D&D 5E Aren't Short Rest classes *better* in "story-based" games rather than dungeon crawls?

[Asisreo]

So. What does it matter? What is the Warlock spending those slots on. If there's no problems that need solving with magic what does it matter?

Just stuff that a wizard of the same level couldn't repeatedly do. Like a warlock can have a high vantage point while moving by using Fly several times, involving the whole group. Or they can use Spider Climb to be out-of-sight while the party is on ground-level exploring the caves. Or they can gaseous form themselves through a barred or locked door.

Not so much solutions as much as tiny advantages that stack together.

 

[Mordhau]

Just stuff that a wizard of the same level couldn't repeatedly do. Like a warlock can have a high vantage point while moving by using Fly several times, involving the whole group. Or they can use Spider Climb to be out-of-sight while the party is on ground-level exploring the caves. Or they can gaseous form themselves through a barred or locked door.

Not so much solutions as much as tiny advantages that stack together.

But all of those do eat away at scarce resources the Warlock may want before they get a chance to rest. A 5th level Warlock who uses Gaseous Mist to get through a door now has one spell slot left if there is a combat on the other side.

None of these are things the Warlock can do with the certainty they will have an immediate short rest.

 

[Asisreo]

But all of those do eat away at scarce resources the Warlock may want before they get a chance to rest. A 5th level Warlock who uses Gaseous Mist to get through a door now has one spell slot left if there is a combat on the other side.

None of these are things the Warlock can do with the certainty they will have an immediate short rest.

Is it a risk? Sure. But unless every hour you have a combat after every struggle, usually the risk is worth it anyways.

Like, what are the actual chances that behind this door is an immediate encounter? Especially since a smart party already tried hearing through, peering through the keyhole, and possibly just knocking to notice a response.

And the slots weren't of any real consequence anyways. Again, its not a full adventuring day so the chance that one spell slot was the difference between success and failure is very low.

In other words, might as well use the resource and if something happens, we'll improvise.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

Has anyone put a limit on short rests and kept them at an hour? (And not done something to make long rests harder either) And if so why? Were you responding to a genuine issue in the game? Were Warlocks actually too powerful?

I limit them to 4 per day but keep them at an hour. The reason is that I don't fighters always being able to regenerate back to full with Second Wind. (I use the slow natural healing variant where you only recover half you HD and no how on a long rest, so everybody isn't healing up over night anyway.) It's also future proofing in case anything that similarly bothers my immersion comes up.

With full hour rests, I definitely wouldn't limit them to 2. 2 is supposed to be basically the average assumed number, so if you are getting less than 2 some days you should be getting more than 2 on others.

It works well. I think there have been some days when they took all 4 (as well as days when they took less than 2), but never any days that they needed more than those 4. The warlock does use out of combat spells too.

 

[Weiley31]

I don't know, I just do the Short Rest=5 mins and a Long Rest is an Hour/8 Hours.

 

[Willie the Duck]

So, I've been wondering why people believe that Warlocks and Monks are only strong in adventuring day scenarios with 2 short rests. They only get 2 short rests.

Compare that to a single-combat day. Or travel/downtime days with no combat.

You have 20+ potential short rests, which means a 5th-level warlock has a potential 40+ 3rd-level spells. This is partially balanced by the spell list, but there's still massive flexibility.

For example, a warlock can go to the thief NOC and cast Suggestion: return all stolen goods and run as far as you can. Short rest. Then they can cast Phantasmal Force on the bandit to convince them the town is empty. Short rest. Then they can cast Telekinesis to unbeach the ship. Short rest. Then they cast Detect Thoughts on the shifty man in robes. Short rest. This is one day, no slots lost.

Get it? This is far more utility than a wizard by simply turning all available spells 5th-level and lower as rituals with a 1-hour casting time. If your party has time for Find Familiar, they have time for the warlock to recharge.

Same for Monks. Shadow Monks can cast Pass Without Trace everywhere and makes stealthing easy with very little to no cost. 4-elemonks can cast Wall of Stone more times than a dedicated spellcaster and can create a massive earth castle faster than a druid. Even low levels, a monk with indefinite Ki can out jump a fighter of the same level.

If anything, a full adventuring day restricts these classes more than helps them.

And for the thought that it "stops the party," the warlock can simply meditate on the side while they're not moving. It's not like an adventure is constant movement 100% of the time. Even on travel days, there's still 8 extra hours of nothing that is neither a full rest nor travel.

Something I haven't seen mentioned is that, to compensate for their being able to recharge so readily, what these classes can do per charge is really hamstrung. For most of a Warlock's career, they are going to be limited to having two spell slots readily available. Sure they can cast the suggestion on the thief NOC and then rest, and the phantasmal Force the bandits and rest, and then telekinesis the beached ship and rest. However, the instant they need to do three things before resting, a wizard or sorcerer or bard or similar might be the better choice for the party.

I think one of the reasons short rest classes get as much complaints is that this 'nee'd 3 uses' scenarios come up more readily (for many) than 'massively multiple needs for 1-2 castings and then an hour rest before next problem' scenarios.

 

[Asisreo]

Something I haven't seen mentioned is that, to compensate for their being able to recharge so readily, what these classes can do per charge is really hamstrung. For most of a Warlock's career, they are going to be limited to having two spell slots readily available. Sure they can cast the suggestion on the thief NOC and then rest, and the phantasmal Force the bandits and rest, and then telekinesis the beached ship and rest. However, the instant they need to do three things before resting, a wizard or sorcerer or bard or similar might be the better choice for the party.

I think one of the reasons short rest classes get as much complaints is that this 'nee'd 3 uses' scenarios come up more readily (for many) than 'massively multiple needs for 1-2 castings and then an hour rest before next problem' scenarios.

Yes. You're correct that they aren't quite as capable as classes that can do three things at once. Though, all casters will be struggling to find scenarios that can use three spells with two not being concentration.

So we've established there are glaring flaws even with theoretical limitless short rest opportunities. I still have 2 questions:

Why are we nerfing them when this is their potentially strongest point?

Why is there still the opinion that they are worse on these days?

 

[Xetheral]

So? What is the Warlock spending those slots on? If there's no immediate problems that need solving with magic what does it matter?

There are several always-useful spells, but Sending (available to Great Old One Warlocks and some multiclassed Warlocks) is the big one. The size of the contact network a party can usefully maintain is often directly a function of how many Sendings they can (on average) cast in a day. With a Warlock able to cast 16 Sendings per travel day (during the 8 hours when the party is neither sleeping nor moving) the size of the network the party can maintain is greatly increased. In town that can be increased to 32 Sendings.

Additionally, the opportunity cost of having the Warlock maintain the party's network is lower than having a full caster dump all their 3+ level slots into it since the Warlock is more useful without spell slots than the full caster would be (in the event of combat on a travel/town day), and is also more likely to have the appropriate social skills than a Cleric or Wizard.

 

[Mistwell]

It really very much depends on the campaign setting. For example one group I am in is going through Chult and when we rest we risk an encounter in those undead and dinosaur infested jungles. It's worth a rest or two, but it's often not worth more than that as the risk/reward scale dictates pressing on.

 

[Mordhau]

There are several always-useful spells, but Sending (available to Great Old One Warlocks and some multiclassed Warlocks) is the big one. The size of the contact network a party can usefully maintain is often directly a function of how many Sendings they can (on average) cast in a day. With a Warlock able to cast 16 Sendings per travel day (during the 8 hours when the party is neither sleeping nor moving) the size of the network the party can maintain is greatly increased. In town that can be increased to 32 Sendings.

Additionally, the opportunity cost of having the Warlock maintain the party's network is lower than having a full caster dump all their 3+ level slots into it since the Warlock is more useful without spell slots than the full caster would be (in the event of combat on a travel/town day), and is also more likely to have the appropriate social skills than a Cleric or Wizard.

This is possible I guess, but it sounds pretty niche (and dull).

I'd also point out that this is yet another post that seems to be exploring hypotheticals. Did this happen in your game? Was it a problem?