D&D 5E Short rest house rule

Staffan · Jul 8, 2017

I've noticed that it's often hard for PCs to take a short rest, since doing so takes about an hour. Either things are too busy to rest at all, or they're quiet enough that they can just as well take a short rest. If my group had had access to rope trick, things might have been different, but they don't, and I don't think the intention is that a major game mechanic should require a specific spell.

But the game is set up with the expectation that PCs will be able to take two short rests per adventuring day. Certainly, not all days are created equal, but so far we've seen little ability to take short rests. This removes a major healing mechanic (using hit dice), and makes short-rest abilities (action surge, second wind, bardic inspiration, channel divinity, wild shape, arcane/natural recovery, ki, warlock casting) less useful. So, I want to make short rests a bit easier to come by.

At the same time, I don't want to go back to the 4e version of short rests (5 minutes) which made all short-rest resources "per encounter" resources. That makes them too useful. So my idea is instead that the first short rest each day takes 5 minutes. You're still fairly fresh, so you just need a quick breather to get rolling again. The second short rest would take 15 minutes - now you're getting winded and need a proper break and maybe a quick snack. The third and subsequent rests would take 1 hour each as normal - now you're getting worn out for real.

Anything I'm missing here and should account for?

dagger · Jul 8, 2017

Not sure if your are missing anything but I like it at just a quick glance.

Kobold Stew · Jul 8, 2017

Do you track time so rigorously in your game that the difference between 5 and 15 minutes is meaningful? Do the chances of wandering monsters change between these two? I think in most games the answer would be no to both of these.

A short-short rest allows recuperation with minimal chance of interference (except in games with a fuse burning).
A longer short rest is roughly on the clock for a single check for a possible passing encounter that might interrupt it.

The DMG has alternatives in it already. Unless your players are calculating whether it is safe to rest for an additional five minutes here and there, it is not clear what this house rule achieves.

ad_hoc · Jul 8, 2017

I don't really understand either.

The exchange goes something like this at my table:

- We take a short rest
-- Time passes. You benefit from a short rest, what do you do now?

It takes all of 1 minute or so and we move on with the game.

Xeviat · Jul 8, 2017

Why not just limit short rests to two per day, then make them 15 minutes?

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FormerlyHemlock · Jul 8, 2017

Staffan said:
I've noticed that it's often hard for PCs to take a short rest, since doing so takes about an hour. Either things are too busy to rest at all, or they're quiet enough that they can just as well take a short rest. If my group had had access to rope trick, things might have been different, but they don't, and I don't think the intention is that a major game mechanic should require a specific spell.

But the game is set up with the expectation that PCs will be able to take two short rests per adventuring day. Certainly, not all days are created equal, but so far we've seen little ability to take short rests. This removes a major healing mechanic (using hit dice), and makes short-rest abilities (action surge, second wind, bardic inspiration, channel divinity, wild shape, arcane/natural recovery, ki, warlock casting) less useful. So, I want to make short rests a bit easier to come by.

At the same time, I don't want to go back to the 4e version of short rests (5 minutes) which made all short-rest resources "per encounter" resources. That makes them too useful. So my idea is instead that the first short rest each day takes 5 minutes. You're still fairly fresh, so you just need a quick breather to get rolling again. The second short rest would take 15 minutes - now you're getting winded and need a proper break and maybe a quick snack. The third and subsequent rests would take 1 hour each as normal - now you're getting worn out for real.

Anything I'm missing here and should account for?

Things you might be missing? Well, there's the fact that only the first long rest takes only 8 hours. After that it's 24 hours before the next one is legal. I can sort of kind of sympathize with someone thinking there's not much difference between 1 hour and 8 hours, but 1 hour vs. 24 hours?

Furthermore, if you set your gameworld up with day/night cycles, a long rest will often finish half of the cycle. It may well be the case that the players can e.g. afford to take a short rest while exploring the haunted ruins, but can't afford to take a long rest because then the sun will go down, the vampires in the ruins will start to walk, and the worgs in the forest around the ruins will come out to hunt.

Bear in mind also that you, as DM, don't necessarily have to regular that PCs get exactly two short rests every day. In an open-ended, non-railroadey adventure you may not have fine control over the players' schedules. Just go by the DMG advice about certain encounters probably necessitating a short rest afterwards, i.e. build in opportunities for them to rest. If the PCs have ten hours to find the MacGuffin before the sun sets, players might be able to take more than two short rests and that's fine. Or they might take only one, or none, and that is also fine.

Edit: specifically RE: the proposed house rule, it will kind of mess up monks a bit, because they need to spend 30 minutes meditating in order to regain ki, which means the ultra-short short rests won't work for them unless you also houserule those. You may also see a lot of warlocks casting Hex + Armor of Agathys and then "resting" immediately afterward, since that first rest is so cheap. Neither is likely to cause serious mechanical problems.

Tersival · Jul 8, 2017

I felt an hour was too long and just changed it to half an hour. To me this seems plenty of time to catch your breath, bandage wounds, wipe the blood off, have some refreshments then get ready to move off again.

CapnZapp · Jul 8, 2017

Kobold Stew said:
Do you track time so rigorously in your game that the difference between 5 and 15 minutes is meaningful? Do the chances of wandering monsters change between these two? I think in most games the answer would be no to both of these.

I think you unfairly drills down on specifics here.

The point is the difference between 5 and 60 minutes.

That's the origin of his houserule so you should start there.

Assuming you agree there IS a difference between 5 and 60 minutes, feel free to consider a variant of his house rule where the second rest takes 60 minutes, not 15.

Why? Because I feel focusing on the 5 to 15 minute difference misses the point.

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CapnZapp · Jul 8, 2017

ad_hoc said:
I don't really understand either.

The exchange goes something like this at my table:

- We take a short rest
-- Time passes. You benefit from a short rest, what do you do now?

It takes all of 1 minute or so and we move on with the game.

You sure you couldn't see the point? That a 5 minute rest feels significantly less risky than a 60 minute one?

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CapnZapp · Jul 8, 2017

Hemlock said:
Things you might be missing? Well, there's the fact that only the first long rest takes only 8 hours. After that it's 24 hours before the next one is legal. I can sort of kind of sympathize with someone thinking there's not much difference between 1 hour and 8 hours, but 1 hour vs. 24 hours?

Furthermore, if you set your gameworld up with day/night cycles, a long rest will often finish half of the cycle. It may well be the case that the players can e.g. afford to take a short rest while exploring the haunted ruins, but can't afford to take a long rest because then the sun will go down, the vampires in the ruins will start to walk, and the worgs in the forest around the ruins will come out to hunt.

Bear in mind also that you, as DM, don't necessarily have to regular that PCs get exactly two short rests every day. In an open-ended, non-railroadey adventure you may not have fine control over the players' schedules. Just go by the DMG advice about certain encounters probably necessitating a short rest afterwards, i.e. build in opportunities for them to rest. If the PCs have ten hours to find the MacGuffin before the sun sets, players might be able to take more than two short rests and that's fine. Or they might take only one, or none, and that is also fine.

Edit: specifically RE: the proposed house rule, it will kind of mess up monks a bit, because they need to spend 30 minutes meditating in order to regain ki, which means the ultra-short short rests won't work for them unless you also houserule those. You may also see a lot of warlocks casting Hex + Armor of Agathys and then "resting" immediately afterward, since that first rest is so cheap. Neither is likely to cause serious mechanical problems.