D&D 5E Why my friends hate talking to me about 5e.

[Sacrosanct]

Keep in mind that long healing times in early D&D were there to eat up time (the most valuable resource according to Gygax), which the characters have to pay for in lodging etc with an aim to keeping them poor and thus justifying more adventuring for gold.

Pretty sure that's not the reason why time was so important in AD&D. It was important because when you leave to recoup or recover, the monsters organize and restock to be prepared for you when you get back. Guidelines in those adventures said this happens over a span of 1 to a half dozen days or so*. In a low level adventure that has thousands of gp of treasure in it, that 1cp meal at the inn doesn't keep you poor.

*Edit: I'm starting Night Below tomorrow as a matter of fact, and in my prep reading, it's mentioned all over how monsters will react and restock when PCs have to leave and regroup and rest in town (the adventure heavily assumes PCs will do that fairly often or most assuredly have a TPK.). Speaking of, that's something much different from old school to new school. In old school, it was assumed you frequently retreated and went back to your base of operations. In 5e for instance, PCs are assumed to almost never do that, but to keep trudging forward. Imagine if in 5e you couldn't level up until you went back and spent weeks with a trainer?

 

[Cruentus]

Definately try it out - the more eyes on it, the better!

I used that exact mechanic in my last campaign in 5e (if you fall to 0, you gain a level of exhaustion). It worked very well. If people yoyo'd in fights, they paid for it. It did cause my players to consider and think about their fatigue levels, and whether they wanted to press on or not. It still didn't address @CleverNickName s comment about how weird it was for characters to be in a monster infested ruin, and get a goods night sleep, recover all their abilities and spells, and be all healed up. (Naturally, Leomund's Hut of Invulnerability helped immensely ).

But, overall, the mechanic worked. And I also had a super slow pace - more hexcrawl/lots of travel rather than 6-8 encounters per day. We also didn't get past 6th level or so, as the razor edge of how to challenge parties to not cause TPKs, was elusive. It was either "we're dead" or cakewalk. And our frontline fighter was an Arcane Archer... everyone else was a spellcaster of some wort/cleric/sorcerer/wizard.

*edit, I also did change the exhaustion mechanics to a 6 level system where there was cumulative -1 or -2 modifiers to attack/save/Con checks/AC, etc. We were ok with futzing with more fine adjustments, as the 5e exhaustion mechanic is heavy handed out of the gate. You still didn't want to get to higher levels using my house rules, and players paid attention to it.

 

[DEFCON 1]

The Exhaustion table as-is does make things less fun for the rest of the game in my estimation because Disadvantage on Ability Checks at Level 1 means that a bad encounter in combat now makes everything outside of combat bad too. The placement of that effect on the chart is what is the real issue in my opinion.

But once I moved the effects around on my personal chart, everything became much more useable. Having a level or two of exhaustion was fine and not as punishing, because it only really impacted additional combats (which if you were that bad off already, you should have been doing your best to avoid them.) But exhausted characters could still participate in things outside of combat without being hosed (until the level at which you're getting closer to death and thus should be hosed on almost everything.)

My version:

Level 1: Speed halved.
Level 2: Max HP halved.
Level 3: Disadvantage on attack rolls and saving throws.
Level 4: Disadvantage on ability checks.
Level 5: Speed reduced to 0.
Level 6: Death.

 

[Stalker0]

The problem with exhaustion is that it simply makes you suck, so once you have it the rest of the session becomes frustrating as your character is either constantly failing, or doing nothing because the risk of failure is too high. Dealing with exhaustion occasionally can be a challenge and roleplaying opportunity, but if it becomes routine then all it does is reduce player agency and suck the fun out of the game.

I think the real pain of exhaustion is its longevity, you can't even get rid of it with a short rest (even though you can heal on a short rest). magically it takes a 5th level spell, and you only drop 1 level.

That's what makes it so brutal, in a game where a serious injury is just one 1st level spell or an hours rest away from being fixed up.... the fact that exhaustion still lingers on is narratively very weird, and mechanically very strong.

 

[Cruentus]

I don't disagree; there are lots of good games out there to suit a lot of playstyles.

That said, there's nothing wrong with "slowly whittling away at 5th edition" until it plays the way that you and your friends want it to play. The very first page of the DMG says that you aren't beholden to the rules and that you can play the game any way you want so...whittle away, I guess? ¯\(ツ)/¯

I tried that whittling away, but it was more like wrestling, it was exhausting. I gave up on it, and we moved to an earlier edition.

 

[Vaalingrade]

It's amazing how quickly these discussions go from "Here's something you can do" to "Nobody should ever do this and here's why."

No one should ever express their opinions without filing in triplicate affirming that their opinion is their opinion.

Otherwise people feels justified in attacking you for badwrongfunning people.

 

[Guest 7034872]

No one should ever express their opinions without filing in triplicate affirming that their opinion is their opinion.

And have it notarized just in case of any legal challenges.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

The Exhaustion table as-is does make things less fun for the rest of the game in my estimation because Disadvantage on Ability Checks at Level 1 means that a bad encounter in combat now makes everything outside of combat bad too. The placement of that effect on the chart is what is the real issue in my opinion.

But once I moved the effects around on my personal chart, everything became much more useable. Having a level or two of exhaustion was fine and not as punishing, because it only really impacted additional combats (which if you were that bad off already, you should have been doing your best to avoid them.) But exhausted characters could still participate in things outside of combat without being hosed (until the level at which you're getting closer to death and thus should be hosed on almost everything.)

My version:

Level 1: Speed halved.
Level 2: Max HP halved.
Level 3: Disadvantage on attack rolls and saving throws.
Level 4: Disadvantage on ability checks.
Level 5: Speed reduced to 0.
Level 6: Death.

I agree, but if you can gain exhaustion in combat, I'm not sure I like halving speed at the start of the track either. It makes fleeing nigh impossible.

 

[CleverNickName]

If someone says, "you all could jump off that bridge", its pretty natural for people to start saying why its a bad idea

When people give houserule ideas, its very natural for people to jump in and explain why that idea might not be the greatest one for many players. That can always be ignored of course, but its not amazing that we shift into these notions....its very natural.

I stand corrected. What I should have said was,

It's amazing how quickly these discussions go from "here's a house rule for your game" to throwing oneself off a bridge.

 

[Cruentus]

Pretty sure that's not the reason why time was so important in AD&D. It was important because when you leave to recoup or recover, the monsters organize and restock to be prepared for you when you get back. Guidelines in those adventures said this happens over a span of 1 to a half dozen days or so*. In a low level adventure that has thousands of gp of treasure in it, that 1cp meal at the inn doesn't keep you poor.

*Edit: I'm starting Night Below tomorrow as a matter of fact, and in my prep reading, it's mentioned all over how monsters will react and restock when PCs have to leave and regroup and rest in town (the adventure heavily assumes PCs will do that fairly often or most assuredly have a TPK.). Speaking of, that's something much different from old school to new school. In old school, it was assumed you frequently retreated and went back to your base of operations. In 5e for instance, PCs are assumed to almost never do that, but to keep trudging forward. Imagine if in 5e you couldn't level up until you went back and spent weeks with a trainer?

The other reason healing took so long, was they were effectively playing a "west marches" type of group play. Remember, from reports, Gygax's group was about 50 people... If you went out on an adventure, other groups were out adventuring too in the same world. If you got injured, you couldn't go out - you picked up a different character/hireling/henchman, and adventured using that character, while your other character recovered. They didn't have small groups of the same adventurers all the time. That's a more modern iteration (and by modern, I'm talking in the past decades).

They also tracked time very carefully. If you left a dungeon, another party might enter it and finish cleaning it out and take the treasure. So everything was a cost/benefit discussion or more like risk/reward.