D&D 4E Standing Guard in 4e...no rest for you?

[Spinachcat]

Players: We camp for the night.
GM: Who's on first watch?

You obviously cannot stand guard and be totally aware and ready for action at the same time you are getting a good deep rest where all your wounds are healing and your dailies are recharging. If an extended rest in 4e is six hours (not necessarily at night), then what becomes of those individuals who do not rest?

So the question becomes, can you break up an extended rest? If we camp for 12 hours, then two teams can get extended rests. If we camp for 8 hours, everyone can do 2 hours watch and 6 hours rest that gets broken up at some point in the night.

Also, what happens if you are 5 hours into an extended rest and the wandering monster stomps into camp? What about 3 hours?

 

[Rex Blunder]

I hope extended rests can be interrupted - your point is well taken.

Also, in 3e, when camps were attacked, there was this feeling of "let's let the casters sleep through the attack if we can" that, in my mind, didn't seriously add to the fun. I'd like that to be absent from 4e.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

I expect that an 8 or 9 hour camp where everyone gets 6 hours rest and at least one good meal will be the standard. That's how I've always run it..

Fitz

 

[Ulthwithian]

One option is that the Elf or Eladrin (I'm not sure if this was in the Elf entry or in one of the preview books) trances instead of sleeps, and the listed game effect is that you are fully aware of your surroundings while 'resting'.

That would allow you to 'have someone on watch' without depriving anyone of 'rest'.

 

[VannATLC]

The same thing that happens to your current 3.5 campaign?

In my 3.x campaigns,
If you do not get a full 6 hours of rest (adjusted for race, as indicated), you will not get the effects of your daily rest, in HP. A wizard does not get the spell allotment. Clerics are able, with their morning meditation, to get their spells.

I'll probably run something along the same for 4e.

Eladrin don't sleep, in my recollection, so they make excellent guards.

 

[kristov]

8/16

We always ran our games with 8 hours sleep/downtime, probably expecting like 6 hours sleep and 2 hours miscellaneous downtime.

16 hours of traveling/fighting/working/thinking/etc. is serious business.

 

[Valerion Steele]

in other game systems you can be interrupted in your rest for a few minutes without loosing the benefit of the rest...
and a few mins should actually suffice for a wandering monster.
i think that if you get a total of 6 hours in a 8 hour rest guard shifts should not be a problem.
thats how i handle it.
and theres the eladrin thing...

 

[invokethehojo]

HOLY FREAKING GOD!

What is wrong with you people? Are you allergic to just having fun? Can't anything at all about this made up fantasy game be simple for you?

LET ME ASURE YOU, THIS GAME IS FUN... IF YOU WILL LET IT BE.

 

[Professor Phobos]

Just ask yourself if the interruption was sufficient to make you grumpy the next day at work. If it's just getting up to take a piss, then I wouldn't say that the six hours was broken. It helps to play loose with this sort of thing- just ask, "Would the characters be reasonably well rested the next morning?"

If yes, they're fine, if no, they're not.

 

[Cadfan]

invoke- I feel your pain. Every so often, I have to step back and skim through the Feng Shui rulebook or something, to remind myself that there is indeed another path.