D&D 5E Halving the natural healing rate?

[ExploderWizard]

No change to the rules can reasonably be made in a vacuum. Assuming this change is made, and HP recovery has been slowed down, what effect is it going to have on the rest of the game?

Assuming the players aren't suicidal they are going to move much more slowly.

The XP system still assumes a brisk encounter pace, which won't be happening.

Short rests will not be providing the healing that they are designed for. As a consequence the adventuring day will get shorter meaning more long rests than short rests. Classes that refresh their big guns on a long rest will thus get a power up, and short rest classes could end up being underwhelming.

The original game worked with slow natural healing and less magical healing available because play wasn't assuming X number of combat encounters in a day. XP was largely treasure based and players could be clever and avoid encounters without crippling their XP gain. If you tried to use the old system to play through a series of combat encounters it turned into a deadly meatgrinder with more time generating characters than playing.

Its a simple question of the rules needing to be matched with the expectations of play. Assuming this change is made how do you plan to compensate for the 5E expectations of play?

 

[Psikerlord#]

In theory, yes. In practicality, not in my experience. There was no "maybe we should spend these resources on healing, or maybe we should spend them on [insert something else here]" because no one ever made the other choice. Many times the "decision point/opportunity cost" was basically this: Option A) benefit from the treasure you found in the form of healing, or Option B) Gain no benefit from the treasure you found, effectively the same as having never found it.

It was exactly as much of a "No brainer" as you suggest that HD healing is, according to my actual experience.

Judging by the fact that the current resource/HP/hit dice regaining systems are the result of survey questions regarding how quickly players in general want recovery to be, I would estimate that my experience in the practicality of recovering overnight, even in the 1 hp/day spent resting +Con bonus at the end of a full week spent resting natural healing era, is shared by quite a lot of gamers (or at least is seen as preferable even if it isn't how things worked out in practicality for them in the past).

I suppose our experience differed. I never played in a game with cure wands or plentiful potions, so there were decisions to be made for us.

 

[MechaPilot]

Off topic but could you say what your lingering injuries rules are?

If you take a critical hit, or you take damage from one source that exceeds your Constitution score by five or more, you have to make a Constitution save. The DC for this save is the greater of 10, or half the damage taken. If you fail the save, you suffer a lasting injury.

Lasting injuries can only be healed by magic (if you receive at least five points of magical healing the injury is healed), or with the passage of time. There are different injuries with different rates of recovery, and they operate on a track (similar to 4e's diseases). Here's on as an example:

Sprained Ankle
Common Cause: Falling damage.
Initial Effect: Your speed is reduced by half, and you may suffer disadvantage on checks or saves related to mobility (depends on circumstance and DM judgement). You can negate this disadvantage by pushing through the pain at the cost of having to spend one of your HDs.
Recovery I: After two long rests, the speed penalty is reduced from half to -5, you still may suffer disadvantage on checks or saves related to mobility. If you attempt to push through the pain at this stage of recovery, you must make a DC 10 Con save or else revert to the initial effect.
Recovery II: After another two long rests, you no longer suffer the effects of this injury.

 

[Tinker-TDC]

My game has natural healing like so:

Short Rest: You may spend one hit-die per hour rested.

Long Rest: You regain one hit-die.

Comfortable Long Rest: You regain half you total hit-dice (rounding up).

Comfortable being a rest where natural conditions do not inhibit sleep (ie. if you're in a cave you'll want a mat to lie on, if it's cold you'll want warmth, if it's raining you want shelter.)

 

[Gadget]

I would be very careful before altering the natural hit point recovery rate, especially if new and coming from 3e. 5e may look a lot like 3e on the surface, but there are many subtle differences that can have side effects. The 3e emphasis of ever increasing bonuses and numbers have been curtailed, and Bounded Accuracy introduced. While not perfect (IMO there are still too many ways to boost AC very high), BA is supposed to keep most of the numbers down with the exception of Hit Points and Damage. These two numbers (along with, to a lesser degree, to hit bonus) are the real measure of toughness from level to level and keeps mobs of mooks still somewhat threatening.

That being said, the DMG give several alternate variants for a more 'gritty' feel that can be more enjoyable to certain play styles. To my mind, this newer overnight healing isn't much different from how 3e was mostly played, only in that game people just stocked up on Cure Light Wounds wands and the like to provide the same effect. It is also designed to reduce the "Who's going to play the Cleric?" syndrome that many complained about. Although nowadays, with the cleric, druid, paladin, bard, and ranger all getting significant healing spells, that burden is much more distributed.

 

[Draegn]

For our game natural healing is as follows

Highest damaging wound + 1 per other wound - constitution bonus = days healing

Example: if you have a character who was hit three times for 10, 15, and 20 with a constitution of 18 he would need 20+2-4=18 days to heal.

 

[Ancalagon]

I would be very careful before altering the natural hit point recovery rate, especially if new and coming from 3e. 5e may look a lot like 3e on the surface, but there are many subtle differences that can have side effects. The 3e emphasis of ever increasing bonuses and numbers have been curtailed, and Bounded Accuracy introduced. While not perfect (IMO there are still too many ways to boost AC very high), BA is supposed to keep most of the numbers down with the exception of Hit Points and Damage. These two numbers (along with, to a lesser degree, to hit bonus) are the real measure of toughness from level to level and keeps mobs of mooks still somewhat threatening.

You know, that's a really good point. At low level in 3e, you were doing great if you had an AC of 20. At level 8 or 9 an AC of 30 was certainly achievable, making it *really* hard for a goblin to hit you.

In 5e at level 8 or 9 your AC won't be 30! And that goblin has +4 to hit... So really, in essence your HP is your defense...

I'm going to have to think about this now...