D&D 5E [5E] Longer long rests and spell durations

[Chaosmancer]

I think I have been misunderstood by a couple of posters.

DMs who change up the rest periods (including utilising the alternatives in the DMG) do so specifically and intend for certain spells to lose some of their functionality. Those are intended consequences.

There was a massive thread (200+ pages) which discussed this on Enworld 2 years back about how the 1 hour and 8 hour rests are easily circumvented by using spells such as a Rope Trick and Leomund's Tiny Hut.
One of the many solutions suggested was to change up the rest periods. It is very much known.

You cannot exactly have a gritty campaign when spells bypass any measures taken to make it gritty.
Hence TwoSix's quote

Right, I get for some DMs, they fully intend every consequence of their actions.

But, in this very thread, we have Oofta who said they changed the rest periods because they wanted to change the encounter design because of (what I assume) narrative reasons. But they do not intend to change Mage Armor from a spell that Wizards can cast for cheap as an improvement to their AC.

For me, if I changed the rest variant, I wouldn't have thought of Mordenkainen's Mansion. A 7th level spell suddenly turned into a quick way to get a short rest. Way weaker than it was intended, and honestly, I feel kind of worthless in that case. Which is a shame because you can have some good humor with that spell.

Hence, my reply. Because not every DM intends every consequence when they change something. Maybe they did it for an entirely different reason than weakening spells meant to aid in resting, and realizing those spells are affected is something they would like to reverse.

 

[Bacon Bits]

I think I have been misunderstood by a couple of posters.

DMs who change up the rest periods (including utilising the alternatives in the DMG) do so specifically and intend for certain spells to lose some of their functionality. Those are intended consequences.

There was a massive thread (200+ pages) which discussed this on Enworld 2 years back about how the 1 hour and 8 hour rests are easily circumvented by using spells such as a Rope Trick and Leomund's Tiny Hut.
One of the many solutions suggested was to change up the rest periods. It is very much known.

You cannot exactly have a gritty campaign when spells bypass any measures taken to make it gritty.
Hence TwoSix's quote

I disagree. I don't think it's necessarily about making things gritty. Sometimes it's just about changing the pace of the campaign. I know more than one thread about changing rest patterns is about not wanting to run 6-8 encounters in one adventuring day. They want to have comparatively few encounters and don't want players to recover all their resources between every encounter.

Adventures in Middle Earth's journey system generally restricts the party to only short rests while on a journey. You need to encounter a suitable location in order to long rest, and that's not guaranteed. It's not like the PCs are still subject to 6-8 encounters per day. They usually have 6-8 encounters per journey and usually only one per day. It's not about making journeys difficult, per se, just about making them a bit less trivial.

I could see rope trick being changed so that if you spend 1 minute casting it then it lasts 8 hours (i.e., one short rest), or goodberry changed to feed you until you long rest. I could see changing create food and water to do the same thing. Tiny hut is already a ritual, so I don't see a need to change that. Magnificent mansion could give you a piece of chalk or a doorknob that gives you the ability to return to the mansion until you long rest (inside the mansion or otherwise). The PCs are still spending a resource over the same recovery time. They should get a commensurate benefit.

Similarly, I could see changing the time restrictions on gentle repose, raise dead, etc.

I can understand a gritty game not modifying the spells, but that's because the intent is to soft ban them (except for tiny hut, since it's a ritual). However, I think that intent is different than just modifying the rest pattern.

 

[Oofta]

Right, I get for some DMs, they fully intend every consequence of their actions.

But, in this very thread, we have Oofta who said they changed the rest periods because they wanted to change the encounter design because of (what I assume) narrative reasons. But they do not intend to change Mage Armor from a spell that Wizards can cast for cheap as an improvement to their AC.

For me, if I changed the rest variant, I wouldn't have thought of Mordenkainen's Mansion. A 7th level spell suddenly turned into a quick way to get a short rest. Way weaker than it was intended, and honestly, I feel kind of worthless in that case. Which is a shame because you can have some good humor with that spell.

Hence, my reply. Because not every DM intends every consequence when they change something. Maybe they did it for an entirely different reason than weakening spells meant to aid in resting, and realizing those spells are affected is something they would like to reverse.

Since you mentioned me, I thought I was clear. Any spell with a duration of an hour or more gets multiplied by 5. In my campaign that would be long enough for a long rest of all you are doing is resting.

So yes, I changed for pacing purposes but I adjust duration to compensate.

 

[Horwath]

What I would do:

1. Remove rope trick, or change it's mechanics so it does not give instant, free short rest without risks.

2. Reduce shor rest to 15 mins, but limit them to 2 in between long rests.

3. Extend long rest duration to 12 hrs, 6 must be spent sleeping. Extends the time frame for ambushes.

4. Limit of 4 long rests before taking 3 day extended rests. Weekday-weekend work rate.
after 4 long rests without extended ones you cannot take short rests and long rests count as short ones(except that they give you sleep benefit).