D&D 5E Classes with resources feel like usage is too restrained

[CapnZapp]

That's not the problem. The problem for many is they don't use the assumed [6ish encounter 2ish short rest] adventuring day despite the game balancing there.

That's not the problem. The problem is the game is balanced for a really really inconvenient point.

Unless you run dungeons, 6-8 encounter days are simply a pain in the butt.

The game needs better support for things like travelling, where you might have ONE encounter every three days.

 

[CapnZapp]

The game needs better support for things like travelling, where you might have ONE encounter every three days.

Do note the easiest and best solution isn't to rejigg all the balancing, but to redefine when you can take a long rest.

For instance, take the above journey. Say you can only take a long rest after you reach your destination; the crummy camp sites along the road doesn't cut it for a long rest.

If the journey takes three weeks (21 days), bam, everything falls into place, balance works as intended, no actual work needed - since you now have 7 encounters between long rests.

 

[Flamestrike]

That's not the problem. The problem is the game is balanced for a really really inconvenient point.

Unless you run dungeons, 6-8 encounter days are simply a pain in the butt.

The game needs better support for things like travelling, where you might have ONE encounter every three days.

For the gazillionth time mate, the game provides the 'gritty realism' variant. It supports this exact playstyle. We've had this conversation before (a lot).

Straight out of the box you have support for 0-3 encounters per day, and around 3-4 such days (interspersed with days of no encounters) before needing a weeks rest.

 

[Willie the Duck]

That's not the problem. The problem is the game is balanced for a really really inconvenient point.

Unless you run dungeons, 6-8 encounter days are simply a pain in the butt.

The game needs better support for things like travelling, where you might have ONE encounter every three days.

I'm not personally arguing for any specific view but I thought I'd bring up an argument which might explain why they chose this--
It can be said that it is easiest to set something at an extreme and back correct in only one direction than to set the baseline somewhere in the middle and correct in both directions. A dungeon is perhaps the most extreme scenario the average gamer would put their characters in in terms of # of times they would decide whether to use a limited resource (basically rounds of combat/day). I'd say that it makes sense that they would set the resource expenditure balance at the dungeon level.

It is unfortunate that they didn't give more "redefine when you can take a long rest" style advice to account for the rest of the time. Perhaps a fear that their customer base doesn't handle ambiguity well (but that conflicts with their rulings-not-rules mentality with this edition).

 

[Imaro]

For the gazillionth time mate, the game provides the 'gritty realism' variant. It supports this exact playstyle. We've had this conversation before (a lot).

Straight out of the box you have support for 0-3 encounters per day, and around 3-4 such days (interspersed with days of no encounters) before needing a weeks rest.

It also provides support by supplying us with the values for an adventuring day as well as advice on multi-part encounters and waves... Anyone whose sticking strictly to 6-8 encounters is chosing to do so not because balance dictates it.

 

[Parmandur]

Hoe is "running dungeons" an inconvenient measure for playing Dungeons & Dragons...? I would assume most folks are mainly running Dungeons?

 

[Flamestrike]

Hoe is "running dungeons" an inconvenient measure for playing Dungeons & Dragons...? I would assume most folks are mainly running Dungeons?

And 99 percent of published adventures are based in one (or a string of several).

Not saying its the only way to play, but the game design is based around this (and other) assumptions.

 

[Flamestrike]

It also provides support by supplying us with the values for an adventuring day as well as advice on multi-part encounters and waves... Anyone whose sticking strictly to 6-8 encounters is chosing to do so not because balance dictates it.

And there is nothing wrong with the occasional single encounter day, a day with a lot of encounters and no short rests, a day with a lot of short rests available but no long rests, or a grinder of a day racing against the clock with more than 6-8 encounters.

Keep the Players guessing and you achieve the same result (and allow certain classes to shine in different adventures and different sets of adventuring days).

The real grumble comes from inexperienced DMs who lack the ability to enforce this paradigm, or DMs that dont undertand it, or DMs that stubbornly oppose it 'because reasons'.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

For the gazillionth time mate, the game provides the 'gritty realism' variant. It supports this exact playstyle. We've had this conversation before (a lot).

There is no combination of rule options in the book that prevent someone from going down to zero, and then resting for the night and being back up to full. Even the slowest option allows a short rest overnight, and even the grittiest option still permits you to spend all of your Hit Dice over a short rest.

There is no 'gritty realism' variant in the game because the default heal rate is so ridiculously generous that there's no way to get it back down to reasonable, at least not with any of the dials that they give you. Likewise, there's no real way to balance a game around one big boss fight in a day, because the default expected encounter rate is so ridiculously high that a single enemy is outside the bounds of what works, at least if you try to follow their budget guidelines and monster level restrictions simultaneously; that math problem is over-constrained and no solution exists. Attrition over the course of an adventuring day, whether that adventuring day is 24 hours or 240 hours, is the only option that's included in the game.

 

[Flamestrike]

There is no combination of rule options in the book that prevent someone from going down to zero, and then resting for the night and being back up to full. Even the slowest option allows a short rest overnight, and even the grittiest option still permits you to spend all of your Hit Dice over a short rest.

So? I wasnt discussing resting and healing. But I dont see the problem. You spend all your HD on a short rest (8 hours long in this case). If you roll above average then yes, after a nights rest you are back to full HP.

Of course, HP are not 'meat' so all you've done is restored your pool of (using the PHB definition of HP) 'luck, resolve, the will to live and health'.

Youre still as wounded (or not wounded depending on how the HP loss was narratted) as you were the day before. You feel a lot better though. Your resolve is strengthened, and you feel healthy and refreshed. You're down on your luck (whether you realise it or not) and any HP attrition you suffer from here on in will probably be an actual wound that will take at least a weeks bedrest to recover.

There is no 'gritty realism' variant in the game because the default heal rate is so ridiculously generous that there's no way to get it back down to reasonable, at least not with any of the dials that they give you. Likewise, there's no real way to balance a game around one big boss fight in a day, because the default expected encounter rate is so ridiculously high that a single enemy is outside the bounds of what works, at least if you try to follow their budget guidelines and monster level restrictions simultaneously; that math problem is over-constrained and no solution exists. Attrition over the course of an adventuring day, whether that adventuring day is 24 hours or 240 hours, is the only option that's included in the game.

Your statement is patently false. Ive been DMing a game for 12 levels and 2 years of real time roughly adhering to the 6-8/ 2 short rest guidelines (the occasional shorter or longer adventuring day, or solo encounter here or there) and have encountered no problems with the system.

Logically it must be a user error on your side.