D&D General Changing your Rest paradigm is the single biggest, yet smallest, change you can make

[overgeeked]

Emulating novels was a big part of my reason as well. I'm a big fan of The Dresden Files and similar. Everything is going along just fine and then the feces hits the fan for a few days.

Jim Butcher explicitly writes with the scene and sequel structure. He’s written blog posts about it and talks up how once he started using it his career as a writer took off. It’s a fairly straightforward structure and a common action-adventure framework. So your pacing will more closely match that style of story. Importantly, novels don’t run on resource management mechanics, so something like the rest as reward above might work. Maybe one short rest every sequel or one long rest every sequence or act.

 

[Xeviat]

I do add a houserule though, that any spell that lasts 30 minutes or more (other than cantrips) gets their duration multiplied by 4. That's just so that things like Mage Armor still function in-game similar to what they do with standard rest rules.

That's a really good reminder!

 

[Shardstone]

Changing the rest paradigm without talking about pacing is... well, it's short sighted. The number and types of rests that fit the game mechanics best changes depending upon what type of adventuring you are doing. Wilderness exploration the standard rules don't work well because how many days of travel are going to have more than one encounter? But in a dungeon, or even in a city in the middle of a tumultuous series of encounters the standard rules can work great.

You've got to coordinate your resting along with encounter pacing.

Pacing is the second part of the conversation. Rest schedule heavily influences, but doesn't dictate, encounter schedule. Sorry I didn't write long enough of an essay for you, I'll make another post down the line.

 

[Ancalagon]

as someone who's played with a lot of editions, the speed of natural healing also has to be considered...