D&D 5E Interrupting rests

[Ovinomancer]

Yes. My players start a short rest, then change their minds part way through and decide on a long rest.

I wouldn't characterise this in terms of "problems" as that is evidently subjective. Rather I am interested in the mechanical implications. As I said, the case seems to rely on that first hour being the wrong kind of doing nothing...

I don't understand, here. Do you check in at intervals during a rest to see if the party wants to do something else? If my players say, "We're going to attempt a short rest," then I adjudicate that -- it's the declared action. If it appears that there's no issues, it would be automatically successful, I say so, and it's done. If it appears uncertain, I engage whatever mechanics I need to resolve the uncertainty, and then it's either successful or not. If I think it can't be successful, then it's not. At no point do I do this check multiple times during a rest, short or long, so I just don't understand were this occurs.

But, let's say it does occur, because, for whatever reason, the GM has decided to check in mid-rest. If there's been no combat (or spellcasting, or whatever is ruled to break a short rest), there's no exploit, so this isn't at all a problem. If there has been combat, then the short rest was already interrupted, so, again, no problem. Either the situation is that the rest was interrupted or it was not. The only case where your issue can occur is the former -- uninterrupted rest -- and, here, there's no game issues that occur, no exploits, no nothing. Unless you were planning a combat at 59 mins and 59 seconds, but you let your players switch at 59 minutes and 58 seconds -- no, even then it's not a problem because nothing is gained by the PCs, even with this level of strangely accurate rest timing tracking.

You're complaining about an issue that has no impact on the game, but only looks to you like a strange gap in the rules. But, this really only exists at all if you allow it -- meaning that only if you adjudicate rests so that you check in with the players mid-rest to offer the opportunity to switch rest types. Don't do that and there's not even the rules oddity to worry over.

 

[Scott Christian]

I like the idea of different types of rest:

• No rest which would include combat or being extremely cold or under the aura of something sinister
• Rugged which includes camping, keeping watch, maybe sleeping in an unknown thieves' den even though they invited you, etc.
• Restful such as staying at an inn, your house, etc.

 

[Hriston]

Yes. My players start a short rest, then change their minds part way through and decide on a long rest.

I wouldn't characterise this in terms of "problems" as that is evidently subjective. Rather I am interested in the mechanical implications. As I said, the case seems to rely on that first hour being the wrong kind of doing nothing...

The players changed their minds about what their characters were doing. That’s no different than deciding to change what you’re doing on your turn in combat before it has been resolved. If your DM allows it, it might amount to a retcon of the fiction, nothing more.

 

[clearstream]

I don't understand, here. Do you check in at intervals during a rest to see if the party wants to do something else? If my players say, "We're going to attempt a short rest," then I adjudicate that -- it's the declared action. If it appears that there's no issues, it would be automatically successful, I say so, and it's done. If it appears uncertain, I engage whatever mechanics I need to resolve the uncertainty, and then it's either successful or not. If I think it can't be successful, then it's not. At no point do I do this check multiple times during a rest, short or long, so I just don't understand were this occurs.

But, let's say it does occur, because, for whatever reason, the GM has decided to check in mid-rest. If there's been no combat (or spellcasting, or whatever is ruled to break a short rest), there's no exploit, so this isn't at all a problem. If there has been combat, then the short rest was already interrupted, so, again, no problem. Either the situation is that the rest was interrupted or it was not. The only case where your issue can occur is the former -- uninterrupted rest -- and, here, there's no game issues that occur, no exploits, no nothing. Unless you were planning a combat at 59 mins and 59 seconds, but you let your players switch at 59 minutes and 58 seconds -- no, even then it's not a problem because nothing is gained by the PCs, even with this level of strangely accurate rest timing tracking.

You're complaining about an issue that has no impact on the game, but only looks to you like a strange gap in the rules. But, this really only exists at all if you allow it -- meaning that only if you adjudicate rests so that you check in with the players mid-rest to offer the opportunity to switch rest types. Don't do that and there's not even the rules oddity to worry over.

Your argument is essentially - there are no gaps in the rules if a DM refuses to allow them?

 

[Ovinomancer]

Your argument is essentially - there are no gaps in the rules if a DM refuses to allow them?

No, there's no gap here unless the GM makes the gap. You have to decide to adjudicate rests in a very specific way for this to even occur. If you follow the normal play procedure -- players declare action; GM decides success, uncertain, or failure; GM narrates outcome -- then there's no room to find a gap. Players declare a short rest, the GM adjudicates that, and there's no place that players have to decide, halfway through, to switch to a long rest.

OR, if you do allow a switch, then it was always a long rest because nothing was gained from the period where it was a short rest. Your problem only exists because you're creating a corner case for it to exist, and then the problem is really that you've used two different adjudication methods that don't closely align when you created your corner case.

 

[clearstream]

No, there's no gap here unless the GM makes the gap. You have to decide to adjudicate rests in a very specific way for this to even occur. If you follow the normal play procedure -- players declare action; GM decides success, uncertain, or failure; GM narrates outcome -- then there's no room to find a gap. Players declare a short rest, the GM adjudicates that, and there's no place that players have to decide, halfway through, to switch to a long rest.

OR, if you do allow a switch, then it was always a long rest because nothing was gained from the period where it was a short rest. Your problem only exists because you're creating a corner case for it to exist, and then the problem is really that you've used two different adjudication methods that don't closely align when you created your corner case.

That's shifting the grounds. At issue was what could interrupt that first hour.

As you say, a DM can gloss over it. The purpose of digging into it is part-curiosity and part-inductive reasoning about rests. It is mechanically strange that in hindsight, that one spell cast that potentially interrupted that first hour, in fact could not have interrupted that first hour because it turned out to be part of a long rest (per the putative interpretation).

The converse casts it in brighter light: players could start a long rest and - just prior to one hour in - decide to curtail it to a short rest... so that the one spell they cast five minutes in must now interrupt it! Curiously, one ends up with two kinds of doing nothing. Glossing over it is simply evasion.

 

[Ovinomancer]

That's shifting the grounds. At issue was what could interrupt that first hour.

As you say, a DM can gloss over it. The purpose of digging into it is part-curiosity and part-inductive reasoning about rests. It is mechanically strange that in hindsight, that one spell cast that potentially interrupted that first hour, in fact could not have interrupted that first hour because it turned out to be part of a long rest (per the putative interpretation).

The converse casts it in brighter light: players could start a long rest and - just prior to one hour in - decide to curtail it to a short rest... so that the one spell they cast five minutes in must now interrupt it! Curiously, one ends up with two kinds of doing nothing. Glossing over it is simply evasion.

There is no "first hour," though, that's what I'm getting at. Either you're taking a short rest, in which case there is only the hour, or you're taking a long rest, for which the first hours isn't at all special. It's only this strange case you're inventing, where a party starts a short rest but, at some point, changes to a long rest, that you have an issue. And, in that odd event, there is never a case where there can be both an interruption and a switch to the long rest. You're pointing to an impossibility to claim that there's a gap in the rules.

 

[clearstream]

There is no "first hour," though, that's what I'm getting at. Either you're taking a short rest, in which case there is only the hour, or you're taking a long rest, for which the first hours isn't at all special. It's only this strange case you're inventing, where a party starts a short rest but, at some point, changes to a long rest, that you have an issue. And, in that odd event, there is never a case where there can be both an interruption and a switch to the long rest. You're pointing to an impossibility to claim that there's a gap in the rules.

You're claiming it is impossible. My players have at the table (well, online as we use FG) started rests and changed their minds about them. I don't think anything in the rules prevents them doing so.

In fact, there is the interesting thought of characters who - at the end of some 8 hour stretch having met the conditions of a long rest - claim a long rest. IDR the RAW demanding they commit to the rest up front.

 

[TwoSix]

Different kind of doing nothing

It's a really nice concept, metaphysically!

Do people actually run it as though a long rest isn't just a longer short rest? To my mind, you can declare as a player what type of rest you're aiming for, but it's the actual narrative of the characters not doing much that causes the mechanical benefits. Once the characters haven't exerted themselves much for an hour, they gain the benefits of the short rest. If they continue to do nothing for 5 more hours after that, than they gain the benefits of the long rest.

Basically, I treat rest benefits as being a consequence of the fiction, not a mechanical state to be requested by the players. Although I have no problem with the players saying "We set up camp for the night so we can get a long rest." But anytime they do nothing for a while, I'll tell them to gain their rest benefits.

 

[Charlaquin]

That's shifting the grounds. At issue was what could interrupt that first hour.

As you say, a DM can gloss over it. The purpose of digging into it is part-curiosity and part-inductive reasoning about rests. It is mechanically strange that in hindsight, that one spell cast that potentially interrupted that first hour, in fact could not have interrupted that first hour because it turned out to be part of a long rest (per the putative interpretation).

The converse casts it in brighter light: players could start a long rest and - just prior to one hour in - decide to curtail it to a short rest... so that the one spell they cast five minutes in must now interrupt it! Curiously, one ends up with two kinds of doing nothing. Glossing over it is simply evasion.

Have you stopped to consider the implausibility of your scenario? For this to actually occur in a game of Dungeons and Dragons, the players would first have to declare that their characters are taking a long rest. Then, before the DM has determined whether or not this rest is successful and begun narrating the results, one of the players would have to declare “oh, but before the hour is up, I cast (whatever),” despite knowing that this action will prevent the rest from being successful. Then, instead of the rest of the players reminding him that this will spoil the rest and asking him to wait until it’s over, they have to collectively decide “whoopsidoodle, guess we’re actually taking a long rest now!”

It seems like you’re thinking about the rest from an in-fiction perspective, which each minute playing out in real time and the characters deciding what to do moment by moment, forgetting the realities of play, where players say “let’s take a short rest,” and the DM either says “ok, go ahead and spend your hit dice” or rolls some dice and depending on their results says “30 minutes into your rest, a wild owlbear appears. Roll initiative!”