Continuing beyond Healing Surges

[CapnZapp]

I have discussed elsewhere that 4E - contrary to WotC's claims - does not abolish the 15-minute adventuring day.

Instead of allowing (ecouraging, even) the casters to nova in each day's first fight and then demand sleep; you get perhaps four encounters, then somebody will be out of healing surges, which demands sleep just as well.

Can you break the 15-minute day with four encounters? Probably. But does it matter? No: to me, it's still there regardless of whether you've spent 10 or 30 minutes.

The end result is still that during 23 of the 24 hours of the day, you're forced to remain inactive, recuperating a critical resource, and that it's highly unlikely more than one or two characters have run out at the same time.

This you can discuss more over here:
http://www.enworld.org/forum/d-d-4th-edition-rules/245931-reasoning-behind-extended-rests.html

In this thread, however, I would like to focus on easy solutions.


One simple solution would be to allow characters to transfer their healing surges to others, effectively pooling their resources. Put otherwise, allowing characters to heal others with their surges.

But I've sketched on another approach:

Edit:
§1 Instead of Healing Surges, Fatigue Points are used. Each morning, a character's Fatigue Points start at zero. See §9.
§2 Assume a character's Fatigue Threshold = his number of Healing Surges +1.
§3 Assume a character's Exhaustion Threshold = his number of Healing Surges +5.
§4 Each time you take a Second Wind, you get a point of Fatigue. (Any time you would have spent a Healing Surge, you instead get a Fatigue Point)
§5 Once you reach your Fatigue Threshold, you're Fatigued. If you get below this threshold, you immediately cease to be Fatigued.
§6 Once you reach your Exhaustion Threshold, you're Exhausted (in addition to being Fatigued). If you get below this threshold, you immediately cease to be Exhausted.
§7 Each hour spent out of strenuous activity (such as combat, running or climbing) removes one Fatigue Point.
§8 Reaching a milestone removes one Fatigue Point. Option: You can regain the use of a Daily power when reaching a milestone. Instead of removing one Fatigue Point, add one.
§9 Six more-or-less contiguous hours of rest (i.e. an Extended Rest) removes any and all remaining Fatigue Points.
§10 The DM can declare all Fatigue Points lost at any time for any reason.

Fatigued (Condition): You take a -2 penalty to all rolls and checks (attacks, skills etc).
Exhausted (Condition): You take a -2 penalty to all defenses. You take a -1 penalty to your Speed. Once Exhausted, the Fatigued condition won't go away until you rest for 24 contiguous hours with nourishment and warmth/cool readily available.

1) Assume a character's Fatigue Threshold = his number of Healing Surges +1.
2) Each morning, a character's Fatigue Points start at zero.
3) Each Second Wind gets a character one FP. (Other ways of spending Healing Surges should probably add a Fatigue Point too)
4) Once you reach your Fatigue Threshold, you're Fatigued. If you get below this threshold, you immediately cease to be Fatigued.
5) Being Fatigued means you take a -2 penalty to all rolls and checks (attacks, skills etc).
6) Each hour's rest (sleep, light transport etc) removes one Fatigue Point, with six more-or-less contiguous hours of rest removing all FPs.
7) The DM can declare all Fatigue Points lost at any time for any reason.

What do you think?

My main drive for this mechanism is to remove the hard limit where you are almost unhealable once you run out of surges. Which in turn removes/lessens the (very) strong disincentive to keep going even when a character has entered this state.

Then as a much more personal preference, I feel fatigue points convey a much less videogamey feel than "healing surges" even though the basic numbers stay much the same.

 

[Stogoe]

Do you really fight four encounters back to back, with only a 5 minute rest between them? How is that even possible?

 

[Lokathor]

Monster nest, for example, dungeon, you know, anyplace where you can walk less than 300ft and find another monthers.

Anyways, to the topic: Your solution doesn't seem to fix the surge problem. People are still going to run out of surges. Unless you mean that with Fatigue you don't track surges at all. I think I like that, just say that once you've spent more than X surges you get -2 to everything (if you go beyond X more than once the penalty can stack up if you like). Such a rule would make it so the PCs can go for as long as they want to, it just gets slightly harder every few battles.

I think I'll pitch the idea to my own group.

 

[Alex319]

Unless you mean that with Fatigue you don't track surges at all. I think I like that, just say that once you've spent more than X surges you get -2 to everything (if you go beyond X more than once the penalty can stack up if you like). Such a rule would make it so the PCs can go for as long as they want to, it just gets slightly harder every few battles.

Yes, I think that's what he means. Fatigue points as a replacement for healing surges.

 

[the Jester]

I disagree with your assessment of the problem; I have found my pcs running for three sessions, including hours of exploration, multiple trap-monster combos, etc. without taking an extended rest.

Regardless, just for clarification, I assume that you're eliminating healing surges in this system? It looks like it might serve its purpose; but ime the "15 minute adventuring day" problem, when it rears its head in 4e, is usually the result of a 3e mentality. You can only nova so much when only two of your powers are dailies; you still have most of your powers left. And it seems pretty rare to me for pcs to run out of healing surges in 2-4 combats; sure, one or two pcs will likely be out, but if you have the right cleric or warlord powers, you can still do a certain amount of healing even without surges (e.g. cure light wounds).

Edit: But to be more helpful, I'd say that your proposed system is a good start, but what if the pcs just keep going? Is there a point at which the penalties get worse? I would recommend it, but I'm not sure how you'd want it to work.

 

[Lakoda]

I do not think you need to make this change but if you want to and it fits your players, go nuts.

Can you break the 15-minute day with four encounters? Probably. But does it matter? No: to me, it's still there regardless of whether you've spent 10 or 30 minutes.

The end result is still that during 23 of the 24 hours of the day, you're forced to remain inactive, recuperating a critical resource, and that it's highly unlikely more than one or two characters have run out at the same time.

Assuming it takes about 4 encounters in a day to use all your HS, for your example to work you must have all 4 of those encounters in a row right after waking up. Where is the story or for that matter a DM? If you want to munchkin through a super dungeon and never leave it that if fine but that is not what most people think when they think of the standard D&D adventure day. It certainly is not what is in the DMG.

That being said I do agree that it is too easy for the Defender be without HS well before the rest of the party. I think this would address that but I think there are better ways if that is the exact problem you want to fix.

 

[darkwing]

You could simplify it a bit. When you run out of healing surges, you are fatigued (-2 etc...), but can still "spend" healing surges as if you had them. An extended rest removes fatigue and restores healing surges. Keeping track of fatigue points I don't think is necessary because the group will probably want to stop soon to get their daily powers back anyway.

 

[Stogoe]

Monster nest, for example, dungeon, you know, anyplace where you can walk less than 300ft and find another monthers.

Wouldn't that be just one big encounter?

 

[77IM]

This is a pretty good idea. Here is a similar house rule that I think might be easier to inject into the game:

MODERATE REST

• Just Like Short Rest: A moderate rest works just like a short rest in all respects, except as described here.
• Duration: A moderate rest lasts one hour.
• Regain Healing Surges: After a moderate rest, you regain up to 2 spent healing surges. You can choose not to regain any healing surges. (You can then spend healing surges if you want, since a moderate rest works just like a short rest.)
• Renew Daily Power: After a moderate rest, if you didn't regain any healing surges, you can instead renew one spent daily power. You select which daily power at the end of the moderate rest. (You also renew all your encounter powers, since a moderate rest works just like a short rest.)
• Requires Adequate Sleep: Similar to an extended rest, you must have slept for at least 6 of the last 24 hours in order to gain any benefit from a moderate rest.

In other words, the moderate rest is a sort of extended rest chopped up into parts. It's not quite as good as a full extended rest but still very useful due to its flexibility.

-- 77IM

 

[mlangsdorf]

Any limit to the number of moderate rests in a given time period? Weeny players in static dungeons could have encounter, nova, and then take multiple moderate rests to regain spent surges and Daily powers. Going into every fight with the Fighter's Rain of Blows active, the Wizard's Stinking Cloud ready, and the Warlord ready to Lead the Attack or Stand the Fallen is going to make many encounters very easy.
​