D&D 5E An "adventuring day" versus a day in the life of an adventurer

[Sword of Spirit]

It occurred to me that when we discuss whether our groups regularly get the assumed 6-8 encounter, 2 short rest adventuring day, there is an aspect I think we sometimes miss. Basically, I don't think every day that you are adventuring needs to be an adventuring day for it to still be meaningful.

Take my party. We do a lot of social and exploration days, where we might have no encounters, or a random encounter or two (likely not even dangerous--they're random!). That's probably the majority of our days adventuring.

But the assumed "adventuring day" comes into play when we are in dungeons or on some sort of timed adventure. If we were playing a published mega-adventure, then that would probably end up being more days than not. But since we aren't, it isn't.

I think the 5e designers were experienced enough that they probably assumed that most games aren't going to be a breakneck pace through 6-8 encounters most sessions. If that is the case, then it would make sense to also assume that the whole "adventuring day" thing is intended to represent only a part of the active play experience, and that it shouldn't matter outside of that experience.

 

[NotAYakk]

A day where 0 encounters happen has no impact on the 6-8 encounter adventuring day.

A random encounter on an off-day is probably not really worth doing in 5e, unless your DM intends to (a) make it crazy hard, or (b) sometimes starts off with random encounters and they just keep coming all day, so the players have to always husband their resources, or (c) you just like roflstomping things sometimes.

A medium difficulty combat that you are confident you can take a long rest after is pretty trivial in 5e. Even a deadly one is often a yawn.

 

[robus]

But the assumed "adventuring day" comes into play when we are in dungeons or on some sort of timed adventure. If we were playing a published mega-adventure, then that would probably end up being more days than not. But since we aren't, it isn't.

Adventuring day is another name for especially challenging day, i.e. a day when the PCs eke out a hard-earned victory and beat the boss. And of course the challenges should ramp up over the course of the day: medium -> hard -> deadly with easy ones interspersed for pacing and variety.

And of course one needs to adjust what those threat levels are for one’s group so that they deliver the desired challenge.

But you’re absolutely right that not every day is an adventuring day.

 

[Charlaquin]

I think rather than re-examining what is meant by “adventuring day” it is more important to consider what is meant by “encounter.” 6-8 encounters doesn’t have to mean 6-8 combats. Any scene in which the players face obstacles to their goals, that involve a degree of risk, and are likely to cause expenditure of the characters’ resources is an encounter. If you’re not regularly getting at least a few such scenes per day, I’d have to question if what you’re doing could really be described as “adventuring.”

When you say “we do a lot of social and exploration days, where we might have no encounters,” do your PCs not risk exhaustion due to exposure to the elements on exploration days? Do they not expend rations, water, torches, feed for their mounts, or spells that replace the need for these things? Do they not have to make decisions about whether to take the longer, safer route or the shorter route with a higher risk of random encounters? Do they not occasionally become lost, leading to more loss of resources and more random encounters? On your social days, do your PCs not risk social consequences? Do they not cast spells or spend coin on bribes to avoid these potential consequences? Do their political rivals not send hit men after them?

If your PCs do these things, I would say you are indeed having encounters on these days. If they don’t do these things... What do they do that you would consider “exploring” or “socializing”?

 

[Shiroiken]

I think the 5e designers were experienced enough that they probably assumed that most games aren't going to be a breakneck pace through 6-8 encounters most sessions. If that is the case, then it would make sense to also assume that the whole "adventuring day" thing is intended to represent only a part of the active play experience, and that it shouldn't matter outside of that experience.

Pretty much, yeah. The term "adventuring day," is probably meant to refer to any in-game day that focuses on a specific adventure, rather than just travel or general social days. Travel and exploration, if the focus of the adventure, could easily utilize the 6-8 encounters per day. An investigation adventure might have a lot of social encounters, but still include several combat encounters during a day (as the bad guys try to eliminate or throw the party off the trail).

In my current campaign, I normally have a session between each adventure where the party interacts with the town. I get to introduce NPCs, and the majority of the session is pure roleplay. The primary purpose of these sessions (besides getting the players invested in the location) is to drop adventure seeds and see which ones the party might be interested in. This gives me time to get the adventure ready between the sessions, while allowing the players to choose their adventure.

 

[Asisreo]

I think rather than re-examining what is meant by “adventuring day” it is more important to consider what is meant by “encounter.” 6-8 encounters doesn’t have to mean 6-8 combats. Any scene in which the players face obstacles to their goals, that involve a degree of risk, and are likely to cause expenditure of the characters’ resources is an encounter. If you’re not regularly getting at least a few such scenes per day, I’d have to question if what you’re doing could really be described as “adventuring.”

When you say “we do a lot of social and exploration days, where we might have no encounters,” do your PCs not risk exhaustion due to exposure to the elements on exploration days? Do they not expend rations, water, torches, feed for their mounts, or spells that replace the need for these things? Do they not have to make decisions about whether to take the longer, safer route or the shorter route with a higher risk of random encounters? Do they not occasionally become lost, leading to more loss of resources and more random encounters? On your social days, do your PCs not risk social consequences? Do they not cast spells or spend coin on bribes to avoid these potential consequences? Do their political rivals not send hit men after them?

If your PCs do these things, I would say you are indeed having encounters on these days. If they don’t do these things... What do they do that you would consider “exploring” or “socializing”?

I think you hit the nail right over it's head. When the rare opportunity that I'm a player comes around, I'm often disappointed in how exploration is done. In that, no exploration is done. You start to feel less like an adventurer and more like a mercenary or dungeon clean-up crew when you get Helicopter Deployed to every one of your destination or you only fight a stray owlbear or group of bandits once per day. If it was causing that much trouble, but a group of level 1 adventurers could handle it while every NPC knows the exact GPS coordinates, why don't they have the local knight and/or guard handle it?

Most of the time, it breaks immersion when I get somewhere and it is an issues they paid 500 gold to get done and all the "hard" work has already been done. Imo, Explortion should be run as a Dungeon.

Heck, even the DMG encourages this form of exploration. Just change the minute scale into hours. (Help I'm on mobile and no matter how many times I push the B button on the wizard up top, I can't turn off bold. I'm serious. This isn't a joke. I'n not being funny.)

 

[Oofta]

I rarely run dungeon crawls or heavy wilderness exploration games, my games tend to be very urban or at least highly interactive within a local region. I try to mimic the feel of books like The Dresden Files where everything is going fine for a while and then everything goes sideways for a day or five.

I regularly have down time between adventuring periods which are typically at least a couple of days but may be longer. During those adventuring periods we may have a day or more of investigation, travel or other activities. I also use the alternate rest rules meaning a short rest is overnight while a long rest is several days, usually a week or more. So the downtimes during adventuring periods will only normally be short rests.

Then after that adventuring period, I let people know roughly how long it will be until the next adventuring period. If they want to do anything particularly special they can write up a story (I reward inspiration points if they do) or email/chat with me about anything special. We usually start the game after a "break" with RP and resolution of downtime activities.

So for example in my last game session the party had some story related things due to a rival from a previous downtime period, someone else started a business, I had some interaction with various NPCs the group has been involved with and so on. It was a lot of fun but did take up the first couple of hours of the session.

It's going to depend a lot on the group, but we really enjoy having these downtime RP heavy sessions where non-combat skills and backgrounds get highlighted.

 

[robus]

When you say “we do a lot of social and exploration days, where we might have no encounters,” do your PCs not risk exhaustion due to exposure to the elements on exploration days? Do they not expend rations, water, torches, feed for their mounts, or spells that replace the need for these things? Do they not have to make decisions about whether to take the longer, safer route or the shorter route with a higher risk of random encounters? Do they not occasionally become lost, leading to more loss of resources and more random encounters? On your social days, do your PCs not risk social consequences? Do they not cast spells or spend coin on bribes to avoid these potential consequences? Do their political rivals not send hit men after them?

One of my groups is playing in my remix of Dragon Heist, so there's not much risk from the elements or going hungry and, yes, there are days when they're asking questions and making connections and trying to figure out what's going on and who the bad guys are. Then they're given a mission to infiltrate some bad guys place and that becomes an adventuring day. The other days will make minor dents in their resources but nothing like a real adventuring day.

I agree that PCs are always in the midst of adventure, they are the protagonists after all, but these adventuring days are intended to be especially challenging days that will sap their resources to the limit and make them feel like they eked out a victory.

 

[Charlaquin]

I think you hit the nail right over it's head. When the rare opportunity that I'm a player comes around, I'm often disappointed in how exploration is done. In that, no exploration is done. You start to feel less like an adventurer and more like a mercenary or dungeon clean-up crew when you get Helicopter Deployed to every one of your destination or you only fight a stray owlbear or group of bandits once per day. If it was causing that much trouble, but a group of level 1 adventurers could handle it while every NPC knows the exact GPS coordinates, why don't they have the local knight and/or guard handle it?

Most of the time, it breaks immersion when I get somewhere and it is an issues they paid 500 gold to get done and all the "hard" work has already been done. Imo, Explortion should be run as a Dungeon.

I agree, I think travel is made far too easy far too often.

Heck, even the DMG encourages this form of exploration. Just change the minute scale into hours. (Help I'm on mobile and no matter how many times I push the B button on the wizard up top, I can't turn off bold. I'm serious. This isn't a joke. I'n not being funny.)

I recommend using asterisks to bold and italicize on mobile. One on either side of the text you want italic, two on either side of the text you want bold.

 

[Oofta]

I agree, I think travel is made far too easy far too often.

Which is part of why I usually hand-wave travel except at low levels. There may be times when they encounter something dangerous, but generally it will be handled with just some quick checks and possible setbacks if anything.

For example, if the group is travelling through goblin-infested areas they'll discuss precautions they're taking and I may describe some sample scenes. But I would only actually run a combat if it was potentially deadly which almost never happens. I may narrate a skirmish or two, but in general if they don't stumble across something unexpected we do very little with it.

But it also depends on the situation, there may not be anyplace safe enough to get a long rest.

I recommend using asterisks to bold and italicize on mobile. One on either side of the text you want italic, two on either side of the text you want bold.

Good to know!