharge. That's especially clear if you look at the pricing of the Four Elements abilities, or do the math for Monk discipline abilities as Spells by the DMG guidelines.