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<blockquote data-quote="JohnSnow" data-source="post: 8985843" data-attributes="member: 32164">Fourth boiled all character abilities down to one of At-Will, Per-Encounter, and Per-Day. It was very video-game inspired, and every class got some of each. In addition, they had healing surges and introduced the concepts of the short rest (during which anyone could spend a healing surge to regain some hit points and per-encounter abilities were &quot;recharged&quot;) and long rest (sleep, which recovered all your surges, all your hit points, and recharged your per-day abilities). It was a good system in some ways, and it certainly codified a lot of things. With 5e, the designers basically kept the &quot;At-Will powers for Spellcasters&quot; part and a good chunk of the healing system - although they ditched the in-combat reliance on &quot;Healing Surges&quot; but preserved their short rest use as the renamed &quot;Hit Dice.&quot; It's worth noting that they did keep 4e's &quot;you get all your hit points and healing surges (hit dice) back if you take a long rest&quot; mechanic.Full disclosure: I hate using attrition-based resource-management systems to challenge players.As a result, I've thought quite seriously about starting with the Fifth Edition rules and jettisoning just about ALL of the &quot;per-day&quot; mechanics, because there's nothing particularly magical about a good night's sleep, other than its effect on removing fatigue.It would actually be much easier to balance everything on a &quot;per-encounter&quot; basis, and have a system that slowly whittles away at the character's effectiveness at tackling challenges based on fatigue. When you're too tired to go on, you can either stop to rest, or press on at reduced effectiveness.One of the key elements needed to make this work would be spellcasting checks for anything more substantial than doing things with magic that are, essentially, a magical alternative to mundane gear. There's nothing remotely imbalanced about an at-will &quot;magical bolt&quot; cantrip that does the same damage as an arrow which you can just roll to see if you hit, or another that replaces the need for flint &amp; steel. This is especially true if they, for example, require the caster to be able to speak and/or have their hands free in order to cast, because now they're things they can be denied access to.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="JohnSnow, post: 8985843, member: 32164"] Fourth boiled all character abilities down to one of At-Will, Per-Encounter, and Per-Day. It was very video-game inspired, and [I]every[/I] class got some of each. In addition, they had healing surges and introduced the concepts of the short rest (during which anyone could spend a healing surge to regain some hit points and per-encounter abilities were "recharged") and long rest (sleep, which recovered all your surges, all your hit points, and recharged your per-day abilities). It was a good system in some ways, and it certainly codified a lot of things. With 5e, the designers basically kept the "At-Will powers for Spellcasters" part and a good chunk of the healing system - although they ditched the in-combat reliance on "Healing Surges" but preserved their short rest use as the renamed "Hit Dice." It's worth noting that they [I]did[/I] keep 4e's "you get all your hit points and healing surges (hit dice) back if you take a long rest" mechanic. Full disclosure: I [I]hate[/I] using attrition-based resource-management systems to challenge players. As a result, I've thought quite seriously about starting with the Fifth Edition rules and jettisoning just about ALL of the "per-day" mechanics, because there's nothing particularly magical about a good night's sleep, other than its effect on removing fatigue. It would actually be much easier to balance everything on a "per-encounter" basis, and have a system that slowly whittles away at the character's effectiveness at tackling challenges based on fatigue. When you're too tired to go on, you can either stop to rest, or press on at reduced effectiveness. One of the key elements needed to make this work would be spellcasting checks for anything more substantial than doing things with magic that are, essentially, a magical alternative to mundane gear. There's nothing remotely imbalanced about an [I]at-will [/I]"magical bolt" cantrip that does the same damage as an arrow which you can just roll to see if you hit, or another that replaces the need for flint & steel. This is especially true if they, for example, require the caster to be able to speak and/or have their hands free in order to cast, because now they're things they can be denied access to. [/QUOTE]

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