D&D 5E House rule to force spellcasters with daily spell slots to take short rests

I think one of the problems with the current 5E rules is that the game is apparently balanced on the assumption that the PCs take 2-3 short rests between long rests during adventures, but spellcasters with daily spell slots don't have much of an incentive to take short rests. As a matter of personal preference (possibly because 4E is my favorite edition), I'd also like to see the PCs in my game taking more short rests than they currently do.

So, I am considering implementing the following house rule: PCs with daily spell slots only get one spell slot per level. When they finish a short rest, they can regain one expended spell slot of each level, up to their usual number of daily slots for each level.

So, if you're a 5th-level wizard, you start the day with one 1st-level spell slot, one 2nd-level spell slot, and one 3rd-level spell slot. If you use them all and take a short rest, you can get them all back. If you use them all and take a second short rest, you only get back the 1st-level slot and the 2nd-level slot (and you can use Arcane Recovery to get back one 3rd-level slot). If you use them all and take a third short rest, you only get back the 1st-level slot.

This will also have the side benefit (from my perspective) of limiting the nova potential of spellcasters with daily spell slots. That sorcerers' Flexible Casting can allow them to sidestep some of these limits and gives them more of a reason to exist is just icing on the cake.

How do you think this house rule would impact gameplay? Are there other factors I have not considered?

How about on a short rest a caster can spend HD to regain a spell slot. I would say 2HD per spell level. That is what we do and it works for us. But then again we have several things we allow spending HD on besides healing, so they are a more valuable resource.

Interesting for a lower magic setting. I would think NPC casters would be handicapped as well, not sure I would want that, as a DM I use them all the time. Makes casters less powerful though, and you will have optimizer players crying over this rule.

This will likely devolve into 1 encounter = 1 short rest, after arguments if you can take a short rest after ending a long rest. You're taking away their resources, so players are going to go the opposite direction and want to rest at every opportunity (just like Monks and Warlocks). This means the spellcasters will want to take 1 short rest before doing anything meaningful, and probably 3 short rests over the course of the day. If that's your goal, this is fine.

So you want to make everyone cast like a warlock going by the 1/1/1 slots on a 5th level caster but aren't doing anything about stuff like agonizing x eldritch blast or to a lesser degree ki point fueled flurry and suchvrs action surge and think it will reduce nova?

I think that in action to making warlock and monk crazy good it will force the other casters to rest every fight because they now lack staying power unless I've misread

Dragonsbane777 said:

Interesting for a lower magic setting. I would think NPC casters would be handicapped as well, not sure I would want that, as a DM I use them all the time. Makes casters less powerful though, and you will have optimizer players crying over this rule.

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Sounds good, I'm not a fan of excessive and obsessive optimization, either.

Shiroiken said:

This will likely devolve into 1 encounter = 1 short rest, after arguments if you can take a short rest after ending a long rest. You're taking away their resources, so players are going to go the opposite direction and want to rest at every opportunity (just like Monks and Warlocks). This means the spellcasters will want to take 1 short rest before doing anything meaningful, and probably 3 short rests over the course of the day. If that's your goal, this is fine.

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Yes, this is my goal.

tetrasodium said:

So you want to make everyone cast like a warlock going by the 1/1/1 slots on a 5th level caster but aren't doing anything about stuff like agonizing x eldritch blast or to a lesser degree ki point fueled flurry and suchvrs action surge and think it will reduce nova?

I think that in action to making warlock and monk crazy good it will force the other casters to rest every fight because they now lack staying power unless I've misread

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I honestly think it will put spellcasters with daily spell slots on a more even footing with monks and warlocks. If monks and warlocks now look better because everyone is more eager to take short rests, I don't see it as a problem.

I would use the warlock frame for full caster, and the monk frame for half caster.
Classes would look more all the same, but nothing can be perfect.

FireLance said:

Sounds good, I'm not a fan of excessive and obsessive optimization, either.


Yes, this is my goal.


I honestly think it will put spellcasters with daily spell slots on a more even footing with monks and warlocks. If monks and warlocks now look better because everyone is more eager to take short rests, I don't see it as a problem.

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After hitting backspace a whole bunch, I'm left with....
Take the monk for example.. it's not designed to use blurry of blows as a default attack but your house rule will ensure it can by forcing classes designed to last a full day to rest every encounter.. you seem to under the impression that the real problem with short rest classes is that they can't use their big guns as a default action and the solution is to make every other class so hamstrung that they need to follow a rest cycle that allows it

For better or worse of the experience for all players at your table your three does a nice job of showing why wotc's decision to peg some classes to a short rest scale with most others on a long rest one was a terrible one and does it from quite the unusual angle. Best of luck in your game

In order to just keep things consistent across the board would you also convert other long rest resources into short rest ones? Paladin lay on hands for example. A lot of the subclasses also have features that are limited to long rest recharge as well like the samurai fighting spirit 3 times per long rest or the new rune knight's giant's might that is proficiency bonus time per long rest.

FireLance said:

I think one of the problems with the current 5E rules is that the game is apparently balanced on the assumption that the PCs take 2-3 short rests between long rests during adventures, but spellcasters with daily spell slots don't have much of an incentive to take short rests. As a matter of personal preference (possibly because 4E is my favorite edition), I'd also like to see the PCs in my game taking more short rests than they currently do.

So, I am considering implementing the following house rule: PCs with daily spell slots only get one spell slot per level. When they finish a short rest, they can regain one expended spell slot of each level, up to their usual number of daily slots for each level.

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A 2nd level wizard gets 1 1st level spell slot per short rest, to a maximum of 3.

A 2nd level warlock gets 2 1st level spell slots per short rest, no maximum.

A 5th level wizard gets 1 3rd, 1 2nd 1 1st per short rest, to a max of 3 3 4. A 5th level warlock gets 2 3rd level spell slots per short rest, no max.

This is still basically worse than the warlock.

A 9th level wizard gets 1 2 3 4 5th level slots to a max of 4 3 3 3 2 per day, compared to a warlocks 2 5th level slots. It isn't until level 7-9 that the warlock doesn't massively dominate every other spellcaster under your system.

At 11th level, the wizard gets 1 2 3 4 5 to a max of 5 3 3 3 3 per day, plus a 6th level slot and a warlock gets 3 5th level slots per rest and and 1 6th level slot. The warlock is ahead again I think; the difference is a pair of 5 slots over a single slot of each level from 1 to 4. That is a better deal for the warlock.

So you have taken all daily spell casters, and made them worse spellcasters than warlocks from level 1-6 and 11-18. Only in levels 7-10 do they compete (slightly fewer high level slots, but significantly more lower level ones).