Five-Minute Workday Article

[KidSnide]

3. Making more powerful/occasional resources take something more than a rest to recover

4. Giving incentives to adventure on, and to save more powerful powers for later in the "day".

These are, of course, two sides of the same coin. They are the carrot and stick for conserving resources.

As I see it, the key to controlling nova classes is to ensure that the top tier nova abilities are only really usable on a per adventure basis. Higher level spells that can only be recharged in arcane labs or holy temples (Runequest-style) can give casters the ability to bring out "big guns" but only once during an adventure.

The imbalance between character classes strikes me as a "toolbox" issue, in that WotC should give DMs the ability to adjust the number of expected combat rounds per day. There should be an ability to give at-will focused characters limited nova abilities to handle campaigns where the expected number of combat rounds is shorted. Likewise, there should be an ability for casters to replenish at least some of their spells (through a milestone mechanic?) for campaigns where the PCs are supposed to be able to handle additional combat rounds per day.

The L&L "non solution" sounds like a perfectly reasonable default. Some days are short, other days are long and -- for most people -- it works out most of the time. It's just that there are also some campaigns that will want a systematic solution to the problem.

The other thing that's missing from the L&L column is the frequent deficiency in WotC's adventure design. Seriously, if WotC (or Paizo!) is going to publish an adventure with large adventure sites expected to be visited over multiple days, the adventure needs to tell the DM about the writer's refresh assumptions and how the adventure site changes if the PCs leave to rest. There are some outliers that handle this issue fairly well (e.g. Gates of Firestorm Peak or the first 85% of Red Hand of Doom), but so many adventures don't seriously address this issue (e.g. H1-3).

-KS

 

[Crazy Jerome]

The solutions to the nova problem are:

1. Ensuring all resources can be regained in a short time. This could be done by only giving characters abilities and resources that are at-will or which can be regained after a short rest.

2. Giving the players incentives to increase the length of the adventuring day (or disincentives to reduce it). This could include bonus experience points for each encounter beyond the first, making the adventure harder (e.g. by giving the PCs' opponents extra resources) or reducing the rewards (e.g. more opponents flee with their treasure) each time the PCs stop to rest.

It's curious, but in my experience, the first one is actually that you need resources that are trivially regained or very difficult to regain--preferably a mix. So they don't all need to be short. There is a window in the middle that seems to encourage such play--and the window is different sizes for different players.

That is, say a character has three resources. One is essentially at-will, like swinging a sword in D&D. Another is a daily. A third is only recoverable after a couple of weeks of rest and the expenditure of some non-trivial amount of gold. Almost every player I have ever been around will at least consider the issue of resting to get that daily back (if it is at all worth having), but will quite happily press on into all but the worst circumstances, hoarding that last resource carefully, using it strategically, and then forgetting about it.

I've made that example extreme for clarity, but I think the lines between the steps are rather fuzzy in most instances. I've even played with a few people that treated "daily" spells as more in the third category than the middle one.

You can even see this in tactical, round-to-round decision making if you play a game with more realistic load times for crossbows (or firearms). At some point, the crossbow moves from "weapon that I really use a lot" to "thing that I load if I'm expecting trouble, use once, then close for melee." And it's precisely when load times are sitting in the fuzzy area that people chafe. Without spending feats to improve it, the load time for the heavy crossbow in 3E is in this fuzzy area for a lot of people, I think. It would actually be more palatable in some cases with a slightly longer load time, as that would make it clearly something to be used once. And if you did that, you could then up the damage from it slightly.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

First, you got players sitting around for multiple rounds doing nothing.

Secondly, most fights in 5e will be over before a three or more round spell is completed.

Third, the poor caster is likely to get his clock cleaned way before he gets those highly charged spells off and (hopefully) they will be ruined by the attack...

Break spells down into three groups, roughly by power for their level:

1. Minor spells - can pretty much be cast on a whim or as a reaction, feather fall being the prime example, but other defensive/reactive spells could fall in this group.
2. Standard spells - use the standard D&D casting mechanics.
3. Major spells - must be "prepared" in one round as an action, then "cast" in a second round as an action. You can still move while doing this. (And yes, I stole this blatantly from Dragon Quest casting.)

This makes using one of the "big gun" major spells something to consider a bit more carefully. It's a spell that is much easier to interrupt, even if taking damage only makes you start over instead of losing it. Plus, in this system, any opponent familiar with spell casting at all knows that if you start casting and haven't finished before they get to react, it's something big worth trying to interrupt.

I agree that when things start taking three, four, five rounds, it isn't going ot work in a D&D system--at least not one that moves at a speed that most of us would find tolerable. Two rounds to really let someone have it, though, is manageable. Players already have instances where particular rounds aren't all that useful. If they can start something that will pay off next round, then so much the better. Major spells will be a lousy choice when a wizard gets surrounded, but I see this as feature, not bug.

Because each spell level will have minor, standard, and major choices, the player can choose the mix they want. If someone wants to play uber-strategic wizard with carefully hoarded power, and depend on the rest of the group to keep him protected, he can. Or if he wants to stick to traditional D&D, he can go all standard. The most effective route is probably a mix--but playing to the choices you make will be more important than anything else.

That will help around the edges on the nova, because players prone to nova are going to be really tempted by the extra bang from those major spells. Or if they get too char op, realizing that two standards are more effective in the moment than one major (but at the cost of burning twice as much resources), the DM and the rest of the group can more readily say, "Tough. We aren't just playing for effectiveness in the moment. You want to blow stuff up freely, take some majors and suck up the preparation time."

 

[tlantl]

I kind of like the 2 round to cast the big spell idea. It fits with the way casting times in AD&D worked. Most of the really powerful spells had long casting times that when combined with initiative rolls would put the spell into the next round, that is if the spell didn't already have a multiple round casting time.

I play with people who don't usually care who is in the spotlight so unless the guy going 'nova' is causing the party to retreat to reload his spells in situations that are inappropriate it isn't a problem. The guys I play with will abandon the mage, leaving him to his own devices, if it means they have to find a safe place to rest rather than get on with the adventure.

Player's without spells or other's to protect them in a world that doesn't revolve around them usually learn to play nice.

But most of the time my games are relaxed enough for these issues to be moot. I don't write major time critical rescues or epic world changing events that turn player's into spell misers and I like for there to be enough magic in the party that they can whip out a scroll or wand with out worrying that it will be gone forever if it gets used.

 

[Kraydak]

It's curious, but in my experience, the first one is actually that you need resources that are trivially regained or very difficult to regain--preferably a mix. So they don't all need to be short. There is a window in the middle that seems to encourage such play--and the window is different sizes for different players.

That is, say a character has three resources. One is essentially at-will, like swinging a sword in D&D. Another is a daily. A third is only recoverable after a couple of weeks of rest and the expenditure of some non-trivial amount of gold. Almost every player I have ever been around will at least consider the issue of resting to get that daily back (if it is at all worth having), but will quite happily press on into all but the worst circumstances, hoarding that last resource carefully, using it strategically, and then forgetting about it.

I've made that example extreme for clarity, but I think the lines between the steps are rather fuzzy in most instances. I've even played with a few people that treated "daily" spells as more in the third category than the middle one.

You can even see this in tactical, round-to-round decision making if you play a game with more realistic load times for crossbows (or firearms). At some point, the crossbow moves from "weapon that I really use a lot" to "thing that I load if I'm expecting trouble, use once, then close for melee." And it's precisely when load times are sitting in the fuzzy area that people chafe. Without spending feats to improve it, the load time for the heavy crossbow in 3E is in this fuzzy area for a lot of people, I think. It would actually be more palatable in some cases with a slightly longer load time, as that would make it clearly something to be used once. And if you did that, you could then up the damage from it slightly.

All true. And, in at least my experience, but I think in the experience of many others, PRE 3rd, spell casters acted as hoarders. Why the change? The simplest option is a combination of "I'm wrong about 1e play in practice" and "1e players weren't sophisticated". I'd prefer to discard that option....

If we discard it, there are a LOT of potential culprits, all of whom probably play a significant role.
a) Consumables became cheap and common, and spell casters gained spell slots: casters had the option to be less careful how they spent their power.
b) The introduction of EL significantly reduced to number of "weak" encounters. This made it less feasible for casters to conserve power.
c) Spells were dramatically increased in power (via the saving throw rules changes mainly). This, again increased the Spellcaster available resources, but see also point (d).
d) Fighters were nerfed, hard. This made it vital that non-fighters contribute, even to easy fights. In 1e, Fighters made the utterly dominant combat contributions in easy fights, and still the majority contribution in boss fights.

Altogether, it is clear that there are reasons that would explain why the 15 (or 5) minute work day showed up, and show how to avoid it. Keep consumables at the per-adventure level. Throttle spell slots. Nerf spell output, hard. Power up fighters and rogues, hard.

 

[Stormonu]

You could always give XP as a percentage of the total hit point damage done to the party over the course of the adventure, with perhaps some special bumps for "save and end up with some condition incurable except by magic".

This will have some perverse effects on munchkins, but I'm not sure that everyone else will get sloppy and take more damage merely to boost their awards a bit.

That'd work for handling combat, but you'd also need to have a system for encountering and surviving things that don't deal HP damage - for example, disarming a trap instead of wading through it, convincing the town guard you're on the up-and-up, talking to the king, sneaking past the dragon to steal its treasure without waking it, etc.

If you only reward taking/dealing damage - or make it a more enticing award (example, granting full XP for killing a monster, but only half for driving it off...), that's what players will gravitate towards to advance.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Which is why, in the post you quoted, I said this:



There are non-4e ways to deal with the issue. What about a milestone mechanic for unlocking wizard spells, for example?

.

I think as an optional module that would be great. But I think the divide is so fundamental that many of us dont think it is even a problem to begin with (or if we do think it is a potential issue we would rather see an adventure design solution than a mechanical one). So for me, milestone as part of the core of the game would be something I wouldn't want to see. I appreciate some people prefer these things. For me it gets into many of the same issue so many other 4e mechanics created for my style of play.

 

[JamesonCourage]

Ok first of all, your campaign sounds like an absolute BLAST to play in. Even though 4E is my far and away prefferred system, these are the kind of games that shine in any system... and well really a good DM and a fine group of players is far and away more important than the actual rules.

Thank you, and I agree about the group to system dynamic (though of course system is important too).

But I'm also curious, it seems like your world is especially prone to 5 minute workdays.

Probably in some ways.

First of all, let's say the low level characters choose option A and travel for one month. Do you give them encounters on the road? If so, how many per day? I've always found wilderness travel really exacerbates 5MWDs because it's likely that any encounter they meet will just be met with at least a partial nova, because the players know they will refresh their abilities.

Generally speaking, no. They might encounter something, though. I have a chart I'll roll on to see if anything happens. Then, if it does, what it means (good for PCs, bad for PCs, good for NPC, bad for NPC, news of event, etc.). Then, I'll roll on one of two charts: the first chart gives me a very rough idea by giving me a couple words to work with, while the second chart gives me a more specific event that's going on. Then, depending on the current situation, location, area, etc., I interpret the rolls and insert them into the game.

This rarely ends up in any sort of combat for the PCs, but it did just a couple sessions ago (though they did initiate it). But, I don't go out of my way to start encounters on the road or anything, no.

Second, the party travels for 30 days to reach an adventure spot. Will it matter if they rest 2 additional days, making the total quest take 32 days instead of 30?

It depends. Oftentimes, no. Other times, those two days might (or will) matter. Are they acting as messengers ahead of an invading force? Those two days will probably matter a great deal. Are they showing up to the Pit to stop the rampaging ghosts? Those two days will matter some, but not as much as the first scenario. Are they showing up to break a curse, but it's not harming anything in the area and won't be anytime soon? Then those two days don't matter too much.

What if the party invests in magical items, or has a druid that makes wilderness travel easier, or uses utility magic to vastly increase their travel time? Say the party arrives at the adventure spot in only 24 days. Do you allow them 6 extra days to get their quest done? That would give them many more rests.

First, yes, if they increase their speed and save some time, then this may help them (it's why my players almost always invest in horses, even after having lost them on multiple occasions). Like before, it depends on the situation. If they arrive six days early to warn of an incoming invasion, that's six extra days to help set up defenses, get to the next town, etc. This is a positive thing for the PCs, and they're rewarded for investing in speeding up. If they're showing up six days early to the Pit, they're going to save lives in the surrounding area (as they can try to stop the ghosts from rampaging). If they're arriving six days early to break that curse, it may mean very little.

In my experience games where there is a long travel time to a site, I hand wave the encounters and the travel time (making a broad note of it) but once they reach the site the real "clock" begins... and then I pace the adventure accordingly. It's not perfect, but there is a hit in verisimilitude.

Well, I described how I deal with encounters, and I also described how I deal with time as it relates to their travel. I also mostly hand wave the travel time, unless they encounter something (good or bad), unless the weather gets much worse, etc.

Also it's really cool that your high level game involves armies and castle sieges and politics and what not. But you also said it takes place over game YEARS. How do you deal with the wizard player that can simply take 3 days off per month from his political wranglings to make himself improved invisible, teleporting to the enemy base camp, leaving 4 delayed blast fireballs behind, and then teleporting back home? Or to stop the enemy from doing the same to the players?

Well, this is a problem in 3.X. It was something I tried to fix for my RPG. But, I'll answer your question, as the level 2-27 game was played using 3.5.

Generally speaking, the enemies were acutely aware of this sort of tactic, and tried taking steps to stop it. The Mage Council -an international organization devoted to protecting magic users- had made a pact with each nation not to engage in this type of warfare. The nations had just received magic again after a few thousand years, and people across the nations were wary of magic users. To keep the general populace of each nation from stringing them up, big displays like this were punishable by death by the Mage Council (with the blessing of each nation).

Secondly, when the bad guys were building up smaller things, they'd use things like Forbiddance
to keep people from teleporting in, creatures with blindsight for invisible creatures (something the Fighter PC did quite often, too, thanks to his prestige class), etc. The Sorcerer in the party was, at one point, caught in a Bigby's Crushing Hand in the no-teleport zone, and when I asked him what he was doing, it was "I... guess I'm yelling for Blake (the Fighter) to save me." Which he did, by the way.

So, there was an in-game reason that those types of attacks didn't happen often (hunted by the Mage Council). However, the party engaged in scry and fry a couple times, but the Sorcerer also got paralyzed in his sleep by a lich and tortured to death, so that type of thing can run both ways in my game.

High level games that take place over long stretches of time, in my experience, only exacerbate the power vancian characters with a large array of utilitarian options have over martial characters that have fixed abilities that happen each round. Especiallly in social and exploring pillars. How do you get around this?

I'll answer this one from my RPG, because I think that's a better way to answer the question. I do use spell slots in my RPG, though you can cast continuously using a skill check (for less powerful spells). Also, there's no memorizing spells. So, it's kinda Vancian, in that a hit die 15 character might "nova" with his level 7 and 8 spell slots, rather than use his level 3 spells.

The way to keep this in check is through a few methods. First, I don't give bonus spell slots based on high attribute score. Secondly, combat spells, even at high level, are generally less effective than warriors. And, most utility spells (charms, divinations, etc.) are less effective than skills are. At first, this didn't sit well with the players, but they've grown very fond of it over time. Lastly, spell slots take longer to recharge over time (a level 8 takes 1-2 weeks to come back, for example).

Essentially, a high level caster can "nova" to attempt to be nearly equal to someone in their field, or occasionally do things that nobody can do (fly, etc.). But, most things benefit those who are good at it. For example, you can turn someone translucent (the equivalent of invisibility), but it merely allows them to make Hide checks without any cover or concealment. This means that the ideal person to conceal is the Rogue, not the Wizard. Or, you can use Revelation magic (divination) to find out who somebody is, but this merely gives you the most common perception of that person. So, people that cover their tracks, are unknown, give out fake names, etc. can bypass this magic. However, with a good Leadership check to gather information, you can find out things that the magic does not have a chance of revealing to you.

Magic becomes a "jack of all trades, master of none" for the most part. It does allow some unique things, obviously (creating magic items, talking to rocks, flying, etc.), but each of those usually comes with a balance of some sort (magic items drain Charisma, your primary casting attribute; rocks have a terrible memory; it takes a standard action to fly; etc.).

So, to balance Vancian, I'd suggest:

• Checks on spells that allow unique effects.
• No bonus spell slots for high attribute score (stopping around 2 spells of each level).
• Lower spells can be performed at will.
• Magic is worse than skills or warriors when it comes to utility or combat.
• Magic benefits those adept at things already (translucence on the Rogue, not the Wizard).
• Spell slots take longer to recharge.

I should note, though, that when it makes sense for the party to be able to rest and nova, I don't try to stop it. It seems to happen infrequently enough (especially in my RPG) that it is its own little reward. When it makes sense, sure, unload your whole spell load, and take the couple weeks to recover (again, this is with my RPG). If there's no logical reason to stop it, then I don't. It just usually doesn't work out that way (or the players don't know if it will, and hold back out of a learned cautiousness). As always, play what you like

 

[Tony Vargas]

Good post! But, some quibbles:

I think it would be useful to decompose the 5-minute workday into two (that I can think of, anyway - there may be more) separate problems.

The first, I call the imbalance problem. The issue here is that different characters have different resource recharge rates. The typical contrast here is between a totally at-will class (such as pre-4e fighters and rogues) and a totally daily class (such as pure Vancian spellcasters). Longer "days" favor the at-will classes, while shorter "days" favor the daily classes.

The solutions to the imbalance problem include:

1. Giving all characters similar resource recharge rates. It need not be AEDU - all characters could be completely at-will, completely daily, or have a combination of at-will and daily abilities.

That's a solution, yes, and a fairly decent one.

2. Ensuring adventuring days of varying lengths. This could be done by occasionally imposing time limits that constrain the PCs' ability to rest, while allowing them to take their time on other occasions.

Not a solution, more of a work-around - and a problem, in itself, as it constrains the DM's options.

The second, I call the nova problem. This is the tendency for players to want recharge their resources between encounters so that they go into each encounter at full resources, or close to it. The PCs thus fight one encounter and rest to regain resources.

The solutions to the nova problem are:

1. Ensuring all resources can be regained in a short time. This could be done by only giving characters abilities and resources that are at-will or which can be regained after a short rest.

Not sure if that's a solution, or building it in automatically.

2. Giving the players incentives to increase the length of the adventuring day (or disincentives to reduce it). This could include bonus experience points for each encounter beyond the first, making the adventure harder (e.g. by giving the PCs' opponents extra resources) or reducing the rewards (e.g. more opponents flee with their treasure) each time the PCs stop to rest.

Similar options would be mechanical rewards like action points or other abilities that 'unlock' after one or more encounters. A delicate balancing act, but could result in a more interesting resource-management aspect to the game.

Also, a workaround, like 2, above: 3) Force a minimum number of encounters each day, for instance, by arbitrarily attacking the party while they rest if the do so too soon.

Increasing the length of the adventuring day to solve the nova problem might actually create an imbalance problem if it reduces the number of short adventuring days.

Very true, and one reason those are work-arounds with their own problems, rather than solutions.

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

More brainstorming.

How about a maximum threshold, equal to caster level, that inhibits overcasting? Your threshold starts at zero and each spell cast increases your threshold an amount equal to the spell's level (with cantrips not adding to threshold). Any round you spend not adding to your threshold (including casting cantrips) decreases your threshold by 1. Any spell that would put you over your threshold cannot be cast until you have room within the threshold. Alteratively, have an optional rule allowing overcasting that causes either damage or temporary ability loss. Explain the threshold as a surge of magical energies that are dangerous if not kept in check.