Lanefan
Victoria Rules
Sure, this works; but the question was around fighting a bunch of similar foes rather than a boss-plus-helpers. Different kind of combat.
D&D 5E Dropping to 0 HP - House Rule Variant
Bacon Bits
Hero
I really don't think a penalty needs to be that severe to discourage groundhogging. I genuinely think a one round penalty is more than enough to make "free" healing a really poor tactical choice. I don't think it needs to be harsher than that. It also makes narrative sense. You've just had your bell rung.
I really think it can be as simple as:
"When a creature stops being unconscious, they remain incapacitated until the end of their next turn."
An incapacitated creature can still move, so you'll be able to get up and start to run away.
Or you can make it noodley and say:
"When a creature stops being unconscious, they become weakened until the end of their next turn. Weakened has the following effects:
On the flip side of the stated goals, if you want to discourage the 5MWD the solution is not to penalize the PCs for resting. The solution is to reward the players for not long resting all the time. Give them abilities that don't work until after the 2nd, 3rd, or 4th non-trivial encounter of the day. Give them bonus XP or treasure for any encounter they complete after they have reached their daily XP budget. Apply a +1 bonus to all ability checks after each non-trivial encounter; the bonus resets after a long rest.
Now you don't have a 5MWD and things like one encounter travel days don't feel unfair. Now the party wants to short rest when they can. Now there's a risk-reward tradeoff.
I really think it can be as simple as:
"When a creature stops being unconscious, they remain incapacitated until the end of their next turn."
An incapacitated creature can still move, so you'll be able to get up and start to run away.
Or you can make it noodley and say:
"When a creature stops being unconscious, they become weakened until the end of their next turn. Weakened has the following effects:
- A weakened creature has disadvantage on all ability checks and cannot benefit from advantage.
- Opponents of a weakened creature have advantage and cannot suffer from disadvantage on all saving throws from any spells, effect or abilities from the weakened character."
On the flip side of the stated goals, if you want to discourage the 5MWD the solution is not to penalize the PCs for resting. The solution is to reward the players for not long resting all the time. Give them abilities that don't work until after the 2nd, 3rd, or 4th non-trivial encounter of the day. Give them bonus XP or treasure for any encounter they complete after they have reached their daily XP budget. Apply a +1 bonus to all ability checks after each non-trivial encounter; the bonus resets after a long rest.
Now you don't have a 5MWD and things like one encounter travel days don't feel unfair. Now the party wants to short rest when they can. Now there's a risk-reward tradeoff.
Similar Threads
