D&D 5E Downtime: When, How, and How Much?

[Sorcerers Apprentice]

My game has no formal downtime, and only vague tracking of time between adventures. If any characters have long term activities, they may progress an arbitrary amount between adventures.

 

[Stalker0]

I have some questions about this:

Is the regularity of downtime part of the premise agreed on by the group, or is it something the DM decided in setting up the campaign (could be both)?

Do the players know how much downtime they’re going to have each time, or does the DM sometimes cut it short with a new mission or other complications?

It was my premise when setting up the campaign that the players knew going on.

And the amount of downtime does very. Sometimes they have only a week, or one mission after another, or sometimes its a month or more of downtime, just depends on the current story.

Now keep in mind, when I do full downtime that doesn't mean I'm doing entire sessions dedicated to it. Sometimes its as simple as "my character is doing X, Y, and Z". Sometimes we do RP it out depending on what's going on.

 

[Weiley31]

I'm assuming when you guys say training in the downtime, you mean they get bonus XP for training? Because how else would you train skills?

 

[Swarmkeeper]

I'm assuming when you guys say training in the downtime, you mean they get bonus XP for training? Because how else would you train skills?

XP for training? Not so much at in our table. See Xanathar’s (p 134) for how to handle training for tools or languages.

 

[gyor]

D&D 5e is too stingy with Downtime. If you want to cast something like Temple of the Gods enough times (365) to make it permanent. Except that you don't get enough downtime days to do even that one to permancy.

 

[Oofta]

D&D 5e is too stingy with Downtime. If you want to cast something like Temple of the Gods enough times (365) to make it permanent. Except that you don't get enough downtime days to do even that one to permancy.

That has nothing to do with the game rules and everything to do with the DM and the campaign

 

[Blue]

Really depends on the group and the DM. Some groups never take a day's rest, others may take a year between adventures. Literally.

 

[Hriston]

Pretty much. Occasionally, depending on the player, I'll throw in unexpected complications if I think they'll have fun with it.

Occasionally it's something we'll resolve at the start of the game. For example if they're opening a bar and there's uncertainty about how well it's going to go we'll do some quick checks. But if I think that will take more than a few minutes, we'll deal with most of it offline.

There are also times when there are gray areas. For example when the group was funding a small army as part of a revolution, some of the paperwork and logistics were handled as part of the game some of it was handled offline.

What sort of complications do you like to use?

 

[Hriston]

It depends on the needs of the story. Sometimes an adventure or set of adventures keep the party moving at a fast pace with very little downtime beyond occasional shopping stops. Other times, there will be plenty of downtime. We often handle activities during that time off-screen. People will email me with their goals for the time and I'll start the next session with an overview of how it went. Sometimes we'll go around the table for highlight scenes from each player.

Do the players ever misapprehend or ignore the “needs of the story” and take downtime anyway, or are they a fairly cooperative group?

 

[Oofta]

What sort of complications do you like to use?

Typical stuff. Jealous rivals, not able to get supplies because of something going on, dealing with a disgruntled customer. Sometimes the complications can lead to a potential plot hook.

Much like with wild magic surges, a lot of times I'll start the charts in the DMG and roll randomly and then figure out if I can work that into a story. For example if a PC has a rival, they may become a nemesis later on so I try to figure out their tie to any of my existing power centers whether they've supported or opposed the PCs in the past.

Other times it can be tainted supplies leading to negative consequences; the rye the bakery is using was a bit moldy and people eating it start hallucinating. Not only do they have to deal with people taking a potentially magical variation of LSD they need to track down the source.

Or it's just as simple as a business rivalry with someone spreading false rumors. Do they counter the rumors or spread their own?

Just depends on the players and what I can come up with. It's not really a systematic method.