D&D (2024) Rests should be dropped. Stop conflating survival mechanics with resource recovery.

[Remathilis]

Could you explain it to me then?

At the risk of embarrassing myself...

OP is looking at a design system closer to an MMO, but without the video games limitations. Specifically;

Resources (health, mana, etc) and pool based and doing things (getting hit, casting spells) deplete them. Resources do recharge, but slowly (you get a few points back for rest, but nothing akin to a long rest or even most short rests).

Instead, resources recharge by doing things (eating food restores some health, potions restore mana). The things you do are tied to a foraging and crafting system. If you don't want to craft, you can rely on found/stolen things or just buy them with gold.

What I get is a gameplay loop similar to New World (minus the PvP) where resource management and risk assessment (is it worth it to go to the Caves of Darkness for troll's blood, even though that makes the best healing potions) are as important as quests. PCs don't insta-heal and maintain the same 10 days rations that they got at level 1 somehow.

At least that's what I think. I await being chastised for not understanding it if I'm wrong.

 

[Emberashh]

eating food restores some health

As novel as I found Runescapes use of food in lieu of conventional healing potions, thats not one Id borrow. Chugging a potion in the heat of battle is one thing (even kung fu movies do this), scarfing down an entire monkfish is another.

What I get is a gameplay loop similar to New World (minus the PvP) where resource management and risk assessment (is it worth it to go to the Caves of Darkness for troll's blood, even though that makes the best healing potions) are as important as quests.

More or less. Part of the context (for the game Im writing) is that leveling up requires active use of your characters various skills, similar to the Runequest -> Elder Scrolls style of leveling, so the "pillars" of the game have to encourage skill use across the board.

Crafting and gathering in this sense not only makes adventuring have more of a point beyond chasing a story (and gives a point to random adventuring, something I think most TTRPGs, even OSR ones, tend to fall short of doing) but also gives more opportunities for players to level their skills and get those precious class levels.

Although, PVP in TTRPGs is something I've been curious about, and I've actually tested a variant rule for my combat system for it. Works quite well and actually inspired me to stick an uber realistic dueling game in my back pocket.

and maintain the same 10 days rations that they got at level 1 somehow.

Im not familiar with the reference but Ill remind that survival should be optional.

Don't get me wrong, I personally love survival and would rather be going full tilt gritty survival sim at all times, but not everyone is like that and my table sure wasn't. Thats why segregating survival out of the gameplay loop of the game is important.

Relatively few actually commit all the way to survival, and yet DND is still tying itself down to survival mechanics despite having long since made the bulk of them so superfluous that even for people that enjoy it, its rules are quite bad.

That Rests as presented can range from minutes to literal weeks at a time and can only barely affect the balance of the game is a testament to that. Epic Heroism was always my preference, and even with hour long Long Rests, the game didn't become that much more balanced, only just so, and it took until the mid game for spell recovery to kick in and balance out casters. And most Im sure know that short rests being easier to take benefits those classes substantially, but they don't suddenly become OP, nor do casters and such stop reigning supreme.

The unimportance of time in DND fundamentally undermines the point and value of running survival at all, and dropping the rest system is just embracing that truth.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Mod Note:

This:

As said to another person earlier, if you're going to deliberately troll, just stop.

Is a classic example of rhetoric I asked everyone to avoid when I posted:

Mod Note:
If you think someone is being rude, or even just rubbing you the wrong way, don’t escalate your rhetoric. Instead, disengage. Report the posts in question. If necessary, use your account’s Ignore feature.

It’s not the only one I’m seeing, either. It’s Clarifying and reiterating for EVERYONE: cut it out.

Continued rhetoric like this is going to draw threadbans and a possible lockdown.

 

[Remathilis]

Im not familiar with the reference but Ill remind that survival should be optional.

Just a reference to the notion that some games do so little resource tracking that they write "rations" down on their character sheet during creation and forget they exist. See also: infinite arrows.

 

[Emberashh]

Just a reference to the notion that some games do so little resource tracking that they write "rations" down on their character sheet during creation and forget they exist. See also: infinite arrows.

Ah that makes sense. Ive surprised people more than once when I pull out my trusty crowbar.

 

[mellored]

The things you do are tied to a foraging and crafting system. If you don't want to craft, you can rely on found/stolen things or just buy them with gold.

Survival crafting game then, like Rust.

That really only works if you are the first person in a new world. Including being shipwrecked or similar.

Otherwise, someone will eventually capture a troll to harvest troll blood. And in 3 generations you got an industrial potion factory.

326 Getting Ahead in Business - Giant in the Playground Games

 

[tetrasodium]

Yea that's the difference between the old 2e style & 5e. When the GM said "You guys were hoping to rest for ... six hours was it?... the first [dice clatter] 2 went ok, but pretty quick the watch that Alice & bob were taking saw clear that the locals caught your scent & it's not safe to push for more" was just a quick turnaround with "cool so that gives Cindy/Dave that gives you a good chunk of spells back right? like 12 levels worth? Cindy can you use some of that twelve levels worth of spells* healing Alice?".

Even in 3.x where you needed "a good night's sleep" plus one hour of studying (or mostly similar from class to class/prc) to get spells back & a level based number of HP per day it wasn't as bad interrupting one because consumables like wands & scrolls were the norm for various unrelated reasons & allowed for scraping along when low at some cost.

Spoiler: *The relevant 2e rules

• PHB107
  "Memorization is not a thing that happens immediately. The wizard must have a clear head gained from a restful night’s sleep and then has to spend time studying his spell books. The amount of study time needed is 10 minutes per level of the spell being memorized. Thus, a 9th-level spell (the most powerful) would require 90 minutes of careful study. Clearly, high-level spellcasters do not lightly change their memorized spells."
• PHB111
  "Priests must pray to obtain spells, as they are requesting their abilities from some greater power, be it their deity or some intermediary agent of this power. The conditions for praying are identical to those needed for the wizard’s studying."
• PHB81
  " Healing: A character proficient in healing knows how to use natural medicines and basic principles of first aid and doctoring. If the character tends another within one round of wounding (and makes a successful proficiency check), his ministrations restore 1d3 hit points (but no more hit points can be restored than were lost in the previous round). Only one healing attempt can be made on a character per day.
  If a wounded character remains under the care of someone with healing proficiency, that character can recover lost hit points at the rate of 1 per day even when traveling or engaging in nonstrenuous activity. If the wounded character gets complete rest, he can recover 2 hit points per day while under such care. Only characters with both healing and herbalism proficiencies can help others recover at the rate of 3 hit points per day of rest. This care does not require a proficiency check, only the regular attention of the proficient character. Up to six patients can be cared for at any time."

Building off this, there was a 2e rule I forgot to mention that bridges some gaps. Turns were 10 minutes (PHB197) & if you got your con to 20 or above you'd start regrating HP just with the passing of time. That regen would start at 1hp every 6 turns & drop a round every point of con till it was 1/1 at 25con (PHB21).

 

[Maxperson]

How do you acquire potions? From a potion seller? With gold?

I can see the negotiations now—

Player 1: "Let's head back to town, I'm out of potions"
Player 2: "But I don't wanna! Let's stick to the adventure!"

or

Players: "This potion seller's dry? Well, there must be another nearby. Let's go look around!"
DM: "No, there are no more potions to be had. You'll have to make do with what you have"
Players: "No competition among potion sellers? There goes any sense of verisimilitude in this pseudo medieval economy"

or

Player 1: "Potions are expensive! Let's strip the gold filigree from all these statues to pay for our potion habit!"
Player 2: "That's boring, and it's breaking my immersion! There's adventure to be had!"

----

I think a certain amount of obnoxious haggling between players is endemic to the genre. If it's not rests, it's something else. I don't see your solution fixing anything, really.

And now it has potions!

 

[Maxperson]

I guess resource attrition is a scared cow people are willing to kill.

That's going to be hard to do now that we can just give the cows potions to keep them alive.

 

[Maxperson]

No one said potions have to be addictive. The point is that resource recovery consumes a resource and isn't tied to adventure restricting survival mechanics that are only used in this way because of a dumb tradition.

Right! Tradition is the ONLY reason that rest restores energy resources. You should test that out immediately by never going to sleep again and instead drinking lots of potions(Monster, Rockstar, etc.). Let us know how that works out.

Countless RPGs have zero problem with this.

While I don't know every RPG out there, the only RPGs that I know of that do this are video games. What sit down RPGs give all of your resources back via potions and none via resting.

When I was homeless, Ive literally slept outside in the middle of Hurricanes and woke up rested, and sure enough I got woken up by cops more than once.

Wait! So now you can get the energy resource even if you rest in the middle of a hurricane? Does resting work to restore energy or not?