Five-Minute Workday Article

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I don't understand why everyone is so surprised by developer incompetence at this point.

I remain surprised because they gave me 4E, which is a wonderful and well designed game for me and that did not happen by accident. The people knew what they were doing.

I guess I am just seeing them using their powers for [-]evil[/-] for someone or something else but my issues with D&D and myself.

 

[FireLance]

I don't think that will work. If you use resources to achieve your goal, and there is no cost to rest, then the smart choice is to rest to get your resources back - so you can use them to achieve your goal.

Frankly, I think the best fix to the five-minute workday is to make it expensive or risky to use spells, so that spellcasters are actively encouraged not to use them unnecessarily. For example:

1. Each daily spell reduces the XP reward from the encounter by 100 per level of the spell. Using a spell makes the encounter easier, so the characters learn less from the encounter.

2. Each daily spell requires material components worth 100 gp per level of the spell to cast.

3. Each time a spellcaster casts a daily spell, he runs the risk of attracting attention from malevolent extra-planar entities who will destroy him. Each time he casts a spell, if he rolls the spell level or less on d%, he dies.

I'm sure such a system would bring back even more of the players who felt alienated by 4e since it brings back XP costs, gp costs, risky spellcasting and the chance of random, instant death.

 

[Markn]

Someone should do a poll. I'd be curious as to the percentage of people would like the 5mwd day addressed vs those who don't see an issue.

 

[MatthewJHanson]

Someone should do a poll..

Done

 

[drothgery]

Only since reading ENWorld and other forums have I even thought about the phrase the "5 minute work day". As a player or DM, we just wouldn't allow for that kind of break and rest unless you were tired enough. You don't wake up at 6 am, kill camp, walk into the nearby cave, fight a roomful of orcs, and leave to sleep. It's too bright, you're too antsy, just not tired.

In the first combat encounter of the 3.5 game I was playing last week, my cleric took 7 points of CON damage from a trap (having rolled a 1 on my Fort save). He's the only front-line melee character in the group, so I didn't think it was safe to continue exploring the dungeon when his max HP had been almost cut in half. Bam. Five-minute adventuring day (and short on spells the next day, as half of my 2nd-level slots went to Lesser Restorations).

 

[LostSoul]

If XP rewards diminish the longer it takes to reach your goal and resting costs time, and allows the opposition to fortify positions then frequent rests will result in puny rewards and slow down gaining levels.

Anything that impedes XP gain will be avoided by most players if possible.

Yep, costs are good. They offer the players a chance to make a meaningful decisions.

Frankly, I think the best fix to the five-minute workday is to make it expensive or risky to use spells, so that spellcasters are actively encouraged not to use them unnecessarily.

That's one contributing factor, but there are others. Consider HP. If you get into a fight, lose some HP, and there's no cost to getting them back - might as well get them back.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

The fact that we've had complaints from players and DMs of the 5 (or 15) minute workday in AD&D, 2E, 3E *and* while playing 4E pretty much tells us there is NOTHING that can be done. You know why? Because every DM is different, every DM designs his combats and adventures different, and every reason why "going nova" occurs to a particular game is completely different. It's NOT POSSIBLE to fix the issue, because there is no ONE ISSUE to fix.

All we need to see to prove this point is the incessant arguments here on ENWorld about things like how punishing the PCs for resting is lauded by half the players as a good way to condition them not to try and rest often and in any location... while the other half gets mad that they feel as though they are playing a "metagame" by artificially throwing extra combats out there, not because the story asks for it but purely as a punishment. And this is two opposite sides on just a single idea to solve the problem. Every other idea possibly offered up has the same amount of proponents and opponents. WOTC CAN'T WIN.

Even if WotC was to design and offer up in the DMG three different game mechanics in an effort to combat the "5 minute workday", we'd still get hundreds of players complaining that they didn't solve the issue. Even if they offered up FIVE different modules to try and rectify it, that still wouldn't be enough. Many players would still find ways to go nova within the confines of whatever style of game the DM was playing, and the DMs would have to figure out ways to deal with it.

The ONLY thing that can be done is to admit that there is no way to solve this issue, because like I said, there is NO ONE ISSUE. The "5 Minute Workday" is not an issue. It is a symptom of DMing Style, which is truly the issue. And you can't "solve" DMing Style-- because no DM cops to the idea that how they DM might really be the issue for why things they don't like keep happening.

As I said most recently here, the 15MWD shows up in any game that has ablative resources and a GM willing to put the campaign world on hold while thë party restocks & recuperates.

Any RPG with ablative resources- ammo, spells, whatever- can run afoul of the 15 minute workday if the game master puts the game world on hold so the PCs can rest & recuperate without penalty.

The first non-D&D example that I heard of was in a mundane Special-Ops type game some guys were in. Whenever the demolitions guy ran out of stuff, they retreated and camped until he could replenish his stock. They would absolutely not advance unless the guy with the most potential punch had something significant to contribute beyond using his Colt .45 or combat knife.

In a Supers game I heard of, it cropped up when the team gadgeteer was kitted out with entirely the wrong set of stuff and had to find a lab to swap out gizmos. The party sidetracked the entire day of gaming to get him the resources he needed to be fully contributory, so nothing was accomplished in terms of achieving the mission that session.

In a space opera campaign, what controlled the PCs progress was the number of energy packs they had for their weapons. Since the big weapons drained the packs the fastest, they would retreat when they only had enough packs to power the small arms for a couple of combats.

I haven't personally run into GMs that let this happen, so I have neve seen the 15MWD in person.

 

[I'm A Banana]

So, Mearls seems to be saying: "If you like a game where casters dominate, you can have that. If you want a game where casters suck, you can have that. It's in your hands as a DM. We give you a rough parity, tell you why it's there, and it's up to you to figure out if you want to deviate from that or not."

It's an interesting non-solution. Presumably, stuff like the Caves of Chaos reactive-adventure advice is in play to help DMs judge how they want to bone their players (or not).
[sblock=Caves of Chaos Advice]

The Caves of Chaos is a living, breathing environment. Large groups of intelligent creatures are not likely to sit in their rooms, waiting for adventurers to kill them. Half or more probably range through the countryside, hunting and foraging, or ambushing travelers on nearby roads. Others might be sent to spy on a rival tribe, trade with others, raid them, negotiate with the cultists of the Shrine of Evil Chaos, and so on. If the PC's wipe out the remaining denizens of one cave, the returning members might stay to replace the lost, form a war party to hunt down the PC's, or wage open war against another tribe in an attempt to seize new territory.
...
Nothing stops you from reducing -- or increasing -- the number of creatures in an area, making it easier or harder to suit the needs of your story.

One way to make the adventure more engrossing and fun is to have things change, or stay the same, depending on the PC's actions. If they kill some of the hobgoblins and then leave, perhaps they encounter a funeral feast when they return. If their assault weakens the orcs enough, the PCs might return to find goblins in the orc caves, celebrating their victory. Character actions might have important and long-lasting effects. Clearing the kobold caves might provide a fine redoubt for other assaults (once the PC's figure out what to do with the corpses) -- or turn the complex into a base for another, tougher group of monsters.

Intelligent monsters adapt their strategy and tactics to observed behavior. For example, if the party uses flaming oil in battle, surviving tribal members might use flaming oil later in a similar way. If adventurers consistently sneak up on the monsters, their targets could respond by setting alarms and traps. If they observe that characters flee from overwhelming numbers, the monsters might shout and make noise to seem numerous. Monsters that have been attacked before are likely to be on high alert, posting extra guards in entrances or sending out scouts to watch for enemy approach.

Such success might bring fame to the tribe, increasing its numbers by 2d6 in addition to growing its wealth. The tribe might be extra alert for 1d4 weeks afterward, in case the adventurers return to take revenge (or some other party comes to seize the loot).
...
When PC's clear all monsters out of a cave complex, it remains deserted for a time; 1d4 weeks is a typical interval. If the party does not enter the lair again before the end of that period, it might be repopulated. Perhaps the surviving former inhabitants return or another monster moves in...

[/sblock]

I'm fond of the flexibility, but I'm not sure they don't need a slightly heavier hand here at least as an option. So many people are so utterly terrified of the hint of a specter of a possibility of a vancian spellcaster being slightly more situationally effective than another class that there probably needs to be a bigger and more impressive shiny red button you can press that will easily give you the "You Don't Need To Worry About Wizards" effect in a very obvious way.

I think it might also be worth explaining to people why and how this track is being taken. Being Freaked Out About Wizards is practically a part-time job for a good segment of the D&D audience. It's not something 5e has earned trust on yet (despite the main complaint against the playtest wizard being along the lines of "It casts spells TOO OFTEN!"). Coming out and saying "Wizards might dominate if you don't keep DETAILED CAREFUL CONTROL OF YOUR ENCOUNTERS IN A DAY!!!!" isn't reassuring.

I might have to try and take a stab at this...

 

[thecasualoblivion]

The difference of opinion lies in whether or not you hold traditional daily based magic to be sacred or not. If you hold it to be sacred, then the consequences are a given and the failure is upon you to for not dealing with them. If you don't hold traditional D&D magic to be sacred, particularly if you hold your own gaming preferences in a higher regard than traditional D&D spellcasting, when that magic comes into conflict with your own D&D philosophy it's the rules for magic that need to be changed.

People who are complaining are generally people who don't hold the traditional D&D magic system to be a sacred truth, above all other considerations.

 

[77IM]

Incentives Matter!

Incentives matter. Players will do what the system rewards them for doing. "It's a DM problem" or "you should focus more on story and less on combat" are answers that ignore some basic human nature.

Right now, the ONLY way to get back your resources (spells, HP) is all-at-once, with a long rest. And you get them all back, no matter what. So the very clear strategy is to blow through as many resources as you need to defeat the monsters in front of you -- and then take a long rest. There's no incentive to continue, no incentive to stretch out your resources, and no incentive to think about when you are spending spells or make interesting decisions about resource management.

-- 77IM

PS. Many other game systems don't have problems with "the 5-minute work day" so saying this is an unsolvable problem is another cop-out.