D&D General D&D without Resource Management

[Shardstone]

Between recoveries there is most definitely a balance point and too many/too few encounters will be unbalanced.

I have no idea what 'break balance' means.

I dont think you know what Im getting at at all tbh. Your criticism just doesnt hold true in my paradigm. Adventuring days arent real.

 

[Shardstone]

I don't know this means, man. Balancing for the encounter does not make sense, insofar as verisimilitude is concerned, in all situations. I really think you need a mix.

Its clear you guys really are making no attempt to understand what Im saying. I give up,

 

[FrogReaver]

I dont think you know what Im getting at at all tbh. Your criticism just doesnt hold true in my paradigm. Adventuring days arent real.

What I’m saying is true in all paradigms.

Having recovery tied to real time while game time is not tied to real time will not balance the game any better than what we currently have. It doesn’t even eliminate the 5MWD, it just shifts how the players achieve it.

 

[Shardstone]

What I’m saying is true in all paradigms.

Having recovery tied to real time while game time is not tied to real time will not balance the game any better than what we currently have. It doesn’t even eliminate the 5MWD, it just shifts how the players achieve it.

I just don't agree. But even if I did, making it a 10 minute refresh and not per-game session invalidates your entire criticism. But even then, both ways, it doesn't matter because you're not understanding the purpose of balancing the game on a smaller adventuring day. The whole point is so that you can choose to have a normal day with 2-3 encounters. You can have an easier day with 1 encounter or a more intense day with more encounters. It's easier to balance the game from the perspective of a smaller adventuring day then it is for a longer adventuring day.

The 5MWD does not matter. I am ok with people having a 5MWD. And if that's the expected game, then it is easier to extend that workday. A 7-day adventuring day where everyone has to play well when it comes to conserving resources is flat out a lot harder to make small then it is to do in reverse. Same for a 24 hour day.

D&D is a game where a lot of tables meet up, talk, roleplay, do some exploration, and then maybe enjoy 1-2 fights in a session, sometimes more (especially for tables that play for longer hours), sometimes less (I've had many sessions, both as DM and player, where no combat at all happened). And if you want to go full dungeon crawl or hack n slash, you already know when your players will burn out so you can adjust through that in a myriad of ways.

I must truly stress how little of a problem what you're bringing up is. In a game with magic items, inspiration, spells, boons, charms, and deeds, there are so many tools at my disposal for giving players a longer work day. However, if I give them a shorter work day in the current system, they have all those powers outright to bear. By flipping the system, and making it so I can use these various levers to length the normal workday, I create a more organic and easier-to-mod experience.

This has nothing to do with making D&D more narrative. It has everything to do with making D&D a smoother, more engaging game to run. With a shorter adventuring day standard, I don't have to ignore levers, I can actively choose to bring them in at any time.

I'm not saying I'm 100% right, but the arguments you're bringing up just do not hold water.

 

[M_Natas]

For me, simplicity isn't the issue, it's the question of what I get out of participating in the system.

With Blades, you get flexibility and creative agency for using the loadout system. In order to be worth taking the time to keep track of it, I want an encumbrance system to offer something other than the chance to not bring the gear I want.

How about travel, mobility and stealth penalties and benefits depending on how lightly or heavily loaded you are?

Personally I wouldn't like a system that is in state of hyperflux where you can choose (a number of times) to have the gear you need right now.

I prefer that I as a players or my players I DM have to plan ahead what they bring. That is part of the fun and challenge for me.
So I don't think we will find a common ground in that regard.

But I see the problem, that the encumbrance system right now only offers negative effects without any upsides.
So could their be mechanical benefits of for example being lightly encumbered that could make it worth your while to keep track of ressources?

 

[FrogReaver]

I just don't agree. But even if I did, making it a 10 minute refresh and not per-game session invalidates your entire criticism.

Of course it does because my criticism is about doing something entirely different. I can also criticize the 10 minute refresh, it’s just a different criticism.

It's easier to balance the game from the perspective of a smaller adventuring day then it is for a longer adventuring day.

If this is all you are trying to get at then everyone agrees.

I must truly stress how little of a problem what you're bringing up is. In a game with magic items, inspiration, spells, boons, charms, and deeds, there are so many tools at my disposal for giving players a longer work day. However, if I give them a shorter work day in the current system, they have all those powers outright to bear. By flipping the system, and making it so I can use these various levers to length the normal workday, I create a more organic and easier-to-mod experience.

I just don’t get what this has to do with your idea of tying recovery to real time session length.

This has nothing to do with making D&D more narrative. It has everything to do with making D&D a smoother, more engaging game to run. With a shorter adventuring day standard, I don't have to ignore levers, I can actively choose to bring them in at any time.

More narrative wasn’t my criticism.

I'm not saying I'm 100% right, but the arguments you're bringing up just do not hold water.

You just started talking about something else where they aren’t applicable. They were perfectly applicable to the original point you made.

 

[Shardstone]

Of course it does because my criticism is about doing something entirely different. I can also criticize the 10 minute refresh, it’s just a different criticism.


If this is all you are trying to get at then everyone agrees.

I just don’t get what this has to do with your idea of tying recovery to real time session length.

More narrative wasn’t my criticism.

You just started talking about something else where they aren’t applicable. They were perfectly applicable to the original point you made.

The fact that you think my core point was session-based recovery means that you don't get what I'm trying to say. I'm not arguing for particularly session based recovery. I brought it up as a possibility. My biggest belief is in the 10 minute Refresh. From there, adding limitations to it is specifically for shaping the feel of your game.

I feel like we have such drastically different opinions of balance and how to achieve it that we can't even communicate clearly to each other. The criticisms you bring up have been challenged and taken down not just in countless RPGs, but even in my own D&D games. I'm sorry that you feel unable to adjust your game to different refresh rates and that different refresh rates makes it too hard for you to balance the game.

 

[M_Natas]

I meant to respond to this earlier, but have been distracted by IRL things.

Frankly, Lanefan, this position comes across as naive at best; you are assuming that because someone does something, it necessarily must be the most fun they could have. That is simply, outright false. We can cover it with a thought experiment: Imagine you are playing Qhess, which is just like chess, except that it has an automatic win button which only activates if the player captures no pieces after playing for exactly one full hour. The optimal choice, then, is to sit there and do nothing for exactly one hour and then slam the instant-win button; by definition, you have captured no pieces (since you haven't moved!)

The problem here is exactly what I said earlier: the difference between task and outcome. The game tells players that some outcome is valuable, and thus they will pursue it. The whole point of telling the player something is valuable is to get them to want to pursue it. But, for a game to be a game and not a puzzle (or other non-game things), there must be multiple tasks which could potentially lead to that outcome. Hence, the player is encouraged to pick whichever task is the most effective at producing the outcome. But the outcome itself is, generally speaking, not much fun, for the same reason that "cross the finish line" in isolation is not a particularly enjoyable action. It is the process of getting to the finish line that is, generally speaking, where the enjoyment occurs.

Hence: Something which short-circuits that process, which lets the player completely reject the challenge, really does damage the fun of play. It turns the process into something trivial and boring.

Players will optimize the fun out of a game if they're given the chance to do so. Not all of them, of course; but most of them will. It is human nature to want to win, and if one must endure tedium, even outright unpleasantness in order to win...most players will do it.


I mean, there's also a third way, which has none of the problems of either of those, and instead gets the players to want to engage with the actually enjoyable gameplay-process of the game in question.

That is, write the game so that engaging with the process of gameplay, engaging with risk and challenge, IS the most optimal path to victory. Then, the folks who would already be doing that because they want to aren't punished for refusing to push the "I win" button, and the folks who prefer to optimize will literally optimize for an enjoyable experience because that's what is maximally effective.

Hence why I desire games where it doesn't matter which direction you look at it. Choosing to do the roleplay that makes sense and offers a fulfilling experience leads to mechanical benefits and better gameplay; choosing to seek mechanical benefits and better gameplay leads to roleplay that makes sense and offers a fulfilling experience. Games that fix the problem of optimizing the fun out of the game by making optimization indistinguishable from choosing to have fun with it.

One bandaid solution for this is using XP as a balancing tool ...
I think 4e did this, but am not sure:
The more encounters your have between long rests the more you get (like in multipliers).

So, to put that into 5e as a quick and dirty solution is, when ever you take a long rest, all XP you got till the start of the Level gets halved or a specific amount of XP gets removed (adjusted by level). By RAW except for the first levels, you need 2 to 3 adventuring days to get enough XP to gain a level - so you adjust the XP Reduction and XP you give so that that stays true. But when you take more long rests, Leveling up gets harder.
So for example:
You need 1000 XP for the next level.

Normal would be:
400xp trough adventuring - long rest - 100xp = 300xp, 400xp - long rest 100xp = 600xp, 500xp adventuring- long rest - 100xp = 1000 XP level up.
3 adventure days to level up.

Now, with the 5minute adventure day:
100xp adventuring- long rest - 100xp = 0 XP gained total.
So they will not level up at all.

More careful adventure day:
200xp trough adventuring - 100xp for long rest that's 100xp.
So they need 10 "adventuring days" to level up.

Like, that is a purley mechanical incentive with no inworld representation ...

Maybe the other way would be better ...
Getting a bonus for more encounters.
So of you only do one encounter, your XP is multiplied by 0,5. If you have two encounters the XP you gain is multiplied by 1, with 3 encounters with 1,5, 4 encounters with 2 and so on (0,5 multiplier per encounter more).
That sounds more positive.

 

[FrogReaver]

The fact that you think my core point was session-based recovery means that you don't get what I'm trying to say. I'm not arguing for particularly session based recovery. I brought it up as a possibility. My biggest belief is in the 10 minute Refresh. From there, adding limitations to it is specifically for shaping the feel of your game.

I don’t think you understand my point. You brought up that possibility of session based recovery and I talked about it and only it. I wasn’t talking about anything but that idea.

I feel like we have such drastically different opinions of balance and how to achieve it that we can't even communicate clearly to each other.

I think we can. We just have got to stop confusing challenging one point of a post with challenging everything in the post.

The criticisms you bring up have been challenged and taken down not just in countless RPGs, but even in my own D&D games.

My single criticism of session based recovery not being a general solution to game balance has not.

I'm sorry that you feel unable to adjust your game to different refresh rates and that different refresh rates makes it too hard for you to balance the game.

Don’t make it personal.

 

[FrogReaver]

One bandaid solution for this is using XP as a balancing tool ...
I think 4e did this, but am not sure:
The more encounters your have between long rests the more you get (like in multipliers).

So, to put that into 5e as a quick and dirty solution is, when ever you take a long rest, all XP you got till the start of the Level gets halved or a specific amount of XP gets removed (adjusted by level). By RAW except for the first levels, you need 2 to 3 adventuring days to get enough XP to gain a level - so you adjust the XP Reduction and XP you give so that that stays true. But when you take more long rests, Leveling up gets harder.
So for example:
You need 1000 XP for the next level.

Normal would be:
400xp trough adventuring - long rest - 100xp = 300xp, 400xp - long rest 100xp = 600xp, 500xp adventuring- long rest - 100xp = 1000 XP level up.
3 adventure days to level up.

Now, with the 5minute adventure day:
100xp adventuring- long rest - 100xp = 0 XP gained total.
So they will not level up at all.

More careful adventure day:
200xp trough adventuring - 100xp for long rest that's 100xp.
So they need 10 "adventuring days" to level up.

Like, that is a purley mechanical incentive with no inworld representation ...

Maybe the other way would be better ...
Getting a bonus for more encounters.
So of you only do one encounter, your XP is multiplied by 0,5. If you have two encounters the XP you gain is multiplied by 1, with 3 encounters with 1,5, 4 encounters with 2 and so on (0,5 multiplier per encounter more).
That sounds more positive.

One bandaid solution for this is using XP as a balancing tool ...
I think 4e did this, but am not sure:
The more encounters your have between long rests the more you get (like in multipliers).

So, to put that into 5e as a quick and dirty solution is, when ever you take a long rest, all XP you got till the start of the Level gets halved or a specific amount of XP gets removed (adjusted by level). By RAW except for the first levels, you need 2 to 3 adventuring days to get enough XP to gain a level - so you adjust the XP Reduction and XP you give so that that stays true. But when you take more long rests, Leveling up gets harder.
So for example:
You need 1000 XP for the next level.

Normal would be:
400xp trough adventuring - long rest - 100xp = 300xp, 400xp - long rest 100xp = 600xp, 500xp adventuring- long rest - 100xp = 1000 XP level up.
3 adventure days to level up.

Now, with the 5minute adventure day:
100xp adventuring- long rest - 100xp = 0 XP gained total.
So they will not level up at all.

More careful adventure day:
200xp trough adventuring - 100xp for long rest that's 100xp.
So they need 10 "adventuring days" to level up.

Like, that is a purley mechanical incentive with no inworld representation ...

Maybe the other way would be better ...
Getting a bonus for more encounters.
So of you only do one encounter, your XP is multiplied by 0,5. If you have two encounters the XP you gain is multiplied by 1, with 3 encounters with 1,5, 4 encounters with 2 and so on (0,5 multiplier per encounter more).
That sounds more positive.

I like this high level concept a lot.