D&D 5E Have the designers lost interest in short rests?

[Undrave]

It seems a super odd way of doing it though. Almost as if they expect more encounters per long rest at higher levels.

Nah, they just expect you to use that ability more often per encounter, because its impact isn't as big as it used to.

 

[Don Durito]

Nah, they just expect you to use that ability more often per encounter, because its impact isn't as big as it used to.

Except some of these features are themselves encounter features (such as Bladesong). And the Barbarian Rage has always worked this way (almost).

This brings us back to the long rest schedule. Proficiency long rests times a day means twice a day for Bladesong at level 2 and 6 times a day at level 20. That's an improvement from once every three encounters at level 2 at six encounters a day, to every encountar at level 20.
Of course, if you only ever get about two encounters a day then there is effectively no improvement.

 

[Don Durito]

If someone is willing to let me play a 5 minute adventuring day game with a battlemaster that starts with three uses of action surge, three attacks a round, GWM, and 15 superiority die at level 11.... Okay.

I strongly suspect the downloaded nova build paladin in that scenario would be a bit miffed.

The base class of Fighter is easy to convert into a long rest class. 3 times a day Second Wind/ 3 Times a day Action Surge, but only usable once per encounter.

The Battle master is a little more clunky. You could triple the total number of superiority dice but you'd probably want to put some limit on their max number in a single encounter. Proficiency seems a little low, so probably Str or Dex mod.

Or just make them all encounter dependent.

Of course this assumes you're getting in three encounters a day (but really it should be fine with just two, I think it only falls behind as you level up if you're doing the one big superova encounter fairly regularly.)

The Warlock is the class that is most wedded to short rests.

To my mind the problem is less about class balance and more the way it changes and distorts the game to something it's really not suited for. (If big setpiece combats are wanted than 4th Edition or 13th Age do that a lot better than 5e).

 

[tetrasodium]

No it’s not because as you said, that variant makes long rests into an hour and I do not; plus as you said I put a cap on short rests which means that rather then being essentially the same the same they are actually extremely different except in one superficial respect.

The goals are completely different, ‘Epic heroism’ is a lazy attempt to change the feel of the game, while mine just means short rests are easier to justify in the fiction so I have don’t have to sit through tedious discussions about whether it’s safe to take a short rest, and ensure that the game continues to play as intended.

Spoiler: epic heroism, dmg267

Agreed, all epic heroism does is replace cantrips with leveled spells & monk attack actions with flurry of blows . Like all of the half baked rest/recovery variants in the dmg it is incredibly broken as described in the wasted pagespace. Yours at least tries not to shift things too badly by putting limits on how often things can be done.[/spoiler]

 

[Asisreo]

I think it's because you're thinking about it as a matter of DM pacing. The timing can be arbritrary but fictional time does matter.

It works better when the players pace the rests. That's why it's a concrete thing and not an arbritrary judgement call by the GM. In 13th Age the GM decides when a long rest happens (after roughly 4 battles) and I found it was quite disempowering to the players. The short rest also corresponds to the 'milestone' in 4E which was generally two encounters (but again DM judgement call).

And in a lot of cases it doesn't really make sense for a whole hour to pass without an incident. The DM can arbritrarily declare that there are no encounters but if they do that then that signals to the players that the DM may be willing to bend the fiction to allow them to rest.

But discussion on whether or not a location is safe enough for a short rest are tedious, as are questions like "can we take a short rest?" by which the players usually mean "nothing urgent seems to be happening right now, but we don't know if you're planning for something to happen momentarily so we need to ask". Given that it's meant to be primarily a strategic decision on the players' part as to how to manage their resources, it's easier just to adjust it fictionally so it's in their hands.

To me, an hour just isn't that long. Especially in a place like a dungeon where there's probably tons of other rooms. Let me see if I can succinctly explain why Long Rest v Short Rest really should be skewed towards Short Rest 99% of the time.

Okay, there's 24-hours in a day.

The Party wakes up at 6am to start their adventure and walks to their destination.

The party arrives at 8 am and the guardian of the destination fights them. This fight is a medium encounter.

The party decides it is too dangerous to walk into this mysterious dungeon without being discovered so they take a long rest. However, the party must wait until 10pm at night before beginning. Its currently around 8:05 am.

While waiting, the group decides to just sit outside in a secure location. The party isn't doing anything, but the warlock and monk take the time to take a short rest.

2 hours pass (10 am) and a patrol perceives the party and flees to inform the dungeon. The party can either give chase or continue their wait. They decide to stay where its safe, maybe relocating somewhere.

Patrol returns an hour later (11 am) with reinforcements but the party has changed locations. Patrol tracks them down and a finds them after 3 hours of losing and refinding the trail (2 pm).

Patrol and reinforcements together constitutes 2 more medium encounters in the day. The party decides to relocate again.

2 hours pass and the dungeon is worried the patrol and reinforcements may have been defeated so they decide to leave the dungeon with the mcguffin or whatever. All the remaining forces are moving together in case the party tries to ambush them, meanwhile, the warlock and monk has once again taken a short rest.

By this point, its 5pm. Still 5 whole hours before the party is allowed to start their long rest. The party has 2 options, continue to rest, giving the fleeing forces a head start and to possibly escape, failing to retrieve the mcguffin; or they can engage the forces and finally take the mcguffin.

If they engage, the remaining forces are worth 3 medium encounters so they must be strong. After a hard-fought battle, they emerge victorious.

As it turns out, the party had their 2 short rests and 6 medium encounters without any actual doomclock because the time naturally flows in favor for the short rest classes.

TL;DR Unless your combats are so close together that an hour can't be spared waiting until the whole adventuring encounters have occured or you only run a single combat encounter for the day, the short rest classes will be able to find time between long rests to take a short rest.

 

[Don Durito]

The short rests classes should be able to rest roughly every 2 to 3 combats, but NOT after every combat. That is part of the issue.

The fact that it works fine in a very specific model of a dungeon is not a saving grace - it's the crux of the issue. It's inflexible.

Is an hour an exceptionally large amount of time? It's relative. If short rests were four hours the problem would certainly be bigger. Just like making them 5 minutes makes them easier to use. The only problem there is putting the brake on them so the party can't short rest after every combat.

 

[ph0rk]

The short rests classes should be able to rest roughly every 2 to 3 combats, but NOT after every combat. That is part of the issue.

Level dependent - in Tier 1 resting after every combat isn't that bad.

 

[Asisreo]

The short rests classes should be able to rest roughly every 2 to 3 combats, but NOT after every combat. That is part of the issue.

The fact that it works fine in a very specific model of a dungeon is not a saving grace - it's the crux of the issue. It's inflexible.

Is an hour an exceptionally large amount of time? It's relative. If short rests were four hours the problem would certainly be bigger. Just like making them 5 minutes makes them easier to use. The only problem there is putting the brake on them so the party can't short rest after every combat.

I had to be specific to put weight into my example. Without specifics, I couldn't get the flow to work out quite right.

Anyways, the part I'm confused about is:
Is the problem that the short rest classes get too many short rests, or not enough? If its too much, then limiting the amount of times they can short rest makes sense but if its not enough I just plainly disagree.

Personally, I only do 6-8 encounters when it makes sense. Not all my locations can be an extensive dungeon after all. It still works out for the short rest classes, though.

 

[Don Durito]

Is the problem that the short rest classes get too many short rests, or not enough? If its too much, then limiting the amount of times they can short rest makes sense but if its not enough I just plainly disagree.

Both. Depending on circumstances.

 

[Don Durito]

Level dependent - in Tier 1 resting after every combat isn't that bad.

This is true, but Tier one is less affected by more frequent long rests as well.

I don't think it's a coincidence that as the rest schedule becomes increasingly important over the course of the game, the amount of people playing at each level drops dramatically.