Dungeons & Dragons Has Done Away With the Adventuring Day

Adventuring days are no more, at least not in the 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide. The new 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide contains a streamlined guide to combat encounter planning, with a simplified set of instructions on how to build an appropriate encounter for any set of characters. The new rules are pretty basic - the DM determines an XP budget based on the difficulty level they're aiming for (with choices of low, moderate, or high, which is a change from the 2014 Dungeon Master's Guide) and the level of the characters in a party. They then spend that budget on creatures to actually craft the encounter. Missing from the 2024 encounter building is applying an encounter multiplier based on the number of creatures and the number of party members, although the book still warns that more creatures adds the potential for more complications as an encounter is playing out.

What's really interesting about the new encounter building rules in the 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide is that there's no longer any mention of the "adventuring day," nor is there any recommendation about how many encounters players should have in between long rests. The 2014 Dungeon Master's Guide contained a recommendation that players should have 6 to 8 medium or hard encounters per adventuring day. The 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide instead opts to discuss encounter pace and how to balance player desire to take frequent Short Rests with ratcheting up tension within the adventure.

The 6-8 encounters per day guideline was always controversial and at least in my experience rarely followed even in official D&D adventures. The new 2024 encounter building guidelines are not only more streamlined, but they also seem to embrace a more common sense approach to DM prep and planning.

The 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide for Dungeons & Dragons will be released on November 12th.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Here is what the 2024 Players Handbook says about being a DM.

The players drive and steer the narrative:
"The players decide."
"The players choose."
"You determine the results of the adventurers decisions."

"
Guide the Story. You narrate much of the action during play, describing locations and creatures that the adventurers face. The players decide what their characters do as they navigate hazards and choose what to explore. Then you use a combination of imagination and the game’s rules to determine the results of the adventurers’ decisions.

"


The job of a DM is to "serve" the fun of the players.

"
Adjudicate the Rules. You oversee how the group uses the game’s rules, making sure the rules serve the group’s fun.

"


The is a "lead storyteller", a "guide", even a "mastermind" who creates an adventure. But "the DM isnt your adversary". "Dungeons & Dragons [is] a cooperative game."

Sounds good.

In 5e, such talk about a "DM dictator" isnt a thing.

Of course it is not a thing, because it is a strawman you yourself invented to discredit those who disagreed with you!

 

[Yaarel]

Of course it is not thing, because it is strawman you yourself invented to discredit those who disagreed with you!

This thread has several posters who actually refer to themselves as a "dictator" with "absolute power", and "if a player doesnt like it, they can leave" (my way or the highway), and more.

This talk about "DM dictator" is a man of flesh and blood − far from a strawman. Such talk is obsolete. It didnt age well. It no longer exists in 5e.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

This thread has several posters who actually refer to themselves as a "dictator"

Are there?

with "absolute power", and "if a player doesnt like it, they cant leave" (my way or the highway), and more.

This talk about "DM dictator" is a man of flesh and blood − far from a strawman. Such talk is obsolete. It no longer exists in 5e.

It is mostly you and others who have issue with GM authority how have used such language. It is weird moralistic hyperbole and misrepresentation for the simple idea of there being a curator, a conductor, one person who makes the final call in the game.

 

[Yaarel]

Are there?

Yes there are. I assume you have read the posts in this thread.

Do you need me quote posters, or can you read for yourself?

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Yes there are. I assume you have read the posts in this thread.

Yes, and I can't recall such. Then again, it has been well over hundred pages...

 

[Not a Decepticon]

Yes there are. I assume you have read the posts in this thread.

Do you need me quote posters, or can you read for yourself?

well it is only fair to ask you for proof.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Right. So in DW, someone declares a move that is obviously out of bounds and not appropriate to the theme of the game. What happens?

Nothing, because you can't "declare" moves at all. That was explicitly covered. "You have to do it to do it" means you can't "declare" moves. Another rule (which I alluded to but did not explicitly state) is "Begin and end with the fiction." Being obviously out of bounds means it's not in the fiction; the player is (as I have so often said) not actually participating in good faith.

They declare that they have a tactical nuke in their inventory and say that they nuke the enemy city. What next?

The rest of the table would look at them bewildered and ask where this arises from the fiction up to this point. If they can genuinely sell everyone else on it, awesome, but I find that pretty unlikely. Instead, your hyperbolically extreme and ridiculous example leads to exactly what I keep saying, that you are presuming bad faith from the player.

If the player isn't playing in bad faith, they literally wouldn't ever do this.

What happens if when resolving something they grab a handful of extra dice?

Nothing? Rolls to find out if something works are always 2d6 (usually, but not always, + some kind of modifier). Damage dice are set by class or by move.

Those are extreme examples but I assume something happens at least now and then, at least with new or casual players, that doesn't fit the expected gameplay.

I have never once seen anyone do anything even remotely like this, despite having introduced four different people who were brand-new to TTRPGs at all, and every one of my players was brand-new to PbtA games in general (not just DW.)

Saying "you have to do it to do it" is pretty meaningless.

It isn't. It is literally one of the most important and relevant rules in the game, and both specifically and directly averts the "My players just declare Diplomacy/Perception/etc. and roll" complaint that so many DMs complain about in D&D (not just 5e, but I find it is more common in 5e than it was in 4e, though that may simply be the larger number of newer players.)

 

[Zardnaar]

Yes there are. I assume you have read the posts in this thread.

Do you need me quote posters, or can you read for yourself?

You might need a quote since you're making a specific claim no one else can remember.

 

[Oofta]

Here is what the 2024 Players Handbook says about being a DM.

The players drive and steer the narrative:
"The players decide."
"The players choose."
"You [the DM] determine the results of the adventurers decisions."

"
Guide the Story. You narrate much of the action during play, describing locations and creatures that the adventurers face. The players decide what their characters do as they navigate hazards and choose what to explore. Then you use a combination of imagination and the game’s rules to determine the results of the adventurers’ decisions.

"


The job of a DM is to "serve" the fun of the players.

"
Adjudicate the Rules. You oversee how the group uses the game’s rules, making sure the rules serve the group’s fun.

"


The DM is a "lead storyteller", a "guide", even a "mastermind" who creates an adventure. But "the DM isnt your adversary". "Dungeons & Dragons [is] a cooperative game."

In 5e, such talk about a "DM dictator" isnt a thing. This notion of a DM saying "my way or the highway" didnt age well, and didnt survive into the D&D of future generations.

But the DM still enforces the rules of the game and narrates what happens as a result of the player's actions. Of course the players choose what their PCs say and do ... nobody has said otherwise.

 

[Oofta]

Nothing, because you can't "declare" moves at all. That was explicitly covered. "You have to do it to do it" means you can't "declare" moves. Another rule (which I alluded to but did not explicitly state) is "Begin and end with the fiction." Being obviously out of bounds means it's not in the fiction; the player is (as I have so often said) not actually participating in good faith.


The rest of the table would look at them bewildered and ask where this arises from the fiction up to this point. If they can genuinely sell everyone else on it, awesome, but I find that pretty unlikely. Instead, your hyperbolically extreme and ridiculous example leads to exactly what I keep saying, that you are presuming bad faith from the player.

If the player isn't playing in bad faith, they literally wouldn't ever do this.


Nothing? Rolls to find out if something works are always 2d6 (usually, but not always, + some kind of modifier). Damage dice are set by class or by move.


I have never once seen anyone do anything even remotely like this, despite having introduced four different people who were brand-new to TTRPGs at all, and every one of my players was brand-new to PbtA games in general (not just DW.)


It isn't. It is literally one of the most important and relevant rules in the game, and both specifically and directly averts the "My players just declare Diplomacy/Perception/etc. and roll" complaint that so many DMs complain about in D&D (not just 5e, but I find it is more common in 5e than it was in 4e, though that may simply be the larger number of newer players.)

Yes, you are pedantically correct because I didn't use the proper phrase from a game I have never played. Duh. What was I thinking trying to get a straight answer. I don't know why I even bother.